Mr. Fix-It

[madimpossibledreamer]

Main Points:
Jojo's Bizarre Adventure
Summary: Jotaro shows up, and Josuke tries to make him feel at home.
Word Count: 1192
Rating: Teen
Warning: Jotaro's definitely suffering from anxiety in this part.

        If it’d been surreal before, fighting alongside Jotaro-san against that bastard Angelo or interacting with him around town, it’s even weirder now.  Sure, he’s almost effortlessly cool, but it’s a lot easier to read him when there’s the promise of an upcoming fight.  He hadn’t expected the man to be so…formal, though.  Or maybe ‘traditional’ is the word he’s looking for, he’s not really sure.  Jotaro-san shows up with gifts—ramune and snacks.  Also a couple huge books and what looks like notes.  He announces his arrival, and even presents the gift correctly.  He takes off his shoes and positions them correctly, glancing at Josuke’s feet briefly—but not briefly enough that Josuke doesn’t notice—to see whether they wear slippers or socks indoors.  The answer is socks, unfortunately, because Jotaro-san doesn’t seem to believe in socks.
        “Uh.  I can go get you a pair of socks?  They’re clean, so you can keep them,” Josuke offers, and his nephew looks awkward but nods.  Maybe he really, really doesn’t like socks, and Josuke thinks hard.  Is there some kind of good alternative?  Wait, maybe.  “Hang on, I think one of my admirers gifted me a really nice pair of slippers last year.  They’re really nice, but we don’t use them, so it’d be fine if you kept those instead?”  Too late, he remembers how Jotaro-san feels about admirers.  He tries to be good and keep all the stuff his admirers give him and repay them on White Day, but he also wants to be a responsible uncle.  Jotaro-san’s face might not be lying and he might not actually care, but something in his nephew’s demeanor says he’s really uncomfortable and he wants to do everything he can to make him feel at ease.  And honestly, a gift to help fix a situation with a family member means more than him using it personally, anyway, no matter how soft and stylish they feel.
        “If you and your mother wouldn’t mind, I’d like the slippers,” Jotaro-san confirms quietly, and score!  He’s looking a bit less stiff, so maybe Josuke isn’t doing too badly at this after all.
        “Nah, it’s fine.  You’re family, you should feel comfortable.  I’ll be back in a sec,” Josuke states, hopefully as reassuringly as he can, and hurries upstairs.
        When he returns, Jotaro-san accepts them solemnly.  The intense focus makes it feel like it’s part of a ritual or something.  After that, though, he’s quieter than before, which is really saying something.
        “Feel free to use them whenever you come over,” he suggests, trying to get some sort of response.
        “Thank you.”  There’s literally nothing different in his expression or tone, and Josuke might be imagining things, but he’s pretty sure his nephew sincerely means it.  It makes him a little bolder.  It’d be great to get to know more about him than just what his Stand can do.
        “I, uh…do you want to try out some of my games?” he asks hopefully.
        His nephew considers that for a moment, then shakes his head.  “You have homework.”  At this point, it probably doesn’t matter if that’s a question or not.
        Josuke groans.  He’d been hoping to forget about it.  “Please, one game?”
        Jotaro-san’s brow furrows more.  “…Maybe if you finish something.”
        Josuke groans harder, slumping over one of the chairs theatrically.  “Man, I’ve only been doing homework!  Kids should enjoy their youth, right?”
        He looks up to see if it’s all effective on his nephew, and—Jotaro might be smiling.  Maybe.  It’s just the very corner of his mouth.  In response, though, all Jotaro does is silently lift the bag again, like the food is an offering to make up for it.  Maybe it is.  It’s not perfect, but it will help.
        Enough of goofing around, though.  “So, wait, you came over to…make sure I was doing my homework?  That’s gotta be really boring.  I can’t help but think you have better things to do.”
        Jotaro-san sighs deeply, waving the books and notes this time.  “We both have our work to do.”
        It takes Josuke a bit to understand.  Jotaro-san, it seems, isn’t the type to say what he means.  Apparently, statements like this need context.
        The context, in this situation, is that his nephew could have done…whatever he’s doing…in his hotel.  Instead, he’d come out all this way.  Stopped at a konbini to pick up a few things, and while ramune isn’t Josuke’s favorite, grabbing the variety of those and snacks was thoughtful.  It’s entirely possible he’d been concerned about a Stand User attacking his uncle, but even then, he didn’t have to do any of this.
        And now Jotaro-san’s not looking at him.  He’s tugged his hat lower on his forehead, hiding his eyes.  Like he’s embarrassed.
        He’s insisting that they don’t have time to goof off, but he did honestly come to hang out, even if it’s boring.  Maybe especially because it’s boring; Jotaro-san doesn’t look like it, but maybe he’s just as prone to boredom as Josuke.
        Josuke breaks out into a huge smile.  He might still feel weird about his old man, but he’s really starting to like Jotaro-san, not just being impressed by the guy, and it feels like he’s made this big breakthrough, figuring this out.  “Great!  I can ask you if I need help, right?”
        “Yare yare.”  From anyone else he’d be worried that’s a no.  From his newfound knowledge, though, he knows better.  It’s not even really—probably, anyway—annoyed.
        He’d been really worried about the lecture, and now he realizes that’s perfectly silly.  Jotaro-san’s gonna bring it up, obviously, but a lecture from Jotaro-san is a few lines, not fifteen minutes of sheer agony, and when Josuke says he’s fine taking this slow and not immediately becoming buddy-buddy with Mr. Joestar, he’ll stop pushing. 
        “Do you mind if I put music on while we work?”  He’s a little anxious; music is a personal thing, after all, and he’s worried Jotaro-san won’t like it.  Prince is cool, and he’s pretty sure anyone as cool as his nephew would like him too, but for all he knows Jotaro-san doesn’t listen to music—
        “Yare yare daze.  This is your home.”  That could be an answer, but he just has to be sure.
        “I want to make sure you can concentrate, too,” he insists, and by this point Jotaro-san’s eyes aren’t visible under his hat at all, he’s pulled it down so far.
        “It’s fine.”  Jotaro-san’s voice is really quiet, but he does actually answer.
        Next is the question of where…  “I guess you could work at my desk, and I’ll go on my bed.  I’d say we could stay out here in the living room, but there’s not really room for the books, and I’d rather not sit at the dining room table for hours.”
        His nephew nods and waits silently for him to lead the way.  Which he does, complete with commentary—sure, Jotaro-san doesn’t necessarily need to know about the time he drew on the walls and then fixed it with Crazy D when he was four, but it’s interesting and his nephew is at least grunting in all the right places.