Chapter 23.4- One Thousand Hands

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“Steak again, Shori-nii?” I smiled at her voice as I heard her whine her way into the kitchen. The red haired ball of sunshine looked like she’d had quite a day.

“Go wash your hands, Kushina” I said, as I saw her marching her way to the plates already laid down even if she did start by complaining about the food.

“Besides, what do you mean by again. We haven’t had steak in three days” I replied when the nature of the complaint finally sunk in.

“And we haven’t had Ramen since yesterday. It’s ramen’s turn” Her opposition was instant.

“First of all, that makes no sense. Secondly, I know you had ramen for lunch” I replied.

“Nuh-uh” She denied.

“I already asked Domu-san, and she said you made her make you ramen for lunch Kushina. No lying” I reprimanded, even if my heart wasn’t in it. She just stuck her tongue out at me and took a seat at the table opposite Izuku and Uzume.

“Stop staring” I reprimanded all three of them when five minutes passed and the only sound in the kitchen was the sizzling the steak made as I worked to cook enough for everyone and then some.

“Kushina, these are my friends Uchiha Izuku and Uchiha Uzume. They’re cousins like you and me. Izuku, Uzume, this is my little cousin I was telling you about, Uzumaki Kushina” I finally said when neither party seemed keen on breaking the deadlock that existed between them.

“Cousins?” Kushina asked with audible curiosity.

“Yes, we’re cousins” was Izuku’s reply.

“Nuh-uh. You look like Siblings, Dattebane. And you even have the same name. Not like me and Shori-nii at all” She said sagely, almost making fumble the lay off as I dropped one more sizzling slice of steak down on a plate. Placing down the pans, I worked to lay down each plate in front of each guest and began working to dish the rice when another person entered the kitchen.

“Hope you made enough for me, brat” Tsunade’s voice rang out as she marched in and plopped down on the seat I’d been saving myself next to Kushina. I didn’t even blink as she began to dig into the plate I’d already set down. I was ready for this. I made extras for a reason. This Senju household had people showing up all the damn time.

“Siblings don’t have to look identical, the same way cousins can look alike, Kushina-san” Izuku continued the debate with Kushina almost like nothing had changed and we didn’t just add an interloper to dinner. Another slice of steak was dropped on the pan as I worked to dish out rice in a new bowl for myself.

As I walked towards the table to put it down on Kushina’s other side, I heard the sound of a cane tapping. A sound that no one who lived in the compound would mistake for anything else.

“I was just dishing your food, Oba-san” I said as she walked in.

“Of course you were, Shori” Mito replied with a smile that said she didn’t believe a single word. She took a seat at the head of the table and I quickly rerouted the plate of rice I’d just dished, towards her. The steak began sizzling to tell me it was ready, and after a quick flip, I had it on the plate and heading towards her, even if she had since joined the debate building between the Uchiha cousins and little Kushina with anecdotes of how everyone back home at Uzushiogakure could have been mistaken for siblings with how alike everyone looked.

I ignored the conversation, thankful that I still somehow had more food in the pot and began dishing another plate for myself. There was barely any rice left, so I picked a few vegetables I knew would taste good together and began chopping them up as I cooked the steak. The steak went on a plate and I used the rest of the grease to begin frying the veggies. Finished, I topped the bowl of rice with veggies and took hold of both plates as I went to take my seat.

Of course, in that moment someone else walked in.

“Well done, Shorirama. Just what I was craving” Grannduncle Tobirama took the plates from my hands as I was frozen in place and then took the last seat at the table. I just stared at the whole thing dumbfounded.

“Thank you for inviting me to dinner, Mito. Apologies for the lateness” He said right before he began to dig in, and then everything slotted into place perfectly. I turned to my Grandmother with twitching eyes, but she just gave me a wide smile and nothing else.

Nothing to be done about the situation, I sighed, and moved back to the burner to see what could be whipped up. We were all out of steak as that was the last cut, but there were some eggs in the pantry, and I still had some left over veggies so I could use that. Rice was finished, but Domu had left out some beef broth so there was a meal to be made between all of that. By the time I returned to the table, the conversation had turned to Kushina regaling all of us with the tale of how she’d beaten Minato-baka in today’s physical tests. Of course, it was an endurance test which she had an unfair advantage in, but that mattered little. It excited her, and kept the table engaged.

I tried to send silent apologies at both Izuku and Uzume for dragging them into this, but Izuku was taken with the whole thing and was hanging on to every word being said while Uzume had her head pointed down at the plate and was eating her food at a slow pace, careful to observe every rule of etiquette there was.