Work Text:
At the risk of looking less like a proper adult, Shiba will never – even under torture and fear of death – admit that he ate more meals at the Rokuhira house than by himself. In his defense, he traveled a lot and never had time to sit down for a meal which is why he snacks on a lot of grilled fish but he knows if he says that to Chihiro, he’ll likely lose at least five points of respectability with him.
When he ate with the Rokuhira’s, Chihiro always cooked. Sometimes, Shiba would bring something fancy like real crab meat for croquettes, or high grade beef for sukiyaki just as a sort of apology for always barging in without calling.
Chihiro never seemed to mind, always meticulously portioning out food for three people instead of two. When he plated everything at the table, all the portions were of equal size but Kunishige and Shiba would make it a game of who could sneak more food onto Chihiro’s bowl from their own, both of them insisting that Chihiro needed it because he was still growing and Chihiro would hide his smile behind his bowl of miso soup.
Shiba also becomes a believer of savory tamagoyaki after Chihiro makes it for them one time for lunch when Shiba comes over with too many containers of salmon flakes he got from the store right next to the hotel he had been staying at.
Chihiro puts them into the tamagoyaki he makes that day and Shiba hasn’t been able to go back since. After that, any other tamagoyaki just doesn’t taste right and Shiba has to start buying salmon flakes to go with his eggs, much to Azami’s puzzlement and mild disgust.
After Kunishige’s death, Shiba stops buying salmon flakes for his eggs and Chihiro stops cooking altogether.
This is because in the first year after Kunishige’s death, Shiba doesn’t allow Chihiro anywhere near the kitchen.
The first day after his dad’s death, Chihiro had woken up, began making breakfast out of habit, set the table for two, saw Shiba walk into the kitchen instead of his dad, and went catatonic.
The rage followed shortly after, and only after Chihiro comes back to himself does Shiba gently yet forcibly guide him to sit down in the living room. When he’s sure Chihiro won’t get up from the couch, Shiba goes back into the kitchen and cleans up the mess.
Neither of them talk about the way Chihiro had muffled his sobs – raw, ugly wails of grief too heavy for his still wounded body, his small boyish frame that did not know how to bear the loss of the only world he knew – as Shiba swept broken glass, smashed bits of miso soup and tamagoyaki into the trash.
When Shiba suggests they order take out for lunch that day, Chihiro can only nod.
It becomes an unspoken rule that they either eat out, or Shiba cooks for them.
Eating becomes a methodical task that Chihiro completes every day simply because he knows his body requires sustenance if he wants to continue to wield Enten and cut down the people who killed his father. He makes no complaints, or comments about any plate of food put in front of him no matter if it’s a local store’s specialty katsudon or Shiba’s sixth attempt at dried squid fried rice.
Shiba wonders if he should feel offended about that or not.
After Chihiro’s head wound begins to close up, Shiba teaches him sorcery and how to wield a katana.
Chihiro throws himself into practice, with all the razor focus of a boy who has lost everything so he clings onto anything to keep him afloat. He doesn’t try to make breakfast, or any other meal once he starts learning and Shiba isn’t sure if it’s because he’s too tired from training, or he’s trying to avoid anything that would remind him of his old life.
Shiba watches the wound on Chihiro’s head close up, and begin to scar, and tries to ignore the growing pit in his stomach that had been forming since the day he found Chihiro kneeling next to Kunishige’s dead body.
Chihiro doesn’t get better, per se but now that he has a goal again, he’s once again the boy Shiba watched grow up. There’s a sharpness to him that wasn’t there before, but it’s hard to stay wholly innocent and untouched by blood after you’ve plunged a weapon into another person’s body and killed them, regardless if they were yakuza scum or an innocent civilian.
Shiba doesn’t hear him cry anymore, all his grief having been channeled into a cool, simmering anger that boils just beneath a calm veneer.
Shiba has always known, however, that Chihiro wasn’t cut out for revenge.
Yet Shiba had been the one to give Chihiro the option to learn sorcery, had supported his efforts to learn how to wield Enten and kept his existence a secret from the Kamunabi because Shiba had wanted Chihiro to live.
It hadn’t mattered to Shiba what the method was, so long as Chihiro continued to have a will to live. So he helps Chihiro in his search for the Hishaku, watches the boy who was the son he never had cut down swaths and swaths of men, staining his hands and katana with blood, because he would rather have Chihiro cut down another man and live, than to lose him.
(Chihiro claims that it is his hatred that keeps him going every day, that the scar is a reminder of that day but Shiba has seen Chihiro kneel before a crying lost child to gently ask where their parents were, and then hold the child’s hand as they walked to the closest police booth together.)
The years pass and Shiba forgets the taste of tamagoyaki but memorizes the texture and chew of every type of grilled fish from the food stalls at the train stations they pass through.
He stops finding Chihiro standing in the middle of the kitchen late at night, awash in pale light that leaves him more specter than flesh and blood because Chihiro had another dream about making breakfast.
