Chapter Text
Tanjiro had no idea how he’d managed to lose one of his father’s earrings. But he had, and he’d been looking for it all afternoon, and he had absolutely no idea where it was.
He’d searched everywhere he could think of: in his bedsheets and all around his bunk; in and around the shower; in the mess hall, in case it had somehow fallen out while he’d been trying to stop a fight between Inosuke and Zenitsu. And it wasn’t anywhere.
The only place he hadn’t looked yet was the barn, and if it wasn’t there, he didn’t know what he’d do. Those earrings were one of his last mementos from his father - he couldn’t just lose one.
As he entered the barn, he just barely remembered to slow down and move more calmly. Everything in him was desperate to tear the place apart, but that would only upset the horses, and he couldn’t deal with that on top of this.
Where was it? Where was it? It had to be here somewhere, it had to be…
He scanned the floor first, making sure to check every corner in case the earring had been swept to the side. When that didn’t turn up anything, he started for the tack room - then froze at the sound of a quiet voice coming from a nearby stall.
“I don’t understand why Himejima thought this would help. It’s not like you can understand me.”
Genya! He didn’t want to eavesdrop - it was wrong and he didn’t have time; he needed to keep looking - but Genya didn’t seem to have noticed his presence, and his curiosity briefly superseded his worry.
“And even if you could understand, it’s not like you can answer me,” Genya continued. “I don’t speak Horse any more than you speak Human. But he was sure that you could be, I don’t know, some kind of equine therapist or something for me.” He scoffed. “It sounded a lot less ridiculous when he was the one saying it.”
As quietly as he could, Tanjiro changed course to Sunshine’s stall. There was a chance his earring had fallen there when he’d been getting ready for a ride, but also…
It was wrong, he knew it was wrong, but staying in the main barn would also give him a chance to keep listening to Genya.
“Horses are all right, I guess,” Genya went on. “But I don’t see how you’re supposed to help me talk to Sanemi. It’s not like you can get him to listen long enough for me to apologize, or even just explain to him that I’ll never be any good at math. Heck - I don’t even know if you’re listening right now or if this is just a bunch of stupid gibberish to you.” He scoffed again, but it was sadder this time. “Seems pretty stupid. I should just talk to him, right? But it’s never that easy.”
He couldn’t stay and listen to this any longer. Genya was clearly having a very personal, very private conversation with his horse, and it was none of his business. And his earring was still missing, and he really needed to find it.
It wasn’t losing Dad again, but it felt like it, a little bit. He’d promised he’d never lose them, and he’d failed to keep that promise, so did that mean he was failing as a son? If he’d never left home, if he’d never come to camp, he almost certainly wouldn’t have lost the earring, and then—
In his distraction, he stumbled, tripping over his own feet. He barely managed to catch himself on the stall door; with his added weight, it swung shut with a loud clang! A few horses startled, letting out sharp snorts before settling again.
…Well, Genya certainly knew he was here now.
“Who’s there?” his voice rang out, rough and angry.
“It’s me,” Tanjiro croaked back. He righted himself and exited Sunshine’s stall, seeing Genya come out of Dove’s to approach him.
“What’re you doing in here?” Genya crossed his arms, any previous indication of vulnerability entirely gone.
“I’m looking for my earring,” he explained, well aware of how desperate he sounded but decidedly unable to modulate his tone at the moment. “I can’t find it anywhere, and I can’t have lost it, and—”
“Whoa, jeez, calm down,” Genya held up his hands. “It’s just an earring.”
“But it’s not,” he insisted. “It’s one of the last things my dad left me and I promised I’d never lose them! I didn’t mean to eavesdrop on you; I just need to find it, and this is the only place I haven’t searched yet, so I thought maybe—”
Genya faltered for a moment, clearly unsure how to deal with Tanjiro’s visibly mounting panic. Which, he briefly registered, was a reasonable response. He generally did his best to keep a smile on his face at all times, so Genya probably wasn’t sure what to make of him right now. And he knew he really needed to get it together, but he just couldn’t.
“Hey, I’m sure it’s, uh, around here somewhere.”
“But where?”
“Well…” He thought for a moment. “In the tack room, maybe?”
Without waiting to see if Genya was following him, Tanjiro turned and ran for the tack room. He immediately began scanning the floor, starting at one end of the room so he could work his way over to the other. Genya entered a few seconds behind him and started searching from the other end of the room.
They had to find it. They had to; Tanjiro wasn’t sure what he would do if they didn’t. He wasn’t sure where to look if it wasn’t here - the pasture, maybe? Or the trails? But if he’d lost it there, it was likely gone for good. How could he search acres of land?
