This is dedicated to my real life friend and secret slave, Melontard, who randomly decided to teach me the mysterious and secretive world of sushi… Don't ask for clarification on that XD
TMNT© Viacom
Story © Turtlefreak121
Fine Dining
Leonardo stared at the inappropriate "kanji" lit up in glittering display above the building. His brow furrowed all the more as he determined that the supposed Japanese restaurant they were entering was not Japanese at all but had Korean calligraphy displayed for the gawking, uneducated public to be fooled by.
Already he could tell that the night was not going to end well.
"You gonna stand like a stiff or what, Leo?" Raphael questioned as a toothy grin expressed itself on his face.
The older brother scowled at the look and huffed. This was all Raphael's fault to begin with and the more Leo dreaded the events to come the more the red masked brother seemed to enjoy the concept. He was such an annoyance sometimes.
"Not as stiff as the man you got that gift card off of," Leo snorted in reply, reminding the group of the reason behind their current predicament.
"Hey, that guy threw it at me, Leo," Raph snapped. "It wasn't my fault if he got scared when I busted up that drug deal and threw his crap at me. I'm just glad he gave me private reservations as a payment for correcting a really stupid mistake."
"Oh, I'm sure that's how it happened," Leo rolled his eyes.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"We should hurry up if we don't want to lose our reservations, guys," Don muttered as he uneasily glanced to his phone for the time again. Punctual Donatello was practically squirming over running this close on time.
Normally Leonardo was right there with him in wanting to be early. Those were always events that Leo wanted to go to, though. This happened to be quite the opposite scenario.
"Yeah, Leo, stop stalling!" Michelangelo exclaimed as he threw an arm around Leo's shoulder and attempted to pull him toward the restaurant entrance. He loved an excuse to dress up in trench coats and fedora to enjoy the fine dining of the city. "Besides you like Japanese!"
"This is about as Japanese as that Chinese Take-Out you and Don order," Leo grimaced before shaking his head. "And it's not even a full restaurant, it's a Sushi Bar."
"That we have a private room to!" Raphael growled, now aggravated with the conversation. He pushed them along forcefully, though, other than Leo, no one really protested the shove. "Stop your belly aching and get in there!"
Leo groaned as he entered the door and was immediately met by the stereotypical Japanese décor. It was not even all Japanese, it was heavily influenced by Korean, Chinese, and even a smidge of Taiwan. Any cultured contesor should have seen through the guise.
So why did it take a two hundred dollar gift card to eat there? What was the appeal?
"Yeah, I called here earlier," Raphael spoke up as he leaned against the counter, making a show of himself as usual. Leo could only rub his temples in hope that this night would end soon and without any of their casual encounters lead to them being discovered by the general public… or by Master Splinter. "Reserved party for Schwartz."
"Ah, yes," the host smiled before waving his hand toward a hall where a waiter was already waiting to guide them through a series of rooms. "Please, Mr. Schwartz, make your way to your private room, and do enjoy your sushi."
Leo growled as he took up the rear, following the waiter as they crossed the red velvet carpet.
The utterance caused Don to look to him and laugh at his obvious discontent while their other brothers excitedly made their way toward the private room. "You'll have to lighten up, Leo," the collective brother chuckled. "It's a good chance to eat out of the Lair for once."
"Did you notice that the waiter and the host weren't even Japanese?" Leo snorted. "They're all Caucasian. This is a sham."
"A high priced sham," Don corrected him with a smirk. "It's just food, Leo. Try to enjoy it else you'll be letting Raph win."
To this Leonardo could only sigh. Don was only half correct in his thinking. If he was miserable the entire night then Raph would win in making Leo absolutely aggravated. If he ended up enjoying this excursion, well, Raph would win, too. He would have proved that he could make Leo enjoy a night outside of training and studying.
Silently, Leo questioned whether or not staying at home was still an option when Michelangelo, who had already reached the reserved room's entrance with Raph, released a thick, surprised but much enjoyed laugh.
Leo became incredibly nervous. That laugh was rarely a good sign for the temperamental leader.
"What? What is it?" Leo forced himself to question before stepping up to the entrance with Don, freezing just behind their other brothers as the sight came before him.
The older turtle's jaw slacked and he almost became queasy with shock at the very sight of the naked woman laying on the sushi bar with minute slices of seaweed delicately used to cover up her most private areas and her eyes. A smile red as blood gleamed back at the teenagers, anticipating their enthusiasm and basking in it as it protruded from the pale, never seen sunlight flesh.
"Now this is a sushi bar!" Mike cracked.
