In words love can be read. In action, love can be measured. But others do not know, that even in silence, love can be heard.
-:-
"Fine. Do what you want. I'm tired of this. I don't care anymore." Hotaru said in an uncaring and unnerving cold voice before she walked away. And it left a hole to Mikan's heart.
Mikan didn't know how it happened. One moment she was being confronted by her best friend demanding for an explanation, then next they were arguing like never before. To say that she was dumbfounded when Hotaru left just like that leaving her with cold voice was an understatement. In reality, she just wanted to run and follow her best friend and cling to her and cry and beg for forgiveness and spill everything up; because to Mikan Sakura Yukihara, her best friend in the whole wide world being mad at her is something to die for.
No exaggerations in her mind though when she says she'd die before Hotaru could ever leave her; because that very same walking block of ice had been her sole companion through her life. Hotaru had seen every part of her, being stupid or not, a freak or a normal teenage girl, and still accepted her. Oh, that would be the cause of her death alright, if not those stupid stinking wolves.
But she can never spill the beans because it isn't her secret to be sharing on about. Hotaru wanted to know what happened that made her open up to those 'strangers', which she found offending because those 'strangers' are her friends. And she told Hotaru just that. Mikan thought the issue would stop at that, but Hotaru just became even more pushy. She demanded an explanation because according to her, Mikan wouldn't open up to just anyone. And Hotaru wanted to know why.
Which, by the way, she answered with 'we just get along, what's wrong about it?' And Hotaru did not like that answer.
Well, what could she say? That she was attacked by a pack of wolves and Natsume and his soldiers saved her, who turned out to be a group of vampires? She doubts Hotaru would even believe that. Hotaru might even say that she was just making an excuse as to not let her in on their little secret. On the other hand, she could have just left off the crucial part like talking wolves or vampires, but one answered question would just result to another question. She knows Hotaru, and she knows how curious her best friend could get. If she said she was attacked by wolves and Natsume helped her, Hotaru would wonder why and she would look deeper into it seeing that she wouldn't believe that Hyuuga would just go saving lives like that. And she hasn't got any answer for that.
Mikan sighed as she lied down her bed. She even tried her best to move her injured arm normally throughout the day so Hotaru wouldn't be suspicious, but even without that blasted sling to support her arm, Hotaru still noticed that something happened; and through her conversations with the guys on top of that. Who knew Hotaru knew her that well.
A smile crept up her face. Just the thought of a worried sick Hotaru made her heart flip and jump with joy. She knew it. Hotaru really loves her despite the cold acts. But that smile has faded in an instant. She got into a fight with Hotaru and it isn't something to smile about.
Quickly, Mikan stood up and headed towards the place her heart rests well – the lake.
Upon arrival, she couldn't help but see a slump of body sprawled on the ground under that particular Sakura Tree. She knew that silhouette very well, and before she knew it, her feet was already dragging her to that boy and sat down beside him.
Natsume frowned when he felt a familiar presence arrived. And the frown just deepened more when he felt that presence sat beside him. Too bad she didn't see because of the manga smothering his face. Oh, he knew it was a 'she'. There's only one person with that effect on him, and there's just one person who would even dare to go and sit beside him: the stupid Mind Reader.
It was quiet for quite some time, which Natsume found unusual and rather… disturbing. It was already disturbing enough when Mikan wouldn't shut up and just talk on and on about anything to the point where it annoyed him, but her being quiet and all was even more so.
He wanted to ask what the problem is, of course. But he won't. Not until he's Natsume Hyuuga. And that would be never. Unless a series of event takes place and revealed that he was actually not himself, which is highly impossible.
A couple more minutes and Natsume felt beaten. Mikan wasn't making any sounds, she wasn't even moving! The gloomy cloud hanging around them was annoying, and the inaudible sighs were starting to piss him off. Feeling the loss, Natsume removed the manga on his face and sat up. "Oi. What's your problem?"
The girl whom he was annoyed the most looked up at him blankly and stared. That blank look on her face was actually kind of creepy, to Natsume's admittance. If he could choose, a stupidly smiling Polka is much better than this blank one. "Oi."
He watched as different flick of emotions flashed across her face. First was pure blank, and then her face crumpled into that of a confused one, then thoughtful, and then moping. It was amusing how so much appears in one's face in a little over a second. But his amusement went down the drain when Mikan started to shed tears, and then turned to outright cry. "Uu~ waaah~! Uuuu… -hic-"
"Wha -? Oi! Stop! Wait! No, no, don't, don't cry!" Of course, he didn't know what to do. What would anyone expect of him? He's Natsume Hyuuga, he makes people cry and not hush them to comfort when crying. Natsume didn't know whether to touch her or not, his hands reaching out to her; but he settled not to touch her, fearing she might break. "Sssh! Wait! Wha -?" No matter what he stuttered to say, Mikan just cried. Cried like a lost child. Her voice echoing, slapping each and every corner of his soul he thought he'd lost already.
