Disclaimer: Obviously I own nothing.
A/N: Same 'verse as "Brother of the Bride", but you don't need to have read that one to understand this one. Years may pass, fandoms may pile on top of one another, but this ship will never leave me alone!
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Of Swords and Curtains
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Sasuke contemplates strangling himself with the curtains.
It is, unfortunately, not a new feeling. When your cousin is marrying your brother there are bound to be some awkward moments along the way, even if the couple in question has been estranged from most of their family for some time already.
In what Sasuke considered an astonishing display of goodwill (further proof that Itachi is a far better person that he would ever be), they'd still invited every one of their relatives to the engagement party. They couldn't have expected any of them to actually respond, but they'd done it anyway. And of course, not one other Uchiha had. There had been nothing but radio silence from everyone except for old Aunt Uruchi, who had taken the invitation as an opportunity to write another one of her scathing letters along the same theme of how they were disgracing the family name and had best stop the whole thing while they still could.
Sasuke had been there when they'd gotten that in the mail. Itachi had smoothed his expression quickly, but Sasuke hadn't missed the flash of hurt that creased it. Shisui had gone unnervingly stone-faced, shredding the letter methodically until he had a pile of neat papery bits and then staring at it.
For his part, Sasuke had wordlessly offered him a lighter with which to set the bits on fire.
He's felt strangely, stupidly protective of them both since then. That, and embarrassingly proud that they've managed to buck the outdated yet bizarrely cherished family traditions of arranged marriages and cold smiles and backstabbing. Even if they did resort to sort-of-incest in order to do so.
And they haven't burned all of their bridges, as evidenced by the two other people who are currently sitting in their living room.
"So," Mikoto begins brightly, in a brave attempt to break two minutes of excruciatingly awkward silence. "How is your work going, Shisui?"
Shisui scratches the back of his neck nervously. "It's been alright. I've got one kid who keeps sitting on this other kid and trying to drown him-" Shisui teaches swimming classes at the local gym "-but I'm thinking maybe if I threaten to withdraw waterslide privileges he'll chill out. How, uh—how've you been, Mikoto?"
Sasuke watches his mother's smile stiffen. She's too well bred ever to say something about it, of course, but Shisui dropping her affectionate moniker of "Aunt Mikoto" (Sasuke assumes this was a last-ditch attempt to make the whole marriage thing less outwardly creepy) undoubtedly stung. It makes her reply somewhat crisp.
"I'm fine, Shisui. Thank you."
Another long stretch of silence ensues. While Sasuke has to give his mother and Shisui some credit for trying (at least harder than Fugaku or Itachi, who've done nothing so far but stare each other down, or Sasuke himself, who is focusing all his energies on not committing any acts of violence), it's beginning to look hopeless. The atmosphere in the room feels, impossibly, even more suffocating than before. He needs to get out, to breathe.
He stands up abruptly. "Anybody want a drink?"
Waiting until everyone else has waved him off (and ignoring his mother's reproving eyebrow at his offering drinks in someone else's home—what the hell ever, he's stayed here overnight more than once, and the things he'd seen and heard more than entitled him to raid the alcohol cabinet), Sasuke power-walks-doesn't-run into the kitchen. Once there he wastes no time in bracing himself against the countertop, closing his eyes and taking several long, deep breaths.
"Are you seriously hyperventilating?"
Sasuke twitches, opening his eyes to see a bemused Shisui.
"Turn around and leave me to asphyxiate in peace," he says grumpily. Shisui rolls his eyes and joins him instead, leaning up against the counter.
"Get over yourself, princess," he says, shoving Sasuke lightly in the shoulder. "You think I'm not ready to set fire to the place just to end this damn thing? Only thing stopping me is the amount of work that went into painting the living room that stupid taupe color. And pretty soon that won't even be enough."
"Why the hell did you insist on an engagement party, anyway?" Sasuke mutters after a minute of silent commiseration. You ought to have known nobody else would come goes unsaid.
Shisui shrugs. "Olive branch. Figure we'll try one more time with the actual wedding invitations, but after that…well, there's not much point in trying again, is there, if they're not even going to bother turning up for the wedding?"
He's trying for an air of nonchalance, but Sasuke can hear the strained undertone to his voice. Shisui's own parents are long dead, and being the bastard child of an already-married Uchiha and a woman from "outside" has never won him any favors with the rest of the family, but they're still the only family he has.
