Filum Fatalis
Summary: Threads have always been used to sew and patch ruined clothes. In the case of one prideful boy and one gluttonous girl, invisible threads have always been sewing them, patching them, drawing and pulling them close together, no matter how much others have tried to put them apart.
Chapter Twenty-Five: Floreo
A/N: I'm having that sinking feeling you get when the fanfic you have stopped updating for a year (and had just updated recently for the heck of it) gets more reviews than the fanfic you keep on updating every month. I'm thinking of going back to my original fandom if this keeps up... *aimlessly flutters away in the wind*
Also to IlikeNoms, since you kindly asked for my complete playlist for this fic, I'll gladly put it up on my profile. :3 (There're lots of songs, you see. *blink*)
People of different races walked down the grounds of Toukyou Gaikokugo, one of the most prestigious universities in Japan that specialized in foreign studies. Japanese and foreigners alike walked down the campus. Americans, and mostly those who were new in the school (or newly living in Japan themselves), talked amongst other students, professors and staff on which class they will be in. Some of the foreigners were quite tall and had ashen to blond hair, and seeing tall men with such blond hair vaguely reminded her of her fiancé.
Yako was on her phone as she observed the grounds with much interest. The pavilions were much bigger than she expected, and the some of the buildings overwhelmed her at first. They were too huge, and most of them were built with tempered glass of various sizes, so passersby could see clearly what was on the inside of each building.
Yako was smiling as she passed by one of her professors from her earlier class, bowing politely as she walked. Once she passed him by, she talked on her phone once again.
"—and then I almost missed my first class because of the food we bought. Tee hee!"
"Yako, you can't have that anymore. We're college students now. Co-ll-e-ge! We're treading a different path! And I am not there with you to guide you through your insane diet! Same goes for Nougami-san! So please, Yako. Do yourself a favor and curb your binge eating."
"Geez, okay, sorry, Kanae-chan. But really, I'm not binge eating. I can absolutely control myself when it comes to food and—ohmigosh. Kanae, gotta go now. I finally found the campus cafeteria, and they're selling melon bread!"
"Hey, what happened to you saying you can control yourse—"
Yako hung up her phone and made her way to the entrance doors excitedly, taking in the sights and smells Toudai cafeteria has to offer. Food!
Dinner at the Katsuragi house seemed livelier than usual, as Yako kept on talking about her experience in her first day college.
"And then they have this massive lecture room—not a room, really. It's a massive building. And they have this library filled with books on different languages from all over the world and—"
Neuro chewed on his ham as he spoke, "Hm. Can I go there when I don't have any classes? Borrow books, perhaps?"
Yako shook her head, "They don't allow visitors to lend their books. But they do accept visitors who would photocopy their materials within the academy. Also, it's fine if you would just read them there. You just have to present some identification, I think."
Neuro shrugged, "Fine with me. I'd just scan through all the pages in all those books while waiting for you. Easy enough."
"But what about your classes, Neuro? You might still have a class in the afternoon, maybe?" asked Haruka.
"Ah, I'm fine, Haruka-san. I chose my own schedule according to the hours when Yako and I could meet up. I'm free on Friday at noon onwards. I only have four classes in the morning every Friday, you see. I start at seven thirty and finish at noon—they're all majors."
Seiichi drank his cup of green tea and cleared his throat, "You're willing to wait for Yako after that? Her classes every Friday starts at seven and ends at three."
"I have six classes every Friday. It sucks," and Yako pouted at her plate of spaghetti. "By the way, you haven't told me anything about your first day in Soudai. So, how was it? Found anything interesting?"
"The reason why you got the awful schedule every Friday was because the slot you were supposed to pick was already full. I told you to get your enlistment done two weeks before March ended. Did you listen? No. So now you are going to suffer for the whole term no thanks to your laziness. And as for your question earlier, yes, I did found something interesting. There was this professor in Economics class that miscalculated a part of his lesson and so I—"
Yako cut him off with a deadpanned retort, "Let me guess. You corrected him in your own way."
And Neuro smiled at her broadly with his sparkly green eyes of adorable doom, "Bingo! How did you know? Hm. That professor did something unexpected, though. He tried to talk back at me (not many teachers did that to me before), so I did the next best thing I could think of. I—"
"Approached him and whispered something to the poor guy's ear that would most probably result in him taking the largest dump in his underwear for the rest of the term every time he would see you in his class. Or in the corridors," Yako said apathetically.
Neuro blankly smiled at her, "Heh."
Haruka and Seiichi looked at each other quizzically, not quite following what their daughter was talking about.
The rest of the week flew by quickly, and by Saturday, Yako found herself alone with Neuro. Again.
"Mother and Father are away on work again. They'll be back by next Monday," Yako said, reading on the little sticky note on the fridge.
"Why is Sonobe-san always with your mother again?"
"Because everything my mother touches turns into an inedible mess and she needs Sonobe-san to fix things up, remember? Being a freelance writer sometimes has its downside."
Neuro drank down a can of iced coffee from the fridge and hummed, "Well, at least we have some time alone. We need a bath to relax." As though for emphasis, he popped open the first three buttons of his shirt. Yako sighed as he crushed the can in his hand and threw it in the trash bin, and he jogged up the stairs, hollering for her to hurry up.
Once he had everything prepared, Neuro stripped down to nothing and immersed himself in the tub of warm water, laying his arms lazily on the rims as he waited for Yako to come up. He left the bathroom door wide open—not like anyone other than her would enter, anyway.
When Yako entered the bathroom, the first thing she saw was the tub filled with bubbles covering Neuro.
"You used up all of my strawberry bubble bath soap, didn't you."
Neuro looked at her with his usual superior air, and those lips curled in his attractive, lopsided smile. "I couldn't find anything labeled with Irish spring on it, so I used your bubble bath soap instead. Works well, I must say. It's like I'm being bathed in your scent."
"Geh. Hearing you say that gives me goose bumps. It's creepy."
Neuro laughed, and he watched her lock the door and start to undress. "You could have waited for me to take a shower, at least. Sheesh, you want me to go in there with dirt all over me," he heard her say. Neuro grinned.