Before he knew it, his hands did what it thought was best – he pulled the little girl's head and buried her face to his chest, doing all he can to comfort her any way possible. And attempt to shut her up, though it failed miserably.
It was the first time Natsume hugged a girl aside from his little sister Aoi who is just a twelve-year-old kid at the moment. And this is awkward to say the least. She's so soft, like a bunch of clouds. Aoi was also soft but in a different way, as if the little sister had more bones and edges than this girl.
Mikan's warmth sipped through his clothes and on to his skin, sending little pricks of electricity crawl all over him; making his body hot all over and his heart beat wild. His sister was also warm, but it never sent his body hot nor his heart race. They are both girls, but what's the difference? Why is he having such a reaction towards Mikan when he also hugged Aoi the same way?
He felt a tug to his shirt and watched as Mikan clutched on to him helplessly. She continued to cry even more, pouring her heart out. Her face was flushed with a deep hue of pink, crumpled in a pained expression. Tears ran down uncontrollably from her puffy eyes like a kid. Seeing her like that, Natsume felt something inside of him twist.
It took a while before Mikan finally settled down. "…sorry. Sorry…"
"Tch. Just tell me what your problem is and quit it with the depressing cloud!"
Mikan looked at him for a second, thoughtful, before curling herself into a ball and bury her face on her knees. She actually has no idea what came to her and cried like that the moment Natsume asked what her problem is. At first she was shocked, how could Natsume know that something was wrong? Then she got confused, why does he care anyway? After that, she contemplated on what to say to him, which lead her back to her and Hotaru's fight. And finally, she just cried.
The raven boy watched as the girl in front of him got lost in the immense thought, and he couldn't help but feel annoyed. It's rare for him to actually give a damn enough to ask a person 'what's wrong', but this girl just wouldn't answer and he can't have that. Because whatever he wants, he gets. And its rare for him to want for anything. He was on his patience end, but before he could speak, Mikan beat him to it.
"I got into a fight… with Hotaru." She added the last part as if to justify why a fight would send her to tears.
Shocked. Disbelief. Natsume can't help but feel those and he stared at her with a pissed off face and a twitching eye. It took him all of sheer power not to bump his head against the tree he was leaning on. How shallow can this girl get? It was just a fight! "Fuck. That's stupid." He hissed.
"No! You don't understand!" Mikan shot her head up as she automatically answered with a tone of defense in her voice. "It's because…"
Natsume raised a brow.
"Because… because… she, she wanted to know what happened that made me befriends with you guys. Hotaru knows everything about me, including the ability. Of course, she also knows that because of that very same ability, I don't make friends, I'm wary of people. That's why she was surprised to see me off-guard with you guys…"
"You could have told her or you could just lie." Natsume shrugged.
"Stupid! Do you think that's easy? I can't! Hotaru's a genius, and she knows me. She can tell whether I'm lying or not. And it's not like I can tell her the truth either, she'll question your identity. Seeing that any explanations about last night would lead to her knowing your identity, I chose to not tell anything. And she got mad." Mikan couldn't help but sigh. Talking about it out loud, she noticed how stupid it sounds even to her ears. But she can't help it. She's stupid that way.
Natsume looked at the girl. He was confused, but his mind refused to process what he just heard. If he deduced it right, this girl, Mikan, just had a fight with her life time best friend because she wouldn't tell her that they were vampires?
It was awkward, at least to Natsume. It's a first that he heard something like that, first time someone tried to hide their identity. Of course, it's his pride to be a vampire, though he admits it would be such a disaster and chaos for the whole society to know that a living vampire exists in the world. Even though he's such a jerk and an ass at times, he admits that what Mikan did was on favour of his race. Though the price cost her of her friendship.
In a situation like this, he really doesn't know what to say. Should he tell her 'that was good riddance' or 'go on and tell her'?
He's ashamed. Being a burden like this on someone is a big blow to his pride, and he doesn't like it. But even if he want to sate his pride by saying 'go on', he has a duty and responsibility to uphold. As the next clan head, he must always put the responsibilities first before his own pride; and at the most crucial times, he can almost do that. Yet now, he found his self considering the exposition of their existence to the whole world just because one girl was crying in front of him mere seconds ago; how pathetic can he get?
The raven looked at the sky, accepting the light of the setting sun to his eyes though a little painful. He never liked the sun, no vampire ever did. Though it was a petty rumour made of humans that vampires turn to dust when the sun is up, the blinding light still has its varying effect depending on the vampire. Some of those low levels have their low level strength reduced to half, making them even weaker and useless to battle – these are the commoners. Soldiers, however, only gets affected by Millicent, reducing a fourths of their strength, nothing big to be a threat. With someone like him, of course, the mere effect of something like blinding light of the sun is him being sleepy.
