Summer Stories - The Grand Japan Sake Prix - Chapter Two
Stupid Negima fanart contest is taking away all my time, even though I have no chance of winning since I can't draw very well. -.-;
Previous Chapters: 1
"The restaurant at the end of North Jinkan Street serves the best sake in the district. Naturally, everyone goes there, and so it's always jammed.
I'm usually never drunk-"
Kagura interrupted and asked, "But what about that time two years ago?" When she closed her eyes she could still see the mental images burned on the back of her retina.
Nyamo answered patiently, "That was because I didn't want Yukari getting drunk. Trust me, a drunk Yukari is the worst possible thing in the world."
Chiyo, being the smart one, asked, "But then why do you always go out for sake with her?"
Not having an answer to this, Nyamo merely settled for snarling at Chiyo, "Shut up, will you?!"
"Ok, so since I'm usually never drunk, I usually have to lead Yukari out of the restaurant. So she's always smacking into people, which is actually all right, since most of them are completely stoned themselves.
On that particular day though, Yukari crashed into this redhead. Green eyes, sporty-"
The group sighed in unison, "We know already."
"FINE. So she starts stripping for whatever reason, and the girl was still sober and kinda like Woah, OMG-"
Tomo waved her hand frantically and stood up. "What does OMG mean?"
"Oh My God, now STFU!" Nyamo's face resembled a blueberry now, her dark blue hair only serving to enhance the image.
Tomo waved her hand frantically and stood up again. "What does STFU-"
A truly ear-splitting roar burst out of Nyamo. "SHUT UP!!!! Ok, so naked girls attract drunken men." She paused as if contemplating the strangeness of that phrase, then continued, "Remember that if you remember nothing else.
Anyway, so these guys start tottering towards us, and so we have to drag Yukari out of there in a hurry before she does something stupid. She's pretty heavy though, so it was a godsend that the red-headed girl was there, even though we later had to reimburse her for her loss of sake. Woah, wait. SHE CHEATED US OUT OF OUR MONEY!"
Nyamo stood up in a sudden blaze of fury, knocking Yukari off her comfortable position drooling on Nyamo's purple shirt.
"Wh-what was that for?" Yukari asked, yawning widely.
Nyamo glanced sideways at Yukari and said, "Midori-"
"Sit down," mumbled Yukari, tugging on Nyamo's black slacks. Sighing, Nyamo complied and reclined on the plush couch once again. Instantly, Yukari buried her head into Nyamo's lap, eager to get back to sleep.
Nyamo looked down at the dozing Yukari, almost ready to kick her into the outer confines of the atmosphere. The minute features about Yukari that she loved were all emphasized in the light though, from the hair that framed her face in a small halo to the way her forehead crinkled as she slept wiped any hostile feelings Nyamo had been harboring clean off her mind. The only thing she could think of doing was look down tenderly at Yukari and pat her head.
As the rest of the group sat on the rug staring at this unusual display of affection, the only thing running through their minds was, "This is true love. We're doomed."
After a few more minutes of enduring the sickeningly fond caresses, Yomi finally asked drearily, "Can we get back to the story?"
Instantly Nyamo was alert again, a bright red blush staining her cheeks. "Yes, yes, let's, uh, talk about the story again? Now where was I?" she said cheerily in a completely fake voice.
A moment later she resumed her story in her normal voice, a thing which all the occupants in the room were glad for, except for Sakaki. She'd thought it was cute, kind of like a cat's mewling.
Osaka began to wonder if her former teacher was an alien.
"Anyway, back to the story! So the girl introduces herself as Midori with a flourish, and calls her cell for someone to pick us up, as we were garnering a lot of weird stares with Yukari now rubbing up a pole.
So her friend pulls up with a car, and a really nice one too - it was a Mercedez, black and shiny with leather seats."
The collected people oohed and aahed. Chiyo gasped, "Wow, even I don't have that car."
Tomo nodded, a smug look on her face.
