Chapter 25 - Imouto-not-so-chan

"Ganma, where's Mama?"

Tsuchiya wandered into the kitchen, trailing his monkey by the arm behind him, and looked at his grandmother dolefully. He had had an exciting afternoon with Uncle Sota, but now that evening was here, he had had enough. He was ready to go home.

Mama stopped her dinner preparations to pick him up and hold him cuddled against her shoulder.

"Your mama is very busy right now. She's having her baby. Your papa will come back when she's done to get you. Until then, you just have to wait with us."

Tsuchiya sighed unhappily in her arms. Grandma was a comfortable cuddle, but she didn't smell like his mama and the house didn't smell like home either.

"Want Mama!" he said firmly, smacking his monkey on Mama's chest a few times.

"I know, Tsu-chan. Your papa will be back as soon as he can. Then you can go meet your new little brother or sister."

"Do you really think he's ever coming back?" Grampa asked skeptically from where he was sitting at the kitchen table. "He's got the perfect opportunity to skip out now. And we'll be stuck with the boy."

"Psst!" Mama hissed at him. "Tsuchiya!"

Grampa grumbled under his breath and returned to his tea.

Tsuchiya had caught the undercurrents swirling around the kitchen, despite Grandma's reassurances. Something was going wrong with Papa and Mama. Then there was all that talk about brothers and sisters. He wasn't too sure what that was about either. He wanted his Mama.

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It was evening of the next day before InuYasha arrived, more than enough time for nerves to grow very frazzled in the Higurashi household. By the time noon had arrived with no word, Mama had started to worry that something had gone very wrong with the birth, Grampa was repeating his dire predictions of InuYasha's dereliction with greater conviction, and Tsuchiya had reduced everyone, including the cat, to a basket case.

InuYasha burst into the living room, caught Tsuchiya up in a swooping toss and hugged Mama tightly, spinning them both around, before he announced jubilantly, "It's a girl!"

It was such a transformation from the sullen InuYasha who had departed the previous afternoon that the Higurashis exchanged bewildered glances, wondering just what sort of happy-spell had been cast on him and when it was going to wear off.

"How's Kagome?" Mama asked.

"She and the baby are doing just fine," InuYasha beamed. "I'll bring them through in a few days, when Kagome is up to moving.

"You have the prettiest little sister," he told Tsuchiya. "Are you ready to come see her?"

"Want Mama," Tsuchiya demanded firmly.

"Mama wants to see you, too," InuYasha assured him. "Go get your monkey and your blanket, and we'll go see Mama."

Everyone pitched in on the mad scramble to find Tsuchiya's monkey and blanket, then they were off through the well.

Grampa looked at the wellhouse into which they had disappeared and commented, "I don't know what Kagome fed him, but she should do it more often."

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Kagome was resting in bed when InuYasha returned with Tsuchiya. The baby was sleeping bundled up in a basket beside her. Tsuchiya scrambled over the covers to give his mother a kiss and get a big hug, then she turned his attention to the basket.

"Come see," she said, "this is your new little sister, your imouto-chan.

Tsychiya peered into the basket to look at the tiny face sleeping quietly within. It was pretty boring, so he soon looked away. He wasn't sure what was so great about a sister, but Mama and Papa seemed very happy about it.

"Were you a good boy for Grandma?" Kagome asked as he climbed into her lap for a cuddle.

Tsuchiya bounced excitedly a couple of times, waving his arms, and said, "Unka Sota gots a big, uh, and, and it goes whoom and then it..."

"A big what?" Kagome asked.

"I don't know. I didn't see it," replied InuYasha.

"And... And then..." Tsuchiya climbed out of her lap and ran around the room with big swoops and whoops, then stopped to bounce on his toes a few times. Then he ran back to give Kagome another hug.

"Did you have dinner?" she asked.

"I hungry," he said, looking toward the kitchen.

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The baby woke up about ten o'clock that night, wet and hungry. Kagome was in the middle of changing her when Tsuchiya wandered in, attracted by the noise and activity. He wanted onto Kagome's lap too, and tried to muscle his way in while she was feeding the baby.

