Updated! This was a fun chapter to write, another of those DII (does it itself) ones :D Plus the start was all worked out because it was actually the end of the last chapter. Heh.

Enjoy. (Disclaimer disclaims I don't own anything).

"It is absolutely out of the question," she stated irresolutely; the tongue of Natsume's mother clicked irately between sentences, as she voiced her disapproval of his choice in girlfriend. "I do not like her at all."

"You don't need to like her," Natsume hissed sourly. "I do."

"And you do, son?" his father inquired.

"Of course," he snapped. "Isn't that obvious?"

"I don't know, you tell us," his father said carefully, as if the fact that Natsume had just kissed Mikan in full view of them both wasn't enough.

"Well I'd rather be out there with her than in here," he said moodily, and then realizing he was-as-a-matter-of-fact leaving Mikan to travel home alone turned around – he could follow what he'd just said up and also see her home. It wasn't even that he was concerned about her safety any more, it was just a habit.

"Don't even think about it," his mother sniped. "Do not leave this house. You cannot see it now, but she is not right for you, Natsume. As your parents we can tell."

"What do you know?" he yelled. "You don't know a thing about me or her! What grounds have you got to say she's not right for me?" It was probably a typical teenage thing to do, but arguing with his parents about why he should break up with Mikan only made him even more determined to stay with her. For how long? He couldn't say.

Which was a better start than most got.

"We are your parents!" his father bellowed sternly. "We know what's good for you!"

"Barely my parents!" he snapped. "You can't be gone all the time and then come back and expect to be 'mom' and 'dad' like that, you can't get involved when you usually don't give a shit. You can't rule my life!" he shouted, and then realizing how pathetic and typical he sounded then calmed himself down.

"I am eighteen," he said coolly. "You cannot tell me who I can and can't go out with. Legally you can't make me do a thing. I'm an adult."

"Barely," his mother scoffed with a smirk, throwing his own words back at him contemptuously. "You still live under our roof, and you'll obey our rules."

Natsume sensed the battle was over. It was time give up. They could win the argument, but they couldn't make him break up with her, so really they were still losing.

"Whatever," he muttered, and walked into the house – heading to his room.

"Don't walk away from us," his mother threatened unsuccessfully, and Natsume stormed silently up to his room; this time remembering to close the door.

He glared at his bed as if it were the thing's fault. He had been so close to the thing he wanted most in the world, and it was snatched away from him.

Mikan would have gone the whole way, he could tell, he could sense it, and although they didn't quite make it, at least that meant she would again. Simply the thought of that kept him from losing his mind, but to aid the process he called her.

"Okay, so you said 'scary'," was the first thing Mikan said when she picked up the call. "You didn't say insane."

"It was implied. Did you hear any of that?" he asked, meaning the argument that happened when she was only steps out of the door.

"I think the end of the street heard that, Natsume."

"I'm sorry they're... them. And that you have to go home alone too."

"It's fine, I do it all the time," she laughed carelessly, and Natsume scowled on the other end of the phone. He didn't like to think of her doing things without him, particularly things where she wandered around the city on her own.

"I take it we're still going out, then?" she added cheerfully, and he wondered why she was in such a great mood – was it something he did?

"Yes," he replied quicker than quick, and then after a pause said, "I wish I was with you. This place is hell." Mikan wondered if Natsume had realized she lived alone yet or not. She'd purposely been very hazy about her living arrangements; if he knew she had a constantly free house he'd just want to use the place to have sex all the time, and she didn't want to fuck things up even more by making a load of memories in her house that would go bad after he left.

"Mine's not much better," she replied with a sigh, thinking about how godawfully alone she'd be.

"What if... I were there?" he suggested coolly.

"I don't know," she said 'innocently'. "Why would that make it any better?"

"Because I'd drag you right into the middle of the floor and hold you down, good and firm so you couldn't fight me off," he said suggestively. "That would make things interesting."

"Ohh," she responded warmly. "That's what you're thinking of. How unusual," she said sarcastically.

"Well for saying that, I'd slowly start taking off whatever you're wearing right now, piece by piece," he described, squeezing his teeth over the top of his tongue as he heard her deepening breaths.

