#natsumeweek 2019

[winterune]

Pretending

Word count: 702

My very late and very short entry for @natsumeweek 2019 Day 7. Prompt: Loyalty / Longing

~*~*~*~*~

Natsume was staring at that picture again—that old picture of his parents just before he was born. He had been staring at it a lot lately, and there was something different about him. Nyanko-sensei could tell, because he had been watching the boy for a long time now.

Natsume had tried to hide it, but Nyanko-sensei could tell from the way his lips were pursed and his eyebrows drawn that the boy was overwhelmed with an immense sorrow every time he looked upon the photograph. Nyanko-sensei had always pretended he didn’t notice the way Natsume’s body would go still at times, or how his eyes would take on a vacant look as they gazed toward the horizon, or how silent sobs would sometimes shake him awake in restless nights. Natsume probably never noticed how Nyanko-sensei would silently move closer and sit beside him, hoping whatever comfort he could offer was enough to drive any nightmare away.

In moments like those, Nyanko-sensei would often see Reiko in front of him, lying on a flower field high in the mountain or sitting by her lonesome on some stone steps, a bruise or a scratch on her cheek and arms, this empty and forlorn look in her eyes as though her mind wasn’t quite there. Then he would enter her line of vision and she would notice him there, and her smile was both bright yet strained, and he had always pretended he didn’t see.

Would things have been different if he had approached her about it? Would she still be alive if he had tried to ease her loneliness? Would Natsume still have his family intact?

He remembered the last time he saw her. She had looked somewhat ill—frail and weak—weary lining her every features. She had challenged him into a game, the Book of Friends as the prize. He had a feeling something was different because Reiko would never have wagered the Book for no reason, yet he pretended that he didn’t know.

If he thought about it, Reiko probably already had a child by then. How young had her child been when she died? Too young. Too young to be left alone in this world. But so was Natsume. And so was Reiko.

Nyanko-sensei stared at Natsume from the corners of his eyes. Yes, there was indeed something different about him lately. His time with the Fujiwaras had definitely healed some of those wounds. Long gone were the vacant look and the silent sobs. Now, a wistful smile caressed his face as he gazed at his parents’ faces, but it was better than the hopeless thing Natsume once told him:

It’s easier to just forget about them, Sensei.

“Takashi-kun!” came Touko’s call from downstairs, indicating dinner was ready.

On any other day, Nyanko-sensei would have dashed right out of the room, but now, he waited and watched as Natsume placed the photograph gently on his desk. The kid had actually put it on a frame—at Touko’s insistence after she found the picture lying around on the floor one day.

As he was standing up, Natsume finally realized Sensei’s eyes on him. He cocked his head to the side. “What’s wrong, Sensei?”

Nyanko-sensei remembered the day he promised Reiko he’d take the book from her when she died. Reiko had probably guessed that was his way of saying he’d protect the book. Who would have guessed the Book was now under the possession of her grandson, who, for better or worse, had a knack for getting into trouble with ayakashi just like his grandmother had been?

It was a good thing then that he had promised Reiko that. The one thing one could trust an ayakashi to do was to keep their promises. Nyanko-sensei would protect the Book of Friends, and he would protect Natsume. He would not fail Natsume as he had failed Reiko.

“Sensei?” Natsume called again, already on his feet.

Nyanko-sensei jumped to his feet and shook himself. Of course, there was no way he would ever say any of that to Natsume.

“Come on, Natsume! I’m hungry!” he said, before bounding away out of the room and down the stairs to Touko’s delicious-smelling dishes in the kitchen.

~ END ~

[owletstarlet]

The following say, Souko came again. And, the day after that. I tried telling her that Reiko had waited for her that next day. That she was here the day after that too. That there was a flower field she wanted to show her. That it was such a beautiful place. However, Souko was never able to hear my voice. For days on end, Souko and I sat side by side, waiting for Reiko to return. Day after day I kept talking to her, but my voice never reached her. Then, when the seasons changed— I was never able to tell her. I couldn’t tell Souko that Reiko had waited for her. And I couldn’t tell Reiko that Souko had actually waited for her. I couldn’t tell them.”

