A/N: When I started to write this story, I just wanted to be guilty of the Obligatory Episode With False Babies. You know, these are always there, in tv-shows, cartoons, even anime - everything with the teenagers as a target audience at some point has something annoying and crying in there, and the characters have to take care of it because there's a school grade involved.
Then I sorta fell into the Obligatory Tropes Even Horizon headfirst. Oups.
"Married, With Children"
It was a school day like any other at the True Cross Academy. The a doors into the classroom opened with a loud thud as they hit the walls and the director waltzed into the room with a wide grin on his face and mischievous twinkle in his eyes.
Bad news, Yukio decided. He was not only the student representative at the True Cross Academy, but also a teacher at very unusual cram school. He knew perfectly well that the man in white, extravagant clothing wasn't human at all. While he never attacked any human - at least for what Yukio knew about him - but he still was rather tricky at times.
"Dear students of mine!" he said loudly, with glee on his voice. "Since we're a very progressive school, I decided to put you through a very peculiar project that would help greatly in your future!"
Yukio exchanged glances with Suguro, who was sitting at the opposite side of the classroom, by the window. He seemed to enjoy having the sun shining on his skin and notes, while Yukio found it a rather annoying thing, blinding him or making him feel way too warm while he was working. It was making talking a bit more difficult in a situation like these, but on the other hand, this was a class. They were supposed to pay attention, not talk to each other.
Suguro just shrugged, while sir Pheles happily continued.
"Since you're the best of the bests in this school, I'm certain you're up to the challenge!"
"What exactly is that challenge?" somebody asked.
"Babies, of course!" his grin widened even more. Just then, the doors opened again and the janitor pushed a big cardboard box inside the classroom. Sir Pheles, not wasting any time, dived inside it and when he straightened up again, there indeed was a baby in his hands.
It looked surprisingly realistic for a model. A skin tone was just what one would expect a human baby to looks like and it wasn't as pretty as the usual dolls one could see at the shops either.
"This," he said, grabbing the model by one of the legs and waving it around, so everyone could see it up close at least for a split second. "Is a really good model. There's a timer to check for how long it's unhappy and a few sensors to check this and that. Piece of cake for you guys, I'm sure!"
The class stared at him in silent terror, every single one of them making a perfect impression of a deer that got caught in the car reflectors. Unmoving and with eyes wide open, like they were expecting the danger to pass, mistaking them for statues. Or something.
They were the brightest of the bright and pretty sure that nobody mentioned anything about babies. Even artificial ones.
"Anyhow, It's only a week-long project, so do not worry, you won't lose too much sleep over it!" Sir Pheles laughed cheerfully. "So, since everything was said... I would like you guys to make pairs and each pair will receive one of the dolls!"
"Excuse me!" One of the girls stood up, blushing slightly. "But sir, there are not enough girls in the class to match the boys!"
"Ah?" He tilted his head and gaze of his yellowish eyes darted across the class. "Well, then, no worries! Since you're all treating your studies so seriously, I think it wouldn't be too much of a bother for two of boys to band together for this project, am I right?"
The class reluctantly nodded, all the males suddenly feeling uneasy. They all knew it wasn't anything serious, but still.
"So," the grin widened even more. "Who are the two lucky boys with the best grades?"
Almost all of the boys breathed out with relief, while Yukio moaned. Of course Mephisto would do that. Of course. On his side of the classroom, Suguro lowered his head and was murmuring something quietly, but Yukio couldn't tell if it was a prayer to keep his nerves in check or he was just cursing the ground Mephisto was standing on.
"Oh don't look at me like that!" The Headmaster giggled. "I don't want you to move into each other rooms or something like that! You can find the most comfortable way to take care of it yourself!"
This time the wide, theatrical gesture was a mistake. The doll, which was still in the devil's hand, crashed face-first into one of the desk with a loud thud and something clicked.
Moment later, the air was filled with loud, unholy wail.
"Oh, crud!" Sir Pheles blinked, surprised. "I guess I turned that one on... Well, now you can familiarize yourself with the sounds it's going to produce!"
