Kuroji is the one who opens the door. "Tōkan-kun."

"Good afternoon, Kuroji-san. I'm here to take your son on a date."

Kuroji grins fondly. "Why don't you come in?" he asks, stepping aside.

"Thank you," Tōkan replies. He takes his shoes off by the door and walks in.

Kuroji leads him to the living room, where Harutsugu is sitting in a chair reading a book.

But he puts his book down when Tōkan walks in. "Kokonoe-chan. 🙂"

Oh, are they playing that game? He is going to be so charming Harutsugu is going to forget his family name in a jiffy.

"Please call me Tōkan," he says, bowing respectfully. "And, here." Below the box of chocolates he has a gift-wrapped book, which he offers to Harutsugu.

He blinks in surprise and accepts the gift, then looks up at Tōkan again. "Thank you, you didn't have to. 😯"

"I asked Kuroji-san what to get you." Harutsugu-san... will also appreciate straightforwardness, if Tōkan doesn't miss his guess. "Because I want to charm you and impress you. I am serious about your son."

He... really does not know what to say to that.

Kuroji does. "You're far too kind, Tōkan-kun. Please, won't you take a seat?"

"Thank you, Kuroji-san."

—he puts the gift aside and leans forward. "No gift for Kuroji? 🧐" he asks, leaning into the threatening persona again.

"I wanted to, but Kuroji-san doesn't like receiving gifts, so I suggested helping with dinner tonight after Inori-kun and I come back."

...also correct! "You can cook?"

"Ah, yeah, my father is often pretty busy and doesn't come home until very late so I've learned my way in the kitchen."

"That makes sense," he says, leaning back a bit.

Kuroji walks over to Harutsugu, shaking his head with a fond smile on his face, and plants a kiss on Harutsugu's forehead.

Aaaaand that completely melts the threatening aura away.

...that. Tōkan wants that.

"So, why all of this? 🤨"

"Inori-kun and I haven't actually been on a proper date yet," because they're not actually dating, "and I want the first one to be great so he'll never let go of me."

...that's ridiculously sweet.

Inori shows up at the top of the stairs then. "What's with the noise—oh. You."

Tōkan looks over his shoulder at Inori then stands up, beaming. "Inori-kun." He offers the box of chocolates. "This is for you."

He climbs the rest of the way down two steps at a time and snatches the chocolates out of Tōkan's hands lest they disappear in a puff of smoke.

Good job, Tōkan-kun, food is absolutely the way into Inori's heart.

He suspected as much.

He opens the box and pops the first chocolate into his mouth, but then he grabs his phone and looks at the time. "You're early."

"Better than being late."

"...it is?"

"In the worst case I wait a bit before seeing you, and in the best I get to spend more time with you."

"...hm."

He walks around Tōkan and flops down on the sofa with the chocolate box on his lap.

"...shall I wait for you to finish eating the chocolate, my prince?"

Suspicious look. "'M not a prinsh," he says, mouth full.

Tōkan shakes his head and flops down on the sofa, right next to Inori.

"...why are you so close?"

"Do you not like it?"

He shrugs. "Do whatever you want."

"I am."

...he really hates that smile.

"So what are your plans for today? 🧐"

"Dunno."

"I was thinking we could go to a cat café..."

Okay, he's got Inori's attention.

"...and after that we go to a manga store nearby..."

So far so good...

"...then we catch a movie..."

Ugh.

"...where we buy a double extra large bucket of popcorn..."

Okay that's good again.

"...and finally we come back here and I help Kuroji-san make a big delicious dinner with Inori's favourites."

...you know what, this "date" thing might not be so bad after all.

"...sounds like you've got it all planned out, huh. 😯"

"That's just the general idea. We'll see how it goes. I just want to spend time with Inori-kun." And he reaches for Inori's hand.

Who pulls it away quickly and shoots him a glare, popping another chocolate into his mouth.

So cute.

Harutsugu is honestly still reeling a bit. He hadn't quite believed Inori-chan would ever find someone who looked at him that way.

"I hope you two have fun, then 🙂," he says, surprised to find out that he means it.

