Rin here! Sorry that this might be a little rushed and like 'what the hell' but I was determined to finish this and get it uploaded before Christmas and I have done so with thirteen minutes to spare. YES, I DID IT :DDDDDDDDDDDDDDD! So anyway hopefully on the twenty sixth I'll be able to update both 'The Demon Child' and 'Music Junkies'.
"Amu-chan, aren't you going to bed yet? It's already eleven thirty!" Ran whined for about the billionth time.
The pink haired girl shook her head with a determined look on her face. "No way! Not until I finish this Christmas card; it just has to be perfect!" Amu let her head fall against the desk, erase shavings flying up into the air from the impact. "Ugh, this will never come out right. I should just give up now." There were slight pencil smudges all over the light pink card. Turning her head she saw that her balcony was covered in snow and the white, fluffy stuff was once again starting to fall from the darkened sky. I bet anyone else could write this letter…
"Amu-chan, you just have to let your creative side flow out," Miki insisted with a firm nod of her head. She floated over to stand on the desk and peered down at the blank paper. "Just think of how you feel when you're around him and all the things you wished you could've said to him when you had the chance."
Sitting up Amu let out a puff of air. "That would be way too embarrassing." Letting her head flop back she bit her lip in deep concentration. "I just need some kind of inspiration." She pushed herself away from the desk, threw on a sweatshirt and headed out onto the freezing porch her feet dragging through the snow.
Her charas zoomed out behind her with Su exclaiming, "You'll catch a cold if you walk out in your pj's and with no shoes!"
"Like it really matters," Amu muttered leaning against the railing. "Why can't an idea just come to me! Christmas is tomorrow and it's already going to be late getting to him since I have to ship it and this is just making it later!" She started pulling on her hair almost like she was trying to pull an idea out of the depths of her brain. The snow was landing on her bubble gum pink hair making little white flecks appear before they melted.
The world was silent as everyone was in a deep sleep waiting for Santa to come and bring them presents or nervously hoping that they weren't too bad this year and would actually get presents. Even the Hinamori household was completely silent for once, Ami going to bed as early as possible to ensure that Santa would come. "Everyone else has their presents figured out," Amu muttered.
"You wrapped his present; you're only problem is trying to write a card to go with it," Miki argued.
"Why don't you just send the present and give him the card at a later date? You could write an I.O.U!" Ran spun around excitedly at her brilliant plan.
Amu sweat dropped staring at the pink cheerleader. "You can't write an I.O.U for something like that. Besides it would just make more sense and be easier if I sent both of them at the same time." Her toes were starting to freeze and stiffen up, so she curled them and started pacing around the balcony to warm them up. "Maybe I should try texting Utau. After all she already made her card for her boyfriend Kukai, so maybe she could help me."
Buzzing right in Amu's face, Miki exclaimed, "No way! You've gotta think of something on your own without help from anybody else! This is a very personal letter you're writing and should be treated as such, which means no help from anybody, got it!"
"F-fine; I won't get help from anybody," Amu agreed grudgingly. I guess that means she won't do a character change with me. "Either way I'm still in a slump and I'll never get any ideas about how to write this stupid card!"
"Eh, sounds like Amu-chan is having trouble," an all too familiar voice whispered next to her ear.
"Gah! Ikuto, you moron; you scared the crap outta me!" Amu shouted with a blush quite prominent on her face. She stepped to the side trying to make the distance between them greater as sneakily as possible since he would just move closer if it was too obvious. "What are you doing here anyway? I thought you weren't coming back to Japan until I was an adult."
Ikuto smirked at the middle schooler's shyness. "What, I can't make a surprise visit?"
"Not at almost midnight on Christmas Eve, you can't."
Without any hesitation, Ikuto picked Amu up bridal style and strolled into the house taking care to shut the door behind himself. "I can't believe you went out there dressed like that to let yourself freeze to death. Honestly if you're doing stuff like this all the time that's really going to make me worry."
Blushing as red as a tomato, Amu shouted, "Put me down you stupid cat! And what concern is it of yours what I do!"
"You better keep your voice down unless you really want your parents coming in and finding us both in here…" Ikuto knew he had won this argument and had no worries about getting thrown out by any parental figures.
"P-put me down! Or else I w-will make sure my parents hear you…" Amu's voice got quieter with each word since she knew she wouldn't let her parents find her like this. "Please?"
Ikuto stared in shock. "You actually said please? You must really be desperate for me to put you down, huh?" Hesitantly he set her down on her feet where she instantly started curling and uncurling her toes to try and get circulation through them again. A sly smile lit up his face as he started, "The question is why are you so desperate for me to put you down? Is it because you don't want to get too close to me and accidently reveal your true feelings?"
"W-what are you talking about! There's nothing to reveal except that you're really starting to annoy me," Amu argued looking anywhere but at the boy in front of her. "You need to leave now. I'm trying to write a card to someone and I can't do that with you in here."
His expression instantly darkening the cat boy asked, "Let me guess: it's for the kiddy king, isn't it?"
Taking a seat in her desk chair Amu answered, "As a matter of fact it's not. I'm writing it for someone else, but I just can't get the words right. I don't want to sound stupid, but at the same time I've been beating around the bush with this person for far too long and I just want to tell them how I feel, but that's turning out to be…practically impossible."
Ikuto's interest was suddenly peaked at this and he sidestepped so that he was standing directly behind her chair. "So if it's not for him who is this precious card for?"
