Written on 7/9/2014 for two anons on tumblr for the AU ficlet meme:

4. teacher/single parent au

Ryouta hated parent-teacher meetings.

Natsuko took after him in a lot of ways; actually, sometimes he wondered if there was any of her mother in her at all. She definitely resembled him at age ten - she was an energetic, excitable child, constantly searching for stimulation.

Often her teachers would would talk to him about how she was disruptive, how she didn't listen, how her grades suffered. Ryouta knew from experience how boring and uninteresting classwork could be - the apple really hadn't fallen very far from the tree - and even now he didn't have an answer to the question of how to engage a child whose strengths funamentally led them away from academics.

So he wasn't looking forward to this year's meeting any more than he'd looked forward to any other meeting, as he strolled through the school halls. He ignored the way that some of the mothers openly looked him over; his priority these days was being Natsuko's father, being as good a father he could to make up for her flighty and irresponsible mother.

(they'd been young starlets drunk on their rocketing fame; it had been an accident, but Sakiko had refused to have the pregnancy terminated even though she didn't want the child, and Ryouta wasn't able to abide the idea of the child being dragged around the world with no sense of home or consistency with a parent who was barely more than a child herself. He wasn't that much more mature or grown up than Sakiko at the time either, but…)

He arrived at the classroom listed on the handout Natsuko had brought home two weeks ago; there was no one waiting outside, but he could hear the murmur of voices inside. Clearly Natsuko's teacher was still with the previous parents, so he sat down on the chair outside with a sigh.

It was a few minutes before the door opened, and a couple stepped out, thanking 'Aomine-sensei' for his time. Ryouta stood and knocked on the door as he entered.

"Yeah, come in, give me a second," was the distracted answer to his knock. It was just as well that the teacher was flicking through his files to find Natsuko's, because Ryouta needed a minute to get over how attractive Natsuko's teacher was.

(It was definitely irresponsible to hit on your child's teacher. Definitely. No matter how attractive and well-built he looked.)

He sat in the seat across from Aomine-sensei, and the man looked up and blinked.

"Just you?"

Ryouta bit back the flare of irritation that sparked. Aomine-sensei probably didn't mean to suggest he wasn't enough for Natsuko; he was probably just wondering if they were waiting on another person to begin.

"Just me," he answered, and gave his best smile. "Natsu-chan's mother isn't around much."

Aomine hummed. "Okay."

"I know Natsu-chan's grades aren't very good," Ryouta said, because that was where all these meetings started, and he wanted to get it out of the way. "And I know that she's disruptive and can't sit still and she can be loud. So if you're just going to tell me she's a problem child—"

"Natsuko's not a problem child," Aomine interrupted. "Well, okay, she is, but not like…" He ran a hand through his hair. "She's bored and has too much energy, yeah? She needs to find somewhere to expend some of it."

Ryouta sighed and slumped back into his chair. "I know," he mumbled, "but she's too much like me. Nothing keeps her challenged long enough. I had that problem at school too." He bit his lip and then continued. "I really did hope she wouldn't be a fast visual learner like I was, and then I hoped that maybe she'd be able to find a challenge where I never did playing with boys, but she's running through sports just like I did."

Aomine tapped his fingers on the desk, seeming somewhat lost in thought."I might have an idea," he finally said.

(It wasn't until Natsuko's elementary graduation that Ryouta took the chance to steal a kiss from Aomine-sensei; but, he decided in hindsight, it had been worth waiting for.)