Minutes passed. Tanjiro’s breath grew more and more ragged as they didn’t find anything. How was he going to tell his mother that he’d managed to lose an heirloom? She’d be so disappointed in him. It wasn’t something that could easily be replaced. It was a small blessing he still had one of the earrings, but they were a matched set and he’d gone and lost one. How could he have lost one?
“Do you remember where you last had it?” Genya asked.
“No,” he admitted. They didn’t weigh much so he hadn’t even noticed it was missing until Zenitsu pointed it out to him. The last time he could remember having both of them was this morning, when he’d put them back in after he woke up. He’d gone all over the place since then - they’d had a riding lesson and gone on a hike, and after lunch Inosuke had dragged him out to the pasture to show him a strange bug. It could have fallen out anywhere. “What if we can’t find it?”
Genya shrugged. “It’s not like it just disappeared. It has to be somewhere.”
But that didn’t mean they’d be able to find it; all that meant was that it hadn’t vanished off the face of the earth. He shook his head, swallowing down a lump in his throat. “But if it’s not, then…!”
His eyes stung as he remembered the day Dad had given him the earrings. It had been one of his father’s better days, when his breathing was a little easier and he wasn’t in as much pain. Dad had told him those earrings had been passed down in their family for generations and that they hopefully would be for many more.
But they couldn’t be passed down if Tanjiro had lost one of them.
That prickling in his eyes progressed to the welling of tears as it occurred to him: he wouldn’t just be failing Dad, but every other Kamado who’d ever possessed those earrings, as well as every future Kamado who was supposed to but now wouldn’t get the chance.
Genya’s eyes widened. “Whoa, hey, it’s all right.” He shifted awkwardly for a moment, then continued, “Look, we haven’t even finished searching here yet, and there are still plenty of other places it could be. Don’t lose hope yet, all right?”
Tanjiro sniffed, trying to get ahold of himself. Genya was right; he couldn’t give up now. Not when there was still a chance of finding it; not when there were more places they hadn’t yet looked. “O-okay.”
They continued searching for another few minutes. But Genya’s assurance only provided a temporary reprieve from worry; the longer they searched, the farther Tanjiro’s thoughts began to spiral.
And then—
“Tanjiro!” After so long a span of silence, Genya’s voice made him jump. “I found it!”
He was at Genya’s side in an instant. Sure enough, Genya was holding the missing earring. Slightly dusty but otherwise intact, it must have been on the floor beneath the wall of helmets. Maybe it had fallen out when he took his helmet off after their lesson.
“Thank you!” he cried, taking the earring. The backing was still missing, he noticed, but that didn’t matter nearly as much as the earring itself. He could probably ask Counselor Kocho or Mrs. Ubuyashiki if they had any spares.
He’d found it. Genya had found it.
“Thank you,” he repeated, breathless from relief, “thank you, thank you, Genya!”
Genya rubbed the back of his neck, cheeks tinged faintly red. “‘S nothing,” he muttered.
“Not to me,” he insisted. “Thank you.” His first instinct was to engulf Genya in a tight hug; he barely managed to stop himself upon remembering that Genya wasn’t one for physical affection. “This earring…means a lot to me.”
“I can tell.” Genya was quiet for a moment. “You…said it was your dad’s?”
He nodded. “Before he…died, he passed them down to me. Apparently they were a gift from a family friend a lot of generations back. They’ve been in my family for so long…I didn’t want to be the one to lose them now.” And he hadn’t. Or, rather, he had, but thanks to Genya, the earrings were a pair once again. He hadn’t irrevocably failed his father or the rest of his family.
“Well,” Genya ran a hand through his hair, “I’m glad you were able to find it, then.”
“We found it,” Tanjiro corrected.
The red in Genya’s cheeks darkened a little and he shrugged. Was he really so uncomfortable with gratitude?
“Anyway,” Tanjiro said, “I need to find another backing for this so I can put it back on.” He wondered if this meant that he and Genya were friends now - if this shared effort had managed to break down the other boy’s walls. As bad as temporarily losing the earring had been, it’d be nice if something good could come of it. To test the waters, he asked, “Want to come?”
But Genya shook his head, and Tanjiro could practically see his walls coming back up. “No.” They both winced at how snappish his tone was; he repeated, more neutrally, “No. I was doing something before you showed up.”
“Okay,” Tanjiro nodded. It was a little disappointing, although he really should’ve expected it. They wouldn’t instantly become best friends after accomplishing one shared goal. “Thank you again for finding it!”
Again, Genya shrugged it off.
After leaving the barn, he headed to the office to see if he could find Mrs. Ubuyashiki or Counselor Kocho. Mrs. Ubuyashiki had a spare backing and gave it to him; he thanked her before hurrying off to rejoin the rest of his cabin.
