a/n: I'm sorry about this. Really. It's goofy and fluffy and such, but sometimes so is life. Anyway, this should clarify a few of the questions I've been posed recently. Hope you like it.

Part 17. The Talk

"Your mother says she caught you kissing Piotr in the convention center lobby after the match yesterday."

"He's European. They kiss to say hello."

"After the match?"

"And goodbye!"

"On the MOUTH?"

"SOMETIMES!"

"There is no way you are allowed to date some foreign boy three years older than you. He's practically in college, and you are far too young to-"

"He's my RIVAL!"

"Yeah, well, Touya's my rival but you don't see me kissing him!"

"Maybe you should try it sometime. The results might surprise you..."

"YOU ARE GROUNDED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE!"

-

"She's driving me insane." Shindou sat across from Touya at their usual board in the salon. "I mean, what's a fourteen-year-old girl doing kissing boys anyway?"

"You'd rather she were kissing girls?" Touya let a hint of wry amusement color his words as he looked at the papers prepared by his accountant. The salon was doing quite well, unsurprisingly, and his investments were coming back nicely.

"I'd rather she weren't kissing anybody. I mean, she's just a kid. She shouldn't be trying to grow up so fast." He sighed and threw his head back in exasperation.

"You're teaching her to play games for a living – I hardly think you need to worry about her growing up too fast." He made a few notations on items to discuss at the next meeting.

"I'm not teaching her anything," grumbled the errant maiden's father in the direction of the ceiling. "She's got a coach for chess and you for go. She hardly even talks to me anymore."

"According to my mother, all teenagers go through that phase. You can't let it bother you." He shuffled the papers into a neat stack and stood to return them to his briefcase. For a moment, he felt the now-familiar weakness and paused, resting his hand on the goban for stability.

"Touya? Are you okay?" His recovery from what turned out to be a rather nasty virus and several bacterial secondary infections had taken over a month, half of which had been spent in hospital. With the aid of massive doses of antibiotics and bed rest, Touya had managed to finish the Meijin Tournament. He'd defended his title admirably in the second half, but three months after the fact, his health had yet to fully return. Even so, it was improving, and Shindou's continued concern had long since become irritating.

"I'm fine. I'm just going to put these away and then we can play." He set a single black stone on the grid. "Nigiri. I'll be right back." So saying, he headed back to the office to file away the papers, leaving post-it notes on the ones he meant to act on. It was high time Ishikawa received another raise, certain remodeling items were due for consideration, and the lease was up for renegotiation. He wished all his work could be as rewarding as playing go, but the thought of hiring a business manager when he was still perfectly capable of attending to things for himself rankled. At least Shindou's troubles were soothingly simple. He was smiling when he returned to the board.

"I'm white," the man announced as his rival nodded and sat. Touya opened with the tengen, just to amuse them both, and watched Hikaru grinningly respond with a more traditional star point.

"So are you going to cancel her trip to Russia?" Touya floated the question lightly over his next move. He wondered how Hikaru would respond to the combination of an unusual opening and distracting conversation.

"No. I can't do that. I guess this seminar thing is very prestigious, and her coach says it will really help her game. I just wish he wasn't going to be there." That move would undoubtedly leave a dent in the board. Touya wondered whether he should consider getting a new one for this location. Then again, nothing short of steel would hold up unblemished against their regular conversations here. Perhaps it was just as well that the regular patrons generally avoided this corner.

"He seems nice enough," he commented, continuing with the opening game. Admittedly, Touya had only met his student's rival in passing, generally picking up or dropping of the younger Shindou. Kinume's long-running monologues on the subject, however, described a studious, well-mannered chess player with no real interests beyond the game. He did not seem to be a real danger. As Russia's greatest prodigy in a decade, he had a reputation to uphold if nothing else.

"Maybe, but I don't like the way he looks at her." Touya decided that laughing out loud probably would be overdoing it. Shindou had to know how utterly childish he sounded.

"When they're playing?" he asked. Shindou nodded.

"He gets this look like... I don't know," he placed his next move somewhat absent-mindedly. "Like he's..."

"Passionately interested?" That last move had been a mistake and Touya pounced on it by way of a warning. He saw Shindou become abruptly aware of his peril and watched the familiar intensity light up his eyes. "Perhaps you should try looking in a mirror when you're playing some time."

For several minutes, Shindou was silent, giving this game due consideration. Then he sat back, relaxing slightly and placed his response. Touya noted with satisfaction that it was a considerably better move. They continued the opening at a slightly quicker pace for several hands, until Shindou looked up.

"Playing your rival can be pretty intense, but there's passion and then there's passion, you know?" He played an odd foray into an unoccupied section of the board.

"You're seeing things that aren't there," Touya replied, mostly wondering what his rival was up to with this new gambit. "From what I've seen of him, he's completely devoted to the game."

