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“Ow—ow! Not so fast, Rei!”
“If we go any slower we’ll stop moving.”
“Yeah, well…just give me a second, then.”
Rei sighed. “Do you want me to carry you?”
“What? No!” Kazuki shifted on his good foot, his arm still draped over Rei’s shoulders. “As if you could, anyway.”
He shouldn’t have said that. Rei’s eyes narrowed, and the next thing Kazuki knew he’d been hoisted up in a fireman’s carry. “All right! All right! You absolutely, totally could carry me! Now, put me down!”
Rei obliged, careful to let Kazuki situate himself before fully letting go. “I’ll get your crutches.”
“It’s not that far to the kitchen,” Kazuki protested. “Come on. Just a few more steps. Just...a little bit slower?”
He felt Rei sigh as the other man took his place at his side. Leaning on Rei, Kazuki slowly hobbled to the dining area, taking a seat on one of the chairs with a sigh of relief. “Thanks, Rei,” he said genuinely. “I just need—what are you doing?”
Rei was in the kitchen. Rei was in the kitchen. “I’m making dinner.”
“No, you don’t!” Kazuki shot to his feet, nearly collapsing back into his chair as his bad ankle gave out under him. “You don’t even know what I was planning to cook tonight! You’ll ignore all the vegetables and just cook the chicken—if we’re lucky—and you have no idea which sauces to use and what need to simmer and what needs to fry. You can’t cook dinner!”
His friend stared at him blankly. “I was going to make instant noodles,” he replied, hefting the kettle in his hand.
“We can’t serve Miri instant noodles!” Kazuki exclaimed, burying both hands in his hair. He had to let go of the chair to do so, and nearly lost his balance when he did. “What kind of fathers would we be?”
He could see it now. Miri, addicted to convenience food. She’d grow up with no idea of proper nutrition. No cooking skills. She wouldn’t be able to stand on her own two feet and take care of herself. She’d end up with the first asshole who promised to look out for her—and he was probably already married, too. She’d just be some jerk’s mistress, living in a cheap apartment with all her meals delivered to her. Nothing but cup noodles and convenience store sushi for the rest of her life.
“It’s one meal,” Rei announced blandly.
“One meal is all it takes,” Kazuki snapped back. He lunged for the counter, hopping on his good leg—dammit, why did he have to sprain his ankle, today of all days? Couldn’t the universe have let him build up a nice supply of homemade, ready-to-eat meals for Miri before it took him out of commission? “You give me those noodles,” he hissed, making a grab at Rei.
Rei took a step back, still clutching the kettle. “What are you talking about?”
“We can’t let our Miri grow up to be someone’s kept woman! She has to learn how to plan a meal! How to fend for herself! We have to teach her how to be independent, so she can survive on her own when we’re gone!”
“Chill out, man,” Rei protested. He’d backed away, kettle held to his chest, as Kazuki lunged at him again. “Did you hit your head when you twisted your ankle? It’s just noodles.”
“It’s just noodles to you.” He advanced on Rei, aggressively holding eye contact. He straightened up as much as he could, to take advantage of their height difference. “But it could be everything to Miri.”
Rei raised his hands, one still holding the kettle, and slumped down beneath Kazuki’s furious stare. “Okay. No noodles.”
Kazuki relaxed. He accidentally put weight on his bad foot, and would have collapsed if Rei hadn’t hurried over to steady him. “Just bring one of the stools into the kitchen. I can cook like that.”
“Why don’t you just tell me what to do instead?”
“Because you can’t cook!”
Rei looked down. “We could get takeout,” he mumbled.
“We’re not getting takeout,” Kazuki fussed. He hopped around, working his way back into the kitchen. “We have perfectly good ingredients here.” He could cook on one leg. He just needed his hands to cook, after all. It wasn’t like he cooked with his feet.
He had to start the chicken first. Miri was upstairs napping, and she’d be ready for dinner as soon as she woke up. That gave him plenty of time to throw together a nice, healthy stir-fry.
The pan was heating on the stove, and he hobbled over to the fridge to pull out the chicken breasts. They needed to be cut into smaller pieces—everything had to be bite-sized, for Miri’s sake—so he brought the chicken over to the cutting board and pulled a knife out of the knife block.
Kazuki hadn’t expected his balance to affect him this much. He wobbled a little as he cut, accidentally putting too much weight on his bad ankle a few times. The cutting board slipped as he fought to steady it, and he didn’t notice that one corner was hanging over the edge. He heard a sigh, and looked up to see that Rei had settled onto one of the stools, staring at him with shadowed eyes.
“You wouldn’t let me run when my arm was hurt, but you can cook when your leg is hurt?” he suddenly said.
“This is totally different,” Kazuki replied. “You can go a few days without exercising. Eating is another story.”
“We have instant noodles.”
Kazuki slammed the knife onto the cutting board, intent on giving Rei a piece of his mind about the damn noodles. He misjudged the distance, hitting the corner of the cutting board instead of the middle, and it flipped up into the air. Kazuki let out a cry of alarm, lunging to catch cutting board, knife, and chicken, only to have his bad ankle twist under him and send him tumbling to the ground.
He barely managed to avoid the knife, which stuck blade-first into the floor, and just lay there for a few long seconds. A miserable heap of ex-assassin and raw chicken.
“Kazuki?” Rei peeked around the corner to stare at him. “Are you okay?”
Kazuki groaned. “Guess we’re not having chicken,” he announced pathetically.
Rei glanced at the mess. “We could wash it off?” he offered.
“No, that won’t work.” Kazuki managed to sit up, scooting around until his back was against the counter. Falling like that hadn’t done him any favors. His ankle was throbbing now, and the pain was radiating up to his knee.
Now they didn’t have any chicken for dinner, and he had a mess to clean up. He’d need to mop the floor, to make sure Miri wouldn’t be exposed to any salmonella. And probably wipe down the counters with bleach, just to be safe. All of that on top of planning and executing a new dinner plan, all while Rei stared down at him.
“Need help?” Rei suggested, holding out a hand. Kazuki accepted it, climbing to his feet only to yelp with pain and nearly go back down, pulling Rei with him. His entire leg had lit up with pain the moment his foot touched the floor, and he was forced to cling to Rei until his friend could guide him over to the nearest stool.
“Ow,” he said faintly, once he was sitting down. “I think I sprained everything this time.”
Rei sighed heavily. “Guess I need to clean up?”
Kazuki nodded. “We can’t leave raw chicken out—sorry about that.” He watched Rei turn off the stove, pick up the chicken and throw it away, and didn’t even complain when his friend pulled out a cleaning wipe to wipe down the floor instead of going for the mop and bucket.
“So what do we do now?” Rei asked.
He could already hear Miri moving around, and knew they only had a few minutes before their daughter was pelting down the stairs to ask what they were having for dinner. Kazuki sighed, propping his elbow on the counter to rest his chin in his hand.
“Maybe…” he started. Rei raised his eyebrows. “Maybe instant noodles would be okay. Just this once.”