With a flick of his wrist, the purring engine of Kuon's silver sports car fell silent. In need of a moment to collect his thoughts, the successful actor shifted his hands to the top of his leather accented steering wheel. The handsome man rested his forehead against his hands and took a calming breath. When he finally felt his heart rate reach a manageable level, the tall blond snagged the heavy envelope from where he had placed it on the passenger seat when he left the studio.
A soft smile slipped unbidden onto Kuon's face as his long fingers clenched around the gilded stationery. He dropped his keys in the outer pocket of his stylish suit jacket. Unconsciously, the actor hit the button to close the garage door just like every other time he exited his vehicle at home. His long legs carried him quickly from the three car garage that currently housed not only his sports car but also a large hybrid sports utility vehicle and, strangely enough, a small economy car whose only concession on expense was light privacy tinting on the side and back windows. Stealthily, the actor traveled out of the neatly organized garage, through the mud room, down the short hallway, past the utility and laundry room, and into the large family room. Only the sound of his soft footsteps could be heard in the large room.
Kuon frowned slightly as he moved beyond the family room and into the large, modern kitchen. An eery silence seemed to have gripped the house in its clutches. Kuon called a greeting into the emptiness. There was no reply. It was so unexpectedly quiet that the soft murmur of the air conditioning kicking on made the actor jump. Despite it being the middle of January, the weather had been creeping close to 80 degrees the last couple days. The air conditioning was getting an unexpected workout. Laughing at his overdone reaction, the actor moved through the kitchen and towards the rest of the house. He slipped off his suit coat and placed it neatly on the back of one of the dining room chairs.
As he moved past the large sliding glass doors to the back porch, the former Japanese star heard the faintest trace of a scream. Frowning, the tall man slid the door open and stepped onto the covered and screened porch. Overhead, a solar powered ceiling fan waited patiently for summer when its services would once more be needed to make the porch comfortable enough for anyone to enjoy time spent outside on California evenings.
Another scream, this time ear piercing in its volume, sounded from the yard beyond the porch. Kuon strode across the enclosed porch and banged open the screen door. He froze in place on the inlaid stone patio as his eyes scanned the large green yard for the source of the ear assaulting screech. For a moment, the blond actor watched Kyoko run through the grass in an almost indecently short pair of cut off jeans and a bright red button up shirt that was tied in a knot between her breasts instead of being buttoned properly. Kuon grinned as the golden-eyed actress flew out of his view and behind the shrubbery that provided some measure of privacy to the patio.
"Welcome home, son," Juli Hizuri greeted as she marked her place in her paperback, dropped it on the cushion, and rose elegantly from her seat on a padded wicker couch.
Kuon turned his smile to the woman of almost unrivaled beauty who gave birth to him over thirty years ago. He offered the willowy blond a quick hug before his eyes shifted once more towards the squeals and laughter coming from the hidden part of his yard.
"What do you have there?" Juli prodded as she noticed the fancy envelope still clutched in her son's grasp.
For a moment, Kuon's blue eyes seemed momentarily confused before he remembered the precious news he had received that afternoon. With a sneaky grin lighting his face that Juli recognized as her son being tickled with himself, the blond actor handed the classy bit of stationery to his mother. He watched as she flipped open the high quality envelope and extracted a thick, embossed card. Quickly, the previous super model scanned the contents before she too grinned proudly.
"Oh, Kuon!" she exclaimed as she wrapped her arms around her son who had been working almost non-stop for the past few months. The tall blond woman hadn't seen her son near as much as she wished lately. "Congratulations! This is exactly what you have been dreaming of achieving for ages. I am so proud of you."
Kuon allowed himself to revel in the warmth of his mother's enthusiastic praise for a few heartbeats.
"I can't believe you were nominated for an academy award," she gushed in uncontrollable excitement. "It is such an honor, Kuon."
"Yeah," Kuon confirmed with an almost dazed expression. "I never expected it. I mean, the film was great and all but to be nominated for best lead actor is just, well, mind boggling."
Juli grinned in response to Kuon's sheepish admission.
"Your father will be so proud. He's been nominated for supporting actor twice but never as the lead male."
Unable to resist, Juli gave her son yet another hug.
"You have to go tell Kyoko and Kuu," she insisted with evident pride as she waved her hand towards the yard and handed her son back his nomination notification.
Kuon nodded and practically skipped to the edge of the patio and jumped down the two steps onto the rich green grass that the sprinklers had to work double time to keep so healthy. Once again, he froze for a moment and just watched the source of all the noise in his yard.
As if under a spell, the actor watched his lovely wife squeal and duck away from a blast of water from the long, green garden hose that was being manned by his older son, Kenta. Meanwhile, his younger son, Kei, was squealing and toddling in circles in an exuberant but useless attempt to avoid the icy stream that Kenta was shooting at anyone that moved.
Kuon couldn't help but laugh as his middle child, Kimi, rushed behind her grandfather in an attempt to avoid the water. The dark haired sprite had found one of the best hiding places currently available when she ducked behind Kuu's leg.
"Hide me Pappy! Save me!" the five year old screamed as the water line chased her until it hit Kuu's grass stained jeans and recently torn t-shirt.