"He's seventeen." Shindou said it as if that one fact could explain everything. Touya decided on an approach and played it as he answered.

"And that has precisely what to do with anything?" Shindou toyed with the stones in his go ke for a moment before playing.

"Well, I was seventeen, you know?" His tone was slightly plaintive, but his play was confident.

Touya laughed. "In some ways you still are." Shindou was still glaring at him as Ishikawa stopped by to offer them tea. The owner accepted his with usual politeness and Shindou followed his lead. They'd long since left behind the days of allowing their little squabbles to translate into rudeness toward the staff. Even so, it was almost comical how the glare returned the moment the hostess left.

"That's not what I meant." Touya arched an eyebrow in a silent request for elaboration. Shindou blushed slightly. "I was seventeen the first time I..."

"Oh," Touya interrupted, deciding that some elaborations were best left unsaid. They played several brisk hands and the game took on a delightful intricacy. It was easy to let the conversation lapse beneath the familiar fascination of conflicting strategies. Even so, as the patterns and battles became increasingly complex, the speed of responses inevitably slowed. In one of these pauses, Touya picked their dialog back up.

"You realize, not all seventeen-year-olds think alike. And even if he were interested, it's not as though your daughter would do anything untoward. She's very strong willed on the subject of love." Somehow, Shindou had manipulated the game into a six moku disadvantage for his rival, and studying the board, Touya was hard pressed to read a solution. If nothing else, awkward conversations bought him time.

"She's strong willed, but he's her rival. She chases him, follows his lead. She'd do almost anything to keep playing him." This thought clearly distracted Shindou enough to give his rival however much time he wanted.

"You think he'd withhold his play until she slept with him?" Should he attempt to strengthen his advantage in the center?

"Well, no, but if he asked her to sleep with him, she might just go along with it because of who he is..." Shindou's eyes darkened at this thought.

"Because he's her rival and she respects his opinions?" Perhaps a better strategy would be to concentrate on finishing the battle in the lower left...

"Something like that." Now Shindou was also concentrating on the goban. He'd clearly noticed that Touya was stalling, and his eyes were lightening with competitive smugness.

"So if I asked you to sleep with me, you'd do it?" Aha! A pincer move here and the game would soon be even again. Touya smiled and placed the stone only to look up into his rival's shocked stare. His words came back to him and he willed himself not to blush. Instead, he put on his most rational countenance. "You see how patently ridiculous your line of reasoning is, now, don't you?"

"Um. Yeah. I guess so." He still seemed slightly shaken somehow, but managed to laugh. "Still, you're a guy and we're both old enough to know better. It's different with K-chan."

"So you mean to tell me that if I were a woman and we were seventeen your virtue would be in danger?" For one dreadfully uneasy moment they both seemed almost to consider this. Then Touya gave what he hoped was an exasperated sigh and narrowed his eyes. "Really, Shindou. You're worrying too much about Kinume. While you're probably right that she and her rival are very close, that's hardly reason to suspect anything inappropriate." It was amazing how easily annoyance could supersede all traces of embarrassment. He picked up a stone, only to realize it was still Shindou's turn. Feeling the comforting safety of increased irritation, he gestured to his opponent's coffer. "Are you going to play?"

Shindou replaced his disconcerted expression with a far more familiar glare and slammed a stone down. His rival responded immediately with the move he'd planned earlier, and goaded by this speed, the blond-banged man returned an equally quick reply. "I just don't want her to get hurt," he protested. Touya sighed, but inwardly sympathized.

"Look, Kinume is a very intelligent young woman, but she is also quite strong willed. At some point you're going to have to trust her to make decisions for herself." The young father bristled slightly at this, but his friend was quick to temper it. "Still, I really think she's a little young yet to even be considering the things you're worried about. And even if she is, I'm sure your wife has talked to her about it." Noting Hikaru's slightly dubious expression, he continued cautiously. "She has talked to her about it, right?" He placed his move without looking, suddenly a little more worried about the conversation.

"About what?" Shindou likewise placed a move to which neither of them payed much attention.

"You know..." He glued his eyes to the board, hoping Shindou would acknowledge what they were talking about without requiring it be spelled out. He noticed the lackluster nature of the past hand and did his best to shore it up with a carefully placed hane.

"Know?" Shindou could be denser than lead some times. Touya watched him place another less-than-ideal stone before giving a sigh of frustration.

"To put it frankly: sex. Surely by now your wife has discussed these matters with Kinume and any choices she makes will be well informed, right?"

"Um, probably?" At this, Touya dropped his stone on the board, and they both stared at it. Their standard rule was that such things counted, but it was certainly not the placement he had intended. They were almost finished with the endgame, by this point, and so they played it out. As it drew to an eerily unavoidable draw, the rivals stared at each other.

"Well, hopefully they'll just concentrate on their game," Touya offered, eyes fixed on his rival's. Shindou swallowed hard and nodded.

"They'd better."