It was a relief for Yusuke to finish the day, because he still wasn't feeling too well. Today he mostly had a stomachache, but his headache was getting really bad, and his skin looked awful. Strangely enough, Kurama was complaining of bad skin, too. Maybe it was just a girl thing?

Yusuke left school with Kuwabara, who he noticed was walking kind of funny, and his face looked like he was in pain. What was wrong with him? Hopefully it didn't mean he was getting his period, like Hiei. Yusuke decided he didn't want to know. Just as the school was out of sight, Hiei jumped out of a nearby tree and blocked their path.

"Don't do that!" Kuwabara shouted, startled.

"Kurama wants us to meet him at his house," Hiei said shortly. "So come on."

"I see." Yusuke was grinning. "So the power couple's back together again, huh? I knew you two couldn't stay apart for long."

Hiei just glared at Yusuke, then jumped back up into the treetops. Yusuke rolled his eyes and changed course for Kurama's house instead of home. By the time they arrived, of course Hiei had beaten them there.

"So what's going on?" Kuwabara asked, looking around. "Where's Kurama?"

"It's something he's doing for his school," Hiei said dismissively. "Cheerleading, it's called."

"Cheerleading?!" said Yusuke in disbelief, and he and Kuwabara burst out laughing.

"What's wrong with cheerleading?" Hiei demanded.

"It's only, like, the girliest sport ever!" Kuwabara chortled, leaning against Yusuke for support.

"You better not laugh at him when he comes back," Hiei warned.

"Fine, but do you even know why he did it?" said Yusuke, wiping his eyes. "I mean, did he just walk up to you and say, 'I'm going out for the cheerleading squad'?"

"No, he was signing up for a competition," said Hiei. "If Kurama's school wins, the committee in charge of the competition will donate money towards whatever charity the school chooses, and their charity is the same hospital Kurama's mother was in when she was sick."

"Oh," said Yusuke. Suddenly, it didn't seem so funny anymore. "Anyway, there's got to be something we can do while we wait for him. Hey, Hiei, do you have board games in Makai?"

"Do we have what?"

"Board games," Yusuke repeated. "Oh, and puzzles. I'll bet they're in the basement."

So the three of them trooped down to the basement to see what they could do until Kurama arrived.

"Ha! Home movies," said Yusuke, going over to the basement TV, where there was a stack of tapes all neatly organized. "Which shall it be? 'Sakura's Third-Grade Play' or 'Sakura's Junior High School Dance Lessons'?"

"Remember our elementary school play?" said Kuwabara. "The one on dental hygiene, where I was floss?"

"And you wanted to be Mr. Tooth Decay, but that role was reserved for the kids who could actually remember their lines," said Yusuke, rolling his eyes.

"Well, all the boys wanted to be Mr. Tooth Decay," Kuwabara said defensively.

"Here's the 'memory box' Kurama's mom put together for him," said Yusuke. "I wonder what kind of stuff is in here?"

"Hey, look!" Kuwabara shouted, picking something up off the floor. "There's that puzzle I got him!"

"You got him a 5,000-piece jigsaw puzzle of a litter of kittens?" said Yusuke. "No wonder he didn't open it."

"I remember when I used to play puzzle as a kid," Kuwabara reminisced. "Whenever I couldn't fit the pieces together, I just glued them together. One time, our family cat walked across the table and got glue all over her paws."

"What's this?" Hiei asked, picking up one of the board games off the floor.

"It's chess, Kurama's favorite board game," said Yusuke. "I don't know how to play it. Want to teach Hiei to play Monopoly, Kuwabara?"

"I'm pretty sure we could finish by evening," Kuwabara was saying, and Yusuke thought he was talking about Monopoly until he saw that his friend was still staring at the kitten puzzle. "Each of us could do one corner, and then we could take turns filling in the middle, and…"

"Would you forget the kittens already?" said Yusuke impatiently, swiping the puzzle away from him. "You know, sometimes you really worry me."

"Fine, then, we can play Monopoly," said Kuwabara reluctantly. "Let's go upstairs."

