The fourth thing of Christmas that's such a pain to me...sending Christmas cards!
"Gure!" Ayame exclaimed dramatically. "I have come to assist you!"
Both Yuki's and Hatori's eyes widened at the sight of the Snake of the Zodiac, yet Ayame pranced in with his usual flourish.
"My darling brother!" Ayame said gleefully as he approached Yuki. "How wonderful to see you on such an important day!"
Yuki felt his eye twitch, yet he tried to maintain a neutral expression. Maybe he should have gone with Tohru and the others after all. He plastered on a tight smile as his eyes shone with warning. "I'm busy," was all he managed to get out.
"Oh!" Ayame exclaimed happily. "You are in the process of creating something truly magnificent with this tree of yours! I know you will do marvelously. You are so talented, it must be because of my influence on you!"
"Ayame," Hatori grumbled from his slouched seat at the table. "Shut up."
"Oh Tori!" Ayame exclaimed, abandoning Yuki and whirling over to the Dragon. "Am I being too loud? How wonderful that we would all be here, right now in Shigure's house!"
"It is always a pleasure to see you Aya," Shigure said with a grin while Hatori groaned.
"Oh Shigure, do stop, you are making me blush!" Ayame exclaimed, fanning himself.
Yuki gripped the garlands in his hands tighter, trying to block the sounds of his brother's annoying babble.
"Now, over the phone, you had said you needed my expertise," Ayame said, plopping down right between Shigure and Hatori. "Whatever you need, Gure-san, I shall provide!"
Hatori placed his head in his hands with a sigh. It was then that Ayame seemed to take notice of his cousin's distress. "Tori-san, whatever is the matter with you?"
"Hangover," Hatori muttered.
Ayame frowned, taken aback. "Hangover? But you never get drunk!" He narrowed his golden eyes. "Did someone spike your drink?" He turned to stare at Shigure with a wounded expression. "Gure! We both made a promise never to spike anyones drink without the other present to watch the action!"
"It was not my intention to provide myself with some entertainment," Shigure stated matter-of-factly. "It was just meant to get Hatori to lighten up as he was having a...difficult night."
Ayame tilted his silver head. "Difficult? How?" He looked up when he noticed Hatori rising from his seat. "Where are you going?"
"To bed," Hatori grumbled, his headache increasing. There was no way he could drive in this state, no matter how desperately he wanted to get away from the constant babble in this house.
"If you do need anything, do let me know and I shall assist you!" Ayame called out boisterously. Why did Hatori think they were taking delight in his misery?
"Don't need help," he grumbled, falling onto the couch with a sigh.
"Now, Shigure," Ayame said, turning to look at his cousin with a twinkle in his eye. "What did you need me for?"
Shigure sat back with a flourish, displaying the cards in his hand like a fan. "Christmas cards!" he exclaimed joyfully.
Ayame clapped his hands excitedly. "Oh! How wonderful!"
'Wonderful' did not necessarily mean 'fun' as they came to find. Both Shigure and Ayame found true pleasure in their conversations and boisterous ideas for the holidays, rather than filling out the cards as they were supposed to.
Yuki was the true victim behind all of these current events as he was forced to listen to their ridiculous antics. His frown of annoyance was permanently on his face, and he gritted his teeth. His eyes flickered over to his phone and a set of earbuds. Reaching over, he snagged his phone and scrolled to the musics he had downloaded. Stuffing the earbuds in his ears, he cranked the song up to the full volume.
"Schools out Christmas Break!"
"Back to Boston, the Red Sox in four straight!"
Yuki yelped and yanked the earbuds out of his ears as the blare of electric guitars and heavy drums left him nearly deaf. He glared at his phone, aghast at what he had just heard. He could still hear the rest of the music blaring through the earbuds, and it left him fuming.
"Who," he growled, catching both Shigure's and Ayame's attention. "Tampered with my music?" The glare he sent them showed that he better get a straight answer.
Shigure smiled. "Oh! Which song were you listening to? The one by Frickin A? I downloaded that for you, as I assumed it was what you would like."
"Why would you think I liked something like that?" Yuki demanded, very close to stormining over to the table and strangling his cousin. He might have ended the Dog's life then and there, but the fact that Yuki's original songs were still on his phone might have just saved the older cousin's life.
With a huff, Yuki turned his back on the two older men and delated the horrendous song before stuffing his earbuds back in.
"Hey Santa! Hey Santa! I wish with all my might!"
Yuki growled, turning to glare at his brother who was beaming happily. "Hey Santa by Carnie and Wendy Wilson?" Ayame questioned innocently. "That was me!"
His brother nearly received a black eye for that, but Yuki restrained himself and instead, focused on his phone, deleting all the songs he did not recognize. It was another five minutes before he settled on his favorite song and went back to fixing the garlands while listening to his music.
"Christmas is the time for everyone to find out that you really don't understand them," Ayame confessed. "That is why I am focusing on one particular individual that I really know this year!"
Shigure batted his eyes. "Me?"
"Yuki!" Ayame declared happily, looking back at his brother who was not paying attention to them.
Shigure pouted. "You forgot about me?" he whimpered, crocodile tears forming in his eyes.
"Of course not!" Ayame exclaimed. "I got everyone a little something. But I am going to shower my brother with all my true gifts, thus strengthen our brotherly bond!"
Shigure could not help but smirk, already knowing what Yuki's reaction to his brother's presents would be.
