At this moment, he was trying to process the fact that his daughters' intended fiance had married one of their friends instead, and was finding it hard to contemplate. Not that he couldn't see a reason to marry her, as there was plenty, but that this situation was seriously skewed from the direction that he'd intended this meeting to go in the first place. Everything was messed up, and since the girls weren't the ones who'd gone off and caused so much chaos, there was only one person that he could blame right then.
"RANMA!" he bellowed, allowing every bit of panic and concern to show in his face. "HOW COULD YOU BETRAY MY DAUGHTERS LIKE THIS?!"
Trying not to jerk back at the sight of what looked like a giant head monster charging at his face, Ranma glared right back at his friends' father. "Whaddya mean?! I didn't betray them! They didn't even wanna marry me!"
"But you were supposed to marry them!"
"How was I supposedta know that?!"
"You were only meant to marry one of them! Not just anyone off the street!"
Makoto stiffened where she sat before looking down at the table. "Oh. I guess I messed things up for you. I am sorry about that. It's just that... I was happy visiting here, and I didn't know that our love was going to cause trouble...."
Just hearing her speak made Soun immediately subside, and his anger vanished in the face of her reaction. A hollow feeling settled into his chest as he realized that his words might have been taken as a dismissal of this girl. But that was far from what he'd meant, as he had always tried to be a 'father figure', or at least a 'favored uncle' to her. There had been something immensely wonderful about having her around, and the fact that he'd just casually insulted her, even unintentionally, hit hard.
"I suppose that if I'm such a problem, I'll just go and wait for Ranma at home. Disturbing your home isn't what I wanted... Mister Tendo."
"No, don't go like that, Mako-chan!" Akane called out, leaning towards her friend. "It's not like that!"
"We like having you here. Please don't think badly of us," Kasumi soothed, looking apologetic.
Nabiki just gave her father a flat look. "Look at what you've done, Daddy."
"It's not what I meant at all," Soun admitted with a sigh.
"Oh, really?"
"Of course! Makoto is a good and loyal girl, and I know that she would never hurt you girls. In fact, she'd probably go out of her way to help you all."
"Then why'd you go and say something terrible like that, Dad?" his youngest daughter demanded.
"I didn't mean to. It's just.... Ranma only had the luck of the draw in this. How could he know that she'd be your friend? She could have just been someone out there, rather than someone whose like family...."
Seeing his wife soften a bit, the pigtailed boy only scowled at the Tendo patriarch. "Don'tcha get it? I wouldn't have known either way. Heck, I didn't even know that my old man 'xpected me ta get married! As far as I knew, I was always free and clear."
"But, still...."
"No, I ain't hearin' it. Makoto's my wife, and that's it."
"He is telling the truth," Nabiki put in, and leaned back to regard the two fathers equally. "He went into this marriage without reservation, and based on the knowledge that he had at the time. So, I know who to blame instead of him."
Genma's eyes widened as he stared at the shapely middle Tendo daughter. "Really? Who?"
"You, to be honest. You, and my father."
"Huh?"
"She is quite right, husband. If you had merely told someone about this earlier, things might have gone differently. Possibly," Nodoka confirmed as she idly regarded her spouse.
"You mean that we could have avoided all this?"
"Well, we could have at least avoided this meeting, and introduced our son and daughter-in-law to our family friends more properly."
"But this promise was made years ago," a confused Genma babbled, clearly more concerned with understanding the situation than 'rectifying' it.
"And getting a girl to marry him, especially one as lovely as Makoto, at this age shows how manly my son is. You do want him to be manly, now don't you?"
"Ah... yes, of course! Absolutely!"
Taken aback, Soun wondered why his friend was suddenly so cheerful. "Saotome, what's gotten into you?"
"Nothing, Tendo. This is good. It's better that my wife stays pleased right now."
"Why is that?"
"No reason. It's just more helpful towards my health, is all.... Ah heh heh...."
All of the teenagers, and Soun, just stared at Genma as they tried to figure out why he'd suddenly gone all spacy on them, but Nodoka simply looked nonplussed, while:
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(Posted Mon, 03 Nov 2008 08:26)
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