"N-none of your business now go away before I literally kick you out of here." Amu jabbed her finger in the direction of the sliding glass door praying that he would leave before he saw anything that would give away who the present and card were for. "You're not being of any help and this present is already going to be late getting to them and you're just making it later each second you waste my time."
"And why is it already late?" He gently brushed his fingertips across her cheek and tucked her bright hair behind her ear.
"B-b-b-bec-c-c-cause…" OH MY GOD HE TOUCHED ME!
"Hm, why so much stuttering all of a sudden?"
Standing up and spinning around to face him, Amu made sure her expression was set to one of rage. "I've already asked you to get out of here, so don't make me ask again: get out of here!"
Ikuto pouted leaning against the back of the now vacant chair. "Amu-chan is so mean."
"I wouldn't have to be mean if you would just listen to me every once in a while." Amu placed her hands on her hips determined to stand her ground and not think about how cute he looked while pouting. "Besides why do you want to know so bad who this is for?"
"So I know who my competition is. It sounds like you've finally gotten over Tadase, so I need to know who's my current competition."
Just like that the words were out in the open. Amu didn't know what to say so she just slowly took a seat again and scooted the chair in enough that Ikuto almost fell over from lack of support from it. "Why would you go and say something like that?"
"Well I've already told you how I feel, so it should be obvious." Ikuto crouched down beside the chair and resting his head on the desk asked, "The sad thing is though you've never told me how you feel about me."
Amu froze her hand in mid air with the pencil ready to try and write the card again. She didn't know what to say since he had never brought up the fact before and she had just been able to avoid it easily enough.
Before she even got the chance to explain herself, Ikuto saw the name on the present sitting on the desk. "It's for me? You got me a present?"
"Yeah…and the card goes with it too." Amu looked away shyly finally able to lower the pencil down to the desk where she picked up a nervous beat drumming her fingers. "I guess I'm just tired of this…whatever you call it that we have. It's only going in circles and well it's getting a little old." She swallowed her face turning even redder than it had been before. Sure Ikuto had told her how he felt, but for all she knew he could've been toying with her. It would be just like him to do something like that even though she knew she had feelings for him. Then again even if he had been sincere it might've taken her so long to answer him that his feelings faded and she had missed her chance.
"So what exactly are you saying?" Ikuto asked in a quiet voice for once not any hint of sarcasm or confidence. His voice had actually shaken a little as he asked the question.
Taking a deep breath to try and gain some form of confidence Amu barely whispered, "I want whatever this is to stop. I…I…" Not being able to stand it she forced herself to look him in the eyes as he always did with her and continued, "I don't us to have this awkward friendship anymore. I-I love you too much to be able to just continue like this!" She squeezed her eyes shut not wanting to know what he was thinking.
Her breath caught in her throat when she felt something warm press itself against her lips. Opening her eyes a crack she saw that Ikuto was kissing her and that's where the warmth was coming from. After only a moment's hesitation she responded, deepening the kiss and wrapping her arms around his neck. He in turn slipped his arms around her and lifted her right out of the chair enjoying every second of it. When they finally broke apart for air, Ikuto smiled warmly at her. "I love you too; that's why I came back so early because I couldn't stand the thought of being away from you for so long." He pressed his lips against hers once again this time letting the kiss be a little more rough and raw. She instantly responded this time to his great delight.
Amu's breath stopped short when she felt Ikuto's tongue lightly flick against her lips asking for entrance. Slowly she let him in and once his tongue found it's way into her mouth her stomach started doing funny things at the new sensation. Their tongues wrestled around as Ikuto carried her over to the bed and laid her down staying on top of her. After a bit longer he pulled away at first leaving Amu wondering what she did wrong until he started kissing her neck. She did her best to try and not moan too loud, but it was getting hard to so as Ikuto had found the sweet spot on her neck and he knew it. He let his tongue glide over her skin and she couldn't help but moan his name, to which he smiled against her smooth neck.
"Ikuto, if you don't stop my parents are going to hear us and if they see us like they'll definitely kill us both," Amu whispered her breaths coming in shallowly.
He gently nibbled her ear lobe before whispering right against it, "I'll definitely risk it if this doesn't stop." Going back to kissing her on the mouth he felt her neck where he had been kissing her to see if he had left any evidence of doing so, which thankfully he hadn't.
Feeling bold, Amu slipped her hands up under his shirt and felt his trim, but tone chest and stomach causing him to moan her name against his mouth. She let out a small gasp when she felt his hand against her bare stomach.
Instead of continuing upward, he started to trace a thin line along her collarbone leaving moaning louder than she had at all that night. "Really, I should be slapping you for being so crass," Amu broke the kiss and muttered.
"But you're not going to, huh?" Ikuto quirked his mouth up in a smile before he started kissing her again letting her tongue enter his mouth this time. Just then the grandfather clock downstairs proclaimed that it was midnight, officially December 25th. He broke the kiss so that he could hug her closely and bury his face in her pink locks. "I love you. And Merry Christmas."
Amu wrapped her arms around him in return and muttered sleepily against his chest, "I love you too and Merry Christmas." Right as she was about to fall asleep it occurred to her that she hadn't heard from her Shugo Charas at all since Ikuto had shown up. Those traitors. They totally went to sleep and left me alone to deal with this. I'll get them for this. She barely managed to keep a hold of these thoughts as she slipped into sleep.
Well how'd you like it? I'm not really good at writing in third person, but when I started writing it it just kinda ended up that way and I didn't want to change it. Merry Christmas and please rate and review! it can be your nice little Christmas present to me as this is for you =^-^=