'Bame: Neither Peach nor I own Yu Yu Hakusho. But heck do we wish we owned Hiei and Kurama respectively.
And humor as the main genre again. . . . I hope it's decent. Hanging around Peach so much is helping my (seriously lacking) sense of humor. Everyone clap for Peach. XclapsX
Peach- Yay!Claps for me.. XclapclapclapX So. . . yeah.. took forever to come up with a title. . . .
KURAMAxSHIZURUxKURAMAxSHIZURUxKURAMAxSHIZURUxKURAMA
Minamino Shiori's son, for all his charm, intelligence, and good looks, had never had a girlfriend or shown any interest whatsoever in certain members of the opposite sex (at least to her knowledge). Which is why, when an attractive young lady knocked upon her door one day and asked to talk to Shuuichi in private, all the older woman could do was smile.
The effect was only amplified by his deep blush upon hearing the attractive young lady's name.
Shiori watched as her son padded swiftly from his upstairs room down to the front hall where said young lady was waiting, eyes trained on the ground. One of the upsides to having all that long, dark hair was being able to effortlessly hide his expression at will, as Shiori had soon discovered after his sudden, rather abnormal decision to grow it out a few years ago.
But gods, did he honestly think he could hide a blush like that?
Kurama resented having to look at her. He knew exactly what his mother was thinking. It wasn't like he could tell her the truth. Oh yes, that would go well. 'It's not what you're thinking, mother. She's simply acting as a temporary messenger between me and the mini-lord of a world you're not supposed to know exists, so you can just go about your business and stop throwing me those looks.' He snorted to himself. Wonderful. Now she had stopped with the looks and had opted to simply stare at him, rather like he was a character from one of the romance movies she rented from time to time.
He didn't enjoy it. He stopped a few feet from her, pointedly avoiding his mother's gaze.
For, of course he knew that she knew that he knew that she knew.
Which just complicated things further.
He forced a smile onto his face in the hopes it would be sufficient to hide the color he was certain had risen in his cheeks. "Mother, this is Kuwabara's sister, Kuwabara Shizuru. Shizuru-san," he went on, smiling just a bit more, for it surely couldn't hurt, "this is my mother."
The younger female was by this time wondering if it was customary for the other two to be so cheery, or if it was simply because of the occasion of the introduction.
". . . We'll be up in my room, mother," Kurama had finished saying, practically dragging her upstairs.
"Geez, way to push people around." She sat easily down on his bed, he coming to sit next to her.
Completely ignoring her comment, of course. Because rhetorical statements aren't meant to be answered.
"I'm assuming something's gone horribly, catastrophically wrong."
A roll of her eyes. "No, just my idiot of a brother screwing things up again."
"You really ought to give him more credit. He's improved greatly, you know."
"He's an idiot, you know."
A laugh from his lips. "All right, what's he done?"
"Gone and smothered a tree in our backyard. He's having a good time explaining it to the authorities right now."
Kurama laughed again, reaching for the telephone on his desk and punching buttons on the number pad. "Well done there. . . ." he muttered, waiting for what would surely be a desperate response from the line's other end.
"Hello? Kurama?"
"Ah, Kuwabara-kun. How are you? I thought I'd call, you know, check up on your state of being, the weather. . . ."
A rather fiendish growling could be heard from the Kuwabara side. "Just tell me how to get out of this!"
Kurama again chuckled, instructing the flustered boy on how to deal with your average enraged local policemen, hanging up again when he had assured said flustered boy that everything would turn out quite all right. When he turned back around, the woman beside him had settled into a more comfortable position on his bed, her back now resting on the mattress with her hands pillowing her head.
"You're through already? I was counting on enough time for a nap."
"You can take one if you'd like. I'm going to finish the homework I WAS doing before your brother felled that tree."
She smiled, shutting her eyes. He turned back to his desk, sitting down and going back to work.
Some might call the lack of noise for the next half hour a comfortable silence, and indeed it was. Room and time were given for thoughts and speculation for each to access individually as they pleased, and this suited them. For this reason, others might call it an intelligent silence, and they too would be in the right.
