Plasma TV & Cafe Au Lait


Atobe Keigo has always believed himself to be generous.

He gave without restraint - donated to charitable institutions, funded museums and educational establishments, lavished extravagantly on orphanages, patronized small and struggling local emporiums, and even spoiled his lifetime manservant Kabaji by buying him the most expensive and top-of-the-line tennis equipment.

And so he fancied himself synonymous to altruistic. No one has ever rejected his goodwill before - for who will refuse what Atobe wants to dole? Such a preposterous thought! Surely, no one would ever play the fool.

Why then did he find himself squabbling on the phone with someone for the third time in three straight days? And worse, how could this someone (God bless her soul) refuse his plasma TV?!

“ATOBE!” The girl roared over his mobile phone, “How many times do I have to tell you, stop sending me gifts!”

The prince of Hyotei heaved his usual insufferable sigh, putting on a veneer of annoyance over his nonchalantly placid countenance.

“It’s a 50-inch plasma TV. No one in their right minds would decline such a gift,” he drawled, creasing his forehead in a calculated frown.

“Take your 50-inch plasma TV and shove it up your ass!” She growled, heavy breathing clearly audible thru the phone. “And stop reading freakin’ Yahoo news, will you!”

The precocious boy in a purple lounging robe heard a high pitched tone on the other end of the line and resentfully flipped his mobile phone close.

It’s been half a year since he first met .

One begrudgingly mundane afternoon after tennis practice, he was suddenly overcome by a frisson of some ilk; some strange foreboding that crept up his spine and parched his royal throat. So, sensible man that he is, he motioned for Kabaji to follow him inside a nearby café.

It was merely a small and humble establishment, much too dreary and mediocre for Atobe’s refined taste. The walls were painted cream with a wainscoting of russet coloring to complement the mahogany fixtures. And yet there was an inexplicable coziness to the place, which slackens ones defenses and makes people just want to lay back for some idle chat. Atobe felt all the tension remaining from tennis practice quickly ebb away from every fiber of his muscles, as if he was being drained in real time, though the sensation didn’t leave him empty but on the contrary made him feel extraordinarily content.

He ordered a cup of café au lait and scones with cream, and for his companion, a mug of steaming hot cocoa and banana caramel pie. The enticing aroma of his coffee made his head reel slightly and the moment the sweet liquid touched his lips, he was in absolute enchantment.

Liquid heaven in a teacup.

Looking at the café from the outside, Atobe didn’t expect much of it. But the quality of the beverage in his hand was astounding. It wasn’t the usual cappuccino or latte substitutes often used in various coffeehouses - it was high grade French drip brew coffee with the smoothest most sumptuous scalded milk. Trusting his highly sensitive taste buds, he concluded it was even better than the original café au lait served in New Orleans’ Café du Monde.

Ah, such sweet, sweet torture.

Never in his wildest imaginations did it ever occur that a mere cup of coffee could send him into raptures. For what is café au lait but ordinary milk coffee? No, he was above such trifling pleasures. The way to “ore-sama’s heart” is NOT thru his stomach.

And yet he suddenly found himself impatiently demanding the waiter to bring him the café owner.

From behind the bar, the proprietress emerged, dressed in a simple pink sundress made of inexpensive chiffon. She had an unusually piquant face but nothing in her features could be considered stunning; she had common brown eyes, a common nose, a common small carmine mouth. And yet the way she carried herself suggested confidence, natural only to those who were born rich. At closer inspection, he noted that she was not much older than he was - that she was probably the daughter of the family instead.

She had a well-practiced professional smile plastered on her features when she approached Atobe. And when he proclaimed with all regality that he wanted to buy her small shop – making clear, of course, that he was to retain the current staff’s services except that they would have no other customers from now on other than him and his selected guests – a small unidentified flicker passed thru the girl’s eyes which left no trace as she declined his offer with a voice of determined calm.

