Well here we are! I was planning this one awhile ago but the last two chapters really made me wanna write them lol. So here you go, Gene is sick and Mai has to take him to the doctor, Naru has to watch Midori at work and things don't go as intended. Enjoy!

21-Sick Day

"I know you have to work today, but Lin is here, right? He can help you get work done while you watch her," Mai said as she dropped the diaper bag on the couch. She was holding her four year old on her hip who whimpered into her shoulder. "Besides, if Gene's contagious, I don't want Midori to get whatever he has."

Naru was about to counter with the fact that if the boy was contagious then it was likely that they all had the sickness in them, but thought better about it when he heard his son crank with a hoarse voice. The sound alone was enough to send a pang through the man's chest. No man wanted to hear his child in pain.

"Besides," Mai continued, adjusting the boy in her arms, "when Midori grows up do you really want to hear her complain about how we brought Gene here more than her?"

"We've had both of them here before," Naru countered as he placed a sleepy eighteen month old on the couch. "There's no reason for her to get upset over Gene coming with us to work before she was born."

"Tell that to an irrational six year old," Mai smirked as she swung her purse over her free arm. "If she's anything like Yukie, then she's going to be upset that we didn't invite her to our wedding." She grinned as she remembered that tantrum Monk and Ayako's six year old had earlier that week. "After his appointment, I'll call you and depending on what the doctor says I might need you to take Midori home tonight."

"That's fine," Naru said with a sigh as he walked his wife to the door. "I'll have Lin lock up and I'll be home after my last appointment."

Mai smiled as he opened the door for her. "Thank you, Naru. I'll see you tonight." Naru closed the door behind his wife and walked back to the couch where Midori had adjusted to sleeping with her butt up in the air. She looked comfortable enough, as he laid a blanket over her he decided she should sleep for a while.

He was grateful that his office had a very good view of the couch if he left the door open and went in to do some paperwork. Lin came into the office shortly thereafter, having dropped Chao off at his daycare for the day. "These files has all of the information we have of our potential clients this afternoon," the tall man said, before retreating to his own office.

For the next half hour Naru worked diligently to make sure he had all of his facts in order to properly interview his potential clients. But something began to eat at the back of his mind. Something telling him he was missing something. Something wasn't quite right. It finally bugged him enough to look up from the file he was reading and now he understood.

Lin seemed to have closed the door when he left the room. Swearing under his breath, he rushed to the door. But it was rather quiet, he noticed, Midori was probably still napping. She was known to take long naps at home, why would the office be any different?

As you might have guessed, Naru opened the door, only to swear again at the empty couch. At some point he had once heard the saying "Silence is golden," but found out very quickly that whoever said that never had children. Silence wasn't golden when you had two small children, especially one being a toddler. No, silence was definitely suspicious.

"Oh Midori," Naru half groaned as he came out into the common room of the office. The eighteen month old must've decided she wanted to explore unattended. "I'm going to have to find the babygates," he muttered to himself as he silently cursed his stupidity for not setting them up before his wife dropped off the toddler.

The only sign of the little girl was her shoes that she kicked off. Now the office wasn't very big to begin with, and the front door was still closed, not to mention the knob was still a little too large for Midori to wrap her sticky fingers around. She had to be somewhere. And then it hit him.

Briskly, he paced to the kitchenette where he found his daughter. How she had managed to climb onto the counter and stand on the handles of the faucet, just so she could lick the window behind it was beyond him.

My daughter's a window licker…literally…Naru thought with a look that was rather a cross between disappointment and distraught. "What on Earth are you doing, Midori?"

"Indo, Mama!" At one point, Naru honestly could not figure out the garbleygook the spouted from the mouths of babes no matter how hard he tried. Though he honestly never really tried hard enough, at least until he had children of his own. And even now he was convinced he would only be able to understand his own children's gibberish. "Iss Mama!"

Kiss Mama, he translated in his head. At least that explains the licking.

He had picked up Midori and held her to his right side as he brought her out of the kitchen. Her wispy light brown hair (like her mother's) had once been up in two almost feather like pigtails on her head. Due to her nap and natural thinness of her hair, they were lopsided with the left's hair tie threatening to fall out completely.

So much for her taking a nap most of the day, Naru thought bitterly as he placed the girl on the couch and rummaged through the diaper bag. Midori rolled to her hands and knees and crawled over to him, completely removing one of her hair ties in the process.

Finally finding what he was looking for, a hairbrush, he lifted the girl up so that he could sit down. The couch had been perfect distance from the coffee table for him to place Midori (standing up), between his legs to keep her from running off while he fixed her hair. Couldn't have her running around looking wild as she did, could he?

