Chapter 18: Eccentric Parents
Yuki could not stop thinking about her classmate's wariness of her, despite Shizuku's advice to ignore them. It bugged her like an itch she had to scratch. It was annoying trying to talk to a classmate and have them discreetly edging away. After tossing and turning in bed for a few nights, too frustrated to fall straight asleep like she usually did, she arrived at a conclusion. Being passive was useless, and if her classmates were going to run away from her, she was just going to have to run after them.
Over the following weeks, she crashed many club meetings, showing up uninvited with gifts of sweets. With the baking club coming along for moral support (in Maria's case - to ensure Yuki didn't go overboard), she made the rounds like a persistent salesman knocking on doors. Every club from the astronomy club to the judo club was graced with her presence and invited to drop by the baking club room to chat with her sometimes. Unfortunately, her invitations were ignored until the day she chanced upon something she shouldn't have.
The Night Class occult mysteries club was composed of four boys. One was a Jun Matsuda who just started attending Cross Academy that year, following in the footsteps of his older brother, Sho Matsuda. Sho, although a student, was also a popular teen actor with admirers in both the classes. Sadly, Jun (like the other club members) was the opposite of Sho when it came to popularity, since being into ghosts and aliens is not very conducive to attracting girlfriends. Due to their introverted natures and general disconnection from Night Class gossip, they did not receive the news that Yuki was going around paying unannounced visits and forcing gifts of sweets into people's hands.
Thus, on that fateful day, when Yuki energetically burst through the door of the occult mysteries club, a box of fruit tarts in hand, the boys were completely caught off guard. They were in the midst of giggling like little kids at nude photos of the famous AV actress Rika, when Yuki and her girls entered. The boys looked with wide eyes at the intruders, momentarily uncomprehending the situation. Yuki stared curiously back at them, wondering why they looked like deer caught in headlights. After a few seconds, she finally noticed the naked and buxom woman smiling coyly on the cover of the magazine they were crowded around.
In her shock, she dropped the box of tarts, and the sound of the sweets hitting the floor finally broke them out of their trance. Two boys screamed in alarm while another tried to hide under a desk. The one holding the magazine quickly stuffed it behind his back.
"It's n-not wh-what you t-think it is, Yuki-sama!" he stammered.
Yuki recovered from her shock and scowled. "Really? Are you going to tell me that's your anatomy homework?"
The boys before her were all first-year students, and they still had baby fat on their cheeks. As a responsible senpai she could not let them be led wayward by licentious pictures of naked women.
"I'll have to confiscate and destroy this," Yuki announced and grabbed the offending magazine from him. A flame sparked up on her other hand as she prepared to burn the magazine.
She was stopped by a shrill scream of protest.
"Nooooo! My brother will kill me if I lose his special edition of Bunny Girl!" Jun moaned. He had stolen the magazine from Sho's collection and could never replace it since it was autographed by Rika herself. He knelt in front of Yuki with beseeching eyes. "Yuki-sama! I'll do anything you say if you give it back!"
Ayumi stifled a giggle while Nozomi turned away to hide a smile. At the sight of their beautiful senpais laughing at them, the boys wished they would just turn into piles of ashes. They thought they had already hit rock bottom of the Night Class's social totem pole, but now discovered they could go even lower.
"Jun, you idiot!" his friends tried to shush him and pull him back. "Yuki-sama's word is final!"
Flames licked threateningly at the edges of the beloved magazine as Yuki stared at the boy with his sandy brown hair and pleading gray eyes. She shifted her gaze to the generously endowed woman on the cover, posing seductively under the raunchy headline "Rika-chan reveals the proper way to undress a woman!". As much as she wanted to destroy his illicit magazine, the gears in her head started turning.
"Anything?" she asked, a somewhat malicious glint in her usually kind eyes.
Jun gulped, wondering what he had got himself into.
"Anything…" he repeated meekly.
Yuki put out the flames emanating from her fingertips and turned with a conspiratorial grin to her friends. Maria could sense she had some ill-conceived plan and groaned in her head before Yuki even spoke.
"Ladies, please welcome the newest members to our baking club!" Yuki chirped.
She turned back to Jun, with an evil smile that caused him to break out into shivers. "Now Jun, if you want Rika-chan back, tell me…do you know which of our other classmates also possess such 'literature'?"
