I'm back! I hope you're glad to know that I'm still alive somewhere and that I still remember I have this fic that I still need to finish. So I won't say anything anymore. Please read on if you don't mind me updating for like a century. :))

Disclaimer: As usual. I don't own NNM.

Chapter 11

"Well, what am I supposed to do?" I muttered in frustration, asking no one in particular but the empty space before me. I was at the back garden of the house, squatting down at the edge of the pond. My feet got tired from pacing back and forth, thinking of plans on how to make Rikuo confess – to simply put it- without being so blatant about my intention.

I've been on it for almost 3 hours now but I wasn't able to come up with anything. And to think I skipped class today– not that it really mattered if I go to school or not- so that I could focus solely on my agenda. I should have known that it would be this hard. I had been considering asking Rikuo directly since he promised that we'll talk about it but I felt that he was still adverse with opening himself to me – or to anyone in particular.

I stared at my reflection at the water below and immediately soothed out the frown that was projected back to me. I let out a sigh and reached out toward the water. Absentmindedly, I made a circular movement as I dipped my finger on it, creating a smooth ripple effect. It almost reflected the state of my mind at the moment, the only exception was the smooth part.

That goes back to my question, how am I supposed to make Rikuo realize that whatever he was trying to hide will not sort itself out? That in some way or another, it will bite him back in the end.

If only he was just like his grandfather, I would not have felt like drowning my head in the pond right now. If only he had been like his grandfather from the start, I would not have dared to hope, however sma-

I abruptly halted my thoughts, realizing what was about to take form in my mind. Shock followed by shame filled me. I shook my head, willing the forbidden thoughts to go away.

Dammit. This isn't about me. This is about Waka and Kana.

I withdrew my hand and placed it back on my knee. I closed my eyes and stayed still for several minutes, trying to keep my emotions in check and setting my priorities straight. Having gained a semblance of myself, I stood up and tilted my head toward the house.

If there was someone who knew better on what to do in this kind of situation, that would be Kejorou.

Now, it would have been a great idea if not for the fact that she had quite an appetite for curiosity. And I wasn't sure if I would not be able to commit a "slip of the tongue" mistake.

Well, there's only one way to find out.

"So, what is your plan?" Ryuuji started as soon as we took our seats in a cafe that was nearby where I accidentally ran into him. After talking with Kejouro, which involved a barrage of questions on her part and a lot of dodging on my part, a solution to my dilemma was presented to me. It still lacked proper planning though so thinking back about it, my impulsive action to ask for Ryuuji's help was understandable. He was not interested at first but for some reason, he changed his mind and decided to hear me out.

"We'll make Waka jealous. Have someone court Kana or whatever and you know the rest."

Ryuuji stared at me as if another head had started to grow out of my shoulder.

"That's a lame plan, if not overly cliche. More than that, those were pretty strange words coming from you."

"What strange words?"

"Nevermind." Ryuuji chuckled. He put his elbows atop the table and rested his chin on his intertwined fingers. He continued," Back to your plan, I'm sure that there were other boys who were interested in her before. And as far as I could tell, your plan didn't get the desired result."

I frowned, realizing that Ryuuji had a point. True, Kana was pretty popular in school and there were some who made their intentions known to her. However, she clearly showed that she was not interested in them so they gave up. The frown on my face disappeared when another realization hit me. I grinned at Ryuuji.

"You're right but those boys were not persistent enough since Kana never gave them any encouragement. Besides, it will be different this time. You'll just have to ask someone who likes Kana enough to pretend he's interested in her romantically but not enough that he'll get serious about it later on. You get what I'm saying, right?"

"Have you considered the possibility that Kana will fall for that someone?"

"That's ridiculous."

Ryuuji roared out in laughter that I had to hunch on my back in embarrassment when all eyes inside the cafe turned to us. That kind of reaction from Ryuuji was unwarranted that I had to rack my brain in which part of what I said was funny. There's none, as far as I could recall. I waited for the attention to pass by before I straightened my posture. I glared at Ryuuji.

"You didn't have to laugh."

"I have to admit that you are one amusing youkai." Ryuuji bemused, unnerving me with the glint in his eyes. I decided to ignore that.

"So, will you be able to help me out?"

Instead of answering me, Ryuuji took a slice of the Strawberry Daiquiri he ordered and deliberately took his time to eat it. To say the least, I almost made an ice statue out of him. If not for the fact that we're on a public place, I might have just done that. Impatient, I was about to repeat the question when Ryuuji finally spoke.

"Really, that's quite a stupid plan you got there – as I've already said before. I was expecting something more sensible but I'll humor you just this once. I'll let you know once I found the guy you were looking for. Anything else?"

