Here Comes the Bride… or rather Here Comes the Groom?
Originally titled:
Here Comes the Bride… that's not right… Here Comes the Groom… er, Husband… oh, fine, Here Comes Fai!
Notes: Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle and xxxHolic crossover; shonen-ai; shoujo-ai
Part I: Preparations!
Nothing seemed to be going Kurogane's way.
First off:
Proposing to Fai D. Flowright, his lover of four and a half years. To make a hell-of-long-story short, let's just say that problem after problem stacked on top of each other before everything collapsed.
It started with the concept of a romantic candle-lit dinner for two while they were celebrating their fourth anniversary together.
It ended with two soaking-wet males walking hand-in-hand to Watanuki Kimihiro's apartment on the poor part-timer worker's evening off. Apparently Ichihara Yûko, also known as the Dimension Witch, let the kid off of work so he could take care of his sick boyfriend-bodyguard, who -they discovered- was staying at Watanuki's until further notice. They (actually, Fai) politely asked to borrow his shower, spare towels, and his dryer, which then lead to the spirit-seeing teen making breakfast with Fai for all four of them.
It had only been nine months, damn it. Nine months since they -Fai, Kurogane, Sakura, and Syaoran- abruptly decided to stay in Japan; Yûko's Japan as unfortunate as it was. They were registered as a family in this country, so Sakura and Syaoran were "adopted" by Fai and Kurogane (with some help from Yûko, of course).
So, if it wasn't bad enough Fai and Kurogane already saw both Watanuki and Dômeki on a regular basis at school; after all, Fai had become a Chemistry teacher and Kurogane had become the Physical Education teacher when they had agreed to stay in this Japan, they were staying at Watanuki's apartment for the evening.
To say that Kurogane was angry was definitely an understatement.
Secondly:
Of course, after proposing to Fai with the ring (before they were soaking wet, but after Kurogane had discovered someone had pick-pocketed him and had to thusly scared the crap out of said poor kid), his blonde haired lover had shown off his new platinum ring to Yûko, their 'adoptive daughter' Sakura, his princess Tomoyo (via the black Mokona), the twin "pork buns" Mokona and Mokona, and Himawari.
Sakura had made fast best friends with the curly pig-tailed girl once she was enrolled in the same high school as Himawari, Watanuki and Dômeki; Sakura attended the high school with Syaoran, now her boyfriend (although they played siblings quite well while they were attending school).
Yûko, Sakura, Tomoyo, the Mokona pair, and Himawari all ooh-ed and aah-ed over the ring before "asking" (it was more like bantering) Fai about wedding preparations; most of which consisted of where they were getting married, who would cook the food for the ceremony, where they were taking their honeymoon, and what they were going to wear.
Needless to say, Kurogane had been against the whole concept of letting "the entourage" (as he referred to: Yûko, Sakura, Tomoyo, the Mokona pair, and Himawari) make preparations for their wedding; but one teary-puppy-eyed look from Fai and his resistance rumbled. Leaving one sulking and reluctant Kurogane to allow them to plan the wedding (although Kurogane did lay down several rules before "the entourage" went completely gaga).
Lucky for Kurogane, one threat from him and "the entourage" quickly left Fai to help the black haired ninja pick out his own clothing.
Third of all:
Then Tomoyo arrived for a three-week trip with Sôma, her personal ninja bodyguard and lover, to help with the preparations and then watch said wedding ceremony.
Of course, once Kurogane's princess arrived, the super scary spiky haired ninja allowed Tomoyo to help him when she arrived - that was after multiple threats between the Tsukuyomi and her chief ninja. The threats mainly consisted of what color clothing and style; the final threat was of Kurogane losing his position of chief ninja if he didn't allow his princess to help him with his wedding outfit. Kurogane winced at tone of his princess' voice as well as hearing that threat from the petite princess while hiding his complaints underneath his breath about the puppy-dog-eyes she was looking up at him with. He silently sulked while agreeing to her demands.
As it turned out, the fashion design the Tsukuyomi had sketched out for Kurogane's outfit was much similar to Kurogane's father's outfit when he was Lord of Suwa. Tomoyo had made to sure to show her super scary ninja when they were alone because upon seeing the sketch, Kurogane had actually started crying and let Tomoyo hold him like he had when they had first met.