"I could wash your back while you're in here. That's what the bubbles are for."
Yako giggled and stepped in the tub, "Can I turn on the shower for a minute? It won't take long. I just need a quick rinse."
"And your filth will then be sliding in the bath I put so much effort in arranging," he retorted, silently admiring the view from where he was leaning. "Though, I don't really see the bad thing in seeing you do it. Go on, turn on the shower."
"Eeh—from that look alone, I can tell you're enjoying yourself from there. Having pervy thoughts, Mister Possessive?" and she gave him a knowing grin as she turned her back on him and turned on the shower to its warmest setting.
Neuro opted not to reply. Instead, he merely stretched out his legs wider and inclined his head more comfortably in the quite spacious tub, giving Yako more room around her feet.
His half-lidded emerald eyes hungrily took in her form that was now being gradually doused in water. Staring at her soaked hair, to her nape, to her slender shoulders, to her arms, to the curve of her shapely back, to her slim waist, to her comely hips, to her pleasingly plump buttocks, all the way to her nice thighs and legs—his eyes devoured it all. Every tiny detail of her body, every miniscule flaw and mark her skin had (like the tiny mole under her left butt cheek), he memorized and stored them all in his vast mind.
Oh, and he seemed to be very pleased at how she always kept herself perfectly shaved in one particular area.
And he could already map it out in his hindsight. When she moved, her bottom would bob just the slightest, and it would give him a perfect view of her tiny, little pink pearl. He licked his lips.
She's so tiny.
She shifted just the slightest, and her bottom shook lightly just as he predicted. He gulped, and before he could stop himself, Neuro was already on his knees, holding Yako's hipbones and giving desperate, open-mouthed kisses on the small of her back. He felt her jerk and she let out a small yelp, but she made no move to get away from him—
—not like that would stop him, anyway.
Yako calmed down and sighed, and let him have his way. Her knees suddenly felt like melting in his touch—the low growls she kept on hearing from him made her weak.
She heard him whisper her name, and his breath tickled her skin. She suppressed a gasp as his arms hugged her thighs and nibbled on her bottom. A dart of a tongue licked the curve of her supple flesh, and his just-trimmed nails raked on her inner thighs, leaving red streaks in their wake. Her head tilted back at the delicious act, letting the stream of water wet her now heated and flushed skin.
Once she had turned off the shower, she detached herself from him, and looked at those charming ethereal green eyes—from where she was standing, he seemed to look like a submissive partner. The thought made her laugh.
Neuro ignored her odd reaction, and hugged her knees once more, kissing her stomach this time, closing his eyes as he did so.
She slowly slid her body into the tub of bubbles and water; all the while, Neuro's lips remained on her dewy skin. She kissed him on the forehead, her hands touching his flushed face, and soon, she found herself being slowly kissed by him. A new pacing for Yako—his kisses were different than usual.
When he pulled away from her moist lips, his warm green eyes looked at her, those expressive orbs swirled in mischief as he whispered to her, "We'll take it slow for the rest of the night. I think a change of pace is good every now and then, don't you think?"
Yako could only absently nod at his words, her thoughts swirling at what he was really thinking.
Damp eyelashes closed as his deft hands kneaded her fleshy buttocks and trailed kisses down her neck, just how she liked it. Her shaky hands knotted in his wet hair, keeping his lips firmly placed upon her jugular as she aimlessly rubbed her hips towards his naked crotch.
A strangled gasp escaped her moist lips as she felt his hardness prodding on her stomach—she pulled away from him, pushed Neuro to his side of the tub, and mashed her lips to his. Hands roamed wherever they could, both wanting to feel more of that heated sensation burning within them—both moaning in their hungry kisses. Yako rolled her hips on his obvious stiffness in a very agile manner, and Neuro, for once, didn't make a move to stop her brash act. In fact, he reciprocated her unspoken invitation, as he slowly bucked his hips to hers. The water and bubbles sloshed around them as they performed their private little dance. He slid his member along her tiny and wet slit, teasing her with a knowing smirk as he licked her ear.
Neuro wouldn't penetrate her. Not now. Not until they were husband and wife—that's what he promised her a long time ago. Yet even so, he kept on dangling the tempting forbidden fruit in front of Yako's greedy eyes. Those eyes that have always been needy for his amorous touch and—
—oh.
Yako was silent now, save for the breathless gasps and occasional hisses her sinful mouth made as she tilted her head back, her lips shaped in a little circle as she panted out Neuro's name. Her right hand clutched itself loosely on her damp and currently wild-looking locks as her nether regions traced the outline of his manhood.
Her hips lazily swayed over his as Neuro eyed her with much amusement. Her honey-brown eyes were now glazed over as her tender and teasing flesh caressed his hard and erect one. Seeing that Yako was too absorbed in blindly feeling his erection, Neuro took it as a chance to hardly pinch her teats, and Yako's back arched as she cried out and held onto his hands, placing them on her breasts firmly as she eyed him with her bedroom eyes.
"More," she simply said. And Neuro looked at his own hands that were stuck in between her hands and her soft breasts. He felt something twitching in between his legs, and he willed the feeling to ebb for now.
Control—he had always been very good at it.
His large hands softly squeezed her tender globes of flesh, and seeing Yako closing her eyes and looking quite pleased, he did it again, experimenting with the various amounts of pressure his fingers could put on her lovely mounds.
All the while, her slow hip-rolling never ceased. As she guided Neuro's hands on how to apply firm pressure on her breasts just the way she wanted it, she kept on teasing the tip of Neuro's member with her vulva. Her heart raced from what they were doing—and that thing that had been teasing her. It was so close yet so far...!
She grunted and removed his hands from her chest, and she stood on her knees and promptly smothered Neuro's face with her bosom—
—just how he loved it.
She could hear him muffling incoherent sounds, and when he gasped for a lungful of air, she saw his green eyes becoming much darker than earlier as he ceaselessly flicked his tongue on her attention-seeking teat. He had been drooling as he was playing with her breasts—
Yako shivered in delight. The power she held over him was divine.