They just stared at him, still shocked by the complete lack of any sorts of care. And the challenge itself. The whole scene was like taken straight from a dumb slapstick show or something like that. These things simply never happened in real life.
Mephisto waved the baby yet another time, completely ignoring the unholy sound coming out of its mouths.
" As I said, this is only a week-long project and since it's just a first go, it wouldn't be a big part of your grade. But give it your best shot anyway!"
That said, he put the - still wailing - doll on the desk and left the classroom, leaving them with the noise and a big box full of other dolls, probably ready to join the scream at any given moment.
The teacher stared at the closed doors for a moment, one of his eyes twitching, then he turned towards the cardboard box, his face getting more and more pale with every passing second.
Yukio sighed.
"Okay, everyone!" he stood up and took actions before the teacher had the chance to flee the room. "Let's keep calm! Please, select your partner and create a queue, so we can proceed with this project as fluently as it's possible!"
"Can somebody turn that baby off?!"
"It's so loud I barely hear what student representative is talking about!" somebody else protested.
"Professor, can you please make the baby quiet for a moment?"
The teacher only stared at the wailing horror on the desk and murmured something under his breath.
Yukio grit his teeth again. "Suguro, would you please lend our teacher a hand? He seems like he need some fresh air..."
At least Suguro was acting like his usual self, not letting the panic set it. He just nodded and dragged the poor man out of the class, while Yukio tried to control the rest of his classmates and hand the artificial babies, one for each pair of the embarrassed and scared teenagers.
When Suguro came back, there was still chaos in the class. More babies were crying, somebody was poking his doll with a pencil like he was expected it to bite him, while somebody else dropped his one on the floor and seemed to be going through a mild panic attack.
"Honestly," he sighed. "It's just a doll!"
"It's a grade!" somebody protested.
"I'm too young to be a mother!"
The whole classroom turned into one huge mess. The desk were no longer standing in nice rows. Instead, they were pushed from their usual spots in random directions, at least two of them were lying on the floor, along with lots of books, pencil cases and other stuff. And some unlucky guy, who was the first one to trip over that mess. Then, there were the babies. Babies everywhere, crying their artificial lungs out with all their might.
Yukio felt, like he was going to join the babies at any moment now. It was almost like at the mere sight of something in a shape of baby almost all of the students went completely mad. While Yukio knew that the babies were no demons from Hell – usually – he also knew that a panicked mass of people in most cases was much more troublesome than pissed off army of goblins. You couldn't start shooting at the panicked mass.
"Woah!" Suguro looked around the classroom, wondering at the pure chaos and sudden craziness that took over their classmates.
"Please, do tell me you're not going to join them!" Yukio groaned.
The Exwire did something worse. He started chuckling.
"And what's so funny, huh?" Yukio growled. He was so going to create a test straight from Hell, just to have some sort of a revenge.
The Exwire seemed to understand the danger he was in and stopped having fun. Instead, he started moving around, helping to bring people back to their senses and explaining things.
"No, this is not how you hold a baby," Suguro grunted, looking with annoyance at one of his peers. The girl was to drop the doll at any given moment, holding it like she was trying to not touch it at all.
"But if this really is like a baby, then it might puke!" she protested. "Babies always puke!"
"That's why you're supposed to wrap a piece of cloth around your shoulder," he rolled his eyes. "Women do that to not show too much when they're feeding their kids. But it works as an anti-puke shield too."
"Woah!" other girl gasped. "Suguro sure knows a lot about babies!"
He just shrugged.
"There's nothing big about it. And now look, I'm going to show you how you're supposed to hold it properly, so you can help other people too, okay? I don't want to be stuck here till evening!"
"Oh, okay!"
Yukio exhaled with relief and walked to the other end of the classroom. With a bit of luck, they should be done before the situation would turn any more ridiculous.
xxx
"Oh man, I can't believe it!" Shima bended over in yet another fit of uncontrollably laughter. "This is like a cheap slapstick show!"
"Oh, bug off," Suguro grunted.
"But you're like a married couple! With a baby!"
