I do not own Naruto or any of these characters aside from Gio!

Excuse typos~

-xXXXx-

"You know what I don't get?" Shisui asked, squinting down at the sheet of paper before him.

Itachi, leaning against the kitchen counter in Shisui's home, grunted, "Hn?"

"Hn?" Akane copied playfully, grinning at her brother. She was super excited they were finally home, mostly because she was having so much trouble with her homework that even her Daddy couldn't solve.

Shisui glared down at the ridiculously easy problems before him. "How I'm so used to calculus that I can't explain something as simple as this in third grader language. Help, Itachi?"

Itachi rose an amused eyebrow at his best friend-turned-boyfriend. "It's simplifying fractions, Shisui."

"Yea, but I can't remember how I used to do it," Shisui pouted his blue eyes at him. "And I can't explain."

Itachi sighed dramatically as he rolled his eyes and went to stand by Akane. "Do you know how to divide?"

"What's that?" she asked cluelessly. Itachi paused for a second and stared at the paper before pursing his lips in confusion.

"See?" Shisui demanded.

"Well, I guess there's no harm in teaching her now," Itachi said, leaning over the table.

"You're gonna break her brain," Shisui whined.

Itachi rolled his eyes but ignored him. "Akane, use your fingers and hold up six." She did as told. "Now, how many times can you put down two fingers?" She looked at him in confusion before he held his own hands out and demonstrated. "One...two...three."

"Ohh," Akane said, and then went ahead and finished the rest of the problem.

"Simplifying fractions is just something you'll have to remember," Itachi told her. "Using your hands at first will help you, but sooner or later you'll have to grow out of it, okay?"

"Okay," Akane said brightly, grinning up at Itachi. "Thank you, Itachi-nii!"

Itachi smiled at her. "You're quite welcome."

"You make me feel incompetent," Shisui complained as he gestured for Itachi to follow him into the living room to give Akane some silence.

"You're not incompetent," Itachi told him with a small smile as they sat on the couch together. "I've just had practice from Sasuke."

Shisui looked up sharply at the mention of the late young Uchiha, to gauge Itachi's reaction. Itachi seemed just as surprised as he was, but he couldn't help the light tremor that swept though him. He noticed the other's look and give Shisui an empty and so obviously forced smile.

"I'm alright," he said quietly. Shisui frowned and reached for his hand. When their fingers intertwined together, the first spot of color since Ame appeared on Itachi's face.

Shisui had been worried. When they got back from the rainy country, almost as soon as the village gates had come into sight, Itachi had gone through a change. The smiles he had been wearing- the blushes, the light in his eyes, the things Shisui thought were beautiful on him and was overjoyed over- all dwindled down into nothing. It was like a switch had been flipped, and Shisui could barely get any kind of reaction out of him. There were a few times, where he was distracted enough, when Shisui could get a smile or even a chuckle out of him, as small as they may be, but those moments were few and far between.

"You sure?" Shisui asked, and he leaned in and put his forehead against Itachi's temple. Itachi closed his eyes and sighed shakily at the contact, feeling the anxiety and panic stir at his insides, so close to boiling over.

"No," he answered honestly.

The wake was tomorrow. The funeral was the next day. He felt the panic rise.

"No, I'm not," he said then, and squeezed his eyes shut. Shisui threaded his free hand through Itachi's hair and kissed the corner of his eye. "Distract me?"

Shisui didn't even ask questions, just dropped the hand in Itachi's hair to wrap around his waist and pull him so that they were leaning against the back of the couch. Itachi leaned against his chest and breathed a deep sigh.

"Right, well, last night after Dad ordered take out, when you were asleep on the couch," Shisui began, lightly tracing patterns onto Itachi's back in case his story wasn't enough of a distraction, "...Akane came out of the kitchen with her hands on her hips, looking all bossy and whatnot, and she says to me, "Shisui! Go clean up your mess!" But I'm watching tv, and you were just so adorable that I didn't want to stop petting you," Shisui paused to grin at the flush on Itachi's face, "So I told her that it was Dad's food. But Dad got all pouty on me, and I told him I would eat the rest if he didn't put up his leftovers. So he went to put them up, and I'm sitting in here, still watching tv, whatever, and I hear a bunch of crinkling coming from the kitchen. I think, "oh, he just got out the tin foil, whatever," and go back to watching tv. But then the crinkling starts getting really loud, and there's alot of it, so I finally get up to go see what the hell he's doing." Shisui started shaking with supressed laughter and Itachi had an expectant smile on his face. "I look in the kitchen, and Dad's got his hands on each corner of a piece of tin foil, and he unrolled the piece to where it's nearly as long as he is tall, just for one to-go box that has a lid." Shisui was laughing out loud by now. "I ask him, "what are you doing?" and he says he's trying to put up the food, and I don't know, I guess he wanted to make some type of alien spacecraft with it or something, because that was a lot of metal."