His hands then reached out to her butt cheeks, squeezing them roughly, and even before Yako said it, he was already spanking her hard.
The water was starting to get lukewarm, but neither of them cared. Neuro quickly held Yako and shifted her position, so her back was now pressed flush against his torso, and he deftly grabbed her breasts and squished them in his fingers, making sure he was pinching her quite small and erect nipples from time to time.
She craned her neck and kissed him softly.
Their playtime had always been rough, though this time, Neuro was willing to tug and pull the borderline between rough and slow.
Not long after, he took her out of the tub and placed her in front of the foggy mirror, and used his arm to swipe away the fog blocking his vision of Yako.
"Look at you. Look at us."
She did just as so, and she was slightly surprised by their flushed and disheveled appearance. Neuro's face held a faint pinkish tinge, and his hair looked like he just woke up. Those half-lidded eyes of his seemed carnal, and his long and damp lashes graced her blushing cheeks with butterfly kisses trailing down to her collarbone.
His arms were wrapped around her waist and shoulders tightly, just in case she might feel faint. Yako could make out the stray droplets of water dripping down their cooling bodies.
"Don't close your eyes," she heard him whisper, and she watched as Neuro dip his head in the juncture between her shoulder and neck, sucking on it audibly.
She bit her lip at the sight of how wanton her face looked like right now, and how Neuro looked so damned hot—
Neuro's fingers slid down her slick body as he knelt behind her. "Just look at the mirror and don't close your eyes," he commanded. And without warning, he languidly licked her dripping entrance.
Yako looked at her reflection on the mirror, and saw her glassy eyes widened as he sucked on her.
Once they have finished with their hour and a half bath time, Neuro literally dragged a still fully naked (and completely submissive) Yako to her bed—a usual occurrence between them.
"You're quiet tonight, kitten. That's unusual," he muttered as he locked the door.
"I'm thinking of what you're going to do to me. I like what you did to me earlier. The part where you licked me down there again," said Yako coyly with her eyes directed at his clothed and obvious stiffness. She made no effort to make herself look a bit presentable on her own bed. Her feet were dangling off the bed, her hair was still in a damp mess from the bath earlier, not to mention she was still stark naked, her body completely exposed for Neuro to see.
She was being closely observed by a pair of startling green eyes.
"We're all alone in this house, kitty. And we have all the time we want."
Yako watched as he crawled all over her on all fours, his feral eyes never leaving hers.
They stared at each other for a moment, and he softly kissed her lips once, twice, thrice, until she reciprocated with fervor. Seeing Neuro's gentle side had never been felt by her when it came to their nocturnal rituals, but—
"Yako, I think you like being kissed slowly—see? I can feel you getting soaked already. Much wetter than the usual. You like being rubbed, right? How about a slower rub?"
"Why are you doing this?" she asked, her eyes still closed and her neck exposed to his soft bites.
"You seem to be fretting over the fact that there's not enough time for us to spend now that we're in different schools, right? Let's just," he held her tight, and she returned the gesture with a few scratches on his back, "take our time whenever we can, making sure our intimacy never goes away. What do you think?" And he gave her a hickey on her right shoulder.
She let out a breathless gasp as he licked and nibbled on her earlobe, entwining her legs around his waist as he ground his clothed crotch to her naked one.
Her back arched towards him as she fervently sucked on his ever skillful tongue. Mirroring her actions, he sucked on her tongue and lower lip, cupping her breast as he did so.
"A long night it's going to be, Yako," Neuro whispered haughtily to her ear, and he purposefully nudged his stiffness to the curve of her slender stomach.
Her toes curled and her teeth bit on her swollen lips—feeling that clothed temptation alone was enough to make her come.
He knows how to drive me crazy.
At four o'clock in the morning, Neuro's phone beeped, and being the light sleeper that he was, he groaned and blindly searched for his phone that was on top of Yako's dresser. He squinted at the sudden white light blinding his sleepy eyes, and when he checked who it was, he shrugged it off and put his phone back on the dresser.
"One new mail from Miyasako", the screen read.
Morning light filled Yako's room, rudely waking up Neuro in the process. He groaned and turned over to Yako's side, burying his face behind her locks as he held her, and he gruffly woke her up with muffled words. She grumbled on her pillow as she bunched up the blankets over her naked body, refusing to face him as she was still sleepy, "Neuro, it's Sunday... Let me sleep in, at least..." And she slumbered once more.
Neuro sighed and pondered if he should get up and eat breakfast, or just stay in bed with her. Looking at Yako's naked form that was loosely draped in blankets—well—
—he decided to just stay in bed as well. Those tempting legs of hers might be getting cold from being exposed, anyway.
His phone then blared that familiar loud ring, signaling that someone was near the house.
The sleep suddenly left his body as he cursed and tried to ignore that damned noise—
—and realization dawned on him as he remembered why his phone was blaring like that.
Suddenly sitting up and getting his Swiss knife from the bottom of Yako's drawer, he got up and looked at the screen on his phone and groaned.
"Front door. Again. Can't they think of entering anywhere else?"
He put on his discarded button-down shirt and a pair of jeans at the foot of the bed as he took his noisy phone and headed for the door. With one last look at Yako, still unbelievably sleeping like a log after all that noise, he sighed and locked the door on his way out.
Rushing down the stairs with his bare feet, and wincing as his feet met cold tiles on near the front door, he looked at his phone one more time and shut it off, his Swiss knife clenched tightly in his hand as he opened the door slowly.
"Yo, Nougami! Long time no see! Can we come in?"
Hayasaka Hisanori. Should have known.
Neuro muttered something under his breath and rubbed his eye. Still hidden behind the door, he quietly sheathed his Swiss knife and put it in his pocket. "What are you doing here so early?" he asked, his voice still gruff, and he opened the door wider, only to see Mutsuki, Kanae and Shinobu greeting him with smiles—
—only, Kanae's greeting turned to screams as she glimpsed at Neuro's lean and decently toned half-naked body that was covered in long, reddish pink scratches.