But Atobe chose to insist and push on mercilessly – after all, who could resist the great Atobe Keigo? Yet with every word he uttered, the owner’s eyes became more visibly clouded with outright dislike, though of course Atobe never noticed it.

And probably, Atobe never would have, had the girl kept her calm. But after a while, she finally snapped.

“Who do you think, you are, SIR,” she hissed, the last syllables escaping her mouth protracted and dangerously low. “My café is not for sale, no matter how much you offer me. I’d rather die than know that the only person who enjoys my father’s coffee is a self-absorbed, self-important, self-centered, obnoxious, narcissistic prick! Go fuck yourself!” She finished dramatically as everyone in the store stared at them.

Atobe smirked.

A woman with a regal bearing and a potty mouth.

He’s never seen such a walking contradiction before. The way she switched from using formal speech to shouting an invective. Oh, was he amused. Was he BEYOND amused.

Amused amused amused.

Atobe left the café that day with a mission. He’s going to do whatever it takes to own the place because more than the good coffee, the unexpected challenge excited him immensely.

With a little research, he soon found out the lady’s name and that her father’s company went bankrupt before he died, living only the small shop to his 18 year old daughter. And so he spent the next few months showering her with gifts, hoping to win her over. For even though he could use force if he wanted to; his style didn’t permit him so – he was a lover, a refined gentleman with good taste. And truth is that the young proprietress intrigued him, and trying to capture her is nothing short of hunting for a fiery animal in the wild. Atobe has never been more excited.

In the months that followed, he lost interest in the café, but not in trying to capture her. In fact, he doubled his efforts, sending her gifts almost every day – gifts which were immediately returned. But instead of making him lose hope as it should have, it pleased him to see her resisting. This was something fresh to him - no one has ever rejected him before.

And yet sometimes it bothered him, for what if she never gives in. Even that is something new, for Atobe was never bothered to this extent before either.

What disturbed him most at the moment though was that she knew where he got his idea. A little while ago, Gakuto advised him to do what common people do and get ideas from “online”. So Atobe had Kabaji researching for him, and his loyal lackey came with a printout straight from Yahoo news.

“An Oxygen Network survey released today found that more than three out of four women said they'd choose the television over a diamond solitaire necklace. Women preferred a top-of-the-line cell phone to designer shoes by a similar margin. And a little white iPod narrowly trumped a little black dress.”

So over the last three days he sent her an iPod, a Vodaphone and the 50-inch plasma TV they were squabbling about earlier. Apparently, none of it worked.

Over the next few days, Atobe lay low and formulated a new plan. He’s been sending her gifts and visiting her so often for the last six months, he lost count. Maybe it was time to declare open war.

The fifth day after the failed plasma TV plan, found herself being dragged into the back of a limousine and brought to what she only knew too well as the Atobe mansion. Inside, she was forced into a little black silk number and three-inch black velvet Prada shoes. A Harry Winston diamond solitaire necklace graced her opalescent neck in all its resplendent glory.

Atobe expected her to be gratified when he finally faced her. Who wouldn’t? If she didn’t want the phone, the iPod and the 50-inch plasma TV, surely, she wanted the dress, the shoes and the necklace.

But there was not the faintest trace of gratification when they came face-to-face. ’s features were so visibly contorted with rage; Atobe was taken aback for a fraction of a second before regaining his usual overbearing composure.

“What is the meaning of this, Atobe?” She seethed, voice dripping venom.
“You don’t like them?”
“You thought I will?” She snorted derisively.
“If you don’t like the dress, the shoes and the necklace, you should’ve taken the iPod, the Vodaphone and the 50-inch plasma TV in the first place.”

Smirking slightly, the boy leaned against a tall Dorian column coiled with vines of a motley assortment of blossoms.

