Entry tags:

fanfic series: meet the parents, fanfic: tenipuri, pairing: zukabe

PoT fic: Meet the Parents - Side Atobe
Title: Meet the Parents - Side Atobe

Author: Me

Fandom: Prince of Tennis

Series: Same universe as Meet the Parents - Side Ohtori, can be read separately

Pairing: TAT - established

Disclaimer: Not mine and all that.

Summary: Atobe takes Tezuka to meet his parents. Things go better than expected. Which isn't saying much.

Author's notes: It's an Atobe-centric fic despite listening to Okiayu-san's sugar-high song. Don't ask me where my brain makes these weird associations.

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“…and that’s when Ohtori-san pulled out the dress with frills.”

It was lunch and Shishido was once again ranting about his traumatic meeting with the Ohtori clan, pointing out repeatedly that normal parents don’t try to marry off their children like that and what was this doing to Choutarou’s home life? Atobe merely rolled his eyes and dug into the four-course lunch his butler prepared this morning, wrinkling his nose as he picked the peas out from the gravy.

“Eat your vegetables, Atobe,” Oshitari reprimanded while still lending Shishido half an ear. Atobe sneered and Shishido veered away from his raving long enough to add, “Yeah, you’ll get rickets if you don’t eat greens” and returned to rehashing how “you have no idea how disturbing it was to go to a bridal fitting.”

“You only get rickets if you’re lacking in vitamin D,” Atobe retorted into deaf ears. Shishido was into his second wind of whining and Oshitari’s attention was absorbed somewhere between his lunch and the book in his lap. Slightly annoyed that he was being brushed off by the two who he considered friends, Atobe added sulkily, “And stop complaining, Shishido. Ohtori’s family isn’t that bad.”

Shishido paused to think then agreed, “Yeah, you’re right. Meeting your parents was much worse.”

Atobe glowered. At the same time, Oshitari pried himself away from his fascinating read to comment, “Speaking of meeting parents, have you taken Tezuka to meet the family yet?”

“What do you mean?” questioned Atobe, suddenly distracted from his visual dissection of Shishido for slandering his family by the mention of his boyfriend’s name.

“It’s just that you and Tezuka have been going out for a few years now. Shouldn’t you have introduced him to your parents at the least?”

“Forget it, Oshitari,” Shishido interrupted with a snort. “If Ohtori’s family is insane, Atobe’s parents are like the seven levels of hell all rolled into one really disturbing package delivered by the devil himself.”

“I thought that was nine circles of hell.”

“Shishido, you are going to regret insulting ore-sama’s family like that.”

“What? Was I wrong?” Shishido asked, ignoring Oshitari’s moment of geekdom.

“Well…in a literal sense,” Atobe prevaricated, looking into his lunch to avoid eye contact. With great reluctance, he mumbled, “It’s just that I’m an only child and they have a tendency to be over enthusiastic.”

“Atobe, your mother called me ‘Ryoh-chan’,” Shishido enunciated with slow deliberation, looking more incredulous with each syllable. “She took me to a marriage counselor to test for our compatibilities. And you only introduced me as ‘the guy on ore-sama’s tennis team’.”

“Compatibility tests are scientifically proven to be effective,” defended Atobe.

“No, they’re not,” Oshitari interrupted unhelpfully and earning himself a glare from their buchou. Shrugging off the glare, he continued, “Come on, Atobe. You’re going to have to introduce him sooner or later, best to get it out of the way early. That way, if it turns sour, you’ll have time to mend fences.”

“You inspire such a sense of optimism, Oshitari.”

“I live with eternal hope. And Atobe? Eat the carrots too.”

~*~

In the end, after much deliberation, Atobe had decided to introduce Tezuka to his family after all. However, even as he stepped into the foyer with Tezuka tagging behind him, he couldn’t shake the nagging sense of doom and the feeling of a fate gone horribly wrong.

“Tadaima,” he called out, stepping out of the genkan and onto the carpeted floors.

“Kei-chan!” a warm and high pitched feminine voice drifted from the stairs to greet him, followed by the owner of said voice herself. Bedecked in an outfit that was more lace and ribbons than contiguous fabric, his mother sailed smoothly down the steps and flowed toward him, pausing just close enough to drop a gentle kiss on his cheek.

“Okaa-sama,” he grimaced in protest at the nickname and pulled out of her reach. Then, turning to the silent Tezuka, he introduced, “This is Tezuka Kunimitsu. Tezuka, my mother. “

“Hajimemashite,” Tezuka greeted with a bow.

“So this is the Tezuka Kunimitsu that I’ve heard so much about,” his mother trilled, smiling a beatific smile at the subject of discussion. Giving Tezuka the once over, she observed, “My, my. You are a handsome young man. How on earth did my son snag you?”