"Papa! Pay!" Midori exclaimed trying to dislodge herself from her captor as he ran a brush through her static filled hair.

"No play, Midori," Naru said firmly as he grabbed the hair tie that had fallen to the floor as gathered the hair that belonged in it. The toddler continued to squirm and crank as he continued working. After a bit of effort the left side of her head looked more presentable. Naru gave an audible sigh. "Your mother is much better at this than I am."

"It's still a strange sight." The voice had caught the man by surprise. Looking up he saw the bleach haired monk he'd come to call his friend, struggling to not laugh.

"Midori's squirming? She's always been like that," Naru commented, trying to retie the right pigtail, only to have the girl jerk her head away that he almost pulled out a chunk of her hair.

"No, you doing your daughter's hair, though I must say you're failing miserably," Monk smirked, mimicking a tone the younger man had come to know was mocking his own.

"You want to try?" Naru offered the brush to the monk who took it and pulled Midori over to him.

"Midori! If you stay still long enough to fix your hair, Uncle Monk will give you a piggyback ride!" Monk told the girl excitedly, her eyes grew wide as she nodded furiously. Monk smiled and quickly pulled up the other half of her hair into its own pigtail to match the other side.

Once he was done, Midori turned around and hopped up and down with her arms up. "Uh! Uh!"

"Up you go!" Monk said as Midori squealed in laughter as she was lifted to the man's shoulders. She knotted her chubby hands into his blond hair. Monk turned around and grinned at the younger man sitting on the couch. "Mai texted me, I can't stay too long, but if you want to get some work done without interruption I can stay for the next hour."

"Long line at the doctor's?" Naru asked, standing up. Monk nodded.

"Yeah, a lot of kids seem to get sick around the end of summer vacations," he commented before galloping into the kitchenette making horse noises to Midori's pleasure.

Naru was silently grateful for the extra hand as he walked back into his office. He wasn't sure why watching his daughter was such a chore today. He had watched Gene at the office countless times, why was he so antsy this time?

Then he remembered that usually Mai was there with the boy at the office. Where they could both take turns parenting the child. Once in a while he did have to watch Gene alone at the office, but that didn't start happening until he was nearly three and verbal boundaries could be set easier. Midori was half that age and was still learning the concept of "no." With his only backup being Lin, he stood no chance in getting any work done.

At least she understood that faster than I did, he thought as he sat back down in his office. A little light flashed on his cell phone and he opened the waiting message from his wife.

Doctor's is taking longer than I thought. Let you know when we go in.

Still not in yet, sent Monk to help you. M must be running amuck! :)

The texts were sent twenty minutes apart, but Naru couldn't help but smirk. She knew he wasn't going to get anything done, so she took initiative. And warned him even though he didn't have his phone.

He put the phone down and went back to his paperwork. All too soon did Monk have to leave, handing the toddler back to her father. She waved goodbye to the monk as he left before turning back to Naru with a grin on her face. "Nack!"

"You're hungry?" Naru asked quizzically as the girl hopped up and down in his arms, flailing her own.

"Rawbewy! Rawbewy!" With a sigh, Naru walked out of his office and toward the kitchenette. He opened the fridge to see the lunchbox Mai had packed with snacks. It was mostly filled with strawberries, as that was the only thing Midori seemed to want these days.

With one hand, he pulled out the Tupperware from the lunchbox and opened it revealing strawberries cut up to bite size pieces. Midori nearly squirmed out of his grasp as she reached for them. "Calm down, you're going to get some," he chided, holding the bowl up to her reach. She shoved her chubby hand into the bowl and pulling out some berries before shoving them in her mouth.

"I see you've learned your manners from your brother," Naru commented dryly as his phone rang in his pocket. He went to put down the bowl, much to his daughter's displeasure. "I'm not putting them away, I just need to see if this is Mama." Sure enough, it was. "Moshi, moshi."

"Hey, they still haven't seen us yet," Mai's voice rang through the speaker, as Naru wedged the phone between his cheek and shoulder so that he could hold up the bowl to Midori.

"I thought you made an appointment?" Naru asked as he walked into the common room, placing the bowl on the coffee table and Midori right in front of it.

"I did, but it seems they triple booked the time slot on accident," she explained with an exasperated sigh. Naru could hear a rather painful sounding cough in the background. "They are also short staffed today and four kids chose the perfect time to puke. I'm in the waiting room with Gene and believe it or not he actually took a nap on my lap."

"At least one of our kids took a nap."

"Midori woke up right after I left, didn't she?"

"Managed to squirm off the couch and climb onto the counter in the kitchen so she could lick the window," Naru replied with a smile. He heard his wife chuckle on the other end.

