Just a heads up, this one will probably be a lot more cringe/awkward to read towards the end. Just letting you know, it was definitely awkward to write.
Update: I literally ended up changing maybe three and a half sentences. So no real point in what I did.
BlackDragon829: Truthfully, probably half of these or so won't be that forward. Glad you still liked it though.
shininglegacy22: Thanks again! Hopefully, none of these will be gag chapters. But who knows, I may end up with a few.
"Hello Senpai! C'mon in!" Nagatoro greeted. Her senpai quickly took the offer and stepped out of the snow and into the warm house. Nagatoro had invited him over, and after a lot of thinking, he decided it couldn't hurt to get out of his own house for a while.
"Thanks. It's really coming down out there," the teen offered as he took off his coat and hat. He placed them down on the floor and slipped off his shoes before joining Nagatoro in the kitchen.
"No one else is home again. Everyone's out, and none of us expected the storm to be this bad."
"Yeah, I was a bit surprised myself," Senpai replied, taking another look outside.
"So...you want to go up to my room? What am I saying, of course you do," the girl said, already beginning the inevitable barrage of teases and jokes at his expense.
"May-maybe. But not for that reason," he nervously replied while pressing up on his glasses.
"...What reason were you thinking? I got a new game, and I figured you and I could give the two player mode a try," Nagatoro deadpanned.
He had fallen for the classic misdirect yet again.
"Oh. That...that sounds nice."
"But first, what would you like to eat? Mom's been pushing leftovers recently, which are still really good." Nagatoro pulled half a dozen plastic containers from the fridge and opened them, revealing all sorts of foods.
"I'll just fill a plate after you, if that's okay."
The girl passed him a plate before filling her own and putting it in the microwave.
"We also have juices, if you're thirsty," she offered. Two glasses of fruit juice were poured and soon both had steaming plates of food on the table.
"So Senpai, have you been to any other girls' houses yet?"
Naoto promptly choked on his food and almost needed Nagatoro to give him the Heimlich maneuver. Once he stopped gasping for air, he took a long drink of juice.
"That's not, that's not important, is it?" he bashfully replied.
"Maybe. C'mon, finish up so we can start the game!" She quickly shoveled the last of her dinner into her mouth and dropped the dishes in the sink, closely followed by her guest. The two made their way to Nagatoro's room, where she started up the new game.
"Nebula Wars?" Naoto said when the game logo came up.
"Yeah, it looked good, so I thought I'd give it a try," Nagatoro answered. After browsing the characters, Nagatoro chose Dark Vazer and Naoto decided on Flail Wyndu.
"Take this! And this! And this! And this!" Despite her best efforts, Senpai's years of playing games gave him an edge even in a new game, and he was about to win the first match.
Determined not to lose so quickly, the girl resorted to her underhanded methods and prodded Senpai in his side, causing him to giggle and lose focus long enough to lose.
"Come on, you can't keep cheating to win!" he complained once he regained his composure.
"It's not cheating! It's playing smart!" the girl declared, then stuck out her tongue in defiance.
"Whatever. Let's start the next match."
Once again, Naoto took the lead. He knew Nagatoro was going to pull something, so he steeled his nerves and prepared. And, once again, he lost all of his focus when Nagatoro poked him in the side many times in quick succession.
"Wow, you can't fight in the game or in real life," she sneered after taking the win.
"I could fight in the game if you stopped tickling me," the boy retorted.
"Maybe you shouldn't be so ticklish," Nagatoro suggested as she flexed her fingers in a sinister way. Slowly, menacingly, she walked on her knees towards him, still flexing her fingers in a threatening fashion.
"Come on Nagatoro, let's just play the game." He started backing away from her, eventually running into a wall.
"I think I want to play a new game," she whispered. Her face warped with a malicious expression much like the looks she gave when they first met. To say this was not a good sign for him was an understatement. Sooner than he liked, Nagatoro was right in front of him, still reaching out for him. In an attempt to defend himself, he grabbed her wrists.
He still wasn't as strong as her, but the workouts she put him through for the school marathon weren't for naught. With his panic-induced strength, he managed to push her back.
"Hey! When did you-" she began to ask, only to be cut off when both of them fell to the floor. She landed on her back, and her would-have-been victim fell on top of her.
"S-Senpai, you-you can get off me, now," Nagatoro stuttered, already turning as red as him.
"S-s-sorry about that. I didn't mean to," he offered as he frantically pushed himself off of her. The awkward silence that fell over both of them was thankfully broken when Nagatoro's phone bleeped.
"Hmm. Mom and Dad won't be able to make it home tonight. Sis was already spending the night at a friend's place, so that means my brother is the only one who might come home tonight," she muttered after reading and replying to the text.
"I'm not surprised. Look," Naoto replied with a gesture to the window. The snowfall had actually picked up instead of slowing down, and the roads were covered in a foot of snow already.
"Wow, it's like a blizzard out there."
"I don't think I'll be able to make it home if it doesn't stop snowing soon," the boy stated.
"We have a guest room. If you and your parents are okay with it, you can always stay the night," his friend offered.
"I'll ask my mom." He sent a quick message to his parent, and pocket his phone. "C'mon, let's play again. Fair, this time."
A quick "bleh" came from the girl next to him as she stuck out her tongue at him again. After a few rounds, Naoto's phone pinged at the receival of a new text.
