Disclaimer: Kuroko no Basuke i.e. The Basketball Which Kuroko Plays is produced by Production I.G. and based on the manga of the same name written and illustrated by Tadatoshi Fujimaki.
Disclaimer #2: It was only after I wrote this fic that I discovered that someone had already coined the phrase 'Pretty Boy Syndrome' and it has a completely different definition than what I had in mind. They seem to be talking about good looking fuckboys (And that, ladies and gentlemen, was the sound of the rating of this fic going up~) and to help clear things up, I started off with a definition of my version of the Pretty Boy Syndrome.
A/N: Isn't Kise awfully submissive to his senpais at Kaijo? He doesn't protest Kasamatsu's tough love either. What a pretty uke~
As always, Enjoy~!
Pretty Boy Syndrome: A condition that has a severe pheromonal effect similar to that of an aphrodisiac on bystanders close to the sufferer. The sufferer himself is often ignorant of his condition and can't imagine why hordes of strangers and close friends alike keep throwing themselves at him.
Kise Ryouta was an idiot. But that wasn't the problem. It would've been a hell of a lot easier if that had been the problem. Kasamatsu knew how to deal with idiots. Take a look around, he had a whole damn gym filled with them.
But, no, all the idiocy did was camouflage the actual problem for a little while, at least for Kasamatsu.
At first, the captain in him was too pissed off at the Miracle, their lucky lottery draw to the Inter-High, too frustrated at his blatant superiority, arrogance and his complete obliviousness to his own disrespect, and Kasamatsu himself was too high strung about the captaincy he'd claimed by the worst mistake in his own basketball career.
So while he ran drills, formed strategies and captained the Kaijou basketball club, said club was busy ogling their lucky break with less than honorable intentions that were in no way related to basketball.
"Kise-kun, can you help me stretch?" Whether it was wide-eyed first years.
"No, Kise, come warm up with us" Or drooling upperclassmen.
"Kyaa~! Ryouta-sama!" "He just looked at me!" "No he was looking at ME!" Or the managers, that now consisted of practically the entire female population of Kaijo High.
And there Kasamatsu stood in the sidelines, jaw agape in bewilderment at the scene unfolding in front of him and thought to himself, 'the fall of the basketball club is nigh''. If he was smarter man he'd have realized the fall of his sanity was equally as nigh'.
He didn't know then, that this problem was contagious and spreading throughout all the basketball clubs and quite possibly the universe at an alarming rate. The bystander effects of Kise's Pretty Boy Syndrome.
Luckily, he was immune, or so he thought.
"Here you go, senpai!" Kise handing him his water bottle after practice had become all but a ritual by now. Kasamatsu smiled his thanks and spared a corner of his eye to observe his basketball protégé underclassman discreetly, and was almost blinded by the apparent solar flare that was Kise Ryouta.
It's just that Kise was…sparkly. There was no better word to put it. Kasamatsu wonders what the official diagnosis was for hallucinating sparkles around specific underclassmen.
Singularly specific underclassman.
How the hell could he not have noticed this before?
True, he was a bit late to the 'get into Kise Ryouta's pants' game or whatever it is his team was playing at, so he must be at least a little immune to whatever pheromones Kise was emitting. He'll hold on to that and what little rationality he had surrounding him to keep this team together for at least one more year.
"Senpai, what's wrong, aren't you thirsty?" Kise stares into his eyes like it held all the answers.
"You're too close, idiot!" Kasamatsu kicks out on reflex.
Dammit, it was just proving harder said than done.
"I like girls"
Kasamatsu groaned. It was Moriyama's weekly ritual of reaffirming his non-existent heterosexuality to Kasamatsu. He tried not to remind his friend that feeling the need to inform the world at large that he was in fact, 'straight', was not very straight at all.
"Can't you talk to Kobori about your midlife crisis?" What good's a vice captain, after all, if Kasamatsu can't drop the more useless of his chores on him? "You've not even reached midlife yet, for crying out loud!"