Yomi upon noticing this scowled and asked Tomo, "What are you so happy about? It's not your car. You own a shitty second-hand XingKai that you've crashed at least a hundred times already."
Tomo just smirked at Yomi.
Finally tired of waiting, Nyamo screeched in a Yukari-like imitation, "Can we get back to the story?"
Without waiting for their answer she continued, "So we get in our ride and we're driving back. It takes something like 20 minutes to reach her house, but there's usually a lot of traffic, so naturally we're stuck in this stupid bumpy old road with all these stupid taxis honking.
Anyway, since it's taking a lot of time, Yukari wakes up and somehow comes out of her stupor. She realizes she's half-naked but ignores it and instead asks who those weird people are driving a Mercedes. Midori introduces herself and she does it for the doctor too. Her name's Youko. Anyway, Yukari just kinda nods, then yells loudly, "I like sake! Do YOU like sake?"
Midori laughs really loudly and whips out a sake bottle, cackling happily even as Youko tries to stop her, a panicked expression on her face.
Right then, I knew that there was going to be trouble if Yukari and Midori became friends."
Nyamo paused dramatically, as if about to relate the climactic part where she prevented the two sake demons from bonding and making herself out to be a hero, but instead just collapsed and said weakly, strength gone from the horror of the memory, "Which they did."
Everyone facefaulted.
"So the two proceed to get thoroughly insobrieted, so much so that Youko just stops at her apartment and asks if we could stay over rather than head to our respective places, since it would be a nightmare trying to keep Midori from doing something rash while on the road. I had the same thoughts for Yukari anyway, so I agree - it wasn't like my flat had anything I absolutely needed to finish the day anyway, and Yukari was too stoned to care. Bet her mom would've been happy to have a load like that out of her hands for a day anyway."
There was a stinging sensation on Nyamo's face as a hand smacked right into her cheek, creating a red imprint.
"I heard that!" Yukari yelled. A moment later she went back to sleep.
Kagura had been just about to agree loudly with Nyamo, which would've caused everyone else to join in, but luckily the slap made her rethink the idea just in time, and Nyamo continued with her story, albeit now rubbing at her right cheek.
"So we stay over, and after the stress of trying to get two drunk raving lunatics to calm down and go to sleep - they finally just crumpled on to the floor by themselves, by the way - me and Youko-"
Chiyo piped up, "Youko and I."
"What?"
Tomo yelled, "It should be Youko and I! Grammar!"
Yomi sighed. "Even Tomo knows that."
In response Nyamo yelled, "Well at least I know how to do sports!"
Kagura was the only one who emphatically nodded; the others had all heard this millions of times before and weren't really expecting anything else - although it apparently was still a surprise to Tomo, who stood up and yelled, "Really?"
Everyone chose to ignore her and allow Yomi to wrestle her back down.
"Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, so Youko and I were so tired after trying to calm them down the entire night, we overslept and awoke to find that Midori and Yukari had gotten rid of any massive hangover that they should've had and were systematically destroying Youko's supply of sake.
Which was not much, so technically they'd already destroyed it. They left a note on the table saying that they had gone to get more sake.
We bolted out of the apartment in just our pjs, but alas, Youko's shiny Mercedes was gone. And all the cars in the place sported a dent in them. One even looked like it had been run over by another car, the shape of it being like a hill.
It was ridiculous. We ran to the nearest supermarket and asked them if they'd seen the two, and they answered angrily that they'd bought out their entire supply of sake and now they would have to wait two weeks before getting another load.
I was stunned, for my part, because that's an enormous amount of money. But apparently Youko wasn't, because she just looked through her purse and said, 'Yup. My credit card's gone.'
It was horrible, let me tell you that. We walked back to the apartment and found literally crates of sake in every niche of Youko's now beat-up car, and walking into the room found the place stacked with sake as well. In fact, Midori and Yukari were drinking sake on a sake crate!
I mean, to this day I don't even know how they got all that sake in in such a short amount of time!"
"Chiyo's dad helped us," Yukari said, awake, before starting to snore again.
"Guh-WHAT? Yukari, what are you talking about?"