"Every piece of lip you give me, I'd take something off. Including that bra you're wearing... what was it, strawberry print?" He vaguely recalled the pattern of the one he'd been quite well acquainted with not too long ago, in this very room, but to be fair the print wasn't what he was most concerned with at the time.

"What if I didn't want to be topped by you, huh?" she posed flirtatiously.

"Another thing off," he commanded. "You don't get a choice. I always top." He did always top, apart from a few times with Yuri all those years ago, Natsume had never let a girl take control in bed; that defeated the whole point of why they slept with them.

"Overbearing, aren't you?" she taunted.

"And that's another one," he retorted. "You're running out of clothes fast."

"Poor me," she simpered. "What will I do?"

"I could find uses for you," he quipped, and without realizing, frightened the shit out of Mikan.

"What am I supposed to be, your personal hooker, huh?" she snapped suddenly. "I'd like to think you see me as a bit more than a piece of ass for your 'use', Natsume." He couldn't understand why she'd flipped. He thought they were just playing around with some dirty talk, but evidently that was not the case. She said he had mood swings.

"I didn't mean..."

"You think I don't know about you? How you think about girls?" she yelled, trying to hold back the way she was feeling – she was getting so close again, and he was just proving she was right. He'd be gone before you could say 'goodbye'.

"What are you talking about?" he snapped. "I don't get a word of this."

"You do us and then leave us," she growled. "I'm not stupid, I've talked to all your 'hits'. You don't stick around long, do you?"

"What? Other girls I've..." He broke off. No, she couldn't think...

"Why the fuck are you laughing, dickhead!" Mikan shrieked.

"You actually think I'd do the same with you?" he scoffed. "I knew most girls were insecure, but seriously–"

"Don't treat it so casually!" she insisted. "You asked me out because you wanted to get with me, didn't you? What's changed since then?" He was a little surprised that she seemed to know his primary motivations back then, and he asked himself what had changed. Why had his pathetic 'quest' to sleep with her turned into something real, something he valued more than any number of girls or petty points of revenge?

"...Everything," he eventually replied. "Everything has."

"Well..." she said feebly, her breath loud down the phone, "what's that even supposed to mean?"

"This is... hard to do on the phone," he murmured. "Can you come around again tomorrow? They'll both be out, and we can sort out whatever weird shit you've been thinking to yourself." The conversation drew to an artificial close, but he tried to make sure she knew he wasn't avoiding the question; he just wanted to be there in person.

"Well, okay," she relented quietly. "Time?"

"Any time, I'm not going out," he replied. "Look... if you were the same as other girls I wouldn't still be here. I'm..." He hesitated, hating that he sounded like such a played fool – but it seemed she was just as bad. "I'm pretty into you, okay? See you tomorrow?"

"Yeah, okay then.... Bye, Natsume," she said, and then he hung up. What was even going on? She'd lost track of it all, sometime during that crowded train ride when they'd first kissed for real.

He said once she was afraid he'd sweep her away, and even though she denied it, it seemed that it had happened all the same.

This night was the first time Mikan had lain in bed and honestly wished Natsume was there with her, even if it was just to explain why she wasn't the same as anyone else he'd done, but putting up a bigger fight. She'd wondered, of course, what it might be like to share a bed with him before – she'd only spent an entire night with someone twice in her life; once she didn't even have sex with the guy, but the other was with Narumi, and that made up for the first.

So she was early, well early-ish, to his place the next day. Not so early as to make her look too eager, but early enough for neither of them to spend time waiting for the other one.

She called him from the station – she couldn't remember where his house was after going there just once – and he wandered down to get her.

"Hey, dense girl," he greeted her, and the look she gave him was less than fond.

"I don't know what you seem to find so amusing," she snarled. "You know as well as I do that you don't exactly fit the 'committed boyfriend' standard." He shrugged.

"Maybe," he remarked, and took her chin in his hand, tilting her head from side to side carefully. "Hn, but perhaps you are as stupid as you look, eh?" She swung a hand out to slap him, and he caught it with a tiny smirk. He pulled his hand forward and dragged her mouth onto his, and then started to push her in the direction of his house after the kiss had ended.