She hurriedly turned her back and hid her face in her hands, bowing and apologizing to no end. Neuro, merely blinking at her reaction, looked down at the numerous red streaks on his own torso, and he shrugged nonchalantly as he simply buttoned his shirt and zipped up his jeans. Good thing he slept with his boxers on.
"K-Katsuragi did all of that... again?" Yukinori asked, his eyes wide and his finger pointed at Neuro's apathetic face.
Neuro smiled and yawned as he simply let them in, uttering a vague response of "She could be a wild tigress if you push her buttons hard enough" as he guided them to the living room.
"I'll let Yako know you're all here," he deadpanned, and the pattering of footsteps could be heard as Neuro went up the stairs.
"Those two really are insatiable. That lucky bastard... Did you see those love bites and bruises on his neck?" Yukinori whispered to a still wide-eyed Shinobu, "I bet even his back is riddled with even more scratches from her nails."
Shinobu could only dumbly nod, still speechless. The little teen smiled at Yukinori, "At least nee-chan is satisfied with Neuro-nii's ways."
Kanae gasped, her mind still reeling with the image of a (deliciously, drool-worthy) half-naked and sleepy-eyed Neuro. "M-Mucchan! Don't say such things!"
In Yako's room, the girl remained sleeping soundly still, and as much as Neuro wanted to lie in bed all day and look at her tempting body, he had no choice but to wake her up—
—in his own way, of course.
Yako didn't know what was all over her face when she was woken up by a happy-looking Neuro. She then wordlessly got up and dressed up as decently as she could. Once she thought everything looked fine, she kissed Neuro on the cheek as her morning greeting and went downstairs to greet everyone, leaving Neuro sitting on the bed, blankly smiling as he now toyed with the permanent sharpie in his left hand.
"Good thing the stupid slug didn't even look at the mirror."
Following Yako downstairs still with his blank smile on, he muffled his laugh as he heard Yako's wails and the laughter of the others.
"Something the matter, piggy?" he asked, his blank smile still on his face as he watched Yako angrily pointing a shaking finger at him.
"What did you do to my face, you asshole!"
"It says 'Hippo-Piggy' on your forehead. So people will know what you really are!" and Neuro put on his faux innocent face.
From the couch, Yukinori guffawed while Kanae tried not to laugh.
Pictures were laid out on Yako's bed, and she smiled upon looking at them—each shot was taken in various parts of their high school. Earlier, Yukinori had given her and Neuro their personal copies of their high school pictures. It was one of the reasons that Neuro had received a message from Mutsuki this morning—to notify him that they were coming to the Katsuragi residence.
Apparently, the younger Hayasaka had a complete collection of every student in school, along with every event since they started senior high. Being the younger brother of the school's principal really had its perks.
She giggled as she took out one picture from the pile to her left, "Neuro, look! This is us during the Sports Festival!"
Neuro came over to where Yako was, and he smiled upon seeing himself in the picture. It was taken on the first day of the Sports Festival in their junior year, and Neuro, donned in their PE uniform, was heaving Yako on his shoulders—both of them were preparing for the kibasen, and Mutsuki had taken the shot.
"How about this one? The one where we had whipped cream on our faces?"
And Yako laughed as she took the picture from Neuro's hand. That shot was taken in their Home Economics class, and their assignment was to bake a Black Forest cake. And it had been a messy one.
Yako looked at another picture, and she giggled, "Hey, this was on Valentine's Day when we jumped off the window! How did anyone get a hold of this?" In the shot, Neuro and Yako were seen hugging as they jumped off to the trampoline below.
Neuro chuckled, "I think the little shrimp took that one. She was the one who took the first jump, remember?"
Yako blinked and looked at the picture thoughtfully, "You think? But Yukinori-san was also there below and—oh wow. This one was taken on the day after we saw the results of our uni exams! You did nothing but to hug me the whole day that time!"
"That's because I was feeling proud of you that day. To think that a lowly and squishy bug such as you would get to pass the exams from a revered school like Tokyo Uni—that was just pure joy!"
"You didn't have to mask your compliments with insulting me like I'm an insignificant bug."
"Heh."
Yako pouted still, a bit miffed at being called a bug (again), though he made it up by kissing her on the forehead.
She then glanced at an isolated little envelope that was placed at the bottom of the other pile of pictures from her right. On the white envelope was a note, handwritten by Mutsuki. "'For nee-chan and Neuro-nii', it says," Yako looked questioningly at Neuro, and he shrugged.
"Open it, then."
She did just as so, and a picture, lying faced down, slid out to her palm. Another note was neatly written on the top right-hand corner, 'Through the language of flowers, you will know what he means.'
Yako turned it over, and a smile instantly bloomed on her face.
In the picture was a cherry blossom tree in full bloom, and beneath it was a smiling Neuro, standing in front of an equally smiling Yako, both of who were facing away from the camera. In her hands was a large bouquet of various flowers tied with a red ribbon, and knotted near the edge of that ribbon was an intricate-looking ring that Yako was quite familiar with.
"This was taken on the day you proposed to me... on White Day two years ago," and Yako couldn't contain her joy as she then kissed Neuro on his cheek.
"I see she had been spying on us that day," Neuro mumbled, his grin mimicking the one that he had in the picture.
"'Hanakotoba', Mutsuki-tan said in the note—did she mean the flowers you gave me that day?"
He shrugged, his grin still in place as he looked at her with pride, "Maybe."
Yako puffed her cheeks at him, "You know something that I don't, do you. I can see it in that smarmy smile of yours."
He showed her his fanged smile. She showed him a lopsided smirk.
"The language of flowers could be interpreted in different ways depending on which country you are in, right?"
Neuro merely raised his eyebrows at her, his expression still amused at where their conversation was going. Yako continued talking.
"Since we are in Japan, might as well think of what these flowers mean in Japanese and—don't laugh, dummy! I'm going to figure out what you meant to say that day. You never told me what those flowers mean," and she pouted at him as she made her way over to her laptop and turned it on.
"What are you doing?"
"Finding what all these flowers mean."
And Neuro grinned widely, "Good luck finding their meaning."