"I hope so too."

"Where's this café?" Inori asks after they leave his place.

"Ikebukuro."

"Hmm." That's not too far. Maybe he could start visiting occasionally.

Tōkan considers then discards the idea of holding Inori's hand. Not yet; give it time.

And soon enough: kitties!!!

They're very cute. And relatable. ...not for being cute, that's not relatable, but for being God's perfect murder machines and not liking most people.

He might actually expire from the cuteness of Inori interacting with cats in a cat café.

"Hi, welcome to Cat Café Mocha Ikebukuro," says a waitress walking over to their table and giving Tōkan a menu (since Inori is over in a corner playing with a cat). "My name is Watanabe. I'll be back shortly to collect your orders!"

"Inori-kun," he calls. "Do you wanna pick something to eat?"

Inori looks a bit annoyed at being interrupted but when he realises the topic is food he immediately abandons the cat to go back to the table and choose. He snatches the menu off Tōkan's hands, looks at the prices, then gives Tōkan an incredulous look.

"Obviously I'm paying, I'm the one who invited you. Get whatever you like."

Well in that case...

Black hole stomach, seriously.

And now back to kitties.

"Have you been to a place like this before?"

"Dunno. Once, years ago, I guess."

"...huh. Why?"

"Haru wanted to come," he shrugs.

"No, I mean, why haven't you come more times since?"

"Dunno."

"Well, we should, then. Maybe visit other cafés, cycle through them so you can taste more food and meet more cats."

...there's an idea.

Yessssss... all according to plan.......

In a few minutes the waitress returns with the family size double strawberry milkshake and two straws. After asking Tōkan if they want to order anything more she walks off, muttering something under her breath about teenage alphas and omegas' unreasonable metabolisms.

Inori notices the milkshake immediately and flops back down onto the cushioned seat across the table from Tōkan. He grabs both straws and pulls the drink closer to him then lowers his mask and starts drinking.

He raises an eyebrow.

...what?

Oh, nothing. He supposes it's his own fault for assuming that the "family size" "double" thing meant Inori would share. 

Is he also a fool for assuming Inori will share the fries?

Yes. Get your own.

Figures.

He's still cute tho.

Fortunately for Tōkan's health Inori cannot read his mind to know that's what he's thinking.

Man, just the other day he was thinking he didn't want an omega crushing on him. Oh, how the turntables.

The manga store is probably very useful for Tōkan's character observation! Mostly Inori's choices are very characteristic: he likes action, tends to prefer stories that happen "on Earth" rather than isekais or pure fantasy, and goes for underdog protagonists. Some of his choices might be a bit stranger, though, like Not Your Typical Reincarnation Story.

Huh. Yeah, that is strange.

"What do you like about that one?" He wouldn't have expected an isekai romance between an omega and an alpha to be his thing.

He shrugs. "Dunno. I just like it."

"...alright." Well, more information to incorporate into his idea of Inori, then, he supposes.

He squints at Tōkan's smile but decides that it's not his problem and goes back to his manga.

The movie Tōkan picks is an action movie of the "someone being incredibly badass in martial arts" kind, and he specifically goes for one with a beta protagonist that's popular recently (though the actor is an alpha). He'd go for an omega if there was one, but those are very thin on the ground, and he expects Inori will appreciate a story about a bunch of alphas and betas having their asses kicked. And the popcorn.

Correct.

And on the way back to the Yamadas' he'll try to get opinions out of Inori and actually discuss the movie.

...fine. He'll get what he wants.

Inori doesn't love that the protagonist is a beta but it definitely is better than if they were an alpha; he absolutely hates stories with an alpha protagonist kicking ass, real life has enough of that for his tastes thank you kindly. He likes that the asskicking ended up solving problems. He likes that it wasn't just the asskicking, that the protagonist had to be good at other things, too. He has opinions on those other things, and opinions on what he thinks the protagonist should've done better and what he was being dumb about.

He thinks the plot was kinda bad? Mediocre? But he doesn't expect much from action movies anyway. It was fine for what it was.