Author's Note: Ah, the Mukamis are almost better than the Sakamakis for comic mischief because of their wonderfully clunky family dynamics. I'm still getting familiar with their characters, and this is the first time I've written them, so I apologize if anyone seems wonky.
I love Yuma so much. :D
Stupid Hose
Every evening, when the sun had just dipped down beneath the horizon, Yuma lugged himself out of bed to pay his garden a visit. Even if there was nothing to pick or plant, the act of going out there had become a ritual of sorts. Tending his garden first thing in the evening gave him a sense of inner peace. It kept him sane most days. Of course, sometimes he would sleep in too late or one of his brothers would inevitably get themselves into a situation that required his assistance and his visit would have to wait until later in the day, and that pissed him off.
Of course, nothing pissed him off more than the fact that Kou had broken his watering can.
That is to say, Yuma was pissed off that Kou had upset Azusa, who had come out looking to be hit, and that he'd accidentally stepped on his watering can in his attempt to chase Azusa off. Had Kou actually been the one to step on it, the watering can might've been salvageable. As it was, the cracked, disfigured lump of yellow plastic was nigh unusable now.
Which was why Yuma was currently attempting to drag the hose out of the shed.
Yuma did not like the hose.
The mere thought of it gave him anxiety. It was pale and gray, like a dead snake, and leaked in several places. Not to mention that the water spicket was on the front of the house and his garden was all the way in the back. Being a vampire, Yuma wasn't bothered by having to carry the watering can back and forth, but the hose messed with his brain.
Hauling the massive wad of tangled plastic out of the shed, Yuma dumped it on the ground and stared down at it.
He imagined it staring back with its dead snake-eyes.
"Oy, are you listening to me? You'd better not give me trouble today, or something awful might happen to you. I'm in a shitty mood."
It didn't say anything back, so Yuma assumed that it was too petrified to speak.
Shifting through the hose, he fished around for the end he needed to screw into the spicket. It was, predictably, buried underneath the brunt of the hose. He yanked on it, kicking at the rest of the hose in an attempt to dislodge it, but only succeeded in making the rope wrap tighter around itself.
"No trouble, remember?" He jabbed a finger at it. Sighing, he rubbed his forehead. "Fine. I'll just take all of you with me. But don't expect any special treatment."
Spinning on his heel, Yuma marched off around the side of the house, dragging the hose behind him. It was heavy and cumbersome, but he wasn't about to complain. He was the strongest. It only felt like more work because he was irritated.
"Honestly, you're so damn conceited to think I'll carry you everywhere. Why waste the effort when you don't even work right?"
Half the hose had unraveled by the time Yuma reached the spicket. It took several tries to get the ridges lined up to screw the hose on, but after a couple minutes of threats and cursing, the hose was more or less attached. He marched over to the knot of hose and stared down at it.
It was like looking at a wad of gum.
"I ought to use you to strangle Kou," he muttered, yanking the hose this way and that. "Then at least you would be useful."
Brute force, however, only succeeded in tightening the knot. Finally, Yuma dropped to his knees and painstakingly unwound the hose.
"You're such a girl, making me do it gently like this. If I pieced you with my fangs, you'd probably scream like one, too. Pathetic."
Yuma snatched up the end of the hose and began dragging it around the side of the house. It got caught on the corners and in the bushes several times, and each time he was forced to manually go back and unhook it, before continuing on. By the time he reached the garden, he was seething.
Throwing the end of the hose down, he gave the nozzle a harsh kick. "Bloody irritating piece of shit."
And so, he tromped all the way back around the side of the house to turn the water on.
"...Kou? What are you... doing?"
Kou flattened his tongue into the dip of his spoon, sucking the last bit of ice cream off of it. "'mm 'atching 'uma."
Azusa sat down on the porch step beside him. He tried to reach for Kou's tub of ice cream, but was swatted away. "Why?"
"Looksh 'ike 'e's 'aving throuble 'ith th' hoshe." Kou removed the spoon from his mouth and handed it to Azusa. "It's funny."
"...Is he... angry?" Azusa asked, scooting closer so he could take a scoop of ice cream. Kou grew impatient with the time he was taking getting the spoon to his mouth, and leaned over to steal it. "Hey! That was mine..."
"Snooze, you lose." Kou licked Azusa's cheek, leaving a sticky trail of ice cream behind.
"Kou!" Azusa wiped at his cheek with his bandaged wrist. "I don't... like that..."
"Would you rather I gouge you with the spoon?"
"...Yes..."
Kou snorted. "Of course you would. Now, give it back."
Azusa placed the spoon in his outstretched hand with a sort of reverence. "Are you going to...?"
"I'm going to finish my ice cream."
"But... you said..."
"There are plenty of things that hurt more than a spoon." Kou noisily slurped the ice cream off his spoon. "Like Yuma. So you should probably stick around in case he gets really angry."
Yuma stomped back into his garden, snatching up the hose again. The moon was already starting to rise. Usually, he was almost finished watering by now.
"You're making this take too damn long," he snapped. He twisted the lever on the nozzle to allow the water out.
The hose sputtered air for a few brief moments, then a pathetic amount of water began dribbling out.
"OY. What the hell is wrong with you? Huh?" Yuma whacked the nozzle against the fence a few times, but only succeeded at flinging droplets of water into his face. He sputtered indignantly, wiping his face with his sleeve. "I'll make you pay for that."
