juridp:

Okay, listen…

Sasuke and Hinata working at a daycare.

Hinata all doting and maybe a bit of a worrisome Winifred. Sasuke letting the little ones do as they please up until someone gets hurt.

Hinata telling Sasuke he needs to be more attentive. Sasuke saying children need to learn their limits and capabilities.

Children flocking to them both and Hinata’s all hugs and smiles while Sasuke is acting like he can’t feel all these children tugging on him to get his attention.

Parents assuming the two daycare workers are an item, but they haven’t dated in years.

oh god. 
Oh god, do i dare?
>.< someone tell me no.

So I had a lot of fun writing this, and the first one. I also really enjoyed discussing it with @giada-luna. This is pretty much co-authored by that darling. She deserves credit where credit is due. More Sasu/Duckling adventures ensue. Part 2 of I no longer know how many.

She had gracefully, elegantly allowed him (and his ducklings) to move in. Not permanently but still, there was a surprising sense of long term associated with hauling several boxes worth of things out of his car and into her house. Or at least, that’s how he secretly felt about it. 

Hinata was all smiles, as usual. Sunshine in a person, she laughed and danced through the posse of his ducklings always at his feet, tripping him or squawking loudly when almost stepped on. 

“That one!” He snapped, nodding at a particularly clingy bit off fluff stepping in front of him every step he took through the foyer and up the stairs to the spare bedroom. “That one is suicidal or trying to kill me. I’ve almost stepped on him half a dozen times in the last half hour." 

Hinata laughed, scooped up the offensive duck and despite his quacking protestations followed Sasuke and the rest up the stairs. 

"I believe that he just loves you more than the others.”

“Of course you do.” Sasuke grumbled, although the sound of her saying “loves you” in his direction was distracting any negative thoughts and turning them into rainbows and butterflies in his head. 

The storm had washed the city clean and in the noon day sun it sparkled as though doused in glitter. The ducks found this refreshing and as soon as he stepped into what would be his room for the next while they were off to investigate, quacking cheerily. 

Hinata’s smile was secretive as she kissed the top of the ducklings head. “Well, I have to run to the dojo to meet my cousin for that toddler lesson and if I don’t show up on time he will panic with the kids…” she drifted off, rubbing her neck.

Sasuke smirked broadly, remembering again the frantic call he had witnessed weeks ago from her stoic unwelcoming cousin and Tenten’s guffaws as Hinata scrambled away to save Neji from a horde of upset toddlers at her family’s dojo. 

“Don’t let me keep you. I can…handle this…” Sasuke began strong and upon seeing several ducklings tumble from the bed into the waste basket by the nightstand he winced.  

Hinata pursed her lips.  

“Are you sure, I… I don’t- maybe I can call my sister to-?”

“Nope.” It came out too fast. Flushing he turned and scooped up the ducklings from the waste basket, trying to not look her in the face. 

Hanabi was straight forward, and about as perceptive as a microscope on bacteria. She had taken one look at him and within five minutes began to smile with this knowing and rather nerve wrecking sort of ferocity. If he was left alone there was a very high probability that he was going to say something incriminating and since he had literally just moved into her sister’s spare bedroom…

He shook his head. “I can handle them by myself for a few hours. For sure.”
This was a stretch and Hinata’s face twisting with mild disbelieve said so. Most of the night had been spent awake, despite his best intentions. The ducklings peeped incessantly at the door, and when he finally opened it they wandered through the hall until he couldn’t find them in the dark. 

A good portion of the very early morning was spent searching for a duckling that had in fact been asleep in Sasuke’s bed and after all that he and Hinata had passed out in the living room in their pajamas, ignoring the ducklings and their hopping on their backs. 

“I wonder if maybe you can get them to nap.” Hinata blinked mildly at the duck in her hands. It blinked back for a moment as if in disbelief at her suggestion and then quacked a small laugh.  

“Do ducks nap?” Sasuke raised an eyebrow, sweeping a handful of ducklings off the clothes he had put down on the bed so he could put them in the drawer. They tumbled like bowling pins, chattering indignantly. 

