"What can we do now that we have this television?" asked Shigure.
"Wow!!" screamed Momiji. "Look at all the video tapes that are in this drawer!!"
"Well, I guess we could watch video tapes!" said Ayame.
"What tapes are these?" wondered Tohru. "All they have is a bunch of dates on them all the way from 1975 to 1989!!"
In case you're confused, we'll explain it to you. The show takes place in 1999 because that's the year of Momiji's New Year's Dance. Now, this story takes place ten years earlier so it's 1989. Get it? Good!
"Oh, these are the New Year's Dances." Said Shigure, pushing all the kids aside as if he was parting the sea like Moses.
"Let's watch either 1989 or 1977!" suggested Ayame.
"YAY!!" cheered Tohru. "I wanna watch all of them!"
"I don't wanna watch ANY of them!" declared Kyo. "These stupid dances are nothing to get excited about! I'm going upstairs!" And that's exactly…what… he did.
"Well…he's not supposed to watch them ANYWAY!" chuckled Shigure as he went right for 1982.
"NO!!" yelled Ayame. "We're watching 1989!"
"Wait…better yet…" said Shigure, pulling out 1976. "1976."
"What happened in 1976…? Oh right…" said Ayame with a devious grin towards Hatori.
"Why would you want to watch something like that?" said Hatori with a sigh.
"We're definitely watching this one first." Said Ayame.
"What's so great about it?" asked Yuki.
"Let's just say that Hatori's costume was a little big for him that night." Shigure answered. "And, considering Hatori was only four years of age and didn't know any better, he tripped over…"
"That's enough." Hatori interrupted. "Why don't we watch YOUR dance, Ayame?"
"No, I'd much rather watch the dance that shamed the Year of the Dragon considering it was your first dance and all." Ayame answered. "But we'll definitely watch mine after. Both of them."
"I'd prefer if we didn't watch mine." Started Hatori but he was too late for Ayame had already put the video in AND snatched the remote AND made popcorn! Everyone sat on the couch and watch while laughing heartily at poor Baby Hatori's expense as Ayame kept rewinding the tripping part over and over and pausing it half way through to see the expression on Hatori's face and see all the people in the background laughing and then afterwards when Hatori was crying. Of course, at this point in time, there were none of the characters that we know and love except for Ayame, Hatori, Shigure and the chicken. Everyone else were some crazy old people because there had to be SOMEONE to be the curses before our present cursed people. They just haven't died and passed their curses along quite yet.
"I can't find me." Said Haru.
"You're not born yet." Said Shigure.
"Yes I am." Said Haru.
"Fine, you're right there." Said Shigure, pointing to some random old guy with white hair.
"Oh." Said Haru.
"Look, I got Hatori's face at a funny moment!" laughed Ayame.
"This isn't funny anymore." Said Hatori. "In fact, it was never funny."
"But you were so cute, Hatori!" said Tohru. "You look like you only younger and very sad!"
"It's time to end this year." Said Hatori.
"Fine, let's watch 1988!" Shigure said excitedly.
"Why, Shigure, isn't that ALSO the Year of the Dragon?" asked Ayame.
"Yup." Shigure replied, standing up and retrieving the 1988 video. "This is the year that Haru thought that it would be okay to just go out and dance along with Hatori." With that, he put the video in.
"There Hatori goes, shaming the Year of the Dragon AGAIN!" sighed Ayame, shaking his head in disbelief.
"Hey, there's me!!" yelled Yuki, jumping up out of his seat as he pointed to himself standing in the background.
"I remember this!" said Momiji. "This was last year!"
"Wait guys, here comes Haru…!" said Ayame. "Right…now!" Just as he said that, Haru suddenly came running out and started dancing around like a fool and then crashed into Hatori who fell backwards into a buffet table.
"That's so funny!" said Tohru. "Poor Hatori! Your dance was ruined again!"
"It's okay." Said Hatori though you could tell in his tone of voice that he was crying on the inside and secretly wanted to crawl under the couch and die.
"Watch this!" said Ayame as he rewound and fast-forwarded the part where Hatori was splashing into the punch. "Into the punch, out of the punch, into the punch, out of the punch!"
"Ayame, don't make me take that remote away from you." Threatened Hatori because this dance just so happened to be last year so it was recent so it's not like he could look back on it and laugh at his younger self falling into the punch because as I stated earlier, it was only last year.
"Let's watch mine now!" said Ayame as he pulled 1988 out and put in 1977. They all watched little mini-five-year-old-Ayame dance around looking way too enthusiastic. "I was such a beautiful child." Said Ayame, wiping a tear from his eye. "And I didn't mess up ONCE!" he added, eyeing Hatori who tried not to look like he cared but you could tell he was ready to break down into tears but not really.
