Chapter Ten
"Come on, Iruka! It's time to get uuuuuuup!" Cracking an eye open at the sound of his brother's energetic whining, Iruka glared at the bright blue orbs mere inches away. He let out a soft huff before turning his head, burying his face back into the soft pillow. "Oi, it's nearly eleven and if you don't get up soon, Sasuke's going to have to eat all the pancakes he made for you!"
The little bastard of a brother was teasing him with a promise of pancakes! Iruka pulled his face out of the pillow and blinked at Naruto a few times, weighing out the chances that Naruto was lying about Sasuke making him those fluffy little pieces of heaven. No, that was too cruel, even for Naruto. Gesturing for his brother to move, Iruka waited until the lanky blonde had scrambled off his bed before trying to push himself up into a sitting position.
"There better be a lot of fruit involved," Iruka replied as he finally got himself up on his elbows. Narrowing his gaze, he waited for Naruto's comment on him reminding the young man of a beached whale, but the nearly daily crack at his increasing size never came. "What, no making fun of the pregnant brother this morning?" He glanced over at the blonde and saw Naruto staring down at his stomach with wide eyes. "It isn't going to eat you," he joked as he slowly slid his legs over the edge of the bed, and all but threw himself off the mattress.
"You are getting big," Naruto whispered as he hesitantly touched the brunet's bare middle. Iruka rolled his eyes, putting up with his brother's curiosity. Usually he was wearing baggy shirts or puffy jackets to hide most of his belly, but he would have thought that the resulting illusion of being smaller wouldn't have worked on someone he lived with. Seeing Naruto's face pale a little, Iruka wondered what had gotten into the jounin now. "You still have a whole three months! You're gonna be gigantic!"
Iruka felt his fingers tighten into a fist as a vein started throbbing at his temple, but he fought the urge to punch his brother for his inconsiderate comment. "How many times do Tsunade and I have to tell you – the baby is going to be big?" His battle with gestational diabetes made sure of that fact. What Tsunade had earlier seen as just a little bit of fluctuating blood sugar had just recently settled at a very high number. Now, not allowed any type of sweets and on enough medications to choke a horse, Iruka was finally starting to feel better, but it still meant the baby was already abnormally large for just six months. It also meant that he had to be very careful until the end of the pregnancy. It meant a great deal of bed rest, that Iruka was already starting to despise.
"Well, yeah, but how much bigger! You might burst before Little Sumo is born!" Naruto pointed out, receiving a powerful jab in his stomach from his brother for his nickname for the baby. Iruka stalked off in the direction of the kitchen, leaving his doubled-over brother to gasp for breath.
"I heard something about pancakes," Iruka announced as he finally waddled his way into the kitchen, chuckling softly when he saw Sasuke already setting out a plate of pancakes. Of course, in keeping with Tsunade's orders, they had no sugar in them and absolutely no syrup was allowed, but Sasuke did wonders with the restricted diet Iruka had to keep to.
"Good morning," Sasuke replied, eyeing Iruka for a moment before going back to the stove. "I told Naruto to let you sleep." The teacher smiled at the Uchiha's statement; Sasuke spoiled him rotten in a way that still somehow kept to the quiet jounin's personality.
"It's okay, I already punched him once for calling the baby 'Little Sumo,'" Iruka said as he sat down at the table, happily digging into his breakfast. After a few moments of companionable silence, Iruka sat back with a sigh. "I need to go over to my apartment and pick up some stuff." Seeing Sasuke starting to open his mouth to, more than likely, say he could get whatever he needed, Iruka raised his hand to stop the jounin. "Tsunade said to rest, not lay in bed all day, so I'm going over to my apartment to get a few things. And considering you are going on a mission next week, and Naruto is going to be in Suna for a few days while you are gone, it'd be better to go now so you two can make sure I don't lift anything heavy, or strain myself, or whatever it is that you think I could possibly do to myself, by getting a few scrolls to pass the time."
Sasuke pursed his lips, wishing his lover was in the kitchen, but he could hear Naruto overhead in Iruka's room – probably rolling on the floor clutching his abdomen. Naruto would be able to think of a quick response that would keep Iruka from his mission for a number of hours, perhaps even a few days if they were lucky.