If he was going to say yes, he should not have ridiculed Kejorou's idea in the first place. I'd forgotten how annoying he could be most of the times.

"You skipped class, didn't you?"

"II'll skip class whenever I feel like it." He replied flatly. "If there's nothing else, can I eat in peace?"

I shrugged my shoulders. "Suit yourself. I'll just finish mine then I'll go." I reached for the blueberry cheesecake in front of me and started to eat.

We fell into a surprisingly comfortable silence until we finished eating our desserts. When we stepped out of the cafe, it was starting to get dark. Since we're living in the same house for now, I didn't know if I should go with him or not. We're not really that close so I was sure that it'll be an awkward walk if ever it happens. Gratefully, Ryuuji saved me from my dilemma when he said that he had somewhere else to go. I went home by myself.

I could not help but release a sigh as I took in the sight around me. Kiyotsugo was sitting on his usual seat, facing his computer while searching for some new information regarding youkais, with Jiro hovering behind him. On the other side of the room, Maki and Saori were lounging on the fluffy lounge sofa, most probably talking about trivial things that so far happened to them today. Kana and Rikuo were on the different lounge sofa adjacent to that of Maki and Saori's. Apparently, being good students that they were, they were leaning above a book, with notebooks on their laps, and were engaging in a serious conversation.

Since nobody noticed my arrival, probably due to the fact that they had their full attention in whatever they were doing, I let myself focus at Kana and Rikuo a bit longer. They look perfectly good together. Just one look at them and people would have to wonder what could possibly go wrong between them. But then, something did. And if I had to go with the way the Night Rikuo had treated Kana, then that something had to be addressed as soon as possible.

I could have stayed passive about it for a bit longer if only Ryuuji had not come into the picture, but he did, and that's what made the situation more complicated than it already was, leaving me with no choice but to act on it. An act that had been futile even up to this moment.

Marrying Rikuo to Yura wasn't a bad idea at all. Yura was great, both as a person and a fighter and I knew that she would be an ideal wife for Rikuo. With her characteristics, it would not be impossible for Rikuo to fall for her. But it was still too early for them to get married. Ryuuji had already explained the logic to it but it was still ridiculous. But I was even more ridiculous to team up with Ryuuji to prove to him that marrying Rikuo to his sister wouldn't work since Rikuo was already in love with Kana.

Until now, the set-up didn't make sense to me but I've already come this far- there's no other option for me but to continue with it. Rikuo was very important to me and his happiness matters above anything else.

How ironic and hypocrite.

Somehow, if I were to dig deeply into it, I was not doing this for Kana. I wasn't doing this for Rikuo either. I was doing this for myself.

A bitter taste started to rise on my throat and I had to swallow hard as to not let it choke me. Pushing the thought out of my head, I reverted back to my usual self, the happy and care-free Tsurara. Without creating any sound, I walked toward Rikuo and Kana and plopped myself on her left side that was vacant. Kana squeaked, which was an adorable cry, apparently surprised by my appearance. All pair of eyes went to me. Well, that was dramatic.

"Hi." I said, grinning from cheek to cheek.

"You startled me." Kana breathed out once she got over her initial shock. Which she followed with a laugh. To which everyone followed suit.

"Took you long to get here." Rikuo said once the laughter settled. He leaned forward, taking up an angle where he could better stare at me.

"There were just some stuff I need to take care of."

Rikuo only nodded in understanding although he looked like he was going to ask something. At the same time, Kiyotsugo swiveled on his chair, his expression thoughtful as he stared at me.

"I'm not really sure but I think I saw you together with Yura's big bro yesterday. You had your back on me so I wasn't sure but I could not mistake that hair of yours. It's you, wasn't it?"

Taken by surprise, I gaped at him. And when my blood was able to catch up with the realization, it spread all over my face.

"With Ryuuji?"

I tensed, my mind flowing out of the gutter. Rikuo's voice sounded confused but more than that, it was the disbelief that had taken a more prominent form.

Coincidence must be playing a big joke on me. It was not a place that Kiyotsugo usually went to and as far as I knew, they had class yesterday. I decided not to question him though, I will just sound suspicious. What's more important was that I would be able to come up with a plausible reason why I was with Ryuuji without exposing the truth behind it. And it seemed like I wasn't totally doomed for today when an idea crossed into my mind. I shifted on my seat, fighting the urge to smile.

"Ryuuji wanted to tell me something important. It's actually about Kana."

With the sudden shift of reaction on their faces, I could tell that it was a far more breaking news than the previous one. Their eyebrows shot up, especially Kana's.

"You see, there's a guy in Ryuuji's class that likes Kana. He wanted to know more about you..." I tilted my head towards Kana, addressing her. "... so Ryuuji thought that I might be able to help his classmate."

