I'm back~! You still there? Thank God…

SAKAMAKI SHUU X KAZUKA MAYU = SHUYU!

RATINGS WILL BE KEPT SECRET~!

Everything's ready. Oh my God. I'm so happy I found this spot. All the things are in place, the gift is ready. Everything's perfect. And Shuu doesn't know a thing. I glance over at Shuu's sleeping figure on the blanket, chest raising and sinking heavily in peace. How could he though?

I was just going to wait until he woke up, whenever that would be. It had already been an hour soon, but I was still as nervous and panic-struck. And I was just sitting there on the blanket, ready to jump up and scream 'HAPPY BIRTHDAY' with every breath I took as I stared at Shuu.

Did he even know that it was his birthday? Sure as hell didn't fucking look like it. He didn't even know that I had dragged him out of the mansion, he had slept so soundly the he himself didn't notice. Which was admirable in a way.

I watched him, an excited smile on my face and almost too eager for him to wake up.

…

…

He doesn't wake up.

…

God knows when those eyes will open. Will I just continue to sit here for another hour? By the time he wakes up, it won't even be his birthday anymore!

Looking for some inspiration of how to calmly and discreetly wake the guy up, my eyes wandered here and there in our surrounding. They stopped to my left, gazing out at the beautiful view. Yeah, I thought. That will work.

I forced my already worn out shoulders to bare with Shuu's weight as I grabbed his legs and pulled roughly, already knowing far too well that nothing can wake him up. I walked backwards and did my best not to stumble over any roots from a tree or something until my feet finally trampled on something hard, making the wood under them force out a whined creak. I had reached the dock.

Then, when I let my feet carefully slid around the ground it was standing on and finding that I was right by the edge, I stopped and breathed out. I was really going to do this, wasn't I? It is too late to back out now.

So when I was properly prepared with Shuu's body in front of me, I swallowed hard and took a deep breath. Here goes nothing, I thought as I got down on my knees and forcefully pushed my hands against Shuu's body, making him slowly roll down until tipping off the dock.

However (read 'however' in Morgan Freeman's voice), just as the blond was about to hit the cold water, blue eyes opened harshly to meet mine, and an arm reached out to grab my arm before I was able to react. I was pulled along.

I first reacted when the cold embraced me, experiencing the water as completely unexpected before going through in my head what had just happened. But my instincts, and the fact that I had gotten no time to take a breath, told me that I had to get above the surface as quick as I could.

An arm grabbed me, and I inhaled a long breath as fast as I felt cold air hit me, coughing heavily after. Another arm took me, and together both of them pulled me up on the dock. But it couldn't have been Shuu who had dragged me up, so my first thought was to look around in the after so that I could kick his sneaky ass.

I barely spent a thought on the person pulling me up.

"You're such an idiot, what do you think you're doing?"

Which turned out to be Shuu after all.

I threw my head around, jumping on him as fast as I had confirmed that it definitely was the guy, reaching my hands out to try and strangle him and free myself from his tyranny once and for all.

"No, what do you think you're doing!?" I hissed aggressively.

I collected my common sense, dropped my hands from his neck even though his face told me he didn't even feel a slightest sting of pain, and moved back onto the blanket.

I coughed, eyes closed and pretending nothing had happened. "So, you were awake the whole time."

I went through everything in my head, making sure that I hadn't said anything that I shouldn't when I thought he was asleep.

Okay, let's just act normal and sophisticated on this fine evening now, eat some cake and shit, and then go to sleep like normal people.

"Yeah, and for a moment I thought you were going to rape me, touching me shamelessly like that.

That guy. And that was not how I saw it.

"Will you just sit down and eat some goddamn cake, will you?" Why is he so childish!?

He lazily crawled onto the blue blanket, dropping down on it as soon as he reached it. He yawned, eyes following my movement when I cut the first piece of the chocolate cake for him.

"What for?" he replied to what I had said when he got the piece, even though it was actually too late to answer what had been said long time ago.

What for? WHAT FOR!? IT'S YOUR GODDAMN BIRTHDAY THAT'S WHAT FOR!

