Kyousuke's Night of Strange Dreams

The ebony-haired girl came back later that night, wearing a pair of snug cutoff jeans, a sleeveless red shirt with an 'Orange Road' logo in front, ankle-length socks, and a pair of worn white laceless canvas-top shoes. She bore a hefty backpack on her sweaty shoulders. Kyousuke took one look at her tired face and quickly stripped her of her load.

"Whoa! What did you put in here?" he said, struggling with the day-glo orange pack. He failed to balance it, and it toppled from his hands onto the floor. "Sorry." He frowned, and the backpack floated into the air, serenely sailing ahead of them as they made their way to the living room.

Manami was there, seated on the couch watching Minna no Uta on TV, the obese family cat Jingoro in her lap. She was dressed in a super-large shirt and spandex tights. Upon seeing Madoka she took Jingoro in her arms, stood up, and bowed. "Welcome to the family, Ayukawa-sempai," she said, smiling shyly. "I'm so glad onii-chan finally confessed to you."

Madoka bowed back. "I still can't believe your entire family are espers, Manami-chan," she said. "Had I known that the first time I met you, I wouldn't have slapped your brother for making me stop smoking."

"That's okay, Ayukawa-sempai. Onii-chan wouldn't have had the guts to do anything to you that time anyway." Manami grinned. "I think he fell for you the first time he met you and got that red straw hat he always keeps in his room."

"Manami-chan!" Kyousuke rumbled. "Instead of shooting your mouth off, why don't you bring this to my room?" The backpack floated closer to the ponytailed girl, who set the struggling Jingoro down on the sofa and pursed her lips.

"Onii-chan, you are such a lazy boy." Manami looked at the backpack, gestured to Kyousuke that she had it, and disappeared with the floating burden down the corridor leading to his room.

"It must be lots of fun being an esper, Kasuga-kun," Madoka commented as she sat down on the couch. Jingoro bestirred himself and climbed onto her lap, yawned, and went back to sleep, curling up in seeming feline contentment as she gently stroked his fur.

"It is, most of the time," Kyousuke admitted, standing beside her. "Sometimes, though, it's a lot more trouble than it's worth. Have you eaten dinner, Ayukawa?"

The aquamarine-eyed girl nodded. "Yes, I have. You?"

"Un. Kurumi cooked it, though, so I'm worried I might get an upset stomach later."

He must have said it a little too loudly, because a voice shouted from the kitchen, "I heard that, onii-chan! You're terrible!" Out from the doorway popped the brown-haired twin's head. "Just for that, you be the one to do the dishes!"

"I'm just kidding, Kurumi!" Kyousuke shouted back, chagrined. "Don't worry, I'll do the dishes, like you said."

Kurumi emerged fully from the kitchen, wiping her wet hands on a blue towel. She was wearing a Piyo-Piyo apron, red-and-blue striped t-shirt, and long pale-green corduroy shorts. The first she removed and handed to her brother, the second she smoothed out self-consciously, the third she adjusted a bit. "Thank you, onii-chan." She turned to Madoka and smiled cheerfully. "I'm trying to keep him too busy to do anything ecchi to you, Madoka-san," she explained.

Madoka laughed and looked at the now-steaming Kyousuke. "Oh really? Is your brother always like that?"

Kurumi nodded vigorously. "Yeah! In fact, he's been shutting himself in his room a lot lately..." She shrieked and dodged as her incensed brother made a grab for her.

"Kisama..." Kyousuke growled as he chased her around the room. "You..."

"I was just kidding, onii-chan!" Kurumi giggled as she ran down the corridor to the bedroom she shared with Manami. Reaching its sanctuary, she stuck her tongue out and shouted "Not!" at him as she slammed the door in his face, determined to get the last word in.

Kyousuke stared at the door in irritation for a moment, cut off the uncharitable thought that he wished his younger sister would grow horns like Lum—or perhaps better, like a water buffalo's—and stalked back to the living room.

Madoka was still laughing. "Your sisters are a handful, aren't they, onii-chan?"

"Yeah." With a grunt he sat down beside her.

"What's all the ruckus about?" came a voice, and they turned to see Takashi Kasuga standing at the entrance to the corridor which led to the genkan. "Oh, good evening, Madoka-chan."

Madoka put Jingoro aside, stood up, and bowed. "Good evening, otou-san."

"Oyaji! It's Manami and Kurumi again! They're making me look bad in front of Ayukawa!"

"Oh?" Takashi strode up to his son and patted him on the shoulder. He leaned towards their visitor and whispered in a confidential tone, "Don't worry, Madoka. Only half of what the twins say about their brother is true. Except for anything prurient."

"Oyaji!" For Kyousuke, having his own father joining in and teasing him was the last straw. He tackled Takashi, and they spent a minute or two struggling on the floor, yelling such things as "Take back what you said!", "No, I won't!", "Korakorakorakora!", and the like. They only stopped when the family patriarch got an armlock around his son's neck.

"Truce?" he said. Kyousuke nodded, panting.

"Truce."

Takashi gave him a noogie, rubbing his knuckles against Kyousuke's head, and let him go. The photographer stood up. "Honestly, Madoka-chan, my boy's a good soul. He just needs a little curbing sometimes. Welcome to the family."

Madoka, who had been standing and giggling all the while the fracas was going on, bowed again. "Thank you, Kasuga-otousama."

