A/N: The relationship between Yukari and Nyamo fascinates me. This is just a little slice-of-life type thing, although I admit I softened Yukari a fair bit for narrative purposes. I will also say that if you've never had a migraine, consider yourself very, very lucky (and if you're not sure whether you've had one or not, you almost certainly haven't).

Summary: When things are bad, she's always there to make them better. Yukari/Nyamo.

Rating: A gentle PG

Disclaimer: All recognizable characters belong to the makers of Azumanga Daioh, not me.

Reason
by: Hayseed

The good thing - the only good thing - about migraines is that she at least gets fair warning.

This time, she's in the pool, treading water in the middle of the lane, waiting to catch Chiyo-chan and help her get turned back around. The little girl can manage half-laps, as long as Minamo is willing to hang out in the middle to give her a push-off point.

The vision in her right eye goes all strange and filmy as Chiyo-chan comes splashing up, huffing and puffing, and for a split second, Minamo thinks she's just got water in her eye. A few futile swipes later, and she realizes that she's got about half an hour before her life turns into a living hell.

Her prescription, of course, is sitting in a cabinet in her kitchen.

Fortunately, this is the last class of the day, so maybe she'll be able to finish up and get home before the worst hits.

The air rushes out of her lungs abruptly; in her efforts to swim back to the edge, Chiyo-chan has managed to land a kick in Minamo's gut.

"Oh, Kurosawa-sensei," she says, looking like she going to cry. Almost immediately, the girl begins flailing in the water, and Minamo reaches out to steady her as if on autopilot.

"It's okay, Chiyo-chan," she tells her, smiling and trying not to blink so much (it's instinct and she knows it, but that doesn't make it any less frustrating). "Occupational hazard."

"Do you have something in your eye, sensei?"

She grits her teeth and resists the urge to rub it again. "Don't worry about it. Let's get you turned back around."

Wordlessly, she drops her car keys on Yukari's desk. They land with a loud rattling sound that makes her wince.

"Hey, Ny-" The instant Yukari looks up and gets a good look at her expression, she falls silent. "When did it start?"

"About forty-five minutes ago," Minamo tells her, voice barely above a whisper. "It's only really started hurting within the last ten or so, though."

"And your medicine?"

"At home." Minamo nods and really wishes she hadn't; the world does a slow, lazy spin that makes her stomach turn.

The keys rattle again when Yukari picks them up. "Let's go."

"But don't you need to-"

"It's nothing that won't keep until tomorrow." Yukari is standing and putting a gentle arm around Minamo's shoulder. The office is basically empty, but Minamo knows that if most of their colleagues saw Yukari acting like this, they wouldn't believe it anyway. "Just let me get my bag."

She moves away and Minamo's head starts pounding in earnest.

Suddenly, magically, the lights turn off, and the room goes mercifully dim. "Here," Yukari says, thrusting something into her hand as she walks back across the office, "put these on."

Yukari's sunglasses.

Yukari's prized expensive-Christmas-present sunglasses. Minamo once accidentally put them on as they were heading in to work one morning and she immediately launched into a screaming fit.

She blinks down at her hand, unsure as to what she should do.

"Yours won't work as well," Yukari tells her matter-of-factly. "They let too much light in on the sides. You can be so cheap sometimes, Nyamo."

Minamo slides the sunglasses on and feels the difference instantly. She can open her eyes a little wider and hold her head a little straighter. "Thanks..." she mumbles.

"Can you make it to the car?"

"I think so."

And she does, mostly. It's touch-and-go when a few of the girls from Yukari's class come bouncing through the corridor, making more noise than a herd of stampeding rhinos, but she slides the glasses down her nose, smiles at them, and says something appropriately indulgent, and only Sakaki-san is looking at her with anything remotely resembling concern.

When she slides into the passenger seat, she heaves a sigh of relief and lets her eyes slide blissfully shut. Cool hands reach around her to buckle her seatbelt, but Minamo is so far beyond caring that she doesn't even protest.

It's not that Yukari is a bad driver... okay, it probably is that Yukari is a bad driver, but she can be all right when she bothers to pay attention to what she's doing. Which is why Minamo doesn't so much as crack an eyelid on the way home. There's no real need to.

"I can't carry you upstairs," Yukari says lightly once she switches the engine off. "At least, not without smacking your head on something."

"Just give me a second..." Minamo mutters, gathering up the courage to open the car door. Her head spins as she stands up, and the ground feels like it's going to fall out from under her feet. "Yukari..."

And she's there, her hand at Minamo's waist. "We'll make it," she says, sounding amused.

It's slow, but Yukari's right. They do manage to make it upstairs. Minamo collapses on the bed, stripping off her jacket and slacks without a moment's hesitation.