Itachi was chuckling, now, and Shisui beamed down at him. "Your family is strange," Itachi said, looking up at him with a smile.

"You love us," Shisui declared arrogantly, and Itachi's smile grew.

"I do," he admitted.

Shisui smiled and leaned down to press a kiss to his cheek, and though it ended up being much closer to Itachi's lips than he meant it to be, he was fine with it and pulled back to play with Itachi's hair some more.

"We love you, too," he said gently. Itachi, ever the shy one, was, of course, blushing, but he smiled warmly anyways.

-xXx-

If they were to have gone by tradition, Itachi would have been the one required to arrange the wake and funeral. Luckily for him, Itachi thought as he sat in the front row, waiting with Shisui's family on the left side of the room and his mother's family on the right side, the council had put together everything for him. It wasn't so much as an act of kindness as it was just Itachi being absent on his mission and otherwise unwell enough to plan something like this.

Itachi sighed, his eyes darting up to the front of the room where three caskets lay, each facing north as was tradition. He quickly looked away, unable to bear the sight of them more than he absolutely had to. No, he wouldn't have been able to organize a funeral.

He was sitting on the right most seat in his row, and next to him sat his uncle. Akane sat between Tamotsu and Shisui. Itachi thought he would have preferred Shisui sit next to him, but it made sense for it to be his father's brother. They were all wearing traditional mourning clothes; mostly black in Shisui and Akane's case, but completely black in Itachi and Tamotsu's. They could hardly be called comfortable, but wearing anything else would be disgraceful.

The only bright color in the room would be the light kimonos his mother and Sasuke had been dressed in, the splash of colorful flowers near their caskets, and the bright green stuffed dinosaur in Itachi's lap, carefully cleaned of any bloodstains.

"We're about to start," Tamotsu whispered to Itachi, glancing back behind them. The rows were almost completely full and the number of people standing was rapidly dwindling. The clan priest made his way up to the front of the clan, and once he had the full attention of each individual in the room, he began talking.

He talked of their lives, of the people they each had helped, of how Fugaku and Mikoto had been excellent leaders for the clan and how Sasuke had been an excellent child. Itachi could barely bring himself to pay attention, mostly keeping his eyes on the green toy in his hands.

The priest finished with a few prayers that they all bowed their heads to. Itachi was the first to go. Tamotsu squeezed his knee for support before Itachi unsteadily rose to his feet, Sasuke's toy clutched tightly in his hand.

Walking to the coffins for what seemed like several minutes actually took just a few seconds. Itachi could hear his heartbeat pounding in his ears as he neared what he knew to be his father's casket.

Itachi finally came to a stop beside it and drew in a sharp breath. Aside from the deathly pale palor of Fugaku's face, he could have been sleeping. The hard lines of his face and the almost constant grimace had all but disappeared, making him look nothing like the man he had known to be his father. He had been dressed in his best kimono, which was a dark green color, and the right side was folded over the left alternatively to the way living people wore their clothes.

Itachi, unable to help himself, reached forward and spread his hand out over his father's cheat. Beneath the expensive silk, he could feel the numerous stitches over his father's heart. He briefly remembered the numerous times Fugaku had pushed and pressured him into being stronger, into gritting his teeth and pushing his way through, into keeping his temper under control and his head held high, into being more; the best he could be.

"You made me stronger," Itachi murmured, staring at his father's closed eyes. He removed his hand and took a slow step back before he bowed deeply. "Thank you, father."

To his father's right was his mother. She was dressed in a gorgeous white kimono; her wedding one, in fact, if Itachi recognized it from the pictures he had seen. Several delicate flowers had been laid around her, framing her soft features. There was a white cloth lightly wrapped around her neck, hiding the stitches Itachi knew to be there.