Still others might call it broken by a teenager's unwelcome voice. They, unfortunately, would be quite correct in their musings.
"SHUUICHI! DINNER TIME!"
He sighed, calling back. "I'll be right down. And I'm not deaf yet, you know. No need to yell."
"ALL RIGHT!" There was a pause, then, "MOM TELLS YOU TO TELL YOUR FRIEND TO STAY TO DINNER WITH US IF SHE DOESN'T ALREADY HAVE PLANS FOR TONIGHT!"
The boys' mother was by now doubled over with laughter, as her son and his friend made their way down to the dining room.
"Interesting family you've got. That your stepbrother?"
"Indeed. And according to him, you'll be butchered by my mother if you don't accept her hospitality."
"Butchered and then served AS her hospitality, hmm?"
"Naturally. This is my mother we're talking about. Mothers can be vicious when they want to be."
She laughed.
"You wouldn't be saying anything about me, would you?"
"Not at all." They now entered the dining room, Shizuru laughing. Kurama's stepfather looked up at the sound of a second female voice, a rarity in his household.
"Ah, I don't believe we've met." He looked curiously at Kurama, then back to the lady before him. "Are you his girlfriend? I don't remember him mentioning you before. . . ."
Kurama coughed in embarrassment, phlegm rushing to his throat and blood rushing to his face. "No!"
"Oh, all right then." A pause. "So who are you, again?"
"She's Kuwabara's older sister."
His stepfather looked confused. Shizuru decided to join in the conversation.
"My little brother, y'know, the big stupid one with the carrot hairdo?"
The man had to laugh. That WAS an accurate description. He now vaguely remembered meeting his stepson's friends, including a small angry one -- that was the boy's best friend, if he remembered correctly, though the reason for this completely escaped him -- and an average-sized one with an interesting sense of reality. And a group of females with varying shades of unusually colored hair. Yes, they were odd.
Especially that one with the boat oar.
Kurama's mother motioned for everyone to sit down, catching her birth son's eye and jerking her head toward the kitchen. He followed her, helping to bring out their dinner.
"You never told me about her. . . . Did it not come up in passing?"
"Uhh, I. . ."
"Oh, I see how it is."
"What? What do you mean?"
She only raised her eyebrows, carrying a plate of food into the dining room.
"M-Mother!"
"Yes?"
Ooh, if blushes could kill.
Unfortunately for Kurama, they couldn't. Which meant he was subject to his mother's verbal torture through the whole of their dinner.
And heck, subtlety could BITE.
It was dark when the five diners finished their food, and Kurama thought it wisest to walk his guest home. Shifty characters took to dark alleys at night. Dark alleys with shifty characters in them were not pleasant places for lovely, unsuspecting young women.
"Have a good walk!" Shiori called after the couple. She winked at the male of the two before closing the door behind them, smiling softly to herself.
Fifty paces of silence later, Shizuru smirked and raised an eyebrow. "Wow, your mom likes to tease."
"You caught all those glances she was giving me, I take it?"
"Don't lump me with Kazuma. I'M not stupid."
He chuckled. "I never said -- nor thought -- you were."
"That's good to know."
Which got him thinking. What DID he honestly think of her? She was intelligent, amusing, attractive, sure. But what else? He remembered his brief romance with Maaya-san a few years ago, how he'd felt around her. Did she make him feel like that?
He thought she did.
Maybe his mother was right.
They came to her front door, and he found himself unhappy to be leaving her side. She waved lazily over her shoulder, taking out her key. The lock clicked, and she made to enter.
"S-Shizuru -- wait!"
"Hmm?" She turned, coffee hair sprawling over her back in a smooth, swishing motion. He noticed this. He noticed that he noticed this.
His mother was never going to let him hear the end of this.
"Actually. . . I was wondering. . . if you'd like to go out somewhere this week. . . with me."
Yes, his face would serve as a second oven for his mother's cooking for weeks to come.
She smiled faintly. "Love to. Make sure you call at a time you know Kazuma will be home once you think up a nice romantic date, so I can make him jealous." The door closed.
But oh, was it worth it.