Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. Beta'd by drowsyivy and UmbreonGurl. Next update: Wednesday! (and bonus chapters).
Kawaguchi Masa is born in the fifth month of the year, her month old celebration coinciding with the month of His Imperial Majesty's sixtieth birthday and named just prior to that joyous gathering.
"Are you upset?" he asks after the celebrations had concluded.
Hisa is in front of her loom today after the celebrations of her littlest sister's first month in the world, in the back room behind her study, and he is at his spinning wheel, practicing turning raw silk into thread once more.
Today, she is uncaring of particular patterns, weaving raw, undyed silk thread into cloth for the dye house so her shuttle flies from one side of the loom to the other.
"About my father's daughter?" she asks dryly without looking up. "Why would I be?"
She'd expressed no particular sentiment upon hearing that her stepmother and Gifu-san would be having another child, and she does not seem to have expressed much now that the child is firmly of this world instead of a mere concept.
With how much she loves Momo, he would've expected her to be…happier.
With how much she felt and still feels about her stepmother, he would've expected her to be sadder and angrier.
And yet, she is neither happy nor sad nor angry.
But what lurks beneath her surface isn't indifference either — it never is with Hisa. He knows that now.
"I know you don't like her." And it isn't hard to understand why.
Chiba Natsu-san is only five years older than Hisa, and by that logic, two and a half years older than himself.
There is not much of a division of age between them, though in marrying Gifu-san Chiba-san has assumed the status of someone a generation above them.
There is not much of a division of age between them, so they, all three of them, will be living with each other for a far longer span of years, even when Gifu-san is gone.
"What Chichi-ue does is not my business." She sighs, treadle coming to a stop. "And I am happy that he is happier."
"You don't always have to be a martyr." He does not mind Chiba-san that much, for they do not often speak, and when they do, it typically has something to do with Momo, but Hisa…
But for Hisa he would hate Chiba-san if that would make her feel better.
She clasps her hands together and sets them on the loom. "It's not being a martyr."
"I'm your husband." He stops spinning as well. "It's alright if I hear what you're thinking, even if it is improper."
Chichi-ue and Haha-ue have always shared their joys and sorrows.
And he knows that for a very long time, Hisa has lived without sharing thoughts she deemed improper, unable to stop carrying them with her.
Talk to me.
Set aside these burdens you do not have to carry.
"She will never be my mother." The knuckles of her clasped hands had gone white. "But she is my father's wife and my sister's mother. It is unfilial of me to not like her, for she has done nothing wrong."
He rises and she turns on her bench to face him.
He holds her elbows, looking down at her upturned face. "She has trespassed."
She does not cry, but she does squeeze her eyes shut and lean against his chest. "It is hard to be a good person to her, Izuna."
It would be a small admission to anyone else, but from Hisa, it stands tall as a mountain and just as hard to move.
To be unfilial is a heavy thing, and he grapples with it himself in his day to day.
He grapples with it, the balance of expectation and the boundaries of self.
"You have been a good person to her sometimes." And indeed, she has. "Do not blame yourself for not being a bodhisattva." Do not blame yourself for being a real person with real emotions instead of a statue in a temple.
Few people in life can embody virtue and grace in every moment.
Few lives are as strifeless, and few can truly negate themselves to that degree.
"It's hard," she admits. "It's hard."
"It is," he agrees. "It is."
And if he holds her, it is because he wishes he had the words to explain properly.
But he cannot.
"Izuna, my mother sent someone to bring you lotus root soup." Hiroto draws the door closed behind him, having accepted the lunch tray from the girl outside.
He turns another page. The Book of Rites is long winded and boring, and the words wind round and round in his skull. "Tell her thank you?" Haha-ue had done her best to instill manners into him, as well as a love and respect for his fellow man.
The elderly cook of the Kawaguchi household has always looked after him, even in the days when he was newly hired and unusual in the household.
Thin as a weed you are, Kuma had said the first time Hisa had sent him to the kitchen to eat his meals there. It's a wonder you haven't melted in the rain like a child's paper doll.
