A/N: Honestly thank you very much for reviewing! Enjoy the chapter.

Disclaimer: I don't own blah, blah…

Chapter 7 Kiss Me!

(Normal PoV)

Taking in a deep breath, Natsume places his hand on the door knob and slowly turns it. With his eyes closed and still holding his breath he slightly pushes the door. He can feel his heart pounding inside his chest, he tries to let the air he's been holding out, but he finds himself completely unable to move, like a statue.

With all his might he manages to step one foot outside of the bathroom and finally opens the door all the way, exposing himself to anyone who might be in the living-room. He just stands there, silent, eyes closed, not moving a muscle and still holding his breath waiting for any type of sound or reaction from anyone.

He waits… but nothing ever comes, not a word, not a sound… He slowly opens his eyes after some time expecting to see Mikan frowning or holding back her laughter, but instead he finds her lying on the couch sleeping peacefully. He sighs, had he really taken so long in the bathroom?

He walks up to her and one of his hands starts approaching her sleeping figure. The corners of his lips curve slightly as his hand is about to reach her face. He just wanted to wake her up, that was it, or so he repeats inside of his head several times.

He is so lost in that thought he doesn't notice one of the rooms' door opening. Youichi comes out of the room and yawns stopping in mid-yawn when he notices Natsume there giving his back to him. He stealthily approaches him from behind and whispers in his monotonous voice "What are you doing?"

Natsume's eyes shoot open and his jaw drops, his whole body suddenly tightens and he goes back to statue-mode for a while. When he recovers from the shock he quickly retreats his hand and tries to explain. "I was ju-just trying to-." his voice coming out louder than he expected.

"I would keep my voice down if I were you… You don't want her to wake up now do you?" as soon as he finishes saying that sentence her eyelids start parting slowly. She yawns and stretches a little causing Natsume to freak out and jump backwards falling on his back to the floor, landing with a very loud -thud-

Mikan quickly sits up and looks at the source of the noise frowning. He sits on the floor and winces, thus closing his eyes, and rubs his back. Youichi rolls his eyes and sits down on a sofa. When she finally realizes what's going on, Mikan gets off the couch and helps Natsume stand up.

"What are you doing on the floor? Honestly you should-." She suddenly becomes silent when Natsume finally opens his eyes and looks at her. It's really hard to describe what she felt at that precise moment when his eyes met hers, considering she couldn't really think straight at that point. It was like time suddenly stopped, it felt exactly like the time she first took his glasses away from him, well that multiplied by ten. The problem is she can't smile or blush or do anything stupid now, because he can see her face clearly this time.

She was completely lost in his eyes for a second that felt like hours to her. She is completely hypnotized. Her body won't move while her mind will keep screaming 'DO SOMETHING, ANYTHING!' She can tell her eyes are wide open, and she's afraid that she is probably gaping but she can't move an inch. She can feel heat crawling onto her cheeks. 'Come on Mikan pull yourself together!' she mentally scolds herself.

Her left hand starts moving unconsciously, her fingers itching to touch his face to make sure it's not just a dream. Youichi takes this as his cue and coughs loudly, immediately bringing Mikan back to reality. She shakes her head and backs away a little. She looks at him again trying to avoid eye contact at all costs. 'It was just the shock of seeing him like this, that's all…' she tries to convince herself.

"Well…" she says after a while tapping her chin with her index finger. "I guess it COULD be worse…"

Natsume, who was obviously registering her every move didn't miss on anything, not her shocked face, not her moving hand, not even the slight tint of red that appeared for a full second on her cheeks. He realized she wanted to say something else, but obviously Minako wouldn't forgive her if she did.

But he didn't mind, even though they had only REALLY known each other for like two days, for some reason he could understand her completely without her having to do anything. He knew perfectly well what she really wanted to say, and he wasn't gonna push her to say it, he didn't need her to.

He smiles at her remark and shrugs. "I could say the same thing about you…" he answers chuckling.

"What's that supposed to mean Na- Kazume?" he raises an eyebrow and then frowns, making Mikan look away.

"Eh? What was that you were saying Mi-na-ko?" he asks with a serious face. She then remembers what he had told her the night before. So she WAS acting a LITTLE like Minako, but did he have to act so much like Hotaru? It was really disturbing.

"Nothing… Forget it… Geez I had more than enough with just one Hotaru-." -Pick up baka it's me- Hotaru's voice comes from Mikan's cell phone. "Speak of the devil…" she says.

