Life in Death City had never been better. The students had been thriving and growing stronger, protecting the world from the evil of the Kishin. And from their success, a new stronger sense of morale brought peace and happiness amongst the people in Death City. The students were much happier, and as a result so were the adults. Small businesses thrived once again with people now feeling safer going out at night. A new night-life emerged, spreading happiness during the night and continuing into the day.
"It's amazing how noisy it's been at night lately." Maka notes as she looks out the kitchen window, looking at all the lights on and people and cars in the streets. "It's going to be hard to get sleep if things keep up like this."
"Like you ever sleep anyway." Soul notes.
Maka turns to see her partner at the kitchen table with a spoon shoved into a tub of vanilla chocolate chip ice cream and he pulled it out and ate a whole spoonful.
"You already stay up until three in the morning reading. The only difference now is that you have some extra reading light." He says and points his spoon to the window before digging into the tub again.
Maka giggled at her partner and smiled at him.
"Well it's not like you ever sleep much either." Maka reminds him and moves towards the table. "Eating all of that sugar before bed and playing video games. You're up until three in the morning too."
"Hey, pointing out my flaws to feel better about your own's not cool." Soul reminds her and licks his spoon clean before putting another spoon in the tub and pushing it towards Maka in offering.
She smiled at him and sat down on the chair across from him. She took the spoon and started eating the ice cream too.
"How about sharing them with your partner?" Maka asks him.
"Now that is cool." Soul replies and eats another spoonful.
Maka giggles and eats one too.
"You know what I think is really cool?" Maka asks and Soul looks up at her, silently asking her to continue. "How all the hard work we've done together is the reason why all of this is happening." She says and looks outside. "Because of us and the other students people are safe and happy and their lives are so much better."
"And that's all thanks to you." Soul says.
"It's not just because of me." Maka says. "There's the other students at the academy. They've all worked really hard."
"Yeah but you're the best meister." Soul says.
"I can only be a good meister because I have an amazing weapon." Maka tells him honestly. "An amazingly cool weapon." Soul laughed and looked away from her, smiling. "So cool." She says and pokes his cheek with her spoon full of ice cream.
"You know that's not very cool." He tells her.
"Really?" Maka asks. "But ice cream is cold. I thought it would be very cool." Soul laughed and turned to her again.
She poked his mouth with the spoon and he smiled at her.
"Come on now." She coos. "Be a good boy and open up."
He smirks at her and opens his mouth for her to put the spoon inside. He closed his mouth around it and ate off the ice cream. Maka pulls it back out of his mouth. He smirks at her and swallows.
"I was wrong." He says and she tilts her head in confusion. "It is pretty cool." She laughs.
He picks up his spoon and spoons up some ice cream and then pokes her mouth with the spoon. She smiles at him and giggles. She had a look in her eyes. Soul's cool facade faltered a bit. He had never seen that look before. It was making his heart rate increase. He felt himself blushing as she opened up her mouth and closed it around the spoon. She pulled her mouth back and the ice cream was gone. She swallowed and smiled at him.
"Yeah it is." Maka says and smiles at him.
"Wow." Soul breathes.
"What is it?" Maka asks.
"You..." Soul says and smiles at her. "Just now when you looked at me...it was different."
"I looked at you differently?" Maka asks him.
"Yeah." Soul says and smiles a bit. "Something in your eyes, they look brighter. Why?"
"I don't know." Maka says. "Maybe it has something to do with me getting older." She says and gets up and puts her spoon in the sink.
"Ah. How could I forget." Soul says. "Your birthday's in a few days. You're going to be fifteen."
"Same age as you." Maka tells him.
"Only for a few months." Soul chuckles. "Don't get too used to it." He gets up and puts away his spoon too.
He looked down at Maka. He couldn't help but stare. There was definitely something different about her. He couldn't put his finger on it but she looked different. He liked it. He liked looking at her. It made his chest warm. When she smiled at him, it was like a spark went off in his heart.
"What are you looking at me for silly?" She asks him.
"Nothing." Soul tells her and messes up her hair with his hand. She giggles and moves his hand away. "Just messing with you."
"Okay well go to bed. We've got school tomorrow." She reminds him then gently hugs him.
He hugged her back and rubbed his hand on her back softly. He let out a breath he didn't know he was holding and rested his cheek on her head. He held her softly, just like he always had. But now he felt like he was holding her a slightly different way. He didn't want to let go. But she started to pull away. She smiled at him.
"Goodnight Soul." She says and then goes to her room.
"Goodnight Maka." He says and smiles at her as she closes her bedroom door.
"What was that all about?" He asks himself and puts away the ice cream. "There's definitely something different about her." He declares and turns around to go to bed.
"Hey there cutie." Blair says, wearing nothing but a towel.
"Ugh. Seriously Blair! This is getting really old!" Soul exclaims. She tilts her head in confusion.
"What are you talking about? I thought you loved seeing me naked. You always get those cute little nosebleeds when you do." Blair reminds him and drops her towel.
Soul blushed and looked her over. But then he looked back up at her face and shook his head.
"Just put something on Blair." He says and picks up the towel and gives it back to her before going into his room.
"Hm..." Blair says. "Something is definitely different around here...I'd better find out what's going on!"
The next day during school Soul walked to the balcony with Black Star to have lunch together. As they walked a bunch of girls stared at Soul and blushed, giggling amongst themselves. He chuckled a bit and smiled at them, causing them to squeal and run off to gossip to more of their friends. Soul just shook his head.