There indeed was a baby, currently lying in a schoolbag that belonged to Suguro. It was an artificial one, but it still looked as out of place as any baby would be in a classroom destined to train demon fighters. At least it was quiet.
"So, how the life of a wife is treating you, Bon?" Shima grinned widely. He rarely had an opportunity to poke fun at his serious, serious friend, so he decided to squeeze all he could out of this situation.
"Wife?!" Suguro spluttered. "Why the hell I'm supposed to play the female role?"
"Because Teach Okumura has a job!" Renzou explained, trying to keep a serious expression on his face. If not for a slight twitch of the corners of his mouth, he would succeed. "He's supporting the family financially, so you're the stay at home mum!"
"Can't we be a progressive family?"
"Oh, so you're gay then?"
"I'm going to strangle you!" Ryuji announced in a low growl.
But he couldn't implement his threat. The clever doll reacted to the sudden raise in the noise around and decided to join in.
"I love this project," Renzou sighed, looking at the artificial baby in awe. "I really, really do!"
"Go screw yourself, you idiot," Suguro grunted, unhappily.
"Your wish is my command!"
"Oh ew!" Izumo shuddered. "That's the most disgusting thing I've even heard!"
"There are children in the room, you should stop saying things like that!" Rin scolded him with a serious expression on his face.
"This is a doll!" Shima made a wide gesture with both of his hands. "A doll!"
"Well, you started it," Izumo shrugged.
There was not much more time to make fun of Suguro – who right now was more occupied with trying to force the doll to shut up – since the lesson started.
However an idea was born inside of Shima's mind. He spend the whole cram school oddly silent, with his eyes wandering every few minutes towards the baby filled bag, thinking.
xxx
It was late in the evening and the Okumura twins were not expecting any visitors anyway, so it was pretty odd to hear knocking at such late hour. Yukio was never knocking and he had the keys and Mephisto never cared about such things anyway. Rin opened the doors and blinked, surprised.
"Suguro? What are you doing here at this time of the night?"
"I uh..." Bon chewed on his lip, a slight blush creeping up his cheeks. "Can I hang out with you guys for tonight?"
"Yeah, sure!" Rin grinned, then his brow furrowed in worry. "Something happened?"
"Shima happened," Suguro grimaced, gladly walking into the silent, almost empty dorm building. "He decided that because almost everyone in my class is completely clueless about little babies, it would mean easy money for him."
"You don't say!" Rin gasped.
"There's like seven dolls inside my room by now," Bon groaned, leaning with his backs onto a wall. "And it's going to be more, because he somehow managed to talk Neko into helping him."
"Woah!" Okumura blinked. "No wonder you decided to get out of there!"
"I don't mind the dolls," Bon sighed. "I'm just so damn tired...!"
"Well, we did have all night long stuff to do yesterday..." Rin mumbled.
"And the night before I spend learning for chemistry test," Bon sighed.
"Really?" The older Okumura blinked. "I never notice when my brother is studying extra hard for something..."
"He's much better at this stuff than me," Suguro shrugged. "And no wonder, since he's the pharmacology teacher at the cram school."
"Yeah, he's sort of awesome!"
He pushed Suguro further inside and soon enough they were both sitting in the room with tea and cookies.
"Sorry for these," Rin grimaces, breaking one in half. "I was trying out the new recipe and something went wrong. They were supposed to be crunchy, but ended up just dry. And kinda rubbery too."
"They are not that bad," Suguro just shrugged and took another one. "And it's not like I know anything about baking."
"Hah," Rin smirked. "And here I was, thinking that you know everything about anything!"
"I'm not a walking encyclopedia, you dolt!"
Before Yukio finally came back from his evening job, Suguro and Rin finished Rin's homework and actually went through some of the cram school material. At some point Ryuji admitted his defeat and they switched to watching some sort of a movie on the laptop. Rin wasn't sure what it was about or even what genre it was, too occupied with the excitement of having an actual sleepover. It was first time in his life and he didn't want to spare any of his attention to something like a dumb movie. It's not like he couldn't watch it again on some other day.
