#once again not the focus but it's a Naeishi family thing

[rkin413]

Naeishi Family - Father's Day

"Father, we're here!" Taka called, knocking on the door. Next to him Makoto stood, struggling slightly with a couple bags of groceries they'd picked up, and the twins behind them.

"Wanna go home..." Sachiko muttered quietly to herself, although Taka still heard her.

"Come now, Sachiko! It's Father's Day!" he scolded. "Don't you want to see your grandfather?"

"No."

Taka bit back a sigh. Sachiko had never liked his father – she was just as scared of him as she was of... everyone that wasn't himself, Makoto, or Noriko. The one thing the two of them most frequently clashed over was her tendency to hide for the entire duration of his father's visits, which were becoming increasingly rare. No doubt due at least in part to Sachiko's blatant rejection of him.

The door opened.

"Taka-Boy, Mako!" Hiroko greeted, opening the door to let the family in. "4'oclock on the dot, I see."

"Of course! Punctuality-"

"Is everything," both Makoto and Hiroko said in unison. Makoto coughed slightly, apparently not expecting the stero.

"I'm going to take these to the kitchen," he said, holding up his bags. Sachiko clung onto his leg and gave him a pleading look to keep him from leaving. He transfered one bag to the other hand and pat her head. "You'll be fine, Sachi. Hiroko, could you show me the thing we talked about on the phone?"

Taka knew he was referring to something about the two of them cooking a meal for the day, although he didn't know the specifics. Hiroko nodded and led him towards the kitchen.

His father's study creaked open, and Taka had to lunge for Sachiko as she tried to dash behind a nightstand. Foiled, she instead spun with surprising dexterity to hide behind Taka instead, bending his arm awkwardly in the process.

"Hello you three," his father greeted, looking tired. As usual. "Happy Father's Day, Kiyotaka."

"Happy Father's Day to you as well, Father!" Taka greeted. he was still happy to see his father, no matter how melancholy the other man's exhaustion made him.

Noriko, completely unlike her sister, charged her grandfather and wrapped her arms around his legs. Takaaki ruffled her hair.

"Hello, Golden Rule."

"That's Daddy and Papa's name for Nori," Sachiko muttered to herself.

"Say hello to your grandfather, Sachiko," Taka told her, his tone slightly sharper than he'd intended.

"...hi, grandpa." Sachiko said quietly, barely peeking out from behind Taka's legs. She immediately hid herself again, and this time Taka did sigh.

.................................................

Aside from Sachiko's chronic rudeness, which was worsened by her disappearing to who-knows-where once Taka had let go of her, the visit was nice. Makoto had come out a few minutes later to greet his father-in-law, and the adults had struck up a conversation about recent clean-ups in the area, including the fact that a mysterious group (either one of Hajime's groups or a copycat group) had set up air purifiers in the area. Makoto clearly intended to ask later, and Taka quietly wondered if his father and stepmother living in the area had anything to do with it. Makoto and Hiroko both disappeared into and reappeared from the kitchen, and after an hour and a half, the doorbell rang again.

"That'd be Yasu," Hiroko smiled, and Taka watched her bring her son and grandson in.

"Hiro!" Taka scolded, making Hiro jump as soon as he'd wandered leisurely though the door. Eiji did not, and just shot his Dad an amused look, knowing a scolding was incoming. "Everyone was meant to be here by five o'clock at the latest! How could you be so late!"

"Whoa, hey, chill lil'bro!" Hiro defended. "Our train lost power midway, okay?"

"He lost our tickets," Eiji snitched.

"No I didn't! You stole them!"

"Because you would have forgotten the, Dad. You didn't realize you didn't have them until we were at the station."

"The disrespect..."

"How'd that make you guys late if you had the tickets?" Makoto asked in confusion.

"Dad dragged me all around the station trying to get someone else's, while I was trying to get his attention."

"Hey, you got my attention plenty of times! You just used those times to give suggestions instead of telling me you had-"

"Enough!" Taka interrupted. "You both should be ashamed of yourselves, trying to take other people's tickets! Especially you, Hiro, you need to set a better example!"

Hiro muttered something about Sachiko's absence from the room that no one quite caught but Taka still wilted slightly.

"I'll go find Sachiko," Makoto volunteered. "Eiji, want to help?"

"Sure, Uncle Makoto, I can ferret her out." The two left, and Taka heard him asking about whether Toko, Komaru, and Ryuu would be joining them, which they wouldn't be. Something about being busy – Makoto had told Taka that he suspected they were going to visit the hospital again. He wished them the best.

"Heya Nori!" Hiro greeted, scooping up his niece. "You're glad to see me, right?"

