All for the Sake of Pleasure

Chapter 12

The next few weeks passed by all too quickly for Iruka. It might have been because he had gotten a proverbial second wind and was sailing into his eighth month of pregnancy without a problem. In fact, he seemed to have more energy than his two self-appointed nurses put together. The jounin couple traitorously thought that they might have made a mistake in asking for vacation time.

In those few weeks, Iruka had them do everything from shopping in order to finish the final touches on the nursery, all the way to reading towers of parenting books so they could be the perfect babysitters when Iruka needed them to watch their little niece or nephew. When Christmas week finally rolled around, all Naruto wanted was for his brother to go spread his renewed spirit somewhere else. Sasuke just wanted sleep for Christmas.

It was needless to say that, had it not been for Iruka waking them up quite loudly on Christmas morning, the two jounin would have happily slept the holiday away and not had a single regret.

Sasuke, simply because he was easier to wake up, was the first one to be dragged downstairs. By the time Naruto finally stumbled into the living room, wearing only a pair of frog boxers and too tired to care otherwise, Sasuke had been able to have their hyped-up guest make him a cup of coffee. Silently handing over his steaming mug to his exhausted lover, the raven-haired man did a very un-Uchiha thing and flopped back against the couch. Naruto followed suit and curled up against Sasuke's bare chest before starting to fall back asleep, while still miraculously holding the cup of coffee up.

They would have fallen back into blissful unconsciousness too, had it not been for a loud crash. Being the more awake of the two, Sasuke was the first one to react, throwing Naruto to the floor as he jumped up from the couch. Before the blonde even hit the ground, Sasuke was racing towards the direction of the kitchen where the sound had originated from. It also happened to be where Iruka was, which had been Sasuke's reasoning for flinging his lover to the ground.

Racing into the kitchen, Sasuke instantly moved when he saw Iruka bowed over, holding onto the edge of the counter with one white-knuckled hand, while the other was wrapped around his middle. If he'd had time to think, Sasuke knew worry would have nearly stopped his heart, but at the moment, he was acting purely on instinct.

He didn't take the time to notice the shattered glass and dark liquid scattered across the floor – the remnants of his destroyed coffee pot – nor did he care other than making sure Iruka didn't step on the sharp pieces, as he gingerly moved the man away from the counter and towards a chair.

"S-sorry," Iruka gasped as he was eased into the seat, his now free hand quickly gesturing at the broken glass. Sasuke knelt down in front of him, ignoring his comment. His attention was more on checking the brunet's vitals and making sure that the older man hadn't hurt himself.

"What happened?" Naruto finally came skidding into the kitchen, his face blanching when he saw Iruka. His blue eyes immediately focused on the tan arm wrapped around a large belly. "The baby?" he asked, his voice a mixture of horror and worry.

"Is fine," Iruka replied breathlessly as he gritted his teeth. "The little bugger just kicked me really hard and I dropped the coffee pot. Sorry," he apologized again as he looked to Sasuke. The stoic jounin had an outright love affair with his coffee, so it was understandable he might be a little miffed about his loss of caffeine. When he saw the Uchiha's expression, Iruka smiled despite the pain he was in. From the glare he was receiving, Sasuke didn't care one bit about his broken coffee pot, but was worried about him.

Keeping the smile plastered on his face, Iruka ignored the tightening pain around his middle. The last thing he wanted to tell the two fusspots was that it wasn't a kick that made him drop the pot of coffee. It was the burning pain in his lower back that had hit him so suddenly, Iruka had softly screamed. Losing his grip on the glass container was probably the only thing that saved him from discovery – the shattering glass effectively covered up his cry of pain.