Personally, Sasuke sometimes thinks he'd be all right telling most of their relatives to fuck right off, but Shisui and Itachi weren't exactly given a choice. As far as they'd known, it had come down to choosing either each other or the entire rest of their family—Itachi's parents and Sasuke himself included. They'd had no guarantee anybody would stick with them after the whole thing came out, and they'd chosen each other anyway.
If Sasuke were a hopeless romantic he might find that hideously sweet. Good thing he's not a hopeless romantic, then. He has a reputation as a snarky, eye-rolling prick to protect.
Anyway, taking that all into consideration, he figures it must be a massive relief for them that Mikoto and Fugaku have shown up at all. His parents automatically earn some brownie points for even that bare minimum of effort, especially since it's way more than anyone else with the last name Uchiha has opted to exert.
Well, fuck the rest of them.
Sasuke doesn't realize he's said that last out loud until he notices Shisui's amused look.
"What was that, squirt?"
He tamps down on the instinctual homicidal rage that rears its head at the old nickname. Resisting the urge to strangle his cousin is habit now, really, all part and parcel of being forced to spend extended amounts of time with Shisui. Besides, he realizes, he has something to say.
"Fuck them," he repeats coolly. "All of them. If they can't be bothered showing up for your damn wedding, then they're not your family, simple as that. I'll be there, looks like Mom and Dad will be too, and-"
Sasuke falters, seeing the unusually soft look on Shisui's face and feeling suddenly embarrassed. For god's sake, if he's not careful he's going to end up giving the impression that he approves of this whole thing.
"And anyway, if nothing else you'll save a shitload on the reception," he finishes, smirking and surprising a laugh out of Shisui.
"Yeah," Shisui says, grinning. "There's always that."
They head back into the living room, miraculously still sober, and Mikoto smiles at them as they sit down again.
"Fugaku and I have something we want to give you," she says, and Sasuke doesn't miss the brief look of concern Itachi and Shisui shoot one another. (The happy couple telepathy thing. How cute. Sasuke wants to die.) Fugaku sits stonily next to his wife and doesn't move until she elbows him (perhaps less than gently, if his quickly concealed wince is any indication—Sasuke's mother might look like a porcelain doll, but he knows from experience that there's steel underneath). He gets up and leaves the apartment, presumably to get whatever dubious something they've brought out of the car. As the door closes Mikoto makes another valiant attempt at conversation.
"Have you picked out a venue yet?"
"Uh." Shisui looks like a fish out of water. Sasuke remembers teenaged conversations wherein his cousin passionately declared elopement a much better option than the myriad terrors of a proper marriage ceremony and almost feels sorry for him.
Itachi steps in to keep his fiancé's brain from breaking in the middle of their living room. "We haven't decided," he says smoothly. "It is…a lot to plan for."
"You don't need to tell me, Itachi," Mikoto says with a small smile. "I remember. I don't want to be the pushy mother in this equation, but if you want any advice on the wedding planning, I'd be happy to help."
Itachi's face softens, and Sasuke doesn't think he'd realized until now how tense his brother has been all this time. Jesus, he thinks tiredly, at this rate we're all going to need therapy before the night's out. Maybe they offer family packages. It wouldn't really surprise him.
Mikoto hesitates before she goes on. "I know the two of you have faced some…less than supportive reactions from the rest of the family-" Shisui snorts, apparently unable to stop himself, and Sasuke notes with a smirk Itachi's elbow immediately insinuating itself between his ribs "-and I know your father might not seem thrilled about all of this, Itachi, but…it's been a lot to take in for him. For all of us." Her tone is warm. "I just want you to know how glad I am that you invited us tonight."
Some of the smiles in the room are starting to look decidedly wobbly, and Sasuke tries his level best not to squirm. Agonizing awkwardness or being stuck in some twisted version of a Hallmark movie, he wonders morbidly which is worse.
Luckily any further conversation is derailed by the return of Sasuke's father, lightly dusted with snow and carrying a long, thin, wrapped package in his arms. Wordlessly he crosses the room and places it on the coffee table between his and Mikoto's seat, and Itachi and Shisui's.
Sitting in his own chair somewhere in the middle, in what he had deemed early on to be Switzerland in the geography of his brother's household, Sasuke eyes the package as he would a bomb threat. A gauntlet or a peace offering, he wonders unhappily, it's pretty much impossible to tell with his father. Although if his mother was involved, he likes to think it won't be anything too horrible; left to his own devices, Sasuke wouldn't put it past Fugaku to wrap up a shotgun or something equally lacking in subtlety in the hopes of sending some kind of message.
