Disclaimer: I still don't own Puri Puri. I swear. :hides forged copyright papers:

Whew! Chapter 2 is finally here! It took so long mostly because I fail at life, but partially because I was at a loss for what to write. But here it is 8D

This chapter goes out to my little sister Brittany, whose personality I use to help characterize Yuujirou. And of course to my beta reader Maria, without whom this story would be ultimate fail. I tried to fix the ending of this chapter, Mari-bear! I hope I helped it feel a little better.

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"So this is where Princess Kouno lives, eh?" Yuujirou asked in his singsong voice as Toru closed the front door behind them. He stood with them for a moment in the foyer, not really sure what to do next.

Toru really hadn't bothered to think of mentioning to his aunt and uncle that he had made new friends at Fujimori. His relationship with his surrogate parents had always been tentative and polite; Toru had a tendency to restrain himself around others. They would ask questions and he would answer, but he never brought things up on his own. It was for this reason that something simple like having friends over unexpectedly was far more awkward than it should have been. The whole setup was sometimes more trouble than it was worth. It almost made him wish he was a little less like himself and a little more like Yuujirou.

"Uncle?" Toru called, moving toward the doorway to the living room and peering around the doorframe.

"What is it, Toru?" Koichi Kouno lifted his gaze from the newspaper in his hands and fixed it on his nephew. Toru blinked.

"Um… some friends of mine showed up unexpectedly. Is it alright if they stay for a bit?" he was aware that he felt slightly guilty for even asking this much. He wondered exactly when he had become so rigidly polite around his uncle, or if it had always been this way. He couldn't even remember.

Koichi appeared to give the issue some thought. "I suppose that would be alright," he answered with a nod.

"Thank you," Toru gave him a polite smile and turned back to the foyer, only to find Yuujirou several inches away from his face.

"What, so you're not even going to introduce us?" the blond spat, shaking his head. "Honestly, Toru. Where are your manners?" he glided past Toru and flounced into the living room and straight up to Koichi, who looked at him with some surprise. "My name is Yuujirou Shihoudani, and this is Mikoto Yutaka," he said, gesturing toward the redhead who was still standing beside Toru and sulking, his irritation at being dragged away from Megumi early evident in his surly features. "Thank you for letting us stay on such short notice." and then he bowed in a fair approximation of acceptable social conduct. Toru almost laughed. Yuujirou never ceased to surprise him.

"So, you're Toru's friends from school?"

"That's right," Yuujirou answered. "And we're sorry for barging in like this. We just missed Toru and we wanted to surprise him. Right, Mikoto?"

Mikoto gave something between a nod and a grimace. Meanwhile, Koichi was looking at Yuujirou with an expression that conveyed something akin to confusion. Toru couldn't rightly blame him; he had been confused upon meeting him too because of that androgynous face. If he had managed to confuse him for a girl at first, there was no doubt his uncle could as well. It seemed at the moment that Koichi was looking at Yuujirou and trying to figure out exactly what a girl was doing attending Toru's supposedly all-boys' school. He decided to put an end to the confusion quickly before something awkward was said on Koichi's part. Yuujirou could be unpredictable when it came to confusion about his gender.

"That's right," he said conversationally and stepping forward to place a hand on Yuujirou's shoulder. "Yuujirou meant to call, but it just slipped his mind." he made sure to make the 'his' perfectly clear when he said it. Koichi's face slid from confused to surprised to neutral, and then he smiled.

"Well, it's perfectly alright. I'm glad to see that Toru has friends who would come all this way to see him."

Toru smiled slightly. "Well, we're going up to my room now," he told Koichi with a small wave, making his way toward the stairs. Yuujirou and Mikoto trailed behind him, and Toru was grateful that Yuujirou waited until they had reached his bedroom and closed the door behind them to say something.

"What's with all the awkwardness, Toru?" he demanded, leaning against the door and fixing him with his intense gold stare.

"What do you mean?" Toru shrugged and pretended to be immersed in stowing Yuujirou and Mikoto's luggage under his desk.

"I mean you talk to your uncle like he's your teacher or something. I wasn't that awkward around my step-dad when he was my teacher! So what's going on here? Spit it out!" Yuujirou had moved over to him now and stood beside him with his arms crossed, clearly bent on making it obvious that there was no escape from the question.

"You're not awkward around anyone," Toru reminded him. "You just put up the Princess smile and act like you're not uncomfortable at all."

"Maybe he was just awkward because somebody decided to come all this way without bothering to tell him!" Mikoto said, giving Yuujirou a patronizing look.

"Oh shut up, Miko-chan," Yuujirou said with a haughty wave of his hand. "You didn't have to come if you didn't want to. And stop pouting already. You're only being dragged away from your precious girlfriend two days early. So suck it up and don't be such a whiner. You're not a first-year anymore."

"I'm not whining!" the redhead protested. "I was just saying that maybe he wouldn't be so awkward about it if you'd-"

"Sounds like whining to me," Yuujirou told him with a smug grin. Toru smiled and joined in as he took a seat in his desk chair, unable to resist teasing him at least a little bit.