—chapter 89, “Tell Me Your Name” pt 2

@natsumeweek day 7, loyalty/longing

[shenyuans]

Natsume Week

Day 1: Color / Monochrome

@natsumeweek

[dragon-in-a-mug]

Impossible Colors

Fandom: Natsume's Book Of Friends

Warning: None

Hurt/Comfort, Fluff

Word Count: 1.261

Summary: Natsume can see things that others can not. That often causes him trouble, but it has become a part of him. A part that he doesn't want to lose.

Note: I wrote this based on the prompt "Colours/Monochrome" from NatsumeWeek 2019. I'm four years late, but time is fake anyways. I just had this idea when I saw the prompt and thought why not, so here I am. Enjoy!

If anyone would have told young Natsume Takashi that he would miss not being able to see yokai, he would have looked at them with a concerned gaze and asked them in his quiet and timid way if they were okay. 

But it was different now. Now he had met kindness. He had friends amongst the yokai. 

When he had first learned that people could lose the ability to see, he wasn't terrified per se. He was more uneasy. Because how could Takashi keep his promise to himself to honor his grandmother's memory by returning the names of the yokai that seemed at least somewhat important to her. If this wouldn't have been the case, she wouldn't have called it Book Of Friends. 

Maybe he was also a little sad. Seeing Hotaru's glowing departure made something in his heart heavy. During this time he witnessed a lot of goodbyes wich were both colored by melancholy and dulled by a sense of emptiness. 

Then he met more and more yokai that were now his friends and dear memories and he couldn't imagine, one day not being able to see them anymore, to talk to them. They filled his life with something he couldn't quite name. Sure, they often made things complicated and Takashi hated to worry his friends and the Fujiwaras because of them, but he found he also couldn't let go of them. 

He always became more aware of that whenever he was dealing with exorcists, be it Natori or Matoba. They may be able to see the same things, but they were wearing hate-tinted glasses. Natori said they didn't have to agree on everything, still it made Takashi sad, that he wasn't able to see the goodness that some spirits possessed. People that were able to see yokai, which were mostly exorcists, asked him time and time again why he would help and defend the yokai despite the harm they must've caused him. And wasn't that a question to ponder over. 

But at the end of the day the answer was simple. It was the same reason why he didn't shun humans. It was because he found a home with them. People and yokai that enjoyed his presence and stayed. Stayed even though they couldn't always understand him, couldn't see what he saw. Stayed despite not being obligated to. 

The Fujiwaras loved him, his friends cared for him, the Dog's Circle enjoyed his company and Nyanko-Sensei… Well Nyanko-Sensei stayed because of the Book of Friends. At least that's what the cat-like yokai always told him. Takashi wasn't sure how much of that was still the truth, but he was not going to question his bodyguard about this. Some things are better left between the lines. 

That also applied to Takashi's fear when he wasn't able to see Nyanko-Sensei's true Form. Or any yokai at that. Of course he didn't regret helping Taki with her curse (she shouldn't have been hurt just because she saw them), but he couldn't deny that there was a big black hole in his chest, threatening to swallow him whole. 

The effect of the evil ayakashi's saliva was of course temporary. That did not mean that Takashi wasn't afraid anymore. No. Sometimes he lay awake at night, thinking and dreading. Worrying how his world would turn up site down if part of it would go missing. Without his sight a part of him would go missing. A clear, but shimmering part of him that almost no one would notice wasn't there anymore. But he would notice. He would notice and he would be like everyone else, just like he had  always wished for when he was younger. That wasn't him anymore though. He wouldn't be the same Takashi anymore. Takashi, that listened to voices no one could hear, see struggles and emotions and colors no one saw and touched hearts with beings that no one else could. 

