NXYZ Community Christmas Fic Exchange
Title: One Day Mom
Written for: Lahdolphin
Special Message: I hope you like this story and sorry for my still in-training writing skill :) I did my best for this story though :D
Pairing: (hint of)MaruiOC
Genre: Family
Rating: K
Beta: Frog-kun (I love you!)
Disclaimer: Owning Prince of Tennis is a dream within a dream except for Konomi Takeshi.
One Day Mom
"Daichi, don't tease your sisters, okay? Mikki and Mayu, don't fight each other while I'm away."
"Alright mom," the three kids answered in unison.
"And listen to your Papa, okay?"
"Yes, mom."
"Well, then, I'll see you again later." She hugged her three children.
"I'll leave the house to you then, Bun-kun. Don't forget to do the house works," she said lastly to her husband.
"I know, I know. Don't worry too much, Natsuki , or else you'll miss the travel," he said, pointing to the clock.
Natsuki gasped and hurriedly took her handbag. "Well then, I'll see you guys again tomorrow." She gave Marui a quick peck on his cheek and rushed into the taxi that has been waiting in front of their house.
"Bye bye, mom." The kids waved to their mother who was also waving at them from inside the car.
"Don't forget to be good kids," she said lastly as the car started to move to the airport. The four of them stayed in front of the door for a while until the car was out of their sight.
"Papa, where does Mama go to?" the youngest twin, Mayu, asked.
"Well, she said that she won a lottery for a one day trip to an onsen."
"Will she be alright?" the daughter continued to ask.
"Don't worry, she'll be alright." He spoke softly to his daughter, sensing that she would cry as soon as…
"WAAAAAAHHHH!" the little girl started to cry.
He knew this was coming; after all, Mayu was the cry baby one out of his three children. She would cry anytime, anywhere. By contrast, the older twin sister, Mikki, was brave, adventurous, and a hyper active kid, like her elder brother, and sometimes would give Marui another headache because of their pranks.
"There, there, don't cry, Mayu. Your mother will come back tomorrow. So until then, why don't we play together? We have a whole day to play around." He comforted his daughter who seemed to be a little calmed down. "Look, why don't we call Jackal to come? I'm sure he won't mind to play with you all day." He took out his cell phone and pressed the dial number to call his former partner and team mate while the youngest daughter finally stopped crying.
"Oh! Papa is calling the baldy!" Daichi, the first son, excited.
"Yay! I want to play with baldy!" Mikki followed.
"Mayu too, wants to play," the third child said although she didn't follow her other two siblings, who were jumping on the sofa.
"Yo, Jackal!" he greeted.
"Hn? Oh, it's you, Bunta. What do you want?" the other side asked, feeling so unlucky from the moment he heard Marui's voice.
"Can you come to my house for today? The thing is, Natsuki is off to a trip and she won't come back until tomorrow. And the kids are so eager to play with you. So I need you to come over here. Alright then, see you soon," he explained and hung the phone, not letting Jackal to talk even one statement.
"O-oi! At least let me talk!"
BLEEP BLEEP
"Ah, he hung up," Jackal sighed.
"It's settled! Jackal will come to play with you guys for today," Marui said which earned some cheers from the kids.
"Well, how about lunch while we wait for Jackal?"
"Papa, I want omelet rice." Daichi raised his hand.
"I want pancake!"
"Mayu will have pancake too."
"Alright, alright, one omelet rice and two pancakes, right?"
"Yes!" They nodded.
Marui went to the kitchen and took out the ingredients for their lunch. His children soon followed him to the kitchen and watched him to cook.
"I love Papa's meal better than Mama's. Mama's cook always tastes plain if not salty," the first son said and the twins nodded in agreement.
"You know she'll be mad if she heard this, right?" Marui warned his son jokingly.
"I didn't say anything!" Daichi quickly covered his mouth with his hands. Marui laughed at his son's response. Being left without his wife wasn't really a bad thing, was it?
Just as they finished their meal, the bell rang and Daichi rushed to open the front door without being told to.
"Yo, Daichi." A Brazilian with tanned skin greeted the 6 years old kid in front of him and gave him a pat on the head.
Daichi smiled. "Papa! Baldy has come!"
