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“Masumi… Masumi… Heeeey, Masumi…”
Masumi was dragged out of sleep by Natsuki poking at his face. He groaned and tried to bat her hand away, squinting at the bright light shining through the tent walls. Damn, he’d meant to get up earlier today. Natsuki giggled.
“You’d better get up, or Natsuki will get a head start!” she said, scrambling out of the tent.
Masumi blinked a few more times in the wake of her enthusiasm. He pushed himself up onto his elbows, and then pressed a hand to his head as his vision got fuzzy for a second. Great, this was just what he needed right now. He dug around through his stuff for a bottle of pain meds, finally finding it stuffed under an old hand towel. Nearly empty. He would have to remember to get more the next time they were in a town, in case Natsuki ever needed them. He took two pills, grabbed a protein bar, and slowly crawled outside.
Natsuki was crouched down near the fire circle, poking at something with a stick. She bounced up excitedly when Masumi emerged from the tent, but he wordlessly held a hand up and propped himself against a tree to eat. Natsuki sighed and crouched down again, though now she had abandoned the stick and was just staring at Masumi. The sun was already almost overhead. Masumi felt more tired than hungry, but he tried to finish his protein bar quickly, even as it scratched his throat going down. He stifled a few coughs into his sleeve and took a sip of water, very aware of Natsuki’s puppy-dog eyes in the corner of his vision.
When he finished, he cleared his throat and managed not to sound too raspy as he said, “Alright, let’s head out.”
Natsuki sprang to her feet and dashed to the edge of the clearing.
“This time, Natsuki will beat you to the treasure!” she called.
“Wait–” Masumi started, before breaking into a dry coughing fit.
Natsuki ran a little farther into the woods, and then stopped and turned back with a confused look. She’d clearly expected Masumi to run after her and try to jokingly elbow her out of the way, like usual.
“Masumi, are you okay?” she asked.
Masumi walked over to where she was standing.
“I’m fine,” he said shortly. “Just tired.”
Natsuki looked doubtful, but didn’t push any harder, and the two of them continued walking in the direction of the cave they were making for. Masumi tied his bandanna over his nose and mouth, just to be safe. It wasn’t like he hadn’t pushed through worse. Especially when he was a kid and couldn’t keep up well at the best of times. This wouldn’t be an issue.
Masumi’s headache softened as they got moving, but it was small comfort. They had gotten vague directions to the cave system a few days ago – how many miles north it was, the landscape around it, what the entrance looked like, that kind of thing. Masumi had been sure he’d remember them. He was pretty sure he remembered… some of them. At least he knew the general direction they needed to go, but his compass swam in front of his eyes every time he looked down at it, and the constant glancing between it and the ground and the horizon was starting to make him dizzy.
Wait. Natsuki was waving her hand in front of his face.
“Huh?” Masumi said.
“Natsuki can use the compass this time!” She said brightly.
Well, she had used the compass a few times before. It would be good practice for her.
“Sure, knock yourself out,” Masumi said, and Natsuki took the compass and began studiously following the little red needle.
Honestly, Masumi was relieved to have an excuse to lag behind a bit. Just focus on putting one foot in front of the other. Just focus on the ground in front of him, on any rocks or tree roots that might have tripped him up. Just focus….
Natsuki stopped abruptly, which Masumi failed to react to fast enough to avoid walking into her. Natsuki was looking around the forest, her eyebrows scrunched together.
“Um, Masumi? How far was it supposed to be?” she asked.
Masumi tried to remember.
“About a mile? Maybe a little less?”
Natsuki’s face fell.
“We’ve been walking for a really long time… Natsuki thinks we might have gone past it…” she said.
Had it actually been that long? Masumi checked the sun. It looked like it was already well into the afternoon. When had that happened? Maybe he was more out of it than he’d thought.
“Nothing else to do but go back, then,” he said.
He turned around and started walking in the opposite direction, when his foot caught on something and sent him sliding down a small ledge. It wasn’t a large enough fall to really catch him off balance, but he sank down to the ground anyway as his vision started to spin. He could vaguely hear Natsuki’s footsteps as she hurried to where he was. He tried to get his feet back under him, but he ended up leaning on Natsuki as she lifted him up.
“Masumi, something is wrong!” Natsuki said.
Masumi took a step away from her and took a deep breath, trying to clear his head.
“Yeah, alright, I have a cold,” he admitted. “It’s not gonna get in the way or anything, I’ve done this before. And I don’t feel that bad–”
Natsuki interrupted him, her hands on her hips.
“So you do feel bad, then!”
“This is just how treasure hunting works, Natsuki,” Masumi said, and started to walk unsteadily back the way they’d come from. “If you’re not taking advantage of the first opportunity to get a treasure, someone else is. You can’t let that chance get away just because you feel bad.”
Natsuki stomped her foot, then stepped purposefully in front of Masumi, blocking him from going any further.
“But if Natsuki was sick, you’d take care of her, right?” she said.
Yes.
Obviously.
Masumi tried to push past her.
“Well, idiots don’t catch colds anyway, so I’m not worried about that,” he said, with a poor attempt at a teasing grin.
Natsuki blocked him again.
“Great!” she said, beaming like the sun. “So Natsuki won’t catch yours then!”
And then Masumi’s vision flipped as Natsuki wrapped her arms around his waist and lifted him over her shoulder faster than he could react. He scrambled to get his bearings and make a protest, but he just ended up breaking into a storm of coughing. He kept his eyes on the ground and tried not to get too nauseous as Natsuki steadily made her way back to their campsite.
