Damn, I killed him again.
Behold the sixth chapter of fluff. Part 2 of "Planning a Trip". It's all kind of silly. Hahaha!
Chapter Six
Three's a Crowd
While we're half naked and in the middle of things, Miki's cell phone rings again.
I let out a surprised cry because up until now, we've done an extraordinarily good job of keeping quiet. Accompanying my cry is my head jerking up, and Miki, surprised by both her phone and my voice, whips her head sideways and downwards, resulting in us crashing faces in the most pain-filled nose-to-nose contact I've experienced in my life.
"OW!!" we both howl like animals.
Miki falls away from me, clutching her face as I roll onto my stomach, tears of pain pouring from my eyes.
"Owwowwoww..." she moans as she manages to get onto her hands and knees and crawl to where her jeans are, jabbing at a button on her phone and finally silencing the offensively loud melody.
She looks back at me, her face contorted in pain and fright. I wipe my tears away from my cheeks and wince, my heart beating so fast that I'm afraid it'll burst. My whole body is shaking from the sudden switch of feelings within me. From enjoyment to terror. And now I have to prepare to face the wrath of Mrs. Fujimoto...
But nothing happens. There's no knock at the door. No cries of "I know you're in there, Miki!"
Miki opens her cell phone ever so quietly and reads the message she has just received. She lets out a pained groan and lets her body fall limp onto the floor without putting out her arms to brace herself. I crawl over and take the phone out of her hand to read the message.
Shopping at department store. Will call later.
It's from Miki's mother. So she left already. There we were trying to be as quiet as possible, and all for nothing.
How maddening!
I place the phone beside Miki's hand and then lie down on my stomach beside her, letting out a huge breath that I've been holding for eternity.
"I thought I was going to die," she mumbles, her voice cracking.
"Me too," I sigh.
I reach out a shaking hand and put it on Miki's back. She jerks, and I can't help but laugh.
"Arrrgggg!" she gurgles.
She rolls onto her side and shoots me an exasperated look.
"My mom. Ug!"
"It's okay. She's gone now," I comfort her.
"She knows how to totally ruin a mood."
This is true. Now that we've been rudely shocked apart, any desire to continue what we were doing has left me, only to be replaced by wariness and a sharp pain in the bridge of my nose.
"Aw, be easy on her Miki," I say in an effort to placate her. "She had no idea."
"Yeah, but now I have to let her stay over here, and that ruins the plans that we had," she grumbles.
True, that's not such a great thing. But it's just for a short while. I can come back when Miki's mom leaves.
I sit up and reach for the rest of my clothes, starting to put them back on.
"What are you doing?" Miki asks in disbelief.
I pause and look over at her.
"You'd better call your mom and tell her you're on your way home. I'll pick up my things and get out of your hair."
Miki refuses to let me sacrifice myself, though, and she grabs my hands to keep me from leaving.
"No. You can hang out with us. I don't want you to go. I don't want to spend all this time alone with my mom," she insists.
"Stop being such a baby," I roll my eyes. "Besides, I can't stay here with you two. It's mother-daughter time."
"I don't want mother-daughter time," she whines. "Hang out with us? Please? Just for the afternoon?"
She shoots me such a pathetically sad look that I find myself saying that I'll stay. She does a cheer and hurries to get dressed as I sit in the middle of the room, shirtless and wondering what sorts of mystic forces Miki channels in order to get her way with me.
We clean up our mess from lunch, and Miki calls her mother, making up a story about how she and I were out. She also bickers with her mom for a moment, chastising her for coming a week early. They finish their call.
"She'll come by soon. She said she's looking forward to seeing you, too," Miki tells me teasingly.
I love Miki's mom like my own. She's a funny woman around her friends and family, and when she and Miki are in a room together, they put on quite a show. They're both obstinate in their ways, but they love each other very much. That makes for some exciting entertainment. Their wills clash and they do combat by teasing each other, uttering biting things that some comedians wouldn't even touch on. I hear that Miki's mother actually used to terrify her daughter with these super flying kicks, but that was back when Miki was younger and still lived with her family. I would have loved to have been around for that.
I smile, and we plunk ourselves down in front of the TV to wait for our company.
Miki has trouble sitting still without fidgeting, and her hands keep wandering over to me as she pretends to touch me accidentally.
"If you dare ignore your mother when she comes to the door again because you're too busy thinking about me, I will personally open that door and tell her the exact reason why you didn't let her in the first time," I threaten her.
