“How
could you say you and Kevin didn’t do anything inappropriate?”
Lindsay looked scandalized. “Everything you just told me is
completely inappropriate. Seriously, you two… and in the bath…
how is that not inappropriate?”
“Kevin’s
my mate. Anything he does to me is not only appropriate, but
completely normal.”
Lindsay
looked like someone had just smacked her in the face with a dead
fish. “… Is this another kitsune thing?”
“Ara?
A kitsune thing?”
While
Lilian and Lindsay spoke of things that Kevin rather wished he
couldn’t hear, Christine sat down on his other side.
“Hey,”
she greeted, “you look like shit.”
Kevin
gave her a bland look. “Gee, thanks. Hearing someone say I look
like crap really brightens my day.”
Christine
blushed. “T-that’s not what I―I just meant you look
tired!”
“I
know.” Kevin rubbed a hand down his face. “Sorry, I’ve
got a lot on my mind right now.”
“You
wanna talk about it?” When Kevin looked at her like she’d
said something strange, Christine’s cheeks turned blue. “W-what
the hell are you staring at me like that for, you idiot?”
“No
reason.” Kevin’s blond hair swayed as he shook his head.
“I’m just surprised you’re being so, well, so
nice.”
Christine
looked offended. “I can be nice!”
“You
yell at me every time we talk.”
“Urk!”
“You’ve
also started hitting me whenever we talk, too.”
“Gurk!”
“Don’t
forget the number of times she’s beaten up Eric,” Lilian
added.
“Ugh!”
“Eric
deserved all of those beatings,” Kevin pointed out.
“True,
true.” Lilian nodded. “I was just pointing out how
violent she is.”
“Stop
talking about me like I’m not here!” a blue-faced
Christine shouted.
“Speaking
of Eric,” Alex started as he and his brother stopped arguing,
“where is he?”
“Don’t
know,” his twin said, “but it’s kinda odd that he’s
not here. Eric’s not one to miss out on a chance to try and
grope Christine.”
“Wha―SHUT
UP ABOUT THAT!”
“Justin
is also missing,” Lindsay added.
“So
is Iris,” Lilian frowned.
“Eric’s
probably trying to peep on the freshmen girls while they change into
their PE uniforms,” Kevin determined. “That, or he’s
already running from them.”
As
if on cue, loud, obnoxious wails of agony echoed across the campus,
followed by equally loud screams of pain.
“NOT
THE FACE! NOT THE FACE! AAIIEEEE! YES, THE FACE! YES, THE FACE!”
A
stiff breeze blew through the now silent clearing. Several birds
cawed in a most annoying manner.
“Or
he’s already been caught,” Kevin said into the silence.
“And
Justin and Iris?” asked Lindsay.
Kevin
and Lilian shared a look.
“Last
I saw, Iris had convinced Justin to give her a tour of the school,”
Lilian said.
“Tch!
Lucky bastard,” Alex grumbled. “How did someone like
Justin manage to catch the interest of a babe like Iris? He can’t
even hold a proper conversation!”
“That’s
probably why,” Lilian mused. “He’s so simple-minded
that manipulating him is easy for someone like Iris.”
Iris
had been extensively trained in the art of pleasing and manipulating
people. The matriarch had wanted to turn Lilian’s sister into a
field agent; someone who would travel around the world and gather
potentially beneficial information via the seduction of men―and
women. She probably would have become their best temptress, too, had
she not been so adamant in refusing the matriarch under the claim
that “
the
only person she wanted to seduce was her Lily-pad.”
Alex
and Andrew looked at each other.
“Think
we should start acting dumber to pick up chicks?”
“It
worked for Justin, didn’t it? I’m sure it will work for
us.”
Kevin
rolled his eyes. “I swear, all of my friends are idiots.”
“That’s
not a very nice thing to say.”
“I
agree. You might be a Harem Lord, but that doesn’t give you the
right to make fun of your loyal subjects.”
“Shut
up! I’m not a Harem Lord or whatever, so stop calling me that!
Ugh,” Kevin buried his head in his hands, “why couldn’t
I have smarter and less embarrassing friends?”
“There,
there.” Lilian rubbed Kevin’s back in soothing up and
down motions. “I know what will make you feel better.”
“What’s
that?”