I roamed my eyes around, gauging their expressions. Jiro looked like he wanted to do a happy dance upon hearing my explanation, which was weird. Kiyotsugo nodded his head like he didn't really think much about it. Maki and Tohrii had their jaws hanging open. Kana blushed, clearly embarrassed at how the topic got directed to her. As for Rikuo, a slight scowl was plastered on his face.

"Why didn't you tell us?"

"What's there to tell? That somebody likes Kana? That's not really something new, right? It's just that it happened the guy this time asked Ryuuji."

"Still. And are you seriously thinking about helping that guy? You don't even know him."

"If Ryuuji is helping him, then I believe he's a good guy."

"Guys, don't you think we have better things to talk about than this?" Kana hesitantly interjected, her eyes drifting from Rikuo to me. She raised the book they were reading a while ago, emphasizing her point. Rikuo and I held a staring contest for at least a second before he broke it off with a huff.

Okay, this was going to have repercussions later on.

"It's been quite a while now that an upperclassman shows interest in Kana." Tohrii said, steering the topic away from the previous one. I was so sure she was going to put fuel to the fire but it seemed she wasn't interested in that right now. Or maybe she had just missed it.

Saori chuckled. "This should be interesting. But yeah, before that, please finish first the assignment from our terror math teacher so that we could copy it before the next class starts."

Good point.

I could not be wrong. This could have something to do with my revelation this afternoon that had digressed Rikuo's mind into that of a 3 years old. He was acting normal when we were still at school but after we had dropped by Kana at her house, he suddenly gave us the cold shoulder. Even when we arrived at the house, he continued to ignore us, including all the youkais inside the house, and just went straight to his room. Dinner came and he had not shown himself yet, prompting Kejorou to kick me out of the dining room to fetch Rikuo and drag his ass out of his room. They never asked me what actually happened. As long as I smooth things out with Rikuo, they didn't care at all.

So here I am, standing inside his room and staring at a bulky mass of sheet lying on top of the futon that was Rikuo. He was pretending to sleep, that I knew much. I've already announced my presence quite a few times but he just ignored me. He did not even stir a bit. I didn't know whether to get amused or pissed at him. I'm already hungry and I'd want nothing but to sit in front of the table and eat my dinner.

Well, okay, I was just kidding. But still.

"Waka. Don't be such a baby."

"I'm not a baby."

That's a progress. Eventhough he sounded really disgruntled, he still replied.

"Then why are you acting like one? We can't eat dinner if you're not there."

"I'm not hungry. Just go on without me."

"You know we can't do that. Come on, everyone's waiting for you. Don't be stubborn."

"No, you're the stubborn one."

"Waka."

A full minute passed yet not a single sound came from him. I sighed, getting exasperated. Without saying another word, I stomped towards him, grabbed his blanket and tugged it forcefully away from him. He shrieked, clearly surprised by the move. He immediately sat up and faced me with a glare. He wasn't wearing his eyeglasses that I could perfectly see the reddish glow of his eyes. If his hair and clothes weren't a mess and if he wasn't in his human form, I would have flinched under his stare. Fortunately, Rikuo's state right now was downright amusing, if not funny.

"Well?" I prompted him, letting the blanket dangle from my hand.

He tilted his head to the side, raising his chin in defiance. His stubbornness was something to be reckoned with. That left me with no choice but to be blunt.

"Are you mad that I decided to help Ryuuji's classmate?"

His head snapped right back at me, his expression incredulous. "Where did you get that idea? It's not the reason why I'm-oh never mind. "He sighed in frustration, ruffling his hair. " I'm not hungry, really. You can just tell -"

A loud rumble vibrated all over the room, effectively cutting Rikuo's speech short. Silence followed as we stared at each other. Unable to help myself, I broke out laughing. I didn't miss the cherry color that spread on Rikuo's face and neck.

"That your stomach begs to disagree. "I said, chuckling. Rikuo was about to make a protest again when I put down his blanket down and extended my hand at him. "Come on, I knew you were drooling at what Kejorou had prepared. "

Rikuo tilted his head to the side, wearing his stubborn pout. Well, that was a good sign.

"Oh come on." I said. And this time, I bent a little and grabbed his hands, trying to pull him up. Rikuo was startled at first but he recovered quickly. He was laughing as he stood up.

"Okay, okay. You win. I'm joining you guys to dinner. My stomach feels really empty, anyway."

With the sound I heard a while ago, I could just imagine how empty it was. " Let's go." I said simply.

Dwelling on the issue would only aggravate Rikuo further so it's best to leave it as it was. What mattered the most was that he's no longer acting like a spoiled kid that was denied with a lollipop. That was a horrible description but still, the idea was there.