"B-baldy?" Jackal was dumbfounded.
"Well that's the fact. Puri." Another person came up behind him.
"N-Niou? Why are you here? I don't remember calling you." Marui was irked. The moment he saw the silver haired, he knew something bad would happen. Sooner or later. Last time he came here, Marui ended up in hospital because of food poisoning. And he certainly didn't want that to happen again.
"We just happen to meet on the road and I decided to tag along with him," he explained.
Marui grunted. "Whatever, just what do you want from here?"
Mikki interrupted him. "It's Uncle Niou. Hey, teach me playing darts again."
"Of course I want to, but it seems your father is not pleased to see me enter your house." Niou smirked.
"Eh? Papa! I want to play with him! I want to play with him!"
Curse you, Niou. Marui glared to the male in front of him.
He sighed. "Fine. Just don't teach my kids something weird."
"Yay! Come in, Uncle! Let's play!" she dragged the male inside.
"Come in too, Baldy. I want you to do something for me." Daichi grabbed Jackal's hand and made the older male to follow him.
"Wait, why I'm the only one called without honorific here?" he protested.
"That's true, Daichi, you can't call him Baldy," Marui scolded him. "At least call him Uncle Baldy."
"That's not what I mean!" Jackal shouted.
"Hurry up, Uncle Baldy." Daichi ignored his protest.
Jackal could only sigh. Why he was always treated like this, he wondered. It had always been like this since he entered Rikkaidai and met with his team mates. His thoughts wandered to the past when he was still in Rikkaidai tennis team, and his rough time dealing with Akaya and Marui using his allowance to fulfill their needs. That's until he felt a small tug from behind.
He looked back and found the younger twin was the one who tugged his jeans. "Oh, Mayu-chan, it's been a while."
"I want a horse ride," was the only response he got from the little girl.
At that moment, Jackal realized that those kids were definitely a Marui in child version. Not only they treated him like he was a servant, they also didn't pay any respect to him.
"I'm the one who's playing with him, Mayu. You'll do it later. Go away and help Papa to clean up." Daichi gestured her sister to let go of her hand.
"But Mayu also want to play. Mayu don't want to clean up," she whimpered. The two of them started to yell at each other.
"Hey, hey, don't fight. Remember your mother told you not to fight, right?" Marui stepped in.
"I won't if she let go of her hands."
"But Mayu want to play." She sniffed.
"Well, how about this, Jackal will give Mayu a ride while playing with you," he suggested, not wanting to hear a loud cry from his daughter again. They both exchanged look.
"I think it's okay," Daichi agreed, earning Mayu's smile.
"What about my opinion?" Jackal cried as he was now carrying Mayu on his back and went to Daichi's room, which was on second floor.
Now that all the kids were off to play, all Marui had to do was do the housework.
"Let's see… Well, I'll start up with cleaning the dishes first," he said and started to do the work.
After cleaning up the dishes, he went to the next job that waited to be done. He took out a vacuum cleaner from the closet and cleaned the living room. Another hour passed and Marui couldn't help but felt something strange. Well, ever since Niou set his foot inside his house, nothing would go well.
Marui put the vacuum cleaner back and decided to check on the kids, starting from Mikki. He opened the twins' room and peeked inside. Niou was still inside with Mikki, and they seemed still playing darts only the target board was actually not a board. It was a drawing by a crayon right on the wall and they were throwing the crayon at it and leaving dotted marks all over the wall.
"What the heck, Niou? I thought I told you not to do something weird!" Marui snapped and snatched the crayons away from them.
"Whoa, watch out the words, Bunta. You don't want your daughter to have a bad mouth right." He gave Marui a grin.
"Right. Now why don't you two go help me to clean up all this mess?" he said sarcastically.
"But I still want to play darts, Papa." Mikki complained.
Marui approached his daughter and kneeled to match her eye level. "Mikki, I know you still want to play, but what do you think your mother will be like if she saw this?" He pointed to the wall that was full of dotted colors.
"She will praise me?" she answered innocently. Niou chuckled by the girl's answer.
Marui felt like banging his head on the wall. "And why do you think so?"
"Because Mama loves to draw."