Being the only one for Iruka to direct his pointed gaze on, Sasuke felt his confidence flail as he tried to think of something – anything – that would keep Iruka from finding out their surprise that they had yet to finish. With his and Naruto's busy schedules, they hadn't had the time to even start doing anything other than clean out the teacher's guest bedroom, and start planning out the nursery they were going to convert it into.
"O-Okay…" Sasuke finally broke under the older man's gaze and bowed his head in defeat. It would have been much better had he and Naruto finished the nursery, but Iruka would still appreciate the thought.
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"Damn it, couldn't you have stalled a few days?" Naruto hissed at Sasuke. They were far enough away from the teacher that Iruka was unaware of the little spat going on between the two. Glancing towards the man – well, man transformed into something that resembled a woman – Sasuke pursed his lips. It had been quite some time since Iruka had entirely removed his jutsu, but anyone with two eyes could see that the teacher was in less physical pain because of the changes in his body structure. He also was having an easier time moving around the village – people didn't gape at a pregnant woman like they would have had they known that Iruka was very much male, despite the curving alterations of his body.
"How?" he asked softly as he glanced over at his miffed lover. As he looked at the blonde, he watched as Naruto's anger dissipated in a matter of moments. He had apologized several times; there was nothing else he could do to stop it. Looking back to the teacher, Sasuke blinked a few times, surprised to see that Iruka was no longer in sight. "Where did he go now?"
"His apartment – he might be big, but he moves fast when he wants to," Naruto replied jokingly as he leaned his shoulder into his lover. Sasuke could only sigh at Naruto's mildly offensive reminders of Iruka's size. Continuing on in comfortable silence, the two reached the teacher's apartment in just a few minutes.
As they walked through the door, Sasuke was attacked. He didn't even get the chance to pull a kunai to defend himself as tan arms wrapped around him and a roundness pressed against his groin.
"Thank you!" It took a moment for the jounin to recognize the feminine voice as Iruka's – or Keiko as they had decided to call Iruka's other side – and the arms tightening their grip around him as belonging to the pregnant teacher. After another second of breathing deeply to settle his rattled nerves – it wasn't often an elite jounin was surprised – Sasuke relaxed enough to wrap his arms around the brunette in his arms.
Glancing over at his lover, they silently tried to figure out what Iruka was going on about now, but neither jounin could figure out what exactly had sent the teacher on his current sniffling fit that was broken up with soft 'thank you's.
"You two didn't have to!" Iruka all but squealed before taking the two by their wrists and dragging them fully into the apartment and down the hallway. When they finally reached the doorway to what had once been a guest room, Sasuke and Naruto understood Iruka's gushing gratitude.
Before them was no longer the room they had gutted only the other week. The walls were no longer covered in pencil marks that had been hastily written down as the two lovers argued over every little detail. The floor was no longer painfully bare. There was no longer a gaping hole in the one wall where Naruto had accidentally punched through to Iruka's own bedroom, as their discussion over paint colors turned heated. Well, there was a hole, but it was now not a small circle, but a rectangle large enough for someone to comfortably walk through.
The two jounin stepped into the room behind Iruka, their eyes taking in the soft, pastel green shade of the walls, the doorway covering up Naruto's clumsiness, but what had gotten their mouths to drop was the rest of the room. In one corner was a little white crib they had been planning on buying the teacher when they had caught Iruka looking at it during one shopping trip. Next to it was a matching chair that rocked backwards as Iruka lowered himself into it.
Other pieces of furniture were littered around the room, along with some of the cutest stuffed animals to exist, but as Sasuke looked around one more time, he caught a glimpse of something that was very off in the lightly-colored room. Moving with lightning-fast speed, he picked up the dark object from its spot behind one of the miniature dressers, and stuffed it into his pocket before either Naruto or Iruka saw it.
"It is amazing," Naruto whispered, still gaping as he studied the room. Sasuke was about to send a warning glance at his lover, but decided it would seem suspicious if he started glaring daggers at the blonde. Hearing Iruka chuckle, the jounin let out a sigh of relief.