He found Inosuke and Zenitsu sitting by the pasture fence, having brought some tack outside to clean. Inosuke was scrubbing furiously at a saddle, while Zenitsu was meticulously cleaning each strap of a bridle. A carefully-laid-out pile of more gear was on the ground before them, presumably waiting to be cleaned, while one or two other pieces were already gleaming in the sunlight.
“Oh, good, you can help us!” Zenitsu breathed a sigh of relief when he saw Tanjiro. “He—” he jerked a thumb in Inosuke’s direction— “was throwing acorns at me, and when I tried to fight back, Uzui gave us both all this to clean as punishment. If we don’t get it all done by the time he comes back, we’ll have to help Mr. Urokodaki muck out all the stalls too!”
Tanjiro grimaced sympathetically. “Inosuke, why did you throw acorns at Zenitsu?”
Inosuke huffed, “Because he was blathering on and on about how annoying Shinagaga is, and I didn’t want to listen to it any longer!”
“He means Shinazugawa,” Zenitsu explained. “And can I help it if he is? All I did was trip and bump into him and he glared at me like I insulted his mother!”
…Was he talking about Genya or Counselor Shinazugawa? “Um…which one?”
“The angry one with all the scars!” Inosuke said as if it were obvious. “Y’know! And the crazy hair!”
“That’s both of them!” Zenitsu shook his head. “Shinazugawa the counselor. And he is annoying. And we have a lesson with him tomorrow! He hates all of us - it’s going to be terrible. I guess Genya gets it from him.”
“You’re not giving Genya enough credit,” Tanjiro protested. “I think he’s just shy. He’s really nice!”
Zenitsu gaped at him like he’d said Genya secretly had two heads.
“You know how I lost my earring,” he explained, “and he helped me find it! I’d been almost ready to give up but he told me to keep looking, and then he found it!”
“Hmm,” Zenitsu frowned. “Nope - I can’t imagine him ever doing that. Are you sure he wasn’t sleep-talking or something?”
“It’s the middle of the afternoon,” he pointed out.
Zenitsu threw up his hands, the buckles and straps of the bridle he’d been cleaning clinking as he did so. “I don’t know! It was just an example. I just don’t believe that that guy, of all people, would help you look for your earring!”
“Well, he did,” Tanjiro declared. “And I think if you were nicer to him, too, he’d be nicer back.”
Zenitsu’s eyes widened. “Me, be nicer to him? He’s hated me since the first day! I didn’t mean to put my stuff on his bed!”
“I know,” Tanjiro tried to appease him. “But did you ever apologize? Even if it was a misunderstanding, it would’ve shown him you really didn’t mean to do that.”
“...No,” he admitted.
“I’m with Ponitsu on this one,” Inosuke said. “Mohawk Guy’s too angry to be nice.”
Tanjiro shook his head. “Can you just give him a chance, please? I’d like for all of us to be friends, if we can.” Or at least tolerant of each other - they were in the same cabin, for goodness’ sake. They’d been living with each other for not quite two weeks at this point, and would continue to do so for the next six, so it would be nice if everyone could at least be civil.
“Look, if you really want to try to be friends with him,” Zenitsu said, “I won’t stop you, but I still don’t think he’s ever going to like any of us.”
Tanjiro sighed. He doubted this was a fight he could win here and now - he’d just have to show them. “Fair enough.”
Later that day, Tanjiro was walking to the office to mail a letter to his family when he heard two voices coming from behind the building. He’d think it was an argument, if not for the fact that while one voice was shouting, the other’s responses were far more tentative.
He faltered as he realized he recognized both of those voices. The tentative one was Genya, while the one doing the shouting was his older brother, Counselor Shinazugawa.
“Please,” Genya was imploring, “can I talk to you? Just for a few minutes. I just want to—”
“Forget it!” Counselor Shinazugawa snapped. “I told you I don’t want to hear it!”
“But—”
“Go,” he ordered, the steel in his voice leaving no room for further discussion.
“I…okay,” Genya quietly agreed, his voice so impossibly small.
Why was Counselor Shinazugawa so completely disinterested in whatever Genya was trying to say? Even if they weren’t brothers, Genya seemed genuinely desperate for Counselor Shinazugawa to hear him out - but since they were brothers, shouldn’t Counselor Shinazugawa want to listen to him all the more?
Of course, now that he thought about it, Tanjiro had never really seen them interact much. Could they be estranged?
He couldn’t imagine having that kind of relationship - or lack thereof - with his own siblings. Whenever two of them were fighting for whatever reason, someone else would mediate while they talked it out until everyone was happy. He wasn’t used to a situation where one party refused to listen to what the other had to say.