"Mother," he whispered, picking up the hand her wedding ring glimmered brightly on and pressing a kiss to the back of it. He released a shaky breath as he replaced her hand, and, as a last thought, curled her fingers around a lily he had taken from one of the ones surrounding her.

"As beautiful as always," he told her softly. He leaned in and kissed her cheek, and her scent- someone had sprayed her perfume on her, the scent he had grown up with and always associated with safety- made him falter. He hesitated, leaning his forehead against hers, and his dark eyes stared imploringly at her still face with all the desperation of a child without his mother. His eyes began to sting and he closed them tightly before forcing himself away from her before he could act on his instinct to crawl into the coffin and lay down next to her.

He stepped back and looked hesitantly at the last coffin, this one on Fugaku's left and so much smaller than the other two.

Sasuke had been put in a deep blue kimono Itachi hadn't even known he had. As his eyes raked over it, he couldn't help a pained smile. Well, it made sense that he had never seen him in it. Sasuke would never stand to wear something that fancy for more than an hour. A dark colored cloth similar to the one his mother wore was wrapped around Sasuke's neck.

He placed the stuffed animal next to his brother's torso, lifting one limp arm to curl around it. Had Itachi been alone, he might have entertained the idea that Sasuke was just sleeping; that his mother would tell him to wake up and get ready for school; that his father would be sitting at the table with his pipe and newspaper.

But he was not alone, and yet he still did not let that control his actions. He leaned over, smoothing the unruly hair out of Sasuke's face, and pressed a kiss to the cold skin there.

"I'm sorry, Sasuke," he whispered. "This is the last time."

And he had to bite his lip nearly to the point of bleeding to keep from sobbing out loud. With a last kiss to his little brother's forehead, he turned and quickly walked to the exit, unable to prevent more tears from falling down his face even in front of his entire clan.

He stood on the empty deck that surrounded the back part of the Nakano shrine, leaning against the railing that overlooked the river. His arms wrapped tightly around himself, he kept one hand clapped over his mouth to prevent him from crying out. He couldn't stop the tears now that they had started and his jaw ached with the effort of clenching it closed. He didn't know how long he was by himself, but it seemed like ages until Tamotsu had appeared, looking just as upset as Itachi.

"Oh, Itachi," he sighed, and rushed forward to drag him in to an embrace. Itachi trembled, his pitiful control on his emotions shuddering at the physical contact.

"It's never easy," Tamotsu whispered to him, tightening his grip on his nephew. "It will be very hard. But I promise," and then he pulled back enough to look Itachi in the eyes, "It will get better. As long as you try to be happy, you will be. I swear." Then the sound of the door sliding open made them both look over.

"Daddy," Akane wailed,dragging an equally tearful Shisui behind her out of the temple. "I wanna play with Sasuke!"

"Come here, baby," he said roughly, reluctantly letting go of his nephew to deal with his sobbing daughter.

"Hey," Shisui soothed Itachi as he approached, wiping the tears off his face but forgetting about his own. His cousin merely leaned into him, wordlessly asking to be held, and Shisui complied with his request despite the growing number of relatives making their way onto the deck.

After it seemed like the deck could not take anymore people, Tamotsu lightly touched his son on the arm.

"We're going back to the house," he said softly, leaning in so Shisui could hear over the murmuring. Akane was sitting on his arm, her eyes closed and pressed into a large wet spot on his mofuku.

Shisui nodded distractedly, preoccupied with stroking Itachi's hair and face.

"We'll be back sometime tonight," he murmured. "I'm gonna take him somewhere."

Tamotsu watched his boys with sad eyes before leaning over and pressing kisses to both of their heads, careful not to jostle Akane too much. "We'll see you later."

"Aa." Shisui watched as his father maneuvered his way through the crowd, and removed one hand from Itachi's person to wave back to his sister, who had opened tired eyes and waved goodbye to him. When he couldn't see them anymore, he looked back down at Itachi. "Do you want to leave?" he asked quietly.

"Yep, please," Itachi whispered, still pressed against him and drawing looks but not caring at all.

Shisui wrapped his arms securely around Itachi's waist, and he used the body flicker technique to jump them away from the shrine. Itachi wrapped his arms around Shisui's neck tightly until he felt them stop, and he opened his eyes to see that they were on the dock overlooking the compound's small lake.

"We could go get normal clothes," Shisui suggested, tilting his head so that his dark blue eyes met Itachi's. He tugged on the uncomfortable mourning attire pointedly.

