Title: "The Thing about Chores"
Author: tentsubasa
Summary: The thing about chores is that they can land you in a whole lot of unexpected situations.
Genre: Friendship/Romance
Rating: K
Pairing: Mio Takato x Tsukasa Hasegawa

Thoughts will be in italics between quotes.

Disclaimer: I do not own Kiniro no Corda or any affiliates.

"But Kaho-chan~!" Mio whined in protest as she leaned on the broom she had been using to sweep the classroom floor, "Why can't you come with us? The concours is over, so you don't have to practice all the time!" She pouted cutely with large, beseeching eyes. "We haven't gone to eat cake together in ages!"

Kahoko smiled apologetically from where she was clapping chalkboard erasers by the window. "I know, but I get that much worse if I slack off."

"But-"

"Just leave her be, Mio," Nao called from where she was mopping up the floor. "You know how she gets with her violin."

"But it's a weekend!" Mio repeated, ignoring their more diplomatic friend. "You're always busy with your part-time job and with violin classes and stuff. Can't you take off one afternoon?"

Kahoko coughed from the chalk dust. "Mio…I really have to practice today…." Despite her words, it was obvious she was weakening. It was true, they hadn't hung out properly for almost a month, but she really had to get in some practice for an upcoming audition.

"For how long?" Nao suddenly broke in.

"Huh?"

"How long do you have to practice? If it's not too long, then maybe we can wait around."

Kahoko tapped her cheek thoughtfully. "Umm…it should be at least an hour."

"In that case, why don't you skip out on the rest of cleaning, and we'll come and get you afterward?" Mio suggested cheerfully, not seeing Nao's face fall. They still had at least two-thirds of the work to do.

"Really?" Kahoko perked up. She hated cleaning duties.

Nao gave a martyred sigh and waved her friend off. "Yeah, go practice. Mio and I can handle it from here."

"Thank you!" Kahoko grinned as she put the erasers down. As she turned to leave with her stuff, she looked back at them. "Oh, I just remembered. Could one of you feed Kanazawa-sensei's cat? Since he's at some kind of conference, I promised to take care of it. I think the cat food should be in the Orchestra Club's closet somewhere."

"Gotcha," Nao nodded.

And with a wave, Kahoko was off. As she continued to walk, Kahoko frowned a bit. There was something she was forgetting, but what was it?

"What's the matter Hino Kahoko?" a voice suddenly called out to her.

The girl looked up with a smile. "Hello, Lili," she greeted. "What do you mean?"

The fairy looked at her in concern. "You looked kind of troubled. Are you having problems with your violin practices?"

She shook her head. "No, it's nothing like that. I'm actually on my way to go practice. I just felt like I was forgetting something; that's all."

Lili beamed back happily as he did back-flips in the air. "It makes me so happy to hear that you're taking this so seriously!"

"Merowr!" a cat suddenly pounced at Lili out of nowhere.

"Aah!" he cried in terror as he fled before the feline. "How many times do I have to say this?! I'm not food! Go away!"

"Oh!" Kahoko clapped her hands together as the light bulb came on. "The door! I forgot to warn them about the door!" Then with a shrug, she reasoned, "Well, it shouldn't be a problem. Hihara-senpai only mentioned it to me because it had caused him trouble." She giggled as she thought of how she had found her senpai humming and doing various other things to keep himself amused.

But oh how wrong she was.

Mio pouted as she emptied out the trash into the dumpsters. "I know it was my idea, but Nao-chan didn't have to send me to do all the icky stuff!" Then she turned toward the music wing with a sigh. Time to go feed that cat. She hoped it would be easy to find. She didn't care that much for cats actually. They were too hard to please. Give her a cute little doggie or birdie any day.

It took her ages to find the Orchestra Club room. The only reason she managed to not get lost in the labyrinth of hallways was because the layout was fairly similar to the General Studies' side. She wanted to cry when she looked in the room. There were closets everywhere! Which one did she want? So she went from closet to closet, opening and closing doors, finding tubas, tympanis, music stands, chairs, etc., etc., but no cat food!

She sighed and looked around. Where else could she look? Did she have the right room? Then she noticed a door that said, "Out of Order." A mixture of relieved and worried, she opened the door. It seemed to work just fine. She shrugged. Maybe someone had forgotten to take down the sign. Spying the cat food, her eyes lit up. Success! As she bent down to grab it, she heard a click behind her as the world went black.

Her eyes widened in disbelief. "No way!" She pounded frantically on the door. Small, dark, enclosed spaces gave her the creeps! "Help! Somebody help! Somebody get me out of here!" she whimpered with tears in her eyes. But of course, there was no one around to hear her cries.

Suddenly, something skittered across the floor, brushing against her foot. Screaming shrilly, she reeled away from the door and fell into the rest of the closet with a thundering crash. A mop clattered to the floor beside her. Picking it up with trembling hands, she slowly regained her feet. If there were going to be creepy, crawling things around, she'd better defend herself. She froze as the skittering sound came again. She backed away with her face as white as a sheet, shakily lifting her mop. And at the sudden click behind her, she wildly swung it, connecting with a tall boy's face.

"Yeowch!"

"Oh my goodness!" she quickly dropped the mop stared up at him. "I'm so, so sorry! Are you okay?"

The boy's grey eyes looked at her in irritation as he rubbed his aching cheek. "You just beaned me in the face with a mop! What do you think?"

Her eyes filled with tears again as she bowed deeply. "I'm so sorry!"

The boy ran his fingers through his messy brown hair. "Ah…it's okay. I mean, it's not that bad," he tried to comfort her awkwardly. Suddenly, he cocked his head. "Hey, you're a friend of Hino-san's, right?"

Mio looked up in surprise, but nodded with a smile. "Yes, I'm Mio Takato. Kaho-chan and I are in the same class." She looked at him thoughtfully. "Weren't you Hihara-senpai's accompanist?"

Tsukasa nodded. "Yup. Tsukasa Hasegawa." With a raised eyebrow, he asked, "So why were you in the closet? Didn't you read the sign?"

Mio blushed. "Kaho-chan asked me to feed Kanazwa-sensei's cat for her so she could practice. When the door opened properly, I figured it had been fixed."

"Ah," he nodded. "We probably should've been more specific about what was wrong with it." He laughed. "Actually, a couple days ago, Kazuki got stuck in there until Hino-san came and let him out."

"Whaat?!" Mio exclaimed. "Kaho-chan knew the closet was broken?! That's so mean! She should have warned me!"

Tsukasa shrugged. "Well, I guess what matters is that you're out now."

"Oh!" She remembered herself and bowed. "Thank you for rescuing me from the closet, Hasegawa-senpai. It was really creepy in there."

He smiled. "Don't mention it." He looked back at the closet. "Why don't I help you with that? Can't risk having you locked in again, right?" he teased good-naturedly.

She giggled. "Thank you." She shook her head at the cat food as he lugged it out of the closet. "I never liked cats much to begin with, and thanks to this, I like them even less."

"Dog lover?"

"Yup!"

"Way to be," he grinned. "I think the bowls sensei uses are in there somewhere."

"I'll get them." Turning back to Tsukasa, she began, "Here you go, Hasegawa-sen-"

A mouse shot out of the closet, its tail brushing her ankle.

Without even thinking, she screamed and launched herself straight into his arms, frantically trying to keep her feet off the floor.

And as their eyes locked on each other's as they clung to one another, it came to pass that a mouse, of all things, was the spark that started it all.

The End