Jun wanted to cry. As if it wasn't already bad enough that he was caught looking at Bunny Girl and facing the judgment of his female senpais. Right now, he felt as if he was facing a yakuza boss instead of a pureblood princess. Perhaps the rumor that Shizuka-sama was the secret boss of an international drug cartel were true after all.
A while back he had overheard his parents gossiping about Shizuka-sama who had run away from her husband, and how the Senate was looking for her. There were all sorts of hearsay but one of the most popular was that she was wanted for operating a cartel that kidnapped both humans and vampires and forcefully drained them to produce blood tablets. He could picture this Yuki-sama, despite her look of girlish innocence, being the heiress to such a dangerous organization. Maybe she sported a giant dragon tattoo on her back under that uniform! If he didn't cooperate, he would be whisked off and made into black market blood tablets!
"Yuki…don't bully our kohai," Maria murmured, finally stepping in out of pity for the boy who looked ready to burst into tears.
"Don't worry, I'm a very nice senpai," Yuki said before turning her attention back to Jun who was currently besieged by his overly active imagination. "Anyway, if your brother wants his Rika-chan back, tell him he'll have to come see me."
A week later, Shizuku strolled past the baking club room before backtracking and staring in disbelief through the open door. The room was filled with people eating pastries and conversing. Yuki sat in the middle, nodding happily at the noble who was recounting some story to her. She glanced up, sensing his presence and beamed.
"Shizuku, you should join us! Sho-kun here is such a gifted story-teller!"
He eyed her suspiciously. For some reason, the popular actor and his buddies were hanging out with Yuki when she had been avoided by most of the Night Class only a few days ago. And now that he was paying more attention, something seemed off about this scene of social gaiety. Why did half the guys present have such gloomy gazes and forced smiles as they ate their sweets? The kid sitting in the corner was looking at him with an imploring expression, like a hostage trying to convey a message without the knowledge of his captor.
He frowned. "I'll pass."
She shrugged and returned her attention to the noble.
A few nights later, when Yuki came to visit him after class, he confronted her.
"What did you do to them?" he asked point-blank as he stared at her.
She was lazing around his couch, flipping through a fashion magazine, and getting cookie crumbs all over his Persian carpet. She glanced up and smiled innocently at him. "What do you mean?"
He cupped his cheek in his left palm and kept his gaze firmly on her. That cherubic smile was not going to work on him. "You know exactly what I mean – half the guys at the baking club the other day looked ready to weep as they ate their cakes. That Jun was practically sending me an SOS with his eyes."
"Perhaps Maria's baking was so tasty they were ready to burst into tears of joy. As for Jun, he's perfectly happy being a member of our club – I've no idea what you're insinuating."
Shizuku scoffed at her blatant lie. "Really? Because I heard a funny rumor that a certain pureblood was going around extorting people to join her club."
Yuki instantly scowled. "That's a really distorted account. I'm merely inviting them to join and partake in good food and conversation!"
"So you don't deny the extortion?" he asked, arching an eyebrow.
She pouted. "That's a misinterpretation. How can a cute innocent girl like me extort others? I simply gave them a choice between the destruction of their prohibited magazines or getting to know me better."
He snorted and leaned back in his chair. "No cute and innocent girl would actually refer to herself as such. The fact is that you blackmailed them with their porn into hanging out with you."
She shrugged unapologetically. "I discovered this was more efficient than my former method. Besides, if they didn't do something wrong in the first place, I wouldn't be able to blackmail them. They should be more like you, hiding cute toy ships instead of smut. By the way, you're still quite the child at heart, aren't you?"
He froze for a second before sitting up straight as a rod. "You…you were snooping in my bedroom?!"
She paused mid-bite of a cookie, realizing what she had let slip. She glanced at him out the corner of her eye to assess his reaction. His green eyes were blazing with fury. It's time to show myself out…she thought and hurriedly gobbled the remainder of her cookie.
"Oh gosh, look at the time! It's so late – I should go. Goodnight!" Yuki yelled over her shoulder as she scrambled up, not bothering to take her magazine as she fled. She was out the door before he could even get past his desk.
"Yuki!" The angry bellow of the furious pureblood echoed throughout the old dorm building.
Now that she had taken care of her relationships with the nobles, Yuki wanted to deepen her relationship with Kaname – they were family after all. Although she saw him every day and often had lunch with him and his group, there was an unspoken distance between them.