It's not that I don't want her touching me. Far from it. But if she keeps up with this fidgeting, I'll lose focus, and Miki's mother will be left out in the summer heat again. I have too much of a guilt complex to let that happen to her.
Miki grumbles in complaint, but her hands stop poking at me. This has the strange effect of making me wish I hadn't opened my mouth about the touching. As we sit there quietly, I begin to think more and more of what we were doing before being rudely interrupted by the phone. The mood is coming back to me, and no matter how hard I try to shut it up temporarily in a tiny room in my head, it keeps growing.
The doorbell rings, and I sigh in relief, but underneath my skin I feel a slightly ominous foreboding sense of doom and destruction.
Miki skips to the door and opens it up, letting her mother in.
"Aya-chan, how are you?!" Mrs. Fujimoto cries in delight, completely ignoring her daughter.
I grin and greet her while Miki glares at us. I flash an innocent "I love you" look at her that only makes her glower deepen. Eventually, however, she joins us, and we chat. I sit back and watch as mother and daughter catch up.
We go out for a bit and do some shopping. Miki's mom buys her some new things for her apartment, a very kind and generous thing to do, and we bring them back to the apartment. Miki enslaves her mother and makes her cook dinner for us while we clear the table and then disappear into the bedroom.
"Oh my god," Miki says the minute we're alone.
"What?" I ask in alarm, looking behind me to see if a fire has broken out.
"I love my mom, but I just want her to leave so that I can have you all to myself."
I laugh a little too wickedly.
"How long is she staying again?" I ask.
"Till Thursday," Miki groans.
The smile drops from my face. That is quite long. This means I can't spend a night with Miki until Thursday. That's five nights from now.
"Wonderful," I mutter. "Just wonderful."
She moves in closer to me, but I take a big step back.
"Uh uh. No," I say firmly. "Mother in kitchen. Not good."
"Come on," Miki grumbles, and she grabs fistfuls of my shirt in her hands and pulls me towards her.
"Miki-chan! Where's the sesame oil?!" Mrs. Fujimoto yells from the kitchen.
Miki's face twitches in exasperation, and she mouths obscenities under her breath.
"Coming!" she calls out, letting go of my shirt and turning around.
"Go help her," I laugh, covering up my own frustration and giving her a slap on the butt like she's a horse.
She turns her head and shoots me a look that says "we're not done here" before ambling off to help her mother. I sigh and lie back on Miki's bed until I hear the two start quarrelling. I go out and play peacemaker.
Dinner is delicious. Miki's mom is an excellent cook. Far better than Miki.
"Fujimoto-san, why can't you teach Miki-chan how to cook like this?" I ask after swallowing a mouthful of spinach.
The woman bursts out with nefarious cackle. Miki shoots daggers from her eyes at both me and her mom.
"I've tried. My dear daughter has clumsy hands," she laughs lovingly as I bite back words to contradict her. "I don't know how she managed to get a job that involves so much dancing. She could barely move her body back when she lived with us."
Things change, I think, laughing in my head at the murderous look on Miki's face.
"Well, mom, I have to have inherited it from someone," she retorts.
Her mother, however, is too good at this game.
"I agree. You can thank your father for that."
I see Miki wind up for another blow, but I quickly interrupt before a full-fledged argument can start up, and I lead our conversation onto other things. After we're finished eating our meal, we sit with the television playing in the background, but we're too busy talking to pay much attention. Miki has calmed down and no longer looks like she wants to commit matricide. Likewise, Mrs. Fujimoto seems to have become satisfied by the amount of poking and prodding she's done at her daughter, and she lets that side of her rest.
I don't notice the time until half past ten.
"It's pretty late. I'd better get going," I say, standing up and giving Miki a pointed look.
So much for our sleepover plan, I try to communicate to her.
Her face darkens almost comically.
"Oh, don't go yet," Mrs. Fujimoto bursts in, interrupting our telepathic moment. "Why don't you stay the night? We can have a slumber party."
What...the hell?! I think.
Miki's face reflects my thoughts exactly.
"Aren't you a little old to be having slumber parties with girls in their twenties?" Miki asks bluntly.
Her mom looks at her crossly.
"And here I was thinking you'd thank me for sacrificing my alone time with you and offering to let your friend stay with us," she bites back.
Miki ignores her and then looks up at me.
