A/N: Don't own OFJ. Please enjoy chapter six!

Episode 6: Yuki

"Tatsumi, can we have a pillow fight?"
The two young men were sitting on Tatsumi's bed, whiling away the raven-haired boy's rare Sunday off. Tatsumi had decided to use the relaxation period to peruse a novel he'd been keeping ready on his bookshelf in preparation for a moment such as this. Unfortunately–or fortunately, depending on how you looked at it–his new shared living situation with Wakasa had added new, Wakasa-centric activities to his life, putting an end to the portion of his downtime he typically spent in literary pursuits. The blond man's attention span wasn't suitable for reading; instead, he preferred to bother Tatsumi whenever the dark-haired man cracked open a book until the aforementioned individual put down the story and played whatever new game Wakasa had discovered or told him everything about whatever strange new interest the blond had developed. It was certainly a much more dynamic, surprising life than how he'd passed his days before Wakasa came to his home. And while Tatsumi certainly didn't want to go back to the time before the joyful blond man entered his life, he couldn't help but admit there were times when he missed his peaceful reading sessions.

So when Wakasa had announced he was going to watch his favorite show "Fairy Princess Saves the Day" (or at least that was what Tatsumi would have named it based on the content), his black-haired roommate decided to seize the chance to get some quality time with his waiting book. Wakasa sat excitedly at the edge of the bed, hugging his knees to his chest, his blond hair streaming out like a gossamer blanket behind him. Tatsumi, who had developed the ability to screen out the sounds of any magical girl-based anime courtesy of Kazumi, settled himself so he was leaned comfortably against the headboard and immersed himself in his book.

He had gotten to the zoning out the rest of the world in favor of the world inside the book stage every reader knows so well when Wakasa suddenly asked his completely unanticipatable question.

"What?" he asked, thinking he must have misheard his childlike friend.

"A pillow fight," the blond man repeated, turning to face Tatsumi. Removed from his reading daze, Tatsumi realized he could hear the all-too-familiar strains of "Fairy Princess Saves the Day"'s end credits. Wakasa must have finished with the episode he had set out to watch. Tatsumi sighed, ruminating on how, once again, he had ended up in an apartment where he could identify the end credit music to a magical girl anime–and probably sing along, too, if the situation demanded. How had he managed to move away from one magical girl anime lover only to take up house with another? It certainly hadn't been his plan.

"What?" he asked again, this time inquiring more of the cause of the question than requesting a repetition of it.

"Michiko and Machiko had a pillow fight in "Twin Unicorns Fly!" and it looked like fun!" Wakasa exclaimed, a grin bright on his face.

"Twin Unicorns Fly!"? Tatsumi wondered. Oh, so that's what "Fairy Princess Saves the Day" is really called. I guess I wasn't that far off. He smiled to himself, which, unfortunately, Wakasa seemed to take as a go-ahead for the pillow fight.

"Yay!" he exclaimed, reaching for his pillow at Tatsumi's side.

Hastily, Tatsumi grabbed the other end of the pillow, setting down his book at the same time. Well, he thought, I guess I knew that reading session wasn't going to last. Wakasa might be bizarrely cute when he got his way, but Tatsumi wasn't about to let his blond roommate start swinging his pillow around.

"Wakasa," he said, his voice carefully measured. "Maybe we can talk about this? I'm not sure a pillow fight seems like the greatest idea."

Wakasa sagged, the bright enthusiasm draining out of him at the cautionary tone of Tatsumi's voice.

"It's just, pillows tend to get broken in pillow fights," Tatsumi explained, feeling his resolve weaken at the sight of Wakasa's saddened face. "And they're filled with feathers, you know? So it would be awfully hard to clean up if one did break. I just…" he trailed off, praying Wakasa would spontaneously lose interest in pillow fights. It was probably the only way the situation would end the way he wanted it too.

"But Tatsumi," Wakasa said, giving the golden-eyed man his best puppy dog eyes, "I've never had a pillow fight before."

The black-haired man paused, giving the matter some thought. It was true that, having grown up on the streets, Wakasa was unlikely to have encountered an instance of pillow fighting. That was something typically reserved for the bedrooms of those who watched magical girl anime, and being homeless, as Wakasa had been, meant a lack of access to such places. Tatsumi, of course, had participated in pillow fights in the past–he had a younger sister, so such a thing was par for the course. And as much as he hated to deprive Wakasa of any experience he had previously been lacking, the fact remained that he had no interest in being pummelled and even less interest in sweeping up the fallen feathers afterwards.

"Please," Wakasa begged, turning up his puppy eyes-level twentyfold.

Tatsumi, hit hard by the sudden wave of adorableness, loosened his grip on the pillow for a fatal second.

"I don't know," he replied, unaware he had already sealed his own doom. "It seems like a pretty girly thing…"

He was cut off abruptly by a well-placed pillow to the face.

"Tatsumi?" Wakasa asked, worried by the ensuing silence.

The black-haired man seized his own pillow from behind his back, his competitive spirit shining in his golden eyes.

"Don't forget, Wakasa, this is a fight!" he proclaimed, returning the blow with his own weapon.

The intensely combative cushion conflict between the two roommates that followed Tatsumi's declaration was not something that would be shown in a magical girl anime, or, for that matter, any children's anime. Perhaps this was because it featured two young men rather than a collection of young female children, but the fierce nature of the fight would far more likely prove the true explanation. For, you see, once Tatsumi had been inaugurated into the battle by Wakasa's well-aimed blow, he lost any compunction he might have had at the overly-little girl nature of the activity, feeling his warrior spirit, dormant since his last long-ago pillow fight with Kazumi, rise. The potential perishing of the pillows to their fatal feathery fate, too, he forgot, determined that he might be victorious in this combat. Instead, he and Wakasa were cast as two champions, each returning the other's strikes in kind.