They spent the rest of their waiting time teaching Hiei the rules of Monopoly, then playing the game. Yusuke could tell Hiei was beginning to enjoy it, and he was actually pretty good at it. After about two hours, the front door slammed and Kurama walked into the living room, bringing a strong smell of body odor in with him. His hair was tied into a ponytail, and he was looking happy, but also extremely sweaty. Even though practice was over, he was still wearing his school's gym uniform.

"How was practice?" Hiei asked.

"Oh, it was great," Kurama said enthusiastically. "That's the best workout I've had since the Dark Tournament."

"Yeah, I can tell," said Yusuke, pinching his nose. "Why didn't you take a shower at school?"

"Because the showers at my school don't have any curtains or stall dividers on them," said Kurama, setting his messenger bag on the ground and taking off his gym shoes.

"What?!" Yusuke yelped. "Like prison or something?!"

"Well, not exactly, but I like my privacy when it comes to these things," said Kurama. "I'm not a fan of public showers."

"Just remember, don't drop the soap," said Yusuke, grinning.

"Your crassness aside, Yusuke, I've got to use the girls' locker room now," Kurama reminded him. "So that doesn't really apply, does it?"

"I guess not," said Yusuke. "But that does sound good…being surrounded by all those naked girls."

"If you can't say anything intelligent, Yusuke, just don't say anything at all," Kurama snapped. "I'm going to take a shower."

And without another word to the group, he stomped up the stairs.

…

"Ha! Beachfront property!" Hiei said triumphantly. "Next time, Detective, I'm going to buy all your hotels."

"Is this game over yet?" Kuwabara complained. "It's been the same since we started."

"Aww, is someone a little afraid of going bankrupt?" Hiei taunted him.

"We've created a monster," Yusuke groaned.

Hiei was enjoying the human game, Monopoly, much more than he'd expected. All he had to do was bankrupt Yusuke and Kuwabara before they bankrupted him. Just as he was drawing a chance card, Kurama came downstairs. His hair was still wet from his shower, although it was combed, and he was dressed seriously down—just a loose T-shirt, sweatpants, and pink fuzzy socks. In fact, he might even have been going braless, though Hiei didn't plan on investigating. Now that the concealer he had been wearing was washed off, his skin looked almost as bad as Yusuke's.

"Jeez, Kurama, you didn't have to dress up for us," said Yusuke sarcastically. "Those must be your finest sweatpants."

"Ichika worked us hard today," Kurama said back. "I'm really sore. Besides, I still feel kind of bloated. My new jeans felt a little tight around the waistline when I tried to put them on."

"Have you changed your lifestyle in any way?" Hiei asked.

"Not really," said Kurama. "I don't know, maybe this female body just has more fat. Or it's dispersed differently. Although that doesn't explain why my jeans fit yesterday."

"I'm sure you're just imagining it," said Yusuke. "You don't look much different to me."

"Much different?" Kurama raised his eyebrows.

"Well, I'm not gonna lie, your skin is bad, just like mine," said Yusuke. "Nobody could tell when you were wearing makeup, though."

"I'm not going to pretend I didn't see it, too, but I think it may just be stress." Kurama sighed. "How's Monopoly going?"

"I'm rich!" Hiei announced.

"So I see, but it's probably a little late for me to join in," said Kurama.

"Yeah, it definitely is," Yusuke agreed, staring glumly down at the Monopoly board, where his funds were running low. "Hey, guys, do you want to catch a movie tomorrow? There's this really awesome horror movie debut."

"I can't," said Kuwabara. "I have to go to the doctor."

"The doctor?" said Yusuke. "What for?"

"It's…it's a girl thing," Kuwabara told him, suddenly looking embarrassed. "I have to go to the women's doctor."

"You know, you could have just said checkup or something," Hiei snapped. "And you don't have to go to the doctor if you're bleeding. It's normal."

"It's not that. I talked to Shizuru about it, and she says I should get it checked out in case I have an infection down there."

"Dude, TMI!" Yusuke shouted, dropping his Monopoly cards.

"Hey, you asked," Kuwabara replied. "So I had to tell you, or it would be lying."

"Of course," Yusuke said sardonically. "Hiei's kill count is in the thousands at least, but he draws the line at lying."

