I DO NOT OWN GAKUEN ALICE.
Natsume
A few minutes after I had – for the seventeenth time today – curtly refused her request, she comes running back up the hill to where I lie underneath the shade. "Natsume-nii-chaaaan!" the thin shrill voice swats away peace like an expert at ruining a perfectly planned rest day.
I sigh, taking the book spread out across my face and laying it to the side. Leaves cloud the sky like a curtain, letting sunlight through every time the winds rustle them against each another. A moment is all it takes before Aoi is successful in obstructing the serene view. Her fierce red eyes gaze down on me as she kneels on the grass, hands planted next to my ear. She's smiling and immediately my mood lightens. I'd go through hell and back if it means she gets to keep her smile.
"We're not going to town," I say. Ever since my return, my sister has taken it into her head that she now has a personal chauffer to drive her whenever she wanted to go out.
She pouts. "I got the message after the sixteenth rejection!"
"Didn't stop you from trying for a seventeenth," I point out.
"It's called perseverance," she says, leaning away from me and folding her legs in a fetal position. She starts picking out grass randomly. "Ruka-nii-san just called to say he's coming over for lunch." Her cheeks color up, and her grass-plucking speed increases noticeably. "Does he still enjoy watermelons? Papa and I have been growing watermelons a few years after I got back from the academy, and I was thinking we could lie out a sheet and split some. Or maybe he has a favorite dish he wants prepared? It's really been such a long time. Does he have business to talk to you about, nii-chan? Do you think he will stay long?"
When I don't respond she stops what she's doing and looks at me. She's skittish, I could tell. I sit up and place my hand on her forehead. It's warm to the touch but nothing feverish. I arch a brow.
"Is something wrong, Aoi?" I ask. Aoi. Aoi. Being able to say her name out loud relieves me every time. She is here, she is safe, and it will stay that way as long as I live.
She smiles and I know my worries are ill founded. "Nothing's wrong," she says cheerily. "It's just been a very long time since someone's come over. I guess I'm just nervous."
"That's stupid." When her brows crease in chastisement I feel the lightness that comes only when I'm around Mikan cloud my mind, and it's enough to make me laugh. The similarities between my sister and Strawberry Underwear are striking. "Don't even think of him as a guest. Ruka's family."
Aoi's cheeks flush even deeper and she bites her lower lip in thought. She's keeping something from me. I know my sister well enough to notice the habit. Another gush of wind blows and some leaves start raining down on us. She doesn't even feel them graze the back of her hands or cling to the strands of her long black hair – too lost in her own head.
I lean back against the tree trunk and stare at the spectacle before me. Aoi's hair rocks with the wind – straight, web-like strands, thin as thread, and dark as sin. Her skin is fair and radiant with the glow of a girl who enjoys playing in the outdoors. Her eyes are a deep crimson, the color in itself enough to catch anyone's attention. She chose to wear a loose denim jumper over a pinstriped red and white shirt today. I looked at my sister and thank Kami that she has an unfeminine fashion sense.
At least that's one less reason for the boys to look at her. Oh, Kami, they better not start staring. When she finally comes back from her reverie, her whole face lights up in an innocent little smile. My gut clenches.