Moriyama proceeded to wail dramatically.
"He's absolutely no help at all, in fact, I think he's making it worse! His advice for me was to…" Moriyama shivered "…tell Kise my feelings towards him"
Kasamatsu winced. That was a bad idea in so many different levels.
"How about you go home and count your idol merch?" He suggested "That'll take your mind off things"
To Kasamatsu's horror, Moriyama decided to slump over his shoulder and continue with his wailing.
"They do nothing for me anymore! Nothing! Not a thing!"
"…There, there" Kasamatsu patted his teammate's shoulder, sending furious telepathic signals to his ever-so-reliable vice-captain to rescue him.
"It gets even worse!" Oh, Kasamatsu had no doubt that it did.
"I went out and bought a Teen Idol magazine with Kise's face on it… And then… and then…I ended up making a monthly subscription!"
Kasamatsu was silent for a long while.
"Well, if you ever need it off your hands…" He muttered while Moriyama gives him the most betrayed look he could muster in midst his misery. Oh right, he had the role of the only sane man in this drama on channel insanity.
"I mean, surely having all that around would be bad for your…er" He waves his hands in Moriyama's general direction. "condition?"
Moriyama sniffs in pure desolation.
"Alright then" He agrees. Kasamatsu wonders why he feels oddly guilty.
New information came to Kasamatsu as it always did. Very belated and via 'accidental' overhearing. It was tragic really, that the captain of the Kaijo basketball club had to stoop to spying, bordering on stalking his teammates to get news on anything that's happening.
Apparently, Kise's Pretty Boy Syndrome had its roots all the way back to Teiko, so it was not just limited to Kaijo. Kasamatsu didn't know whether to be disappointed or relieved. But what he did know is that there were at least five people who had spent 2 years and counting with their resident pretty boy and still survived to tell the tale. This was his chance, to get his teammates heads out of Kise's ass (and wherever else they may have wandered off to) and back to basketball.
"How do you do it?" Kasamatsu demands of Kuroko one practice match later, where members of both sides are equally blinded by Kise's sparkles. Kasamatsu wonders if sunglasses and visors can be added to the official Kaijo high basketball uniform.
Kuroko is silent for a while-a long, long, long while- before he deigns to reply.
"It gets easier…once you realize he's an idiot"
Kasamatsu doesn't bother to point out that his team, no scratch that, the entire student body of Kaijo High, was way, way past that tiny roadblock, and just hangs his head and sighs.
"How do you not…jump him, is what I mean" He gritted out, trying to stump out the ridiculousness and absurdity of having to ask love advice (or lust advice-which, come to think of, is probably worse) from a member of a rival team. Well, it was for the sake of his team, so he'd have to bear it.
Kuroko is silent again. Kasamatsu is more than slightly unnerved by this development, but tries not to show it in his 'captain' face.
"It'll be reassuring to know then that Akashi-kun will personally make sure you won't make it to first base…" He pauses "….alive"
...
Well, Kasamatsu supposes he could at least appreciate Kuroko's sense of humor to lighten the mood in situations like this. Ha. Hahaha.
Kuroko wasn't smiling. But then again, Kuroko showing any facial expression whatsoever was an event worthy of a history book mention, so Kasamatsu wasn't all too worried about that.
What did worry him was what came after.
"Kasamatsu-san…did you know? People never notice me coming from behind..."
And he smiles.
Kasamatsu gulps. Maybe he turned to the wrong Miracle.
~TBC
A/N: So~ hope you liked! I know this chapter is a bit shorter than my other KnB fics, but I promise it'll catch up in no time!
More to come since I'm going to pretend I can actually write multichapter fics and not really long drabble like one-shots that I chop up into reasonable chunks of chapter wherever :P
And I AM planning on including all the Miracles, and a few extra characters here and there... so stay tuned? :DDD Oh, and as always any comments, critique or irrelevant thoughts you might have, feel free to say whatever down in that big lonely white box down there~