But the words had been kindly meant.
Return one kindness with two, for kindness begets kindness.
"Ah, I will." Hiroto sets the dish down on the other end of the table. "Might as well eat, Izuna. It's got braised pig trotters in it, and those are your favorite."
He sets his book aside.
Hiroto's outline strikes him for a moment, to so greatly resemble Yushin's that it almost hurts.
Curse the Sharingan for making him remember visual cues so strikingly.
Both Hiroto and Bear are big men with wide shoulders and hair that falls the same way over their eyes, and though their faces and personalities are not identical, they are — were, still are — brothers, and the family resemblance is plain.
It hurts to remember what the feud had cost his family, but it hurts more to remember what it had cost innocent people.
And it hurts to remember Yushin, leaving all the wrong quiet in the spaces he left behind.
Nothing is ever worth quite as much as the love of a brother, and the loss of three of his own had worn thin his soul.
"Yes," he agrees, "they are my favorite, and I doubly thank Kuma-san for thinking of me."
What was it that Hisa had said? We must do what we can do for the living, for they are the only ones who are not beyond our aid.
We must do what we can do for the living. What a strange way to put it for someone for whom the dead weighs so heavy.
But he, too, ought to focus on the living.
Momo-chan peers from just beyond the door at him. "Izu-nii?" He had persuaded her to drop the 'shinobi' and only call him Izu-nii after much explanation that he is no longer a shinobi, and therefore likely shouldn't be called shinobi-nii any longer.
She'd grown much bigger and taller since the first time he saw her and now wears her longer hair in two little side braids tied neatly with red twine that hang over her shoulders.
"Yes, what is it?"
She takes that as an invitation to come in and plops down on the floor near his desk with a puff of green skirts, pouting ferociously all the while. "Haha-ue doesn't want to play with me anymore," she huffs with an impressive little pout, her head propped up on her hands, pastel pink sleeves festooned with embroidery of little birds and flowers. "And Sute won't either. They all love Masa-chan better than me now."
He pats her on the head. "Momo-chan, it's because your little sister can't take care of herself yet." Seven years is a long time for Momo to have been her mother's only child — and Izuna suspects, with the way that things have been, Momo had been Chiba-san's only responsibility in the household for a long time — and he well remembers the day he discovered he was not the axis upon which his parents' lives spun. "She has to have everything done for her right now, and that must make your haha-ue very tired. It doesn't mean she doesn't love you."
Momo's mouth wobbles. "But what if Haha-ue never has time for me again?"
"She will. It might not seem so right now, but it will." He brushes away the first tear that threatens to cascade away down her cheek with his thumb and waits a moment for the others, though they don't seem to come, being blinked away as hard as possible by a very embarrassed Momo.
"You promise?" she quavers, sniffling.
"I promise." His parents hadn't loved him any less even though his father had forced him to learn how to read when he was that age and had somehow become very mean in the process.
He pushes his slightly cooled stew at her. "Do you want any? You can stay and help me learn how to recite this very boring book?"
If he is going to suffer, he might as well suffer with company even if that means he has to share his food and hide his headache.
From out of the corner of his eye, he spots Hiroto trying not to smile and failing.
Senju Tobirama comes to call with carting another old civilian he'd found in a carriage.
Izuna is summoned to deal with it by one of the twin gate guards — they'd been terribly unamused to learn that they could not fool him by pretending to be each other — and ends up coming out of the dye house covered in some shade of blue, which is not as bad as the time he ended up coral pink, but still makes him feel rather self conscious anyway.
He has to deal with it because Hisa had gone out to take tea with Ogawa Toma, and Gifu-san had traveled to Mutsutari to meet a business associate. For propriety and politeness, he really shouldn't make Chiba-san deal with the strange shinobi man outside.
"What do you want?" he asks, briefly aware that he is wiping his hands on an old rag, his wide undyed cotton sleeves tied back, wearing an old pair of boots, followed by a manservant.
Tobirama stares at him for a long moment. "You really do look like a civilian."