"Tsu-chan, you have to share," she cautioned him. "Imouto-chan needs to eat now. Here, you sit on this side, so she can have room. When she's done, we'll put her back to bed and you can have a turn."

When the baby was safely back in the basket, Kagome tried to play a patty cake game with Tsuchiya, but he wouldn't have it. He slapped at her hands and stalked off to his bed to huddle up with his monkey.

All the next day, Tsuchiya watched Kagome take care of his new sister with narrowed eyes and a grim, pouting mouth. He wrenched himself away from any of his mother's advances when she was free of caring for the baby to huddle up in a corner and sulk.

By the third day, Tsuchiya's ears were back in a sullen line and his golden eyes blazed as he watched his father cooing over her and his mother carrying her around for over half the day. Papa was his papa and Mama was his mama. What was so great about her? All she did was squeak and stink. But they always cuddled her first.

When Kagome brought him his breakfast, he picked up his bowl and threw it across the room in a great fit of temper, nailing his father square on the side of the head.

"Tsu-chan! You donot throw your food! Look what you did to Papa!" Kagome scolded.

"Nooo!" Tsuchiya cried, banging his fists down on the table.

"All right, back to bed with you, right now. You can get up when you're ready to be nice." Kagome picked him up, screaming, and put him on his bed with his monkey to cry it out. Then she returned to InuYasha to help him mop Tsuchiya's breakfast out of his hair.

"It had to be noodle soup, didn't it?" she fussed as she picked noodles and tofu out of his hair and off his clothes.

"Rice would have been worse," he replied, giving her a quick kiss as he went out the door. "I'll try to be back by noon."

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There was an unusual number of people in the village square this morning, mostly women in varying stages of pregnancy, as InuYasha crossed over to Kaede's house for his regular meeting, and they all seemed to be watching him furtively. He frowned as he tried to figure out what that was all about. He didn't remember doing anything all that remarkable in the last couple of days.

Miroku and Yamamaru were already there when InuYasha pushed his way through the door. InuYasha looked questioningly at Miroku.

"I thought I might add my expertise to the discussion of any problems," Miroku explained.

"And drum up some business of your own," InuYasha thought cynically. It wasn't necessarily a bad thing; it would be handy to be able to trade off sometimes when their babies were so tiny. And, Miroku did know his youkai.

Yamamaru, on the other hand, was rather given to flights of fancy. It was not the first time he had come in spooked by something perfectly ordinary. This time, it was a half-seen shape he saw flitting through the forest in the twilight yesterday evening, silent as a ghost. InuYasha assured him he would track it down tonight, when it was active again. Knowing Yamamaru, it was probably just an owl.

After Yamamaru left, InuYasha cocked an eye at Kaede and asked, "Do you have anything else to add to that wonderfully exciting assignment?"

Kaede shook her head, chuckling softly, then said, "No, that's it for today. If you'll excuse me now, I have a sick child to check on." She gathered her herbs and ducked through the door while Miroku and InuYasha finished their tea.

"So, do you have a name for the baby yet?" Miroku asked as he blew on his tea to cool it.

"Not yet," replied InuYasha. "About the last thing we were thinking about at the time was names." He had a wistful, sentimental look as he said, "I'd like to call her Kikyo."

Miroku choked on his tea. "You don't want to go there. Good grief, man, you're barely back in Kagome's good graces now. You dump that on her and she'll have your ears."

"Oh." He hadn't thought of that. "Um, so what would you suggest?"

"There are a lot of nice animal names, like Hato or Neko."

InuYasha snorted. "Oh, yeah, right. 'Kitty the Dog Demon', that really works."

"Well, when you put it that way..." Miroku conceded. "So stick with the flowers, there are lots of nice flowers, just don't use that flower."

"Yeah, we'll come up with something soon." InuYasha put away his cup and started for the door.