But try as she might, Nyamo could not get a response out of the dead-weight Yukari.
Finally, exasperated, Nyamo merely chose to continue on with her story.
"At any rate, we were terrified. Youko rushed up to Midori and asked, 'How much sake have you had already?!'
Midori responded by counting on her fingers, and showing a total of six. But it wasn't six bottles, no, it was six crates. In one morning. Youko actually turned white and almost fainted.
We asked them how many they were planning to drink, and Midori just shrugged and said, 'As much as we can get our hands on.'
Yukari responded by banging her cup into the crate and smashing it, thus revealing even more sake, screaming, 'That's right!'
After seeing that show, I gaped at them and said, 'But that'll be all the sake in the world!'
Yukari took a bottle out of the crate and started pouring it, yelling again, 'That's right!'
'B-b-but then what will other people drink?'
There was silence for about a minute before Midori flapped her hand at me, yelling in a loud drunken voice, 'They don't have to drink anything. The world can stay sober!'
At this Youko really did faint. The thought must've been too horrifying for her.
We tried everything to get them out of the apartment and stop drinking sake. Lure of super-expensive restaurants, hot springs, even something like five-hundred thousand yen, but they wouldn't budge.
After exhausting ourselves through the day trying to get them to leave, we gave up and went to roost at my apartment since Youko wouldn't be able to sleep in her apartment, stacked with sake as it was. And Midori and Yukari were still going at it. In fact, half of the sake was gone, and by tomorrow they would be out to buy more.
Or so we thought. Because upon opening the door to my apartment, I found that it was chock full of sake as well.
So we finally ended up sleeping on park benches because we didn't want to waste our money on a hotel when it could be better put to use trying to bribe the two sake fiends out of their hidey hole.
The next morning we woke up, necks stiff, backs sore, and with bird poop on our shirts.
We return our minds to the daunting task ahead of convincing Midori and Yukari to stop drinking sake when Youko finally just sits on the bench and goes, 'Maybe we should just go with gut feeling.'
Naturally I think she's gone insane, and am about to rush out to buy sake for her, especially since she probably wouldn't be able to enjoy it much longer.
But she keeps talking.
'I mean, as a doctor, drinking that much sake is unhealthy for her, but at the same time, I just... want to spend more time with her. I don't know, I must sound stupid, since it really has nothing to do with her drinking sake...'
At this point I'd become interested, because, well, frankly, I could really relate to her.
So I said something like this, 'No, no, I understand. It's like sometimes you don't know whether they're more devoted to sake than you, and even whether they're devoted to you, at all right?'
'Yeah, I'm alright with Midori not stopping, because kami help us if Midori ever stopped drinking sake, but I don't want her to drink it 24/7.'
'Same here. Because as ridiculous as Yukari is, I really...' here Nyamo turned red and mumbled, 'love her.'
Tomo cupped her ears and shrieked as loudly as she could, "WHAT DID YOU SAY NYAMO? WAS THAT A CONFESSION OF LOVE?"
This earned her a swift punch to the gut by Yomi, which was actually quite good because Nyamo would've delivered an even harder punch had Yomi not gotten there first. At any rate she chose to not reply to Tomo's question, instead just continuing on with the story.
"So we decide to just march to the house and go with it. We're confident and jovial all the way up the stairs, but the second we start to unlock the door, we become all nervous and jittery.
Finally we barge in, and the first thing that's out of my mouth is, 'Stop drinking sake!'
There's no one there. On the smashed crate that they were drinking on is taped a Post-It note: We're at Nyamo's, going on to the next supply of sake.
Quick as lightning we're out of the door, not even bothering to lock Youko's door, (not like anyone would come in to steal empty sake crates) and as soon as we're outside again we see a huge riot at the local supermarket because all those poor people can't buy their sake.
Our pace doubles even more at that, for having all those people miss their daily sake fix is definitely NOT a good thing, no matter how much people say not drinking alcohol is good for you.