He frowns despite himself.
"What does that mean?" Hiroto snaps. "I don't see you looking much like a proper shinobi."
Tobirama bristles impressively, before realizing that while Hiroto is tall and broad, Hiroto is definitely a civilian.
There is no ground to be won here.
The old presumably civilian man behind Tobirama looks around worriedly, blinking watery eyes and, to Izuna's eye at least, appears as though he really wants to run away and not come back.
Izuna is not sure he blames him.
Tobirama makes a face. "Can I come in," he says in a way that is not a question. "I found you another medic."
He considers it.
The last experience he had with chakra medicine was not a pleasant time.
And yet…
Senju Tobirama had bothered to drag this old man here likely against his better judgment.
He might as well let them in instead of slamming the door in their faces.
That might alarm the neighbors and give the merchant people of Shunan something to gossip about besides his unconventional marriage and the apparent social climbing abilities of his wife.
He steps aside, though he makes sure to make it clear he is ill pleased about it. "Since you're already here, you might as well."
Tobirama does not look pleased by this, but he starts forward into the house anyway, grumbling under his breath as he goes.
Shortly inside, he stops moving entirely.
"Well?" Izuna asks him, more peeved than anything else. "Do you need a guided tour, or are you just trying to grow roots?"
"No." That does get Tobirama moving again, though still somewhat jerkily as the man tries to figure out where to go.
"Are you lost?" It is possible that Tobirama is lost, having not actually been here very often, and certainly not in the middle of summer when the garden bursts with life and the walkways are filled with people hurrying back and forth between all the dye houses, weaving workshops, the spinning houses and various living quarters busy with any number of tasks.
He has been told it is a busier summer than most for the nobility. His Majesty's sixtieth birthday is fast approaching with the end of the month, and it seems like the whole country is turning out for the affair, orders for cloth to make clothing pouring in and a truly terrifying stream of presents heading into the capital to hopefully be presented at the celebrations.
Tobirama casts him a look that feels remarkably like danger, but the man would be a fool to rise to the bait, so all Izuna does is stalk towards the front reception room.
He's not going to let Tobirama into his and Hisa's courtyard. The last time when Tobirama had to stand around in their bedroom was bad enough.
Wordlessly and uncomfortably, Tobirama and the old doctor follow.
He is sitting down, his sleeve rolled up, arm laid palm up on the table. Tobirama is seated stiffly in another chair off to the side, his arms crossed. If he didn't hate the man so much, it would be almost funny.
"Is the gentleman…" The old civilian doctor trails off.
"I'm a merchant." He attempts to be cheerful, though he's not sure that it worked.
Hesitation flashes across the man's face.
"You will be handsomely compensated for dealing with him," Tobirama mutters. "But I wouldn't try leaving here without doing that if I were you."
He casts Tobirama a look. "Well, I certainly won't keep him."
Tobirama scowls defiantly at him, but says nothing.
The old doctor bows to him. "This one has the humble name of Otsuka Tokinao."
Oddly, this is more formally than he's ever been addressed before, even when people knew he is the son of Count Uchiha of Tohoku.
He nods — he hopes, pleasantly — "and I am Kawaguchi Izuna, Otsuka-sensei."
Otsuka-sensei lays trembling fingers on his pulse.
Chakra prods at him, inoffensive but itchy anyway, in a way that isn't painful but isn't comfortable either.
Otsuka-sensei huffs a frustrated sigh. "Kawaguchi-san was healed by life force recently?"
"If by recently, one means nearly ten months ago, then yes." It is still very strange to be called Kawaguchi-san, but he supposes he will have to get used to it.
It's not as if he'll accept being called Izuna-san by strangers.
It's even stranger to hear chakra referred to as life force, but he supposes that is what civilians call it, having no particular inclination to use it for offensive jutsu. And he supposes that is what chakra is in a way.
But it is still very strange.
"The foreign life force is very strong and not properly aligned with your own." Otsuka-sensei's prodding stops. "If it has truly been ten months, whoever healed you the last time also overapplied their chakra."
