Prompt: Glitter
Other characters: Anna.
Other pairings: None.
Notes: Finally updated, yay!
Disclaimer: I do not own Gakuen Alice or any of its characters.
"I am so sorry."
A less disagreeable man than Natsume might have easily forgiven his girlfriend, especially when she so obviously looked to be repenting, but he just ducked his head down further and glared at her through his bangs. Cringing at the intensity of his gaze, she returned to carefully running her fingers through his hair, picking out anything that even remotely sparkled.
She worked in complete silence for a few minutes – she was too sheepish to say anything and he had never been one to try and ease tension – until finally the quiet was broken by his gruff words.
"It was your stupid idea, wasn't it?"
She looked, if it was possible, more sheepish than ever, and slowly nodded her head in answer.
To be fair, she hadn't thought the idea was stupid at all! In fact, it had seemed wonderful, and if she had been in his place, she would have been more than happy to get covered in such pretty sparkles. The 'stupid' part of the idea was the fact that she'd decided it was a good idea to subject Natsume to such an ordeal – silent, broody, kill-joy Natsume. She should have known better.
When Anna had come to her earlier in the day, begging for her help with the Technical class's booth for the Alice Festival, Mikan had been happy to agree. Her own shift in the Special Abilities class was just ending and she was free as a bird, gleeful at the chance to help a friend. She and Natsume had agreed to look around the festival together when she was done, but she'd just let him know about the sudden dilemma and suggested that he come visit her at the Technical area, which he'd reluctantly agreed to, but only once she'd promised that he could have her all to himself once she was free again.
Due to its popularity, the Technical class had opened up another cafe this year. The maid uniforms were positively adorable, to Mikan's delight, and she'd wasted no time rushing over to her boyfriend when he walked in and showing it off. He simply grunted in appreciation, but she knew that was his code for "You look nice" when they were in public, and she flushed with pleasure.
"Come sit here, Natsume," she told him eagerly, leading him by the hand to a table close to the kitchen. From there, it would be easiest for the two of them to steal glances even while she was working. "I'll bring you a cake – my treat!"
"You sure that's a good idea, one star?" he teased her, and she playfully smacked his shoulder on her way to the shelf of pastries.
Things had been good until that point, but then she'd had her brilliant idea.
One of her seniors in the Special Abilities class had given her some special candles from a pack he'd bought in Central Town not too long ago. They were made so that when someone blew them out, they let off tiny fireworks, and Mikan had been simply awed by the idea. However, her senior had neglected to mention how... powerful they were.
(Or maybe he had, but she'd simply been her usual self and forgotten his warning. If she really thought hard about it now, she could vaguely remember him mentioning something about a "prank" while she'd been too busy squealing over her gift).
Wanting to be a doting girlfriend, Mikan had picked the prettiest cake of the lot for Natsume – one covered completely in Anna's edible glitter – and had stuck the special candles on top for him to blow out. He'd looked mildly impressed by the pastry she'd set before him on the table, along with a steaming cup of tea, and she'd been more than just a little proud of herself as she urged him to blow out the candles.
As soon as he did, they exploded.
So now, here they were, holed up in one of the back rooms with a bunch of kitchen supplies as Mikan picked bits of cake and glitter out of her boyfriend's hair. He'd already wiped the mess off his face with the towel Anna had hurriedly brought him and taken off his ruined shirt, but his hair was a little difficult to handle by himself, especially since glitter was near impossible to get off anything. Feeling incredibly guilty, Mikan had led him somewhere more private and offered to de-glitter his hair herself, and he'd been giving her the silent treatment ever since.
"I really am sorry," she said again, standing a little closer to peer at his unruly locks. He'd mussed them up to get out as much debris as he could.
"If this stuff doesn't come out and I have to go to class this way..." he just said warningly.
"I'm sure it'll be fine once you wash your hair," she whimpered, picking some of the glitter out of his hair. She didn't care that a lot of it had rubbed onto her hands and her clothes as she worked, though perhaps she should have given more thought to a borrowed uniform. "Besides, it really doesn't look that ba–"
She broke off as soon as she saw his sharp glare. Maybe feeding him baseless, comforting lies wasn't the best idea. Anyone with eyes could see that Natsume's hair had practically become a target for satellites in space for how much it sparkled. It didn't help that edible glitter was apparently more sticky than regular glitter, to ensure that it wouldn't slide off desserts.
"Well, I'm sure no one would dare say anything about it," she tried instead.
"And I've got Koko to check that no one's thinking anything either," he mumbled darkly. Mikan cringed. Tomorrow would not be a good day.
"Natsume, don't get mad at them," she reasoned, hoping to keep him from unleashing his wrath upon their unsuspecting class. "If anything, you should be mad at me for causing this."
"Oh, I am mad at you," he snapped without hesitation.
"Then redirect all the anger you might feel at the others to me too. Just don't hurt anyone, okay?"
"Polka, I don't think just one person can handle the brunt of all my anger," he warned her. "Not even a clueless idiot like you."
She sighed, finally pulling her hands out of his hair and taking a step back. "Then what can I do, Natsume? Just tell me. Is there anything I can do that would make you feel better about this? I'll take any punishment game!" She folded her arms firmly, as a show of her resolution.