"Can we watch my video?" asked Haru who was clutching his 1985 tape.
"We still haven't watched my 1989 tape." Said Ayame.
"Ayame, that was only a few months ago." Said Hatori. "We all remember it just fine and don't need to watch it."
"I didn't see it!" Tohru said.
"That's okay." Said Hatori.
"Can we watch my video?" Haru asked again since everyone was ignoring him.
"Watching your video will be pointless." Ayame explained. "You didn't do anything for your dance. You didn't even dance. I don't even think you could walk at that point in your life. It was the stupidest thing in the world to put out a one-year-old and expect him to go and do something besides sit there. But then again, they did it the previous year with Yuki so I guess it was the second stupidest thing in the world."
"Yeah and you thought YOU were gypped of having to do your first dance at the age of four!" said Shigure, slapping Hatori on the back. "I, however, had my first dance at the age of ten."
"Aren't you just so lucky?" Hatori said sarcastically.
"Can we watch my video?" Haru asked again.
"NO!!" yelled Ayame.
"But I'm going to turn into Black Haru…" Haru started.
"Oh very well but we're NOT watching the whole thing." Said Shigure as he turned Ayame's video off and put in 1985.
"HEY!!!" yelled Ayame as Haru's video started.
"Hatori, I hope you don't come out and ruin my dance because I remember you doing that." Said Haru.
"Well, clearly you don't remember correctly because you were the one who ruined MY dance." Hatori replied.
Suddenly, Akito let out a grunt and fell off the couch. Everyone paused for a minute until Ayame finally sprung up and turned Haru's video off and gasped.
"I just remembered!" he said. "No one is supposed to see these except for the Jyuunishi and Akito!"
Everyone gasped dramatically.
"Tohru…I think you have to go upstairs and pretend as though you never saw these." Said Hatori.
"I'm so sorry!" Tohru exclaimed, jumping up off the couch and running up the stairs.
"Uh…we're sorry Akito, we didn't realize that Tohru was here." Shigure explained. "It'll never happen again."
They sat in silence.
"Can we put my movie back on?" asked Haru.
"Let's watch MY movie now!" Shigure declared, springing up and switching the videos to 1982 in record-breaking time. "Look at how cute I was!!"
"Shigure, ten-year-olds aren't cute." Said Kagura as if she were an expert on cute things. Which she probably was considering she's the only girl present in the room.
"I was a cute ten-year-old." Shigure assured everyone.
"All right, my video next!" said Momiji as he ran over and turned the VCR off.
"Hey!" yelled Shigure. "We were watching that!"
"YOU were watching it." Said Yuki.
"I just hate it when the little kids dis us." Sighed Shigure.
"Look at the time!" gasped Ayame suddenly. "It's nearly midnight!"
Kagura looked up at the clock. "Um…no it isn't." she said. "It's only nine o'clock."
"No it isn't!" said Ayame.
"Ayame, they're not stupid." Said Shigure. "They ALL can probably tell time. Well…except for maybe Haru."
"That's not true." Said Haru. "I can tell time."
"Don't worry, we know that, Shigure's just implying that you're certainly not one of the brightest ones here." Said Ayame, patting Haru on the head.
"I thought we were watching MY video." Said Haru.
"I rest my case." Said Ayame and Shigure AT THE EXACT SAME TIME!!!!
"Well, nine o'clock is a fine bedtime for children." Hatori declared, standing up.
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!" screamed all the kids including Tohru and Kyo from the loft.
"Yes, I agree!" Ayame…agreed. "Everyone in their pajamas and don't even THINK about coming upstairs in our loft tonight!! Last night was a pain in the neck and I hardly got any sleep."
"What are you talking about Ayame?" Hatori said. "You slept like a rock."
"And your snoring prevented US from sleeping!" Shigure added.
"Oh right!" said Ayame with a laugh. "I suppose I was thinking of some OTHER night in which I didn't get any sleep."
The elders then went upstairs to change into their pajamas and kicked Tohru and Kyo downstairs. Not LITERALLY but you know.
"Now I don't have anything to wear tomorrow." Said Hatori.
"You can always wear something of mine!" offered Shigure. "My stuff is probably more Hatori than Ayame's stuff."
Hatori raised an eyebrow but didn't say anything.
Just then, Momiji came up the stairs. "We never had dinner…" he whined.
"Hatori, you lazy bum!" gasped Ayame. "You didn't feed the children!"