"Mom says she understands if I need to stay the night. She's okay with it as long as you are."
"I don't mind. C'mon, I'll show you to the guest room," she replied. The two got up and took a short trip down the hall.
"Here it is. Not much, but it has a bed and the bathroom isn't too far. We don't usually have people staying over, so the room might be a bit dusty."
"It's fine. And thanks, I really didn't want to walk home in that."
"Yeah. You could have turned into a pervert-cicle out there."
"I'm not a pervert!" the boy shouted back.
"Sure you aren't." Nagatoro started running in circles around him while chanting, "Pervert" over and over again.
"Stop it!" he requested, which only seemed to make her more enthusiastic.
"Whatever. Let's just play a few more rounds. Then I'll probably call it a night," Naoto stated while returning to Nagatoro's room.
The girl followed him and eagerly started another game. They had gotten a third of the way through when the lights turned off and the screen went blank.
"Looks like we had a power outage," Nagatoro stated.
"Not just us. I'm guessing a branch fell on a power line over or something." Naoto had taken a look out the window and noticed that the streetlights and nearby houses had also gone pitch black.
"Well, this sucks. What are we supposed to do now?" Nagatoro complained.
"Do you have any board games?"
"I think I have a few. Let me check." The girl dug through her closet, but came out with game of checkers with half the pieces missing and another game that neither knew how to play.
"I guess there's nothing to do other than hope the power comes back on."
"Doesn't your family have a generator?"
"Yeah, but Dad hasn't brought it out yet. He was planning to later this week."
"Well, I have a few cat videos saved on my phone. We could watch those," Senpai suggested, which successfully piqued Nagatoro's interest.
"Sure."
The videos weren't too long, but more than once Nagatoro let out an "aww" when one of the cats did something cute. The last video finished, once again leaving the two with nothing to do.
"It's getting late and kind of cold. I think I'll turn in. Goodnight, Nagatoro," the boy offered before leaving.
"Night, Senpai!"
If he had known he would end up staying the night, Naoto would have brought a set of pajamas. But there was no use in complaining, so he crawled under the sheets in his shirt and jeans and closed his eyes.
Sometime later, he slowly awoke to the sensation of being gently shaken. When his vision cleared, he was greeted by Nagatoro wrapped in a blanket standing next to his bed.
"What's wrong?" he asked. She nervously looked away, and if the lighting was better he would have seen her blush.
"It's really c-c-cold in my r-room. Can I...do you mind...I was wondering..." She wasn't sure how to ask, but he already had a general idea.
"You-you want to share a b-bed?" Naoto asked, starting to shiver himself. Nagatoro shyly nodded.
"Um, I guess? If it's really that cold," he offered bashfully. He skootched over until he was on the far edge of the bed, allowing Nagatoro to somewhat reluctantly slip under the covers, facing away from him.
"Any better?" he asked, earning a quiet, "Uh-huh".
Naoto was mere moments from falling back asleep when he was violently grabbed and dragged to the center of the bed.
"Wha-" he exclaimed, but cut himself off when two arms wrapped around him. He could feel Nagatoro shivering against him, and she pulled him in closer than he already was and tucked her head beneath his chin.
Something in his brain short-circuited, and he was rendered incapable of saying anything. Not that he would have been able to in the first place.
"Sorry, but you're warm," the girl said, and slowly drifted to sleep. Senpai, on the other hand, was wide awake.
For ten minutes he laid there, feeling the outward and inward motion of Nagatoro breathing. He could admit that she too was warm and made the cold night more bearable, but he wouldn't admit it to her, or anyone for that matter. He cautiously draped one arm around her and took note that her shivering had all but stopped. Thanking every god he had known wasn't enough to express how relieved he was that she was too busy sleeping to tease him about the current position the two were in.
He too fell asleep, nowhere near as cold as he was earlier.
By the time he woke up, Nagatoro had already left. But given the sounds of arguing that came from down the hall, she hadn't gotten far before getting a taste of her own medicine. He sat up in the bed and took in the conversation the two were having.
"The power went out and it was really cold last night! Do you have a problem with that?"
"No. And if I didn't know any better, I'd say you didn't either, given that big, goofy grin plastered over your face before you woke up," the older girl he had dubbed "Sis-Toro" remarked.
"Shut up! I was dreaming! That's all!"
"Sure. I bet I know who you were dreaming about."
The argument went on for another five minutes. Eventually, Nagatoro just walked away and went downstairs.
"Well well well, looks like someone was more than just 'interested' in my little sis," the older girl snickered from the doorway.
"It-it wasn't my idea. She started it," he babbled, pressing up against the bridge of his nose out of habit.
"I know. For as much as she calls you creepy and pervy and all that, I can tell you're a nice guy. Although, I wouldn't be against turning off the power next time you visit," she slyly offered before rushing downstairs.
Now alone in the room, he could only contemplate how bad the teasing was going to be in the future. Specifically, the moment he and Nagatoro were left alone by Sis-Toro.
'Was she really grinning?' he asked himself before getting out of the covers, which brought about a quick shaking of is head to clear the thoughts before heading downstairs.
A/N: I guess this one turned out okay. Not the best, but I can live with it. Hope you enjoyed (if it wasn't too weird to read at times). As always, suggestions are always welcome. Have a good day y'all!