"You're welcome to stay, Aya-chan," she says sweetly.
Stay. Don't you dare leave, is the underlying message.
I think about it.
Can she control herself if I stay? Her mother is here. That should gross her out enough. But it takes a lot to gross her out. She's so blasé about certain things that I wonder if she has any strand of human dignity left in her.
Well, of course she has dignity, but the question is: is it enough to get through a night with me and her mom in her relatively small apartment?
Maybe. It's quite possible.
Now I have to ask myself this: can I control myself enough to get through a night with Miki and her mom in her relatively small apartment?
"No, I don't want to ruin your time together. You two have fun," I say.
I refuse the invitation because I'm fairly certain the answer to my second question is "no".
"Come on, it'll be fun," Mrs. Fujimoto says cheerfully.
"Yeah, Aya-chan. Stay and have some fun," Miki pouts.
Gah! Two Fujimoto women urging me to do something. Peer pressure can't get any worse than this.
They keep egging me on until I give up and say, "Fine, I'll stay. Thank you."
I look at Miki while her mother goes to use the washroom.
"You know this is going to end badly," I sigh.
"No it's not," Miki says comfortingly, scooting over to sit beside me, leaning right against me and putting a hand on my knee. "We'll do some drinking and get my mom drunk so that she'll pass out. She's a heavy sleeper."
My jaw drops.
"What? You're a horrible daughter!"
Secretly, I start to calculate how long and how many beers it would take to get Mrs. Fujimoto drunk enough to fall asleep.
"I'm joking," she laughs. "But if she has a few beers, it'll help make her sleepy..."
"Do you have any beer?" I ask, not recalling seeing any in her fridge.
"No," she replies with a disgusted sniff. "But there's a machine around the corner. I'll go get some."
Before I can protest, she's at the front door putting on her shoes. She turns around and sees me looking distressed.
"Don't worry. It's just for my mom. I won't make you drink a drop," she smiles.
I feel a little at ease.
"What do I tell your mother?" I ask.
"Just tell her I'll be back in a second," Miki says with an unconcerned wave of her hand, and she leaves without locking the door.
I sigh just as Mrs. Fujimoto walks out of the washroom. She inquires about the missing Miki, and I say that she's stepped out for a minute.
"I have to apologise for my daughter," she says to me as we sit and watch television.
"Huh? Why?" I ask, surprised.
"She can be a bit difficult to deal with. I aggravate her on purpose because it's so easy and fun," she says, and at this point I think that this woman is still stuck in her silly, naughty teenager years, "but her other friends may not realise that despite how stubborn she is, she's not really angry with them."
I know this already.
"Don't worry. I've figured that out. It doesn't bother me one bit."
"Really? Because I know she's lost some friends because of her bull-headedness," Mrs. Fujimoto says, sounding surprised.
"Fujimoto-san, I assure you. Really. If someone can't recognise the good side of Miki-chan, which is about ninety-eight percent of her, then that person isn't worthy of knowing her."
I smile at the woman who raised the girl who is the most important thing, person, or idea in the world to me.
"You're wise beyond your years," she jokes. "And thank you. I don't know if Miki ever shows you how much she appreciates your friendship, but she does. She always talks about you."
Miki does show me how much she appreciates my friendship, but it touches me to hear her mother telling me so. The bond between those two is complicated, but tight and strong.
"Thank you for being a good friend to her," she continues.
I start to flush with embarrassment. I can usually handle compliments, but coming from Miki's mom, it's like the strength of the compliment is multiplied by a hundred.
"We feel good knowing she's got someone like you watching her back."
I can't bear it. I start to wave it off when the door pops open and in walks Miki carrying an armful of cans.
"You went to buy beer?!" Mrs. Fujimoto exclaims, jumping up and cutting short our heart-to-heart.
Miki nods with a grin.
"Come on, Mom. It wouldn't be a girl's night without some drinks."
I roll my eyes.
Mrs. Fujimoto goes and helps her daughter bring the cans to the living room table, and she hands us each one, taking one for herself. I shoot Miki an annoyed look.
I thought the plan was to stay sober, I think, trying to shoot my words into her mind.
She gives me a nonchalant shrug and cracks open the tab.
"To youth!" Mrs. Fujimoto toasts.
"To youth!" Miki echoes, winking at me.
"To youth," I repeat in a low voice, glaring at Miki and then quickly covering it up with a smile when Mrs. Fujimoto looks at me.