“I hope so. They didn’t really sleep at night.” Hinata laughed. “At this rate…”

“We’re going to lose.” Sasuke nodded, pushing another fluff ball aside to step up to the dresser he was filling with clothes. 

“Maybe. We need to be smart.  We should go to the library.” Hinata tapped her chin thoughtfully with one long finger.  

“The library?”

“For books on…”

“Raising ducks.” He fixed her with a long stare and Hinata flushed, grinning. 

“They might suggest a farm, I suppose.”

“This… is ridiculous.”

A sound of chimes ringing set the ducklings into a tizzy and while they all sprinted to their dad’s feet Hinata giggled, pulling out her ringing cell phone from her pocket. 

“Oh I have to go, that’s Neji-nii.”

“Right.” Sasuke replied, watching her hesitate for a moment with her gray eyes lingering on the hopping ducklings at his feet. 

“Are you going to be-?”

“Hinata.” He sighed, trying to instill confidence into his voice. “Go.”

“Okay, okay.” And with a smile and a wave she was hopping down the stairs two at a time, leaving Sasuke alone with his squad of ducklings. 

It was not fine.

“When can you be here?”

Sasuke pinned the phone to his ear with his shoulder as he army crawled over the ground, heart in his throat and eyes wide. The flutter of fluffy wings beneath the couch sent him scrambling along the carpet, knocking into the coffee table in Hinata’s living room and setting a ball of yarn she had been using to knit the ducklings a blanket rolling. 

“Shit, shit shit!” Sasuke gasped, turning to look at the pink and blue yarn ball spinning into the hall. 

From the phone Naruto’s voice came through.

“Uh… Teme? Are you okay? I was fairly sure ducklings were not carnivorous but you sure sound like you’re getting eaten.”

“No. Dobe, are you coming or not?”

“Tch. Never heard you so excited for my company. You must be screwed. I will be right there. Fifteen minutes.”

“Fifteen minutes?” Sasuke balked at the sound of his own voice. Somewhere between a cat getting it’s tail pulled and getting kicked in the groin. 

Naruto’s barking laugh replied. “I’m coming, princess. Knights in shining armor shouldn’t break the speed limit laws.”

“Oh shut up.” Sasuke growled, throwing the phone over his shoulder. 

The ducklings had vanished. In the end he had fallen asleep. The spring sun was shining through the window in Hinata’s spare room and in the haze of heat and the smell of her on everything he had curled with the fluffy quacking balls on the bed for a moment. It had only been a moment. 

Upon waking, twenty minutes later there was no ducklings. Just his heart in his chest sprinting to get out. 

“She’s going to kill me.”

The exaggeration was not lost on him, but the truth was that just seeing Hinata’s down turned mouth, her eyes shining with tears would probably give him a heart attack. Already there was a knot in his stomach threatening to tighten until he was a pretzel of a man. He couldn’t imagine actually seeing her face in tears. 

Over the stupid ducklings. 

To be fair though, he was panicking for his own sake as well. Another picture was floating in his mind, of ducklings jamming their tiny bills into electric sockets or finding a vent open to crawl through into the walls, or sneaking out a window and being hunted by neighborhood cats or eating laundry soap pods and dying in poisoned agony.

Shuddering, Sasuke shoved himself up and following the whispered quacking of the escaped duckling down the hall past the kitchen and towards Hinata’s painting studio. 

Besides working at the dojo he knew she also taught art classes at the community center and enjoyed it herself enough that occasionally she did commissions. 

She had spent a portion of the evening cleaning up and finishing the piece she was working on after their tea and banana bread. 

Now, Sasuke had an awful feeling.
A terrible feeling.
A very dreadful sinking feeling. 

“No.” He croaked, closing his eyes at the sound of more quacking down the hall. 

“No. No. No.”

The studio was the room with the most light. Windows on every wall meant sun in the morning, noon and evening, of a variety of types. Easels stood to attention along one wall, and at the center next to her rough wooden table splattered with a myriad of colors next to her wooden stool another easel lay on it’s side. 

