Fifty-one Words of Love
Prepare for ultimate fluffiness that all started with an ice cream cone.
Summary: Soul and Maka fight over an ice cream cone. Then strange events happen afterwards. (I'm not good at summaries. .-.)
Chapter 4: MUTUAL
mu•tu•al (adjective)
-given and received in equal amount
-having the same feelings one for the other
-shared in common
"Can I just have one bite of it?"
"It's mine."
"Come on, we're partners! Let me just have one lick!"
"I bought it, I used my own money, I went to the store myself to buy it, so it's mine."
Soul grunted. He wasn't able to think about another excuse to have a taste of the delectable ice cream cone his meister had bought.
"Makaaaa…" He slurred. "It's suuumeeeer… And it's soooo hoooot…"
She continued licking her precious treat, teasing Soul's starvation. "There's no way I'll just hand it over." She wiggled her fingers and glared at her weapon. "Your germs will get over it."
He smirked, pleased that he found a way to devour it. Soul stood up from his seat and lunged forward, licking his new palatable reward.
"H-hey! No! It has my germs on it!" Maka said, drawing the treat away from his tongue.
It just made Soul grab onto her arm and pin her on the ground, leaving the chair to fall on their side and the tasty ice cream cone scattered on the floor. Maka and Soul stared at the mess and groaned.
"I didn't even get to finish it…" Maka sighed, standing up from the awkward position she was in with Soul. She went to the kitchen to fetch a mop, walked over to the puddle of dispersed treaty goodness, and started cleaning it all up.
Soul watched with a frown, knowing it had been his fault for destroying the once sweet delicacy. "I-I'm sorry, Maka… I'll, uh, buy a new one for you…"
"It's okay, I'll do it myself," she said, grumbling as she tossed the discarded clutter in the trash bin next to her. She put the mop back and went in her room. "I'll just go out and get another. If you want, I'll get one for you too, so that you won't try catching mine again."
She reached for her messenger bag (1), fumbling a little on the strap. Soul walked in her room, scratching the back of his head.
"Maka, I said I was sorry…"
Maka blinked at her scythe weapon. "I'm not mad at you, Soul."
"You are mad at me," he said, his hands falling at his sides.
She strode past Soul, who stood at the doorway of her room, and climbed down the stairs outside the main door of their apartment. Without another word, she was gone.
Soul leaned back on the doorframe, sighing. After a few moments, he stood up instantly and ran after his partner.
"Two, please."
"So…two chocolate ice cream cones coming right up, miss."
Maka beamed and sat down on a nearby bench, patiently waiting for her creamy delicacies. She scanned the park and noticed a few children flying vibrantly-colored kites. One girl from the bunch tripped over a stone while chasing after her loose kite which flew to the top of a towering tree.
Maka neared the little girl and took her in her arms. "It's okay, little girl. Don't cry."
The tiny toddler wiped her giant green orbs and sniffed. "M-my kite…" She sniffled a second time.
"Don't worry. I'll get it for you," Maka ruffled the little girl's hair in a playful way, making the child giggle uneasily.
Maka paced across the park and over to the tree. It looked almost menacing, if it weren't for the kite perched on top of its leaves and the birds that sang past it. She gulped once before lifting herself up the tough branches of the tree. The little girl followed Maka quietly and sat down on the grass nearby.
"Oh man, here goes nothing," Maka mumbled to herself, reaching for the last branch. To her surprise, she grasped the colorful kite with ease. The little girl below clapped and cheered. Maka smiled, blushing.
She carefully traced her steps down the terrifyingly steep branches of the tree. One by one, she shifted closer, nearing the child.
But a bird landed on a branch not far from where Maka was about to step on. She fumbled and wobbled, and to her and the child's dismay, she fell backwards from that branch. She knew what would happen next. The inevitable was a cruel destiny. But fate took an astonishing turn when Maka had been caught by her faithful saviour.
"S-Soul!"
The little girl yelped, but sighed in relief when she had finally received her kite back. A woman, near her early thirties, scampered near her child and took her in a loving embrace. The little girl's mother blinked at the meister-weapon pair and beamed.
"Thank you so much!" She squeezed the two partners. "Such wonderful courage, young lady. And your friend, such faithfulness!"
Maka looked at Soul and smiled. He grinned in reply.
"Ah! I know you!" the mother said excitedly. "You're Maka Albarn, the girl who saved us from the madness of the Kishin!"
"Oh, um, I wasn't really the one who did it on my own, ma'am," Maka admitted. "It was my friends and Soul who help–"
"Samantha, this young lady who saved you was the same one who saved us all from the Kishin!" the mother interrupted, a bit rudely.
The little girl squinted at Maka, almost as if she doubted her own mother. But then, her eyes opened wider and she smiled. "I'm Sammi! I wanna be just like you when I grow up!"