Lilian
grinned, and the next thing he knew a pair of soft, warm, and
smoother than milk chocolate lips were kissing him. Kevin could have
melted into them.
Unfortunately,
Christine didn’t like their display of affection.
“Da―wh-w-w-WHAT
THE HELL DO YOU TWO THINK YOU’RE DOING?! DON’T GO AROUND
KISSING IN PUBLIC! THERE ARE PEOPLE WATCHING!”
Lilian
clicked her tongue in annoyance after removing her lips from a
slightly insensate Kevin. “Considering that Kevin and I are
dating, you have no right to tell us what we can and cannot do.”
“Sure
I do.” Christine’s baleful glare was colder than icicles
hanging from a hut in the Arctic Circle. “Someone has to stop
you two from acting so promiscuous in public.”
“So
you say, but I think you’re just jealous.”
“Je-je-je―I
AM NOT!”
“Are
too.”
“AM
NOT!”
“Yes,
you are.”
“NO,
I’M NOT!”
“No,
you’re not!”
“YES,
I AM!” A pause. It took Christine exactly two seconds to
compute what she’d just said. Were her tsundere protocols not
already activated, they would have been now. “Y-y-y-y-you…!
Shut up! shut up, shut up, shut up!”
“Has
anyone told you that your voice is really annoying? Your Seiyuu’s
not Kugimiya-san, is it?”
“What?”
Christine couldn’t seem to make heads or tails of that
statement.
“Nothing,
nothing.” Lilian airily waved a hand through the air in a
dismissive gesture.
The
conversation soon returned to more normal topics after that.
“I
was wondering if you and Christine wanted to sleep over this
weekend?” Lindsay twirled the fork in her salad as she looked
inquiringly at the redhead.
“A
sleep over?” Lilian blinked. “I don’t know…
I mean, Kevin and I…”
Lindsay
rolled her eyes while Christine’s flared with righteous anger.
“You can sleep with Kevin whenever you want. Don’t you
sleep with him pretty much every night anyways?”
“There’s
no pretty much about it,” Lilian corrected, “we always
sleep together.”
Christine
gnashed her teeth together. Kevin feared the girl’s gums might
start bleeding.
“Exactly
my point.” Lindsay pointed at Lilian with her fork. “You
always sleep with Kevin. Surely not sleeping with him for a single
night won’t kill you.”
“Do
you two really have to talk about my and Lilian’s sleeping
arrangements?” asked a mildly embarrassed Kevin.
“Yes,”
Lindsay responded shamelessly, turning back to Lilian, her doe-like
brown eyes sparkling. “What do you say? Come on, say you’ll
sleep over with Christine and I?”
“Who
said I was willing to spend a night with this skank?”
Lindsay
and Lilian both stared at Christine, who held their stares for a
moment, then looked away with a grumble.
“I
don’t know.” An uncertain Lilian looked at Kevin. “What
do you think I should do?”
“Why
are you asking me? This is your life; you should do whatever you
want. You know, live your life the way you want to and all that?”
Truth
be told, Kevin would actually be a little lonely without Lilian. He’d
grown so used to having the enchanting fox-girl sleep with him that
the idea of not being able to hold her in his arms, to feel her warm
body against his, seemed almost foreign to him now.
I
guess it’s true that a lot can change in three months.
However,
Kevin also knew that Lilian enjoyed trying out new things; whether
that was playing games at the arcade or traveling to a place she’d
never visited before.
Lilian
worried her lip for a moment. Kevin could almost see the debate being
waged in her mind.
“Lilian,”
he placed a hand over hers, “I know you want to go, so you
shouldn’t let me stop you. We’re going to be spending our
whole lives together, right? A single night won’t mean much in
the grand scheme of things. Go and have fun.”
Like
a drill piercing the heavens, Lilian’s face broke out into a
vibrant smile. “Thank you, Kevin.”
Kevin
returned the smile. “You’re welcome.”
Lilian
looked at Lindsay. “Okay, I’ll come to this sleep over
thing.”
“Great!”
Lindsay cheered. “Now it’ll be a true girls’ night.
I haven’t had one of those in ages!”
“Girls’
night?” The term made Lilian tilt her head. “What’s
that?”
Lindsay
gasped. Even Christine looked askance at her. “Don’t tell
me you’ve never heard of a girls’ night?”
“Is
that sort of like a girls’ day out?”