The caps must not have been on firmly on a handful of paint bottles because their rainbow essence was spattered all over the floor and to his horror, on the spanning landscape of a meadow on canvas.

Hand over his mouth he stood at the threshold, watching as the ducklings meandered over the canvas, quacking as they splattered their flat feet over the painting in various marbled colors. 

He must have stood there for some time because suddenly the front door was being knocked on hard and then flung open without the time necessary for someone to come answer it. 

“Teme?" 

Sasuke snapped out of his nightmare, blinking hard and turning to look at Naruto down at the other end of the house. 

The blonde shrugged out of his jacket, smirking. "You look scared shitless. What’s wrong? Did one die?”

Maybe that would have been better.

His lack of reply seemed to give the blonde pause. “Teme?”

“…I think, I may have screwed up.”

Before this moment Naruto would have said hell would freeze over before such words left Sasuke Uchiha’s mouth. Blue eyes the size of saucers Naruto padded down the hall, past the disaster of yarn in the living room and past the quiet tidy kitchen to the doorway where Sasuke peered at chaos. 

“Oh…shit.” Naruto whispered, digging his hands into his blonde hair for a minute. “No… okay, this is fine. This is okay.” His voice was strained and for a moment Sasuke marveled at that while watching as a duckling skidded awkwardly in violet paint. His flappy feet flailing and slapping hard before ending up on his rump in the puddle of purple. 

This was bad. If Naruto himself was serious then this was…

The abrupt explosion of laughter from the blonde made Sasuke jump, and dark eyes torn between disbelieving and furious he glared as his friend struggled to breathe through tears of laughter. 

“This. Isn’t. Funny.”

“Oh, my god…” Naruto held on to the door frame, fingers white knuckled as he hugged his stomach, rubbing at the tears with his shoulder. “Oh my god, I can’t breathe.”

“Why the hell did I bother calling you of all people? Sai would have been more useful.” Sasuke snapped, giving him a hard shove into the wall before gingerly stepping into the fray. 

“Aw, come on. I mean look at it.” Naruto waved a hand at the multicolored ducklings. “It’s adorable, if anything Hinata is going to want a picture. Here.” He flipped his phone out of his pocket and moved to aim the camera. 

Sasuke was backpedaling into him so hard they ended up in a tussle in the hallway. Biting words were said, curses were thrown and elbows received by undeserving ribs. 

“No pictures!” Sasuke gasped, finally wrangling the phone out of Naruto’s hands and throwing it down the hall. “If I’m lucky I will only have to look at this humiliation once in my life. Don’t immortalize it.”

“Aw come on.” Naruto struggled to his feet, still grinning. “You have to let me document your magnificent crash and burn.”

“Get out. Just get out.” Sasuke bit out forcefully. “I can’t deal with you and the-”

“Ducklings. Wow, you weren’t kidding about how many there were.” Naruto stepped into the studio then, carefully avoiding puddles of paint. “Fifteen, you said?”

“That’s what the last count was. I am hopeful that they are entirely too young to multiply.”

“God help you, poor bastard.” Naruto’s chortling laugh was met with a shake of Sasuke’s head and grabbing an empty cardboard box he began gathering the paint splattered ducklings. Eyes carefully diverting from the overturned canvas he tried to breathe carefully. 

“How much do you think Hinata liked that painting?” He finally mustered, grabbing two offending ducklings and tossing them into the box. 

The feathery bundles quacked irritably but remained in the box, falling over as he moved to pick up more of their siblings. 

“Uh, you’re asking me?” Naruto cocked his head at the meadow, it’s multicolored duck feet prints like confetti throughout it’s soothing background. “Honestly, I have no idea, but I am guessing this was not how she was hoping it to be finished." 

"I am so dead.” Sasuke sighed, smearing blue on his cheek as a duckling tried to get free of his grip and floundered against his face. 

“I would say you’re toeing the line, yeah.” Naruto’s grin remained firmly in place. “If I can’t take a picture of the mess, can I at least tape the skinning she’s going to give you?”

"I have to get these things in the bath.” Sasuke gasped, realizing what time it was as the clock on the wall tick tocked steadily. “Shit, shit, can you clean this up?”

