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"I didn't mean to trouble you," Natsume says for the fifth time on Saturday morning, lurking guiltily in the corner of the kitchen.
"It's no trouble at all!" Touko said, apparently perfectly willing to brush off his concerns over and over. He knew by this point that he was being an added nuisance on top of everything, and yet her voice was still warm. "Actually, I'm glad you're going to see him. I'm worried about him, living by himself. It doesn't seem completely safe right now."
"He's—” Natsume shut up immediately, gaze darting to the hallway before he brought it back to Touko. "I'm sure that he's fine," he said. "He's been living alone for a while, and he has a manager and...assistants, and stuff."
Hiiragi, out of sight over Natsume's shoulder, made a quiet noise that might have been a stifled snort. She didn't seem upset at his slip, but still, he should know better.
"Even so," Touko said, "it's not a bad thing to check up on him. I'm of half a mind to come with you, but I wouldn't want to put him out." She put cooling packs around the last of the preserves and shut the basket carefully, hefting it in one hand with a careful look on her face. "There, that doesn't seem like too much. There's just enough room on top to fit a little something extra—let me just get something thrown together."
Natsume, who'd heard her planning under her breath what to pack the night before, smiled slightly and leaned against the wall. "He'd tell you not to go to the trouble, you know," he said, but he could feel himself smiling.
"Of course he would," Touko said, returning from the refrigerator. "He's such a nice young man, but..." Here she did pause, and Natsume watched, alarmed, as she turned away from him. "I can't help but feel like we owe him a debt of gratitude," she said, quietly. "I know it's silly, but I can't help it."
Natsume's chest tightened, as a hoarse cry of pain echoed through his mind for the millionth time since that afternoon almost two weeks ago. "I know what you mean," he admitted.
"Thank you for agreeing to come, Natsume," Hiiragi said as he headed towards the bus stop into town. "I've been trying to remind him to rest, but..."
"I'll do what I can," Natsume promised, basket tucked behind his legs at the bus stop. "Hiiragi, I—”
She waited a polite several seconds after he cut himself off before asking, "Yes?"
"What happened..." Natsume said, jaw tight. "Do the other shiki...think it was my fault?"
There was a long silence. Wind rustled through the grass along the street.
"We haven't really talked about it," Hiiragi said. "But...I don't know why their opinion should matter to you in the first place, Natsume."
"They're his friends," Natsume said, and then huffed, and corrected himself, because it was a little more complicated than that. "Well. He matters a lot to them. I undestand if they're upset, anyway."
"Well..." Hiiragi shifted, the rustling of her kimono just audible to him over the early winter breeze. "We don't always talk very much about that sort of thing. But I, for one, am glad that you're coming to visit Master today."
Natsume sighed, and nudged the basket with his foot. "It really is the least I can do."
The walk up to Natori's flat was quieter than usual. Nyanko-sensei had finally stopped pretending that Natsume didn't know he'd stowed away in the basket, and would occasionally hop down between his shoulders and the top of it to avoid notice, only to almost overbalance Natsume by jumping up again. Hiiragi wasn't very talkative, not that she was normally. And Natsume didn't bother with the intercom at the front of the complex, instead punching in the code that Natori had given him and letting himself upstairs.
"Can you let him know I'm coming?" Natsume asked Hiiragi, suddenly uncertain. Ordinarily, he would ask himself, but... "Or check to see if he's busy? Or resting?"
Hiiragi looked at him for a long moment, unreadable as always, but then nodded and vanished through the wall. Natsume waited, hearing voices on the other side of the door. Not sleeping, then.
Then there was a rather large-sounding thump, and he jumped, lunging for the door before he knew what he was doing. The handle refused to turn under his hand, but then he heard a few more thumps, accompanied by a clacking noise, rhythmic and getting closer.
When Natori opened the door, on crutches but under his own power, Natsume couldn't help but feel relieved.
"Natsume," Natori said, sounding surprised, but then his usual charm kicked in. "I wasn't expecting you so soon. Please, come in. I'm deeply sorry about the mess."
"It's fine," Natsume said automatically, hurrying to take the door so Natori could start navigating back out of the genkan. "Sorry to disturb you."
"You're no disturbance at all," Natori said easily, even though Natsume had meant it more in the way of politeness than an actual apology. "Come in, sit down. I'll get some tea going."
The impression of a calm, controlled host was marred a bit by the occasional grunt as Natori tried to navigate around the piles of papers that were stacked in various areas of the apartment. The fact that several of them had already fallen over, some fairly catastrophically, showed that he'd been having trouble. Understandably—the full-leg cast was quite a barrier to smooth movement, and the extra space he needed for the crutches weren't making anything easier.
Natsume caught up with him three steps into the apartment, where he was trying to bend over to remove some boxes that had fallen right into his path. It was obvious, now, what the thudding noise from earlier had been.