Behind Otsuka-sensei, Tobirama's face had gone a surprising shade of pale, his head in his hands.
"Is it permanent?" It has been ten months.
What if he can never use chakra ever again?
"With enough time and proper care, no." Otsuka-sensei opens his medicine box and writes him a prescription with several quick brushstrokes before presenting it to Hiroto, who takes it, glances at it, and blows on it lightly in an attempt to dry it. "Have the apothecary grab the right ingredients, make sure to follow the brewing directions, and drink that medicine daily. It should help to strengthen your own life force, and hopefully that will assist in breaking down the foreign life force faster."
The old doctor then quickly packs up his medicine box and steps aside hurriedly while bowing. "That is my final diagnosis."
He glances at Hiroto. "Is Hiko the one who writes banknotes?"
Hiroto glances back down at the prescription. "He can write them, but you'll still have to sign them."
He nods. "Go tell Hiko to draft one. I'll sign it when he sends it to me."
It is a strange thing to be the one signing banknotes instead of receiving them.
Tobirama attempts to protest this, but he casts the man a very long and knowing look and somehow, despite nothing else being able to shut Senju Tobirama up in all the years they have been trying to kill each other, that does.
How absolutely peculiar.
He will have to keep it for later.
"You married a civilian," Tobirama says, while on his way out, just barely on this side of polite.
"Is that such a hard thing to believe?" As far as he's aware, Tobirama is about his age, unmarried and too prickly to have anyone take a second look at him.
"You became a civilian." This is said with more shock than anything.
"Like I said," he looks at his sleeves, picking slightly at the pretend loose thread he finds there, though there are none, even on a garment as simple as this, "is that such a hard thing to believe?"
Tobirama scowls. "I don't believe it."
Believe it or not, it is true.
It will be true for as long as record of him exists. For good or for ill.
"In any case," he meets Tobirama's eyes. There's no reason not to after all, since it's not like Tobirama has evolved the skill to kill people with his eyes. "I am a civilian."
"I'll believe it when I die."
It's on the tip of his tongue to say 'that can be arranged' but he bites it back and congratulates himself on having masterful self restraint.
"I don't think it's going to change," is what he says instead. "Besides," he says after a pause where Tobirama does not seem to be making for the door, "have you met my wife? She's more than worth it."
Tobirama stares at him for a long moment before turning to go. "Insane," the man mutters. "You've gone completely insane."
But he's certain that's just because Tobirama is incapable of understanding the changes that have occurred.
The letter arrives when he is in the middle of reading through the Spring and Autumn Annals, one chilly winter morning, carried by a crow which appears on his desk in a small puff.
Anija's handwriting.
The crow pecks insistently at the desk until he reaches out for the letter and makes amused cawing noises until he opens it.
He supposes he should be thankful that it didn't start pecking at his hands or trying to nip him.
Crows are smarter than they appear, and this particular one likes to mock him when it thinks he isn't giving it the appropriate amount of attention.
"I'm reading the letter, alright?" He makes a show of breaking the wax seal and unfolding it just so that the crow understands. "I'm reading."
The first line goes:
Dear Izuna-brat, I believe I am experiencing heart failure.
He doesn't pause to read the rest, rising from his desk and throwing on a fur lined cloak and looks long and hard at the crow. "Summon yourself back to Anija and summon me there immediately."
The crow looks long and hard at him before disappearing in a puff of smoke.
One moment, two—
He reappears, head spinning, in some sort of hotel room.
Anija is sitting at a desk there, idly plucking at his qin and staring forlornly out the window. "Izuna?"
He stumbles and shakes his head in an attempt to clear it without chakra to stabilize him.
It is harder than it first appeared.
"Anija?" He takes another stumbling step forwards, still trying to figure out how Anija is before he finally collapses into a chair. "Heart failure?" he manages, while holding his poor head.