“Do I look like I know how to get paint out of hardwood floor?”

“You don’t know how to do shit, I realize that but I hoped-” Sasuke stopped, watching as the ducklings began to hop in the box, attempting to make an escape at the edges. “Never mind, forget this. Let’s get these pests cleaned up and then we can deal with the rest." 

"Whatever you say, Princess.”

“Call me that again and I’m going to show these ducklings how to stuff a human. They need to learn self defense anyway.” Sasuke growled, moving towards the bathroom with the quacking birds in his hands. 

Naruto chuckled behind him. “Aw, look at you. Thinking like a Papa. Wait does that make Hinata the Mama?”

“Jesus, I might actually kill you before this is over." 

Still, it didn’t escape Naruto’s gaze that Sasuke’s neck warmed to a bright red glow despite his protestations. 

"What did you do?”

Sasuke had been asking himself this for several minutes, blinking in disbelief as his ducklings floundered in the soapy water of the bath tub…

Only to sink. 

Naruto watched, brows raised. “I mean- you broke them!”

The urge to bang his head on the tub side was becoming almost impossible to resist and Sasuke pressed a hand to his forehead, glaring at the duckling sinking below the watery surface for a moment longer before pulling him back up.

 The duckling did the fowl equivalent of splutter and before the rest could suddenly begin to drown as well Sasuke was scooping them out of the water. 

“I cannot believe this.”

“Did you use extra heavy conditioner on them or something? I mean, they’re sinking like rocks.” Naruto conversed lazily, chin in hand from his perch on the counter. 

“Extra heavy conditioner? Do you hear the words coming out of your mouth?” Sasuke snapped and jumped slightly at the feel of wet webbed feet stumbling on his shoulders and the back of his neck as the ducks he pulled out of the water attempted to climb his back to get back into the bath. 

“Stop it.” He gasped in exasperation. “Your siblings are drowning, get off!" 

"This is the best.” Naruto commented, swinging his foot idly. “I am enjoying flustered Papa Sasuke. Oh! One made it back in." 

The splash of the duckling  taking a dive off his shoulder made Sasuke growl and grabbing several at a time he dumped the whole soaking mess on the tiles of the floor, wincing at the pooling water and slipping and sliding feet of the fowl. 

"They’re going to drown. Why aren’t they floating!? They floated a minute ago. My god, I am losing my mind- Stop jumping in!” He gasped, catching another aiming to Pocahontas fly off his head. 

“Just the best. It’s just the best.” Naruto continued, his grin so wide it encompassed most of his face. 

“That’s it.” Sasuke snapped, shoving himself to his feet only to stop, frozen about to reach for Naruto’s neck at the sight of Hinata in the door way, blinking rapidly.

“Hey…how’s it going?” She stammered.

Naruto and Sasuke stared at her, both boys looking pale and more wide eyed than usual. 

“Hey, Hina. You’re looking so lovely today. Look at you all radiant! Perfect duckling Mama I have ever seen. And you know, this guy needs all the help he can get! Personally I think you might want to consider filing for full custody. For the duck’s sake, you see. Just my humble opinion.” Naruto laughed nervously, sliding off the counter and squeezing past her through the doorway. 

“I gotta run though, sorry I can’t stay-”

“Oh! A-are you sure, I could make some tea- or coffee?” Hinata blinked at him as he scrambled backwards, ignoring Sasuke’s pleading expression behind Hinata even as it turned less pleading and more murderous. 

“Oh, no sorry, thanks though, Hina. You’re the best. Rain check though? I’ll stay next time. Believe it.” Turning to Sasuke finally he pointed. “Aren’t your ducklings drowning?" 

Hinata whirled, eyes wide. "What?!”

“See ya Sasuke!" 

Sasuke watched, gaping as the blonde almost sprinted out the door and turned slowly back to Hinata who was shoving the shower curtain out of the way and pulling the plug on the drain. 