Soul had to stifle a laugh. Maka glared at him for a moment, and turned back to Sammi. "I'm pretty sure you'll be like me if you work hard to achieve your goals. That's how I made Soul into a Death scythe pretty easily. Having a Death scythe is–"
Sammi gasped, interrupting Maka the second time. She started bouncing around her idol, squealing all the more. This created a huge crowd of tourists and locals, surrounding the four and the intimidating tree.
"I will work very very hard to be like you!" Sammi cried over and over again.
The crowd murmured between themselves, exchanging glances and looking every other time at Maka. She felt a bit uncomfortable with this; Soul could clearly see that.
"Excuse me, um, miss, but we need to be going now," Soul said, a bit impatiently.
"Wait a minute," Sammi's mother pulled out a camera from her bright pink pouch. Oh, joy, Soul thought. "Let me document this event so that Sammi can take a look at this picture forever!"
Maka sweatdropped. She leaned against Soul's shoulder and whispered, "Don't you think they're a little too much?"
Soul shrugged; Maka's head bobbing awkwardly as he did. "It's kinda weird with these many fans. I wonder if I actually have any."
Alarmed by the statement, Maka lifted her head from his shoulder and looked away. "Figures. Cool guys have to have fans."
He glanced at his partner, confused at why she's having such a reaction. He didn't have time to think too much about it at that moment yet, since Sammi's mother's voice echoed loudly in front of them.
"Okay! This camera's on a timer, so we'd better hurry!" She dashed near Maka, cuddling her daughter. "Smile you two!"
"Err.." Maka trailed off, forcing a tiny smile. Soul had a hard time smiling too.
"Cheese!" Sammi yelled out and the picture was finally taken.
Maka yawned as she leaned on Soul's head. He had to carry her back to the apartment; climbing up trees and dealing with fans were too much for one day.
"Hey, naptime's over, Ms. Popular," Soul smirked as he dropped Maka on her bed.
She threw a pillow on his head. "Shut up."
He laughed a bit, then walked over to the kitchen. "Want something to eat?"
Maka's face dropped. Soul turned around, noticing her bizarre silence.
"What? What's the matter?"
"M-my ice cream…"
"Huh?"
"DAMMIT!" She threw her face on the headboard and moaned loudly.
"W-wait, Maka, what's wrong?" He darted into the room.
"I…I forgot to get my ice cream…" She turned around, and Soul noticed her eyes were filled with tears that were fought back.
"Hey, it's just ice cream–"
"NO! IT'S NOT JUST STUPID ICE CREAM, SOUL!" She threw another pillow at Soul's direction, but it missed him by inches. She buried her head in her blanket, sobbing.
Soul ruffled his hair and neared Maka. "Look, you saved that little girl's kite. Isn't that better than getting cruddy ice cream? Besides, you should save more money instead of getting more ice cream if you wanted…"
"Soul," Maka started. "You don't get it." She sobbed even louder this time.
He stood up, irritated, and went in the kitchen. He opened the fridge and took a brown plastic box out, along with a spoon.
When he came back, he plopped it in front of his meister.
"Go, have some. It'll make you feel better."
It took a few seconds for her to lift herself from the blanket. She sat up and stared at the box.
"W-what…"
"I bought it for you," he confessed. "To make up for that ice cream cone I messed up."
She just sat there, staring at the box of mouth-watering goodness. She was tempted to open it, but she just couldn't. "No, Soul. You eat it."
"No, Maka. You eat it."
"You bought it, you used your own money, you went to the store to buy it, so it's yours."
"Maka, I said no. It's yours now. Just eat it."
She didn't move a muscle.
"Fine. I'll feed you myself," he declared. He took a spoonful of chocolate-flavoured creaminess and placed it near Maka's mouth.
"Say 'Ahh'."
Maka blushed, scoffing at her bad luck. Soul smirked, taking the advantage of her blush and used his own hand to open her mouth and shoved the ice cream in without her having much time to actually react.
She tried not to chew, but she knew it would melt anyway. She had no choice but to do as he says.
"That's it. Now one more."
The whole event started once more, making Maka a little too uncomfortable. But this time, to make matters worse, Soul leaned closer, their faces just inches away. "Open up wide, Maka."
She did what he had to do, so she reluctantly opened her mouth.
After a few scoops, Soul sighed. "You're such a slow chewer."
"Am not. Shut up." Maka grumbled, turning away.
He smirked. Awkwardly, Soul shifts from his original sitting place to the area beside Maka. "You okay now, though?"
"Sorta." She leaned back on the headboard, sighing. She looked back at the box; a quarter of ice cream taken out.
"Wanna eat some more?" he asked, noticing Maka's stare. "Or are you on a diet?"
"Didn't I tell you to shut up, Eater?" she spat out.