Then Yukio was back and joined them for a short moment, before decided to head to the bathroom for a quick shower. Rin somehow got sucked in into the movie, though he had no idea what in the world was going on – the sudden explosions were just nicely done and pretty entertaining. The spell was broken only after a slight creek of opened doors told him that his brother was back.
Yukio snorted slightly and gestured for Rin to turn around.
Curiously, he did so and then had to quickly cover his mouth with hand to not snort too loudly.
Suguro was already out as a candle, slightly curled up on Rin's bed, his legs still on the floor.
"To drop like that, he really had to be exhausted..." Yukio mumbled.
"I wonder how Shima and Konekomaru are going to look like after the weeks ends..." Rin said quietly, then carefully walked towards bed.
Spending night crumbled like that, Bon would feel really bad in the morning, so he decided to do the sensible thing and help him a little. Pulling his legs up onto the bed wasn't all that difficult thing to do, same as peeling his shoes off, so he wouldn't dirty the sheets.
"Woah, he's really out!" Rin mused. "He not even grunted when I was moving him around!"
"Yeah," Yukio agreed. "You're going to sleep with me tonight, I guess..."
"Nah," Rin waved his hand at him. "If he dropped like that you're probably even more tired. Go get your sleep, I'll squeeze next to Suguro. It's my bed, after all!"
"Whatever," Yukio just shrugged.
xxx
When Yukio woke up, Rin was still sleeping, holding onto Suguro like the second teen was some sort of an overgrown teddy bear. Suguro himself was still asleep too, which was slightly weird, considering his usual daily routine. He heard enough complains about Bon rising with the sun for the other two boys to know it quite well.
Rin made a small noise and then blinked. Did he woke up because he felt Yukio staring at them? It would be a rather unusual thing for his brother, since Rin was a master when it came to ignoring people – especially his twin brother – but on the other hand he was the absolute master in doing unusual stuff too.
"This is not how I imagined my first time snuggling with somebody, but whatever," Rin shrugged and carefully crawled out of the bed. "You think he's fine?"
Yuikio blinked. "What do you mean?"
"That's Suguro!" he said, stretching. "He's usually up and running the moment Sun's up!"
Well, he had a point here, Yukio decided. Or was reading in his mind, since Yukio himself was slightly worried about the other Exwire being sick.
Yukio shook his head. "He might be just exhausted and sleeping it off."
"He said he was kinda tired," Rin murmured, eyeing the other boy. Yukio hoped that he wasn't considering grabbing a sharpie and covering his face with some odd drawings. Suguro would murder Rin for something like that and then go straight for the other twin, since he let Rin do something like that. "Said something about pulling allnighter to study, I think?"
"Yes!" Yukio couldn't help himself.
"What now?"
"Suguro broke the rules!" he chuckled. "We had a bet going, staying up at night to study was forbidden!"
Rin pinched the bridge of his nose, perfectly imitating the favorite expression of his twin brother. It was almost like looking into a mirror. A mirror that decided you were completely hopeless. "…you guys are just terrible, you know that?"
"Just let him sleep then," Yukio decided after a moment of consideration. They walked out of the room and headed to the kitchen, Yukio carrying the bag with the doll under his arm. Leaving it with the sleeping Suguro only for it to start screaming would definitely be counterproductive. "it's weekend anyway, so it's not like you two have to go anywhere anytime soon."
"Huh?" Rin blinked. "Are you going somewhere?"
"You know I have a job, brother," Yukio frowned slightly. "I can trust you with the doll, right?"
"Sure," he grinned. "Like I would miss occasion to help my brother cheat!"
"I'm not cheating," he grumped. "It was clearly said that we can use whatever means we find sufficient to pass this... test, for the lack of a better word."
"Sure, sure."
"Don't give me that smile!" Yukio frowned.
"Hey, I promise, I won't do anything," Rin groaned. "I'm not that sort of a person!"
"Just watch over the doll, Suguro and don't get into any troubles while I'm away, okay?"
