Title: We're Here
Summary: Something's wrong here. Ryoma hasn't been the same ever since summer vacation has started. Not even the Fourth of July holiday cheer is helping him. What's on the boy's mind? Is it something we did? Come to think of it… where are the rest of them?
Disclaimer: I do not own Prince of Tennis. The anime and its canon characters belong to their rightful owners.
"Ryo-chan! Are you home?" Fuji called out, opening the front door and walking into the Echizen household, Tezuka and Sanada following behind him.
"Ryoma! Where are you?" Sanada called out for the younger male.
"It's been at least a month, and he hasn't made any plans for the summer with us yet," Tezuka sighed, looking around the clean household. "Is he planning something else?"
"No. His parents haven't mentioned anything about plans either," Fuji added, shaking his head with a sigh. "What do you think Ryo-chan is doing? Staying inside or staying away from us for so long?"
"I'm not sure. It can't be the fact that he is giving us more space and time to be together. We've spent plenty of time together by now," Sanada said, earning nods from the other two males. "Something has to be bothering him. Something that isn't related to tennis or something related to school."
"Considering he would never concern himself that much with the two unless it's about a tournament, and the tournaments are done by now until school starts again," Tezuka reasoned.
"I just want to see my little one," Fuji whined, pouting as he made his way to the dining hall and sat down only to see a note. "Kunimitsu! Genichirou!" he called out, getting the two stoics attention. "I found something!"
"What is it?"
"A note."
"Well read it then."
Fuji nodded as he unfolded the note and started to read it.
"To whoever is reading this at the moment, I'm going out for the day. I don't know where I'll be going, but I'll be taking my phone with me. Call me if you really need me for something. I'll be back in the evening. See you then. Ryoma."
"Why would he just up and leave?" Tezuka said, raising an eyebrow. "Without even telling us even?"
"He's been acting weird ever since summer started," Fuji sighed, crossing his arms over the table as he stared at the note.
"Not only has he not called any of us to make plans over the break, but he hasn't been seen by the others that often either. What do you think is wrong with him?"
"Why don't we try and find him?" Tezuka suggested, already pulling out his phone and calling their youngest boyfriend.
"Hello?" a somewhat tired voice answered the call.
Putting the phone on speaker, Tezuka replied, "Ryoma? It's Kunimitsu, Syuusuke, and Genichirou."
"Oh! Hi you three," Ryoma said, a little bit chipper with his voice. "Sorry if I haven't made any plans with you three recently. I've had a lot on my mind…"
"Care to talk?" Fuji questioned, eyes opening in worry for the younger male.
"Not over the phone," Ryoma chuckled. "Maybe somewhere else. You go ahead and pick."
"What about your parents? Shouldn't we tell them?" Sanada questioned.
Ryoma was silent for a few minutes, making the three wonder over it. "Don't worry about them. I've got it covered already," he said, his voice sounding a little more forced than before.
"Are you sure you're alright?"
"Let's just talk about this somewhere else alright?" Ryoma asked, sighing at the end. "Where do you want to talk?"
"Why don't you go ahead and choose the place hmm?"
"I was heading over to Hanako's place actually. Care to join? We were planning to head to the aquarium today so that she can take pictures."
"Hanako? How much time have you been spending with her?" Fuji questioned, trying to put curiosity in his voice. He knew that this particular question always set Ryoma off considering how it reminded the younger of the fight the three of them had over Sanada. Fuji was only curious about the relationship between the two, not jealous as the question may have originally sounded.
Fortunately, it seemed that Ryoma understood. "I've been visiting her or she's been visiting me about two weeks after summer started."
"So for three weeks then," Tezuka said, sounding glad that Ryoma wasn't completely alone in his time. "That's good to hear that you are spending time with the girl."
"Yeah," Ryoma sighed, before groaning. "How is it that you always manage to find me before our designated time Hanako?"
"Sorry Ryoma," they heard a female voice on the phone, shocking them that Hanako was actually starting to use the boy's first name instead of just 'Echizen-kun' as they were used to.
"At least you are calling me by first name now," Ryoma said, a ruffling sound heard in the background.
"Shut up. Come on, I want to go to the aquarium. Who are you talking to anyway? Your mom and dad? I haven't seen them in forever," she chimed happily, although there was an undertone of something else heard from her.
The three on the other side of the call couldn't, for the life of them, figure out what it was in her voice.
"You remember them. My three boyfriends," Ryoma answered. "Mind if they come along?"
"Really? They want to come along. Fine with me then, the more the merrier," she said, happier than she sounded just a few seconds ago if that were possible. "Besides. You need more people around after-"
"I know stupid," Ryoma interrupted her before turning back to the call. "We'll meet you at the aquarium on the other side of town. See you then," he told them, hanging up the phone and leaving the three frozen and contemplating over what had been said over the phone.
"Okay… so we know one thing… Hanako definitely knows that something is wrong with Ryoma," Fuji said, blinking his eyes a few times as Tezuka put his phone away.
"Let's not keep them waiting for too long shall we?" Tezuka questioned the other two in the room, earning nods as they all left the Echizen household after locking it.
Although, they couldn't help but notice something. In the few minutes they were there, they couldn't hear the sound of another person in the household. That was strange considering it was the summer… Oh well, they would dwell on that later on.
"Hey you three," Ryoma greeted his three older boyfriends as he kissed them each on the cheek once arriving at the aquarium. "Hanako already bought us admission passes to go inside," he said, showing them the pass around his neck and handing three lookalikes over.
"So what's the matter?" Fuji questioned, throwing his arms around Ryoma's neck from behind in the form of a hug. "You haven't talked to us recently or spent any time with us. You've been spending it more with Hanako." As soon as Ryoma turned to glare at him, he explained his statement. "I know that she's your friend, but you should spend some time with us too? We're your boyfriends. We're here to support you."