Yako spent all morning browsing the net for the meaning of each flower in the bouquet she held in the picture. Neuro had never once told her what they meant, he refused to tell it, and Yako later on forgot about it. She had never been much of a fan about the flower language.
But Mutsuki-tan said in her note that I'll find what Neuro means judging from the flowers.
She glanced at the clock at the bottom of her screen—it was nearing noon. She glanced at Neuro, and he was now reading a book—with that calm smile on his face.
"Found their meanings yet?" he asked, his lips quirking into that familiar little grin as he turned a page of his book.
Yako squinted at him, her lips still jutted in a minute pout, "I still have three more to go."
Neuro smiled, and he looked at her, "Be sure not to overfry your lonely brain cell, worm."
"Hmph," and she turned her back on him, puffing her cheeks as she wrote another flower's name that was included in the bouquet. "Let's see... carnation..."
Upon hearing her mumbling that flower's name, Neuro looked at her with fondness reflecting through his onyx-jade eyes.
It was nearing two in the afternoon when Yako finished her research, and she was fascinated at what she found.
Looking back at her bed, Neuro was on his back, fast asleep—taking a quick nap, perhaps—and Yako smiled at she looked at the scribbles and notes she had written on a piece of paper.
She bit her lip, silently debating whether to wake him up or not. Tapping her foot twice, she sighed and stood up and made her way back to the still sleeping Neuro, admiring the way his long lashes kissed his face. She smiled, and placed a kiss upon his forehead. She put her little notepad on the bed, and she laid down with him, smiling as she draped her arm over him. And just as Yako expected, Neuro stirred and groaned out her name, smiling as his striking green eyes opened.
Yako beamed and gave him an Eskimo kiss.
"What was that for?" His voice sounded a bit gruff as he gave her a little smile and a kiss on her forehead.
"For awkwardly and secretly telling me you love me," she said with a coy smile, "I finally found out what you wanted to say to me that day."
Neuro's lips curled in a little smirk, his eyebrow arched at her with much amusement as he idly tucked a stray lock of her hair behind her ear, "Hmm—well, let's hear it. Tell me what I wanted to say to you that day."
A tinge of pink graced Yako's cheeks as Neuro's hand rested lightly on the side of her head. She cleared her throat and took the note lying beside her, those honey-brown eyes of hers running over the neat scrawls on the parchment one last time before glancing at Neuro's still beguiled expression—and she quickly sat upright, with her feet serving as her temporary cushion as she read aloud while inwardly covering her face in embarrassment.
"First. The bouquet was given to me, arranged in a specific manner—and this—this manner reflects the way our lives became interwoven since that day."
Neuro nodded, smiling and silently urging her to continue.
"Second... The flowers were arranged—based on the feelings we felt when we first met."
A tight-lipped smile graced Neuro's features, and he barely nodded as he eyed her with what she could only assume as—
"Hydrangea, the symbol of pride—it was how I viewed you on the first day that we met. Always making fun of me and biting my forehead and bending my fingers." As Yako spoke, her cheeks were becoming puffier as she was close to pouting from remembering their early days of being together.
Batting his long lashes as he looked at the expression on his little kitten's face, his amused smile remained in place.
"White camellia—'waiting', it means. You have," she paused and took a deep breath, and she felt her blood rushing to her cheeks as she spoke, "you have always waited for me during those early days. Every day after school, beneath the large wisteria tree near the school gates, you would always wait for me to finish with my cleaning duty, and you would always offer yourself to walk me home, even though I gave no thought on where you lived that time, or if I was being a bother if you had plans." Yako looked away from him, feeling guilty for her past thoughtless actions.
Neuro huffed, eyeing her with mirth, "Damn right you were thoughtless. Just shows how much of a worm-brain you are," and he blankly smiled at her.
Yako harrumphed and she glanced at the next flower on the list, ignoring his thorny insult. "White anemone, the symbol of sincerity—um, I—don't really want to say this (so embarrassing)."
Neuro barked a laugh, a pair of crow's feet crinkling the edges of his eyes. And he cleared his throat and sat up straight, mimicking Yako's sitting position, "Let me say it for the sake of your spinelessness, then. You're too embarrassed to admit it, that I—your sole and impossibly generous master, your sole and peerless hot-blooded lover, and your ridiculously handsome, extremely intelligent and your wholeheartedly dedicated husband-to-be—am completely and zealously sincere in all the times that I walked you home since we were seven."
As Neuro was speaking, a full-blown laugh erupted from Yako, her cheeks hurting so much from laughter. A mirth-filled tear fell from her eye, "Wh-what's with all those ridiculously unnecessary superlatives!" And she tried to say something more, but her soundless laughter kept her from saying anything else even as Neuro inched closer to her face, mirroring her wide smile with his own fanged one. He laughed as he kissed her pinkish and numbing cheek, and the sound of their combined laughter bounced off the walls as Neuro hugged her, both of them still laughing until they fell back on the bed as the wind was inevitably knocked out of their heaving lungs.
"Y-you need a pair of glasses for saying such things, haha—"
And Neuro rolled over her and straddled her still laughing form—and he tickled her senseless.
Yako tried to let out the word 'stop', though she had only gotten to the first syllable before Neuro's fingers of doom attacked her aching stomach.
He stopped slowly once he knew Yako was completely out of breath, and beads of sweat and tears started to appear on her reddened face, her wide, goofy grin still in place as she grasped his hands to keep him from tickling her further.
After a few more minutes of chuckling, Neuro gave in and heaved his weight on Yako, the latter sighing contentedly as he did so.
"So... yeah. As I was saying—" and minute giggles flowed from her lips as Neuro idly toyed with her now mussed up hair with quiet interest. Neuro hummed, that wide grin he had a few minutes back now returning to its previously calm smile, and she returned the favor by idly fiddling with his black fringe, and she closed her eyes when he kissed her lips chastely.
"Let me fill up the details of the flowers I chose for the slow little sow, 'mkay?" and he cooed as he mumbled to her ear. "The daisy symbolizes faith—faith that I could still see you after those worthless scumbags tried to take you away from me."