He choked up an affirmative response to the outfit, which led to Tomoyo locking herself in her temporary chambers at to Yûko's Wish Shop to make said outfit.
Little did Fai, Kurogane, Watanuki, Dômeki, Syaoran, or even Sôma know, but Yûko, Sakura, Tomoyo, the Mokona pair, and Himawari had placed a bet over who could convince Fai to wear their outfit. This led to "the entourage" proceeding to drag the poor blonde out 'wedding clothes' shopping - day after day - which made poor Kurogane very unhappy to be without his spouse-to-be. Kurogane therefore took his anger out on the teens during their physical education class, which gave Watanuki something apart from seeing ghosts/spirits to complain, rant, rave, and whine about.
Yûko, Sakura, Tomoyo, the Mokona pair, and Himawari had set the date for Kurogane and Fai's wedding at the end of April. The Mokona pair then announced that they would have their own bet; apparently they didn't have the skills necessary to make outfits. The white Mokona choose to work with Sakura while the black Mokona agreed to work with Yûko.
"The entourage" agreed beforehand that there was a limit to the amount of money they could spend on outfits, as well as a two week limit to purchase any items to get prepared before they would show Fai their completed designs.
The next day, Sakura asked Watanuki to help her find all the clothes from their travels in the Treasure Room. The bi-color eyed teen then helped her take the clothes back to the small two-floor house she, Syaoran, Kurogane, and Fai lived in (right across the street from Dômeki's shrine).
The brunette princess then proceeded to toss out any of torn clothes or anything that she did not have time to patch up (with the aide of the white Mokona). Making a trip to the sewing shop Watanuki had pointed out to her, Sakura and Mokona purchased multiple colors of thread, several needles, and some extras for add-on decorations to the outfits. Tearing apart several of the outfits, she began to make new outfits for her 'mother' with advice from the Mokona and had Fai dress up in them while she took photos, which Watanuki offered to have developed for her.
Himawari had asked Yûko to call her in sick to school and ditched to take Fai to a nearby mall and dragged him to multiple tuxedo and bridal shops.
After going to twenty-six shops, Fai had settled on three of the more feminine tuxedos they had found and one dress that Himawari had convinced him looked wonderful. During the trip, Himawari had taken pictures of each outfit Fai tried on. Then she sweetly asked Watanuki to have the photos developed and returned to her.
Because Yûko was the Space-Time Witch, she and Mokona decided to take Fai to another dimension all together. Apparently she was friends with a fashion designer who specialized in clothing for feminine men, without making the clothing gaudy, obvious, or attention grabbing.
She, like Himawari, took photos all of the clothes then proceeded to take said clothes with them to the next fashion designer (apparently many of the designers owed Yûko favors because she had helped popularize their clothes by modeling them for various photographers and model shoots).
Apparently Mokona knew several designers in another dimension as well, so the three went to that dimension to purchase more outfits as well as take more photos. Watanuki ended up developing those photos for his boss.
The day after finishing Kurogane's outfit, Tomoyo wisely asked Kurogane what he wanted to see his to-be-husband in for the wedding and began sketches and conferring with Sôma about what Fai would look best in (by the second day, the Tsukuyomi spilled her guts about the bet to Sôma, who laughed at the stakes but began to help her petite lover by any necessary means).
Narrowing the stack down to four outfits, she trekked to the sewing shop Sakura had told her about and began pulling out materials and other necessary items. When Tomoyo returned to Yûko's shop, she then sent Sôma to their native Japan to pick up several other materials she had in mind as well as other necessary items. Meanwhile, she took sewing machine lessons from Watanuki, and was able to finish the basics of the outfits.
When Sôma returned, Tomoyo sent to work with making the outfits with the nifty sewing machine she had purchased. Upon finishing, the petite Tsukuyomi dragged Fai from his work at the local high school (causing Sakura and Himawari to burst out laughing during class as the weary blonde left) to try on the outfits. Then Tomoyo finished hemming and touching up the outfits while Sôma took pictures of the blonde.
When Watanuki appeared with Dômeki after school that afternoon, Tomoyo politely asked the spirit-seeing teen to have them developed.