We start becoming paranoid, actually, because we think that people are on to us and Midori and Yukari the second they start trailing us even for a little while. By the time we reach my apartment we're so panicked we don't even bother getting nervous - it is entirely gut feeling.
So we burst in and I yell, 'Stop drinking the sake!' again.
Unfortunately, this draws the attention of a bunch of sake-deprived people outside, who begin to gather and march up the stairs. And then trot. And then run. And then sprint like Sakaki does when chasing after cute things."
Tomo was outraged, yelling, "That should be ME who's sprinting! ME ME ME!" This earned her another punch to the stomach by an exasperated Yomi, who yelled at Tomo, "Look, if you'll stop doing that, you can go have a lesbian orgy!"
Tomo's eyes grew wide.
"REALLY?"
Yomi blinked twice, not knowing where that had come from, but finally sighed and said, "Yeah."
Tomo began nodding frantically, saying quickly, "Thank you thank you I promise I won't talk anymore promise promise," until Yomi yelled at her to shut up.
Everyone else stared at them, slightly suspicious. Of both Yomi and whether Tomo actually knew what a lesbian orgy was.
Meanwhile Kaorin fawned over the fact that Sakaki had been mentioned as a fast runner, and secretly congratulated herself for doing her best to look especially cute today, since Sakaki always chased after those things.
After Tomo quieted down, Nyamo continued with her story again.
"Yeah, so this mob is charging at us, so we slam the door in their face and lock it. Of course it wouldn't work for very long since they started punching and kicking our door, but meanwhile, well, we were going on gut feeling.
So I take a deep breath and am about to order them to stop drinking sake again, but what comes out of my mouth is, 'Yukari, your mom's really ugly.'
All three stare at me in a strangely awkward silence, so I just look at Youko and shrug. It had been gut feeling.
Youko slaps her forehead and says, 'Ok, so the gist is that we want you to stop sake.'
Midori and Yukari stare at us as if we're crazy, and ask, 'Why?'
There's an awkward silence for a very long time, well not really because we'd just back everytime the door carved in another foot from all the kicks directed at it. When a tiny hole rips in it we all turn to stare at it, and then we turn back to stare at each other, and that's when this gut feeling tells me that I just need to say one thing - 'Because I love you, okay!'
I remember it was cool because me and Youko-"
"YOUKO AND I."
"SHUT UP! Because Youko and I said it at the same time. And then we continued on, saying that they were always devouring the sake and so basically didn't do anything with us, and that made us kind of sad, because even if we didn't have feelings for them we still were their friends.
And I guess the way I'm saying it now makes it sound easy, but it was really hard, to just burst out like that. But I think it was for the better, because they chose us over their sake."
The entire group gave a collective, "Awwww..." at the idea of that kind of sweetness, and looked at Yukari with new respect.
That is, until Nyamo sighed and said, "Well actually, Midori picked Youko over sake. Yukari here kept on drinking until she saw that her drinking partner was gone. Then she kind of wandered over to me and said, 'Well I guess I have you now. Get me out of that window.' We escaped the mob through the window, Yukari riding piggy-back on me the entire time."
Everyone face-faulted at Yukari's behavior, although they had expected no less.
An arm snaked around Nyamo's neck and she looked down to find Yukari awake and yawning.
"Well, everything turned out all right, didn't it?"
Nyamo, miffed, started saying, "That's not the point-"
Yukari ignored her, just pulling her up and saying, "Let's go to bed."
In a very strange moment of tenderness they both smiled softly at each other before beginning to head up the stairs, arms around each other.
Then Tomo yelled, "LESBIAN ORGY!"
And the day seemed complete.
Ehn, notes...
I don't think the Japanese have the kind of grammar blahblahblah and I, but if it bothers you that it isn't technically "Japanese culture" correct, I can just take that part out of the story. ^_^
So yeah, the story's (finally) done. I must confess that I had much fun writing this, especially the first chapter - the expressions of the Azumanga characters kept popping into my mind, and I kept on thinking, ha, they would totally say this! I admit the second chapter was kind of flat, but nevertheless, I hope you enjoyed it and can forgive me for the super-lateness, and please remember to review! ^_^
Previous Chapters: 1
"The restaurant at the end of North Jinkan Street serves the best sake in the district. Naturally, everyone goes there, and so it's always jammed.