"So?" she said expectantly.

"What?" he replied.

"You made me come over today – to take time out of my day – because 'you couldn't do something over the phone'," she reminded him irately.

"Oh, that was that," he said with a sideways glance, referring to the kiss.

"What?! Oh great," she groaned. "I thought you were going to say something."

"I might," he remarked, pushing up a sleeve of his jacket (worn over a tank-top) and then running his fingers through his hair. "Maybe I'm waiting for the right time." Mikan sighed, realizing she wasn't going to get anything out of him until he felt like not being vague.

"Hey, you're wearing an earring," she commented, as she caught sight of a shiny silver stud when he messed with his hair.

"What?" He processed what she said just after he replied. "Uh, yeah, so?"

"Is it a girl's earring?"

"It's a stud."

"And that's not girly?" she teased sarcastically.

"No," he stated firmly, and she laughed.

"It's a bit girly."

"Nope." He simply refused to accept her teasing, which, in turn, made it even more fun.

"Is it your little sister's?"

"No," he snapped, and Mikan giggled.

"Do you have one in the other ear?" She leant around him and tried to look – she found it a little hard to believe she'd never noticed earrings before, although she was aware of his small jewellery penchant; demonstrated by the limited number of rings and chains he wore occasionally.

At least he'd given up on the silly glasses thing; she hadn't seen him in them for a week or two now, and everyone else seemed to believe he'd just changed to contacts.

Perhaps he didn't normally have earrings in,or maybe it was just because she usually only had her hands in the back of his hair, and she really hadn't noticed until now.

He turned around, pushing back his hair, and tugged his other ear by the cartilage, highlighting a large gold cuff that ran right down the edge of his ear.

"Whoa, that's a big one," she gasped. "You don't wear that at school, do you?"

"Sometimes. If I forget to take it off. Haven't you ever noticed it?" he grunted.

"Well, I don't really look at your ears all the time, do I?" she laughed. "It's a bit over the top, isn't it?" He shrugged again, and before he realized it she'd leapt onto his shoulder, draping herself along his arm and nearly bowling both of them over.

"Why're you so quiet?" she asked, wrapping her arms around his neck and taking a better look at the ear closest to her: it was pretty average as far as ears went. "What did you want to say to me?" she inquired again, as her feet dragged along the pavement. "You said 'everything changed', what changed, huh? How am I supposed to know you haven't been playing me this whole time just to get me to sleep with you?"

"How am I supposed to know you haven't been pretending to go out with me so you and all your friends can laugh about how you're leading me on?" he snapped venomously, shaking her off him.

"What? Why would I do that?" she said; hurt and confused.

"I don't know, maybe for the same reasons I'd spend nearly two months with you just so I could sleep with you," he retorted, and as they reached his house he stormed up to the door and opened it, but she remained on the path outside.

"All you've done to girls your entire life is laying and leaving!" she protested. "What am I supposed to think?" Leaving the door open, Natsume strode up the path and grabbed her by the wrist, and then pulled her back down it into his house, closing the door behind them.

"You are the only girlfriend I've had. Ever," he hissed as he pressed her close to the wall inside. "You are the second one I've ever known as a person, you are the only one I actually liked of those two. You are different."

"Two?" Mikan echoed. "Who else?"

"What does it matter?" he retorted.

"Because I want to know!" she snapped.

"Fine," he huffed; it wasn't like it was a big deal anyway. "My... first. She was hired to tutor me two years ago: we didn't study much." He saw Mikan roll her eyes. "But I knew her more than I knew of most others... not that I liked it. She was stupid, self-obsessed, melodramatic... and a slut." Mikan struggled to push him away and glared daggers.

"She was," he insisted as he pushed her back against the wall. "She had a boyfriend and she fucked me; I was sixteen. She was nineteen. Before you ask I wasn't the one who started it either. She just had poor morals and no self-respect."

"Nice to know what I'm classed with," Mikan muttered, and then in a second found her face caught tightly and turned upwards to look at him.

"I do not class you with her, or anyone else," he said calmly. "Get it into your head."

"Then let go of me!" she snapped suddenly. "I don't need holding down like an animal!" Realizing she had a point, and that he was being a bit over-the-top on the physical restraint, Natsume stepped back and released her.