Shiba still cooks, or they eat out.
Chihiro still doesn’t say a word about Shiba’s cooking, even after eating Shiba’s twentieth attempt at dried squid fried rice.
“This fried rice kind of sucks,” Hinao says, three years later, her face scrunched up in a way that implies she does not want to take another bite.
“That means it’s healthy for you,” Shiba insists. “And Chihiro’s never complained about it.”
Hinao looks at him like she kind of wants to hit him over the head with the frying pan he’s currently washing. “That’s cause Chihiro’s too nice.”
“Well we don’t have anything else right now, and the café’s still closed, ain’t it?” Shiba points out, and Hinao makes another face, like she’s deciding which fate was worse: eating Shiba’s cooking, or starving to death.
Then her phone rings with a text. Hinao reads it, and her face brightens immediately. “Shiba, good news. We don’t have to live off your crappy –“
“Hey –“ Shiba tries to protest.
“- fried rice because Chihiro’s coming back with groceries!”
Shiba blanks. “What? But Chihiro hasn’t cooked in years.”
Hinao looks at him like he's the strange one. “What are you talking about? He’s been making meals for Char and Hakuri for a week now.”
“What?” Shiba says, again.
Hinao shrugs. “Char and Hakuri haven’t had any proper meals recently, all things considered, and Chihiro seemed worried about their health so he offered to make food for them when he was free. You know he makes some really good tamagoyaki?”
Yeah, they’re great with salmon flakes, Shiba wants to say but decides against it, mainly because he knows he’ll get into an argument with her about it and that’s a fight he’s doomed to lose.
As promised, Chihiro does return with groceries in hand, Hakuri and Char helping him carry everything in. There’s milk, bread, eggs, chicken and two bags almost overflowing with fruits and vegetables.
“Hi Mr. Shiba,” Chihiro greets him, while handing a bag of apples to Char. “How was your meeting?”
“Fine,” Shiba says, watching Hakuri pick Char up so she can place the apples in the fruits basket on the counter (“She likes to put the apples away because they’re her favorite,” Hinao whispers to Shiba in explanation).
“I was just about to start dinner,” Chihiro tells Shiba, handing Hakuri two bags of chips he puts away in a cabinet. “Char says she wanted oyakodon.”
“Oooh, that sounds great Chihiro!” Hinao pipes in. “Way better than this old man’s fried rice.”
Chihiro huffs, the closest sound to him laughing out loud. “Mr. Shiba, you really need to stop with the dried squid fried rice.”
Hakuri makes a face. “No offense Mr. Shiba, but that sounds kind of bad.”
“It sounds awful,” Char adds.
“Hey!” Shiba could understand Hakuri, who probably has a more refined palette coming from the Sazanami family but Char too? Was his fried rice as bad as mush or something?
“Sorry Mr. Shiba,” Chihiro apologizes as he begins washing some rice. “I have to agree with them – the dried squid is always too salty.”
A part of Shiba is offended that Chihiro never bothered to tell him until now that his fried rice was bad but the other part, still reeling from seeing Chihiro standing so comfortably in a kitchen again, diligently turning the rice cooker on before donning an apron, can’t figure out what he wants to say first.
When did you start cooking again?
Could you make some tamagoyaki again? I miss eating your tamagoyaki, especially when you make them with salmon flakes, those were the best.
Are you okay now, Chihiro?
Shiba starts driving Chihiro to the grocery store after that. Not because Chihiro couldn’t do it himself but because when they went, everyone wanted to tag along. Shiba becomes the designated driver so Chihiro can take care of drafting the grocery list in the car as he discerns what everyone wants to eat for the day.
Grocery runs become a kind of organized chaos that Shiba isn’t used to: frequent breaks for ice cream, dango, or whatever other snack advertisement that caught Char’s eye, Shiba constantly having to restock the tissue box in the car because Hakuri and Char are messy eaters, Chihiro and him counting heads when they enter and leave the supermarket to make sure no one’s been left behind, a weekly bout of rock-paper-scissors between Hinao, Char and Hakuri on what snacks to get for the pantry – Shiba’s starting to develop a new found respect for parents.
Running errands becomes more exhausting than gathering intelligence on the Hishaku but Shiba would rather have this weary exhaustion that reminds him he’s really getting on in his age, than the same hollow silence that once enveloped Chihiro standing lost and alone in a kitchen, a misplaced traveler without a home.
Out of habit, Chihiro begins waking up early to make breakfast again but now he prepares meals for five.
Instead of Shiba and Kunishige fighting to see who can put more food on his plate, Chihiro takes turns with Hinao and Shiba putting more food on Char and Hakuri’s plates, watching Char eagerly devour her portion while Hakuri will try to hide his shyly pleased smile behind his bowl of miso soup.
For the first time in three years, Shiba stops worrying if Chihiro is eating well.