Once again the special customized ringtone she had Hotaru record for her sounds -Pick up baka it's me- she takes it out of her pocket -Pick up baka it'-(A/N: From here on it's just the phone call between Mikan and Hotaru, just so you don't get mixed up it's only Mikan speaking, each "pause" is when Hotaru answers something and so on…)

"Hotaru, how unusual for you to call me this early in the morning!" she answers smiling. "Yeah… they're here… I'll let them know…" she keeps quiet for a while, probably listening to the other girl talking.

"Got it… Oh! And Hotaru?" pause

"I have this friend I'd like to introduce to you…" pause

"Yeah, it's a guy…" pause

"I never said I wanted to hook you up with him now did I?" pause

"I am not!" pause

"Well if you got yourself a boyfriend maybe I shouldn't have to-." pause

"No, he's nothing like Sumire's brother…" pause

"I already apologized for that! Why can't you just let it go?" pause

"I'm not lying! I swear he's not a weirdo…" pause

"Oh come on! When have I ever lied to you?" pause

"Yeah well… but that was completely justified…" pause

"That one wasn't even my fault! He told me that-." pause

"Okay that may have not been the best idea I ever had, but still…" pause

"Well I'm not lying this time!"pause

"Well if you can't trust your own best friend then…" pause

"Perfect! I swear you're not gonna regret this!" pause

"I'll see you there then! Ja!" she smiles and hangs up. "That was tiring…" she says to no one in particular and drops herself on the couch.

"What was that all about?" Natsume asks confused.

"Oh… Tonight, 10 o'clock, Mochu's, tell the others…" she says trying to imitate Hotaru's monotonous voice. Natsume looks at her even more confused. She sighs and waves a hand in front of his face "Hello? Anybody there? Earth to Kazume do you copy?" she says mockingly "Seriously how can you forget about such an important matter? Your first public appearance… Mochu's parent-free-party… Ring any bells?"

"Oh right… that thing…" he says and suddenly Tsubasa storms out of his room.

"What time is it now? How much time do we have before the party? I gotta get back home and get ready… Every second counts I-."A much disoriented looking Tsubasa says.

"Tsubasa-senpai, it's only half past nine, we STILL have like twelve hours…" Mikan says trying to calm him.

"WHAT?! You mean we ONLY have twelve hours… I gotta get back home and-." He starts pacing around the room.

"But we have to finish getting Polka-dots here ready!" she says pointing at Natsume, he blushes and looks down to hide his face.

Tsubasa approaches him and looks at him up and down, not looking at all surprised by the change. "I think he can pass for a normal person..." he says bluntly. Natsume curls his hands into fists and growls "Tsk, Tsk…" Tsubasa says shaking his head slowly "You do NOT hit people no matter how annoying they are…" then he turns to look at Mikan and says "There, my task is done, now can I go home?" he asks bored.

Mikan sighs in defeat and answers "Fine… If you're gonna be like this all day it's better if you're not around at all…" Tsubasa smiles and goes into the room to wake up Ruka and before Mikan can object about anything the two of them are already walking out the front door with evil smirks plastered on their faces, dragging Youichi along with them. "AH! Why did he have to take the other two with him? I could've used the extra help…" she says pouting.

"It's not like there's anything else left to do is there? I have the clothes, the hair, the contact lens and the earrings… there's nothing else to do but wait..." he tells her.

"Yeah but you're gonna make your first appearance at a party, not at school, it makes everything so much difficult… I mean you need to know stuff like how to dance, how to talk casually to someone you don't know at all, how to kiss, what you can and can't do, what to drink…" she continues the never-ending list not minding Natsume, whose face is now red as a tomato and is trying not to look at her directly. "And then-. Are you even listening to me?" she says angrily finally looking at him.

"Eh? Wha-…? Of- of course I'm listening, I just umm got distracted that's all…" he says nervously avoiding her eyes as if his life depended on it. Mikan's eyes widen and a smirk finds its way to her lips when she realizes what's going on.

"You…" her smirks becomes even wider "You've never…" she starts walking closer to him until her nose is almost touching his. Natsume's face becomes even redder (if that's even possible) he feels as if all the blood in his body is on his cheeks. "… kissed someone before." She whispers. "Have you?"