"I'm just trying to get it into your dense head: I like you," he said emphatically. "Hell, I fancy you more than anyone I've ever met. It's about the only thing that keeps me from losing the plot when you..." He was cut off when she lurched towards him and covered his mouth with hers, in a rushed 'you-said-a-nice-thing' spur of the moment kiss, but she broke away with a less than content smile.

"How can I know you really mean it?" she asked weakly, and with a heavy sigh he took her head in his hands, leaning her forehead against his tenderly.

"You just have to trust me," he explained simply. "Trust that I mean it." She blinked slowly and stared at him; his hands were so warm against her cheeks.

"I do," she said. "It's just sometimes... I think that maybe you're only after one thing, and when you've had it you'll move on to someone else. "Hey!" she snapped irately when he chuckled. "Don't laugh at me!"

"You dense girl," he laughed, dropping his arms and giving her a quick squeeze of reassurance. "Just... come inside for a while; we'll hang out and do whatever you want until you get it."

"What if it's just watching TV?" she posed a little more brightly.

"All right then," he replied, with a shrug of his shoulders that suggested that, although there were other things he might like to do more, watching TV would suffice for now. "Is that seriously what you want?" Mikan nodded. "Fine. But you'll have to fight Aoi for the remote."

"Aoi-chan is here?"

"Where else would she be? She lives here," he said sardonically, leading Mikan into the living room, where they sat together, Mikan curling up like a big cat, on a squishy western-style sofa and watched tweeny dramas of Aoi's choosing.

Aoi had insisted that if she was going to put up with Natsume and Mikan doing gross things, like cuddling and kissing, in front of her, then she would have complete control of what they watched.

"Momoko what are you doing?!" Mikan screamed at the TV a little later. "He loves you! He's just pretending to have amnesia because your grandmother's evil twin will cut the inheritance if he marries you because of what your father did to her son. No! Don't run crying to him! He's secretly in cahoots with the old lady to split the stolen money from the railway, and he'll try to seduce you so he can... no! What are you sayi–!"

"That's it," Natsume hissed as he clapped his hand firmly over Mikan's mouth. "You are being way too loud and annoying. Be quiet or we won't watch TV anymore."

"Fine," she whined. "I was just trying to tell her.."

"She's an actress. An actress on TV. She couldn't hear you even if she tried," he said coldly, and on the other side of the room Aoi giggled.

"I thought you said you didn't watch this show, Mikan-chan," Aoi remarked, and after a bit of light wrestling Mikan removed Natsume's hand from her mouth to answer her.

"I don't, Aoi-chan, but you told me what happened and I got a little bit... involved," she said bashfully. Her back was now against one arm of the sofa, and she had her legs curled over Natsume's lap; she could tuck her head in the crook of his neck, and he had a hand resting lightly curled around her ankles to keep her close to him.

"You'd get involved in anything," he muttered darkly, and pulled her a little more comfortably against him. "You got involved with me."

"Yeah," Aoi chipped in sarcastically. "Way to go on that one. He's really awful, isn't he?"

"Aaw, he's not so bad," Mikan replied jollily, slipping one of her cold hands underneath his top to warm against his stomach. "Better than a hot-water bottle."

"I can't believe this is what I amounted to," he lamented, more to himself than anyone else. "'Better than a hot-water bottle.'"

Mikan turned up her face and kissed his jaw fondly. "I'm sorry," she said sweetly. "I like you for other things too."

"Whatever," he grunted. "Aoi won't be able to stick around for the end of this show, it's rated adult." He gave Mikan a heated look; yes, she knew what he meant. TV was not going to be the main attraction of today's entertainment.

Yes, I looked at pictures of our boy on dev/art and remembered how awesome his earrings are. Although he's only wearing the cuff from the manga/anime currently.

Does Natsume seem out of character at the end? As he thaws I worry if he's losing himself, but manga-Natsume can be quite sweet when he wants to... so I'm hoping it's okay.

Leave a review please. I get depressed when I see stories with half the number of chapters as this and double the reviews, and Blue-Niagra has to talk me out of it :P