Noriko nodded once, neutral expression never leaving her face, and Hiro somehow managed to deposit her on his shoulders despite the excess of dreadlocks on his head that logically should have blocked her.

"I'm glad to see you," Hiroko said, inexplicably smirking, "now give your mother a hug!"

Hiro obliged.

"Now, dinner's almost ready. Help me take stuff out of the oven, will ya?"

"This is the real reason we were late," Hiro stage-whispered to Noriko, "getting out of manual labor- ow!"

Hiroko had flicked his cheek. Hiro swung Noriko down back onto the ground and followed his mother, and there were various sounds from the kitchen for a minute.

"NO NO NO!" Sachiko screamed as Eiji, with a little too much glee on his face, physically dragged her back into the room by her legs. Taka stood up immediately, panic jolting through him. "HAGAKURE LET ME GO I WILL HURT YOU!"

Noriko walked over and picked up her sister's shoulder to help. Taka sat back down – if Noriko wasn't all that concerned, she probably wasn't hurt.

"ET TU NORI?!" she wailed.

"You cannot possibly think you're going to die," Eiji said. "Why do you do this?"

"Are you okay, Sachikio?" Makoto asked, peering into the room nervously.

"No!"

"She's fine, right Noriko?"

Noriko nodded.

"Don't trust them they're liars!"

Eiji was – he somehow took after his father, despite no actual biological relation – but Noriko wasn't.

"Dinner!" Hiroko called.

"It's more of a late brunch!" Hiro called immediately after.

Eiji sighed, dropping his half of his cousin.

...............................................................

Dinner/Brunch was nice – although Hiro tried to claim more credit for it than just 'took a vegetable casserole out of the oven' probably warranted, but Taka decided to let that one go.

Sachiko looked like she wanted to run off still, and only very cautiously ate a few bites of her curry, until Makoto told her he'd cooked that in it's entierty. Then she ate all of it and didn't touch anything else.

"Wait, there could have been something wrong with the cookwear..." she muttered to herself in horror shortly after dinner and Taka felt a twinge of a headache. She wasn't like this at home!

Naturally, she disappeared before anyone else noticed as soon as she was able. Well, perhaps not anyone, since Noriko was also missing.

"I'll go find her," Makoto quietly told him with a sigh. "Again."

"Oh, hey, while they're doing that, Eiji and I've got a present for ya, Pops!" Hiro said. "Eiji, I know we left it in the living room, can you go get it?"

Eiji rolled his eyes, shoved himself out of his seat, and dashed into the other room.

Hiroko took a sip of her tea, and turned to her son.

"So, any girls I should know about?"

"Ma! Come on, not today!" Hiro blushed.

"What about that nice Nakajima girl?" Hiroko's tone made it clear she was just teasing, and not expecting an actual potential daughter-in-law. "Or Aoi? She's been around, she's nice."

"I think I'd have to be the last guy on earth for Hina to consider anything with me," Hiro said. "Same with Kanonchi. And I'm not interested either!"

"I believe Hina is dating someone, actually," Taka volunteered. Hiro blinked.

"Wait, really? Oh, wait, 's it that guy with the blue hair again?"

"They're not dating – they're just roommates," Makoto volunteered, reentering the room with no children. "The girl's are working on something in the study – nothing that should cause trouble, but they want privacy."

"Oh? What is it?" Takaaki asked, raising an eyebrow.

"You'll see."

"Present!" Eiji declared, running back into the room. Taka wondered if he'd waited for Makoto to rejoin them.

.......................................................................

A couple of hours later, and sadly the younger Ishimarus had to set off. Noriko had come out of the study, and Sachiko had graduated to peeking through doorways of her own volition, at least.

Taka hugged his father on the way out, and Makoto gave him a slightly nervous handshake. Hiroko scooped them both up into a hug to deposit "motherly kisses" onto both their foreheads. Noriko tugged on Takaaki's pantleg, and he bent down to see what was on the piece of paper she was holding up to him. As soon as he was down to her level, she wrapped her arms around his neck in a hug.

"Thank you Noriko," he said. She didn't let go after several seconds. "Okay, I need to stand up now." Nothing. "Alright, I love you too, please let me go now, N-"

Sachiko dashed out of where she was hiding, gave her grandfather a kiss on the cheek and fled out the partially-opened door. Noriko let go, an unusally smug look on her usually restrained face. She then handed the piece of paper to her stunned grandfather, and skipped out after her sister, leaving the stunned group behind.

"Hey, Progress!" Hiro declared, breaking the silence. Taka shared a relieved grin with his husband, before they both abruptly realized their daughters had both left the house without them and had to chase after them.