The strangest part of all, though, was that he hadn’t smelled even a hint of anger from Counselor Shinazugawa. He smelled plenty of sadness and guilt - both of which he guessed were from Genya - but there wasn’t the slightest trace of anger in the air.
There was love and care. Were they from Counselor Shinazugawa? And if so - if he really did care about Genya - why was Counselor Shinazugawa speaking so harshly to him?
He left his letter in the office with one of the Ubuyashiki quintuplets - Kanata, if his memory served him, although it was hard to be sure because they looked so similar - then exited the building again. He didn’t really expect Genya to still be standing out there when he returned, but he was still a little disappointed when the other boy was nowhere in sight. He wanted to talk to Genya - not to reveal what he’d overheard, just to make sure Genya was all right. If he’d had a fight like that with one of his brothers, he wouldn’t want to be alone in the aftermath. And while he knew he and Genya were fairly different, he still wanted to give Genya the option of company.
But Genya was nowhere to be seen, and neither was Counselor Shinazugawa.
…Counselor Shinazugawa, who they’d be having a lesson with tomorrow. That would certainly be interesting. He hoped that in spite of whatever issues the Shinazugawas had, Counselor Shinazugawa wouldn’t treat Genya differently than any of the other campers.
Well, given his clear desire to avoid talking to Genya at all, Tanjiro doubted that would be much of a problem.
By the time their lesson with Counselor Shinazugawa rolled around, Tanjiro was equal parts curious and apprehensive: curious, because he wanted to learn about whatever kind of riding Counselor Shinazugawa specialized in; apprehensive, because he wasn’t sure how to interact with someone so hot-tempered.
Well, no, hot-temperedness wasn’t really the problem - he shared a cabin with Inosuke, after all. What really bothered him was how harshly Counselor Shinazugawa had spoken to Genya. They were brothers. And Tanjiro couldn’t imagine any kind of problem that would lead to such a painful divide between brothers.
When he reached the riding ring, everyone else was already gathered outside by the fence. Inside the ring, Counselor Shinazugawa stood beside a pale gray horse that, as Tanjiro drew closer, turned out to be covered with scars. Just like Counselor Shinazugawa.
To his confusion, the horse was wearing neither saddle nor bridle. Huh? Were they going to learn how to ride bareback? Tanjiro could barely ride with gear on - he could hardly manage it without.
“All right,” Counselor Shinazugawa drew them all to attention. “So. This is liberty. Put simply, it means you’re not forcing your horse to do anything they don’t want to do. Which is how it should be anyway, but...” He crossed his arms. “Watch how I work with Hurricane and see if you can pick up on the cues I give him. Got that?”
After a perfunctory chorus of “Yes, sir,” Counselor Shinazugawa huffed, then faced his horse. He murmured something Tanjiro couldn’t hear and reached up to stroke Hurricane’s neck. Then, he stepped back and started walking away.
To Tanjiro’s surprise, despite not having a lead rope, Hurricane walked right alongside the counselor, head to his shoulder.
Counselor Shinazugawa walked in a wide circle and Hurricane stayed with him for every step; they stopped when they came back around to face the campers again. He tapped the toe of one boot forward in the sand of the arena, and Hurricane mimicked the movement with a hoof, pawing at the air. He turned to face Hurricane again and held up a hand before stepping backwards. Hurricane remained in place until Counselor Shinazugawa was a few yards away; then, the counselor stopped and raised both hands and the horse trotted right up to him. He bent a knee in a half bow, then straightened, raising his hands as he did so, and the horse responded with a carefully-controlled rear. As the pair walked back to face the group of campers, it was easy to see how attuned they were to each other: they moved in perfect sync, acting and reacting as if each could read the other’s mind.
Stopping, Counselor Shinazugawa tapped Hurricane’s shoulder. Hurricane snorted and bent one knee, lurching down into a bow and holding the pose for a few seconds before rising again.
“And there you go,” Counselor Shinazugawa declared, stroking Hurricane’s neck. “Just a small example of what you can do with your horse if you build their trust.”
“Whoa,” Tanjiro breathed. How much time - how much work and patience - must it have taken for the pair to reach that point? All the counselors had bonds with their horses like that, but when there was no tack in the way, it was even easier to see.
And yet, Tanjiro couldn’t help but wonder…if Counselor Shinazugawa had such patience with his horse, why didn’t he also have it with his brother? What in the world had happened between them? It was clear that it was hurting Genya, and he couldn’t imagine it didn’t hurt Counselor Shinazugawa too.
For all he’d thought camp would be exciting and different, he’d never imagined there would be quite this much drama.