Ayano Aishi, Harem Extraordinaire
The Struggles of the Aishi Harem
A few years after the confession
If someone had asked Ayano as a little girl, “What do you think is the hardest thing about marriage?”, she probably would have thought about how her family interacted with their significant others, and respond with, “Keeping other women away from your husband.” Or, in more...drastic couples, “Making sure he doesn’t escape.”
But if someone had asked Ayano this question as a teen, she would have shrugged and said, “Making sure that they’re as happy as possible, no matter what.” Perhaps even a, “Keeping the house clean and bills paid,” if she was having a rather emotionless existential crisis.
Now? Now, Ayano Aishi would say, “Trying to get their attention.”
Ayano Aishi does not have a distant partner, or one who isn’t faithful. No, Ayano Aishi has loving husbands who enjoy their time with her.
That wasn’t a mistake. There are eight of them.
And all of them have followed tradition and taken her last name.
This is where the problem comes in.
For example, let’s look at what happened just last week. Mido had suggested to Ayano that she and her husbands went to the doctor to get a check up and a shot.
“There’s been a nasty virus going around, and I don’t want any of you to get sick, dearie,” Mido had said, and Ayano promised to go. Her husbands had easily agreed, and they went to the doctor’s office without any problems.
And then, while sitting in the waiting room, a doctor walked out and, oblivious, simply called out, “Mr. Aishi?”
He was not prepared for the eight synchronized, “Yes?” that immediately came his way. The poor soul could only blink at the now standing men, then look back to his clipboard.
“Sorry, Mr. Aishi who is married to Ayano Aishi?” He tried again.
Only to be greeted with another, more impatient round of, “ Yes?? ”
Ayano couldn’t help but feel pity for the poor doctor, who was by then wide-eyed and frantically looking for any helpful details on his sheet, and cleared her throat. “What’s the first name, sir?”
He frowned. “It’s only the first initial, but it’ll do!” He smiled, then said, “Alright, Mr. O. Aishi!”
Aso burst out laughing, and Ayano couldn’t refrain from giggling with him. The doctor looked ready to faint when Osano, Osorō, and Oko walked up to him, all of them just as amused by the situation as their wife.
It had taken twenty minutes for the confusion to be cleared up, and finally the doctor was ready to lead Oko to a room. Then the next doctor was done with their patient, and so they asked, “Is A. Aishi here?”
Amao, Ayano, and Aso had given the doctor a small slice of hell, to say the least.
But the confusion wasn’t just outside of the house, of course not. No, Ayano had trouble getting the right husband when she needed them at home. Because whenever she wanted Amao’s help with cooking, Aso came running up. Or when she wanted Oko to help her pick which necklace suited her best, Hanakō arrived first. And when she wanted Kizano to give her advice on how to seem more confident before an interview, Megamo somehow ended up teaching her how to do the murder walk.
He was good at it, of course. He had to be, as the CEO of Saikou Corp. But that’s besides the point.
Ayano did her best to take the mix ups in stride, but it was always odd to expect one husband to be at her side and find another one in their place. It wasn’t their faults, of course...Ayano has a bad habit of calling all of them, “Love.”
And yet, this isn’t the only confusion in her life. Because the problem of getting the right guy’s attention isn’t just a problem in her marriage, it’s a problem with her parents, too.
More specifically, her fathers.
The most noteworthy time is when Ayano was preparing for her wedding. She had gone to check out a venue, and her fathers had offered to go with her, to make sure that the company didn’t try to overprice her. (Not that it mattered, Megamo had told her that, “No price was too great for her dream wedding.” The sentiment was nice, but Ayano just wanted a simple wedding to celebrate her eight loves. Her eight loves, in return, just wanted her to have the wedding of her fantasies. In the end, Ayano got to decide on the venue, and they got to decide other things, such as food and decor.)
And at one point, Ayano had wanted one of them to look at the dance floor in one room. “Hey, dad,” is all she had said.
The first two yeses were in complete sync, as the most important people in her life tended to speak. The third was a confused one.
You see, this is the exact moment that Mr. Aishi, husband of Ryoba, found out he was not Ayano’s only father figure. This is also the moment that Mr. Aishi found out that he was not the main father figure, either.
He’d been beat by the happy couple that is Mido Rana and Mujo Rana.
Ayano had never gotten around to introducing them, so the next ten minutes were a rather...interesting talk. By the end, she had promised to talk with her father about the details more, with a promise that her mother wouldn’t hear a word.
(This eventually lead to Ayano and her father having a heartfelt talk about Ryoba and the other Aishi women, and how Ayano had always wanted to be different. She told him about how she’d felt emotions over the course of weeks, rather than the span of a few minutes. Her father told her about how proud he was, how happy he was to have a daughter like her.)
(They cried.)
Of course, there were some negatives to the harem in Ayano’s life. There were always those who assumed the Aishi’s were Ayano’s brothers, or that Ayano was a disgrace for having a happy, polygamist relationship.
And then there were rumors. A few passed, saying that Ayano wasn’t truly married to any of them, or that she used them to support her dream housewife lifestyle (it wasn’t true, Ayano was all too happy at her job to give that up), or that she played them against each other for her own amusement.
Of course, there were also rumors that affected other people. A person overheard that Ayano was dating a Yamada, and assumed it was the elder brother. They had seen Taro and Uekiya Yamada soon after, taking a stroll through a park.
Taro had later called Ayano, talking about an angry passerby who had called Uekiya a homewrecker, and thought Taro was scum for cheating on his supposed wife. They had a laugh over it, but Ayano felt guilty.
There was also the time that someone thought Ayano was actually cheating on all of the guys with one another. They began to gossip about the thought, telling Ayano’s coworkers that she was a disgusting girl who would go to anyone who gave her a second of attention. Pictures were shown of her kissing Amao, or Osano, or one of her other husbands if they’d walked her to work. (They’d never gotten out of that habit, not that Ayano minded.)
The day that all of them showed up on their anniversary was wonderful, and also brought more confusion to her coworkers. By the end of the week, Ayano had taken home thirty apology gift baskets. That was also the week that she found out about the rumors, too.
Living her life, Ayano Aishi had chaos, confusion, and craziness that simply couldn’t be found in a normal family.
She loved every moment of it.
1323 words.