One could detail every pillow punch, cushion cuff, and headrest hit that occurred within it, as well as the numerous blanket blows, sheet smacks and comforter clouts that punctuated it, but suffice it to say that a masterful attempt to defeat the other was put up by each, and in the end they both found themselves panting with the effort.

"That was even more fun than it looked when Michiko and Machiko did it!" Wakasa exclaimed, the sunny brightness of his broad grin nearly outshining his gleaming locks. Somehow, despite the chaos of the fight his hair still flowed flawlessly out behind him, not a strand in disarray. Even the blond's face was glowing, his cheeks faintly flushed from the exertion of combat, and Tatsumi had to struggle to convince himself the reason for his rapid heartbeat was only adrenaline from the battle. What could possibly have made him not want to have a pillow fight with Wakasa? Any activity partaken in with his cheerful roommate couldn't fail to infect the dark-haired man's heart with the blond's bubbliness. He returned Wakasa's brilliant smile with a more subdued one of his own.

Wakasa opened his mouth to say something else, but at that moment, Tatsumi's phone rang. Checking the caller ID, he saw it was his mother and remember she had mentioned to him she would be calling soon.

"I'd better take this," he told Wakasa, pretending not to see the slight hitch in the blond's smile at the interruption. He showed his roommate the screen in explanation, adding, "My mother. It's probably about Kazumi."

Getting up off the bed, he left the room, shutting the door gently behind him.

Wakasa, left sitting by himself, took up one of the pillows that had been used in the battle and started turning it around in his hands.

"I wonder what they're talking about?" he asked aloud, worry clouding his usually sunny voice. He had gathered from Tatsumi's almost-disguised moments of unease throughout their cohabitation that taking in a homeless man from the streets wasn't something anyone would do, and that his presence there was a weight on Tatsumi. He couldn't help himself from thinking, at times when Tatsumi was at work or school, that no matter how he smiled and laughed and tried to make the dark-haired man like him he was always at risk. Any day Tatsumi could decide he no longer wanted to take care of a stray like him. And it worried him, too, that Tatsumi had to keep his presence a secret from everyone else in his life because of how out of the ordinary his behavior in taking in Wakasa at random had been. More than one night he woken up from a nightmare about being discovered and forced out, pushed back to the gang he'd left the underpass to escape from. At such times, only Tatsumi's calming warmth at his side could settled his thoughts, and Wakasa was determined to hold on to him as long as the golden-eyed man would allow.

"It's funny Tatsumi said feathers would get everywhere," he mused, glad to leave his serious pondering. Looking down at the pillow he had been tumbling in his hands, he continued, "I don't think there are any holes in this at all."

But no sooner had he spoke than he felt one of his fingers slip into a gap in the fabric. His eyes widened, simultaneously anxious at Tatsumi's disapproval and excited at what new encounter he would discover next. Taking hold of a feather with the tips of his fingers, he gently withdrew it through the breach. Laughing, he marvelled at its white fluffiness. It was nothing like the matted black feathers of the crows that congregated under the bridge that had been his home. How beautiful! Losing sight of Tatsumi's concerns, he grinned and tugged the pillow perforation broader. He took handfuls of the lovely white feathers, tossing them into the sky and watching them rain back down over where he sat.

"Yay! It's snowing!" the blond man cried, delighted.

"Wakasa?" Tatsumi's voice called out. He had finally finished his call and come back, Wakasa thought, now he can see the snow! Tragically, the blond had forgotten stray feathers had been the cause of his roommate's initial apprehension at idea of the pillow fight.

There was a click as the door handle turned, then Tatsumi entered the blizzard.

"Wa-ka-sa…" he growled, his golden eyes alit with a menacing glow. A dangerous purple aura surrounding him, the black-haired man advanced threateningly on the blond, clearly intending to give him a strict talking-to for his snowy fun.

Think fast! Wakasa told himself, reminded of his thoughts about the state he would be in if Tatsumi abandoned him.

"Is this what it's like when it snows up north?" he asked smilingly, desperately injecting his words with a maximum dosage of cuteness.

Tatsumi's face froze. If he hadn't see it many times before, Wakasa's insides would have gone glacial at the sight, but exposure had familiarized him enough to know it was Tatsumi's usual does-not-compute expression–the one he wore whenever he was trying to be mad at Wakasa in spite of himself. The bubbly blond sighed with relief: he was getting out of jail free again. Another thing to add to the ever-growing list of things to thank his hospitable roommate for. After a moment or two, the expression fell from Tatsumi's face and the dark-haired man, too, sighed deeply, sinking his head into one hand.

"I guess I saw that coming," he muttered, resuming his seat beside Wakasa on the bed. White feathers, fluttering through the air, began to accumulate in his hair.

"Not exactly," he began, answering Wakasa's snow query. The tiniest smile replaced his hazardous look, "snowflakes don't get bigger the farther you go north or anything. But there are a lot more of them, and the snow piles up on the ground, so that's what makes it look white all around."

Hanging on every word of Tatsumi's snow lesson, Wakasa shone as brightly as he could. It was his way of repaying at least a little of the unending generosity and forgiveness Tatsumi always showed him.