He maneuvered around Natori. "I'll get it," he said.
"You don't—” Natori began, but was barely balanced as he was, and Natsume had already moved most of the mess out of the way. Natori sighed. "Thank you."
"You should go sit down," Natsume said, scoping out the path to the couch. "I can make tea instead, if that's all right."
"That's...fine," Natori said. "You shouldn't have to bother, but if that's what you want, then okay."
Natsume threw a smile in his direction, and then spared a glance for the shiki. He could feel their eyes on him, but they were making themselves scarce in shadows and corners. If they disapproved of anything he'd done since entering, they weren't making it easy to tell.
He went to Natori's kitchen, navigating through the mess. It would have been hard to miss that it was worse than usual, with different boxes strewn across the countertop and dishes, disposable and not, stacking up in the sink.
Natori's place was usually covered with work-related items, but otherwise reasonably clean. Natsume washed and dried a couple of mugs while he waited for water to boil, and found teabags in the back of one of the cupboards. Once the water was done boiling, he could hear the sounds of shifting coming from the living area.
When he came back, Natori was sitting on the couch with his leg up on the table, flipping through some papers with an absent frown. "Ah, Natsume. Thank you. You really didn't have to."
"It's fine," Natsume said again, automatically. "Oh, Touko-san brought some things, too. I hope you like fruit preserves?"
Natori sparkled at him a bit. "I'm sure everything your guardian makes is delicious, Natsume."
Natsume bristled slightly—he didn't like when Natori did that—but couldn't argue, because it was true. Instead, he pulled out the lunch Touko had stacked on top of the preserves, and went back to the kitchen to find some plates.
Natori, who'd seemed to be ignoring him before, leaned over to give him an odd little frown when he started plating up the leftovers that Touko had prepared. "She wanted to feed me too, did she?"
"I think she's worried about you," Natsume said quietly, but paused what he was doing. "Are you not hungry, Natori-san?"
"I didn't wake up all that long ago," Natori began, but then faltered. Something on Natsume's face must have seemed off, because Natori sighed and added, "...but I could eat, thank you. I'm sorry if I upset Touko-san with all this."
Natsume set the plate on the table and settled back onto his chair. "I don't think you did anything wrong, Natori-san."
"Didn't I?" Natori's smile was twisted, not his charming one at all. This one didn't even try to reach his eyes, though. He looked...tired. "I put you in a great deal of danger on our last outing, Natsume-kun."
Natsume shook his head, feeling his eyes prickle. He'd gotten used to the sensation the last few days; it wasn't to the level where it would show yet. "That wasn't your fault! If I hadn't—”
"You saw something...someone...in danger, and you reacted. Of course, it was a spirit, not a human, and they didn't care that the mountainside under them didn't exist anymore, but..." Natori sighed dramatically, but his smile hitched a little higher. "I swear, you were ten times more relaxed about it than I was, when it was happening. How many high places have you fallen from?"
Natsume's gut curled guiltily. "U-um...probably more than I should."
"One would be too many," Natori said, all mock-severity. "You sprang up right after like it was nothing, too. You had me carried away, too, for a moment..." And Natori grimaced again.
Natsume remembered the moment too, though he was sure it had left a more vivid impression on Natori, if not a clearer one. Nyanko-sensei had wandered off in search of the spirit who'd actually been responsible for the reports Natori had been sent in on, and hadn't been there when Natsume leapt for a spirit that hadn't seen an attack coming for it. It had been an illusion—a projection of the past, and the landscape had changed since then, stable mountainside replaced with a fragile ledge. He'd already started falling before he'd figured that out, and then there had been a warm and insistent hand around his wrist and Natori had slammed into him, wrapping his body around Natsume's without a second thought and taking the brunt of the fall.
"I didn't realize what had happened," Natsume said quietly. "I've fallen from a lot of high places, but...I've always been okay somehow."
"Ah, to be young." Natori sighed dramatically as he picked up his plate. He didn't seem very upset, though. "To be fair, this is the first time this has happened to me, too. Spirits can be dangerous, but they're usually a bit more...direct. If that makes sense."
"It was an accident," Natsume said quietly. "I think."
"I agree with you," Natori said. "Well, next time, maybe we'll be able to face who we're dealing with properly."
"I..." Natsume paused. "I can deal with it, Natori-san."
Natori shook his head. "After how this last time turned out, I'd be more comfortable if you didn't try going back there on your own. They're spirits; they can wait a few more weeks. Or months, as the case may be."
"...All right," Natsume agreed, quiet. "If that's what you want."
"You're such a good boy, Natsume," Natori said, and sparkled at him.
Natsume rolled his eyes, ignoring the moment, and moved on. "How are you doing?"