Yako clamped her lips, feeling a bit flustered. "Um, next is peony, the symbol of bravery, though I fail to see why you chose it—"
"It's because you were brave to fight those full-grown men with only your teeth and feet."
"You taught me how to fight, dummy."
Neuro laughed, "Of course I did. Now, next is an aster tataricus—a symbol of remembrance. I think you know very well why I chose that."
She wrapped her arms around his nape, smiling sadly, "That incident changed everything between us. You—purposely forced yourself into my life just to make sure that I will be safe and..."
"'And'?"
A shy smile and a mumbled garble of words were heard.
"I didn't hear it, moldy."
Yako sighed and spoke louder, "Which brings me to the next flower—the daffodil, for respect."
He smiled, and he placed his forehead on hers, closing his eyes as he slowly rubbed his thumb on her cheek, "I hold a high level of respect for you, believe it or not. It's because of you that I experienced things I wouldn't have done if you didn't bump into me when we met. It's also one of the reasons why the last four were entwined at the branches. Zinnia for loyalty. Azalea for patience."
The tips of their noses touched, Yako's voice a bare whisper, "A white carnation for marriage engagement."
Neuro's lips hovered above hers, his hand winding its way to the back of her head, "And a forget-me-not for true love."
And a tear fell from Yako's eye as he kissed her chastely, and she broke the kiss with a silent sigh. "Eleven flowers—eleven flowers representing the feelings you felt and..."
He kissed her forehead, his lips lingering there as he whispered, "Eleven flowers representing the day of the incident that changed us."
She clutched onto his back, holding him tight as she buried her face in the crook of his neck, "The eleventh of May, was it...?" Another tear followed, and another, until tears filled her vision as she shook uncontrollably in his tight hold, distant yet clear memories resurfaced in her mind's eye as she spoke, "Y-you were completely shaken that day and you refused to let go of me even if we went to the police station that day to report what happened and—and you even bit the arm of the officer that tried to pry me away from you." A choked laugh escaped from her lips upon recalling that specific moment, "And after that, I apologized for the officers—and they later on accompanied us home. Well, they, plus you, accompanied me home, to be precise. Only Sonobe-san and Mother were home that day. I remember you distancing away from me when I stood on the porch, refusing to acknowledge yourself as always since you first walked me home. You simply stood near the officer that you bit—and when the door opened and I turned around to introduce you to my mother, you were already gone."
Neuro merely held her tightly still and smiled sadly as she openly recalled the events of that day. He considered it his worst day ever—and also his best.
He heard her sniffle once more, and he idly patted her head as she spoke, "The day after the incident, you refused to leave me alone—even when I go to the toilet, you'd just stand near the entrance, and you would yell and panic if I didn't reach your one-minute-limit. Always thinking that something will happen to me... It became your worst fear. And since the first day that you entered this house, you vowed to me that you will always sleep next to me like a loyal husband would to his wife—I... I didn't understand it that time, thinking that you were only joking. But as time wore on, the times you stayed over became more frequent, and it finally became the most normal thing we would do together. I didn't give much thought into it until we turned 12—we were having dinner with my parents that time. Father was covering Mother's eyes with his hands just as Sonobe-san laid out a huge cake in front of her."
Neuro hummed, his smile growing a tad wider at the memory.
"It was their wedding anniversary. And I remember your expression that night—a completely clueless expression was written all over your face even when Mother and Father explained it to you slowly. Did you remember the exact words you said that night?"
"'Why is it that Haruka-san and Seiichi-san celebrate such a thing every year? Is that the best thing in the world?' I said."
Yako nodded, and a few more tears slipped from her eyes as she stared at the ceiling, "Yes—you asked that question that sounded so strange from my perspective. And I remember pointing my finger at you and commanding you to kneel and apologize for being rude to my parents. And then... you said the words that made my heart clench every time I hear them in my head—"
"'I've never seen my parents hug each other or kiss each other when one of them goes out. I don't recall any day they celebrate this weird occasion at all—though from the movies I've seen before, couples celebrate it' was what I said."
"...That time, I realized how much loneliness you had been through in your own house. Not knowing what a parents' anniversary means. Not even knowing what a hug should really feel like because you said that you were never hugged by your own parents. So I did what I thought I had to do."
Neuro chuckled, and he rolled over and faced her with that same wide smile, "You taught me how to hug."
Yako giggled as she looked at him, wiping another tear from her eye, "I did it awkwardly, too. I remember the first time I taught you how to hug—"
"You looked like a bumpy and bruised strawberry."
Yako puffed her cheeks, "Hmph. Anyway. The first thing I did was to demonstrate it to you in my room for privacy's sake—"
"And I felt your barren chest."
"Shut up. Don't look at me with that blank smile while I'm trying to recall things here. Anyway. I was just standing there with my arms around you, and you were standing in front of me like a stiff twig. When I told you to hug me back, you said you couldn't because your arms were trapped."
"And you looked like a red pepper when you released my poor arms and you repeated the process."
"And you were doing it awkwardly at first, too—your arms were too loose and you were hovering your hands on my back. When I told you that you were doing it wrong, you asked me how I could do such a thing. And then I said, 'Think of what you felt that day when you saw me in that large plastic bag' and you suddenly had this… shocked, petrified look on your face that I thought I pushed you too far by mentioning that and—you did the thing I least expected you to do."
Silence reigned in the room, the hum of the laptop served as their background noise.
"You suddenly hugged me tight. A bit too tight—so tight that I thought you were trying to crunch my bones. And I felt you shaking. That was the night I told you that that is how you should feel when hugging someone important to you."
"And it became my habit around you since then."
She laughed, "And I remember a week after that hugging lesson, you read a book about human behavior and told me that—"
"'I should hug you more because it says here that hugging brings many benefits to a person.'"
"And since then you hugged me more frequently, from once a week to twice every three days to once every day. They were quick hugs back then. Then it became twice every day, then it became thrice, until you grew accustomed to hugging me so much that it became your everyday habit—trying to surprise me every time you pop up behind me and give me your daily dose of quick hugs. Then you tried giving me longer hugs daily, even in our sleep. At one point you told me that you hated going home to your own house because I wasn't there. Hearing that made me happy for some reason and—and I guess that... was the time that I started to have feelings for you."