Morning is his night, and night is his morning. No, he isn't weakened by such trivial thing as this.
"Explain to her." Before he knew it, those words has already escaped his mouth. Natsume didn't even know where it came from, but he just said it without even thinking. A very irresponsible thing to do.
Mikan rolled her eyes. "I will, but I won't tell her about you. She's my best friend, and if I explain enough to her, she'd understand."
"Then what are you still doing out here?"
"Baka. You don't know how scary a mad Hotaru is. I'll give her some more time to let her think through."
"Fine. Give her some time. Now, can you please go now?"
The girl snapped. How can this guy be so gentle and kind one moment and a jerky ass the next? "No. I'll sleep here, thank you." And to annoy Natsume more, she let her head rest on Natsume's lap as she laid down.
Million volts ran through Natsume's spine, though his poker face never slipped. Why is this girl so careless? Didn't she know that he's a vampire? He can kill her on a snap! So, why does she still act so carefree around him? Besides, he's a guy! And though he's a hundred and twenty years old now, he's still a young and healthy vampire with a raging hormones (though he has never really felt any sexual attraction to anyone ever). So, why?
He cursed inside his head nth times in ten different languages, focusing his attention on anger.
"Get up." He hissed dangerously, but got no answer. "I said, get up!" He tried again as he added more venom in his voice, but still no answer.
He leaned on over to the girl to see her face, and much to his surprise, she has already snored herself to sleep. "Fuck!"
The boy didn't know why, he could have just stood up and let the girl's head fall hard on the ground and leave, but he didn't. And as he said, he didn't know why. Without any other idea what to do, he just leaned back to the tree trunk and with another sigh, let sleep come to him.
-:-
Ruka sat at the farthest corner of the library, making sure nobody could see him. If those fan girls spotted him, well, he can just tell that hell would break loose. He never wanted to have fan girls, never really. He just wanted to have a normal vampire life, serving Natsume as the right-hand man, but why, oh why, did he have to have freaky fan girls here in Japan and even back then to Europe?
All reason to admire Natsume –that, he could see; but him? He's just an average vampire. Okay, maybe he's not an average vampire seeing that only the head of the Nogi clan can be the right-hand man of the head of the Hyuuga clan, but still, he finds his self so average he almost want to puke whenever standing beside Natsume.
He's got no outstanding power, he can just communicate and control animals at will, and he's still training to control werewolves. Nothing special. He can't produce fire out of nowhere. He can't control people. He can't see the past. He's boringly normal.
Cerulean eyes and blonde hair, that's pretty normal for French people. And to where they came from, people can see those traits almost every day. So why, pray tell, do those girls still hunt him down?
A deep sigh escaped his lips as he dropped the opened book he was attempting to read. Speaking of those morbid fan girls, he's still not satisfied. He's far from satisfied actually. He's confused.
While those fan girls ogle him from afar because of who knows what, it seems that his 'charm' whatever that may be do not affect this certain raven hair and amethyst eye girl. He has already tried talking to her several occasions now, but still no luck. The girl wouldn't even see him as equals – no acknowledgements whatsoever. And its making him insane.
Though, he can proudly say, that his girl isn't that of any other girl. She doesn't swoon, she doesn't ogle, and she doesn't squeal. Heh. Oh, she's a genius by the way. And those eyes, those eyes so cold yet it penetrates his soul deep and naked. She's beautiful. And even if the title Ice Princess is always and ever will be attached to the name Hotaru Imai, he would still gladly choose her; that title wouldn't complete the girl if lost, and it wouldn't be Hotaru Imai the girl he likes.
Ruka almost jumped off his seat when the girl of his affection emerged from the bookshelf in front of his table. Cerulean eyes stuck on her as she walked her gracious way to the next table beside him and sat down with a sigh.
That snapped the boy from day dreaming.
Hotaru just sighed, and that's not a good omen.
He watched the genius stare off to space, and he doesn't know whether it's his imagination or not, but it looked like the girl has something going on inside her mind. Ruka hesitated for a moment, wondering if he should attempt to coax her or something. Well, they are sort of friends through Mikan. Right?
Yeah, whatever. Nice excuse, Ruka. She doesn't need you and you know it.
Another sigh from the girl and Ruka lost it. He opened his eyes and the next thing he knew, he was standing in front of the girl.
Gah! Ruka! What are you doing?
"Can… can I sit with you?" No! I'm going to die of embarrassment!
Hotaru looked up to see the blond boy, Hyuuga's best friend, Nogi Ruka. If she was in any other mood aside from depression and anger, she might have gone and took out her camera to snap away this pretty boy's face. But she's not in the mood. Actually, she's far from it, and this blond, for whatever reason she doesn't care, is just making her more antsy. "What do you want?" She irritated-ly asked, though her face remains as stoic as ever.