"What! What happened to them why are they-?” She stopped, picking the duckling floundering in the water up and sniffing him. Sasuke stared, completely confused and holding still for the sake of his own survival. Maybe she wouldn’t kill him if there were no sudden movements. 

“You…” she laughed then, shaking her head and scooping out the rest of the ducks from the bath and into a towel on her lap. “You washed the oil off their feathers.” Her giggle made him let out a long breath. 

“I did what?”

“You washed the oil off their feathers. You can’t use any soap on them. They need very gentle fragrance free soap.” She cocked her head at him. “They can’t float without the oils.”

Sasuke closed his eyes. “Right.”

“Why were you bathing them?” she laughed again. “They were clean yesterday.”

“Um…” Sasuke paused, pressing his lips together hard. Hinata glanced up at him then and paused as well, reaching out to wipe a smear of blue paint from his cheek. “Is that… paint?”

Her touch left a searing mark on his skin, and Sasuke stared at her, wide eyed, trying to memorize this moment before she disliked him beyond any hope of fixing. 

“Well… they were badly behaved.” He began carefully, shooting the ducklings padding around on his lap a look. 

Hinata’s brows rose, her brain putting two and two together. “Ohhh…no.”

Holding up one of the poofy fat babies Sasuke extended it towards her face. 

“Please… try to remember they’re just children.”

As for him, he wasn’t sure there was an excuse that would let him get out of this unscathed. 

Already he was learning about parental sacrifice. 

I saw a video about ducklings last week and sure enough, this happened. I doubt it will be more than two maybe three parts. Not my best work but it is after all just for fun. 🙂 Sasuke and ducklings? Yes please.

It was a ridiculous situation. 

He stared at the rain pouring down and the puddles growing on the side of the leaf strewn sidewalk. A river had formed, small but powerful at the curb and sitting in a huddle together were what appeared to be dirty little balls of lint. Except for when they moved, and occasionally a small duck bill fluttered weakly in the half light of evening. 

God damn it.

Cars drove by, unaware of how dangerously close they passed to the fluffy ducklings. Unaware that a few feet over they could have crushed tiny beating hearts, cracked small hollow bones, stilled a dozen flickering lives. 

One truck swerved and as he watched he held his breath, feeling a sharp pain shoot through his chest. Close, but instead of destroying the ducklings the truck splashed a tsunami sized wave of dirty road water onto the small squeaking creatures and as the water overcame them they slid down the current, panic overtaking their small voices. 

The grate kept them from falling into the sewer, but only just. Little flat feet and tiny skinny legs flailed before becoming stuck between the metal bars. The dozen dirty tiny creatures careened into each other. It would have been comical if it weren’t so incredibly sad. 

They were going to die. 

Sasuke swallowed. Hands in the pockets of his pea-coat, with the collar turned up against the blast of the rain and the howl of the wind he squinted at them from the other side of the road, debating. 

On the one hand, this was most definitely not his problem. The fact that his sharp eyes had even detected them at all was a sort of miracle. No one else seemed to notice the flailing ducklings. They blended into the muddy mess of the sidewalk and street, so filthy and wet and small they were. 

On the other hand…. 

He shifted in his coat, shrugging off the growing anxiety in his gut.
If he left them there he would have to consciously make an effort not to mention it to her. And if he did that it would feel like lying and if he lied he would feel sick for weeks and when it finally came out (because it would eventually, he could only handle lying to her for so long) then he would have to endure her expression. 

He could see it now. Wide eyes, soft mouth open in an O of disbelief, cheeks flushing with either horror or anger or both. 

Swearing under his breath he flung open his car door, a long string of profanities and some rather scathing grumblings escaping his lips as he tossed the clean laundry in the basket sitting in the back of his car. With a towel thrown haphazardly on the bottom he growled in his chest and moved towards the ducklings. 

She would take care of them. In fact they would probably adopt her as their mother and she would be ecstatic for weeks and it would all work out but for now. 

For now he had to deal with… them. 

Like facing off with a cobra he approached, standing cautiously on the side of the road with the towel lined basket at his hip under his arm and his dark eyes unimpressed. 