Kuon continued to watch in amusement as his father glared at his oldest grandchild with mock fierceness before launching himself towards the relatively dry imp. Kenta's eyes flew wide as Kuu tackled him to the ground. Using extreme care not to allow any injury to his grandson, Kuu protected Kenta's body as he forced them both into the grass. Kenta yelled in protest but Kuu expertly extracted the hose from the child's grip. He promptly turned the nozzle against the oldest child. Kimi and Kyoko cheered their hero as Kuu soaked the previous water perpetrator from head to foot.
Once Kenta was sufficiently doused, Kuu jumped to his feet and took aim at the other only partially wet combatants. With an evil grin, he aimed the hose at Kyoko who squealed as the cold water hit her uncovered stomach. Taking off from the sudden danger like a deer, Kyoko bounded from the water stream. In her flight, she swept past Kei and snagged him into her arms. She fled the icy water while her youngest son screamed "Wum, Mum-a, Wum!" at the top of his little lungs.
"I'll save you, Mama!" promised Kimi as she squared herself to her Pappy's body and mimicked his previous tackle of her older brother. Kuu allowed himself to be knocked to the ground in an exaggerated fall and he provided only minimal resistance when his suddenly fierce granddaughter attempted to wrestle the coveted hose from his grip.
Now the proud possessor of the water torture device, Kimi turned it at point blank range onto Kuu who sputtered loudly as the stream of water slammed into his face. Kimi cackled so evilly it would have made the wicked witch of any direction quite proud. She continued to pound her grandfather with water from the hose. The five year old was so intent on her grand accomplishment that she failed to notice Kenta swooping in to snag the coveted device of mayhem. Before the older boy could steal the playful weapon, Kuu grabbed him and held him against his body like a kid-sized water shield. Kimi's cackling only grew louder and more evil as she aimed the nozzle wholly on her bigger brother who was held immobile in Kuu's grasp.
"Me Turm, me turm," called Kei as he pulled his laughing mother by the hand back towards the fray. The scuffle for the hose continued as all five combatants ended up tangled on the ground wrestling for sole possession of the hose nozzle.
Kuon watched as his dad expertly ensured that the play remained fun for everyone as he even maneuvered the hose for a short period into the hands of Kuon's two year old son who promptly shot himself in the face with the water. Instead of getting a scary face full of water, Kuu's hand blocked the stream so that it splattered around Kei's head instead.
A thoughtful expression settled on Kuon's face as Kuu protected Kyoko's body from Kenta's flailing leg as the older boy attempted to escape the laughing, soaking, grass and mud covered mass of humanity wrestling in the ground. The massive pile of chaos finally dispersed with Kyoko now in possession of the hose. Kuon's wife now took a turn chasing everyone around the play area and Kuu scooped up his youngest grandchild and tossed him in the air to keep him out of a wandering water stream. Catching the toddler once again, Kuu tucked the child under his arm and ran away from Kyoko's attack.
"I thought you were going to share your news," Juli stated as she stepped into place beside her son and watched the antics of her husband, daughter, and grandchildren as they moved farther across the yard and towards the pool house where the hose was attached to the faucet.
She glanced at her strangely silent son who was watching his father so closely. It reminded her of the way he used to watch Kuu when he visited as a child on the sets where his father was acting.
"He really will be proud of you, you know," Juli coaxed as she concluded that her son was nervous about showing his father what many would consider proof that he had become an equal if not better actor than his father. "You have worked really hard to be regarded as an actor as skilled as your father."
Kuon turned his attention to his mother for a moment. He handed the lovely woman the precious envelope that held the culmination of his childhood dream.
"I think right now I want to work on being as good a man as my dad is," Kuon stated as he kicked off his expensive leather shoes, pulled off his socks, and removed his long sleeved dress shirt. Dropping all his removed clothes in a pile in the grass, Kuon offered his mother an almost whimsical smile before racing towards the rest of his family in just his dress pants and undershirt.
Juli watched her seemingly transformed son sprint across the grass. Kuon swooped into the fun and gabbed his wife who shrieked at the unexpected attack. Stealing the hose from Kyoko, Ren threw himself full force into the battle.
From her safe haven by the patio, Juli smiled brightly.
"Now that, my son, is a real man's dream," she proudly stated as she settled happily onto the stone edge of the patio to watch the antics of her family from a safe and, more importantly in her opinion, dry distance.
A/N: This has been sitting on my drive for a while now. I originally intended to use it as an epilogue for a story but nothing new has presented itself recently in my imagination to be the story that leads to it. Since I hate just scrapping stuff, I thought I would share this domestic scene. I truly do feel that Kuon needs to strive to be a man to surpass his father and not an actor who does so. The emotional growth would be liberating but perhaps that is just me and my desire to see one of the main characters in this manga show some new-found emotional maturity.
Anyway, I did not award Kuu even a nomination for an Oscar for male lead because, quite frankly, the odds would be against him. As far as I can tell, in the 80+ years the Academy has been awarding them, only two males of Asian descent have even been nominated for the male lead award (Yul Brynner in 1956 and Ben Kingsley in 1982 and 2003). It kind of makes even the nomination impressive for Ren/Kuon from a sheer numbers stand point.
I hope that you enjoyed the peek into the fluffy future of the Hizuris - me