"I'm...hanging in there," Natori said. "I mostly feel bad for my agency. It's been hell moving my schedule around to fit. And there aren't very many exorcisms that it's safe to do on a bad leg, either."
"I...see." Natsume hung his head, staring down at his lap. "I'm sorry for all the trouble, Natori-san. If you hadn't tried to save me..."
"Hey."
There was a clink as the plate was set back on the table, and a shuffle, and a clunk, and then a warm hand on his head. Natsume looked up to see Natori patting him on the head, looking tired but kind.
"This wasn't your fault, Natsume-kun. I was the one who invited you out in the first place, and it was an accident. There's no need for you to blame yourself."
"But..." Natsume didn't want to argue, didn't want to be more of a problem, but Natori was just wrong. "You got hurt trying to help me."
"And that was my choice. You didn't do anything to make it happen." Natori's hand scrubbed through his hair a bit harder. "I would've felt about ten times worse if you'd been the one to get hurt, believe me. Though...maybe this was only my arrogance. I get the feeling might've been fine if you'd just gone down on your own, somehow."
"Maybe," Natsume said. At the very least, he now had a better track record at falling safely than Natori did. "But...thank you." The words felt awkward and heavy in his mouth, but not because he didn't mean them.
It wasn't that he was ungrateful for Natori's help, and the last thing he wanted was to throw that back in his face, but at the same time...every time he looked down at the cast, his stomach folded in on itself yet another time. It wasn't a nice feeling.
"Well, I'd say 'anytime,'" Natori joked, pushing himself back up and away again, "but let's maybe try to keep that to a minimum from now on. Discretion is the better part of valor, and—ah."
It was a remarkably calm sound for the clatter that came next, as Natori slipped and gracelessly flopped down over the arm of the chair that Natsume was sitting in. Natsume, galvanized to action by the clattering crutches, reached out and managed to secure Natori where he was before he could slip backward and collide with the coffee table.
"Oops," Natori said, and tried to sparkle again. Ironically, it was even less believable than usual from up close.
"Natori-san," Natsume said, worried. He reached out and almost grabbed the side of Natori's face, heart pounding. "You have a fever!"
"I...ah," Natori said. He began the process, more carefully this time, of pulling himself upwards. "Indeed. Well. It's...a side effect, mainly, of the medication."
Natsume reached down and grabbed the crutches where they'd fallen, propping them against the chair, and slung Natori's arm over his shoulder instead. It wasn't as hard as it had been in the wilderness, even if the furniture of the living room provided obstacles.
"He's sick," Hiiragi called, out of sight. There were faint sounds of a supernatural scuffle before her voice continued, louder. "Some disease got into it before they set it. The doctor gave him medicine and he's been taking it, but the doctor said to rest and he's not resting."
Natori made an annoyed noise, mouth pressed into a thin line. Shadows stood out sharply under his eyes when Natsume glanced back at him.
"Is that true, Natori-san?" he asked, though he already had a pretty good guess.
"I've spent weeks resting already," Natori said. "There's a certain amount of organizational work that can't be ducked out of once you're an adult, even when you're trying to take it easy."
"I see." The adult part he had very little frame of reference for, but Natsume kind of doubted the resting bit. Now that they were so close, he could feel Natori trembling, and heat radiated off him in a way that had Natsume concerned. "You should be in bed though, Natori-san. I apologize for interrupting your rest."
"He wasn't—oomph!" It seemed the other shiki had grown tired of Hiiragi's perceived disloyalty, as the sounds of a scuffle overtook her voice.
"Play nice, you three," Natori called out, tired, and the sounds stopped. Natsume hoped that Hiiragi wasn't going to be treated too harshly by the other two, but he suspected that all of them had more important things to worry about at the moment than squabbling.
Natori was remarkably tractable as Natsume pulled him upright and tugged him back to his bedroom, which he quickly discovered was even more of a disaster than the living room had been. He'd been told before not to snoop in Natori's things, and had seen the sheer volume of documents and artifacts that he kept in his living space, but items seemed to have multiplied and scattered themselves around since the last time he'd been here. It was a struggle for both of them to make it through the narrow walkway of clear floor to the bed, and Natsume had to lift a few stacks of papers off its foot before he could settle Natori on it and help him lift his cast onto the bed.
"It's a mess in here," Nyanko-sensei commented. "I've never seen a home where the owner is more likely to curse himself by accident. And I knew Reiko."
Natori coughed. "All the more reason I should be up and doing something about it."
Nyanko-sensei huffed. "Yeah, like that's been doing well for you so far."
Natori gave him a pointed look, and Natsume hurried to intervene. "Do you need anything, Natori-san? Medicine, something to eat? Some water?"
"No, I'm fine," Natori said. "My next dose of medicine isn't for several hours."