"Hey," Ayame said thoughtfully as he frowned at a card. "Who sent this card?"
Shigure frowned, leaning over and raised an eyebrow at the masked and hooded family in the picture. He flipped the card over and noticed that it had no return address and no name. He shrugged. "Your in-laws?" he joked.
Ayame laughed loudly, throwing the card behind him. "Well," he said. "That's one person we don't have to bother sending a card to." He frowned as he flipped through the list of people they were supposed to send cards to. "I don't even know half these people!" He gasped. "Aunt May?" Ayame demanded as he stared at the card, his voice shrill. "Aunt May?"
Shigure looked up from his own pile of cards. "Aunt May?" he demanded. "The one who gave us socks for Christmas when we were kids?"
"That was from Uncle Earl," Ayame sniffed. "Did you know what he called my passion of work? He called it a vulgar disgrace! All I offered was for him to come by to my shop and improve his appearance. Aunt May would have appreciated it. He also needed a new toupee. The old one looked like a rug and did nothing to hide his bald spot!"
Shigure hummed. "Wasn't Uncle Richard the one with the speedo?"
Both men shuddered at the mental image that quickly came to mind.
"I honestly thought he was making a fashion statement," Ayame confessed. He placed a hand on his hips. "Though I had thought it was rather bold of him to walk around in pink underwear."
"He was certainly bolder than we were," Shigure commented, scribbling on the piece of paper. "Would it be totally insensitive if I just wrote 'Merry Christmas' and 'Happy Holidays'?"
Ayame gasped. "Gure! You must express your complete thought and affection into those cards! Tell them about how wonderful they are, and how much they mean to you! We will work on that even if our hands fall off!"
However, twenty minutes into that declaration, Ayame was starting to eat his own words.
"Who says we have to do all of this from scratch?" Ayame demanded, twirling his pen around, bored.
Shigure rose from his seat as if that was what he was waiting for. "No one ever did."
Ayame jumped from his seat with glee. "Oh how wonderful!" he exclaimed. "We are going shopping!" He waved his hand around with a dismissive air. "Yuki, my darling brother, Gure and I shall be going shopping! Try not to miss me too much, but do take comfort in the fact that I will be back!"
Yuki showed no sign that he was aware of his brother's announcement, but that did not deter Ayame.
Unsurprisingly, the shopping trip quickly got sidetracked when the two cousins became distracted with many different shopping options. However, they were soon pulled to some cards that caught their attention.
Ayame laughed boisterously. "Some of these cards are so inappropriate for the family." He gathered the cards that were deemed by himself as 'inappropriate'. "I'll take twenty!"
Shigure hummed as he read the cards Ayame had chosen, but his eyes were stuck on the cover of the card itself. "Hm, Mrs. Claus looks quite ravishing in this one."
Ayame sighed dramatically. "Oh Gure, you do have a dirty mind."
"I'm not the one buying them," Shigure pointed out. "But I am approving of them."
Ayame smirked. "True, but only because I know you, dear Gure-san." He hummed in delight and snatched up a card off of a shelf. However, his face fell as he stared at the card, mouth open in surprise at what he was seeing. Curious, Shigure peeked over his cousin's shoulder to see what he was looking at. Both he and Shigure wore identical expressions of shock as their eyes widened at the Christmas card they beheld.
Shigure raised an eyebrow. "This ain't like any other Christmas card I got as a child," he commented.
"Christmas cards are also designed for the pleasure of adults," a bored voice commented, startling both Ayame and Shigure as they turned to see a very short saleswoman standing before them. Her rectangular glasses were balanced on her nose as her thin, bright red lips pursed at them. The green and red holiday uniform she wore was decorated with golden bells, and both men had to wonder how they hadn't heard her approaching them.
"Can I help you with anything in particular?" the woman asked, adjusting her glasses.
"No thank you, madam," Shigure said with a smirk as he snatched the card out of Ayame's hand, causing his cousin to let out a startled yelp. "I think we've got this covered."
"If you are interested in those types of cards," the woman stated with a thinly raised eyebrow, eyeing the card in Shigure's hands. "Then I would suggest that you check out the shelf on the far left. They might be more suitable for your taste."
Shigure's eyes brightened. "Do you have any that...is specified for a particular relative?"
"If you look, you might just find it," the woman stated, turning on her heel and walking away.
"So much for customer service," Ayame commentend snatching the card back from Shigure. "And what type of 'relative' were you thinking of? Hopefully me, of course."
"Of course," Shigure said distractedly. He frowned as he looked through the shelves. "Do we have to cover every family member with a Christmas card? That'll be expensive."
Ayame shrugged. "Only the ones that matter." He huffed. "I'm not sending one to Uncle Ken. He's a weirdo with no sense of style and no idea how to properly romance a woman. He even rejected my ideas and helpful pointers!"
"He does not deserve your attention, Aya," Shigure commented as he looked through the gift-cards.
Ayame sniffed. "So true." He frowned and glanced at what Shigure was looking at. "What are you buying?"
Shigure just smirked, flashing the gift-card he had chosen. "A twenty dollar gift-card for Akito."
Ayame's eyes twinkled. "Fascinating! What is it?" His eyes widened and his mouth dropped open when Shigure showed him. "They sell those?" he demanded. The silver haired man frantically ran for the shelf, searching through it. "I must find one for Mine!"
"Better than a card she'll never read," Shigure stated. "A giftcard of Victoria Secret merchandise."