“Sort
of. A girls’ night is…”
As
the tomboyish blond explained the concept of a “girls’
night” to Lilian, Kevin tuned her out and took to observing the
surrounding courtyard. He could see a trail of dust expanding across
the school yard, at the front of which was Eric, who was screaming
for his life. Sweat trickled down Kevin’s face when he noticed
that his friend’s clothes had been ripped to shreds. He began
sweating even more when he noticed the horde of enraged girls chasing
the boy.
That
idiot really worries me sometimes.
“Who
the fuck do you think you’re talking to, bitch?!”
Kevin’s
head snapped to his left. Blue eyes narrowed in worry when he saw
Iris confronting an angry Chris. On the ground beside Iris was
Justin, who looked dazed.
It
had been a long time since Kevin had thought about the inu. Even when
Chris had become upset after seeing them disembark from Kiara’s
car, the dog yōkai had merely been a part of the background, a
static image.
Such
was not the case now.
“Kevin?”
Everyone
at the table became startled when Kevin stood up and rushed over to
where Iris was glaring daggers at Chris.
“I
think I’m talking to a ragged, beaten up dog who doesn’t
know his place.”
“Fucking
fox!”
Chris
raised his clenched right fist, prepared to deliver a savage punch to
the pretty female. Before he could, Kevin leapt into the air, his
body spinning like a top.
“Don’t-touch-my-girlfriend’s-sister
Screwdriver!”
“What
the—GUAG!”
Spittle
flew from Chris’s mouth as Kevin planted his feet into the
inu’s gut, knocking all of the air from the boy’s lungs
in one fell swoop. He bent his knees, absorbing the shock of impact,
his body parallel with the ground. Kevin then used his impressive leg
muscles to push off Chris’s body, launching the inu several
feet back where he crashed into a garbage can.
For
all of one second, time stood still.
For
all of one second, everyone stared at Kevin in awe.
For
all of one second, Kevin felt like the most awesome person in the
world.
Then
the second was over.
And
Kevin landed on his back. On the concrete. Hard.
As
Kevin’s lungs were deprived of oxygen and his vision exploded
with white while pain overloaded his photo-optic receptors, Iris
knelt beside his head.
“Feeling
manly now?” She asked, her lips stretching from ear to ear in a
wide grin.
Kevin
raised a shaky arm and gave Iris a thumbs up.
***
Track
practice was canceled that day due to the track field flooding.
Apparently, the sprinkler system had broken. Coach Raide had not been
happy.
Since
track was canceled, Kevin had called up Kiara and asked if he could
come to Mad Dawg Fitness to get some training in. Once there, he and
Lilian found a surprise waiting for them.
“Ms.
Grant? What are you doing here? Shouldn’t you still be
resting?”
Standing
on the blue mat that he got his butt kicked on so often was Heather.
The blond woman had donned tight black stretch shorts and a sports
bra of the same color. She was doing stretches; some of them he
recognized, but most he didn’t—and could she bend her
body. He didn’t think it was possible for anyone to be that
flexible.
Kevin
noticed that the trio of Tall, Taller, and Midget was mysteriously
absent.
Heather
scoffed as she straightened up. “Psh! What nonsense is this?
I’m feeling fine—right as rain, in fact. I really do need
to thank you and Red for convincing that maid of yours to help me
out. Her healing abilities are impressive.”
Lilian
puffed up her cheeks in anger, which made her look so cute that no
one would ever be intimidated by her. “Don’t call me
Red!”
“So,
what are you doing here?” asked Kevin. “I know you’re
living with Kiara right now, but I didn’t expect to see you
until the issue with your former organization has been dealt with.”
“Bah,”
Heather scoffed, “they won’t do anything now that their
little machines have been defeated. If they did, they’d run the
risk of people learning about their existence.”
“Makes
sense.” Kevin turned to Kiara. “I also wanted to thank
you for taking her in. I would have let her stay with me but, well―”
a helpless shrug, “―my place is a little cramped at the
moment.”
“I’ll
bet.” Kiara’s lips twitched in amusement. “Anyway,
the reason she’s here is because I thought we’d switch
things up a bit. Heather has police training, and is well-versed in
both armed and unarmed combat. She’ll be able to give you a
better fight than my disciples.”
Kevin
looked from Heather to Kiara, then back to Heather. “So, you’re
going to help me get stronger, then?”