"Well…" I never really thought how embarrassed this was, maybe because I never thought he'd ask why we're sitting and eating cake. It'll be easier if I focus my eyes on something else, like that tree over there.

"I-It's your… birthday, right?" Could he just stop looking at me!? I know he is!

As I thought it all was over, my eyes decided to turn back to Shuu and just casually wish him 'happy b-day, man'. But how the hell could I do that when he looks like that!? Eyes wide, mouth open in shock. The expression infected me, and I wore the same look as him.

No, shake that surprise off. I shook my head. "This is a 'thank you for not killing me yet' thing, okay?" I said, starting to dig into the sweet chocolate piece on my plate. He still looked surprised. "Just eat your goddamn cake, you birthday-bastard."

That woke him up, and his eyes came back to reaction again and started to examine his dessert, criticizing every bit of it. His hand hold it up in different directions for him, and his face said 'am I really expected to eat this?' as he looked for mold or filth or whatever.

"Did you make this?" he asked, voice a little worried and horrified.

I sighed, putting my spoon into my mouth. "No."

Now he sighed, too. In relief. He might have just said 'thank God', because now he was fully optimistic about eating it, stuffing his mouth full with every piece.

"Fuck you, I'm not that bad at cooking, you asshole."

I was happy that I had found this place behind the mansion yesterday. Until then, I had planned to just sit by their fountain and have a small cozy picnic, but then as I followed a path from it, I got to this big opening in the forest in front of a lake. Really beautiful, if you ask me. The moon was perfectly placed above the lake, shining clearly and making a snow white reflection on the water. As if having two moons at the same time. And then I also had thought about putting lit up sentenced candles along the edges of the soft blanket for even more light, but changed them into led lights in different colored flowers because of Shuu's fear of fire. And it turned out to be really pretty, the flowers making the lights glow in blue, in red, in purple, in green and pink and all kinds of colors.

Too bad that it was kinda hard for me to enjoy it now, as I started to freeze my wet, cold butt off this chilly late-October night.

"Y-You know," I started, tearing the peaceful silence in two with my shaky voice. You could almost hear Shuu's frustration because of that, but he kept quiet. "I a-actually wanted to go to some fun fair today."

I smiled. He did not.

"Those kinds of things are just tiresome…"

A laugh bubbled out of me, that lazy ass bum had gotten the face of a pouting child with food stuffed in his mouth. "I-I know you don't like things like that, that's w-why I didn't do it. Dragging you all the way there w-would have b-been a pain, well, not that it is a fun fair here in the autumn."

Even my laugh sounded strange because I was freezing so much, I couldn't stop my shaky voice.

He just sat there and stared at me giggling at the thought, expressionless. "Why do you even care about things like these? You're so annoying, you women…"

He's so cute… "You and y-your brothers don't celebrate your b-birthdays?" God, it's cold.

"No."

"B-But you're a family!" Shit, so cold.

"But we're not humans."

"That.. has n-nothing to d-do with it.. a-and you know t-that." I can't even speak clearly anymore.

"Hey, what's with your voice?"

"S-s-shut… u-up…!" How can he not feel it!?

"..Is it that cold?"

if you only know! Gotta answer with some 'no shit Sherlock' comeback. Oh, God, I can't talk! Dammit, mouth, speak!

"Hey, you're turning blue now."

What, do I look like some fucking smurf to you? Dammit, I can't even.. see ..him… clear..ly…

"O-Oi!?"

My first thought was that, sadly, Shuu's embrace wasn't much warmer, since he's a natural cold creature (please don't call him 'creature', he's not a fricking centaur or something).

In all the fog in my eyes, all I could do was try and listen. "It really is that cold? Ugh, how troublesome… "

I felt a small bump, and the way gravity seemed to be pulling me down, it wasn't hard to understand that he was standing up, carrying me. "And you're shaking so much. It's almost hard to hold onto you, you know. Calm down.

You idiot, I can't! "W-w-wa..i..t..!"

"Ha? I can't understand what you're saying at all."