"Oh! Naru, they're finally seeing us," Mai said breaking her laughter. "I actually wanted to call you to let you know I'm pretty sure the pack 'n play is still in the closet of my office."

"Thanks, I'm going to need that," he replied, looking over to see a pink splotch all around his daughter's mouth and chin. "I'll see you tonight."

"Love you!"

"Love you." He hung up the phone and noticed the strawberries were all gone. He gave an odd look to the little girl in front of him. "You ate all of that?"

She grinned, looking up at him with wide hazel eyes. "Pain, Papa! Pain!" She held up her juice covered hands and Naru looked down at the floor in front of the girl with a sigh. She had smushed the strawberries into the carpet to "paint" it.

"Midori…" he half groaned as he shook his head. He picked her up and carried her to the kitchenette to clean her up. He sat her on the counter so that he could wet a washcloth. Looking back at her he had the fleeting suspicion that his wife must have been just like this as a child.

Then Midori shoved a finger up her nose and jumped when she realized it was her finger that was slimy and not her nose. She examined her finger about to stick it in her mouth as Naru caught it with the washcloth. Definitely, he determined, I certainly was not like this as a child.

Once she was cleaned up, he brought her into Mai's office. He put her down and she wandered around while he looked in the closet for the pack 'n play. Sure enough, there it was in the closet. Perfect timing too. Naru glanced at his watch and realized his first appointment would be there momentarily and he had to fix the carpet.

He set Midori in the playpen and went to grab the diaper bag. Mai had to have packed some toys for the girl to play with. Once the girl was settled, Naru went out into the common room to do something about the stain in the carpet. He ended up moving the coffee table over it and decided it could wait.

Ding-ding! Ding-ding!

Perfect timing indeed. Naru's first appointment had just walked in. He grabbed Lin from his office and invited the client to sit down.

Meanwhile, in the playpen, Midori was bored. She didn't want her teddy bear right now. No, she wanted Gene's green racecar. Her favorite one and she could see the tail end of it sticking out of one of the pockets of the diaper bag. If she could just tip over the pen-

Standing up, she put her hands against the netted wall and pushed with all her might, but got nowhere fast. She tried again and again, only to huff and push her face and upper body against it in her own dramatic way. Turns out that was just what she needed. The playpen began to topple over and Midori quickly rolled her way out of getting hurt and landed just outside of the fallen pen.

Her eyes lit up at her newfound freedom and she scurried over to the bag to fetch the green car. Now she was very happy lying on her stomach and driving the car around on the carpet.

Back in the common room, Naru managed to debunk virtually all of the man's claims, much to his dismay. Still, Lin took careful notes as always as he sat with his laptop. Naru leaned back with a sigh as the potential client left in a huff and a slammed door. "When is the next appointment?"

Ding-ding! Ding-ding!

Lin didn't have to answer as an elderly man waddled his way into the office. "I'm here to see Davis-san? I have an appointment," the man's voice wavered uncertainly.

"Have a seat, Sonozaki-san," Naru said gesturing to the empty seat on the couch.

Midori managed to doze off for a little bit in Mai's office. Not very long, but when she did wake up, she wasn't quite sure where she was. This wasn't her room. This wasn't her home. It looked a little familiar but not enough to settle her. She frowned as she sat up to see she was completely alone. "Mama?" she called quietly. "Papa?" Her frown deepened as tears welled in her eyes. She took a deep breath and-

"PAPA! MAMA!" she wailed, rubbing her eyes. She didn't like the stuff coming out of them, but that only seemed to make it worse.

Outside, all three men jolted at the sound of the cry coming from the closed office. Naru apologized and excused himself to retrieve his daughter. "Midori? Midori, what's wrong?" he called soothingly. "How did you get out of-"

But he didn't finish as his daughter's face, filled with tears and snot, flashed him a look of betrayed relief. "Papa!" she crawled over to him and he picked her up, but she wouldn't look at him.

He pulled out a tissue and did his best to wipe her face with her turning her head away every chance she got. "It's okay, I'm here," he said reassuringly. He tossed the tissue and rubbed her back in slow circles. "Want to work with Papa? You might as well since you're here."

He walked back out to the common room, with a calmer Midori. "My wife has our son at the doctor, so she needed to come with me for the day. I hope you don't mind," Naru explained sitting down in his seat and picking up the file he left on the table. "As you were saying, Sonozaki-san?"

Midori gave a sniffle as she sat on her father's lap looking quizzically at the file in front of her. A lot of words and no pictures. Too plain for her tastes. So she clutched her father's shirt and smushed her face into his chest. "How old is she?" Sonozaki asked after telling the rest of his tale.