"Your priorities never ceased to amaze me," Rin rolled his eyes.
xxx
Suguro woke up and blinked, not recognizing the room. After a few seconds it all came back to him; he was at the Okumura's dorm instead of his own, because Shima was a dumbass.
He sat up with a groan, feeling groggy and migraine welcomed him with white-hot shot of pain.
"Crap!" he groaned and that was a mistake. His own voice rand mercilessly in his ears, causing another needle of pain to surface.
Beautiful, he thought. While it really wasn't the first time the migraine hit him with a full force, he wasn't getting them very often. At least they never were really long, usually passing after several hours. He just needed some painkillers. And to lie down, but that one he got already covered. Even if it wasn't his bed. No way Ryuji would move any time soon.
Usually the headache wasn't as strong as now; while it was annoying and uncomfortable, he was still able to more or less function.
Now however, he was incapacitated.
The doors creaked when they were opened and Ryuji grimaced, closing his eyes.
"Hey, man, you fine?" Rin asked quietly, looking at him with worry on his face.
"It's just a migraine," Suguro waved his hand at the other boy. "It'll pass. It's just annoying."
"You're hurting."
"That's what's migraines are about, you dolt!"
"Hey, hey!" Rin huffed at him. "Now you're hurting yourself and that's not even funny! Go back to bed, I'll make you tea and something to eat..."
"I don't want food," Suguro grunted.
"I'm Sure as hell that you'll not getting any pill on empty stomach!"
"Fine," Suguro growled. "Just nothing with strong smell to it."
"I guess that would be a disaster," Rin nodded and tilted his head, thinking. "Plain rice with egg would be okay with you? Or you want soup?"
"Rice is fine," Suguro said, falling back on the pillows in defeat.
Rin nodded and headed towards the kitchen, taking the doll with him. He probably should just leave it there, because the blasted thing was quite noisy and it definitely wasn't a thing Bon would like at this moment.
Making the dish was even quicker than usual, since they had a lot of left-over rice already cooked and ready to use. Rin planned to use it for tomorrow lunch or maybe serve it with breakfast. Well, it was time for early supper anyway.
He mixed a bit of rice with egg and added several pieces of crab. It was the most bland tasting meat he had in the fridge at the moment and he wanted the food to be something else than just carbs.
Humming to himself, he quickly turned the head on and waited patiently for his pan to get hot enough to cook. While raw eggs were totally fine with him and he knew that Bon would eat pretty much anything - the ability to swallow Shiemi's salads and sandwiches without grimacing was a proof of that - but he wasn't sure if serving it to somebody sick was a good idea.
Suguro ate half of the dish before he grimaced and put the bowl away. Well, at least now he was running on something, so Rin gave him the pills and a glass of water.
Soon enough, he was asleep again.
Rin stretched, then picked up the plates and carefully walked out of the room, trying to close the doors behind as quietly, as possible.
He had still a supper for Yukio to made and maybe some broth for tomorrow breakfast too.
After he cleaned up the meat and vegetables and started on the soup, there was nothing much for him to do, besides watching the doll. Or heading back to his room, to grab a book. Yukio would be proud.
He actually did the later, mostly because he could use it as a proof that he was actually trying when his brother would try to give him a talk about acting like an adult.
He sat on the table, ignoring Ukobach protests for treating kitchen table like that and started to read, setting the book on his lap and grabbed the bowl. No reason for the food to get wasted.
"Blargh!" Rin grimaced after taking a first spoon. "How he could even eat that? It's so bland a cardboard would actually pass as something tasty!"
He immediately put the bowl away and stood up. The forgotten book hit the floor and he almost step on it. But he really, really needed salt. Or soy sauce. Or something, just to save his taste buds from dying.
"I'm ashamed," he muttered, after he added a generous amount of seasoning into it.
Ukobach nodded wisely and patted him on the back.
"I know, I know," he muttered, swallowing a bite. "I wanted it bland, but this, my friend, is an overkill! I hope Suguro won't remember the taste..."