"RAPH!" finally emerged from Leo's throat.
"What? I didn't know this was what the private rooms were!" the accused clearly defended before throwing up his hands. "How the hell was I supposed to know?"
"You planned this!"
"Oh, yeah, Leo, I totally chose to take my hard ass brother to my first real peep show," Raphael snorted at the very notion. "I wouldn't take you to see a movie with me let alone something like this!"
Donatello merely stood and stared with the blood flushing his face.
"Are you going to enjoy your meal?" the waiter questioned somewhat impatiently.
It was at that time that the four looked to the table and, inadvertently, the woman basking on the table. What the four had not noticed in their moment of shock and awe was that the woman was in fact delectably decorated, along with her diminutive seaweed coverings, with a few layers of several types of gourmet sushi rolls.
"That's not sanitary," Don spoke up, fumbling over his own words.
Michelangelo released another roll of laughter as the truth settled in and had to grab his head to seemingly keep it from removing itself from his neck. Tears were forming in his eyes the more and more he realized that he was attending a naked sushi bar with his brothers.
Leo and Raph just stared at each other.
"Well, we might as well as enjoy," Raph snorted at the death glare he was receiving from Leonardo. The brother nonchalantly shrugged his shoulders and entered the private room with Mike soon to follow.
Leo's beak crinkled and he shook his head. He could not believe that this was happening!
Looking at Leo with his bright red cheeks flaring, Don seemed to be asking for permission to enter. The brother who had been so willing to give Raphael's idea a chance was now clamoring for a reason to say no to it. It was embarrassing for him to say the least.
"We can't leave those idiots in here alone," Leo muttered as he entered. "They'll do something stupid."
"Wonderful," Don sighed as he followed, averting his eyes or keeping them to the floor to keep from the horrid sight of the naked sushi woman.
This was far from the approach that Michelangelo was taking as his eyes seemed run up and down the sushi woman's body again and again. His face was seemingly frozen in a rose hue and his eyes were glittering with the prospect of a woman lying out before him. Better yet, it was a naked woman with food decorating her bare curves.
"I don't' think I'll ever be able to eat on a regular table again!" Mike howled.
Leo glared. "Michelangelo!"
"You're telling me!" Raph laughed as he snapped his chopsticks together and reached forward to grab the first California roll.
"Raph, keep your hands to yourself – everyone keep their hands to themselves."
"I have the friggin' chopsticks, Leo! Cool it!"
"Yeah, we're behaving."
Don stared at the napkin on his lap and gently smoothed out its edges.
The waiter returned, somewhat with a more pleasant expression on his face since the brothers had sat down and accepted their meal. He certainly did not seem like someone willing to put up with their teenage nonsense, that was for sure.
"I can take your drink orders, can't I?"
"Uh, sure," Leo spoke up as he picked up his chopsticks, searching desperately for the least awkward part of the sushi woman to take his meal from. "I'll have an unsweet tea."
"Vodka—"
"Raph!"
"Kidding, Leo! Sheesh! Water."
"Dr. Pepper!"
There was a pause and Leo looked to his brainy, awkwardly bashful tonight brother. He frowned at Don's uneasiness.
"Don."
"What?" he questioned as he looked up, surprised.
"Drink order," Leo answered.
"Uh, just water," Don muttered only to return to looking downward.
"That will be all, won't it?" the waiter asked.
"Yes, thank you," Leo answered before Raphael or Michelangelo could produce another foolish remark. His eyes once more turned upon his mischievous brothers and he directed his chopsticks at them pointedly as the waiter left. "We're eating and getting out of here. No goofing around."
Joyous yet put off by Leonardo's determination to disenchant the adventure, Michelangelo waved his hand at his brother. "Fine, fine. Lemme just check out the buffet again," he added before a loud, whooping noise released itself from his throat. "WHOO, baby."
Leo groaned and then leaned forward, reluctantly removing a piece of oshi-sushi from the woman's patella. It began to concern the turtle that she never seemed to move, particularly her hand that had thin, vibrantly colored nails gracing the top of a small, red button. He supposed it was for when customers got too touchy.
"You missed the seaweed," Raphael remarked as he forcefully pressed the California roll in its entirety to the corner of his mouth.
"What?" Leo asked as he brought the rice roll to his plate. "What do you mean missed it?" His eyes, as if by their own command, glanced toward the selective areas which the seaweed so discretely covered. He scowled at Raph. "I wasn't going for the seaweed."
"Sure you weren't."
"I wasn't!"