Anija flutters about with concern. "Izuna?" he says again, as if not quite believing that Izuna is, in fact, here. "Izuna, I didn't mean for you to—"
"If you didn't mean it you wouldn't've written heart failure," he snaps, because now he appears to be growing a headache. "Are you alright?" he asks, after a slight pause, because it is true that Anija does not look particularly alright, dark circles around his eyes and a light but vaguely greenish circle of stress and ill health around his mouth.
"Yes." Anija runs a hand through his hair, which doesn't change the consistency of the mess whatsoever. "Well, no," he admits. "I don't know."
"How do you not know?" He is still holding his head, trying to figure out how one could possibly not know if one is alright or not.
"I don't know!" Anija says again, more woefully this time. "I met someone."
"You met someone." He's not quite sure he follows. "You met someone, and you think you have heart failure."
Anija rises and paces back and forth. "I don't know!" he says again. "I feel strange." He sits back down, but he still doesn't look happy.
"Strange how?" Izuna resigns himself to being here for a while.
"My chest feels like it's been squeezed." This would be funny if Anija didn't look so woebegone and if it wasn't about feelings.
"Well," he sighs, his hands on his knees, "who's the lucky lady?"
Anija stares at him. "What do you mean?"
"Well," he resists the urge to message his temples because his dizziness seems to be trying to resolve as a headache, "if you were into men, I think you would've tried to marry Senju Hashirama yourself instead of letting the Water Country woman marry him."
Anija throws the nearest paperweight at him.
He moves slightly to the right and dodges it instead of catching the wooden block, and it thunks against the opposite wall.
He stares at Anija.
Anija stares at him.
"It's an Akimichi." Anija slumps against the desk. "We had a lovely conversation about knives and—"
Izuna stands up and addresses the crow. "Take me back home."
"But what do I do?" Anija mumbles into the desk. "Izuna, what do I do?"
He glances back at Anija while the crow flutters towards him. "Just finish writing your song and find a time to propose." He considers it. "But make sure to send her to Hisa first."
At least Hisa will know if this is someone Anija should be marrying. It's not as if he can tell.
The crow lands on his shoulder, and he is yanked back across the country and ends up dry heaving against his own desk.
But at least he hasn't been gone long enough to cause a commotion.
Hiko arrives one day with a box containing two dishes of Go stones and a board, for once absent his account book and the writing box that accompanied it nearly wherever he went.
He looks up from the Book of Rites, full of questions.
Hiko sets the items he'd been carrying down on the desk and sits down in the chair opposite. "If you're really serious about the exams, I'm here to help you learn how to play Go."
And he thought that his unfortunate days of having to play Go against Hiko had ended now that he is married to Hisa.
He sees now that it appears those days have just begun.
"Why would I need to learn how to play Go for the exams?" It'd certainly not been anything that Togaku-nii cultivated, and the exams had been his eldest brother's favorite unrealistic dream in the ongoing feud and their suffering circumstances.
Hiko lays the board flat on the table, and with brisk movements lifts the bowls from their box, one for Izuna, and one for himself. "I thought I should tell you that Kimei and I have come to an agreement."
Izuna plays black again, an allowance that Hiko has long given him, for between the two of them, Hiko is the better strategist. But it is the casual chatter during the game that really distracts him from being able to concentrate.
Like right now.
"What sort of agreement?" Would Hisa know? She hasn't mentioned much to him, but that is only natural since Kimei is her dearest friend and closest companion, not his. "And why Go?"
He places a stone on the board, watching Hiko's face more than the game itself.
"We have decided we will get married," Hiko says without much fanfare, as if announcing that water is wet and the sky occasionally has clouds in it. "As for Go," Hiko continues without giving him time to react to the previous matter, "well, even if the exam never asks any questions regarding it, I hear they ask questions assuming that the examinees know the rules of the game and its structure."
Hiko places a stone on the board in the cross section diagonal to his.
Another thing for him to learn. "I see." He places another stone, almost without thinking. "And when will you and Kimei get married? Does Hisa know?"
A corner of Hiko's mouth tilts up as he surveys the board. "I'm sure Hisa has guessed. As for when…" He places another stone on the board seemingly unconcerned. "We are thinking of next summer, after the exams."