Hatori almost lost his temper and chopped Ayame's legs off right then and there. But luckily, Hatori is mentally stable so he didn't end up doing something rash like that. He was just about to do the mature thing and explain to Ayame that he had done just about everything else the entire vacation when Ayame went and started chuckling and slapping Hatori on the back.
"I was just kidding!!" he laughed. "I didn't expect YOU to make dinner for them while we were watching the movies!"
"I did." Said Shigure.
And Shigure almost got his legs chopped off as well but he was quick to add that he too was kidding.
"What, your bacon and snacks from the store weren't filling enough?" Ayame asked Momiji as if he were offended.
"Everyone TOOK my bacon!" Momiji complained. "And all I had was celery!"
"Stop complaining you cry baby!" said Ayame. "There are people starving all over the world!"
"But…" started Momiji with a sniffle.
"I SAID GO AWAY!!" Ayame screamed. Momiji started crying and descended the ladder.
"There has got to be easier ways of dealing with them." Said Hatori.
"I haven't found any yet." Said Ayame as he felt satisfied with his recent domination of Momiji.
There was a pause.
"Okay so…" said Shigure slowly. "GUY TALK!!"
"I could SO tell that you just WANTED to say 'girl' talk." said Ayame. Shigure stopped for a minute, thought about this and then shook his head.
"No…" said Shigure. "I don't think I wanted to say that. I'm not a girl."
"OH NO!!" came a distressed sounding voice from downstairs.
"Just ignore whoever it is…" said Ayame with a sigh.
"But that was TOHRU'S voice!" said Shigure.
"Oh, in THAT case…" said Ayame as he stood up and walked toward the ladder followed by Shigure. Hatori was already halfway down the ladder because even if it wasn't Tohru he was going to find out what was going on.
"I'm SO sorry!" Tohru cried as tears streamed down her cheeks. "It was an accident! I didn't mean to!"
"Didn't mean to what?" asked Hatori.
"She just told you." Said Kagura.
"I'm so sorry!" Tohru begged. "I just couldn't get out of my sleeping bag fast enough! My mom always told me that I was good at making it to the bathroom in time but I just couldn't!"
"So you had an accident?" asked Hatori with no change in expression. Tohru nodded and sniffed.
"Ew…" said Ayame as he backed off because he didn't want to be stuck with clean-up duty.
"Just bring your sleeping bag outside and we'll make a little bed for you." Said Hatori. Tohru nodded and brought her sleeping bag outside and then went into the bathroom to change into her other pair of Barbie Pajamas.
"Out of what?" asked Yuki. "We couldn't make one for ME when I didn't have a place to sleep."
"This is different, Yuki." Said Shigure.
"Yeah." Said Ayame. "We love Tohru."
"We could just spread all of our sleeping bags out so that we can have one big bed!" Kagura suggested.
"I don't want Yuki sleeping on my sleeping bag!" Kyo complained.
"And Kyo's cow sleeping bag offends me." Said Haru. "So much."
"It's either lie all the sleeping bags out for everyone or let Tohru have your sleeping bag all together!" threatened Shigure.
"Fine!!" Said Kyo as if he were all reasonable and such. "We can lie my sleeping bag out but Yuki can't sleep on it!"
"I wasn't going to!" Yuki said as he stuck out his tongue.
Hatori, for some odd reason (it might be because of all the hard work he had been doing this whole vacation) was extremely fatigued and really wanted to go to bed. So he told all the kids that they were in charge of lying out the sleeping bags themselves.
Actually, he told Ayame and Shigure to do it but he might as well have told the kids to just do it themselves by relaying the message through Ayame and Shigure like a rousing game of 'telephone'!
So the three older people climbed the ladder back into the loft and left all the younger people to sort out their bedtime positions.
Tohru came back just in time to help out with this.
"You don't have to bother working so hard to help me out." Said Tohru. "I'll be happy just sleeping on the floor!"
"Don't be ridiculous!" said Yuki. "If I had a sleeping bag, I'd give it to you!"
"You can have mine!" Momiji offered as he climbed out of his sleeping bag and tossed it at Tohru.
"No, I couldn't!" Tohru yelled.
"You can have mine too!" Kagura said. "We can share it!"
"Wait…" said Haru as he unzipped his sleeping bag. "I thought we were lying them all out…"
Tohru started tearing at the eyes. All of her friends were being so nice to her and she needed to repay them! She simply couldn't take their kind generosity and let it go not rewarded! She couldn't take their generosity in the first place!
But she got over it a second later and everyone went to sleep. YAY!!