"Yikes," Soul smirked again. He reached for the box and carefully took another scoop of ice cream. "Don't resist this time."
"Okay, okay," she snorted.
She closed her eyes, obviously ready for the expected, so she didn't need her eyes for this one.
Until she felt something else enveloping her lips.
Soul was kissing her.
"I can't believe you did that."
"Your lips were tempting me."
"Oh, so my lips are the only parts of my body that are actually attractive. Thank you."
"Maka, I'm not a big fan of sarcasm."
"Me neither. So just stop."
Soul shifted uncomfortably in his sitting position. He didn't know what embarrassed him more: the fact that at sixteen (2), his kiss with Maka was his first, or the fact that the ice cream he had initially scooped up for her had melted and dripped on his pants after the kiss.
"I'm sorry."
"What're you so sorry about?"
"I mean, I just kissed you, and I didn't even bother to ask you if you wanted to."
Maka sighed. "No, that's not the problem here." She paused for a moment before saying, "You love me."
He managed a slight nod.
"I don't believe it."
"What?"
Maka also shifted in her seat, edging farther away from her weapon. "I'm going to do my homework." She stood up and walked near her bookshelves. Through the many books, she chose one and started flipping through the pages.
Soul, meanwhile, mentally slapped his face in total defeat and rage. I'm so stupid; why would I think she'd like me anyway?
He got up from the bed and marched near Maka. She looked up from her book and stuck her tongue out at him.
"What do you want?"
"Do you love me?"
She groaned and stared at her book, more intrigued with math problems than romantic dilemmas. "I'm kind of in the middle of something here, obviously."
"Can you please just do me a favour?"
For a moment, the world seemed as if it had stopped moving. Until Maka tore her gaze from the Calculus workbook and glared at Soul.
"Fine. What do you want me to do?"
Soul walked over to her bed, sat at the other end, and pushed a familiar box near her. She gaped at the box, oblivious to what his favour would be.
"Feed me."
"You're such a big baby, you know that?"
He chuckled a bit, but obeyed her anyway. After a few spoonfuls, he noticed that Maka was getting irritated.
"Come on, Maka. Don't give me that face."
"I don't want to do this anymore. I'm not really crazy about feeding my weapon who's, like, a year older than me."
"One more?"
She groaned quietly, but did it anyway. "Close your eyes first."
"What? You're gonna spread it all over my face?"
"Just close it and shut up, will you?"
"I will, I will. Just stop telling me to shut up."
Finally, Soul closed his eyes.
"Open your mouth."
"Aah."
"Wider."
"Crap, Maka, that better not be the whole box or something."
"Wider."
Sighing, he did as he was told. Waiting for a few moments, he wanted to open his eyes, just to check what was taking her so long.
He was too late.
Maka was kissing him.
"Maka, you gotta check this out."
"What is it?"
"There's something really weird going on with your email."
"Wh-what?! Soul, I told you specifically not to mess with my messages."
"No, no, I'm not messing with them. I just found out that you've got quite a lot of fangirls and fanboys."
"Yeah, I've noticed, like, a year ago."
"You really love to disappoint me, huh."
"I'm not kidding. It was like that since a year ago. I've been receiving lots of fanmail ever since that day when I defeated the Kishin(3)."
Soul squinted at the bright screen. "I-it's just so…overwhelming, you know?"
"Nah. I bet you'd have more fangirls than I'd ever have."
"What makes you think that?"
"You're albino, which I personally thought was completely hot beyond belief…"
"True…"
"And you act like you don't care, but you do, which makes you totally attractive…"
"Wait, what?"
"And you're a great kisser," Maka winks at him playfully.
He gulped. "Y-yeah." Stop blushing, idiot.
"Hey, why not check your email?" She played with his white bleach hair. "Check it out and I'll prove to you that you've got more fangirls than I do."
"Shut up," he retorted. "You know that's not true."
"Even if it isn't…" She reached over and kissed him on the lips. "I'll love you forever, no matter what."
Soul grinned.
"So…how many fangirls you said you had?" (4)
A/N: (1) She carries a messenger bag sometimes. (Source: Check out a few Soul Eater manga chapters and the doujinshi "Rendezvous Pitch Maneuver" by niwatori [a famous SoMa doujinshi artist])
(2) I bet Soul's sixteen-years-old, while Maka's fifteen. It just seemed really realistic.
(3) I'm sure she'd be receiving loads of fanmail even before she defeated the Kishin. Just saying.
(4) Soul says this, okay?
The last part with the email happened a few weeks later after that ice cream incident, where they became a couple. :3
Terribly sorry for using the words "delectable" or "creamy goodness" and whatnot for my description on ice cream. It was weird. And it kinda clicked at that time for me. It….just….just REVIEW please~ o3o