The meaning is clear.
Only after the fate of their family has been determined will they marry.
"Personally," Hiroto chimes in, "I don't think that's a good idea, Hiko."
Hiko turns to look. "Why not?"
Izuna takes the time to think over the placement of his next move while Hiko is distracted.
"Well," Hiroto says, his hands clasped together before him, "I think that's too far away. It's not like Izuna can't get distracted from his studies for a wedding since he gets distracted every day anyway." He also turns towards Hiroto at this unfair jab, but the man continues without paying attention. "If you ask me, I think you should just pick the next most auspicious date and not worry so much about putting it next year."
"What do you know about it?" Hiko asks, clearly nettled. "You're not the one getting married."
"You're right." Hiroto shrugs, "I got married two years ago, so the only unmarried man in this room is you."
He smothers a chuckle. "Well," he says, still pretending to look at the Go board, "whichever would make you and Kimei happy."
Marriage ought to be entered into with a willing heart, and it ought to be a good day, full of cheer and laughter from both parties.
Whichever day they choose, it ought to be one that makes them happy.
Hiko does return his attention to the game soon after, and all his early advantage gets washed away.
"Were you aware that Hiko and Kimei are going to get married?" He hangs his outer jacket on the rack, slightly dripping, for it had been raining lightly when he thought to just walk across the garden to look at the flowers — there are so many flowers here, and even though it has been years now, he has not gotten used to it — but in the middle the heavens had opened a downpour and he, without chakra to aid his running had been soaked through.
Hisa is fiddling with the incense burner on her desk, gently patting the sand in it smooth. "I had some idea about it, just from the number of times they've abruptly stopped talking as soon as they realized I was paying attention." She turns and actually sees him for the first time since he came in, "Danna," and comes to help him with the rest of his sodden outfit. "You never used to get this soaked."
He sighs. "No chakra, can't run as fast."
He misses it, but not so much if the tradeoff is Hisa's concern for him. "It's been getting better," he continues because he knows that she is concerned about him all the same. "But I have no idea if it will ever be the same."
But beggars cannot be choosers, as he so often reminds himself these days.
He has already survived death's door once. The prices it has extracted from him are secondary, always secondary.
Always.
She slips a new underrobe over his shoulders, fingers lingering lightly on his skin. "I don't want you to suffer."
He reaches up and pulls the hair stick that keeps his topknot up from his hair and it falls to his waist, clumped together because of the water and he tries wringing it out with his hands. "I'm not suffering."
Perhaps, in a way, one could call it that, but he has chosen the path he will walk, and in good and in ill he will walk it to the end.
He kisses her forehead and then each knuckle on her right hand in turn. "Does my wife have sesame candy? Or will I be poor, bereft, and hungry?"
She laughs, "We have not fallen so far in the world, love."
Love.
She has never said that to him before, though she did not need to.
"Say it again?"
"We have not fallen so far in the world?" There is a crinkle in between her eyes, but she has not said what he wanted her to say again.
"I meant 'love'," he tells her. "Lo—"
She shoves sesame candy in his mouth, and he laughs so hard he nearly chokes.
That year, just after the Mid Autumn Festival, Retsu-chan marries a craftsman, a carpenter who built boxes and bridges and little children's toys.
Hasuyo-ba is over the moon with the thought, for while the man is not incredibly wealthy, craftsmen are better looked upon in the world than merchants, and the trade is an honest one.
He is part of the party of young men outside the gate tasked with making sure that the groom doesn't get inside until the proper hour.
He is not terribly good at riddles, not like Kusakabe-sama is, but Hiroto had told him it would probably be enough to stand there intimidatingly while listening to the sound of tens of firecrackers going off all at once.
The groom and the groomsmen haven't tried to break in yet, so he will count it as a bonus.
He cannot say that it is working exactly, but the crowd seems to be amused by both it and the show he'd put on, what few words he'd spoken, and content to stay outside until the auspicious hour arrives which is the important part.