"Don't be so modest, Naruto," Iruka joked as he hugged one of the fuzzier teddy bears he had picked up out of the crib. The room wasn't simply amazing – it was perfect. It was even better than he had dreamed. The teacher said as much before he tightly clung to the stuffed animal as a new wave of tears washed over him.
With Iruka's vision blurred by tears, Sasuke moved next to his lover and studied the blonde for a moment, glad that they had learned long ago to read one another's expressions well enough that verbal communication wasn't needed. What they could agree upon was that they should play along with Iruka's assumption that they had been the ones to do all of this, even though they had nothing to do with any of it.
Sasuke's grip on the object, hastily shoved in his pocket, tightened. He knew exactly who'd had a hand in such an amazing renovation.
XXX
"You have paint in your hair."
Kakashi blinked a few times as he looked up from his Icha Icha novel. That was certainly a pick-up line he had never heard before. Studying the young man moving to lean against the tree next to him, the silver-haired jounin couldn't help but see that his old student had changed slightly since the last time he had seen him. He was a bit taller, but at the same time, Kakashi would have sworn he was also a little pudgier.
"And you forgot this," Sasuke added as he slapped something black and hard against Kakashi's arm. Glancing down, the jounin inwardly squealed as he grabbed the plated glove. He had been looking everywhere for that!
As he stuck the glove into his vest, Kakashi studied the raven-haired man to see what Sasuke's opinion of him was this week. It must have been at least four months since he had last spoken to the young jounin, and Kakashi had the sinking feeling it had something to do with a certain pregnant brunette. He had heard the rumor that, while Iruka was away on some mission that no one had any knowledge about, his cousin was staying with Sasuke and Naruto. Thinking about it, Kakashi couldn't remember the last time he had seen the bipolar teacher. It had to have been at least a month or two, perhaps even longer. That was a surprisingly long mission for a chuunin who had no experience, other than as an academy teacher.
"Did she like it?" Kakashi asked quietly as he looked back down at his book. He didn't trust himself to be anywhere near the apartment when she got there – it had been difficult enough to redecorate the room with the constant, nagging reminder that the child wasn't even his.
"Crying for well over an hour. The dobe thought that something was wrong with hi - her." Kakashi glanced over at his old student, wondering momentarily about Sasuke's odd slip, but pushed it to the back of his mind as he bit his lip in thought. Crying could be either very good or very bad. Having dealt with Kurenai years ago, Kakashi knew that it was hard to gauge the mood swings of a pregnant woman. "She loved it," Sasuke clarified softly as he pushed off the tree trunk, letting a hand come to rest on Kakashi's upper arm.
"Are you still angry at me?" Kakashi wondered aloud as he started to flip through the pages of his book, but his complete attention was on the young man. He had been surprised how much it had hurt to have Sasuke distance himself. The Uchiha was the first person in a long time that Kakashi didn't begrudgingly admit to being friends with. He was actually quite glad for the relationship he'd had with the raven-haired man.
"She told me what you said. I won't forgive you for that," Sasuke stated coolly, but did something uncharacteristic and continued, "I count you as a friend, but I will always be on her side. Hurt her again and I will tear you apart."
"You sound like some overprotective brother," Kakashi replied jokingly, but his voice faltered when he saw the hard glare Sasuke directed at him. It didn't have to be said out loud – Sasuke didn't mean he would simply inflict a few injuries, he saw it as his duty to destroy Kakashi if he ever went near the brunette again. The silver-haired jounin nodded his head in understanding. If he was in Sasuke's place, he too would be prepared to commit murder to protect the pregnant beauty from any kind of pain.
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B.Z.: ...Men... **sweatdrops** Oh! And I had a thought. I'm gonna guess on how I think Kakashi is gonna find out the truth about Iruka. **removed to keep the suspense** Am I close, or do you have it planned that far? Lol.
Authoress: Kukuku…you have to wait and see! Now, time for bio class! Gestational diabetes is usually diagnosed between 24 and 28 weeks (and our favorite teacher is now at 24 whole weeks!). Not only is it dangerous for the mother, but results in big babies – which can be quite a problem for our Iruka when the time comes! Kukuku! And, just as a heads up - Chapter Eleven will be put up on November 16th! (You have no idea how detailed my calendar is in order to keep this story in-time...) Until next time, everyone, ja ne!