We all drink. Mrs. Fujimoto chugs, Miki takes a sip, and I pretend. I can't stand beer.
We pick up where we left off, watching television and chatting about life. We get the Takikawa update from Mrs. Fujimoto. She informs us about what all the town members are up to these days. And here I was thinking that the entertainment world was full of scandals. That little town sounds like it could keep the tabloid magazines busy for months. If only the world cared.
Before I know it, Mrs. Fujimoto has consumed three beers, while Miki's gulped down about one half. I haven't had any as I haven't touched my can since opening it. I get up with the pretence of throwing out my "empty" can, and I stop to take Miki's can out of her hand when her mother isn't looking. She gives me a thankful look. Beer isn't her favourite drink either, although she's much better than me at drinking things she finds repulsive. I dump our cans in the kitchen sink.
I get back to the table. Mrs. Fujimoto has started on her fourth can.
"I'm so tired," she says with a big yawn.
Miki looks at her watch.
"Me too," she says mechanically. "Bedtime?"
I can hear the hope in her voice. Her mom yawns again, drains her beer in a few gulps, and pushes the empty can away.
"Yeah," she says groggily.
My heart skips a beat.
We clear up the table a little and then go out to lay extra bedding. Two people can stay in the bedroom while one has to stay in the living room.
"You two girls take the bedroom. I'll rough it out here."
We don't object. Quickly, we get the beds done, and then we wash up and change into pyjamas. It's past midnight when we say goodnight to Mrs. Fujimoto, slipping into Miki's bedroom and closing the door.
Almost immediately, she tackles me onto her bed, and upon making a huge booming sound, we grab each other's arms and freeze, waiting to hear her mom call out and ask if anything's wrong. We hear no such thing, and we laugh silently, clutching onto each other to keep from bursting out into giggles.
"You could at least have waited five minutes and given her a chance to fall asleep," I whisper.
"I couldn't help it," she whispers back.
We giggle some more. I wiggle my way from underneath her, and we lie on the bed, our legs hanging over the side as her hand tickles my stomach lazily.
"This is so wrong," I state.
"Don't give me that," Miki teases me, rubbing my stomach. "I could tell all evening what you were thinking."
"But what if we fall asleep together and she comes in tomorrow morning to find us like that?" I ask anxiously.
"Don't worry. I'll kick you out of my bed once we're done," she says with a malevolent grin.
What an irritating girl! I punch her in the arm.
"Ow!" she hisses.
"Sh! Don't wake your mother!" I shush her.
Ug. Her mother is in the next room. Her mother. This is so wrong. So very, very wrong. Why am I even here?
I'm here because I have an appetite that's hard to satisfy. Simple truth.
"I'll get back at you for that," she says, gritting her teeth and looking at me angrily, but playfully.
She gets onto her hands and knees and holds me down again, but all I can think of is her mother.
"Ah! This is too weird. Let go," I burst out before she can do anything to me.
I push her off and go to lie down on the extra futon at the foot of her bed.
"Let's just try to go to sleep," I say, taking even breaths to relax me.
Astonishingly, she doesn't protest.
"All right. Sorry, Aya-chan. Good night," she says sweetly, and I listen to her as she settles under her covers.
I wait and wait and wait, but she doesn't come down to join me.
Can it be that my mischievous Miki can control herself? It makes me want to hug and kiss her. But no, I mustn't. I close my eyes, and I wait impatiently until sleep claims me.
I'm awoken by the sound of sheets rustling and movement. I crack open my eyelids and notice that it's getting light outside. It must be about five in the morning. Maybe later.
I twist my head sideways and see Miki just settling in beside me in my bed. I'm about to open my mouth and ask her what she thinks she's doing, but her eyes are closed, a pleasant smile on her face. She's holding onto her pillow, which she has brought down with her, and hugging it like a child would a teddy bear.
My mind becomes a puddle. A melted mess of grey matter and love.
I scoot over and take the pillow away from her gently. She doesn't want to let go at first, but it's not too hard to persuade her to do so. Once the pillow is out of her hands, I place it on the other side of me and then wiggle my way into her arms. They take note of my presence, and as if replacing the pillow, they open up and grab onto me.
I smile happily and coast just above the line of sleep until it's time to get up later in the morning.
Mother present or not, this is the way it should always be.
The end
Topic: 10 x 2 + ∞ Chapters of Pointless, Plotless Fluff (Read 29286 times)