Kimei squeezes through the crush of people holding the front door, between the laughter and the fireworks to tap him on the shoulder. "Hisa says the bride is almost ready."
He glances at Hiroto on the other side of the gate, and mouths the message to him. The bride's almost ready to leave.
Hiroto nods, throwing up his hands. "The auspicious hour is here!" This brings cheers from the gathered crowd outside, firecrackers pausing for a moment as the horns start to play.
On the other end of the walkway, Retsu-chan exits, dressed in red, holding a round fan before her.
Hisa walks beside her cousin, though only as far as the end of the inner courtyard, handmaids guiding Retsu out the rest of the way.
Hiroto cups his hands around his mouth as the crowd parts for Retsu. "The bride is leaving home!" Someone lights another string of firecrackers, and up ahead, the groomsmen lower the front of the bride's palanquin. "Let's make some noise to wish her well!"
In the noise, Hisa's hand finds his elbow, and he turns to her. "Hisa?"
"I wish her well," she says simply, leaning slightly against him. "A thousand years of fortune."
He throws an arm around her. "Hasuyo-baa chose well."
In the end, no one can say for certain whether a marriage will bring good or ill.
One can guess, one can plan, and one can calculate, but no one can say for certain what marriage will bring.
One can only choose and hope.
They stand there, just inside the gate for another moment, watching as the last of the crowd disperses, and the last red remnants of the firecrackers flitter away in the slight noontime breeze.
Later that autumn, Senju Hashirama comes to call on him instead of Hisa. He lets the man in.
They even end up having tea in the sitting room.
He does not know when it has come to this, but he knows that after visiting the capital and going home to write his proposal song in peace, Anija had doubled back once again and made another visit to Danmai and the Senju clan, presumably for the company of the man currently sitting on the other side of the small table.
When and how did it come to having tea with Senju? He cannot even begin to guess.
"Well, I thought that perhaps…" Hashirama sighs, unusually serious for once. "To prove that we've really mended fences, I would name my first son after you."
He pauses there, letting the words repeat themselves back and forth in his skull. "Me?"
In his own honest opinion, Senju Hashirama is probably better off naming a child after Anija than himself, but—
He's come to recognize that he has no idea what goes on inside the man's head and therefore no frame of reference for how to understand what Hashirama means by anything.
There's something far too genuine about the man that makes his head hurt.
"Well," Hashirama says and frowns while looking into his teacup. "You're the reason the feud has ended, and I think that's as good a reason as any, wouldn't you?"
He doesn't see it, but Hashirama seems very enthused by it.
"Does your wife have no protest to this?" He doesn't know how they carry out feuds in Water Country, but he assumes it's just as vitriolic and terrifying as it is in Fire Country, full of just as much hatred, othering, and spite.
Uzumaki Mito agreeing to name any child of hers after him seems… unlikely.
Hashirama laughs. "Mito-love has said she would not mind it as long as the name didn't turn out incomprehensibly ugly."
"Ignoring how your wife feels about it…" It's hard, sometimes, to remember that Tobirama is related to this man who talks at trees and flowers and suffers so earnestly every emotion he has ever possessed. The only comfort in the whole process is the realization that Tobirama and Hashirama are half brothers, one di — the son of the big madam — and one shu — the son of a concubine. "How does your brother feel about it?"
Hashirama's smile droops slightly, tinged with rue. "How well do you think Tobira has taken it?"
That does make him laugh. The image of Senju Tobirama scowling over something so inconsequential and yet so important leaves him short of breath. "Only if you promise that if the first child is a daughter, she'll be named after Hisa."
There's any number of names that could arguably be inspired by them both.
It needn't be that obvious or ugly sounding.
Hashirama raises his gaiwan at him. "A deal is a deal."
And even though deals are signed in wine and blood and not tea, he still somehow believes in this particular deal.
A.N. Things...progress, as they do.
In other news, I will be starting my summer job tomorrow! I am very excited. I'll be working at one of the research labs on campus!
Thank you so much to everyone, your continued enthusiasm for this fic series continues to astound and delight me.
~Tav (Leaf)