Yuki paced hesitantly outside Kaname's room, she wanted to overcome the distance separating them with some sibling bonding time. However, it was one thing to deal with the nobles, and something else entirely different dealing with her brother. Even though Kaname appeared an exemplary gentleman, sometimes he came off intimidating with his heavy stares and deep silences. At those times, she felt he was older than her by many centuries instead of only a few years – his solemnity was on par with that of her mother's.
After 10 minutes of hearing her trot circles outside his door, Kaname put down his pen. It was time he took a break from paperwork anyway.
"Yuki, you can come in if you want." His voice was clear and loud enough for her to hear.
Her pacing stopped, and a few seconds later, she hesitantly opened his door just wide enough to stick her head in. She saw him looking at her with an amused smile and grinned sheepishly in return, finally entering the room and shutting the door behind her. He indicated at her to have a seat on the sofa and left his desk to sit beside her.
"How are you, Yuki? Is there something you wanted to discuss?"
"Oh, everything's fine, I just wanted to talk to you… since we haven't really chatted in private since the day Yoko was attacked," she fidgeted a little before continuing. "Although we're siblings, I don't really know much about you, and I want us to be closer. But if you're busy I can come back another time!"
Kaname smiled indulgently. "You're right. We should spend more time together to make up for the years we've been apart. There must be many things you want to ask me."
Yuki brightened and felt her courage welling. They spent the next hour and half discussing their parents, something Yuki had always wanted to know more about. Kaname recounted the memories he had of Haruka and Juri.
He mentioned how lovestruck they had been, behaving more like teenagers than millennia old vampires. Yuki listened in rapt attention as Kaname described having to sit through meals in which Haruka and Juri spoon fed each other and looked adoringly into one another's eyes, their sparkly pink mood permeating the entire room. Seeing Yuki's starry eyes and hearing her exclaim how cute that was, Kaname couldn't help but think she was definitely Haruka and Juri's child. He was also greatly amused that Yuki was Yoko's opposite when it came to their views on romance.
Kaname also recounted how Haruka had chased Juri persistently, following her as she spent a few years in a human high school. The story of how Haruka had hidden all the umbrellas one rainy day just to make Juri walk with him under the same umbrella tickled Yuki, who giggled at how cheesy and unrelenting in his pursuit her father had been. Towards the end, Kaname walked to his desk, opened a drawer, and returned with a small, framed photo.
He spoke gently as he handed it to her. "You should have this, Yuki."
The photo within the frame depicted a smiling couple, the male standing to the left of the female sitting in a chair, each cradling a baby swaddled in a pink blanket. A little boy stood between the adults. The man was dressed in a formal black suit, the boy in a miniature version of the adult's suit, and the woman in a frilly, high collared, dark purple dress with a matching purple headband adorning her curly hair. The tenderness reflected in the adults' eyes indicated the depth of their love for their children.
Without Kaname having to explain, Yuki knew this was their family photo. Silently, she traced the outlines of her birth parents' face. As her finger slid over the glass, tears welled up in her eyes and slid down her cheeks. Kaname held her gently as she finally gave in to her emotions and sobbed.
That day, Yuki left his room feeling as though a weight had been lifted. The scarcity of information about her birth parents had always lurked at the back of her mind. Her mother had already mentioned how Yuki resembled her birth mother in appearance, and how sappy her birth parents were, constantly holding hands and addressing each other with corny nicknames when they visited. However, the blanks of their faces had finally been filled in.
From then on, Yuki often visited her brother to chat. He eventually showed her his secret photo collection of Yoko, composed of various shots the headmaster had sent him over the years. Yuki flipped through the pages of the leather-bound album, feeling elated as though she had won the lottery. Although she frequently took pictures of Yoko, lurking behind hedges and trees like the best paparazzi, she did not possess photos of her twin as a child.
After promising that she will work harder on her lessons, she persuaded Kaname to gift her with a photo of Yoko as a toddler. In the picture, her sister was standing against an autumnal backdrop, clad in a gray coat with a blue scarf, her curly hair done in two short braids. Yoko held a bright orange leaf which she examined with an abnormally serious expression, as though mentally debating some deep philosophical question. Yuki found the grave look the toddler Yoko displayed hilarious. It seemed her twin had been overly serious from the start, as though she had been born old.
