Chapter Text
It started with Inosuke, surprisingly.
“What’s that thing you do?” he asked, as forward and gruff as always.
“What thing, Inosuke? I do a lot of things, you know,” Tanjiro replied with the patience of an older brother talking to his kid sibling. He’s petting Nezuko absentmindedly, the demon girl in her smaller form nestled partially in his lap.
“Y’know, that thing,” Inosuke replied unhelpfully. Tanjiro rose an eyebrow, giving Inosuke a look.
The feral boy sputtered, looking as offended as a glassy-eyed pig head can. “You know Monjiro, the thing where Nezuko” -Tanjiro ignored the younger boy’s refusal to pronounce his name correct and instead nodded in approval at the correct pronunciation of Nezuko’s name- “where Nezuko lays there and you pet her and shit.”
“You mean…” Tanjiro paused, incredulous. As someone that had grown up with five clingy younger siblings, he couldn’t even imagine not being smothered with affection half the time. Really, the only reason he’d remained half-sane was due to Nezuko, in more ways than one, but her affection had kept him from promptly bursting into tears every time someone hugged him, and even with her and Zenitsu’s constant clinginess, he’s still touch starved. “You mean cuddling?”
When Inosuke nodded slowly, the question was so apparent in his posture that Tanjiro could half imagine his mildly confused expression.
Tanjiro gasped. “Inosuke! You’ve never cuddled someone before?! Have you at least, like, gotten hugged recently?”
The raven haired boy tilted his head. “Uh, ‘hugged?’ Is that a fighting technique or something?” The last part was said with an excitement that would be rather concerning if it was anyone other than Inosuke saying it. The question was weirdly innocent in the way he said it though, so curious and clueless.
“You’ve never been hugged?! Inosuke, that's really bad for you!”
The boy in question still managed to look incredibly lost, so Tanjiro huffed, reaching out towards Inosuke. “Come here, dummy.” Surprisingly, Inosuke didn’t protest, and waited for Tanjiro to move his sister before letting the lighter haired boy envelop him in a tight hug. Inosuke melted into the touch more like a cat in the sun than the ferocious boar he acted like at times, but started to squirm after a few seconds.
“Monjiro, stop ittt,” he whined.
“Stop what?”
“Making me tingly and hot ’n shit,” he growled, and Tanjiro’s mouth formed a small ‘o’ shape before he replied, “I’m not doing that. You’re just touch starved.”
“Well,” Inosuke hissed crossly, “how do I get it to stop?”
Tanjiro thought for a moment, casually and automatically rocking both of them back and forth gently. “Well, you should really just touch people more,” he mused, and upon seeing his friend’s eager expression, sighed and added, “and I don’t mean fighting, Inosuke. I mean, like, hugs and snuggling.”
This, surprisingly, didn’t seem to dampen Inosuke’s mood too dramatically, and he certainly took longer than necessary to get up.
This somehow became somewhat of a ritual for the two boys and Nezuko, and eventually Zenitsu, who joined one day after a particularly grueling mission, promptly fell asleep, and just kept returning after that. It went like this: every week or two, at some point, they somehow acquired time to relax for a bit. This somehow managed to culminate with one person dragging a blanket or two over to the others and finding a quiet space to sit down together, whether it be the butterfly mansion, the wisteria inn, or even just a campsite they set up for the night.
Zenitsu remarked one time that it was then that Inosuke was the most subdued, that he was quiet when he was with them like that. Inosuke replied hazily, “eh, ’s warm. It’s hard to be mad when it’s warm.”
One day, they were resting comfortably in the Wisteria Inn. Tanjiro had created a blanket nest on the floor of the boys’ room, and was sprawled out in it, Zenitsu curled at his side, the boy’s arm cast haphazardly over Tanjiro’s collarbone. Nezuko was at his other side, face pressed to the side of her big brother’s chest. Inosuke, in a typical Inosuke fashion, was curled up on top of them, head resting across Zenitsu’s side and spread across the other two, body resting on Tanjiro’s stomach. They were discussing their most recent mission in a soft tone, a battle against a high-level demon that thankfully hadn’t turned out to be a kizuki as had been feared by the report. It did end up meeting its end by Muichirou, who then stuck around after for a bit and was resting in the inn as well. Thankfully, injuries were minimal, and the worst damage was done to Nezuko, who had just been sleeping it off.
The four were half-asleep when Muichirou ambled in, in his usual apathetic state. He blinked slowly at the drowsy pile of teenagers before him, uncertain of how to respond or react until Tanjiro reached out, making grabby hands in the mist hashira’s direction. The younger boy seemed to accept this invitation without much issue, accepting the absurdity of it all without much processing time, shrugging and grabbing a blanket that had been thrown off the nest during its creation. He came to sit at Tanjiro’s feet, and it didn’t take long for the younger boy to relax, curling almost happily into the body heat of the others, head resting against inosuke’s body.
Although Muichirou couldn’t be with the other four most of the time, he was always willing to join in on their cuddling sessions after that, when he was able.
“Muichirou!” Sanemi called, sliding open the youngest hashira’s bedroom door with a rather loud “bang”. “I need- eh?” The wind hashira stopped in his tracks, a bit shell shocked at the sight before him. There was a large pile of blankets and pillows and futon mattresses layed out in a large pile on the ground, Muichirou hugging Tanjiro, who lay skewed off a bit to the side and under at least two blankets, Zenitsu visible as well, and a suspicious lock of dark blue hair peeking out from under yet another blanket.
“What the fuck are you doing, Mui? You’re a hashira for god's sake!” he growled. One of the blankets shifted, and a very sleepy looking Giyuu, hair down and framing his face messily, poked his head out from under it. He tossed the blanket off of him slightly with the motion, revealing Nezuko, Genya, and Kanao as well, all sound asleep.
“Leave or join,” he stated groggily. “We’re sleeping.”
Sanemi left that day feeling extremely befuddled.