Neuro smiled and inched closer to her as he laid his leg over hers and he held her tight, "So it was all thanks to that awkward hugging night that I came to be what I am now."
"I guess. It was worth it, huh? You told me you once read that hugs save lives. Does that mean we've saved each other's lives many times since we awkwardly hugged that night?"
He shrugged and closed his eyes, smiling as he spoke, "I guess?"
And they laughed and kissed. "I guess this means Neuro is evolving?" Yako jokingly asked.
"Evolving? Evolving how?"
"Evolving in a way that you couldn't have done if you hadn't met me. If we didn't meet, you might have still been blind in the feeling of being embraced and loved. If we didn't meet, you might have still been that cold person that you really hate to be—still living behind the large and icy walls without feeling emotions. Those flowers you gave me that day—they symbolize your whole heart, your deeply hidden feelings that have been bottled up inside you; feelings that you didn't know you possess. And... I think the reason you never wanted to tell me what the flowers mean was because you think that I will think of you as weak, right?"
Neuro didn't speak, and opted to silently smile instead as he pulled her close to his chest, burying his nose in her hair as he sighed contentedly.
And a lone thought echoed in his mind as he giddily smiled like an overjoyed child.
When did I realize that I have fallen madly for this girl?
Night had fallen by the time Neuro woke up. Glancing at the digital clock, it was nearing eight. We fell asleep?
He looked at Yako, still stupidly smiling while sleeping, and he suddenly had the urge to flick her nose just to give him some amusement, though he held back. Green eyes glanced at Yako's computer, which was still turned on. He went over to the desk and turned it off immediately, mumbling something about wasting electricity and 'thoughtless hippos'.
He pondered over the time, and glanced at the still sleeping Yako, and he felt his stomach rumbling.
He groaned. We didn't eat lunch. And it's night.
Deciding to let her sleep for now, he went over to her and mumbled something to her ear as he kissed her temple. And he walked out of the room to make dinner—for once.
Once he was in the kitchen, he quickly whipped up a plethora of ingredients he found in the fridge. A sealed pack of squids, a small bag of shrimps, a pack of crab sticks, some fatty tuna—Oh, she loves these—a plastic of oysters, five strips of raw beef, a container filled with soba, a small container of narutomaki, a box of leftover bento, pickled plums in a jar, cucumbers, some lettuce, potatoes, tomatoes, green onion, a cup of natto beans (which he threw away with no hesitation), a small bottle of anchovies, four eggs and a small box of mochi.
"That should do it. Now—condiments."
Mirin, soy sauce, ketchup, vinegar, hot sauce and salt.
He laid everything out on the counter, and he bit his inner cheek as he eyed the food with his hands on his hips.
And he grinned.
Yako woke up at nine o'clock, and when she saw that Neuro wasn't beside her, she immediately checked everywhere.
Neuro's sense of paranoia had passed on to her, it seemed.
A flurry of steps was heard from the staircase, and from the kitchen, Neuro called out to her.
"Dinner's ready, piggy," he said as he just finished making the preparations, knowing fully well that Yako was now watching him—
—and the table full of food.
"You can cook? I thought you said you don't cook?"
"You sound so surprised. Just because I said I don't cook doesn't mean I can't," and he washed his hands with a small smile as he looked at her. "Since Sonobe-san isn't here tonight, and since you were sleeping with that imbecilic look on your face again, I figured I should cook for tonight because I—or should I say we—are starving like hounds." He clapped once and sat on the chair, "No time for talking. Now, sit, kitty!"
She did as she was told, and when they said their thanks for the food, they ate.
The dishes he made were delicious.
"How did you make these?" Yako asked, her mouth full of rice and squid.
"Don't speak with your mouth full, stupid. The food is easy enough to make. At least I didn't burn the stove."
"Don't remind me of that."
"Heh. Oh right. Hayasaka called earlier. Something about the new suspect."
"The Indian boy? Vijaya, was it?"
"Yup. He said he wants us to drop by next weekend. He has something to show us. Dunno what that is. He wouldn't tell. He said it will 'make me ballistic'. Could be overreacting."
"...Ballistic. Why would you be ballistic?"
"Who knows. Well, that's all the news he said. Now, eat up."
Yako pondered over Yukinori's words, and shrugged them off as she ate. "Ah. Ootoro!" and she took a fairly large piece of the fatty tuna from the plate in front of her and ate it in one bite, stifling a squeal. "It'sh melting in m'mouth! Om—sho' tasteh!"
Neuro grinned from beside her, chuckling as he looked at her thoroughly pleased expression, "I knew you'd like it."
"And the soba tastes nice—you made it look like ramen, I see. That's rare."
"Yup. Complete with green onion, pieces of beef, shrimps, crab sticks and narutomaki—just how you like them. And there are oysters, too."
"You know my taste so well."
He rolled his eyes playfully, smiling, "Of course I do, stupid."
She smiled in return and ate a part of the soba drenched in hot broth, eating it with a loud slurp. "I shure hop' there'sh still some food left for tomorrow."
Neuro only laughed as he ate a piece of tamagoyaki, nodding as he looked at her chin covered in bits of green onion.
"...What?" Whaat? What's so funny?"
Neuro laughed harder.
Second week in college seemed fine enough. Yako's professors were strict, though. Only a few were kind and lenient and not acting all Spartan-like when in the classroom.
Yako walked down the spacious and glassy hallways, searching for her next classroom.
"Um... Language Structures, it says here... Oh. Here it is." She opened the door and entered the quite noisy room.
Yako gulped at the sight of her new classmates mingling with each other. New people.
She soundlessly closed the door and made her way to the seat at the back, hoping that no one saw her enter the room. I could see everything from here, anyway.
"Hey, all! A fresh face is here!"
Yako suddenly wanted to shrink in her seat and disappear as three men looked at her with dirty stares and lewd smiles.
Neurooo...!