He really hoped so. His cooking skills were his pride and serving a bad dish was just... wrong. Especially since it was the one and only thing Rin considered himself to be actually good at.
xxx
A victory always had a sweet taste and even the younger of Okumura twins couldn't just ignore the opportunity.
"Are you feeling better, Suguro?" Yukio asked with a small, gentle smile. His voice was far too sweet and Rin's eyes automatically darted in his direction. The other boy was oblivious about how dangerous his situation was.
"Yeah, that was just a migraine," he nodded. "Sorry for being a nuisance like that!"
"Don't be ridiculous," Yukio huffed. "That could happen to anyone. Do this happen very often?"
"No," Suguro shook his head. "Usually it's just mild pain, totally bearable. This was the first time in few years that it hit me so hard."
"Good to hear that," Yukio nodded. "It would be troublesome to suddenly develop one during a mission or in a middle of fight... Or maybe it was because of that allnighter?"
Ryuji instantly tensed and then he turned towards Rin, sending him a nasty glare.
"You're busted indeed," Yukio continued happily. " And we are not even that far into the semester…"
"Alright!" Suguro raised both of his hands. "I admit my defeat! Dishonor on me, or whatever."
"Just don't do that again, okay?" Yukio said with a small sight, but he was still smiling. "The whole point of that part of our bet was to not overwork ourselves too much, after all."
"I know, I know," Suguro waved his hand. "I also know that it's all going to be more difficult in the future, so I wanted to get my grades as good as possible, so the eventual drop wouldn't endanger my stipendium. "
"Aand you endangered your health instead, congratulations!" Rin happily summed it all up, while patting Ryuji on the shoulder.
"That I did," Suguro admitted and stood up. "I should be going though, I was here long enough."
"Don't be dumb!" Rin jumped up and scolded him in an instant. "You're already under the weather and the noise is making it worse, right? How many dolls Shima actually decided to take in?"
"I have no idea," he shrugged.
"They you will either suffer through another one on show up here every other day, just to catch some shut eye," he winkled his nose. "Just stay."
"I don't want to be a bother..." Ryuji muttered.
"Rin is right, we have to keep an eye on the doll anyway," Yukio smiled. "And we might take care of other homework too."
"That's pretty good idea, actually," Suguro nodded.
"Of course," Rin muttered under his breath. "I should've started with that. You two have same priorities, after all!"
And an ongoing friendly rivalry too, while he was at it. More than once he caught his brother studying late in the night, because Suguro had better grades and Yukio just couldn't stand that. He even found himself an excuse for that act of masochism - as a teacher he couldn't let his student to know more, because that would be embarrassing. Or something like that. Rin just called him a dumbass then.
"Don't make faces, brother," Yukio scolded him.
"Hey, I actually did some studying while I was alone with the doll. And I made supper too!"
"Oh, that's very good brother. I'm sure we will have a great time quizzing you together!"
"Hey!" Rin protested. "That's totally unfair!"
Yukio and Suguro both snorted.
And they indeed started to throwing questions at Rin when they were done with the food. It was annoying, but at least Suguro was stopping the tortures to actually explain what was the answer and explaining why instead of making painful expression and telling him to study more. Yukio followed the example pretty quickly.
"You're really good at explaining things, Suguro," he said at some point.
"I guess?" Ryuji shrugged. "It's not the first time for me to help somebody at this stuff."
"Ah, so you were helping other people study then?"
"Not exactly..." this time he grimaced. "Mostly just around the temple, there always are kids there. It was harder to do it at school, since, well..."
Both of Okumura twins knew exactly what he was talking about. His temple, bearing the unfair stigma of being cursed after the Blue Night events. Because of that, he was almost as shunned as Rin was during his childhood. But while Rin had vicious streaks that caused people around him to fear him, Ryuji was completely innocent.
"Sorry," Yukio sighed. "I wasn't thinking clearly, I shouldn't been asking questions like that."
"I don't mind," Suguro smiled slightly. "That's in the past anyway."
"Well, you really should try it now!" Rin grinned. "You are actually making sense to me!"
"I'm not sure if I'm supposed to be happy or worried because of that..."