When had she gotten so strong, anyway? She’d always been full of energy, but Masumi remembered back when he had first found her, she’d get exhausted after walking for more than 15 minutes. Not that she’d always recognize it – that or she’d try to resolutely keep up as she got even more clumsy than usual. (Had she gotten that from him?) Regardless, she always ate a lot – Masumi had been a little annoyed at having to buy not just twice as much, but sometimes three times as much food as he had used to when it was just him. But he guessed that, plus all the exercise, had done Natsuki a lot of good.
While he was thinking about this, they arrived back at camp, and Natsuki unzipped the tent, deposited him inside, and brushed off her hands, grinning and barely out of breath. Masumi lied down and waited for his head to stop spinning. It didn’t. He sat up anyway.
“Natsuki…” He cast around for something to say, some kind of objection to raise, although he wasn’t even sure why he wanted one. “...Do you know how to take care of a sick person?”
“Well…” Natsuki’s cheeks puffed out for a moment, but then her expression softened. “Masumi, you seem really, really tired. You should just rest… and Natsuki can make dinner later!”
Masumi was tempted to respond “can you?” but his voice finally failed him and he lied back down again and looked vacantly at the tent roof. Natsuki pulled the top flap of his sleeping bag over him, then stacked his old blanket and a clean towel on top of that. Then she left, zipping the tent up behind her, and Masumi drifted.
When he drifted back into consciousness, it was darker in the tent. He lied there with his eyes closed, content to listen to the distant noises of a fire crackling and cookware clanking that filtered in through the tent walls. Soon they were joined by something like the smell of meat cooking, and Masumi realized that, unlike that morning, he was actually very hungry. He sat up and noticed that most of the dizziness was gone too, although his whole body ached and his throat felt like something died in it. With his head clear, he also remembered that he hadn’t packed any fresh meat.
He crawled out of the tent in search of answers and possibly food. On his way out, he grabbed the towel Natsuki had stacked on top of him and folded it in front of the tent to make a place to sit. The sky was still relatively bright, but the sun had gone down behind the trees and it was starting to get cooler. Masumi couldn’t help feeling a twinge of disappointment that he’d wasted almost a whole day sleeping.
Over by the campfire, Natsuki was scooping something from a saucepan into two bowls. Two tin cups sat on the wire shelf over the fire. Masumi coughed, and Natsuki looked up.
“Masumi! See, Natsuki made dinner!” she said excitedly, although her smile looked a little nervous.
She handed Masumi a bowl, which turned out to hold somewhat charred rice, and… was that…? Masumi poked at it with the chopsticks Natsuki handed him next.
“You know you don’t have to cook jerky right…?” he said weakly. “It’s already been cooked.”
“Oh….” Natsuki’s face fell. “But it’s still good right? Natsuki thought it smelled nice….”
Natsuki crouched down a little ways in front of Masumi and turned on the puppy eyes again.
Well… it hadn’t smelled bad, and food was food, and Masumi was hungry. And he remembered his own first attempts at cooking for himself had been less than ideal. He dug in without much more hesitation. It really wasn’t half bad. Natsuki sighed with relief, which quickly changed to alarm as Masumi started coughing badly.
“Are you okay? Do you need help?” She hit her fist against his back a few times, which did exactly nothing.
“Dry,” Masumi rasped out after managing to get down the bite of food he’d been chewing.
“Oh!” Natsuki exclaimed, her worry apparently forgotten. “Actually–”
She hurried back to the fire and reached for the two tin cups, then rapidly yanked her hand back and scrambled for two hand towels to wrap around them. Once she got them off the fire, she got out two packets of instant hot chocolate and stirred them in, a little roughly. She handed one cup to Masumi with a sheepish smile.
“You were saving those for when we found the treasure, right?” she said. “But Natsuki wanted to make you something nice, since you’re feeling bad.”
As bad as his throat felt, Masumi just sat there for a moment letting the hot drink warm his hands through the towel. It was pretty nice.
“Wasn’t really saving it,” he said, and finally took a sip to soothe his voice.
Natsuki smiled and started drinking her share. She sat down next to him on the ground.
It wasn’t like it was a lie. Sure, he’d gotten into the habit of only making treats like that after a score, but he hadn’t actually said it was a rule. This wasn’t anything special anyway, just the same shitty cheap stuff he always got, the same kind his old crew had always given him, when they found it in their hearts to give him anything. He’d bought a whole box of it all for himself after…. Anyway, Natsuki loved the stuff. In a way, he figured, it was sort of like she’d grown up with it.
The two of them sat in comfortable silence, drinking their hot chocolate, eating Natsuki’s cooking, watching the sun dip below the horizon.
Masumi woke up naturally the next day. He sat up slowly, testing himself. No headache, no nausea. His throat still felt a little scratchy, but when he called for Natsuki to wake up, his voice worked just fine.
Natsuki, on the other hand, groaned miserably, and only after Masumi had shaken her a few times. She had scrunched herself down into her sleeping bag so that only her face was sticking out. She cracked her eyes open maybe an inch, then just said “No,” and rolled over and coughed a few times.
“Well. Guess we’re not going treasure hunting today either,” Masumi said, and went to dig out the painkillers again.
After a few seconds he heard Natsuki turning back around, and felt her tugging at the back of his shirt. He turned around to see Natsuki with a wobbly smile on her face.
“Hey… Masumi, you have to tell Natsuki she’s smart now,” she said, giggling wheezily. “Because… because you said… idiots don’t catch colds. So Natsuki must be really smart, right? You said so.”
Had he said that? Most of the previous day was kind of a blur, but it sounded like something he’d say to brush off concern. He sighed and patted Natsuki’s forehead.
“Yeah, yeah, alright,” he said. “I’m proud of you, Natsuki.”