I'm usually never drunk-"
Kagura interrupted and asked, "But what about that time two years ago?" When she closed her eyes she could still see the mental images burned on the back of her retina.
Nyamo answered patiently, "That was because I didn't want Yukari getting drunk. Trust me, a drunk Yukari is the worst possible thing in the world."
Chiyo, being the smart one, asked, "But then why do you always go out for sake with her?"
Not having an answer to this, Nyamo merely settled for snarling at Chiyo, "Shut up, will you?!"
"Ok, so since I'm usually never drunk, I usually have to lead Yukari out of the restaurant. So she's always smacking into people, which is actually all right, since most of them are completely stoned themselves.
On that particular day though, Yukari crashed into this redhead. Green eyes, sporty-"
The group sighed in unison, "We know already."
"FINE. So she starts stripping for whatever reason, and the girl was still sober and kinda like Woah, OMG-"
Tomo waved her hand frantically and stood up. "What does OMG mean?"
"Oh My God, now STFU!" Nyamo's face resembled a blueberry now, her dark blue hair only serving to enhance the image.
Tomo waved her hand frantically and stood up again. "What does STFU-"
A truly ear-splitting roar burst out of Nyamo. "SHUT UP!!!! Ok, so naked girls attract drunken men." She paused as if contemplating the strangeness of that phrase, then continued, "Remember that if you remember nothing else.
Anyway, so these guys start tottering towards us, and so we have to drag Yukari out of there in a hurry before she does something stupid. She's pretty heavy though, so it was a godsend that the red-headed girl was there, even though we later had to reimburse her for her loss of sake. Woah, wait. SHE CHEATED US OUT OF OUR MONEY!"
Nyamo stood up in a sudden blaze of fury, knocking Yukari off her comfortable position drooling on Nyamo's purple shirt.
"Wh-what was that for?" Yukari asked, yawning widely.
Nyamo glanced sideways at Yukari and said, "Midori-"
"Sit down," mumbled Yukari, tugging on Nyamo's black slacks. Sighing, Nyamo complied and reclined on the plush couch once again. Instantly, Yukari buried her head into Nyamo's lap, eager to get back to sleep.
Nyamo looked down at the dozing Yukari, almost ready to kick her into the outer confines of the atmosphere. The minute features about Yukari that she loved were all emphasized in the light though, from the hair that framed her face in a small halo to the way her forehead crinkled as she slept wiped any hostile feelings Nyamo had been harboring clean off her mind. The only thing she could think of doing was look down tenderly at Yukari and pat her head.
As the rest of the group sat on the rug staring at this unusual display of affection, the only thing running through their minds was, "This is true love. We're doomed."
After a few more minutes of enduring the sickeningly fond caresses, Yomi finally asked drearily, "Can we get back to the story?"
Instantly Nyamo was alert again, a bright red blush staining her cheeks. "Yes, yes, let's, uh, talk about the story again? Now where was I?" she said cheerily in a completely fake voice.
A moment later she resumed her story in her normal voice, a thing which all the occupants in the room were glad for, except for Sakaki. She'd thought it was cute, kind of like a cat's mewling.
Osaka began to wonder if her former teacher was an alien.
"Anyway, back to the story! So the girl introduces herself as Midori with a flourish, and calls her cell for someone to pick us up, as we were garnering a lot of weird stares with Yukari now rubbing up a pole.
So her friend pulls up with a car, and a really nice one too - it was a Mercedez, black and shiny with leather seats."
The collected people oohed and aahed. Chiyo gasped, "Wow, even I don't have that car."
Tomo nodded, a smug look on her face.
Yomi upon noticing this scowled and asked Tomo, "What are you so happy about? It's not your car. You own a shitty second-hand XingKai that you've crashed at least a hundred times already."