After she was dressed and preened forcibly, was brought to the glass gazebo standing over the sprawling manicured grass. Inside, she found Atobe waiting for her with a table for two set not far behind him. She caught the younger boy engrossed with one of the flowering shrubs, his face showing an unfamiliar softness she had never seen before – it took her breath away. And in that moment she knew – she wanted to know more about this man-boy, this prince of sartorial elegance uncommon in people his age, this vain egotistical child playing a grown-up’s game. Somehow she always knew he piqued her interest, yet finally admitting it to herself knocked the wind out of her quite literally, she had to gasp.

But now as she watched him fixing her in a mocking stare, feelings of animosity which were momentarily forgotten flooded back into her.

“I want none of all these crap, Atobe. You should have known from the very start that I can’t be bought.”

“I’m not trying to buy you. Not anymore,” he said quite honestly, for he has no more intention of buying her café.

Atobe pulled a chair for which she didn’t refuse as he had expected. She merely heaved a sigh and sauntered over towards him.

When he was seated across her, he popped a bottle of Dom Perignon open and started to pour her a glass when she vehemently snatched the champagne from his hands.

“No middle school kid is going to drink in my presence,” she huffed, pouring herself a goblet and downing the contents in one gulp. She eyed his amused face and sighed again. How could a child have such an expression? Before she’d met Atobe, she could never have imagined a 14-year-old to have such animated reactions as he did. Just when you think he’s nothing but a vain peacock, he goes and shows you a genuine smile which disappears in the blink of an eye. And you have no choice but to think you’ve imagined it, yet another day, he’d exhibit a child’s wide-eyed curiosity which evanesces just as fast. As much as she hated to admit it, as much as she wanted to lie to herself, Atobe fascinated her just as she unknowingly fascinated Atobe.

“I think it’s time we have a talk,” she started softly and Atobe raised his brows. “First, I want to know why you even tried buying the shop from me. If you liked my coffee, you could have just come everyday. It’s not like I would ban you from my café, a customer is a customer.”

A small smile tugged at one corner of his lips as he opened his mouth to sound his usual drawl.

“I am a very possessive man. When I tasted your coffee, I wanted to be the only one in the world who drinks it. I want the taste to be mine, my property alone.”

Her eyes widened as she gave a laugh. “What a spoiled brat,” she said, though without its usual caustic tone.

“Now you have to answer my question. Why won’t you sell? I know for a fact the café doesn’t earn as much as I had offered you.”

lowered her goblet and stared at the pristine white tablecloth. The moonlight reflected at angles against the glass walls of the gazebo, making illusions of dancing fairies. And for a while, she merely continued staring at it, this kaleidoscopic fantasy, without speaking, without meeting Atobe’s eyes. He understood her silence and made no intention of breaking it.

“My father was all I had in this world,” she started with a tiny crack in her voice, “When my father’s company was in its prime, we were very wealthy, perhaps not as wealthy as you are, Atobe, but we were rich. But five years ago, his company went bankrupt; we even had to relinquish our house. All that’s left to us is my dead mother’s coffee shop. My father wasn’t disheartened when he lost his company though; on the contrary I’ve never seen him happier. And I was ecstatic every time I helped him around the café - I loved every second of it. He made it his mission to ease people’s burdens even a bit with his delicious coffee and even now that he’s passed away, I intend to carry on with his wishes.”

took a swig of champagne from her newly refilled goblet before looking at Atobe squarely in the eyes.

“Now do you understand why I won’t sell?”

Atobe’s face broke into a tiny enigmatic smile she couldn’t quite read and so she settled into asking him another question.

“So Atobe, why the gifts?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean why have you been trying to shove all these expensive gifts down my throat for the past six months? Is it to try to win me over into selling the shop?”
“No, I’m not interested in buying anymore.”
“Then, why?”

Why? He never thought of this before – he never asked himself this question. After it was clear that he had no interest in the shop anymore, why had he still continued to woo her? He never even tried to seek a reason, for it came naturally to him to send her gifts and visit her when he can. Her acrimonious language even became a second nature. How then could he answer such a question?

“I don’t know,” he replied in a baritone voice without even the slightest hint of his usual condescension.