I tried again. "T-th…e p-prese..nt… Yo-ou… h-h-have t-to… ta…ke it w-w-with y-youu…!"

He bent down. "You mean this thing?" I suppose he was holding the package in front of me, but didn't that dumbass understand that I can't see anything right now?

I just nodded, hoping he'd gotten the real thing as I took the square box into my arms. It felt warm, if you compared.

On the way, it felt like it took forever, but when Shuu finally threw me into the bed, it felt like it had only been a second. That was, probably, because the first impression was that he was about to suck my blood.

"I-I-I'm.. s-still go..ing t-to fig-ght ev…en i-if-"

"Just go to sleep and stop talking," he interrupted, crawling (first to my horror, on top of me) over me to pop down beside onto the bed.

He pulled all the layers of blankets and covers that he had, and spooned me, all against my will of course. But my weak attempt to struggle in this state was pretty much futile.

This is so embarrassing, I can't bear it! And the shaking as well, it drove me completely insane. In the beginning, it felt like this would never at all make me warmer the slightest, but after a while, I could feel my arms and legs again, and eventually even move my fingers. There wasn't a misleading fog in my eyes anymore either.

I should probably try to speak, see if it works. "Shuu?" I spoke softly, trying to test if he was awake. It surprised me how I had forgotten how my voice sounded.

He let out a small 'hmm'.

"I'm sorry I ruined everything." Even though I was still agreeing with the part of me that thought a big part of it was Shuu's fault for dragging me along with him into the water

"..I told you earlier, didn't I? I don't care about birthdays," he sighed, yawning shortly after. I felt my mood sink.

What did I expect? I shouldn't have apologized after all. He doesn't care. He never even said 'thank you'.

Embarrassingly enough, he noticed.

"Well, if it makes you any happier," he began after a moment of silence, sounding a little insecure. I waited impatiently for him to continue. "This has been the best birthday I've had in a while, okay?"

Did he just-!? Was he just-!? BEING A NICE PERSON!? I couldn't help it. I was overwhelmed by the shock and happiness. My body moved by itself, spinning around to tightly wrap its arms around the blond guy. "Thank you."

He flinched, letting out some 'eh's and 'uhm's. "Sure, whatever. Let go of me, you're annoying."

"Oh, that's right!" I threw my body around once more, grabbing the box with blue bubble-wrapping and yellow ribbon (it just reminded me of Shuu by looking at it). "Here! Open it, hurry!"

His eyebrows creased as he received it, that 'you've got to be joking' look spreading over his face. "Seriously?"

"Just open it, will you?"

He did, lazily slow and sighing all the while in the middle of complaints about the difficult wrapping. Out of the box came something red and soft, and he unfolded it rather quickly to be him. "A sweater?"

I smiled like a giant dork. "Yes~! I made it so that you won't get cold while you're out more and play in the snow!"

He raised an eyebrow, looking suspicious. "But I won't go out."

"You will as long as I'm here. The winter is the best season, idiot."

"You won't go out either. You're sick and need to stay in and rest. You want to become even worse?"

"But I'm talking about the winte-"

"Sleepy…"

He spun me around, caught me in his arms so that there would be no chance for my escape, and used me as a pillow. I complained, but got tired of it after a while when he started snoring and still had the same stranglehold.

Minutes passed, maybe even hours for what I knew. I couldn't sleep, I never can when he have to be so close like this, using me as his damn warm pillow. I'm not that sick, anyway…

Shuu must have thought that I was asleep, because suddenly out of nowhere his snoring stopped, and he hugged me warmly (feels weird to describe it like that, as there's no body temperature in him).

"Thank you."

At first, I didn't believe my ears nor brain, but they both told me what must be the truth. The smile was unstoppable, and I wanted to hug him back, but I just pretended to be sleeping.

I did, after a while.

Maybe this day hadn't been that bad.

MY NECK HURTS BUT I JUST CAN'T STOP WRITING~! I loved this, finally some fluff and cute shit~! Moe, moe, moeeeee~!

THANKIES FOR READING, HOPE TO SEE YOU AGAIN NEXT WEEK!