In return, Yuki gifted her brother with a personally embroidered handkerchief, an unevenly stitched pink bunny gracing one of the corners. Upon receiving her present, Kaname smiled and patted her on the head. After she left, he reflected on how cheerful and carefree she was. It seemed Shizuka had coddled her quite a bit, but he supposed he would have done the same or worse if he had raised her instead. While Yuki was a lackluster student and somewhat naive, she had a way of winning people over with her innocence and upbeat personality. He smiled as he pondered how it would do Yoko good for some of Yuki's joyfulness to rub off on her.
Everyone at Cross Academy looked forward to the weekends. On weekends, campus was livelier and more relaxed since there was less segregation between the classes. The Night Class could use the campus facilities at the same time as the Day Class on weekends – so both vampires and humans could be found wandering the gardens or milling around the dining hall. Occasionally, clubs from the two classes held joint activities.
The tea ceremony club was notably popular with Day Class girls, since it often held joint activities with its Night Class counterpart. On those days, the club room would be packed since many nonmembers also came to observe the meeting. After all, this was one of the few times the Day Class girls got to closely interact with the handsome Night Class vice president. If they were lucky, sometimes Ichijo bought Shiki along with him.
The school guardians looked forward to the weekends as much as their classmates since the only guardian duty they had then was patrolling the grounds at night. Zero often went off to attend to his hunter duties and training, sometimes with Ichiru tagging along.
On her part, Yoko would wake up early, go for a jog, practice using the Artemis rod, eat a quick meal, then spend the rest of the day at the library. She liked to get assignments done as soon as possible, so she could spend the remaining time researching topics that sparked her interest. She could sit for hours at her customary table and not talk to another soul – like most library dwellers caught in their own studies. However, after Kaname's sister joined the school, Yoko often encountered her in the library on Saturday afternoons.
The pureblood would shyly ask to join her. To Yoko's surprise, she discovered Yuki was having trouble with the Night Class curriculum. She ended up offering to help Yuki with her studies, like she occasionally did with some of her struggling classmates. The other girl accepted with startling alacrity, and from then on, they met every Saturday to go over topics such as balancing chemical equations and events of the last world war.
When exams approached, Yoko made a study guide for her, with special focus on the topics she demonstrated the most trouble with. Yuki received the notes with shiny eyes. It was only through using all her self-control that she did not wrap Yoko in a bear hug or squeal and jump with joy at receiving ten pages of her sister's neat handwriting. Notes that Yoko had made just for her! Even Kaname onii-sama never received a study guide from Yoko!
"Thank you, Yoko! I'll treasure it forever!" Yuki grasped Yoko's hands and sniffled. "In return, let me treat you at a café!"
"You don't have to, it's only a simple study guide," Yoko replied. "In fact, the chairman and I should be thanking you and Kaname-senpai for your family's continued support for this school."
Yoko always felt awkward accepting gifts from others including Kaname-senpai, and his sister was no different. Yuki had already tried giving her various gifts over the semester, including butterfly hair clips, embroidered silk handkerchiefs, and a very expensive-looking necklace. She had accepted the handkerchiefs since Yuki had embroidered them for her but had rejected everything else. Yoko did not feel she had done anything to deserve such generosity and on principle did not like to owe people if possible.
Argh! Yoko, why are you always so polite? I dislike it when you're so polite with me, like we're just strangers! Yuki lamented mentally before insisting again.
"No, no, no! It's only right I treat you for all your help!" Yuki protested. "Are you free tomorrow? Or next weekend? My schedule is very open, I'm free whenever you're free. Just say when and I'll be ready."
Finding it difficult to say no to Yuki's impassioned invitation, Yoko accepted, and they arranged to meet the next day. She supposed being treated to cake and tea was a lot more acceptable than the gifts Yuki frequently offered. Besides, she had been planning to go to town with Yori and get a haircut soon.
The next day Yuki got up at 9 in the morning. It was early, and Yoko had suggested meeting later in the day for her convenience, but Yuki had declined since she wanted to spend as many hours with Yoko as possible. She had often daydreamed about hanging out with her sister, and the moment had finally come. Although she knew Yori, Yoko's friend who she had met a few times, would be joining them, she was still very excited. After spending almost a full hour trying on outfits, she settled on a simple, checkered, grey dress to wear under her navy-blue trench coat. She hastily put on her matching beret, checked if her wallet was in her crossbody bag, then grabbed her parasol and hurried to the front gate where they had arranged to meet.