All through the meeting, there had been a steady background twitter of excited female voices coming from outside. As InuYasha lifted the door mat to leave the house, the crowd of pregnant women outside Kaede's fence surged forward and called, "Is it true, InuYasha-sama? Can you really tell what a baby's sex is before it's born?"

Miroku grabbed InuYasha's collar and yanked him back inside, then called out the door in his suavest voice, "Just a moment more of your patience, dear ladies. We'll be out very soon."

"What the Hell?!" InuYasha yelped, sneaking another quick peek through a gap in the mat.

Miroku snatched him back again with an alarmingly mercenary gleam in his eyes. "Let me handle this. We're sitting on a gold mine if we play this right."

"What are you talking about?" Inuyasha demanded.

"Do you have any idea how far some women will go to discover the sex of their unborn child? There's a huge array of charms out there for divining the answer. And all you have to do is take a sniff. So, let me set up a time when you'll be available, then we charge them a fee commensurate with a guaranteed answer, and..."

"Wait a minute. Charge them a fee?" InuYasha asked. He wasn't sure he liked the sound of this.

"Of course, charge them a fee," Miroku retorted. "Do you want to be accosted by every pregnant woman within ten miles every time you stick your nose outdoors? The fee will slow them down. I'll handle all the arrangements. You just have to show up."

"Miroku, I'm not even sure I want to have anything to do with this," InuYasha protested. He really didn't want to get tangled up in one of Miroku's "business" schemes.

"Oh, no, you don't," pressed Miroku. "You owe me."

"I owe you how?"

"Let's just say this will go a long ways toward making up for shadow of shame you put on me through the winter."

"Just how much are you planning on charging?" InuYasha asked suspiciously.

Miroku thought a moment, rattled off a couple of prices for existing charms, then produced a sum that InuYasha thought was exorbitant.

"That's a bit stiff!" InuYasha protested.

"Not for a guaranteed result," Miroku countered. "By the way, there's no way you could goof this up, is there?"

"Believe me, girl-baby is seared into my brain," InuYasha grumbled.

"And there's only one other answer, so we're set! I'll be cutting you in for one fourth of the take and..." Miroku continued.

"What? I'm doing all the work and you're.." InuYasha objected.

"I'm handling crowd control." Miroku replied.

InuYasha peered out the door again at the crowd of eager, pregnant women arrayed around the fence. Miroku had a point.

"Right. So how do we do this?"

"I expect it will work best if you inspect each woman individually. There's no chance of mixing up scents that way. We'll need a place for the women to wait their turn comfortably. Hmmm... About the only place in the village that works is the shrine. Let me go out first, then join me at the shrine at noon."

InuYasha let Miroku out the door to perform his woman-management magic. When Miroku had led them all, Pied-Piper style, up the steps of the shrine, InuYasha slipped out to do his morning border check.

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Taken one at a time, there were an awful lot of women lined up to get their "reading". InuYasha didn't even recognize half of them. Miroku wasn't kidding when he said there was a big demand for this service. By the end of the afternoon, InuYasha was also glad that Miroku was handling the people side of the business. There was no doubt he was earning his money. Many of the women were very unhappy with their answer, and some of them were not taking well to seeing the jubilant women who got the answer they wanted. Miroku's slick-talking skills were being hard-taxed to keep them all jollied along.

"Was that really worth it?" InuYasha asked, as Miroku divided up the proceeds after the last woman had left.

Miroku shoved a large handful of coins into InuYasha's hand. "I'm not complaining."

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InuYasha arrived home after his unusual day to a household in shambles. It was late in the afternoon, Tsuchiya was badly overdue for a nap, and so was Kagome from the look of her. Tsuchiya had gotten progressively worse all day, throwing a tantrum each time she had fed the baby. Kaede had tried a couple of calming spells on him when she visited, but he had shrugged them off. Shippo was now hiding in his "den" with the door barred shut, complaining sullenly that he wasn't about to come out until someone put a muzzle on Tsuchiya, who had apparently bitten his tail when he'd tried to pull him away from clawing at the baby.