Ryoma sighed with a small nod of his head. "Probably the reason why she ran off as well," he grumbled, earning chuckles from his three boyfriends. "What do you want to talk about?"
"What's wrong?" Tezuka deadpanned, crossing his arms over his chest as the four walked around.
Ryoma kept his mouth shut, his eyes darting around as if trying to figure out what to say.
"Do we need to talk to your parents about what's wrong Ryoma?" Sanada questioned, placing a hand on Ryoma's head and ruffling his hair slightly. "We want to help you. You know that right?"
Ryoma nodded with a sigh. "It's just that… It's my parents and Nanako," he finished bluntly, shoulders slumping as he looked at the ground, stopping on the spot.
"What about them?" Fuji asked, leading the younger over to a nearby table with five seats and sitting down.
"It's… It's nothing really. I'm just being stupid," Ryoma muttered, turning his head away and blankly staring at one of the habitats.
"Ryoma, if it was nothing, you wouldn't be acting this way," Tezuka commented, crossing his arms. "Talk to us Ryoma. You know you can."
Ryoma bit his lower lip and just kept looking away from them. He didn't want to say anything. It was bad enough with how Hanako reacted to what happened, but how were they going to react? It wasn't his fault and it certainly wasn't theirs. He didn't think he would have gotten such a reaction from Hanako anyway.
"What reaction and what event?" Sanada questioned, making Ryoma startle as he finally realized that he was whispering his thoughts aloud.
"It's-"
"Don't say it's nothing Ryo-chan because we all know that it isn't," Fuji said, eyes opening a slit.
Ryoma sighed. "She just… overreacted I think. Kept screaming and wondering what was wrong with the three of them," he finished, burying his face in crossed arms on the table.
"Care to actually tell us the details?" Tezuka said, eyes narrowing slightly in worry as he ran his hand through Ryoma's locks. Earning a shake of the head as his answer, Tezuka suggested, "Maybe Hanako can explain then?" A nod.
After a quick phone call to Hanako and telling her to get over to where they were, they had to wait a good half hour because the aquarium was so large, and she was on the other side of it.
"So what's up?" Hanako questioned, making her way to the table only to see that Sanada, Tezuka, and Fuji were gathered around a sad Ryoma. "So he mentioned something then?" she asked, eyes dropping in sadness for the young male.
"You seem to know about it. What happened?" Sanada questioned, glaring at the girl to tell them.
"Glaring is not going to help," she growled, startling the three. "Sorry, but I've grown attached to Ryoma, oh not like that you possessive idiots," she sneered as Fuji started glaring as well. "I guess I'll explain although I really don't like the entire situation myself," she said, taking the last seat.
"First of all, it started at the beginning of summer. I was going to visit Ryoma and see whether he could recommend me to a good high school and college for art considering he researched a lot of places whereas I'm too busy.
When I got there, I heard a lot of shouting, so I invited myself in. It was Ryoma fighting with his dad with Nanako and his mom on the side, about to shed tears from what I could tell."
"What happened?" Fuji growled.
"I'm getting to that," she snapped before taking a deep breath to calm herself. "It turned out… Nanako was moving out of the house to finish college and staying with her boyfriend… and Ryoma's parents were moving back to America… leaving Ryoma behind…
As soon as I heard that, I started screaming at them too. Asking them why they were leaving their barely in high school son on his own. They told me that they had planned to take Ryoma with them, but considering his relationship with you three, they decided to just go ahead and leave him behind…"
The three were startled. No wonder the house was so empty when they had visited earlier on that day. It was because they were all gone and Ryoma was the only remaining person there, besides for Karupin of course.
"You could have told us you know," Fuji said, startling Ryoma with how calm he was being. "I think Hanako handled all the screaming and yelling at your family for us," Fuji chuckled, seeing the look on Ryoma's face.
"That was her part. Now it's our turn to comfort you," Tezuka finished, knowing where Fuji was going with this.
Hanako smiled as the three males took turns kissing their youngest and gave him a firm hug, adding a kiss to the cheek or a ruffle to his hair. Deciding to leave the group alone, she tiptoed off to get more pictures or the animals here.
"I thought you three were going to ask to contact my parents and start screaming as well," Ryoma admitted after another kiss from Fuji.
"We thought about it… but if you were scared to tell us because of Hanako's reaction, I think she did a good enough job," Sanada said, earning nods from the other two. "We'll always be here for you Ryoma, no matter what happens. Don't forget that. You brought us together, and there is no way we'll let you go without a fight."
Ryoma scoffed with a smile on his face as he sat on Sanada's lap and gathered the other two closer. "I like the sound of that," he said, giving them each a peck on the lips. "Why don't we enjoy the rest of the aquarium hmm?"
"Alright," Tezuka chuckled, getting up and taking Ryoma's hand in his as Fuji took his other hand, Sanada taking Ryoma's free hand. "Let's go. We shouldn't waste these passes," he admitted with a small sigh.
When the other two males seemed to sigh, Ryoma just chuckled at them, knowing what displeasured them. "Don't worry," he said, tugging them all closer and giving them each a squeezing hug, "you're staying with me tonight."
"Glad to hear it," Fuji chuckled, knowing that he would get to cuddle with Ryoma and his other lovers.
"Let's go then," Ryoma cheered, finally happy for once in the last five weeks. He was content with spending time with Hanako, able to get his mind off of his parents and cousin. But he wasn't truly happy. Now he was… mostly because, well, he had three protective boyfriends and-
"We're not leaving you anytime soon," they whispered with another kiss to his temple.