It was one of those nights, where Takashi was staring at his ceiling in the dark, pondering. "Nyanko-Sensei?" he asked with a barely there voice. He didn't dare look at his feline companion, afraid that his emotions and thoughts that were devoid of all colors would swell up until he would be squashed under a black monstrosity of his own making. The cat hummed in response. Takashi could feel the warmth radiating off of the small body not quite close enough to touch him. He laid there for a few shadow filled moments, wondering if he should dare to send his fears and worries out into the night, where they were vulnerable and easy prey. But he trusted his bodyguard, trusted him to keep Takashi safe when he exposed himself like this. 

So he took a deep breath and let go. "What happens if I'm not able to see you anymore? What will you do if I stop seeing, when I start being useless again?" Will you leave me? was left unspoken. Takashi still couldn't look at his Sensei, but he waited for his response with bated breath. The seconds ticked by agonizingly slow. Then he got slapped in the face by a small paw. It didn't really hurt, but the motion surprised him and he startled. 

"Sensei?Wha-" "We made a deal didn't we?", interrupted the fat calico cat. Not waiting for an answer he continued "I will be your guard until you die. When you die I'll get the book. That was our deal. Until that day comes, I'm by your side and do my job. Even if you can't see yokai anymore you will still be able to see this form of me. So don't worry your stupid head off over stupid things. As I know you, you'll probably do something reckless enough that gets you killed before you're able to lose your sight." 

With a small smile on his face Takashi finally looked at Nyanko-Sensei. "If you weren't out drinking so much, I wouldn't be in danger as often as I am.", the boy quipped. The beast let out an indignant squawk and started reprimanding him, but there was no actual heat behind his words. Takashi let out a light laugh at that. He freed one arm from under his covers and laid it on the round head of his friend. "Thank you, Nyanko-Sensei.", he murmured and petted the short, soft hair. The cat grumbled something about him being creepy again, but made no move to get away from the gentle hand between his ears. 

They laid there in peaceful silence. Takashi's heart felt a little lighter and his worries seemed a bit paler. The fatigue slowly took hold of him and started to drag his eyelids down. His hand slowly slipped from the maneki neko's head. "Thanks for sticking around, Sensei", the boy whispered, already half asleep. The cat huffed and with a cloud of smoke he turned into a majestic beast, its frightening form only assuring Takashi of his safety. "Whatever, brat. Go to sleep.", murmured it as it curled itself around him. 

Nyanko-Sensei's fur was warm and Takashi could feel the low rumble of a purr emitting from the large body that held him secure. With a warm feeling in his chest, Takashi finally drifted off to sleep, knowing that Madara would still be there when he woke up. 

The last thing he saw before sleep took him, was white fur glowing in the serene moon light, single hairs shining like prisms and red marks burning like a setting sky.

After all, Takashi's world was much more colorful with yokai in it. 

[goodlucktai]

tunnels through the stone

@natsumeweek 2019 day 1; color

read on ao3

It happens, like so many other important conversations in their lives, by accident. 

A lunch period, the room busy and hectic around them as classmates come and go. Taki, Tanuma and Kitamoto all clustered in chairs around Satoru and Natsume’s desks. They’re making plans for the upcoming summer break, tossing around ideas of where they might adventure off to. 

“We should take a vacation together, just the five of us,” Kitamoto suggests. His father’s doing a lot better these days, well enough that his family might be moving out of the apartment soon and back into their house, and the absence of worry is a good look on him. 

A vacation is just what he needs, Satoru decides, and slides a conspiring look Natsume’s way. Natsume meets it with knowing green eyes, and they’re decided. 

“We definitely should,” Satoru announces, leaning over to steal a croquette out of Tanuma’s store-bought lunch box. “We haven’t gone anywhere in ages.” 

“Someplace in the city?” Tanuma asks. He looks long-suffering, because he’d offered Satoru a croquette ten minutes ago, but Satoru hadn’t wanted one then. “Or the country?”

“The city, obviously,” Kitamoto says. “We’ve got all the country we can stomach right here.”