Tomo just smirked at Yomi.
Finally tired of waiting, Nyamo screeched in a Yukari-like imitation, "Can we get back to the story?"
Without waiting for their answer she continued, "So we get in our ride and we're driving back. It takes something like 20 minutes to reach her house, but there's usually a lot of traffic, so naturally we're stuck in this stupid bumpy old road with all these stupid taxis honking.
Anyway, since it's taking a lot of time, Yukari wakes up and somehow comes out of her stupor. She realizes she's half-naked but ignores it and instead asks who those weird people are driving a Mercedes. Midori introduces herself and she does it for the doctor too. Her name's Youko. Anyway, Yukari just kinda nods, then yells loudly, "I like sake! Do YOU like sake?"
Midori laughs really loudly and whips out a sake bottle, cackling happily even as Youko tries to stop her, a panicked expression on her face.
Right then, I knew that there was going to be trouble if Yukari and Midori became friends."
Nyamo paused dramatically, as if about to relate the climactic part where she prevented the two sake demons from bonding and making herself out to be a hero, but instead just collapsed and said weakly, strength gone from the horror of the memory, "Which they did."
Everyone facefaulted.
"So the two proceed to get thoroughly insobrieted, so much so that Youko just stops at her apartment and asks if we could stay over rather than head to our respective places, since it would be a nightmare trying to keep Midori from doing something rash while on the road. I had the same thoughts for Yukari anyway, so I agree - it wasn't like my flat had anything I absolutely needed to finish the day anyway, and Yukari was too stoned to care. Bet her mom would've been happy to have a load like that out of her hands for a day anyway."
There was a stinging sensation on Nyamo's face as a hand smacked right into her cheek, creating a red imprint.
"I heard that!" Yukari yelled. A moment later she went back to sleep.
Kagura had been just about to agree loudly with Nyamo, which would've caused everyone else to join in, but luckily the slap made her rethink the idea just in time, and Nyamo continued with her story, albeit now rubbing at her right cheek.
"So we stay over, and after the stress of trying to get two drunk raving lunatics to calm down and go to sleep - they finally just crumpled on to the floor by themselves, by the way - me and Youko-"
Chiyo piped up, "Youko and I."
"What?"
Tomo yelled, "It should be Youko and I! Grammar!"
Yomi sighed. "Even Tomo knows that."
In response Nyamo yelled, "Well at least I know how to do sports!"
Kagura was the only one who emphatically nodded; the others had all heard this millions of times before and weren't really expecting anything else - although it apparently was still a surprise to Tomo, who stood up and yelled, "Really?"
Everyone chose to ignore her and allow Yomi to wrestle her back down.
"Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, so Youko and I were so tired after trying to calm them down the entire night, we overslept and awoke to find that Midori and Yukari had gotten rid of any massive hangover that they should've had and were systematically destroying Youko's supply of sake.
Which was not much, so technically they'd already destroyed it. They left a note on the table saying that they had gone to get more sake.
We bolted out of the apartment in just our pjs, but alas, Youko's shiny Mercedes was gone. And all the cars in the place sported a dent in them. One even looked like it had been run over by another car, the shape of it being like a hill.
It was ridiculous. We ran to the nearest supermarket and asked them if they'd seen the two, and they answered angrily that they'd bought out their entire supply of sake and now they would have to wait two weeks before getting another load.
I was stunned, for my part, because that's an enormous amount of money. But apparently Youko wasn't, because she just looked through her purse and said, 'Yup. My credit card's gone.'
It was horrible, let me tell you that. We walked back to the apartment and found literally crates of sake in every niche of Youko's now beat-up car, and walking into the room found the place stacked with sake as well. In fact, Midori and Yukari were drinking sake on a sake crate!
I mean, to this day I don't even know how they got all that sake in in such a short amount of time!"
"Chiyo's dad helped us," Yukari said, awake, before starting to snore again.
"Guh-WHAT? Yukari, what are you talking about?"
But try as she might, Nyamo could not get a response out of the dead-weight Yukari.
