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For all of her calm demeanour and proper behaviour, Kurenai has always been a sly dirty little fox when you get to know her.
Anko often wonders with a pang of jealousy and longing, if that's what made Asuma blush so often when they sat together in the corners of bars.
. . .
The day when everything seemed to stop except for the constant aching pain, was the day when Kurenai knocked on her door with red swollen eyes and then collapsed into Anko as she clutched her heart, hysterically screaming “Make it stop.” over and over again.
Anko had felt a sinking feeling in her chest and knew what had happened.
She'd cried because Kurenai’s pain was her pain, and it was so very agonizing and just so very there . It felt like she was crumbling as she watched Kurenai wail into the fist she had shoved into her mouth and claw at her blotchy face, trying to use physical pain to dull the emotional pain.
When Kurenai had woken up the next day looking dead, she'd felt hollow and imagined that's what Kurenai was feeling too. Like everything had stopped. And if it started moving again, then it'd be too painful to keep living.
. . .
Asuma’s funeral is like staring at the solemn end of the world. Kurenai’s silent tears are Anko’s, and when they get home they don't talk. They just keep moving with the same robotic numbness.
Ultrasounds to see how Kurenai’s pregnancy is going are devoid of the previous cheek-splitting grins and uncontainable excitement.
Kurenai’s eyes are dull and empty when her hand hovers over her stomach instead of bright and full of small secretive smiles.
Anko takes care of her. Reminds Kurenai when she’s due for a check-up and ensures that she eats. She tidies up her messy house to accommodate Kurenai’s preference for neat spaces and sleeps on the couch.
One day Kurenai grips her hand and the look she gives Anko is so devastatingly broken, Anko’s heart, which was always rumoured to be three sizes too small, falls out of her chest and into Kurenai’s waiting hands.
“I'm giving them Asuma’s last name, Sarutobi.”
Anko nods and Kurenai releases her and goes back to staring at the wall with one hand on her bump and the other picking gingerly at her food.
Shikamaru comes around later that day and leaves looking more worried and subdued than Anko has ever seen him.
. . .
Five months after that day, Kurenai whispers something vulgar about a woman in a film they are watching, and ever so very, very slowly, Anko feels the world start moving.
It spins the whole way around when a week later, Kurenai gives Anko a faint smile and pulls up her shirt to reveal her stomach. “They're kicking again.”
Anko places her hand on the bare skin and feels it ripple.
Kurenai’s smile gets a little broader when she presses light kisses to it.
. . .
When Kurenai is seven months pregnant and her stomach is so big Anko thinks it might burst, she lays her head on Anko’s lap and says “You don't have to sleep on the couch.”
The bed is warmer when her feet are tangled with Kurenai's.
. . .
The next week Anko turns the office (which she has never used anyway) into a nursery, complete with atrocious light yellow walls, and pictures of rabbits in bonnets.
Kurenai loves it, and Shikamaru brings around some of his team’s old baby toys, and rescues Asuma’s stuffed bear from a dusty storage box.
He makes it a cute little bow tie and places it in the cot.
A laugh pushes its way through the curtain of sorrows.
. . .
Nine months and Kurenai is about ready to pop. They've got a medic on standby at this point because the baby is due any minute, and Anko has no clue how to deliver an actual human baby.
Kurenai can't really walk so they're in bed, watching another romcom that Anko will never , even on pain of death, admit that she's enjoying.
It would completely obliterate her reputation as badass extraordinaire.
Kurenai points at one of the male characters and says “I bet you he's the kind of guy who likes fingering. Asuma did. He always came embarrassingly soon with my fingers in his ass.”
Anko cackles, and when Kurenai starts laughing too, they both don't stop until they're red in the face.
It's nice to be moving again.
When they finally run out of breath, they have to rewind a whole five minutes. Anko’s pride requires her to protest, but she concedes defeat quickly. Kurenai gives her an all-knowing smile.
At some point they end up with Kurenai’s head resting in Anko’s lap.
At some point Anko starts playing with Kurenai’s silky dark hair.
At some point wild eyes like red rubies lock with hers.
At some point Anko’s heart skips a beat and her breath catches in her throat because she is so whipped .
At some point Kurenai pulls her face down and kisses her hard and passionate.
At some point they stop because the baby is kicking again.
At some point Kurenai says sly as a dirty, little, fox “I can't fucking wait to bury my face in your tits.” and it goes straight to Anko’s groin.
Anko feels her own world start moving for the first time since Kurenai whispered to her late one drunken night, “I think I might be in love with Asuma.”
It feels good, just like the feeling of Kurenai’s soft lips and calloused hands on her neck.
Fin