"So uncool." He comments.
"Yeah I'll say." Black Star says with a frown. "Your new popularity since you became a Death Scythe has gotten more people paying attention to you than me!" He crosses his arms and pouts. "Quit stealing my spotlight!" He roars and Soul flinches.
"Calm down Black Star. It's not like I'm doing this intentionally." Soul explains. "Honestly sometimes I wish things could go back to the way they were before, when all of us could just hang out and not have to hide from fans and stuff."
"Yeah I can see how that would be annoying to you guys." Black Star says. "But since I've been a celebrity for my entire life I'm used to this stuff!" He brags.
"Yeah. I knew this fame wouldn't go to your head." Soul says sarcastically. "But it's been hard for me and Maka lately. There's been all these girls sending me love letters and requests to be their partner and honestly I don't like any of it. And even though she doesn't say it I can see it makes Maka upset too and that makes me hate it even more. It's one thing to annoy me with love letters and partner requests. I'm a cool guy I can ignore that stuff. But if it makes Maka upset then that is completely unacceptable in my book."
"Wow. You should try to do something about it then." Black Star tells him.
"Yeah I am." Soul says. "Why do you think I'm throwing Maka a huge surprise birthday party?" Soul whispers into Black Star's ear.
"Ohh so that's why you wanted to have lunch just the two of us!" Black Star realizes.
"Well the two of us and Kid." Soul says and points to him walking over.
"Why is he a part of party planning?" Black Star asks.
"Well first of all because I am friends with all of you and I want to help give Maka the best fifteenth birthday party ever." Kid explains. "And secondly I'm providing the funds for the venue and thirdly I just couldn't pass up the opportunity to decorate a perfectly symmetrical room!" He dreamily exclaims. "Oh I've designed everything perfectly! There's going to be eight flower pots on each side of the room-"
"Why not fifteen?" Black Star asks. "She's turning fifteen so why not have fifteen flower pots on each-"
"It's an odd number!" Kid shouts at him. "Why can't she be turning an even number or a more symmetrical number like-"
"We get it." Soul interrupts. "What time will everything be set up?"
"Everything should be set to start at 8:00 on the night of Maka's birthday." Kid says.
"I'm going to get the cake." Black Star says. "I've designed it myself. What do you think?" He asks Soul and shows him a picture he drew of the cake.
"Uh Black Star, this is just a sculpture of you made out of cake." Soul tells him.
"Yeah! It's the perfect cake for the star of the party." Black Star says. Soul sighs.
"Listen, Black Star do you think you could maybe..." Soul tries to choose his words carefully. "Back off a bit and let Maka have the spotlight for this party..."
"Why?" Black Star asks. "She's nowhere near as big of a star as me."
"Yeah but it's her birthday." Soul reminds him. "And she's been really busy lately and we've both been under a lot of stress and I just want this party to be special for her, show her how important she is to everyone and make her happy you know."
Black Star and Kid looked at each other and smirked.
"What?" Soul asked.
"It's nothing don't worry about it." Kid assures him.
"What do you mean? What's going on?" Soul asks.
"It's nothing, honestly." Black Star says then starts to laugh a bit.
"You're a terrible liar." Kid says and sighs.
"Okay guys what's going on?" Soul asks. "Keeping secrets isn't cool you know."
"Soul...You've been acting differently lately. Especially around Maka lately." Kid says.
"Different how?" Soul asks.
"You know..." Kid says. "You've been staring at her a lot and the two of you have been getting seemingly closer..."
"Yeah we've known each other for awhile now." Soul says simply. "We're just really close now that's all."
They all hear some girls laughing and look down to see who was there. They see Maka, Tsubaki, Liz and Patty all eating lunch below them. Soul smiled at Maka. She looked so happy eating her sandwich. He couldn't help but notice how the sun shone on her ash blonde hair and lit up her face. Her emerald eyes were shining. How had he never noticed that before? He's brought back to reality when Kid snapped his fingers in front of his face.
"Hm? Did you need something Kid?" He asks. Kid just smirks at him. "What?"
"You think Maka's pretty don't you!" Black Star accuses.
Soul's eyes widened.
"What!?" He exclaims. "Where the hell would you get that crazy idea!"
"It's quite obvious actually." Kid tells him. "It explains all the staring and why you blush around her sometimes. Just accept it, you find Maka attractive."
"You guys are nuts she's totally not my type." Soul tells them. "I'd never find some flat chested girl with fat ankles hot."
"Yeah except she's not that flat chested anymore..." Kid reminds him.
"And her ankles were never really fat were they?" Black Star adds.
Soul started to sweat and he looked back over the balcony. They were right...Maka had developed a bit more since he'd known her. Her breasts were nowhere near the size of Blair's but...they were slightly bigger than they used to be. Enough to make him notice anyway. He let his eyes wander down her figure. His face turned red when he realized she had curves. When did that happen!? But nevertheless, the most shocking part of all of this was how it was affecting him.
"Wow..." Soul says.
"Uh Soul..." Black Star says and pokes his arm.
"What is it?" Soul asks.
"Soul, you uh...have a uh..." Kid points down to his pants.
Soul looked down and his eyes widened. He had a boner! His face turned red and he dashed off to the bathroom.
"Things certainly are changing around here." Kid notes and looks in the direction Soul just ran off in.
A/N: I hope you enjoyed! Please comment if you want me to continue!