"You want your pills?"

She throws an arm over her face. "I'm in the middle of it now. There's not a lot of point."

It hurts to open her eyes. But it hurts to close them, too. A well-meaning doctor once told her that the best thing she could do for a migraine is sleep, but she's always wondered how the hell she's supposed to sleep when she can't even figure out how to manage her eyelids.

Yukari is in the kitchen, making just enough noise for Minamo to know that she's trying to be quiet. After a few minutes - during which Minamo debates the merits of suicide as a pain-killer - Yukari emerges holding a tray. "It's tea," she says. "I know caffeine helps sometimes."

And she's right again. How she remembers stuff like that but can't even keep track of her students' names, Minamo will never know. "Thanks..."

She tries to drink it; she really does. But her fingers don't want to hold on to the cup, so she only makes it about halfway through before setting her cup back down on the tray.

Yukari smiles at the cup's contents. "That's better than the last time this happened. I think you only made it one or two sips in before-"

Oh, shit. Bad idea, bad idea, really, really bad idea!

The low-grade nausea she's been fighting since she got out of the car has officially been upgraded to full-blown sickness. With a gurgling noise, she leaps out of bed and practically throws herself into the bathroom.

Cool hands on the back of her neck, making circling motions as she coughs.

"Better?" Yukari asks brightly.

Minamo doesn't blush. You can't have someone like Tanizaki Yukari for a drinking buddy and be shy about vomiting in front of each other.

And she does feel better. A little.

Her eyes slide closed and she realizes that the knives that were previously being stabbed into her eyelids may have been downgraded to needles. "I might be able to sleep now," she whispers.

"Good girl."

Coming from anyone else, it would be condescending. But Yukari's voice is calm, with a playful edge that speaks to Yukari's awareness that it's rare for Minamo to be the one lying on the bathroom tile, wishing for death to come on swift wings.

She slides between the sheets with a grateful sigh and hears clothing rustling in the background. "Is this okay?" Yukari asks as she climbs into Minamo's bed and wraps her arms around her.

Yukari is wearing one of her shirts; she can smell her own perfume. It's a little odd, but she can also smell the lingering fragrance of Yukari's soap, which is less weird. She relaxes into the loose embrace. "Sure."

As Minamo dozes off, the last thing to fade from her mind is the softness of Yukari's skin under her cheek.

Something is popping and crackling in the kitchen, but what really brings Minamo to wakefulness is the smell.

Curry, peppers, and... something...

Her stomach growls, and she decides that it's now or never and swings her legs over the edge of the bed.

The room dips crazily as she stands, but there's no nausea, and the pain in her head has diminished from a roar to a whisper. She shuffles into the kitchen and leans against the doorframe. "Hey."

Yukari looks up from the pan, a wooden spoon in her hand and a warm smile on her face. "You look like shit."

Minamo ignores her; Yukari's testing the waters, and she's not quite ready for that yet. "What time is it?" she chooses to ask, biting back a wide yawn.

"Six. You hungry at all?" Yukari has taken the hint, then.

"Six?" Minamo echoes. "Feels like I slept longer than that."

With a wide grin, Yukari shakes her head. "Six in the morning," she clarifies. "You've been out like a light for almost twelve whole hours, my dear Nyamo."

She turns this over in her head for a few minutes, scratching idly at her belly. "We ought to start getting ready for work, then," she finally says.

"Nuh-uh," Yukari replies. "You're staying home today. I called our administrator last night to let him know you were sick. He said he hopes you feel better soon, by the way."

"What about you?" Minamo asks, yawning again.

Yukari resumes stirring the contents of the pan - she probably shouldn't be surprised Yukari can cook without burning the building down, but she always is. "I can stay, but I thought I'd leave that up to you," she says, keeping her face carefully hidden.

"Up to... I..." Leave it up to Yukari to pull this kind of crap on her when her head felt like it was stuffed with cotton.

Abruptly, her head jerks up, and Minamo can see the blush staining her cheeks. "I just meant that... I know you probably want to rest, and I don't want to get in your way."

There's some truth in that, but Minamo thinks about cool hands on her forehead and back and knows otherwise. She leans against Yukari's back and wraps her arm around her shoulders. "You won't be in my way," she says quietly. "I'd feel better if you were here."

"I made curry and rice," Yukari says so abruptly Minamo almost laughs at her. "There's miso soup in the fridge if you want that instead, but I thought you might want something hot."

"Curry sounds good," she tells her, giving her shoulders one last squeeze and backing away. "I'm gonna go lay back down for a little while if that's okay."

"Don't fall asleep," Yukari replies with a little smirk.

"I won't," Minamo promises solemnly.