“Mother!” Atobe admonished as Tezuka stared back with a blank expression that, after years of arguing with and teasing the other boy, Atobe was beginning to recognize as Tezuka’s panic face.

“It’s only the truth,” Matron Atobe responded with a blasé air and deliberately wound her arm around Tezuka’s elbow. Under the influence of years of discipline, Tezuka automatically raised his arm to make room for the woman, not seeming to realize what he’d done until Atobe’s mother had pressed into his side, chuckling, “And with such good breeding. Come this way, Ku-chan, and you can tell me all about your relationship with my son. What on earth do you see in that boy anyway?”

Guiding Tezuka toward the spacious sitting room, Matron Atobe led Tezuka away from where her son stood seething in the shadows of the entrance door.

“Mother, I really must protest this,” Atobe demanded loudly as he stormed after his departing mother and boyfriend.

“Protest what, Kei-chan?” his mother asked with an air of practiced innocence while pressing the still silent Tezuka into a sofa, hand lingering needlessly against his shoulder, even after Tezuka had obediently took his seat.

“This!” Atobe gestured toward where his mother remained in contact with his boyfriend, looking murderous as the corner of his eye twitched.

It was into this scene that a new presence arrived, demanding in a loud baritone, “What is going on here?” Then after a pause to observe the situation, continued to state the obvious, “Oh, do we have a guest? A friend of yours, Keigo?”

“Otou-sama, meet my boyfriend, Tezuka Kunimitsu,” Atobe introduced with a flat voice, eyes still shooting daggers at where his mother’s hand was caressing Tezuka’s shoulder. His left shoulder, Atobe’s mind provided with a little twinge of guilt.

“This is the boy that you’re fornicating with?” Atobe’s father asked as he scrutinized Tezuka.

“Father!” Atobe squawked in embarrassment.

Meanwhile, Tezuka stood quickly at the introduction, not fazed in the least and looking grateful for the excuse to escape from under Atobe’s mother’s hand, bowing deeply as he announced clearly, “Hajimemashite.”

“Well, he certainly looks pretty enough,” the elder Atobe acknowledged.

“Please watch yourself, Father,” Atobe warned, his voice dropping into a dangerous drawl.

Tezuka, on the other hand, merely answered politely, “Thank you for the praise.”

“I like this one,” Atobe’s father beamed as he slapped Tezuka hard enough to cause the taller boy to stumble minutely, “and he’s got a great sense of humor.

“Tell me boy,” his father continued, voice lowering to a soft bass as he leaned into Tezuka’s personal space with one arm slung around Tezuka’s shoulders, “and tell me honest, are you a ‘tachi’ or ‘neko’?”¹

Before Tezuka could answer, Atobe forcefully dragged him out of his father’s clutches and shoved Tezuka behind him, eyes sparkling with suppressed rage and reprimanded, “That’s hardly a topic for polite company.”

“Are you lecturing ore-sama on proper behaviour?” his father demanded with a hint of incredulity.

“Honestly, Kei-chan,” his mother piped in now that Tezuka was no longer in her molesting vicinity, “we’re going to be family now. There’s no reason for such proprietary feelings.”

“Family or not,” Tezuka spoke with a steady voice, stepping out from behind where Atobe had shoved him, “what Atobe, that is, what Keigo and I do in our private time is our business alone and no affair of others.”

The room fell into silence as the members of the room considered each other. Finally it was Atobe’s father who broke the silent battle of wills by acknowledging his son’s choice with chuckled drawl, “I see this one has a spine to go with the pretty face.”

“Don’t forget talent and a promising career in tennis,” Atobe reminded his father in a mutter.

“Ah, I suppose the saying is true,” his mother sighed with the despair of generations past, “all the good ones are both taken and gay.”

“Hey, I resent that,” Atobe’s father complained as he turned to his wife.

“Oh, anata, you’re the exception of course,” his mother answered with a sultry smile as she slinked her way towards her husband. As she draped herself against her husband, mouth nudging close into his ear to whisper with a half-lidded expression, Atobe decided it was time to hightail out of the room with consorting adults and into somewhere where there were less nauseating displays of affection.

One hand closing firmly around Tezuka’s wrist, Atobe stalked up the stairs and into his room, pulling Tezuka with him. As he arrived, he threw the door open and Tezuka through the doorway, then closed the door behind him, finally allowing himself to relax enough to let out a sigh of relief.

“Well, that went infinitely better than I had expected,” Atobe finally announced to the staring Tezuka.

“Your mother was hitting on me,” Tezuka reminded Atobe, his panic and fear finally leaking through. “Your father asked me which position I took when we have sex. How could that have possibly gone worse?”

“They could have tried to take you to marriage counseling.”

~*owari*~

Footnote:

¹Tachi and neko are another slang for seme (top) and uke (bottom).