"Maybe you can sleep till then?" Natsume suggested.
"I'm not tired," Natori sighed, and Natsume stared at him for a long moment before biting his lip. Something in his look must've seemed off, because Natori cocked a brow at him.
"Sorry," Natsume said, still fighting back a chuckle. Natori had seemed for a moment like a pouting kid, or a sulky mid-level youkai. "Maybe just try resting for a moment? It can't hurt. I'll get something to cool you off for the fever."
Natori gave him a long, dour look, but eventually leaned back with a sigh, settling in. Natsume went to look in the kitchen for a bowl and a washcloth.
By the time he got back, Natori was asleep. It took Natsume a moment or two to really believe it, but Natori didn't so much as twitch when he set the basin down by the bed. Natsume looked around, a little lost, and found Nyanko-sensei giving him an opaque, judgmental look. He took way too much advantage of being a cat sometimes.
Natsume sighed to himself, silently, and wrung out the rag as quietly as he could before laying it on Natori's forehead. Natori turned his head a bit, and grimaced, but otherwise didn't respond. Natsume shook his head; Natori must have truly been exhausted.
He watched Natori for a few more minutes, noting the dark circles and red rims around his eyes, the way his chest rose and fell a little too quickly for normal sleep. Then Hiiragi drifted in and started staring at him, and after a few moments he got up and left the bedroom, gingerly righting a few scattered piles as he went and shutting the door behind him.
"How long has he been like that?" he asked. He turned to look at the others, Urihime and Sasago, as they came drifting into view as well. "Please. I want to help."
"He came back from the hospital with medicine," Hiiragi said, and then turned sharply as Urihime started drifting menacingly in her direction. "He's been taking it, but he's sick anyway. He's been resting, but perhaps not enough."
"It's more than he usually rests," Urihime cut in, still glaring daggers at Hiiragi.
"Humans need to sleep to heal," Hiiragi shoots back. "Does he look healed to you?"
"If he needed help with his tasks, he would ask," Urihime said, loudly. "You presume too much—”
"Shh!" Natsume hissed, automatically, and the three turned to look at him. "You'll wake Natori-san."
"Sorry," Hiiragi muttered. The other two looked mutinous, but Sasago spoke, breaking the silence, her voice was much softer.
"If he'd wanted help, he would have asked," she said to Natsume, polite but cold. "And he would have asked us before he asked you. He hasn't, by the way."
Natsume wasn't sure he'd heard either of them talk so much before. It was hard to tell how angry they were under the formal exterior. "I'm sorry," he said. "Humans don't always know how much help they need when they're sick. Nothing I'm doing is going to hurt him. I just want to help."
"You're invading his privacy," Sasago began, and Natsume shook his head.
"No! I'm not, I promise. I'm not going looking for anything Natori-san wants to keep secret." He paused, feeling his hands curl into fists at his sides. "I just want to help," he said again, quietly.
"...We're here as well," Hiiragi said, and it was unclear whether she was speaking to Natsume or the room in general. "We'll make sure that our master's secrets stay protected."
"That's fine," Natsume said, relieved. "There are some things I want to move around, if that's all right, so if you could tell me what's safe, that'd be a big help."
Hiiragi didn't answer right away, instead turning to Sasago and Urihime. She glared between them both for a moment, and then sighed. "Fine."
Natsume smiled, and moved toward the first stack.
Natori was in his apartment, and he wasn't alone.
That much would have been normal—he usually had at least one shiki on call, if needed, so he was used to having company. Audible company, on the other hand, was significantly less usual.
Spine prickling, wary, he pushed himself up on one elbow, and winced when something wet brushed against his face. A cloth he hadn't realized was there slipped off his forehead and onto his pillow, but before he could investigate, he was distracted by something warm and solid and alive moving beside his knee.
He jerked backward, pulling away toward the headboard of the bed. His head spun with the motion, and he untangled one hand from the covers to bring it to his forehead. He felt better than he had, he thought blearily, but there was enough fever left to make him light-headed. What time was it?
What was in the bed with him?
"Go back to sleep, exorcist."
Ah. Natori felt some of the tension seep from his back, even as his eyes narrowed. "You. What are you doing in my bed?"
He felt a fwump as the rotund guardian spirit settled in again, bumping harder against his leg. "Pretending to be useful so I don't get roped into cleaning duty. Now do you want the brat to come back in here to fuss over you, or will you go back to sleep on your own?"
Natori considered it, briefly. Listened to the quiet, cordial voices and rustling of papers on the other side of the door, and glanced at the tiny strip of blue visible through a gap in the curtains. Took a deep breath, and picked up the washcloth from where it had fallen.
"Who knew a kitty like yourself could be wise sometimes," he said, re-covered his face, and went back to sleep.