Stealing Ann

Chapter 1: Being Jack

Summary: Thanks to Karen's crazy shindig, Claire is forced to portray as a young man, Jack, to help a fellow cope with mixed feelings without making him uncomfortable. But did Karen ever mentioned that "Jack's" 'client' is Mineral town's local hunk-of-a-guy, Cliff? And what if Ann starts to throw oil into the fire pit of love? Let there be rivalry and revenge!

Rated: T for some lemony influence, language, and some drunken 'yaoi' O_o.

"Hey~ Claire~" A woman's voice comes out of the blue. It's Karen. She hugs a tall, blond figure. 'Claire' glares at the raven haired girl, "This won't work! He won't buy it!"

"Well, I do~" Karen lets go of Claire. "Karen, you're just drunk"

"..."

Claire facepalms and sighs, "It's bad enough I had to find extra long-"

"Ha ha~"

"...Bandages to wrap my breasts to flatten them, but now I had to find some cheesy wig and hat that won't make me look any better with the bandages..."

"You're fine, you're- HICK! Fine, fine~! Oh, shi-" Karen stutters and falls out cold. Claire smirks and chuckles, trying to help the drunken 25 year old to her feet. She sighs twice and fixes her hat.

An hour has passed and Karen is finally sober again. She and Claire sit down on a maroon leather sofa. Karen clears her throat, "You understand your 'client' is terrible at socializing with girls, right?" Claire stretches her arms and responds, "Yeah."

"You are the only one that agreed to help this poor fellow... I don't know his name-"

"Wait, you don't even know his name?"

"Yes. But all I know is that he is a real softie. So don't go beating him up with harsh words, okay?"

"I won't."

"Promise?"

"I swear on my mother's grave."

"Really?"

"Yeah."

The two stopped exchanging promises. Karen winks softly at Claire, "Remember, today at 7:20-"

"You go directly to the church in your male disguise. I get it." The blonde huffs. Karen smirk and sighs, "Just promise me to keep your disguise on at all cost from now on."

It's finally time for Claire to arrive at the church and Carter welcomes her in.

"Hello, you must be Cliff's counselor, Jack." She stopped for a second and thinks to herself, "Jack? JACK? Out of all the male names Karen could pick, she used Jack?"Claire nods her head slowly. Carter smiles and points out a lonely man on one row, "That's Cliff, over there." The disguised blonde gives a quick thumbs up and jogs over to the corner. "Hi! I'm Jack your-" She stopped. As soon as cliff turned his head towards her, Claire swore that someone was singing "Take my breath away" in a clear voice. "Take me away, Harvest goddess…" She says in a monotonous voice.

Somewhere in Forget-Me-Not Valley, the Harvest goddess sneezes twice. Commander Red ribbon's ears perk up, "Miss goddess, someone is talking about you." The goddess just shakes her head, "Must be the Witch."

Back in Mineral town, Claire stands in awe as she scans the young man in brown. The boy had dazzling, beautiful eyes of cyan and green, complimenting his long ponytail that glittered blonde under the sun. He stands up slowly while outreaching his hand, "H-Hi, I'm Cliff. I j-just moved here." Claire's face heats up a little. She shakes her head, then shakes Cliff's hand in a happy manner. "Hi! Hi! I'm Jack, your counselor! Nice to meet you!" Claire joyously blurted. Cliff makes a twisted, yet warm smile, "Nice to meet you too."

It's an hour after starting the conversation, our potential (?) couple started talking about likes and dislikes. "So, Cliff, what do you like?" The blonde asks.

"Me? I love curry? I- I mean, as a food, it's n-not that lame to like curry, r-right?" Cliff stuttered. He had never shared anything about himself, even to other men. His 'counselor' just chuckled, "No. In fact, curry is my favorite too." She smiles warmly pinching a brown lock of her wig. A faint pink color creeps up Cliff's face. The boy shakes his face furiously trying to get the image off of his head. "Why would I blush for a guy? I just met him! A-and I don't think I'm sexually confused." Cliff thinks to himself. "Is something the matter, Cliff?"

"N-no, I'm just happy someone likes what I like. I never met someone like that."

"What do you mean? I bet there are lots of other people who like curry. And besides, it's just food. Who would make fun of you for it?"

" …" Cliff became silent for several seconds. Finally, he answers, "Gray."

"WHAT?"

"He tells me it's embarrassing to like such a thing."

Claire pouted and smiled, "Well tell him liking baked corn makes him look like a wussy."

The two laughed hysterically.

"No kidding. The way he gnaws on one, he looks like a gopher."

The two laughed even harder.

"Gray the gopher? What makes you think of that?"

"He looks like one, and he acts like one. All angry and mad. Why, he reminds me of my brother in-law." Claire stops chuckling for a moment.

"You have a sister?" Cliff asks.

"Yeah. She married a jerkface!" The blonde snickers and they both start laughing again.

The day turns to night and it was time for Cliff to run over back to the inn, or else he would be shut out. Claire pulls of the brown wig, dripped in sweat. She grimaces at the icky slop of brown nylon and remembers Karen's advice to keep it on at all times. So, being disobedient, she tossed the wig hard enough to open her house door when she heard a loud bark. Claire knew this signature cry and immediately rushed inside scooping up the poor puppy. "Pepper! I'm so sorry I hurt you!" The little dog shakes her head as if she accepted the apology. The blonde rancher smiles and hugs the puppy. Pepper licks her face in joy. "You won't believed what happened today!"

It's six o'clock in the morning and Claire wakes up with a smile on her face, excited about meeting Cliff. She quickly grabs her brown wig and blue hat. The blonde was too giddy to realize that she forgot to leave with extra bandages, in case the one she wore broke. "Eh, I don't need it anyways. Little does Claire know, she make a grave mistake.

Yay! I finished! My first fanfiction! It's #1 to the Mineral Answer with lemon so, enjoy~ Don't worry, I'll start the Lemon version.

Disclaimer: Harvest does not own anything Harvest moon!