Happy Birthday Shi-chan: Part One

The boys stared at Shiori in disbelief.

“Two... two days?” Iruka muttered, “but... alone?”

Kakashi held the dishtowel he'd been using too tightly in his hands.

Shiori leaned on her cane, having just gotten back from a meeting. She nodded and looked at the floor. “Yes,” she whispered, “the teacher that was supposed to go had to cancel for some reason. They don't have anymore from Kingdom that can go and someone from the English departments needs to be there. I'm apparently the most qualified.”

“Why can't we go with?” Kakashi asked insistently.

Shiori let out a breath, “Because you need to be here and I guess no one's allowed to bring anyone with, even spouses.”

Iruka's tan skin took on a pink tinge with being suggested that he and sempai were spouses. He knew that most people weren't aware of their relationship so arguing her not going alone would have been hard in and of itself.

Kakashi glanced at the blushing Iruka. He would have let the math sensei go with Shi-chan if the teachers going had been able to bring husbands or wives. He doubted the two of them trying to go would have worked at all. But now neither of them going was making him nervous. Shi-chan's health had been better since they were so good with making sure she took her medicine and put her to bed when she was supposed to go, but it still wasn't easy the thought of her away and with people she didn't know that well. The fact that it was driving back from a teacher thing that she was in her accident in the first place made it even harder.

Kakashi was drawn from his internal moping by the feel of a thin arm around his side. Shiori had walked over and hugged both her boys so tight. “It's just two days,” she whispered, “it's less time than Iruka was gone at State. One of the Kingdom teachers has offered to drive so I won't have to. I promise, I'll be all right.”

Iruka made a sound but didn't fight anymore. He snuggled against Shiori, “well... you better call a lot.”

Kakashi nodded and hugged them both as tight as he could.

Shi-chan chuckled, “I will.”

The three stood in the kitchen just being close for awhile before dealing with getting Shi-chan ready to go and working more on the impending school year.

***

The morning that Shiori had to go Kakashi was already up making breakfast. He'd not slept more than a few moments at a time. He was sure he was being over protective but it had been a long year first year together and it still wasn't done yet. Still, being a worry would just make Shi-chan upset and he wanted her focusing so she'd be safe.

Iruka sniffed from his spot under the stolen covers. Did he smell pancakes? He sniffed again. No, it was French toast! The brown haired math sensei opened his dark eyes and looked around. Shiori was still asleep on her side of the bed, but the middle of the bed was suspiciously empty. With a stretch Iruka slipped from his side of the bed to see what was up.

He peeked into the kitchen and saw Kakashi finishing up a breakfast that would be too much for the three of them. He saw how much had been cooked and how most of the dishes from cooking were already washed and figured Kakashi must have been up for awhile now. Instead of interrupting Iruka headed back to bed to wake Shiori gently.

The rest of the morning was a blur of trying to be normal while still getting ready. Before they knew it, Shiori was getting into the car of one of Kingdom's history teachers and waving slowly.

Despite the unhappiness with their little fox going away there really was a lot of work to do. And then Iruka realized what date Shiori would be getting back on, her birthday. Once that was realized the boys cheered up some as they raced through their school prep, still doing it right of course, to take the time to make sure that Shi-chan's birthday would be extra special.

***

Two and a half days later, Shiori was getting out of the car and grabbing her things to head inside. The conference had actually been really interesting but she missed her `Ruka and sempai badly. She was a little confused why neither came out to help her but wondered if maybe they weren't home.

As Shi-chan stepped inside the house, the first thing she noticed was the house's scent. It smelled wonderful. The red head inhaled what she thought was bar-be-que pork and apples, one of her favorites, along with veggies and. . . what was the sweet thing she smelled?

Shiori set her bag down and made her way towards the kitchen. It was while doing this she saw how clean the house was. Granted they didn't let it get too messy but it was noticeably cleaner than normal, things were even dusted. Her first question in her mind was, `okay, what got broken?'

Hushed voices met her ears as she rounded the corner and stepped into the kitchen. He mouth fell open a little with shock.

Standing at the counter was Kakashi and Iruka, both of who looked like they were arguing over, was that a tube of frosting? The rest of the kitchen, surprisingly, was as clean as the rest of the house. On the stove were a few suspicious looking covered pots with the burners turned off and the table was set nicely but not extremely fancy.

Still not realizing what was going on, Shiori worried over what could have happened to her laptop.

A soft clearing of her throat and both men froze. Almost comically slow the pair turned their heads to look over their shoulders to see where the sound had come from. Both then quickly dropped the icing to the counter and ran for their little fox.

“Shi-chan!” Kakashi exclaimed as he hugged her tight and practically picked her up off the floor. Iruka hugged her just as tight and nuzzled against her cheek, “you're re early.”