"Eighteen months," Naru answered, looking down at the girl. "Midori, can you say 'hi' to Sonozaki-san?"

Midori lifted her face from his shirt and looked at the old man, who gave her a charming smile. She smiled bashfully and clung closer to her father, who only shook his head. "She's not normally this shy."

"Oh that's fine," Sonozaki chuckled. "I have a granddaughter a little older than her and she is the same way. She's also living with her mother in my house which is why I came here to ask for your help. She hasn't become a target yet, but I don't want her to be in danger if the activity continues."

"I'll converse with the rest of my team and we'll let you know our decision on your claim by tomorrow, Sonozaki-san," Naru said as Lin stood up to show the man to the door. Midori climbed up further on her father's torso to wrap her arms around his neck and squeeze tight. "What's wrong Midori?" he asked in a gentle voice, stroking her back.

His grip on the girl tightened when he felt her shaking. I hope she's not getting sick too, he thought as Midori rubbed her face into his neck. "Mama…" she cranked with a sniff. "Want Mama…"

Naru let out a breath and patted her back. She barely took a nap and Mai's not normally gone this long, he thought with a sigh. She's had a long day, I wonder if Mai's has been any better.

He pulled his phone out of his pocket, which he had put on silent before his first client came in, and saw he had a voicemail. He placed the device to his ear to listen to it.

"Hey, we're heading home from the doctor's now," Mai's voice rang through the slight static that comes from talking on the phone outside. "I just realized you're probably with a client right now so you won't get this until later, but I need you to pick up Gene's prescription for me. He has strep and I don't want to keep him out longer than I have to. It should be ready by the time you're finished up but if you can't get it I can always see if Keiko can pick it up for me. Thanks, love you!"

"Mama?" Midori picked her head up and looked curiously at the device in her father's hand. Naru knowingly smiled.

"Yes, that was Mama," he said quietly as he slid the phone back into his pocket. He glanced at his watched and determined that the prescription must have been ready by then and headed for his wife's office. "Lin, I'm going-" He didn't finish what he was going to say as he saw the room had been tidied up by his assistant.

"Go home. Run whatever errand Mai gave you. I'll write up the reports and we'll discuss Sonozaki-san's claim tomorrow," Lin said handing Naru the diaper bag that was all packed up.

With a smirk, Naru said, "Thank you. I'll see you tomorrow."

He made a stop at his own desk to grab his keys but was out the door moments later. Shortly thereafter, he was walking into the apartment he shared with the rest of his family with an exhausted Midori in his arm. It was so hard being little.

He found Mai in the kitchen stirring some type of stew over the stove. She greeted him with a kiss and gushed over the tired little girl. They managed to swap places with him stirring and her taking their daughter. "Here you go, Mi-chan!" Mai cooed, buckling the girl in her high chair and handing her a sippy-cup of milk. She ran a hand through her still short brown hair and took the wooden spoon from her husband. "Thanks, but I got it, go see Gene he's wanted to tell all about the puke he saw in the doctors office today."

"They didn't clean it up before they saw you?" he asked with a raised brow.

"They tried, luckily we weren't put in one of the rooms they were cleaning, but we happened to pass a room where a kid was still puking," Mai replied with a sigh as she continued stirring. "It's all he wants to talk about and I finally dodged the subject by telling him I had to make dinner. Now he's on the couch waiting-wha-"

"Papa Mama iss!" Midori exclaimed from her chair.

In the midst of Mai's rant, Naru realized just how much she had to deal with when watching one child let alone two. Granted he also knew the struggle having watched Midori at the office for most of the day, but it honestly gave him a better appreciation for the woman. Maybe that was why he turned her to face him and kissed her.

Then again, maybe it was a certain deceased medium who gave him the nudge to go through with the motion.

When they broke apart, Mai looked up at him in confusion. With a face straighter than he meant to give, he said, "Have I told you how much I appreciate you?"

Mai couldn't contain herself as she laughed out loud. Naru didn't take the reaction personally, he knew it was her way of releasing stress. Wiping a tear from her eye she calmed down and said, "You know, I could stand to hear it more. Now go and see your son! Dinner is in ten!"

She pushed him out of the kitchen with Midori giggling at the both of them and all Naru could do was smile.

Poor Midori, it's so hard being little. As for the way she speaks (pronunciation of words that is and omitting them) I got that from my own experiences in babysitting and stories my mother tells about me. That also included some of Midair's actions (I occasionally babysit a set of twins who like to stand on either side of a glass door and lick each other through it. Their dad walked by and just said "my greatest creations are window-lickers" and I laughed so hard).

Hope you enjoyed! Let me know what you think!