Takashi smiled at her. "Well, I'll leave you two alone. I've got a lot of work to do. Good luck with your trip tomorrow. Oh, and Kyousuke?"

"What, old man?" the sixteen-year-old esper grunted, still displeased with all the taunting he had been subjected to.

"Remember to use the Power whenever necessary to protect your girlfriend and your grandfather, okay?" With that last reminder, Takashi retreated to the sanctity of his bedroom.

Kyousuke stood up from the floor and gritted his teeth. "Why, oh why, did I get gifted with a family like this?" he asked, shaking his head. "It's like being given a root canal on your birthday."

"Well, I think you've got a lovely family, Kasuga-kun." Madoka sighed. "You should at least be thankful they're always around to help you. Not like mine."

"Ayukawa..."

"Oh, where may I sleep tonight?"

"Huh? Oh, you can use my bedroom. I've already prepared it for you."

"Then where will you sleep?"

"Here on the sofa. Don't worry," he added as he saw she was about to protest, "it's very comfortable."

Madoka sat back down on the sofa, careful not to disturb the cat, who had somehow managed to maintain his alliance with the brother of Death though all the commotion. "Kasuga-kun?"

"Yes?"

Madoka idly toyed with strands of Jingoro's cream fur, flicking it back and forth with a finger. "Did you mean what you said earlier?"

"What part of it?" Kyousuke asked, even though he knew full well what she was referring to.

"Do you really love me? Or did you just say that so your grandfather would help me?"

"Ayukawa... I wouldn't have said that if I didn't mean it."

Madoka let out a puff of air, and a sad smile appeared momentarily on her face. "And here I am always being so unkind to you. I'm sorry about that, Kasuga-kun."

Kyosuke sat down beside her, away from Jingoro, and watched her hand move over the sleeping cat, lightly caressing his paws and his ears. "You're not unkind to me, Ayukawa. At least, most of the time you aren't."

"But I am, Kasuga-kun. Don't massage the truth just to try and be nice to me. I feel so ashamed of myself, now that I find myself turning to you for help. I... I don't know how I can ever repay you or your ojii-san."

"Let's worry about the procedure working first, okay? But Ayukawa?" Kyousuke said tentatively. He was worried she'd think he was taking advantage of her indebtedness to him. "There is one thing you can do to repay me."

Madoka turned and looked at him steadily with her green eyes. "Name it. Anything."

Anything? Kyousuke gulped. He had a sudden lascivious feeling in his loins. His father's voice echoed in his mind. Only half true... except for anything prurient.

"No way!" he exclaimed to himself, surprising Madoka and destroying the mood building between them. "I'm much better than that!"

"What on earth are you talking about, Kasuga-kun?" Madoka demanded of him. Often piqued by his strange actions and utterances, this behavior of his was nothing new to her.

"What? Oh, sorry! Sorry, Ayukawa! I got carried away thinking about something again." Yeah, that's it. Your lips, the way your hair smells, your gorgeously soft breasts... Kasuga, you idiot!

"Anyway," said Kyousuke as he forced his train of thought away from that dangerous set of tracks, "as I was saying, there's one thing you could do to repay me."

"What is it?"

Kyousuke swallowed. "Tell me, Ayukawa. Tell me how you feel about me. I–I realize how embarrassing it must sound for me, a guy, to be asking you this, but you already know how I feel about you... I just have to know. I just want to hear it from your lips."

Madoka laughed softly. "Kasuga-kun, isn't it obvious?" She pinched the collar of his uniform between her fingers and drew him closer to her. "Maybe this will clear the air..." She closed her eyes, and Kyousuke watched her moist, soft-looking reddish-pink lips pucker as they came nearer to his.

Thank you, oh mighty Kami-sama! he thought gleefully. In his eagerness to taste his forbidden fruit, Kyousuke overbalanced himself and pushed against Madoka, who, not wanting to rush their first kiss together, leaned back away from him—and onto Jingoro, who reacted very badly to the roughly eighty kilos of human deadweight that squashed him and woke him up.

Madoka let out a yelp as the obese cat, startled, slashed out with his claws and caught one of her fingers. Kyousuke quickly shooed the animal off the sofa. It landed on the floor and looked back at them with a much-put-out expression on its feline face.

"Bad cat! Bad cat, Jingoro!" Kyousuke scolded. "Ayukawa, did he hurt you?"

"Just a little scratch," she replied, showing him the tip of her left-hand middle finger.

"Wait here." Kyousuke went to the bathroom and took out the family medical kit, then returned to the black-haired girl, cleaned her scratch with alcohol, and put a band-aid on her finger.

"There! All done!" he said brightly. Then he noticed Ayukawa giggling. "Hey, what's so funny?"

"Oh, nothing, nothing," said Madoka, continuing to giggle. "You remind me of a father. 'Oh, be careful, or you might hurt yourself!'"

"Che!" Kyousuke said truculently. "What is it today? Is the moon full outside or did my family pay you to tease me too?" Seeing his exasperated expression only made Madoka break out in laughter.

"Fine! I've had it up to here!" Kyousuke stood up and began to stomp off to his room. "Oh, wait. You're using my room tonight." He stood uncertainly for a moment and scratched his head. "Then could you please leave so I can go to sleep?"

"Sure, Kasuga-kun." Madoka stood up and walked to him. "Oyasumi," she whispered, and kissed his cheek. Kyousuke felt the warmth of her lips on his skin, and had to stop himself from grabbing Ayukawa by the shoulders and kissing her madly.