"—and so even after all that, the killer couldn't have performed the crime from that angle, as a huge obstruction was in the way. Therefore, I think your line of reasoning is flawed in that aspect. If the killer might have moved all the way to the other side just to get his kill, chances are he would be seen by people—let's not forget his goal was to keep a low profile at all costs. Which means that, if we were to follow your exact example, the wall would have been shot and not the victim! Also, if he were to shot the victim at close range, then there should have been traces of gunpowder burn on the victim's clothes! But there was none, which means it's sound to say that the victim was shot at an estimated range of two to three meters!"
The students and the professor stared and gaped at Neuro, who was explaining all the details of a murder scenario from the board.
The professor nodded, clearly understanding Neuro's point of view, "Well, that definitely sounds more plausible, Nougami-kun. Um, what say you, sir? Do you have a counter argument?"
The student—A stick thin male who probably has no sense of thought—who had told an impossible theory earlier about the method of killing could only stammer and shake his head, mumbling a short word of apology as he sat down, completely shamefaced.
And a loud roar of applause echoed in the room as Neuro bowed with a smirk.
Lunch break. The only time when Neuro could get some well-deserved peace—away from the stuck-up professors and suck-up students.
He was eating his last piece of onigiri as he sat on one of the benches in front of the library that he intended to go to once he finished with his humble meal when—
"Oh, hello! You're the guy from Theories class earlier, right? The one with the sharp deduction skills?"
A black-haired woman donned in a blazer and white button-down shirt coupled with a gray pencil skirt and a pair of kitten-heeled shoes appeared, and she had almost the same type of hairstyle that Yako had. And Neuro growled in his last bite, trying hard not to throw the onigiri wrappers in the intrusive woman's face. "Yeah? So?" Can't you see I'm eating and don't want to be bothered?
The troublesome woman sat down on the bench at a decent one-meter distance away from Neuro.
"I was hoping if you could teach me some of your skills! You were completely in control of the class earlier, even the professor was amazed! This is my second course after I took up Culinary Arts! But I feel like I want to try something new so I took up Political Science. Oh, right. I haven't introduced myself—I'm Todoroki Shizuka, nice to meet you!"
Neuro didn't even look at her, not even once, and a dry reply of "Nougami Neuro" was mumbled from his lips.
"'Neuro'? That's a weird name."
His green eyes quickly darted to his left where she sat, and he gave her a cold glare.
"Ah, oh—no, no! I'm sorry, I have the tendency to blurt out things the moment I think of them. Silly me. Um, by the way, about our class for tomorrow, Japanese Constitution, could you give me a few tips to memorize some of them? I mean, the preamble could be hard to memorize word for word and—"
"If you want to memorize, then go to somewhere quiet and study. Don't go around bothering others," and Neuro stood and threw away the wrappers in the bin and made his way to the library, not even sparing Shizuka a glance.
He thought she would leave if he turned away and left, but no—
"Um, Nougami-san, wait!"
Neuro clenched his fist in his pocket, yet he ignored that whining voice.
And surely, the sound of footsteps echoed louder as he made his way to the reception area.
A hand grabbed Neuro's arm, and he was close to growling as he faced Shizuka.
He really wanted to shove his shoe on her face.
"What do you want?"
"Let's study together!"
"What the hell are you talking about, bitch. I study alone. Let go."
"Eh, but that's boring! If you want we could sit together for tomorrow's class—"
The sound of a meowing kitten was heard from Neuro's pocket, and his eyes lit up as he roughly tugged his arm away from the woman's grasp and answered his call.
"Yako? Why did you call? You still have one more class, right? ...you're here? What do you mean you're here? You have no last class for today... Fine, where are y—"
Neuro almost dropped his phone as a thin pair of arms quickly wrapped around his torso. He turned around, and he saw Yako beaming widely at him.
"When did you get here."
"Just now. I figured we could eat some lunch—today was awful."
"So that's why you came here."
"Of course!"
And Neuro chuckled as he put his phone back in his pocket and when Yako thought that he was going to get mad, he promptly squeezed and lifted her as he rubbed his cheeks against her hair and he cooed, "I miss my bolster!"
"N-Neuro, not in public, dummy...! People are staring...!"
"I don't care—I want my bolster and I want her now. So squishy!" And he rubbed his cheek on hers like an overly affectionate cat. Yako could swear Neuro almost purred. She laughed and returned the gesture as well.
All the while, Shizuka stood by, blinking at the seemingly sudden shift of the odd man's behavior. Just seconds ago, he seemed to be in a bad mood, but now...
"Okay, Neuro, you can put me down now—"
"No. You're squishy."
Neuro was definitely in a bad mood just a few minutes prior, Yako supposed. He would only act like this if someone or something pushed him the wrong way.
"Neuro? How about we eat at the udon place for today?" It was a start, distracting him with food. "Or maybe we'd go to the nearest bookstores and buy you something?"
At this, Neuro hummed and stopped squeezing Yako's bones and looked at her. He squinted at her, "Ten books for ten bowls of udon."
Yako beamed, "Deal! Now, put me down."
Surprisingly, Neuro obeyed, and he hurriedly tugged Yako by the collar (she tried not to make a fuss) as he made his way to his van, leaving Shizuka awkwardly standing in the middle of the reception area.
Shizuka puffed her cheeks and stomped as she crossed her arms and fought against yelling out to him. Huffing, she dug into her purse for her phone and called a number.
"Hello? Yes, Sempai! I think I finally found the student you were talking about! He's studying here in Soudai! ...eh—you knew? Oh, right. Of course you knew—haha. Silly me. Anyway, a girl suddenly popped up and seemed to be close to him... Um, about um... A foot smaller than your student. With yellow-orange hair—kind of. And—what? ...oh, she wears strange hairclips. Like teeth. Eh? Fiancée? Um, yeah. Didn't notice if they have rings but I think he called her 'Yako'... Oh, so they're engaged? No wonder they looked so chummy. Well, I'll call you if I get any more updates. Bye, Sempai!"
She ended the call and smirked triumphantly.
Nougami Neuro and Katsuragi Yako, eh...
Personally, I think Shizuka is the most annoying characters in the series. :x