Kagome told him all this as she sobbed on his shoulder, while Tsuchiya clung to her leg screaming, "MyMama!" at the top of his lungs.

InuYasha scooped Kagome up into his arms and, dangling her out of Tsuchiya's reach, he kissed her thoroughly and said provocatively, "My lady".

"My Mama!" Tsuchiya shrieked, kicking InuYasha's shins and clawing into his thigh.

"That was brilliant," Kagome said acidly as InuYasha hissed in pain. "Don't you think I've had enough of that for one day?"

"Let him be jealous of me for a while, OK? He can't hurt me." InuYasha answered.

"Then, can you at least take it outside?" she pleaded. "I don't think I can stand any more."

"Of course." He kissed her provocatively again, sending Tsuchiya spinning out of control. As Tsuchiya climbed his clothes to take the fight to his level, InuYasha slipped Kagome to her feet and went outside with his son for a some man-to-man time.

Half an hour later, InuYasha returned, a bit scratched up, but with Tsuchiya sound asleep over his shoulder.

"Where do you want him?" he asked, crouching down beside her as she fed the baby.

"Just put him to bed," Kagome sighed. "Let's hope he has a good nap before dinner."

InuYasha returned from settling Tsuchiya in his bed and sat down beside Kagome as she burped the baby and checked her diaper. When Kagome mentioned starting dinner, he took the baby into his arms and softly murmured, "How's Papa's little girl?" while she held his finger in her tiny hands and pulled it into her mouth.

Kagome watched the two of them while she laid out the dinner ingredients. Only three days old, and the baby already had him completely wound around her little finger. Who ever would have thought he would be such a sucker for baby girls? But there he was, completely besotted by the little bundle in his arms.

"Do you have any notions of what you want to name her?" she asked as she started cutting the vegetables.

InuYasha had been giving her name a considerable amount of thought. After his discussion with Miroku, he had been thinking of all the flowers he knew, rejecting some as too showy and others as too plain. He wanted something that reflected the delicate grace of her face and hands, without being too blatant. On the way up the hill, he had paused beside the cherry tree that grew at the top of the stairs and watched the fluttering of the petals in the gentle breeze.

"I like Sakura," he said quietly, remembering the tree.

Kagome blinked. "You mean, like my great aunt?"

Oh, my. He'd forgotten about Great Aunt Sakura. He had only seen the old woman for a moment, but it had been one of the more embarrassing moments of his life.

"Still, it certainly wouldn't hurt to jolly the old girl along," Kagome continued on further reflection. "I wonder what she'd think?"

"It's our daughter," InuYasha said. "What Great Aunt Sakura thinks has nothing to do with it."

There was a stubborn set to his jaw that said he had his mind made up. Kagome, herself, had no real objection to the name. Maybe this Sakura would reflect the image of gently scented cherry blossoms on graceful branches better than her namesake.

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When Sakura was a week old, InuYasha took them all to visit the Higurashi side of the family. Sakura was passed around the family for inspection as Kagome and InuYasha tried to get Tsuchiya jollied into a better frame of mind.

"What's the matter?" Mama asked, as Sakura made her way to Grampa and Sota.

"He's jealous," Kagome explained as Tsuchiya tracked his sister's progress with his ears back.

"Oh,my. It's normal enough," Mama sighed. She crouched down to Tsuchiya's level and said, "Tsu-chan, I made some sweet buns up for you special, since I knew you were coming. Do you want to come with me and have one?"

She drew him off to the kitchen with her for a while.

Everyone put in a special effort to pay some attention to Tsuchiya during the visit, but everywhere he turned, there was Sakura, his imouto. Imouto nursing at Mama's breast, Imouto sleeping on Mama's shoulder. He never noticed the times Mama hugged him; he was too busy seeing Papa holding Imouto. When Papa bounced him and swung him around, he saw Imouto getting tickled by Uncle Sota. When Uncle Sota tickled him and rolled him on the matt, he saw Grandma cooing over Imouto's golden eyes. Everywhere, all the time, there was Imouto. She had taken everything, everyone, that was his, and he hated it.

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