She lied, apparently, and Yukari wakes her up with a nudge to her bare leg. "You were snoring," she says promptly when Minamo opens her eyes.

"I'm entitled," she retorts without rancor. "Is the food ready?"

But Yukari is holding two bowls, and Minamo feels kind of silly for asking. "You want to eat here or at the table?"

In response, she just sits up and holds out her hands.

"Careful... don't spill, Nyamo," Yukari teases as she passes her a steaming bowl.

She snorts. "You should talk."

But Yukari just rolls her eyes and takes a big bite of curry.

They eat in silence, which is kind of weird, but Minamo figures Yukari is just being good to her word. "Thanks for cooking, Yukari," she says once she puts her bowl down on the bedside table. "I appreciate it."

Grinning, Yukari bumps her shoulder with her own. "You're the only one I cook for, baby."

And, oddly, it's true. Minamo knows that as marriage-crazy as her own mother can be, Yukari's is ten times worse. Most of the reason she still lives at home is because of her mother's insistence that a single woman living alone is inappropriate. She spent most of her childhood being drilled in things like cooking, cleaning, embroidery, even tea ceremonies; more than once, a teenaged Yukari wound up knocking on Minamo's bedroom window, wearing a mud-splattered dress and making Minamo promise to kill her if she ever started acting like her mother.

Minamo has no idea how Yukari managed to get a job without her mother absolutely flipping out and making her quit, and she's never quite figured out how to ask.

Meaning, of course, that Yukari makes sure her parents think that a wild grizzly bear would be a better housewife than their daughter, and they're pretty much resigned to leaving her alone about it. At Minamo's, she cooks most meals, cleans up after herself, and has even been known to help out with the laundry. Her parents would be as shocked by that as by anything else she and Minamo get up to.

"If you leave the dishes in the sink, I'll wash them later," Minamo offers, stifling a yawn and leaning back against her pillow.

Yukari leans in and presses her lips against Minamo's. "Don't worry about it."

The next time she wakes up, her fingers are tangled in Yukari's hair and the pillow under her cheek is slightly damp. Yukari herself is sitting on the floor, playing some game or another with the television muted.

"Noise doesn't bother me," Minamo mumbles, using her free hand to rub at her eyes.

"I know," Yukari says, not taking her eyes off the screen. "I've been talking to the game for, like, an hour, and you haven't budged."

"Why did you turn the sound off, then?" she asks, mystified.

"Oh... no reason." But her cheeks are a bright shade of pink. Minamo has no idea what this means, and she's too tired and fuzzy to try and figure Yukari out.

She eases herself out of bed. The room stays still this time, and she feels more or less human again for the first time since yesterday afternoon. Maybe, for the most part, the worst has passed. "I'm thirsty," she says, padding toward the kitchen. "You want something?"

"Could you bring one of my sodas?"

She grabs two and pops one open on the way back into the room. "Yukari..." she asks as she sits on the floor, passing the can over. "Can I ask you something?"

Humming, Yukari pauses the game and opens her drink. "Shoot," she says after taking a long swig and stifling a loud belch.

"Why don't we live together?"

Rarely does she get to take Yukari off-guard, but this time, Minamo definitely wins. Yukari's mouth drops open and her soda crashes to the floor. "W-what?"

"You heard me," she says evenly, not taking her eyes away from Yukari's face.

Her hands fiddle with the controller in her lap. "Lots of reasons... there's work, and my mom, and..."

"If they don't care that you call in sick for me, I don't think they'll care that our mailing addresses are the same," she points out logically, taking a sip of her soda. "You're over here all the time anyway, and it... kind of feels weird when you're not."

"I just..."

"If you don't want to, that's okay," Minamo offers gently. "I was just wondering."

Yukari eyes her with something akin to shock. "You want me to move in with you here?"

She blinks a few times, giving it serious consideration. "I don't think that would work," she admits. "This place is too small. But we could get a bigger apartment. One with another room for all your stuff."

Quirking an eyebrow, Yukari tilts her head. "Separate bedrooms, Nyamo?"

"Well..." she replies defensively. "Maybe that's what we let your mother think."

"For now."

Her heart beats faster. "So... you want to?"

Yukari stares at her for a long moment. There's a lot in that stare - curiosity, fear, but most of all, something Minamo is pretty sure is close to love. "Why not?" she eventually says, hitting the Start button and resuming her game.

With a happy sigh, Minamo leans into Yukari's side and lets her eyes slide shut, a fond smile on her lips.

Through the years, plenty of people (including her own mother) have asked why she continues to put up with Yukari. And while Minamo usually dodges the question - for lots of reasons, but mostly because no one would understand even if she did tell them - she's always known the answer.

Life doesn't have to be all that complicated, and when she's with Yukari, she never forgets it.

FINIS