Finally, exasperated, Nyamo merely chose to continue on with her story.
"At any rate, we were terrified. Youko rushed up to Midori and asked, 'How much sake have you had already?!'
Midori responded by counting on her fingers, and showing a total of six. But it wasn't six bottles, no, it was six crates. In one morning. Youko actually turned white and almost fainted.
We asked them how many they were planning to drink, and Midori just shrugged and said, 'As much as we can get our hands on.'
Yukari responded by banging her cup into the crate and smashing it, thus revealing even more sake, screaming, 'That's right!'
After seeing that show, I gaped at them and said, 'But that'll be all the sake in the world!'
Yukari took a bottle out of the crate and started pouring it, yelling again, 'That's right!'
'B-b-but then what will other people drink?'
There was silence for about a minute before Midori flapped her hand at me, yelling in a loud drunken voice, 'They don't have to drink anything. The world can stay sober!'
At this Youko really did faint. The thought must've been too horrifying for her.
We tried everything to get them out of the apartment and stop drinking sake. Lure of super-expensive restaurants, hot springs, even something like five-hundred thousand yen, but they wouldn't budge.
After exhausting ourselves through the day trying to get them to leave, we gave up and went to roost at my apartment since Youko wouldn't be able to sleep in her apartment, stacked with sake as it was. And Midori and Yukari were still going at it. In fact, half of the sake was gone, and by tomorrow they would be out to buy more.
Or so we thought. Because upon opening the door to my apartment, I found that it was chock full of sake as well.
So we finally ended up sleeping on park benches because we didn't want to waste our money on a hotel when it could be better put to use trying to bribe the two sake fiends out of their hidey hole.
The next morning we woke up, necks stiff, backs sore, and with bird poop on our shirts.
We return our minds to the daunting task ahead of convincing Midori and Yukari to stop drinking sake when Youko finally just sits on the bench and goes, 'Maybe we should just go with gut feeling.'
Naturally I think she's gone insane, and am about to rush out to buy sake for her, especially since she probably wouldn't be able to enjoy it much longer.
But she keeps talking.
'I mean, as a doctor, drinking that much sake is unhealthy for her, but at the same time, I just... want to spend more time with her. I don't know, I must sound stupid, since it really has nothing to do with her drinking sake...'
At this point I'd become interested, because, well, frankly, I could really relate to her.
So I said something like this, 'No, no, I understand. It's like sometimes you don't know whether they're more devoted to sake than you, and even whether they're devoted to you, at all right?'
'Yeah, I'm alright with Midori not stopping, because kami help us if Midori ever stopped drinking sake, but I don't want her to drink it 24/7.'
'Same here. Because as ridiculous as Yukari is, I really...' here Nyamo turned red and mumbled, 'love her.'
Tomo cupped her ears and shrieked as loudly as she could, "WHAT DID YOU SAY NYAMO? WAS THAT A CONFESSION OF LOVE?"
This earned her a swift punch to the gut by Yomi, which was actually quite good because Nyamo would've delivered an even harder punch had Yomi not gotten there first. At any rate she chose to not reply to Tomo's question, instead just continuing on with the story.
"So we decide to just march to the house and go with it. We're confident and jovial all the way up the stairs, but the second we start to unlock the door, we become all nervous and jittery.
Finally we barge in, and the first thing that's out of my mouth is, 'Stop drinking sake!'
There's no one there. On the smashed crate that they were drinking on is taped a Post-It note: We're at Nyamo's, going on to the next supply of sake.
Quick as lightning we're out of the door, not even bothering to lock Youko's door, (not like anyone would come in to steal empty sake crates) and as soon as we're outside again we see a huge riot at the local supermarket because all those poor people can't buy their sake.
Our pace doubles even more at that, for having all those people miss their daily sake fix is definitely NOT a good thing, no matter how much people say not drinking alcohol is good for you.
We start becoming paranoid, actually, because we think that people are on to us and Midori and Yukari the second they start trailing us even for a little while. By the time we reach my apartment we're so panicked we don't even bother getting nervous - it is entirely gut feeling.
