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It was around midnight when the coughing began.
Byakuya had tentatively settled into his own bed, dancing on the edge of sleep, but regret and worry had kept him from actual rest. He was kicking himself for taking Senku out and ignoring his worsening condition, and mentally marked the day as a failure of his parenting skills. The moment he heard the raspy noise, he was on his feet and swiftly on his way to his son’s room.
Senku was curled to the side, beads of sweat covering his skin and every cough shaking his small body. Byakuya went to step up to the bed, but froze with a dawning realisation.
He didn’t know what to do.
His outstretched hand quivered, unsure of where to go. Should he wake him? Fetch some water first? Should he check for cough medicine- was cough medicine even okay for children?
This was the first time Senku had gotten sick, and Byakuya now understood he was wholly unprepared.
A particularly harsh cough startled the man into motion, and he was kneeling by the bed in a flash, gently grabbing Senku’s shoulder and giving it a soft shake, grip tightening when he didn’t respond right away. A few seconds later, the coughs became muffled, and a single red eye peered out from under its lid. It searched around, before settling on Byakuya’s worried face.
“… n I wak’ ya?”
The quiet mumble was hard to make out, but Byakuya understood. A cheeky grin began to form, but it was dashed by more coughs, which the boy did his best to supress.
“No, I was still awake. Think you could manage some water? It should help.”
A small nod, which Byakuya took as a signal to help the boy into a sitting position. Once it seemed like he wouldn’t tumble from the bed, he quickly went to the kitchen to fill a glass. He snatched a box of tissues on his way back too, returning to find Senku wiping his nose on his arm, the change in position having released his blocked nose.
“Urh, let’s use tissues please.”
There were no protests when he sat the glass in his hands and held a tissue to his face, his ability to blow diminished by the still frequent coughs. He was doing his best to supress them by clenching his teeth, but without use of his nose he was quickly running out of breath. Watching him struggle was breaking Byakuya’s heart. He finished wiping his nose, then gently put his hand under the glass to help lift it.
“You don’t have to drink it all, just sip-”
The moment Senku began to drink, the coughs began again, sending water splattering everywhere. Byakuya caught the glass as his son let go to instinctively cover his mouth, but half the water had already been spilled.
“Sorry- sorry…”
Setting the glass down, Byakuya leaned in, rubbing circles on his back. Senku jolted forward with each cough, gaining brief reprieves to gasp in a breath every few moments, only to cough again. It was hard to watch, but he was at a loss for what else he could do for his son. Minutes stretched on, but the coughing slowly eased, and when there was more breathing that shaking Byakuya dared to breath himself.
“Are you okay to move?”
It was less of a nod and more of a tired drop of the head, but Senku managed to open his eyes enough to meet his father’s gaze. He tucked his hands under the boys arms, lifting him to his chest, where he could feel just how damp he was, both from sweat and the spilled water. As smoothly as possible, he carried him to the bathroom, setting him down next to the sink. He pulled off the damp clothes and tossed them by the washing machine, then ran a washcloth under the tap.
“…m... b… mb.”
He missed the words under the sound of the running water but caught site of the clumsy lips.
“Hm?”
He carefully began wiping the sweat from his face.
“...’uman ‘ody is dum’.”
Byakuya couldn’t help but laugh.
“Yeah, it can be pretty dumb. But it’s also just doing it’s best to fight for you.”
“I’shud fi’ bett’r.”
He rinsed off the washcloth, rung it out, and sat it on Senku’s head. A small hand rose to hold it in place as Byakuya turned to pull a set of pyjamas from the clean pile. The coughing picked up again as he dressed him, letting his concern rise. He picked up Senku once again, holding him to his chest, and made his way to his own bedroom where he grabbed his phone from the nightstand. Taking a seat on the bed, one hand rubbing circles, he did a quick search of the web for advice.
When 2am rolled around, Byakuya knew there wouldn’t be sleep for him. He’d managed to close his eyes for a while, but lying with Senku had caused the boy to overheat and earnt him quite a bit of shoving. Then the coughing started again. He replaced the washcloth, fetched more water, and soothed him back to sleep before resting next to the bed, head on the mattress. As soon as he relaxed enough to begin to doze, the sound of coughing startled him awake once again. This repeated on and off, neither of them managing to get past the second stage of sleep.
At 3:15am, Byakuya collected his laptop in the hopes of keeping himself distracted. Sitting in the dark, flicking through news articles and bits of his lecture materials had him feeling like he was back in university, using every hour possible to study for the next days test. Except, back then the only time he was pulled away in the dead of the night was to rescue a drunk roommate, and he just left the guy in the bathroom until the next morning.
When the morning finally reached a reasonable hour (7:10 was reasonable, right?) Byakuya chose to make a call to someone who was sure to be a lifeline in this situation. Maybe it was stereotyping to think of a woman, and maybe he was making assumptions when the saying about ‘idiots and colds’ came to mind, but having not joined any parental support groups really limited his choices. He pulled up the contact Senku had set up for one Miss Oki, and dialled the number usually only used for organising playdates.
I rang, once… twice… three-
“Good morning.”
“Ah, Morning. Hope I didn’t wake you.”
There was a soft laugh, “We like to start the day early. Did you want me to put Taiju on?”
“Ah, no- I was actually hoping to ask for your advice. Parenting stuff.”
“Oh?” There was shuffling and the sound of a chair being dragged, “Sure, how can I help?”
“Senku’s caught a cold, I took him out yesterday when I probably shouldn’t have, and he’s been coughing all night."
-Making rice porridge
-Feels sick
-Byakuya gets called to work? The Oki’s sit over, Senku isn’t too happy but convinces himself that he should be doing better and forces himself to push through.
-Lets make it sad hour time, because Senku is still trying to be logical ‘Oh obviously Dad needs to go to work he needs to keep his job and get paid, I mean I'm waisting time here my body should just do better I don’t need Byakuya around Im fine it doesn’t hurt Im perfectly fine but why does being alone feel so bad? It shouldn’t hurt but why cant Byakuya have some time off I thought we’d get to hang out.'