“Where is your real mother?” His voice was no nonsense and the ducklings peeped and chirped nervously at his presence, falling over each other and getting more muddy by the second. 

None of them seemed to have an answer and so after looking around for a moment longer in hopes of avoiding this entire disaster Sasuke sighed and bent down. 

They were gritty. And a little slimy. Gritting his teeth he grabbed hold of one at a time, tossing them not exactly gently into the basket despite their panicked protests and with the chaotic mess of wet feathers and squeaking in his possession he hurried back to his car, already soaking wet and in a worse mood than he had been in a very long time. 

“She had better be happy about this.”

With the ducklings all watching him rather intently from the passenger seat, he began to drive. 

None of it was going according to plan. 

They had not stopped watching him through the holes in the laundry basket the entire drive. It was rather unnerving having over a dozen little beady eyes staring at him and although he would be loathe to admit it, he was rather nervous. Basket on his hip and trying not to rush to avoid spilling the living contents within he parked and skipped up the steps to the front door. Shaking out his rain soaked hair he rang the bell and glanced at the ducklings as he waited. 

Peeping quietly they stared back. 

“…Ugh.” he grumbled at them, just as the door opened and Hinata blinked at him wrapped in a sweater half a dozen sizes too big, her hair in a mess of a bun on her head and hands covered in splashes of various colors. She smelled of paint thinner and her flowery soap and the warmth of something sweet baking. 

A knot worked into his throat as he stared at her and she stared back, her surprise evident. 

“Sasuke! I… I didn’t know you were coming-” she stopped at the sound of a duck signalling it’s presence and her eyes turned to the basket under his arm.  

“…what is-?” she stopped again as he tipped it slightly, revealing the contents. Eyes trained on her face he watched as her mouth opened, not with horror but growing uncontainable delight. “Oh my goodness!" 

"Please.” He let out a sigh, wiping the rain from his face absently. “Help me.”

The door flung open wide and she was ushering them all inside, questions half formed spilling from her mouth only to be side tracked by her exclamations over the tiny messy feather balls. 

“Here, give me your jacket. Oh wow, you’re soaked.” She was giggling despite it, gathering his wet things and hanging them to drip on the tile of her entrance.
Inside the house pulsed with soft light, the smell of something having just been baked filtering through the crackle of her fireplace and the underlying sharpness of the paint thinner. 

Sasuke glanced down the hall, lined with frames featuring her sister, her cousin, her mother, her friends Kiba and Shino, her favorite teacher Kurenai. The people dearest to her grinned at him from the frames as she led him down the hall and he paused at the end, absently letting her take the basket from his grip chattering softly as she walked to the kitchen. 

“…where did you even find them? There are so many!” she did not wait for an answer, and he was not prepared to give her one. Eyes fixed on the last frame he let out a slow shaky breath. 

Beside Sakura and Naruto and Sai flashing peace signs at him was a new frame. Black and silver, plain compared to the others.

And there he was with her sprawled in the snow of a few months ago, wincing at the light of the sun past her phone where she had raised it to take a selfie.

 He could remember the bite of the cold on his back, the snow seeping into the neck of his jacket. Hinata had tripped on the ice, her flailing arms grabbing at him and although he should have been able to straighten them both out they had ended up on their butts in the snow. 

She had laughed, so hard and so long he had ended up joining her and laying in the snow she had pulled out her phone, removing her mittens with her teeth.
“This is a picture moment.” Breathless from her laughter she had grinned.“Yes?" 

He wasn’t one for pictures, but it had only taken her a handful of months to worm her way under his skin. There was little she could ask of him that he would say no to.

"Sasuke?”

Snapping out of his thoughts he turned to look at her as she came into the living room. Her sweater sleeves were rolled up to her elbows and her hands were covered in suds. She blinked at him a moment and he stared back, resisting the urge to wipe the smear of soapy bubbles on her brow away with his thumb.  

“Sorry, what did you say?” He stepped past her into the kitchen then to find the ducklings all chorusing their displeasure loudly only to quiet at the sight of him.  

“I was just asking where you found them, they are so dirty.” she began again, walking back to the sink where they floated like toys, their shining black eyes blinking up at them both. 