“Uh no,” Shiori chuckled, “I'm half an hour later than I'd said. The red head giggled as she watched Iruka and Kakashi exchange a look then look to the clock on the wall.

“Oh... oops,” Iruka said with a hand to the back of his head.

“Yeah,” Kakashi was a mirror of the math sensei.

“Uh, so what broke?” Shiori asked them and both boys looked confused again.

Shiori kept from rolling her pale blue eyes, “dinner, dessert, the house is cleaner than it's been in years.”

Iruka giggled and nuzzled their fox, “you don't know, do you?”

“Know what?” Shiori asked softly.

Kakashi giggled too and nuzzled their foxes other cheek, which was now freckling from her blush, “It's Shi-chan's birthday!”

Shiori blinked, “It. . . today?”

Iruka and Kakashi both nodded with big smiles.

“Oh,” Shiori blushed and tried to see the calendar. Her freckles stood out even more as she saw the marker drawn birthday hat with little hearts on the spot for today. She'd gotten her days mixed up and well, wasn't really paying a ton of attention, whoops.

Iruka giggled and started to move Shi-chan to the table. “We made your favorite,” he grinned, “and Choji helped us make a cake yesterday.”

That must have been what they'd been frosting. The red headed sensei felt a little bad. She really wasn't hungry and wanted nothing more than to crawl in bed with them and go to sleep. She poked at Kakashi to see if the boys had really slept okay while she was gone or if they were just as tired.

A sheepish look from the sociology sensei confirmed they'd barely slept too. “But it's your birthday,” he argued softly.

Iruka nodded from his spot crouching next to the seated Shiori. “We're always either late or early because of school and that one year we missed it until Kakashi's birthday. We really wanted to do something for you on your actual birthday for a change,” he said softly.

Shiori reached up to pull Kakashi down to the level she and Iruka were at then she kissed each of them in turn, “you did. You made me feel all special just for coming home. But do we really want to fall asleep in pork and apples?”

Kakashi and Iruka shook their heads. “We should at least finish frosting,” Iruka stated and Kakashi nodded rapidly.

Shiori chuckled softly, “okay. Do you want help?”

Now both boys shook their head. Kakashi scooped Shi-chan up off the chair and started to carry her back to their bedroom.

“Hey! I thought you were frosting!” Shiori protested with a fresh blush.

“I will, but you should be getting ready for bed,” Kakashi said as he set her on the bed and got out a summer nightgown for their little fox.

“All right,” Shiori said as she took what was handed to her, raising an eyebrow at the fact this was the one she'd mostly stopped wearing because it had been washed so many times you could half see through it.

Kakashi put his hand at the back of his head with a chuckle, “well, we missed you.” Then was gone as he went to “help” Iruka finish frosting the birthday cake and get the food in the fridge.

Shiori indulged them with a deep blush as she changed into the nightgown Kakashi had given her. With a quick brush to her now unbraided hair she got under the covers.

Kakashi smiled as he worked with Iruka. Both dealt with Shi-chan's cane and school bags too. Iruka snooped into her bag to check her medicine and see if she'd taken it all. She'd not taken the muscle relaxant for at night because she didn't like to travel with the needles but it looked like everything else had been taken, she wasn't known for tossing meds that she `forgot' to take.

With a kiss to Kakashi's cheek while he took care of the last of the things in the kitchen Iruka went to give Shiori her medicine for now and get ready for bed himself. He felt a little bad because she was half asleep already but then blushed like crazy when he saw what she was wearing. The used to be red but was now a pale pink nightgown settled over her body nicely. As quickly as he could without being rushed or hurtful the blushing math sensei gave Shiori her injection then covered her back up.

Kakashi took a minute in the kitchen for himself. It was like he was letting out a breath he'd been holding for two days straight. Watching Shi-chan leave had been physically painful and then to have the worry of her health and safety on top of it had been almost too much. The normally stoic fuzzy headed teacher leaned over the sink and cried silently in relief. He wasn't meaning to think on all the things that had gone wrong this past school year but they had haunted him non-stop since she'd left. The image of those bastards finger marks around their fox's throat, the call in the middle of the night of Tenten and Neji's attempted abduction just watching Shiori's health worsen from the stress and what that did in turn to Iruka. He tried to let it all out now before he went to get into bed with them. They didn't need to think on these things now.

He touched the piece of jewelry that had their three birthstones in it. They each had a different piece and it was the only thing they wore to show their togetherness. His was an earring, of all things, Iruka had a bracelet and Shi-chan had a pendant. Most of the time you couldn't even see them but with small exceptions, like Iruka being swim coach, they never took them off.

“Way to bring down a birthday, Kakashi,” he sighed at himself. He did one more thing before he went to bed. He flipped to the next month on the calendar and scribbled something on the last night of the festival, it would mark one year since he'd told and he intended to d something special. He let the calendar fall back into place then quickly went to bed.