He doesn't say anything after that, Mikan sighs and backs away. "Well… I guess we could omit some of the points of the list that aren't really that important and…" she just goes on talking placing her index finger on her lips and tapping them gently "But then again that's really important and…" he ignores most of her speech "Right so we don't have much time so it's gonna have to be a crash course…" she finally says.

"Crash course on what?!" he suddenly asks snapping out of his thoughts.

"Well, it is obvious isn't it? You know many girls say that they can learn everything they want to know about a guy from the first kiss? Now you don't want to make a bad first impression because you really can't change it afterwards…" Mikan answers calmly.

"Ah- I'm …" he doesn't really have anything to say.

"Don't worry, one has to learn somehow, and with our time limit this is the only way I can think of…" she says trying to make him relax a bit. "It's just a kiss it's not the end of the world for anyone!" she starts becoming annoyed by the fact that he doesn't even move.

"…" he's already back to statue-mode.

"Oh come on! Don't be such a baby; you're 16 years-old! Now would you behave accordingly!?" she says frowning.

"…" still no movement.

"It's not such a big deal! All you have to do is kiss me and then it'll all be over before you know it…" she's really starting to lose her patience.

"…" this time when she receives no response she snaps.

"Kazume this is your last warning, now kiss me…" she says very pissed.

"…" no answer 'That does it!' she suddenly puts her hands on either of his cheeks and pulls his face down and locks her lips on his. She still receives no response from him; she tries to slide her tongue into his mouth but meets sealed lips. She frowns and pulls away.

"Kazume you're starting to get on my nerves… You could at least stop behaving like a statue!" she shouts at him, still getting no reaction. "It's gonna have to be the hard way then…" she grabs his face once again and stomps on his foot with her high-heeled shoes.

When the pain gets to him he opens his mouth to curse her but she stops him by catching his lips on a fierce kiss, massaging his tongue with hers. At first he's just shocked by the sudden intrusion but then his body starts moving as if it had a mind of its own, almost naturally responding to her touch.

His hands rise and wrap themselves around Mikan's waist pushing her even closer to him. She gasps noticing Natsume's sudden reaction. He takes this chance to take dominance of the kiss not wanting to think about the consequences of his actions, he pulls Mikan even closer to him and slides his tongue into Mikan's mouth.

Her eyes shoot wide open but almost instantly close again as her hands wrap around his neck and start playing with his hair and closing the small gap that still separated their bodies. They are both enjoying the moment, they can try and deny it all they want later on, but the fact that they did will remain unchanged no matter how much they refuse to accept it. They completely lose themselves in that kiss, all their thoughts and worries suddenly vanish into thin air. And for a brief moment in time nothing else in the world matters.

Mikan (don't ask me how) suddenly snaps out of it and reluctantly pushes Natsume away. Both of them panting, both of them rather disappointed and itching to pull the other into another fiery kiss, but their self-consciousness wouldn't allow it.

To be honest with you, Mikan never expected it to turn out like that. She really wasn't expecting herself to umm… enjoy it so much. She really couldn't help but stare at his lips now, she realized she probably looked stupid, but she couldn't care less, right now she had to concentrate all of her energy in controlling herself and not jumping back into his arms.

Natsume was to put it in simple words, dumbfounded. It was true; he had never really kissed anyone before that. He was shocked by her actions and even more shocked by his own! He couldn't really believe it was him back there doing that. He was outraged; his personal space had been completely invaded 'Without my consentient might I add…' and he… he had actually liked it.

They both sigh deeply at the exact same time and they look at each other. When their eyes meet a very awkward silence surrounds them. They just stand there facing each other thinking what to do next. And Natsume decides he can't take it anymore.

"I'm hungry…" he states nonchalantly. "I'm gonna make something to eat…"

"Eh? I can just ask one of the staff members to bring breakfast… You don't have to-." She's cut off.

"It's not that I have to… I want to…" he says walking over to the kitchen 'Anything to keep me busy right now…' he thinks while opening the fridge and taking some ingredients.

Mikan just looks at him quizzically 'Let's just pretend that never happened… Is that it?' she asks herself and nods agreeing with the voice inside her head. "Do you need any help?" she says heading to the kitchen.

A/N: I wanna take this time to thank all of you who reviewed I'm really happy! Next chapter will be the party… What's gonna happen? Who knows? But drunken Mikan sure as hell sounds funny… I don't know about drunken Natsume though, will he be drunk during that party.

To be continued…