He restrained the urge to literally bang his head against the nearer wall. "But she draws on a paper, not on the wall. If you want Mama to praise you, you should draw in a book after you clean the wall with this uncle. Alright?"
"Alright," she sulked.
"Now I'm going to check Daichi and Mayu, be sure you two clean the wall before dinner." He patted his girl's head and moved on to the next room.
One problem solved, off to the next room. He hoped that everything went well, because if something like before happened again, he was sure that by the time his wife came back, he would be the one who was killed. No, he didn't want to die yet, not until he tasted that brand new cake that his favorite cake shop made.
"Daichi, I'm coming-"
A pillow welcomed him as he opened the door.
"-in…" he finished his line as the pillow fell to the floor with a soft thud.
He scanned the room to find Mayu and Daichi running all around throwing pillows at each other, jumping on the bed, toys were scattered on the floor. And where was Jackal?
"Jackal, what are you doing there?"
The tanned man was lying on the floor, his head was covered by bed sheet as if he was dead. He moved the sheet and finally woke up from his position.
"Bunta, you come to save me right?"
"Huh?"
Before Jackal could say any more words, he was sent to floor again by Daichi's kick.
"You can't move! You're already dead!" He covered Jackal's face again with the sheet.
At this point, Marui finally got a glimpse what they're doing. First, they're playing some kind of war game, maybe he played too much game with Daichi, and this room was their battle field, and lastly, Jackal was dead.
"Papa, want to play with Mayu?" The little girl approached him and gave him her ammunition, the pillow.
"Actually, Papa still has to make dinner for you guys, so I can't play with you. Anyway, you two should stop playing now and tidy up this room for me, kay?" He placed the pillow back to Daichi's back.
"Eh? But-" Daichi about to protest.
"No buts, Daichi. Clean this room now. Don't worry, this Jackal will help you." He pointed to the dead man behind him.
"Me? Wait, I know it'll be like this." He sighed. It would be better if he was really dead, he thought.
"Alright! Uncle Baldy will help us, isn't that great Mayu?" Daichi high-fived Mayu.
"I'll be preparing dinner now. Come down after you finish tidying up this room."
Marui left the room, leaving the poor Jackal and his two kids behind. Jackal knew that he would be the only one who did the work. Next time, he will turn his phone off or block Marui's number. He'd rather go to Yukimura's house or even Sanada's, but not here or Kirihara's.
"Papa!" Mikki hugged Marui's leg from behind as he was still preparing their dinner.
"Oh, Mikki. Finished cleaning the wall?" he asked.
Mikki nodded. "Yup."
"And, where's Uncle Niou?"
"He already went home. He said there's something important."
"That Niou, he doesn't change after all these years," he grumbled.
"Oi, Bunta, we've finished cleaning the room." Jackal arrived with Mayu on his back and Daichi tailing behind.
"Thanks, you're always reliable. Want to have dinner with us?"
"No, thanks, I'll go home now before it's too dark." He placed Mayu down and said goodbye to the kids before leaving.
"Come again," the three said in unison.
Afterwards they were having dinner together and now Marui needed to give his kids a bath before they slept.
"Take that!" Daichi splashed the hot water from the bathtub.
The war was not over. Daichi splashed the water everywhere and the twins brought water toy guns and shooting in all directions. The bathroom became really foggy because of their actions.
Mikki shot some water to Marui's face. "Dou? Tensai teki?"
"Hey, that's my line." He smirked and sprayed water to them with shower and cleaned all of the soap on them as he did so. "Now that's what you call genius."
"Come on, play time is over. You have to go to bed. It's sleep time already," he said while taking them out one by one and drying them with towels.
He sent them to their rooms and gave them a night kiss on their foreheads before they went to sleep. As he turned off the light in the twin's room, Marui realized how hard it was to be a mother even just for one day. Also, today, he learned that kids were stubborn, loud, and naïve, but on the same time, they were really funny and cute, and they could made your day brighter just by their presence.
He felt very lucky to have such family.
OMAKE
Marui found a box of cake as he locked the front door. He took it and saw that it was that cake he really wanted to eat. Without worrying about anything, he took the cake in while humming.
Little did he know that there was a paper under the box with a letter on it.
"-Niou Masaharu"
Merry Christmas! Hope you have a great Christmas!