"Um… um, can I, can I sit? With… you?" Pathetic! Ruka, you're digging your own grave!
The raven girl sighed. She's not in the mood to talk to anyone, but she's also not in the mood to kill right now, "Whatever."
Ruka's face brightened in an instant and with a foolish grin, he sat one seat away from the girl.
Ruka sighed. It has been an hour already and Hotaru still ignores him. He attempted to try and talk to her the first few minutes, but seeing she wasn't even batting an eyelash to his direction or to whatever he was saying, he just gave up. Maybe she just doesn't want to talk right now.
He took a sideway glance to the girl and saw her staring blankly on an open book.
Really, whatever is eating the her must be one good problem. And whatever that problem is, he knows he's not the one to talk to about it. She's got Mikan, her best friend to talk to. And they're even barely friends!
"Do you…"
Ruka snapped his head to the girl immediately. She just talked, right? It was barely a whisper, but he heard it fine. He looked at her, waiting for her to continue.
"Do you know everything about Hyuuga?" There! She talked again, but, what about Natsume?
He looked at her, speculating, calculating whether this is some serious talk. But he's talking to Hotaru right now, would she joke about anything? No. Of course not. He may have been here for just a short while, but at least that's enough to know that this girl here isn't like any other girl. Ruka took a deep breath before answering, "Of course not."
Hotaru looked at Nogi, wondering if she heard it right. Nogi and Hyuuga are best friends, right? So why wouldn't he know everything there is to know about his own best friend? As if hearing her thoughts, Ruka continued. "There are things that are better off unknown. He has his secrets, and I have mine."
Ruka felt naked under those amethyst eyes, and he secretly gulped. "Why?" She asked. "Wouldn't you want to know?"
"Of course I do. He's my best friend, and I'm his. It's just that," He looked away. "I'm his best friend. If there is anyone out there whom he'd talk to, that would be me. But if he doesn't want to talk about it, I've got no choice but to trust and wait. In time, whenever he's ready, he would talk to me about it. We're best of friends, and that's the very same reason why I don't demand things on him."
As he explained the best of friends relationship with him and Natsume, he thought he just achieved Enlightenment. Ah, that must be it, he thought. She must have some problems with Mikan. Ruka almost laughed. Really, this girl. She's a genius alright, but she's a total novice when it comes to people's relationship.
Hotaru looked back to her opened book. That's right. She's Mikan's best friend, no doubt about that; and for sure, one day when she's ready, she'd talk to her about what she wants to know. Maybe she's not really mad at Mikan for keeping secrets, perhaps she's just jealous seeing her off and happy with other set of friends.
She looked at him once again and wondered, why did she ask him about that? It's not like they're friends or anything, so why? "You better not tell this to anyone."
Ruka laughed nervously as he scratched his cheek. "Talk about what?"
Hotaru 'humphed' and looked back to the book again.
But that's where it all started.
In the silence of the evening, the emergency ring echoed throughout the whole academy, sending panic to all of its accommodators.
"What's happening?" Ruka and Hotaru ran out of the library to see a mass of screaming and running people.
"Fire! There's fire everywhere!" One of those running students screamed his lungs out.
Ruka's face instantly paled, his heart thumped out of its ribcage. This can't be! Are we under attack? So many innocent people, just to drive them out?
"Natsume!" "Mikan!"
The both of them gasped their best friend's name out loud in the dawn of realization. Their best friends need them! Bearing the thought of needing to be beside their best friend's side as soon as possible, they ran out the building to find the person they need to protect.
-:-
-:-
Back to school already?
Lemme give you a teeny bit of a sneak peak on chapter 10:
"Oh, shit." Ruka heard himself uncharacteristically cursed softly when he saw that huge oaf of a wolf hovering a dumbstruck yet still cool Hotaru Imai.
It had been too quick, everything happened in an instant. When he saw the wolf about to attack Hotaru, he found his self damning all rules as he quickly, with unhumane speed, jumped in front of the girl, snarled his fangs out, activated his special ability of controlling animals, and ripped the wolf's throat out of its place.
…
It isn't just a mere crush for the seemingly apathetic girl and it certainly isn't some foolishness like love at first sight. No, he's not in love. At least that's what he believes. He's just merely… attached, for some reason that even he doesn't seem to know or understand. It's instincts, he presume. It's in his blood. Something like an invisible force pulling him towards her.
Throughout the time he's here, he would always find his self looking at that deep amethyst eyes. He'd recognize her smell anywhere from a miles away. He'd know it's her by just her hair. He didn't understand why, and he's not going to start divulging the reason any time soon either. But he knows, he knows that in time, this sort of attachment would grow to something more.