"Oi!" Rin instantly protested. "Here I am, trying to be nice and supportive and what are you doing?!"
He pushed Bon, a little harder than planned and he bumped into Yukio.
Uh, oh!, he thought. This was bad, he shouldn't have...
But before the anxiety managed to set in, Suguro picked himself back up and pushed Rin with a wry grin on his face. He shoved Bon again playfully, while Yukio just facepalmed and backed away, to not get hit again by accident. Pretty soon, Rin ended up with his head in a lock, laughing his butt off.
Yukio just rolled his eyes.
xxx
"I," Shima moaned, dropping face-first onto his desk. "Am so tired you wouldn't even believe!"
"You were the one who decided to be a full-time nanny for several babies," Suguro smirked.
"Well, you ran away to be with your husband, what I was supposed to do on my own?"
"Konekomaru was helping you!"
"Actually, he had his own bath of babies, we shared."
"I decided that I want to be a cat lady," Miwa murmured after hearing his name, then curled once again into his chair.
"Well, everybody passed rather nicely," Suguro shrugged. "So you should be satisfied with yourself."
"I wanted to pick up a girl... or two..." Renzou muttered into the desk, but loud enough for his words to be still recognizable. "You know, a guy good with children, chicks are supposed to like that..."
"When they are thirty, maybe" Izumo snorted with annoyance. "Besides, you were taking money for it."
Shima moaned. "What's wrong with taking money for the job?"
"You're supposed to be genuinely taking care of them, not treating it as a job," she explained and huffed angrily. "Honestly!"
"Well, at least I'm rich now!" he muttered. "Rich and so empty on the inside...!"
"You're being overdramatic," Suguro rolled his eyes.
"And I'm glad I'm not in your class. Wasting time like that..." Izumo shook her head.
"It wasn't that bad!" Rin protested. "Actually, it was kinda cute!"
Izumo just rolled her eyes. "You find everything to be either cute or awesome," she pointed out.
"Hey, I'm just enjoying all the things!" he protested. "There's nothing wrong with that!"
"Hey, where you were sleeping anyway?" Renzou raised his head for a moment to look at Suguro. "I think there were only two beds at Okumura's dorm?"
"We shared," Rin shrugged.
"So," Izumo blinked, her eyes widening slightly. "You were thrown out of your own bed because babies took your place... and then you moved into your husband house, just to end up sleeping with his brother?"
She gasped, covering her mouth with hand. "That's like a soap opera coming to life!"
"I don't know where in the world you ended up with that," Suguro groaned. "But sure as hell I don't want to know that!"
"I'm telling the truth! It's so ridiculous it would make a great manga!" She argued, a slight blush of excitement creeping up her cheeks.
"Kamiki, what in the world are you even reading?!"
"Well, I actually do have hobbies, you know!" Izumo grunted, blushing some more.
"Soap operas, huh?" Rin tilted his head. "Hey, Kamiki, does that mean that you're a romantic girl?"
"Me? Romantic? Don't be ridiculous, I'm just reading these for laughs!" she shouted, instantly switching from embarrassment to anger.
"Yeah, keep telling yourself that," Suguro snickered, finally recovering.
The blush on her face deepened and she made another angry huff, pouting at him.
Ryuji just chuckled, amused by the irony of the situation. Just a moment ago she was making fun of him and now the tables turned on her. Without any help from the outside, which was making the whole ordeal even more hilarious. And Kamiki was kind of enjoyable like that too, all flustered and grumpy. This wasn't happening very often, but when somebody get her to this state, she was amusingly bratty.
Before they had time to tease her a bit more, the doors opened and Yukio Okumura walked in, carrying a thick file under his arm.
"Hello, class!" he welcomed them cheerfully.
Shima used the occasion to elbow Bon right under his ribs.
"Hey, princess!" he murmured. "Go kiss your hubby!"
Ryuji just smacked him with a book, instantly more interested with the lesson than anything else. Kamiki sat down nearby instead of her usual place away from the group, probably not wanting to walk all that distance and disturb the lesson.
All was well.