Taki suggests having them all over to her house the next day so they can look over some of the brochures that her brother brought back from his most recent trip, when Natsume pipes up.

“I can’t come tomorrow,” he says with an apologetic smile. “It’s my birthday, and Touko-san wants to have cake.”

Even Tsuji turns around, and he’s three desks away. Satoru, reclined on the two back legs of his chair, lets it fall flat again with a slam. Taki and Tanuma are staring openly, and Kitamoto poses the only question there is: 

“Natsume, what the hell?”

Natsume looks baffled by them, and the worst part is that he means it. “What? What’s wrong?”

“What’s wrong,” Taki parrots in despair. She lets her face fall into her hands, as though she has no strength left to hold her head up. “What’s wrong.”

“How am I supposed to find you a birthday gift by tomorrow?” Satoru barely manages not to shout. “It’s-- tomorrow!”

“Let’s go shopping after school,” Tanuma says fretfully. He digs in his pocket for his phone. “We can go to Shibata’s house. There’s tons of stores up there. I’ll email him.”

“Natsume, you’re not invited, as punishment,” Taki says. “And also because obviously you can’t be there while we’re shopping for your presents.”

“Email Ogata, too,” Kitamoto suggests. “She’ll be furious if we leave her out of the loop. No, I’ll do it, hold on.” 

Natsume looks alarmed by how much has happened in the last two minutes. His eyes are wide and uncertain, hands hovering halfway out as though he’d stop them if he had any idea how to. 

“You-- you really don’t have to go to any trouble. I wasn’t expecting anything from you, so you don’t need to feel obligated.”

Tsuji has given up the pretense of not being invested in the conversation. He wanders over, a worried frown on his face, and says, “If there’s a reason you don’t want to celebrate your birthday, I’ll make them leave you alone.”

That draws everyone up short. Tanuma looks up from his phone with a nearly panicked expression, clearly having already sent his email. Somehow it didn’t occur to any of them that there might have been a reason. 

“No, it’s,” Natsume stammers, with the evident confusion of someone who suddenly has to explain a concept they assumed was common sense and doesn’t have any idea of where to start. “It’s just, I don’t usually do anything special. I-- I moved around a lot, until now, and-- Touko-san and Shigeru-san are the first ones who ever-- “

Tsuji softens with understanding. Satoru does his best to hold onto righteous irritation, but he can feel it slipping through his fingers despite himself. 

Taki says, in a much gentler voice than before, “You can come along if you want, Natsume, but you’re not allowed to peek at anything we buy.”

He nods, without really looking like he knows what he’s agreeing to, and Satoru feels a pang that, by this point, is unfortunately familiar. It lives in his chest like it’s renting an apartment there, this little wrench of pain that comes and goes every day he learns something new about Natsume.

“Hey,” Satoru says. His head feels like a crossword puzzle with half the numbers missing. “You haven’t even invited us to your birthday party yet.”

He’s like a shadow, that Natsume, or a ghost. An impression of someone that only exists when he’s being watched. Otherwise he’s quiet and colorless and focuses most of his energy on not taking up any more room than he has to. 

And then, like just now, someone says something that lights him up. The grays and the shadows wash out to warm living colors, silver-moss hair and forest-green eyes, and he’s so lovely and so human it more than makes up for those moments before. 

“I’ll ask Touko-san,” he says, directing an earnest smile toward the relative safety of his half-eaten lunch, and Satoru thinks he must be the brightest thing for miles. 

They’ll talk about the vacation later, if they even remember. Natsume’s birthday obviously comes first.

[raichana-artblog]

@natsumeweek - July 3rd 2019 - Role Reversal

my brain was all “what if kid matoba set nyanko free?” so here ya go! hope everyone is having a great natsumeweek! 

[renkocchi]

@natsumeweek 2019, Day 1, Monochrome/Color

This kid’s life changed so much after meeting the Fujiwaras and Nyanko-sensei, it makes me emotional.