So we burst in and I yell, 'Stop drinking the sake!' again.
Unfortunately, this draws the attention of a bunch of sake-deprived people outside, who begin to gather and march up the stairs. And then trot. And then run. And then sprint like Sakaki does when chasing after cute things."
Tomo was outraged, yelling, "That should be ME who's sprinting! ME ME ME!" This earned her another punch to the stomach by an exasperated Yomi, who yelled at Tomo, "Look, if you'll stop doing that, you can go have a lesbian orgy!"
Tomo's eyes grew wide.
"REALLY?"
Yomi blinked twice, not knowing where that had come from, but finally sighed and said, "Yeah."
Tomo began nodding frantically, saying quickly, "Thank you thank you I promise I won't talk anymore promise promise," until Yomi yelled at her to shut up.
Everyone else stared at them, slightly suspicious. Of both Yomi and whether Tomo actually knew what a lesbian orgy was.
Meanwhile Kaorin fawned over the fact that Sakaki had been mentioned as a fast runner, and secretly congratulated herself for doing her best to look especially cute today, since Sakaki always chased after those things.
After Tomo quieted down, Nyamo continued with her story again.
"Yeah, so this mob is charging at us, so we slam the door in their face and lock it. Of course it wouldn't work for very long since they started punching and kicking our door, but meanwhile, well, we were going on gut feeling.
So I take a deep breath and am about to order them to stop drinking sake again, but what comes out of my mouth is, 'Yukari, your mom's really ugly.'
All three stare at me in a strangely awkward silence, so I just look at Youko and shrug. It had been gut feeling.
Youko slaps her forehead and says, 'Ok, so the gist is that we want you to stop sake.'
Midori and Yukari stare at us as if we're crazy, and ask, 'Why?'
There's an awkward silence for a very long time, well not really because we'd just back everytime the door carved in another foot from all the kicks directed at it. When a tiny hole rips in it we all turn to stare at it, and then we turn back to stare at each other, and that's when this gut feeling tells me that I just need to say one thing - 'Because I love you, okay!'
I remember it was cool because me and Youko-"
"YOUKO AND I."
"SHUT UP! Because Youko and I said it at the same time. And then we continued on, saying that they were always devouring the sake and so basically didn't do anything with us, and that made us kind of sad, because even if we didn't have feelings for them we still were their friends.
And I guess the way I'm saying it now makes it sound easy, but it was really hard, to just burst out like that. But I think it was for the better, because they chose us over their sake."
The entire group gave a collective, "Awwww..." at the idea of that kind of sweetness, and looked at Yukari with new respect.
That is, until Nyamo sighed and said, "Well actually, Midori picked Youko over sake. Yukari here kept on drinking until she saw that her drinking partner was gone. Then she kind of wandered over to me and said, 'Well I guess I have you now. Get me out of that window.' We escaped the mob through the window, Yukari riding piggy-back on me the entire time."
Everyone face-faulted at Yukari's behavior, although they had expected no less.
An arm snaked around Nyamo's neck and she looked down to find Yukari awake and yawning.
"Well, everything turned out all right, didn't it?"
Nyamo, miffed, started saying, "That's not the point-"
Yukari ignored her, just pulling her up and saying, "Let's go to bed."
In a very strange moment of tenderness they both smiled softly at each other before beginning to head up the stairs, arms around each other.
Then Tomo yelled, "LESBIAN ORGY!"
And the day seemed complete.
Ehn, notes...
I don't think the Japanese have the kind of grammar blahblahblah and I, but if it bothers you that it isn't technically "Japanese culture" correct, I can just take that part out of the story. ^_^
So yeah, the story's (finally) done. I must confess that I had much fun writing this, especially the first chapter - the expressions of the Azumanga characters kept popping into my mind, and I kept on thinking, ha, they would totally say this! I admit the second chapter was kind of flat, but nevertheless, I hope you enjoyed it and can forgive me for the super-lateness, and please remember to review! ^_^