Yuki found the two girls waiting outside the gate and bounded over eagerly. She noticed that Yoko was wearing a black duffel jacket and black jeans and wondered how her sister would look in a blue trench coat and beret like hers. Or maybe she could purchase an identical black jacket and pair of jeans… It was one of her desires to wear matching outfits with her twin, like she sometimes saw the Kiryu twins doing.
The girls joined the line of students waiting for the bus to town. Some of the other students stared in surprise, since it was rare for a Night Class student to be awake this early, and to take the bus with them. When Night Class students went to town, they were almost always chauffeured.
Taking a bus was a new experience for Yuki. Given the situation with Rido, she had almost never taken public transportation. The first and only time she had taken a train was when she had journeyed with Maria to their new life at Cross Academy, and even then, it had been a private luxury compartment.
An hour later, they reached the town and disembarked. Their first stop was the hair salon, where Yuki watched in dejection as the stylist cut away Yoko's hair. Although Yoko, being the utilitarian she was, had explained that long hair was too time consuming to wash and dry in winter, Yuki still felt dispirited seeing her dark brown curls fall and pile on the floor. Unfortunately, she would have to put off her dream of braiding Yoko's hair like she sometimes did with Maria for the foreseeable future.
After Yoko got her hair cut to a chin-length bob, the girls went to the bookstore where they browsed for over an hour. Yuki ended up buying the latest volume of the Crimson Heart series she and Maria were currently reading together. The series was a hit among adolescent females and told the tale of a girl from a fallen aristocratic family who caught the attention of all the kingdom's princes. Although Yuki liked every prince, she personally wanted the crown prince to win the protagonist's heart, whereas Maria, always rooting for the underdog, backed the fourth prince. Yuki tried to interest Yori and Yoko in reading the series too. While Yori good naturedly accepted, the latter politely declined, stating she did not read romance. Yoko did offer a recommendation in return, but Yuki declined the heavy book about fiscal policy. She simply had to accept that she and Yoko had vastly different literary tastes.
When Yuki got tired of the bookstore and suggested heading to a cafe, Yori announced she had arranged to meet her father and would rejoin them later to take the bus back to school. They parted ways and Yuki ended up taking Yoko to the traditional Japanese confectionary stop instead of the café Aidou-senpai had recommended. When they passed the shop, she had been hit with a sudden sense of homesickness upon seeing the flower-shaped confections in the display case.
They sat at a small table near the window, giving them a view of the people passing by outside. The sweets they ordered soon arrived, and Yuki sighed happily as she ate, enjoying the familiar taste of sweet red beans.
"Do you like the one with white bean paste or the red bean paste more?" Yuki asked.
"Hmm…they both taste good. What about you?"
"I like both, but red bean is my favorite. My mother prefers white bean and lets me eat all the ones with red bean."
Yoko saw a wistful expression briefly fall over the usually cheery girl's face. As she sipped her tea, she pondered whether to bring up what she had been curious about for the past months. Her curiosity won in the end.
"Yuki…why were you and Kaname-senpai raised separately? My father told me you were raised by your aunt instead," Yoko asked gingerly, before adding, "Of course, if it's too personal, you don't have to answer."
Yuki paused mid-bite, completely caught off guard by Yoko's question. She wondered how to respond, not wanting to accidentally reveal too much. Eventually she swallowed and spoke.
"There was a bad man who killed our parents. My brother and I were raised apart because it was safer to hide my existence. But now that I'm older and stronger, it was time to reunite."
She was not going to give her uncle the honor of a name nor acknowledge his relationship to her. If it were up to her, Yoko wouldn't ever know of that evil man's existence. Besides, her family drama was too complicated and tragically ironic. It wasn't an outsider who had broken her family, taking away her birth parents before she got to know them, and leaving her sister cut away from her and Kaname, unaware of their true relationship. It was her own blood-related uncle, and ironically, it was his wife who had ended up taking care of her. How much easier everything would be if the villain had been an outsider instead…
"I'm sorry for your loss," Yoko said quietly, she hoped she had not brought up bad memories.