Azusa half-stood up when Yuma started bludgeoning the hose against the fencepost.
"Hey, hey!" Kou grabbed the hem of his shirt to stop him. "Give it a few more minutes. He's still focused on getting his garden watered. Wait until he gives up—then he'll do something to you."
"Oh." Azusa plunked back down on the step, casting Kou something akin to an adoring look. "Thank you..."
Kou grinned, slinging an arm around his shoulders. "Never say I don't watch out for my little brothers."
Yuma found himself tromping back towards the front of the house again, this time keeping his eyes glued to the hose. It had probably swallowed something, the stupid thing, like a rock or a mouse or—
There was a kink.
"That's it? You've choked yourself?" Yuma crouched down to straighten out the kink. "Hah! Only Azusa would be masochistic enough to do something like that. Maybe you'd enjoy being bitten. But then you'd leak even worse, and get out of work."
He leaned close to the hose, nearly hissing at it.
"Don't think I won't destroy you when I'm finished."
Giving it a rough shove, Yuma clambered back to his feet and headed back towards the garden. He paused when he spotted Kou and Azusa sitting on the back steps.
"Oy," he yelled. "What do you two think you're doing?"
Kou held up a tub of ice cream. "Having breakfast."
"Kou... you haven't let me have any yet..."
"Shut up. You'll get some when I'm done."
"...You're eating all of it, though..."
"Ice cream for breakfast? You think you're entitled to everything, huh, Kou?" Yuma kicked the grass in frustration. "If you're going to do that, let Azusa have some, too."
Pouting, Kou reluctantly rescinded the ice cream to Azusa, who scooted several feet away. He kept a wary eye on Kou as he hastily shoveled a spoonful into his mouth.
Deeming the situation suitably rectified, Yuma returned to his garden.
"My... My cabbages!"
His little patch of cabbages was drowning. Undoing the kink in the hose had indeed fixed the problem, but now the water was gushing out unrestrained and a puddle had formed in his cabbages. Yuma dove for the hose, shutting off the valve. He stared at the pool of water in horror.
"Look what you did!" he shouted at the house, even though it was technically his fault for not closing the valve first. "You've drowned them! If anything bad happens to them because of this, I'm going to rip you to shreds!"
The hose hung limply in his grasp.
He huffed out a tense breath, raking a hand through his hair. "I have to get these vegetables watered, but if you screw up one more time, I'm going to kill you. Oy, you hear me? Huh?"
The hose cooperated after that. Yuma kept the valve open halfway, allowing the gentle stream of water to soak each of his plants. He had to admit, once the hose was actually working, it was easier than the watering can. He didn't have to stop watering every few minutes, or debate skimping on water for one particular plant because he didn't want to make extra trips to the front of the house. He could just move from one plant to the next and give all of them the water they—
Yuma took a step to the left, but his foot caught in a loop in the hose, catching him off balance. Down he went...
...straight into the muddy puddle in the cabbages.
His temper, which had been steadily working its way back down to a simmer, exploded.
"What did I tell you? Weren't you listening? Are you deaf?" He scrabbled to his feet, beating the hose repeatedly against the ground, not caring that water was spraying everywhere. "I'm going to rip you in half, you defective piece of shit! You belligerent snake! You stupid, stupid hose!"
"...Yuma...?" Azusa's voice piped up over the roaring in his head. "Are you... angry enough yet?"
Yuma dug his nails into the soft dirt, clenching his teeth hard enough to make his jaw hurt. "Am I angry? Am I angry?" He lunged for Azusa, pinning the frail vampire underneath him. Taking the length of the hose, he wrapped it around Azusa's neck and pulled. Azusa's eyes flew wide and he scrabbled at the hose. "I wonder which will break first?" Yuma growled, tightening his grip more. "The hose, or your neck?"
Kou sprawled across the step, stretching to reach the tub of ice cream. When his fingertips finally curled around the edge, he dragged it towards him only to find it was empty. "Damn it, Azusa," he muttered, sitting up.
He was in the middle of a stretch when he heard the back door open and shut behind him. "Kou." Ruki's greeting was cold and impassive, as usual. "What are you doing?"
Tilting his head back so he could see Ruki's face, he gestured towards Yuma's garden with his foot. "Yuma and Azusa are at it again."
Ruki sighed, muttering, "Idiots," under his breath. He glared down at Kou. "Can't you keep a better eye on them?"
Kou shrugged impishly. "Yuma was having trouble with the hose. Azusa was just trying to help. Besides..." He cast a morose gaze at the empty ice cream tub. "Azusa ate the rest of my ice cream."
"Pigs. I just bought that yesterday." Ruki kicked the empty tub on his way down the steps. "What will all the adoring fans think when Kou Mukami gets fat?"
"Tch. I'm not going to get fat."
"Really," Ruki mused, glancing over his shoulder. "I could swear you're looking a little more... substantial than usual."
"I am not; you're lying. You... are, aren't you? Oi, Ruki! Get back here!"
A/N: I work at a barn and because I can't carry 13+ water buckets from the water spicket to the stalls, I fill them with the hose. I have had more trouble with that hose than literally anything else in the barn. So, Yuma, I apologize for doing this to you, but it's only so I can have someone to share my pain with.
Thanks for reading~!
RegenesisX