She smiled sadly, swirling the goblet in her hand.

“Hey…stop chasing after me without a reason. Stop sending me lucrative gifts just for the heck of it. I’m a not a gold digger and you’re not my sugar daddy; I thought I should make that clear.”

Her cadence had such finality to it - Atobe was left without a fast retort. She made it limpid, she drew the line – proclaim your intentions or desist all your actions. But what exactly were his intentions? He had not the tiniest hint.

“You say that,” he countered, smirk creeping back to his face, “and yet you wear my presents.”
“Only because I was forced into them.”
“And you drink my Dom Perignon.”

glanced at the half-empty goblet in her hand and set it down the table.

“I’ll give you back what I’m wearing and I’ll pay for what I’ve drunk,” she snorted.
“You can’t afford a Dom Perignon.”
“Neither can you!”
“What do you mean…” He narrowed his eyes at her.
“You talk big, you spend on me gifts I could never buy for myself, you serve me the best champagne, and yet whose money is all these? Not yours, Atobe. Your PARENTS’. That’s why I’m telling you now, in my eyes, you’re merely a child. Come speak to me when you’ve become an adult, you stuck up brat.”

With that, she stood and left.

When she was young and her father was alive, he would always tell her that life is pretty simple. When you ask for apples and it hands you lemons, make lemonade. If you’re on your way out and it starts to rain, at least you won’t have to water the plants anymore. It’s only a matter of looking things in perspective.

Yet he had no advice on what to do when a tacky middle-school heir pesters you. But then she remembered one other thing her father taught her – when in doubt, scrub the toilet.

And so that’s how she spent the last seven days after that moonlit drink with Atobe in the gazebo. She scrubbed her apartment’s lavatory clean. And when it was clean enough, she scrubbed it down again anyways. When the cleanliness had glimmered so much it hurt her eyes, she moved on to the café’s washroom, bleaching every nook and cranny, you’d feel ashamed of soiling it.

On the seventh day, after she was thrown out of her neighbor’s apartment for sneaking in to clean their toilet, he finally came.

She was on her way out for dinner when she saw, leaning against the corridor wall, a young man too aristocratic for such a run-of-the-mill edifice.

The young man straightened up to face her, handing her a bouquet of roughly four dozen red roses.

“These are from my rose garden,” he proclaimed. “I didn’t use my parents’ money for these, unless you count that they bought the grafts and the fertilizer.”

Staring at him for a while as if unable to believe her eyes, she finally gave him a lopsided grin, “Well done,” she said.

Atobe smirked and fixed her in his gaze before saying, “Happy Birthday.”

threw her head back and roared a laugh which resounded throughout the empty hallway, and when she ceased, her eyes never stopped laughing.

“I guess I should say I was wrong when I called you a child. I apologize,” she smiled.
“Of course,” he rolled his eyes as if he knew HE could NEVER be in the wrong.
“Oh god, you piss me off,” she chuckled heartily, inhaling a whiff of the roses’ fragrance. “But thank you for these birthday flowers.”
“Birthday flowers?” Atobe raised his brows. “No, forgive me, but you are mistaken.”
“What now?”

She ogled at him incredulously as he took a hold of her hand and gently touched his lips on her knuckles.

“These are to declare my intentions.”
“And what pray are your intentions, young man?”
“Why of course, to make you mine, my inamorata,” he finished simply, smirking at her in a way which curiously warmed her heart.

When she was young and her father was alive, he taught her a lot about life. But the most pragmatic thing which actually works is – when in doubt, scrub the toilet. It never failed her before. For who else could have known that a romance would have sprung from a 50-inch plasma TV and a cup of café au lait? Only she, definitely. Only she.

~OWARI~

~MitsuiSelphie
 08/11/2006

HAPPY BIRTHDAY nikki hiiragizawa! Sorry this had to be an Atobe DN...But as of the moment I can't think of any other T_T Anyways, I hope this year will be one of your best.