Yuki shook her head. "It's alright. I get tired of having to keep everything a secret…its rather a relief to let it out actually."
"That man…has he been arrested and dealt with properly?"
Yuki frowned as she remembered her distrust and dissatisfaction with the Senate. Despite being the institution responsible for maintaining peace in vampire society, the Senate was on that man's side. She had already met Ichijo-senpai's grandfather, the third week after she started school. It had shocked her how the cheery and friendly Takuma was descended from such a cold and intimidating man. Although she was his pureblood superior, the senior Ichijo was a formidable man and she had felt unnerved under his icy gaze – a gaze that vaguely reminded her of the heterochromatic eyes from her childhood nightmares. She had been glad that Kaname onii-sama and Shizuku were by her side during the short meeting.
Yuki had discovered even more reason to resent the Senate when she learned from Jun all the rumors floating around about her mother. It was when Jun asked if he should address her as "aneki" that she discovered he thought she and her mother ran a crime syndicate! Another kicker was the rumor that her mother had stolen all that man's savings and was on the run for financial fraud. Yuki would have laughed, if she hadn't been so angry over how her mother was portrayed as the villain and the actual bad guy, her uncle, was portrayed as the victim. No doubt the Senate had something to with all this nonsense.
"Well…unfortunately the situation is messy," Yuki finally replied and forced herself to smile. "But we shouldn't waste this lovely Sunday talking about such matters. Why don't you tell me about the headmaster instead?"
Yoko tilted her head to the side as she considered how to describe her father. "My father…he's rather eccentric. He likes to dress in strange flashy clothes and reacts very emotionally to the most mundane things. He also enjoys making puns and jokes, but I'm afraid comedy isn't really his forte. He often gets on Zero and Ichiru's nerves with his antics, and I've seen even Kaname-senpai get annoyed with him."
Yoko recounted how when they were younger, her father had once riled up the twins by purposefully switching their names and the boys had ended up chasing him all over the house. Another time her father had said something that irritated Kaname-senpai so much the brunet's eyebrow had twitched before he singlehandedly crushed the cup he held, spilling coffee everywhere. Yoko often wished her father would reign in his tendency to troll and instead act more like how the headmaster of an esteemed school should.
Yuki laughed. She would pay good money to see Kaname get annoyed with Headmaster Cross.
"Despite it all, he's a good man. He might joke around, but he's serious about the mission to foster coexistence between humans and vampires. And if it weren't for him, I might not be here today, enjoying your company," Yoko concluded.
After a moment, Yoko asked, "What about your mother? What kind of person is she?"
"My mother? Well…I suppose she's rather eccentric too. Her sense of humor can be quite morbid and concerning..."
Just last week when Yuki had called home, she had experienced her mother's strange humor. When she complained about the weird rumors, her mother had laughed as though greatly entertained. Her mother had then commented that perhaps she really should get into the black-market blood tablet business, as it seemed much more lucrative than embroidery. Yuki had heard Aoi's voice in the background, scolding her to not even jest about such a thing. Her mother then commented that she should have stolen that man's wine collection at the very least, to which Aoi was heard replying there was no way they would have been able to run with all that. It seemed her mother was on par with the headmaster, if not surpassing him, when it came to oddness.
"She can also be very intimidating… and she has a bad habit of teasing people," Yuki continued. Teasing was definitely a vice of her mother's… if the timid Jun ever met her, he would probably piss himself in fright. Her mother would have a field day verbally toying with him and he would likely come out forever traumatized.
"But in general, she's very elegant and composed, and she loves me very much," Yuki quickly added, not wanting to give Yoko a strange impression of her mother. There were already enough weird rumors about her.
"She sounds very interesting. Maybe I'll meet her if she comes visit the school open house." Yoko was intrigued by Yuki's account of her mother, and she was always down to learn more about Kaname-senpai and his family.
Yuki smiled nervously. "Unfortunately, mother can't travel much. But maybe one day you'll have the chance to meet her." It would have to be in the distant future though…one in which that man was hopefully no longer around, she mused.
"Anyway, the headmaster sounds fun to be around," Yuki stated then added, "You also seem to get along well with the Kiryu twins."
"Yes, they're like brothers to me, like Kaname-senpai," Yoko replied.
