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“Shinazugawa-san?” A nurse calls from the entrance to the waiting room. Sanemi gets up, following them into Giyuu’s recovery room. “Tomioka-san’s surgery went very well. The amount of breast tissue removed was on the low side, so he shouldn’t be in too much pain.” Giyuu smiles when Sanemi enters the room, the expression dopey and just so endearing. “We’ve prescribed him narcotics anyway, and he might not even need them at all, but if he does, he should only need them for a day or two. Most patients switch to paracetamol afterwards.”
“Okay,” Sanemi says, squeezing Giyuu’s hand. Giyuu’s groggy grin makes him have to bite his lip to stop smiling and pay attention to the nurse. “We can get paracetamol anywhere?”
“Oh, yes,” the nurse nods, smiling at the interaction. “They’re over-the-counter medicines like Tylenol, you probably have some at home. One step above that is ibuprofen, in case Tomioka-san needs something more.”
Sanemi nods. “And the follow-up appointment is next week?”
“Yes, exactly one week from now. We’ll send a reminder the day before.” The nurse moves to open the door for them, and Sanemi pushes Giyuu and his wheelchair through. “Have a safe drive, Shinazugawa-san.”
He smiles at them over his shoulder one more time. “Thank you!”
When they re-enter the waiting room, Nezuko, Genya, and Tanjiro are up on their feet, excited to greet their temporarily delirious guardian. Sanemi tells them to stay with him while he brings the car around.
“Oh my gosh, this is incredible,” Tanjiro giggles when Giyuu smiles at them. He takes the bag of prescription medicine and recovery instructions from Giyuu’s lap. Giyuu pouts when he moves away without hugging him, so Tanjiro giggles again, hugging him this time before separating.
“He’s adorable,” Nezuko despairs, “The whole school would combust if they ever saw him like this.”
“That’d be a catastrophe,” Genya agrees. “And Rengoku-sensei would lose his spot as the favorite teacher.”
“Giyuu-san would also never be able to look his students in the eye again,” Tanjiro says. “I can only imagine what Valentine’s Day would look like.”
“I’d rather not,” Genya chuckles, and spots Sanemi pulling up to the front of the hospital. It’s surprisingly easy to get Giyuu into the car with how relatively mobile he is. He may be seriously out of it, but he still responds well, if a little incoherently, and the pain is manageable.
“I’m sleepy,” he says suddenly, and Sanemi really can’t fight his grin.
“You can sleep, Giyuu, the drive’s another thirty minutes.”
“No, I can’t,” Giyuu responds, wounded. “Who’s…who’s gonna stay up with you?” He pouts, never mind the fact that all three of the kids are sitting behind him, wide awake. “I don’t want you to get sleepy.”
“How about this,” Sanemi offers, and connects his phone’s bluetooth to the car. “I’ll play a podcast so I don’t fall asleep and you can.”
Giyuu ponders for a moment, his expression much too serious for the topic of the conversation. The kids giggle. “Okay,” he relents. “Kiss me.”
Sanemi reddens, still shy about demonstrating affection in front of the trio.
“We’ll look away, if that helps,” Genya jests, and his brother reaches behind his seat to try and tickle him, at which Genya yelps.
“Sanemiii,” Giyuu whines, big blue eyes teary. He starts to lean over the center console, stopping when it stresses his stitches and worsens his sulky expression.
“Okay, okay, stay there, or you’ll hurt yourself.” Sanemi waits until they’re at a traffic light, then leans over and kisses Giyuu on the cheek.
“Here, too,” Giyuu pouts again, pointing to his mouth. Sanemi purses his lips, embarrassed, and leans over to kiss him again. Giyuu contentedly leans back in his seat. The rest of the drive home is relaxed, with Giyuu easily dozing off and Sanemi’s podcast playing as promised. It’s a bit of an endeavor to get him up the stairs to the apartment, because Sanemi can’t just carry him up the stairs; Giyuu’s core muscles are weak from the surgery, he can’t lift his arms up very much at all, and the hallways aren’t wide enough for three people. By the time they get into the apartment, Sanemi’s just thankful it didn’t go worse.
Tanjiro, Nezuko, and Genya go on ahead to make sure the master bedroom is set up properly with a mountain of pillows to prop Giyuu up, a container of easy-to-eat snacks, and several water bottles by them. The whole apartment is freshly cleaned, too, thanks to everyone pitching in, so Giyuu doesn’t have to do a thing while he’s recovering.
Sanemi carefully helps him onto the bed, mindful of where Giyuu’s arms are and that they’re kept relatively still.
“Owie,” Giyuu sighs, completely out of character, and Sanemi kisses his forehead in retaliation.
“You’re so cute when you’re hopped up on pain meds,” he muses.
“I’m not cute,” Giyuu insists, doing the most precious sad face Sanemi’s ever seen him do. “I’m very menacing. Ask…Ask Nezuko.”
“She will most definitely agree with me, hon, I don’t know what to tell you,” Sanemi laughs. “Are you hungry?”
Giyuu’s gaze moves to the container of food. “Yeah,” he pouts. Sanemi can see him eyeing the beef jerky and plucks it out of the box. He sits down perpendicular to Giyuu, ripping the package open and feeding him pieces. Giyuu’s absolutely ravenous, asking for piece after piece until it’s empty, and Sanemi takes it as a good sign. He gets up to throw away the wrapper.
“Have…a good day at school,” Giyuu mumbles sleepily, leaning back into the pillows.
“Hmm?” Sanemi turns, bewildered. “What do you mean, baby?”
“You have work tomorrow,” Giyuu reminds him. “And you get cranky with your students when you don’t sleep well.”
Sanemi chuckles, sitting down next to him on the bed. “Bun, I don’t have work tomorrow, I’m taking the week off to be with you.”
Giyuu’s eyes widen, impossibly so. “You are?”
Sanemi’s heart wrenches. “Yeah, baby, we don’t want you stressing yourself out.” He lifts a hand, tucking stray locks of hair behind Giyuu’s ear.
“I get you all to myself for the whole week?” Giyuu asks, as if they didn’t talk about this for months leading up to his surgery. Sanemi laughs again and nods.
“Well, the kids will be here when they get home from school, of course, but we’ll spend the whole week together.”
“Wow,” Giyuu sighs, smiling goofily. “The whole week.”
Sanemi smiles, remembering the wedding ring websites he’s bookmarked on his laptop.
Hopefully, they’ll spend the rest of their lives together, too.