Sasuke sighed, running a hand through his soaked hair and shivering in his still damp clothing. “I was just at the laundromat. They were practically on the road.” He crossed his arms and tried to rub the goosepimples from his skin. “If I left them they would have probably been run over." 

"Oh no.” Shaking her head Hinata rubbed at a ducklings head gently with her thumb, removing gritty sand and oily car residue from his face delicately.

 "I’m so glad you got them!“ She turned to smile at him over her shoulder then. "You must have looked like quite a sight walking around with a basket of ducklings under one arm.” Her giggles made him smirk, if only a little despite his shivering. 

“Well, if I left them you would not let me live it down so-”

“You would not have left them.” Hinata’s firm tone left no room for disagreement and he raised an eyebrow slightly at her back as she worked. 

“You should have a shower though, you’re all wet. I have some of Neji’s old clothes in my closet from when he last came to visit. If you stay in that you’re going to end up catching a cold." 

Sasuke straightened slightly, surprised. "No… it’s fine. I can just go home and-”
Hinata turned again, peering at him past her shoulder, eyes wide. “You’re leaving me with them?" 

He blinked slowly, taking in the very subtle hurt tone, the disbelief.
"I…I actually have some clothes in my car.” He began slowly. “I’ll….go get them." 

A smile, wide and relieved washed over her face then and she nodded. "I’ll start the shower.”

Standing out in the rain again Sasuke blinked the wetness from his lashes, pausing for a moment to catch his breath as he rummaged through his clean clothes in the back of his car. 

There was nothing about Hinata that was complicated. She loved openly, cared deeply, disagreed politely. 

So then, if he was right. Then what did that picture frame…? 

Before he could finish his train of thought the door to the house opened and a peal of laughter made him look up through the rain. Hinata stood at the door, a hand over her mouth to stifle her giggles and one look at her feet told him what was happening. 

The ducklings, all soapy and disgruntled stood at the threshold and one look at him had them stumbling and rolling down the front steps. 

A soft gasp escaped his lips and tucking his clothes under his arm he began scooping up the smattering of ducks, wincing at the tiny fragility of bones beneath the feathers. 

“Why are you letting them out?" 

"They-” Hinata struggled, her soft laugh making her face pink and her eyes water. “They jumped out of the sink when you left!" 

He started, arms full of clean laundry and soaped ducklings and a whole lot of bewilderment. "What?”

“They’re-” Hinata tried again, grabbing a handful of ducklings before they tumbled off the stairs to join him at his feet. “They’ve… they’ve imprinted on you.”

Imprinted.

Face blank he stared at her until she was pulling him into the house, still laughing and smiling and overall more amused than he had seen her before as she carefully closed the door. 

At their feet ducklings fell and slid on the tile, walking over his toes and making the soft incessant noises of children. 

“They must have-” she began and he shook his head slowly. “No, no- Hinata- no.”

“They must have imprinted on you- they’re very young.” she began to laugh again at the sight of his horrified face and shoulders shaking pressed her cheek to his shoulder, listening to the now happy peeping of his ducklings in his arms and at his feet. 

“I… I can’t have ducklings.” Sasuke’s tone was incredulous and it just got her off laughing again, her eyes searching his face with amusement and a compassion that bordered on tenderness. “Let’s just get you all clean and fed okay?”

“But I-”

“The shower is running… you should take your ducklings with you. I’ll make some tea, and I made banana bread.”

“Take them with me?” Sasuke stared after her but she had already disappeared into the kitchen and he was standing there holding an armful of ducks with more tripping over his feet. 

Sighing loudly he walked carefully towards the bathroom, aware that right behind him, eyes always intent were the ducklings. 

One look over his shoulder told him that taking them into the shower with him was not really a choice, and with an expression of supreme annoyance he waited until they all waddled into the bathroom before quietly closing the door. 

It was a sight to behold. 

He had tried to sit on the couch, but then they had wandered all over it, jumping off the back rest into his lap, nearly into his tea. In the end he sat on the floor, legs crossed, face in his hands with ducklings wandering over his arms and shoulders, under his knees, taking flying leaps off his body to the carpet. 

