a.k.a. what happens when Anna Kyouyama – the Anna Kyouyama – gets curious as to how one should kiss somebody.
Anna watched from afar as her fiancé gets warm and cozy with the obviously thrilled Tamao. She crossed her arms. Yoh still didn't sense her presence even if she was just a few meters away, which was unthinkable for a near-shaman king like him.
"Why don't you go and approach them?" asked Horo Horo when he saw the itako standing behind a tree, flaming in quiet fury. "I mean, you might set the poor tree on fire with the roaring jealousy in your eyes right now."
She didn't reply.
One look at her and he already understood that he ought to be worrying about Yoh's fate instead. "Look, Anna. They're just chatting…you know, like all friends do," he said, deciding to be charitable and help his friend out.
Anna raised a brow when Tamao touched Yoh's shoulder. "Like all friends do," she agreed sarcastically.
"W-Well, you don't have to worry. I know that Yoh is crazy about you," he said nervously, conveniently forgetting to say that he meant that she is driving Yoh insane with her brutal trainings.
She sighed. "Tell me, what may be a man's reason to look for another love nest when he already has one?"
Horo Horo scratched his head. "Well…for one thing, maybe he's not satisfied with his sex life…"
Lethal glare from the itako.
Horo sweatdropped. "I-I was just hypothesizing! You know, general inference? I-It does not really pertain to you and Yoh-"
She looked at Yoh again. "I never see him as happy as that when he's with me."
"No one can ever be happy when he needs to live with you under one roof for 24 hours nonstop everyday," muttered the blue-haired boy.
"You were saying something?"
Horo grinned innocently. "Um, mind if I ask this but…have you kissed Yoh already?"
Her eyes widened. "W-Why should I do that?"
"Because he's your fiancé," he reminded her wryly.
She looked down, frowning.
"Besides, it is kind of hard to believe that for the last seven years that you had been living together, no romantic tension came between you," said Horo. "Are you both made of arctic stuff?"
"R-Romantic tension?" Her eyes looked at Yoh, then tried her best to think of times that she felt that so called tension. She couldn't recall any. She was too comfortable with him – she knew that he fears her too much to take advantage of her.
The boy read her mind. "That's because all you wanted to do is to train. When you guys are with us, you train. Whenever you two are alone, you still train. Where would the boy get some affectionate recognition for his training efforts?"
"You don't have a girlfriend. How do you get your 'affectionate recognition'?" she retorted.
"I have Pirika," said Horo simply. "As for Yoh…you're the only girl he knows, and still we're doubting if you really are a girl-"
"Enough," said Anna. "Do you think that if I do kiss that guy, would he stop looking for other girls?"
"Well, if you impress him enough, he won't," he promised, hiding his diabolical smile on his face.
Silence.
Finally, the itako spoke up. "Alright, teach me how to kiss."
WHAT?!" Horo Horo was stunned.
"I don't know how to kiss," said the girl, shrugging.
He sighed. "OK, this is what you do…first, you…"
Yoh was eating dinner as cheerfully as he always does, while Manta was peering at Anna nervously. He could sense that the girl has something in mind, for she wasn't bossing them around as she usually does.
"Won't the people in your home be looking for you already? It's getting quite late already," said Anna suddenly, which surprised the two boys. She had never commented about the time of Manta's visit before.
Does she want me to go home already? wondered Manta. But why?
The little boy stood up and bowed. "Thank you for the meal."
Anna looked on at him approvingly.
"Aw, don't go yet!" protested Yoh. "We're still going to go stargazing tonight, remember? They say that there would be a lot of falling stars to wish on tonight!"
"I-I'm sure that there will be other times when stars will fall, Yoh-kun." With that, the little boy quickly left.
"Darn," sighed Yoh. "I wonder why he was in a hurry…"
"You can still watch the stars even without him," she said.
"Yes, but it's more fun looking at the stars when you have someone beside you," he explained.
After a moment of silence, she spoke up. "If you want, I'll come watch with you."
His eyes widened. "Really?" He wanted to ask her before to join him in his stargazing, but he was afraid that it wasn't her cup of tea. "That's great!"
Anna, on the other hand, prayed that what Horo Horo taught her would work out just fine.
"What time will the stars fall?" asked Anna as she and Yoh sat on the steps of the house, waiting.
"Hmm…ten more minutes, I think."
Anna looked down at her lap. "Yoh?"
"Yeah?"
"The moon is really nice tonight, isn't it?" she said.
He blinked. "Well, yes, it certainly is." He turned his attention back at the night sky.
Anna's grip on her shawl tightened. How in the world was she going to set a romantic mood for the two of them? Horo Horo told her that once she was able to establish the mood between them, it would be easier for the two of them to be carried away and kiss.
But the only thing she could think of as romantic is the moon, yet her fiancé won't even react!
She tried again. She snuggled closer to his body, but to her dismay, he inched away from her.
"Anna, the space beside you is still large," he said, rubbing his head.
"If I want to sit here, you can't do anything about it," she snapped.
"Yes!" He immediately shut up.
"How many more minutes?" she asked in a resigned tone. She had been rejected twice already. If he still won't kiss her in her last attempt, Horo Horo would get what he was looking for.
"Seven."
"That is enough time," she said.
"Huh?"
She looked at him squarely. "Kiss me."
Yoh's eyes widened. "Huh?"
"Kiss me."
He looked at her intently. "Um, are you ok, Anna? You're not sick or something?"
She bit her lip. She didn't know exactly why, but she felt that he was rejecting her again. "Never mind," she whispered, not noticing that her voice broke.
Yoh did, however. He stood up when she did. "Anna, wait, what's wrong?" He tried to grab her hand, but she pulled it away. However, she lost her balance in the steps of the house and would have fall if not for Yoh's quick arms that caught her. He pulled her back into him, face drawn in concern. "What's the matter?"
Anna refused to look at his eyes. "Are you disgusted with me? Why can't you do that simple thing I ask you to do? I'm your fiancée."
He wanted to laugh, but he could see that her usually blank eyes were now welling up with tears. "Anna…"
"Horo Horo told me that a kiss can spell out the real score between us," she continued, shamefully rubbing away the lone tear that escaped her eye. "I just want to know how I stand in your life before we commit a mistake like marrying each other without love." Finally, she did look at him. "Do you love me? Do you hate me? Should I stay? Should I go? Do you like me, or do you like someone else? Tell me! What do you want me to do?"
He gazed at her for what seemed like an eternity before he spoke up. "I want you to just stand still here with me."
Before she could ask why, his face leaned down towards her. He was so close, that she could feel his warm breath on her face. "And I want you to be like this for the rest of our lives."
"O-Our?" she echoed, looking up at him. "O-Our lives?"
Her words were drowned when he brushed his lips on hers tentatively, then slowly became more urgent as sweet passion began to dictate the two who had never kissed anyone else in their whole lives on how to respond to each other.
Behind them, stars began to fall down, leaving silver streaks across the velvety darkness of the night sky. But their beauty was insignificant, compared to the miracle that the two young people below them had realized.
That they do love each other very much.
Amidamaru appeared. "Hey, Master Yoh, the star display is starting!"
When his master didn't reply, he turned to him. When he saw what he was doing, he smilingly turned his back on the scene and concentrated on the falling stars, silently wishing all the best for his master and Anna.
Fin