"Yeah Mikoto… even if your intentions were pure, you were still using a whiny tone. That automatically constitutes whining," he said matter-of-factly. Yuujirou gave him an amused grin from where he sat on the floor.

"So now you two are whine scientists or something?" Mikoto asked incredulously with a frustrated look etched into his features.

"No, we're whine tasters!" Yuujirou said, and immediately broke into hysterical laughter. Toru felt inclined to join in, though it was the kind of ludicrous joke that made him want to give Yuujirou a dubious look and slap him for being corny to an inappropriate level.

"You guys are impossible!" Mikoto told them, throwing his hands into the air in an 'I give up' kind of gesture.

"S-sorry, Mikoto," Yuujirou said between giggles, wiping tears of mirth from his eyes. "We're picking on you too much, right? We'll give it a rest. Sorry. We're done."

"Y-yeah…" Toru had to hold the chair to steady himself as he held in silent laughter. "We won't pick on you anymore today, okay?"

Incidentally, they kept it up until dinner.

XXX

"Come on Toru, just admit it!"

"No way! Your thighs are way fatter than mine!" Toru shot Yuujirou a playful smirk and took a small sip of his soda. "We both know it! You just don't want to admit it because it makes you insecure that you look like a fat-legged girl."

"Guys shouldn't notice if they have fat thighs or not," Mikoto remarked offhandedly, immersing himself in his milkshake. His mood had improved substantially since the day before, but he still couldn't keep himself from commenting. He didn't like admit that he had that much in common with Yuujirou; sometimes he lacked the ability to control his mouth. His indiscretion was made obvious when Yuujirou shot him a look and made a small 'humph' noise.

"It's hard not to notice when you prance around in a dress for an entire school year." he chewed pensively on a French fry before finishing his statement, "And you're just saying that because we all know you have perfect thighs."

Mikoto wasn't entirely sure if this was meant to be a compliment or if he was teasing him. But since it was Yuujirou, it was most likely the latter, and he opted for reacting by scowling off in a random direction and hoping he wouldn't say anything else. He tried to occupy his mind with the joyful reality that during the coming school year he would be able to participate in sports, he would not be wearing any dresses, and he wouldn't have to be ashamed of brining Megumi to school functions (unless you counted how embarrassing Yuujirou and Toru were fond of being when around someone whose opinion Mikoto cared about). And then, as though he had read his mind, Toru's voice broke through his reverie;

"Hey Mikoto, isn't that your girlfriend?"

Snapping back into consciousness, Mikoto looked in the direction that Toru was gesturing. And there she was, by some wonderful (and terrible, if the company he was currently in was taken into account) twist of fate, standing and looking lost near the entrance to the shopping center several yards away. Not even caring how humiliating the experience would be with Yuujirou and Toru with him, he got up and hurried over to her, breaking into a happy grin as he filled quickly with the joy of actually seeing her, this far away from home of all places.

"Megumi-san!" he reached her quickly, and when she saw him she smiled, making his heart drop into the pit of his stomach. He took her hands in his and successfully kept himself from exploding with excitement. "What are you doing here?"

"We invited her," said Yuujirou from behind him.

"Since you got dragged away from home early," Toru chimed in.

"And we didn't feel like listening to you whine," Yuujirou finished.

"Really?" Mikoto turned for a moment to stare at them, positive that this was some kind of terrible practical joke. "You guys?"

"Of course. What's the matter, you didn't think we were capable of doing something nice for our little Miko-chan?" Yuujirou tossed his hair dramatically. "Typical."

"But-"

"It's true," Megumi said, regaining his attention. "They paid for the bus ticket and everything." she blushed. "And they said you… missed me."

"Of course I did!" Mikoto wasn't entirely sure of what to say. Such random acts of kindness were not commonplace in his relationship with his fellow former-Princesses, and all he could do was stare for a moment. "Thanks, guys," he managed lamely.

"Don't mention it," Toru said, shrugging. Yuujirou just gave Mikoto a signature smirk.

"Be sure you don't waste this instance of kindness," he said, crossing his arms. "It might not happen again."

And despite that intimidating golden smirk he was faced with, Mikoto smiled at Megumi and couldn't help but think that with occasions like this, second year just might end up being better than he had anticipated. The fact that the other two would do something like this made him almost want to hug them (though he wouldn't go that far). He smiled blissfully, unconsciously slipping his hand through Megumi's and holding it loosely.

"So, what's the plan, then?" Toru asked offhandedly as he glanced at the obnoxious burger-shaped digital clock that hung over the food court. "We should probably get going if we're going to do anything before it gets too late."

Mikoto knew instantly that this whole thing had been too good to be true when Yuujirou smiled. It wasn't, however, the kind of smile a normal person would give in this situation; it was the kind of smile that spelled certain doom. Mikoto was completely certain when he narrowed his eyes slightly and spoke four words that made his blood run cold.

"We're going to karaoke."

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Oh noes, poor Miko-chan. Would you guys rather they went back to school or I did a chapter of them karaoke…ing?