On the other side of the coffee table by the fire Hinata watched, sipping at her tea and unable to take the ever widening smile from her face. 

“I can’t have ducklings." 

"You…kind of do now.”

“Hinata.” He looked up at her through black bangs, and she smiled bigger, seeing the panic and desperation there where usually his gaze was a fortress.

 "What am I going to do with a dozen ducklings?”

“There’s actually fifteen.” She motioned to the fluffy things, now clean and partly yellow. They had come out of the shower shiny and smelling fantastic.

 Almost as great as he smelled, but that was something Hinata had pushed aside rather forcefully. 

“Fifteen?” He looked around and found that trying to count them was impossible as they meandered through her living room, getting tangled in her yarn basket beneath an end table and hopping on and off the furniture.  

Smiling still Hinata nodded. “I counted as they tried to dive out of the sink after you.”

“Ugh.” Softly, Sasuke picked up the delicate fluff on his shoulder and placed it on the ground, watching the little bird waddle away only to come hurrying back to him a moment later. 

“I’ll get them some peas. I happen to have some in the fridge.” Hinata pushed herself up and carrying her tea carefully entered the kitchen, leaving Sasuke to the affectionate nibbles of his duck babies. 

“I don’t think they allow ducks in my apartment.”

A laugh, delicate and joyful responded from within the fridge. “I dare say they don’t, no.”

One particularly adventurous baby nibbled on Sasuke’s earlobe and he hissed slightly, grabbing it and plopping it on the carpet. 

Feeling whiny he closed his eyes and buried his face in his hands, leaning his head back against the couch. 

“Hinata.”

She paused at the edge of the living room, staring at the long smooth stretch of his neck, the curve of his Adam’s apple in the light of the fireplace and the elegant pale fingers of his hands against his face. Her name was a long tangled sigh from his mouth and she licked her lips nervously at the feel of a sharp, not exactly painful tug in her belly at the sound of his voice.

“I guess… they could stay here.” she began slowly, lowering herself to the carpet with the bowl full of peas. In a few moments half the ducklings were shoving and pushing at the bowl, bills working on the round green peas carefully. 

The others were content to flip and flop on their human daddy. 

Sasuke dared to open one eye, peering at her through his fingers. “Oh?”

“Well, the thing is…” she shifted, watching her tea carefully lest it spill. “I have a feeling they might not be very happy without you.”

Heat rushed to her face, starting at her cheeks and moving to her ears. Clearing her throat she sipped at her tea, eyes averted. “I…I do have a spare room, you could stay and..” she drifted off looking up in time to see him straighten and cock his head at her. 

“You know… until they’re… older." 

Sasuke smirked. "You want me and my ducklings to move in.”

Hinata blanched and then at his chuckle let out a nervous half laugh. “Uh… not.. I mean..”

“Well.” He sighed, picking up another fluff ball. “I guess they do need a mother.”

Still blushing furiously Hinata buried her nose between her raised knees, peering at him over her jeans.

“I…I could be a duck mom." 

He smirked, eyes trained on his duck babies. "I guess I could be a duck dad.”

 There was very little reluctance in his voice and her heart beat faster at his easy tone. “I do hear parenting is easier with a person you like." 

Her tea was not as warm as her neck and cheeks. 

"W-well, good thing it’s Friday, we can… um… go to the pet store tomorrow and ask them what to do with…them…” she floundered, picking one of the wandering feathery things in her hands as it walked by. The bird flailed half halfheartedly in her gentle grip and settled in the end on her palm, his rapid heart beat competing with her own. 

“Okay.” Sasuke mused, suddenly very pleased with himself. 

So sure, he had considered leaving them to fend for themselves on the street and had not been pleased with saving them. 

But somehow they had now provided an excuse to spend a whole weekend straight through with Hinata and he was not about to complain about that. 

In fact, he was starting to become rather fond of the little pests.

Of course, no one needed to know that. 

Hinata pretended not to see when he picked one up and gently kissed it on the head.