The Pediatrician's Closet

Prey

As a general rule, Masaomi didn't have great luck with women. Oh, he drew them in fine enough, but once they were in and getting deep, problems started. All completely his fault. He'd own up to that.

First, he was busy. Being a medical student with a full-time job had barely given him time to breathe let alone have a girlfriend. Throw in several younger brothers and an overwhelmed mother and no girl could get in edgewise.

Second, he had quite the conservative criteria for the kind of women he liked to get serious with. Having to essentially raise his brothers on his own when his mother ran off to become a career woman, Masaomi didn't really want to marry a girl who was set on working outside of the home. Unfortunately, that made him come across as chauvinistic and old-fashioned, which most women in the modern day did not appreciate. Of course, he was fine if she went off to have a job once the kids were grown, but kids, well...they needed their mom. He'd seen that first hand. And he still saw it every day when kids came into his office with a background of living at home alone because mom and dad were too busy. He did not want that for his own children, and he would not budge. At the same time, he liked a woman with strength and brains and a degree. He wanted an equal, after all, and finding that odd mixture of educated without needing a career was...nigh impossible.

And third, he wouldn't have sex. Had to do with his sensitivity to the needs of children again. As a doctor, even as a pediatrician, he knew how often babies came into the world beating the odds of birth control. Heck, he knew second hand how creation often gave birth control the finger, as no couple he knew of sanely planned on having thirteen children. With his luck, he knew he would inherit his parents' immunity to birth control and impregnate a woman without trying. And also, having dealt with many 'whoopsie' babies to single mothers and fathers, the idea of creating a child with a woman he didn't plan on staying with forever, or her staying with him, horrified him. To think of not being able to be a part of that child's life for any reason—or ensuring that child had a mother on hand whenever they needed her...

And then there were the unhappy children of unions where neither parent wanted them, or both were still children themselves.

While sweet in theory, his abstinence did nothing for girlfriends who wanted to take it a step farther. And since he had yet to come to the point where he felt right proposing, they all grew impatient and left for brighter opportunities. At the rate he was going, Masaomi would die a virgin, as some of his brothers happily pointed out for him.

There was a fourth reason. But it was the third he thought of when Fuuto stepped in and sat on the exam bench with a crinkle of paper.

"Lay on me what's happening, doctor," he said, leaning back onto his hands. Even after a day of supposed work, the seventeen-year-old idol had perfect hair and unmussed designer clothes.

"First I'll need you to dress down," he gestured to the folded, flowery blue hospital gown on the counter. "Then I'll hook you up to an IV to prep you for the procedure. While I do that, I'll talk you through what's going to happen."

Masaomi couldn't help but feel a sense of wryness as his brother got up and went to the attached bathroom. None of the elder brothers would have been so trusting.

That brought to his mind the fourth reason why he hadn't been able to hold on to a girlfriend.

He had been mild-mannered as a child. Though there had been occasions when, given certain circumstances and the right buttons pushed, a dark, powerful fury would be unleashed. In that way, he hadn't been unlike Yusuke. While at home with his baby brothers, Masaomi was the picture of gentility and caring. But once his brothers got old enough to go to school and encounter bullies, a monster was unleashed. An unorthodox one, for Masaomi had never taken vengeance or made threats with his fists.

It wasn't until a poor boy had ended up blind that Masaomi's parents and Masaomi himself realized the kind of horror he had become.

He tried to think of this as Fuuto walked back, looking far less glamorous in the bleaching, open-backed hospital gown. But as it had in those days of old, the red fury only countered with other images, such as Fuuto walking out of Ema's room with a bulge sticking out from the crotch of his pants, and the whispered reports of how skittish and wary Ema had become afterward. Then of Fuuto's test results.

At least he still had the decency to appreciate how calm his hands worked as they tied Fuuto's upper arm and found the needle into the vein.

"So, what's going to happen," he said casually. "Is that you are going to stay away from Ema. That includes her room."

He taped off the needle and caught Fuuto paling, but little else. Always so cocky.

"Pardon? Since when did she have anything to do with this?" he didn't sound impressed, but Masaomi knew the ring of guilt when he heard it.

"Your test results showed you have an STD. I'm sure I don't have to explain what that is."

The boy's eyes shot wide and he paled further, almost to a gray.

"I've got AIDs?"

"No. But you nearly inflicted Gonorrhea upon Ema through your complete lack of control and selfishness. If you must become a womanizer, fine. But don't you dare ever let me hear even a whisper of you going near our sister or I will see to it you'll never be able to enjoy a woman again."

The mixture of shock and disbelief twisting about his younger brother's face made the reawakened monster in him purr, while another part of him told him to stop while he was ahead. But he had their mother's permission. And it wasn't like he was going to hurt him. Just scare him a little. Or maybe a lot.

"You...you're insane? Why didn't anyone ever tell me you were insane?" Fuuto's hands clenched the edge of the table. "Okay, fine. Whatever, can we just get this over with?"

"Don't think I'm serious?" Masaomi let himself smile, the same smile he gave to everyone. "Didn't you know STDs can't be gotten rid of with just a simple 'flush out'? Otherwise, no one would need a doctor. Some cranberry juice would fix everything."

Fuuto had flinched and half rose from the table. Then narrowed his eyes. "Will you stop freaking me out already? I get it. I won't do it again."

"No." Masaomi already had the syringe uncapped and the needle in the IV. "You don't."

And little brother was out.

The fourth reason why he didn't have any girlfriends was that, other than his hidden, diabolical temper, Masaomi was an extreme pacifist. He avoided getting angry, even for the right reasons. More than one woman had left him when he hadn't risen up to argue with them or challenge other men. Because above being naturally mild-mannered, Masaomi had always been deeply ashamed of the dark punishments he had given in his fits of fury.

Of course, it would be Ema to bring this out of him after eighteen years of silence. Ema, the little girl in the body of a woman.