"Oh, Leo, you know you want to."
"Shut the hell up, Raph!"
"Hey, I want some wasabi for my amaebi!" Michelangelo interrupted as he looked around the woman, for once not completely consumed with the actual sushi woman herself. "I can't eat my amaebi without some wasabi!"
"Mike, that's disgusting," Leo groaned as he rubbed his temples, pleading the upcoming headache to leave before it came. "Amaebi's sweet. Why would you put wasabi on it?"
"Because I like to party," Mike responded before looking to the woman's face, apparently oblivious to the fact that she was masked with seaweed. "Hey, where do you keep your wasabi?" he asked as he leaned over, glancing about the body.
Leo felt his brow furrow as the woman's finger stiffly directed itself more toward the red button.
"Stop, Mike," he warned.
The younger pouted and leaned back into his seat before glancing around, watching Raphael grab for another sushi roll, this time delicately placed just over her navel. It moved Mike's eyes toward the belly button itself. "Think there's wasabi in there?"
"Shut up, Mike," Raphael chuckled.
A small noise, like muttering, came from Don and Leonardo glanced over to see that his brother's utensils remained untouched and his eyes purposefully averted still. It was beginning to concern Leonardo that perhaps his brother was lost within a cocoon.
"Are you going to eat?" Leo asked.
"Maybe," Don responded. "I'm not hungry."
Leo frowned but decided against arguing. Instead he looked back to the selection and was not too surprised to see both New York and Philadelphia rolls. So much for having a select food of Japanese tradition. The "sushi bar's" authenticity dwindled more just as Leo had thought it was impossible.
Still, the ikura roll looked great and he could never overlook the opportunity to get good sushi when it was provided. He reached forward and took the roll from the woman's abdomen.
"Little low to get your leaf, Leo."
"Raph! If you don't stop—"
The argument was immediately extinguished as the waiter returned with their drinks, laying them all on the outer rim of the table where their plates remained. Leo frowned at his tea. The sweetened smell certainly did not tell him that the waiter had accurately taken his order.
As the man leaned over Mike's shoulder to place his Dr. Pepper before him, Michelangelo threw up his arm, swinging his body to turn toward the man and, simultaneously, causing the man to tip Raph's drink all over Mike's head.
Mike let out a throaty noise at his own dampness and shook his head. "I just wanted to know where the wasabi was!"
"Michelangelo!" Leonardo growled as he covered his face in humiliation over the event.
Raph howled with laughter, doubling over and clinging to his sides desperately. "Oh, no way," he chortled. "This night is just too good!"
"I am so terribly sorry, sir!" the waiter apologized as he immediately grabbed the cups and ran out of the room to fetch a towel.
"Aw, my mask!" Mike whined as he wrung the tails of his orange signature.
Miserably, Leo rubbed his eyes before deciding that he needed a triad of sushi before he could really start eating. He reached for the second ikura roll near the sushi woman's stomach and looked sternly toward Raph and Mike.
"I hope you guys realize that you're acting like idiots," he snapped as he grabbed onto his selected prize and pulled back, surprised at how weightless it seemed. Had he missed?
There was absolute silence between the brothers as even Don joined in looking to see what Leo had blundered and pulled off the woman. Everyone turned a bright red as they realized Leo had removed the seaweed slip that covered her left breast.
"OH, GOD!" Leo exclaimed as Raphael and Michelangelo woke from their own stupors and fell to the floor, squealing with laughter. The older turtle scrambled to replace the seaweed but fumbled instead and the discreet piece slipped to the floor.
Donatello was a deer in headlights staring at the woman's revealed breast. His face was so red that it seemed as though the rushing blood could cause his face to burst!
Leo quickly ducked back, attempting to grab the strip from under the table only to smack his head against the edge of the table. It would not have mattered in any case for the woman had already pressed the emergency button and the private doors flung open to the manager, host, and waiter barging in.
"OUT OUT OUT!" the manager screamed, his white face furiously pink and slowly fading into a light purple at the humiliation of his employee.
The boys did not need another hint. They immediately leaped up and ran from their seats, bolting out the hall and out the doors, the restaurant becoming one solid blur of tacky Asian décor and red velvet carpet.
Not that any of the teenagers had taken notice of the sights of the restaurant as they exited. Their minds were focused, whether they wanted it to be or not, on the sight of the naked sushi woman who would haunt them for the rest of their lives.
They continued to run all the way to the sewer depths, no one needing to breathe a word of their agreement to never tell their father of their adventures in fine dining.
…
A/N: … bwahahaha
