A girl with purple hair opened her the front door to her house, weary. She shouted in a fairly pleasant if slightly nasal voice, "I'm home!"
She went to her room immediately, practically diving on the bed. Anyone could tell that this day had been significantly more demanding than most from the way she practically fell asleep. Her pigtails were a mess about her head as she took a moment to take the moment in. 'Home at last.' She thought as sighed pleasurably and rolled over to stare at the ceiling.
She took just a few minutes, eyes closed, to relax, if from nothing else, from the train ride. Such a train ride, though routine by now for her, still was the icing on the tired cake, especially since she had to stand most of the way, preventing her from sleeping.
The Hiiragi residence was a pretty quiet place that Friday afternoon. It was one of those few days where Kagami was the only one without plans. Miyuki had scheduled a quite unusual meet-up with friends from her old school.
'Actually,' Kagami thought, sitting up on her bed, 'that doesn't sound too weird. I can imagine it now, it'd probably be like three Miyuki-chans together.' She silently chuckled at the thought of three pink haired moes hanging out together.
Konata was, of course, recovering from an all-nighter of epic proportions from the day prior. 'Typical Konata,' Kagami mused, 'probably asleep or reading manga.' She sighed still. 'I hope she did decent on that test...' She stood up from her bed. 'I should call her.'
The pigtailed girl flipped out her cell phone, for convienience's sake, and chose #7 on her speed dial- Konata Izumi. Someone picked up after four rings.
"Izumi residence." A rather aged man answered the phone. "Who is this?"
"Hey Mr. Izumi," spoke the tsundere, "is Konata there?"
"Oh, hey Kagami. Konata's passed out; she must've pulled an all-nighter last night or something. Poor thing- I think I'll make her favorite curry for dinner. Then again, I'm a bit tired myself..." Sojiro eventually punctuated this with a loud yawn.
"Okay, thanks Mr. Izumi." Kagami sighed and ended the call. 'Like father like daughter...' she closed the phone and slipped it back into her pocket.
A few minutes passed. Kagami laid on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. She soon got up and checked through her light novels. 'Ugh, I've read all of it!' she pouted, turning to her games. 'And I've beaten all of these, too.'
She went up the stairs, beginning to lose hope that there was something to do on this boring weekend afternoon. "Tsukasa, y'there?" A similar phone call to one made not more than twenty minutes ago enlightened that she had gone out with their older sisters to go... manga shopping?
'That was uncharacteristic of them,' the elder of the Hiiragi twins thought, 'and since when do Inori or Matsuri particularly like manga? Such horrible liars, they're probably corrupting Tsukasa with yet another scheme...' Kagami blushed upon realizing the vacuous possibilities that the lie may have covered, some of them being... far less appropriate for one of Tsukasa's calibur than others.
"Dammit! Why is there nothing to do!" Kagami complained to the vacuous nothingness that was her room, in a matter more expected from a child. She laid on her bed again. 'Maybe there's something on TV I could watch?'
It was television that turned out to be her sanity's savior that afternoon. For once, there was some decent afternoon programming- and in an oddly consistent order, too. A detective show that was reaching a genuinely interesting climax was followed by some American animation; most definitely a rare sight on Japanese televsion. Kagami noted that it was slightly more fluid and probably used far different animation techniques than the local variety- not to mention that it was loaded with American cultural references that absolutely did not pass through to the Japanese language dubbing, as well as American puns that were not properly replaced, explained or removed. Under any other condition, it perhaps would've been "meh", but it was easily the most unusual- and thus interesting- sight on the airwaves.
Perhaps that would've been the end of the search for interesting things. Unfortunately, as the cruel television schedule would have it, the channels' programming began to shift from the afternoon-styled, less popular shows to news, game shows, and so on. When the exotic animation ended, boring news replaced it.
'Argh, time to flip again.' A minute or so of flipping revealed all channels to have reached the same fate. Frustrated, Kagami went back to her bedroom. 'Ugh, nothing to do again!'
The girl looked over at the clock in her room. '5:43. It's getting late, wonder where everyone is. Shouldn't be taking so long just to... ugh, I don't even want to think about it."
A large comical grumble resounded throughout the room, echoing off every previous silent surface. The source of the grumble sighed angrily.
Outside of a somewhat popular fancy Western afternoon cafe, a pink haired girl waited. Her hair fell low past her shoulders, although her clean street clothes belied the fact that the street was rather dirty, and the air rather unpleasant. In fact, she seemed to give off a radiant aura, to the point where it seemed that even those that passed her smiled just a little bit.
'Oh, where are they...' Miyuki began to worry as the time they were supposed to come by had come and passed. The meganekko walked inside the cafe, and spoke to the hostess, "Hello, how do you do?"
The hostess looked up. "Hm? Oh, yes, I am fine, thank you! How are you?"
Miyuki adjusted her glasses, "A bit late I'm afraid." The moe girl sweatdropped. "Can we please move my reservation... a few minutes ahead?"
The hostess looked at Miyuki, and sighed. "The place is pretty empty now, so why not. Your reservation was..."
"It should be under Takara, miss,"
"Oh yes. Friends running a little bit late?" The hostess smiled.
"Um, yes, it appears so..." Miyuki meekly responded. She grabbed a novel out of one of her coat pockets and walked back outside.
'Back to waiting I suppose. I wonder if they would even notice me, it feels like eternity since we've seen eachother in such a group.' She kept a vigilant guard up for a minute or two, then grew subconsciously frustrated. 'Oh, I suppose they may take a short while.' She made sure her cell phone was turned on, then opened the novel. 'Might as well read while I wait for them,' she decided. 'Oh my, I wonder what's taking them?'
A small blue haired girl staggers inside a door. Her hair is significantly messier than usual; she looks worn out to the point of utter exhaustion.
"Kone-chan, are you all right?" Sojiro asked Konata as she staggered in and threw her bag to a wall. Konata mumbled back a response, and Sojiro nodded. 'It really isn't like her to be so tired, I mean, even her all-nighters are usually recovered from by this time.'
"Couldn't get a nap on the train, sleepy head?" Kojiro questioned his daughter. Konata responded with a slow, tired nod as she tired to remain balanced on her own feet.
Kojiro sighed. "This isn't that healthy you know." Konata groaned as Kojiro laughed at his little joke. "Come on, I'll let you rest." Konata tried to stutter out an anime reference, but it buckled and fell shortly before her legs did the same. The dating sim otaku bent down over the other dating sim otaku to hear a faint snore. Kojiro picked up the small blue haired one in his arms, and walked over to the Konata's room. Noticing himself shiver, he laid Konata down on the ground for a second as he lifted the kotatsu from the living room at least a foot off the ground- a definite strain considering it was not packed up in any sense of the word- and brought it over to the sleeping short girl. He diligently set it up for her room, and then laid his daughter down under it. The traditionally clothed man propped Konata's head up to set a pillow under it, then turned on the kotatsu.
'Sweet dreams, Konata.' Kojiro took a long look at his sleeping daughter. 'She works so hard at her schoolwork.' he ironically thought as he walked out of the room, assured of Konata's comfort. 'I think I'll make her favorite curry tonight.'
He looked over to his laptop, now sitting on the floor. 'Well, maybe after I write a chapter or two of this story.' He sighed, and began to walk over to the laptop.
Just as he walked into the now-slightly-more-barren living room, the phone started to ring. Kojiro almost jumped towards the phone, and answered it as quickly as he could- after four rings.
"Izumi residence," he spoke to the caller.