Itachi looked up at him, his pale face still tucked against his neck, and glanced over longingly at the water.

"In a few minutes...?" he pleaded.

Shisui rolled of his eyes and threaded his fingers through Itachi's hair. "We can stay however long you want, Itachi."

Itachi looked up at him gratefully before pulling away slightly, keeping his hand in Shisui's and tugging him to sit with him at the edge of the dock. The water was too high for them to hang their legs off the edge and stay dry, so they sat with their legs crossed and looked over the edge.

"...Did you train here, too?" Shisui asked after a silence, looking out across the lake.

Itachi looked up too and a nostalgic look came into his eyes. "Who didn't?" he asked with a small trace of humor.

Shisui smiled a little. "I nearly caught this on fire," he said, tapping the wood of the dock.

Itachi gestured over his shoulder with a jerk of his head to the tree near the dock. "I nearly caught that on fire."

Shisui blinked incredulously at Itachi and the tree. Itachi smiled slightly. "How? It's way the heck over there!"

Itachi's smile widened a fraction and he turned back to the lake. "It was windy," he said with a shrug. Then he sighed, a trace of pain leaking into his expression. "...Father's clothes had to be replaced, though."

Shisui surprised him by letting out a loud snort. "You caught him on fire?"

The darkness in Itachi's expression lessened as he looked at his cousin. "The wind was blowing really hard," he defended with a slight pout. Shisui grinned at him and he found himself smiling back.

Shisui scooted closer to him and tugged him over so that Itachi was leaning against him. He rested his head against Itachi's and closed his eyes contently with a hum.

"... I watched Sasuke training here," Shisui said somewhat hesitantly. "Sitting in the tree you nearly caught on fire."

As expected Itachi tensed. But Shisui draped his arm over him and pressed his fingers into the tight muscles of his back to try to force out some of the stiffness.

"He didn't get it on the first try," Shisui went on, slightly encouraged by the fact that Itachi hadn't broke down completely in his arms. "But then again, none of us did. He had a pretty good spark going, though." He shrugged, jostling Itachi as he did so.

Shisui turned his head and kissed the side of Itachi's head. "He was good," he said. "Took him only a week of nonstop practice, even though he had Academy classes. Poor kid wore himself out." Shisui shook his head fondly, aware of how Itachi was now playing with his fingers and was no doubt listening intently. "But it all payed off. At the end of the week, his fireball was bigger than the one your father had shown him, and he could hold it for a pretty damn long time."

Itachi's face changed, and Shisui glanced down to see a rare proud smile. Shisui felt himself smiling as well. "Your father had that exact same expression on his face," he said, touching Itachi's cheek. "After the shocked look though. That was actually pretty funny."

Itachi looked up at him, and Shisui was surprised to see that the smile had morphed into something much warmer and... adoring.

"Shisui," he said, and then just shook his head and leaned forward. Shisui, though surprised, found himself automatically leaning forward to meet him, their eyes slipping closed as their lips met in a warm and wet kiss.

At the risk of sounding cliche, Shisui felt the world stop while he and Itachi shared this simple act. They pulled away from each other with flushed faces, dark grey eyes meeting dark blue, and their foreheads touched.

"I'm glad you're with me," Itachi murmured, relaxed in his arms.

"I could say the same," Shisui smiled, tucking a piece of hair behind Itachi's ear.

-xXXXx-

BTWs, for those of you who disagree, guys can totally wear kimonos, too. They're just a lot more plain than the ones the girls wear.

And yes, admittedly, I did forget about this story. *wears the cone of shame (yea, I saw that recently Q.Q)* If it wasn't for Danizaraki, there's no telling how long this break would have been. O.O So thank her! I command thee!

And now, as this chapter has depressed the shiat out of me, I will go hide under a rock and cry. Also, I love my parents, no matter how much of a pain they can be, and my siblings are absolutely darling. My little sister is my life. I don't think you understand the emotion an author can have writing something like this O.O We have the entire scene played out in our heads and we put ourselves in the character's position, and if I could express said scenes more efficiently, I'm sure you guys would be as emotional as me.

I took the ACT today. That crap was easy, but I didn't finish cuz they gave us like, no time.

Valete!

Edit: I'm helping convert a fangirl into a yaoi fangirl. *cackles evilly* I have corrupted you!