Yoko smiled wryly as she remembered how Ichiru sometimes referred to her as his "other brother". He had also commented that despite her appearance, she completely lacked feminine appeal. Zero had been more offended than her by that statement and had whacked his brother in the head before apologizing profusely to her.
She was not bothered by her "lack of feminine appeal", but sometimes she wondered what it was like to be more feminine in both appearance and demeanor like Yori and Yuki. Yori possessed that quiet and modest charm typical of a girl from a refined family. Yuki was cute and lively and had a decent number of admirers among the Day Class boys.
Yoko studied Yuki and thought the pureblood was probably the type of girl her father and Kaname-senpai would like her to be instead. Yuki's hair was done in a charming braid with a large ribbon, her nails painted a shimmery pink color. She wore a nice dress, a pretty trench coat with a dainty bow at the neck and looked like she could be one of those idols she saw her male classmates gushing over. Yoko mused that with her height of 180 cm and her all-black outfit, she probably looked large and masculine compared to the petite and feminine Yuki.
Yuki looked quizzically at Yoko upon noticing the other girl observing her. "What's wrong? Do I have something on my face?"
"No…I was just thinking that you're very cute."
Yuki nearly dropped her tea. Such a direct and unexpected compliment! Yoko called me cute! She pressed her hands to her blushing cheeks and turned away flustered from Yoko's gaze. Quickly calming herself, she turned back to face the other girl.
"Oh my, what are you saying Yoko? You're cute too!"
Yoko only smiled back mildly at her. Yuki frowned – it seemed Yoko didn't believe her.
"It's true! You have such nice long legs and a great chest!" Yuki blurted without thinking.
Yoko stared at her with widened eyes.
Oh no, my sister thinks I'm some sort of pervert! Yuki groaned to herself.
Yuki hurriedly tried to explain herself. "I mean that in an objective way – without any weird meaning! I don't go around staring at other girls' legs and chests, really! Okay… maybe I do that sometimes, but all girls do – it's a natural part of being a girl- ogling other girl's figures!"
She stopped fumbling for excuses when she heard an unfamiliar sound. It was a quiet and light sound reminiscent of wind chimes. She glanced over and to her surprise saw Yoko laughing. She had never seen her sister laugh until now!
Yoko soon stopped but retained an amused smile. The other girl's candor was admirable. Yuki was very different from Kaname-senpai in that regard. "Thank you, Yuki."
Yuki smiled sheepishly; her cheeks still flushed. Thankfully, Yoko didn't seem creeped out – and on the bright side she had witnessed her sister laughing.
The two girls chatted some more before heading over to the bus stop where Yori was waiting. They made it back to school without incident, and Yuki skipped happily back to the Moon Dorm. She couldn't stop smiling and only regretted that she had not taken a photo of her sister laughing – capturing that rare and beautiful moment.
Yoko's short hair ended up giving Yuki more anxiety than she could have ever expected.
Ichiru, being the troublemaker he was, had made a deal with his female classmates. If they behaved for one full week, not causing trouble for the guardians or the Night Class, he would cross-dress, donning the female uniform for half a day. The idea was very well received, and the girls even offered to behave for two whole weeks if Zero also cross dressed. Ichiru regretted not having a camera on hand to capture the expression his older twin made upon hearing the proposal. Zero definitively rejected said proposal and stressed that under no circumstances would he ever cross-dress. He also tried talking Ichiru out of it, but of course his younger twin ignored him.
To Zero's great consternation, even Yoko joined in the madness. One of their more imaginative classmates had long noticed an odd physical resemblance between their female prefect and Kaname and had jokingly proposed that if Yoko also cross-dressed, they would behave for another week. To everyone's surprise, the ever-decorous Yoko accepted. She reasoned that if putting on the boy's uniform will give them a week of respite and bring cheer to her classmates, it was not a bad deal.
Yuki and the rest of the Night Class were already feeling odd after experiencing two weeks of abnormally well-behaved Day Class girls. They were even more confounded the day they made their way to class and saw that two of their guardians were replaced by an unfamiliar male and female while the other guardian, Zero, looked extremely downtrodden. Only upon walking closer did they realize the "strangers" were their regular guardians crossdressing!
The silver-haired girl was Ichiru wearing a long wig and the female Day Class uniform – he seemed to be playing the role with much gusto. The male was actually Yoko in the male Day Class uniform, with her chest bound flat and her already shortened hair tied back. Some students blinked several times to make sure they were seeing correctly.