He simply rolled his eyes. "I doubt any punishment game would really make you learn your lesson. You'll just turn around and do this again at some point, won't you? Tomorrow, even."
"Not true!" she argued vehemently, but the argument was a little lost when she stomped her foot like a child. "I can too learn from my mistakes – just like I can own up to them. Just watch me make up for what I did!"
She glanced about the room in desperation, hoping something would pop out at her and give her the perfect idea for a punishment. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed something sparkling on one of the shelves, and upon closer inspection, she discovered that it was a whole tube of the same glitter that was now in Natsume's hair. The idea hit her immediately, and as her eyes lit up, she reached for the glitter and unscrewed the cap.
Without warning, she dumped the entire contents into her own hair.
"Polka, what the hell!" Natsume cried in shock, leaning back a little as some of the dust flew in his direction.
Mikan, grinning so widely her cheeks might have cracked, just rubbed the glitter into her hair and brightly exclaimed, "Now we match!"
Her boyfriend narrowed his eyes at her, incredulous. "And how the hell is that supposed to make everything better, idiot?"
"It's less embarrassing if there's two of us now," she explained in a matter-of-fact tone, combing her fingers through her long strands so that any extra glitter drifted to the ground. They had made such a mess in the supply room by now.
After staring at her for a few more beats of incredulous silence, Natsume put his face in his hands and groaned. "God, now they're going to think we're doing some weird matching couples thing, like we put the glitter in our hair to show our love or some shit like that. Do you ever think things through, Mikan?"
She stuck out her bottom lip, slightly irked that her efforts had gone unappreciated. She'd just poured glitter all over her hair for him, for God's sake! Did Natsume not realize that for girls, their hair was their life? He could have at least commended her for her sacrifiice.
"Geez, Natsume, I give up!" she whined. "You're such a kill-joy about everything. Who gets this upset over some harmless glitter?"
His answering stare was dry. "Oh, and I suppose when you call my name for the Last Dance and people stare at the two dancing idiots with the matching, sparkling heads, you won't care?"
That finally gave Mikan pause. She opened her mouth, but then closed it again just as quickly. After a few minutes of twirling some of her hair on her finger, she finally stuttered out, "Th-the Last Dance?" There was a flush creeping onto her cheeks.
He blinked up at her. "What? Were you not going to call my name?"
"G-G-Geez, Natsume!" she cried, her voice a few octaves higher than usual. "You're just so cocky, aren't you? You fox!"
"Well, were you or were you not going to call my name?" he demanded coolly.
"Th-that's besides the point!" she shot back. "Besides, it's my choice. How can you be so sure I'll even request you?"
"Who else are you going to request?" he replied, flippantly.
Mikan flushed even more. Of course, she had been planning to request him. He was right: there was no one else. But she'd wanted it to be a surprise, dammit! There was nothing romantic about her calling his name for the Last Dance for the very first time if he was already so sure she would.
Not to mention, he'd made an excellent point. She didn't particularly mind about the glitter in her hair right now, but the dance was a special occasion; she'd be getting all dressed up and sharing that legendary dance with her boyfriend. Having this mess of glitter in her hair would just ruin everything!
"Maybe... maybe I won't even dance the Last Dance this year," she considered slowly, though the idea of missing out on it definitely disheartened her.
Natsume raised an eyebrow. "Oi, oi. Don't be hasty, Polka."
"Well, what else am I supposed to do?" she demanded. "You said yourself you don't want to dance with me if you have glitter in your hair–"
"I didn't say that," he interrupted her with a roll of his eyes. "I just said we'll look like idiots, all thanks to you."
"So... what?" she inquired innocently. "Will you still dance with me if I requested you? Even if people stared at us and made fun of the glitter?"
He looked off to the side, casually shrugging his shoulders in response. But he'd ducked his head so that his bangs covered his eyes, which she'd learned meant that he was embarrassed. It was the best "Yes" she was going to get out of him.
Mikan's chest suddenly felt very warm, as if it might just burst. She carefully swept the bangs out of his eyes and placed a kiss on his forehead.
"You're sweet, you know that, Natsume?" she said with a giggle. "Though I do wish you didn't have to always be so vague about it – pretending you're mad about the glitter when you were only worried that our dance would be ruined."
"I'm actually mad about the glitter, moron," he huffed, but the words didn't have his usual bite. "And what was up with those stupid candles?"
She swiftly averted his eyes. "Like I said, I really am sorry." She tried to look as pathetic and as apologetic as possible. "Please forgive me?"
It took another hour of her incessantly groveling and giving him all sorts of promises before he finally stopped sulking, but even then, he absolutely refused to accept another piece of cake while he waited for her shift to end, despite the fact that she was all out of candles.
At least they had a nice time wandering through the festival together, even if she did constantly have to restrain him from attacking any of the kids who pointed at their hair.
A/N: I think I actually want to write about the Last Dance at some point. Let's see which prompt it ends up being :) Though I still haven't decided whether I would want to reference back to this glitter debacle and vaguely link the two drabbles together.
Anyway, I hope everyone's been doing awesome since the last update, and will continue to do so until the next one :) See you next time!