Thanks as usual to the fabulous Tawnybmw!
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Mugen barely recognized the girl who came running out to meet them – her hair was loose and tumbling down her back in lank curls, her skin was dull and grey, her eyes circled with thick red smudges, like a bruise.
"What the hell happened to you?" he asked bluntly.
"Jin – Shino had the baby," Fuu gasped out, and Mugen had to flinch at the sound of her voice – it was rough, as though she had been screaming.
"So soon?" asked Jin, oddly quiet. Mugen looked over at him and saw that he was paler than he had ever been before, even when he was bleeding to death.
"It's a boy," Fuu continued as if he had never interrupted, "and he's fine, but Shino . . . she's sick," her voice dropped away into a whisper.
Jin dropped the sack he was carrying and strode away into the house.
Fuu stood still after he had passed her, and to Mugen it appeared that she slumped a little lower into herself. She looked like she was deflating. He had automatically turned in the direction of the house when Jin had left, but now he hesitated in place.
"You look like shit," he said.
"Oh!" Fuu looked startled, as though she had forgotten he was there. She turned back towards the house and trotted after Jin.
...
The baby was screaming and the paper door to the bedroom was closed when Fuu and Mugen got back inside. Fuu went at once to the bassinet – actually a drawer – and hoisted out the wriggling little boy, bouncing him up and down on her shoulder until he quieted down.
They both looked at the bedroom, where they could hear the murmur of voices, not enough to make out the words. Fuu hung around the doorframe, debating whether to enter or not.
"I wouldn't," Mugen advised.
The baby started to fuss again and Fuu sighed. She should take him outside.
"It's okay, baby," said Fuu, walking out to the garden with the baby wrapped up on her back in a folded cloth. "I think your daddy's just a little distracted right now."
He was a good baby, easy to please. Fuu hauled him around with her wherever she went, and he never complained.
Weeds had grown over Mugen's tomatoes, and the beans had shriveled and died, but there were a few straggling carrots and Fuu pulled them out of the dirt while the baby bounced and gurgled on her back.
"Does that feel good?" she said, jiggling him gently until he cooed. "Do you like the sunshine?"
He responded by drooling down her neck, wetting the color of her kimono.
"I bet that's a yes," said Fuu. There were noises from the house, and Fuu began to dig harder, using her fingernails to separate the slender roots of weeds from her flower bed. "That's the first thing you gotta learn, baby, is that sometimes bad things happen, and there's nothing we can do about it." Her eyes were suddenly wet. "But it's not your fault. It's not your fault at all . . ."
"Geez, you're gonna make him soft," said Mugen.
"Don't startle me!" said Fuu, jumping to her feet, "I didn't know you were there!"
"It's gone kinda quiet inside," said Mugen, avoiding her eyes.
"Shit," said Fuu with feeling.
...
Fuu barely got a glimpse inside the room when the women of Tairyō came to prepare Shino for her funeral. She saw Shino's shiny, beautiful hair spread over Jin's lap, and a flash of her white arm as the women gently lifted her to carry her away.
"Come along, Fuu," said one of the elderly women. "It's not time for grief. We have a duty to perform today. She was your sister, wasn't she?"
"Yes," said Fuu tonelessly. "She was my sister." Out of respect for Shino, she followed obediently after the women, to a room filled with scented oils and white linen, and at nightfall, a flaming torch.
...
After the funeral, which he attended, Jin returned to the room where Shino had died and closed the door. Then Fuu and Mugen didn't see him for the next few days. He had never, as far as Fuu knew, even looked at his son. So Fuu changed the baby's dirty clothes, she gave him his baths, she coaxed him to eat, and she woke with him in the night when he cried from his place next to her futon.
"Mugen, we've got to give him a name," said Fuu reluctantly, dandling the baby on her knee. "I was waiting for Jin to decide something, but . . . I don't think he's going to make a decision anytime soon."
"Yeah, I got that." Mugen squinted at the baby, who was reaching out chubby hands in his direction. "Gimme the brat."
"Are you sure? You don't usually – "
The baby started to cry as soon as Mugen touched it.
"Hey! He bit me!" Mugen shouted, pulling his arm away.
"Oh, yeah – he does that," agreed Fuu ruefully.
"Oh I got a name for the little squirt – we're calling him Kuso."
Fuu snatched the baby back. "That's not funny, Mugen!" she insisted, swinging up the squalling child to begin the never-failing jiggly dance. "Don't worry, baby," she whispered, listening to his snorting little grunts, like a pig, as he snuffled in her shoulder. "Your daddy will give you a proper name, just as soon as he's feeling better."
...
A/N: 'Kuso' is a Japanese swearword.