"If Shizuru says you have a problem, you likely do," Kurama put in. "Besides, she's the only one who knows what happened to us—besides Botan, that is."

"Speaking of Botan, that wasn't very nice, what she did in the lingerie shop," Yusuke said. "Pretending she didn't know what was going on, instead of trying to help us out of the situation."

"That's funny, Urameshi, I don't remember you being conscious," Kuwabara joked. "Just kind of in shock."

Yusuke pounded him on his curly head, after which he was the one to be barely conscious.

"I was not in shock," he said to Hiei and Kurama, as if they were the ones who said it. "Anyone would have the same reaction if he saw his girlfriend buying some lacy black thing." He paused, his face red. "You know, maybe that's what's happening to Kuwabara. He's not infected, he's just…well, how do we know if anything we feel is normal?"

"We don't, I guess." Kuwabara sat up again, still looking a little woozy. "But anyway, that's not what's happening to me."

"Well, then, why don't you ask the doctor for me when you go?"

"Better yet, why not make an appointment with your own doctor?" Kurama suggested. "Then you can ask all your questions yourself."

"Because I'm not talking to anyone about that," said Yusuke. "Not even a doctor."

"Well, I still think it's a good idea to have a checkup," Kurama told him. "I'll see if I can schedule one for myself with my mother's doctor. If you have any questions, I can ask them for you."

"Go ahead," said Yusuke, looking depressed. "But I'd have to give you a list."

"That's fine," Kurama replied.

Yusuke must have been very embarrassed about the questions he had, because instead of asking, he just wrote them all down on a piece of paper. His excuse was that he didn't think Kurama would be able to remember everything, but of course that was ridiculous.

"Thank you," Kurama said, as Yusuke sat down on the couch. "Hiei, do you have anything to add?"

"Whatever I want to know, it's probably on the novel Yusuke just handed to you," Hiei replied. At the moment, he couldn't think of anything, anyway.

"Very well." Kurama folded up the piece of paper and stuck it in his pocket.

Yusuke and Kuwabara left shortly after that, but Hiei was planning on staying overnight, so he and Kurama spent the rest of the afternoon watching a teen romance movie (ironically, of course), and making comments about how stupid it was. They would be lying, though, if they were to say they didn't get a little choked up at the ending.

"That was so sweet." Kurama wiped his eyes with the back of his hand and gave Hiei a big hug. "I-I just knew things would work out all right."

"That's because it's a movie, and stop that," said Hiei, shoving him off, but there was no hiding the yellow tear gems he'd left on the floor.

"More popcorn, girls?" said Shiori, stepping into the living room.

"No thank you, Mother," Kurama replied. "The movie's over."

"Let me know if you two are hungry for dinner, then," she told them.

"You should be asking her about that doctor's appointment, if you still want to go," said Hiei.

"Good idea." Kurama got to his feet and followed his mother into the kitchen. "Mother? Can I ask you something?"

Hiei waited in the living room while Kurama went to talk to his mom. It was always nice staying over at Kurama's house. There was a spring rain that night, and to Hiei, rain was a relaxing sound that always helped him sleep.

"So did you make an appointment?" Hiei asked.

"Yes, they managed to squeeze me in tomorrow after cheerleading practice." Kurama was smiling; Hiei could tell. "Mother is very pleased I'm finally going out for some activities."

"Are you nervous?" Hiei asked.

"Why should I be nervous?"

"Because you don't know what they're going to do."

"My mother says it isn't that bad," Kurama replied, "and she said now that I'm sixteen I should be going regularly anyway. See, I told you it was a good idea to just get a checkup now and again."

"I still don't need to hear all the details," said Hiei. "I said it yesterday at the mall, remember? Back when we were our regular selves, can you name even one time we discussed our masculine regions?"

"Did you just say masculine regions?" Kurama laughed.

"Well, you know what I mean. Name one time we discussed them."

"I can't," Kurama admitted. "But now, a lot of sensations are new and strange, so it helps to talk about them. That way we can tell if what we're feeling is normal."

"It seems like we're all having problems," said Hiei. "Whether they're normal or not."