He knows Itachi and Shisui are thinking along the same lines, Shisui looking at the offending object with deep suspicion while Itachi does the same thing, just less blatantly. Mikoto watches them both expectantly while Fugaku continues to look deeply uncomfortable (Sasuke sympathizes).
Finally, when the quiet has crawled on too long to be socially acceptable anymore, Itachi is the one to gather his courage, lean over and pull the package onto his lap.
"Thank you," he says politely, and looks to Shisui.
"Right," Shisui says, sounding like a man facing down the gallows. "Thanks."
In any other circumstances ever (like, say, any circumstance where he didn't have to witness it) Sasuke would be smirking because oh, Shisui is definitely thinking about the shotgun too, that tone said it all. Itachi shoots him a sharp look but turns his attention back to the gift, hand hovering uncertainly over the plain brown wrapping paper.
"Ah, come on," Shisui says suddenly, reaching over haul half of the package across his legs. "We're not gonna save the paper, 'tachi."
Itachi rolls his eyes, but the tension is broken and he joins in Shisui's immediate shredding frenzy. Bits of brown paper go flying, because Shisui's nervous energy has always manifested itself in bursts of (occasionally destructive) movement.
But it gets the job done at any rate; the gift becomes quickly apparent, propped up on an unassuming stand inside a clear class case, and Sasuke's pretty sure his jaw hits the floor with a resounding crash.
It's the katana. It's the katana, the one that's held the place of honor on their fireplace at home for as long as Sasuke can remember, bright and sharp and deadly and gorgeous. He has vivid early memories of straining to reach the shining blade before being slapped away and told, in no uncertain terms, that he was never to touch it. And just as many memories of stories told about that sword, stories about some ancestor and some battle with some enemy samurai, or maybe it was ninja; the details have blurred with time, but never the sense of quiet awe that came with looking at the katana, the physical reminder that the family Uchiha has been around for a very, very long time. It brings a sense of heritage, of a long, proud family line, and now…
Itachi's eyes are huge, the shock apparently enough to shatter the neutral mask he's been wearing ever since their parents walked through the door, and he's running his fingers reverently over the glass like he can't quite believe it's real.
"Father?" he says quietly.
Fugaku clears his throat. "You remember the stories I used to tell you about this sword?"
Itachi nods wordlessly.
"It has been passed down from one eldest son to the next, for centuries. Your mother and I thought now as good a time as any to continue the tradition." Fugaku clears his throat again. Sasuke wonders if he's in danger of choking on all the emotion floating around. "I expect the two of you will pass it on to your son in due course."
Itachi looks at Fugaku then, and Sasuke has to look away, because his big brother just reverted to the age of five in front of his eyes, so damn relieved to have their father's approval, and that is in no way something he is meant to see. He looks at Shisui instead, desperate for someone to fill the hole of calm neutrality that Itachi has just abandoned, but it's no good, because Shisui looks like he's about to fucking cry.
Those damned curtains are beginning to look really tempting again.
But thank whatever higher powers might exist for his mother, because Mikoto is having none of the usual Uchiha repression bullshit. She gets up off the loveseat, navigates around the little coffee table, bends over and kisses her older son's forehead. And then turns to Shisui as does the same to him. And then, probably out of some motherly instinct that constantly reminds her to be equal in everything with her boys lest the younger one wind up with a complex, she turns to Sasuke and kisses his forehead as well. By the time she retakes her seat next to her husband, her eyes are shining, and Sasuke is going to forego the curtains entirely and just jump out the damn window if his mother starts crying.
"My sons," she sighs, looking at them and smiling a watery smile. "All of my sons."
All, not both. Sasuke doesn't miss it, and judging by the look on Shisui's face he doesn't either.
There is way too much emotion going around right now in this cramped space for Sasuke to be completely comfortable with, and his usual coping mechanism of acerbic remarks and torturing Shisui to the best of his ability obviously isn't going to go down well here.
But there's something curling at the corner of his father's mouth, something that can almost be classified as a smile, and Itachi has reached for Shisui's hand under the mess they've made of the katana's wrappings, out of sight of his parents, both of them smiling fit to burst, and Sasuke's willing to admit—albeit grudgingly—that maybe this whole engagement party thing wasn't such a heinously awful idea after all.
Fin