The Day Class whispered excitedly as Kaname approached Yoko and stopped a few feet away. Yuki felt like fainting and reflexively grabbed Shizuku by his elbow to steady herself.
Yoko looked too much like her brother.
While she was a beautiful girl in her usual clothes, done up like this she looked very much a bishounen like her brother. She was already tall for a girl (in fact taller than Aidou-senpai). If she were even taller, her jawline and cheekbones more masculine, her shoulders wider, and her eyes brown instead, she would look like the archetypical Kuran male. As expected, Yuki could hear students from both classes murmuring about how much Yoko resembled Kaname.
"It's over," Yuki gasped and tightly squeezed Shizuku's arm in her anxiety. Everyone who was not blind was going to figure out their relationship right there and then!
"Is this unexpected when your gene pool is so limited? The only thing shocking is how so few people noticed their resemblance until now." Shizuku whispered back.
Yuki scowled and purposely dug her nails into his elbow upon seeing him looking as though he was having the time of his life while she was on the verge of a panic attack. This asshole was the type of person who laughed while the world burned.
Yuki glanced at her brother, and she could swear that for a fraction of a second, he looked like he had seen a ghost. He blinked and quickly recomposed himself. She wondered if he would say anything to refute the whispers, but he simply smiled and continued leading the Night Class away without comment.
Shizuku dragged Yuki along, whispering, "Act like you don't notice anything like your brother is doing. If you make a fuss, you'll seem more suspicious instead."
Later at lunch, there was an unusual atmosphere at the table where Yuki sat with her brother and his close followers. Ruka and Hanabusa kept exchanging furtive glances, and even the normally bored models looked like they had something on their minds. Only Takuma was talking, and Yuki joined him in his lighthearted chatter in an attempt to dispel the mood.
As Takuma was in the middle of relaying the latest chapter of a manga he was reading, Ruka cleared her throat and interrupted him.
"Kaname-sama…the way Yoko dressed earlier was quite surprising, she looked so much like you."
"Really?" Kaname asked and continued sipping tea calmly.
The pureblood's response was so elegantly nonchalant that Ruka and the others began to wonder if they were overthinking things. The noble stayed silent, unsure how to respond.
At that moment, Yuki burst out laughing, startling most nobles at the table.
"That was indeed quite a shock Yoko gave us! For a moment I wondered just who the handsome guy was. I don't think she looks like Kaname onii-sama though – or if she does, it's because beautiful people tend to look alike, don't you think, Ruka?" Yuki asked with somewhat forced jocularity.
"Yes, that may be the case Yuki-sama."
"If Yoko does resemble Kaname onii-sama, it's because they share a similar hair color. Besides, it's hard to mistake the two of them when Yoko has such pretty blue eyes and my brother has rich brown eyes, like me," Yuki continued.
She was glad her family possessed such a common hair color. It would have been a lot harder to explain away the resemblance as mere coincidence if they possessed a rare hair color instead, like her mother or the Kiryus did.
"That might just be it Yuki-sama," Ruka acquiesced.
Yuki directed the conversation away from Yoko, and the awkward atmosphere eventually faded. As the Night Class headed to their respective classrooms after lunch, Takuma caught up with Yuki in the hall.
"Well, Yoko-chan unwittingly caused quite some trouble today for you and Kaname didn't she? Kuran genetics are just that strong," he whispered, leaning close to her.
Yuki stared at him with her eyes wide and her mouth open. "Ichijo-senpai, how much do you know?"
The blond smiled mysteriously before bringing an index finger to his lips. "That's a secret between me and Kaname."
He winked and left her standing in the hall, mulling over the situation. On her side, Maria and Shizuku knew about Yoko. On her brother's side, it seemed Ichijo-senpai and Seiren were aware, while Aidou-senpai and the others were still unaware. Their family secret was safe for now…or at least until that man comes to end what he had started 16 years ago. Yuki hugged her books closer and fervently wished that these peaceful school days would last as long as possible.
A/N: As I wrote the part about Yuki being avoided, the "Why are you running?" meme came to mind, lol. And yes, Bunny Girl is a shameless rip-off of Playboy. This Yuki engages in some light blackmailing…she is a tad more forceful and mischievous since she was raised by Shizuka.