[natsumeweek]

NATSUME WEEK BEGINS TOMORROW!

Get hype y’all! In three hours, Natsume week 2019 will officially begin, and you can begin posting your creations!!!

As long as you tag your post #natsumeweek or tag @natsumeweek in the caption we’ll be able to find your post. We’re so excited to see your submissions!!

[winterune]

Solace

Word count: 1164

@natsumeweek 2019 Day 4. Prompt: Masks / Secrets 

~*~*~*~*~

When did it start? The time when she realized she could see things others could not. The time when people started avoiding her because she was weird and violent. The time when she gave up on forming any sort of connection with anyone or anything.

Reiko lay on the field of white and blue flowers, arms stretched wide and eyes closed as she faced the clear blue sky. Deep breath in, deep breath out. Her chest rose and fell in a rhythmic breathing that soothed her irritating nerves. Her right cheek smarted, a bruise already forming by her jaw. A slap across her face by a mother whose daughter she had helped find her way out of the forest. Granted, the little girl’s arms had been full of scars and scratches from the youkai who had been bothering her. Of course it became her fault.

Wouldn’t it be great if the earth could swallow her whole? If the wind could just carry her to a far off place where not a single soul knew about her? Reiko wished she could just disappear and never be heard from again. No one would mind. No one would miss her. Heck, she wondered if anyone would even notice.

Deep breath in, deep breath out.

Her irritation suddenly disappeared and all the strength left her. It was best not to think about it.

Reiko didn’t know how long she stayed that way. She might have slept at some point because when she finally opened her eyes, the sun had already started to set and the sky was a lovely shade of orange.

A deep rhythmic breathing that was not her own drew her attention to her right and her eyes widened slightly at the white beast dozing beside her, his head resting on his massive forepaws, tail curling around him like a cat.

“Don’t you get tired of sleeping, Madara?” Reiko asked, because whenever they met, she would always see the beast dozing under some patch of sunlight.

“Mind your own business, human,” Madara growled under his breath. Clearly he wasn’t exactly sleeping. Or was he just about to sleep when she disturbed him? Reiko grinned, feeling mischievous all of a sudden.

“Hey, Madara?” Reiko called.

Madara’s ear twitched, but he didn’t budge.

“Ma-da-ra,” Reiko called again.

There was a hint of a growl, but his eyes remained closed.

“Madara!” she hissed.

Madara’s tail swished irritably, ears flattening, a hint of a scowl, but he still didn’t crack open an eye.

“Sheesh, you can be quite stubborn when you want to be,” Reiko said, but she was smiling and she felt her heart already lightening a bit.

“So can you,” Madara said, which made Reiko chuckle.

Thin wafts of clouds were moving across the sky. Silhouettes of birds flew across her vision. The gentle summer wind was warm and if she closed her eyes, she could imagine herself flying.

“Hey, Madara,” Reiko said quietly. “Let’s have a match.”

Madara didn’t say anything.

“If you win, I’ll do anything you say. But if I win, you’ll write down your name on a piece of paper and be my follower,” Reiko went on.

She’d done this for so long the words just naturally flowed out of her mouth. She had asked Madara time and time again but the youkai always brushed her off. She knew nothing would change this time around. If anything, she probably just felt like asking him again.

“Are you still collecting those names?” Madara asked instead.

Reiko glanced to her right and found Madara had finally opened his eyes. Was that indignant she saw there? Reiko raised an eyebrow.

Madara sighed and looked away. “And I heard you’ve been compiling the names into a book.”

“Hey! Don’t mock the Book of Friends!” Reiko said, her voice raised.

The beast scoffed, his eyes rolling. “And you call it the Book of Friends.”

Reiko scowled at Madara’s condescending tone. Clenching her fists, she leaped onto her feet and glared up at him. The beast only spared her a glance before closing his eyes again. That dismissive behavior made her bristle with anger, as if the Book was stupid and she didn’t matter at all.

What was wrong with calling it the Book of Friends? Sure, these games were just to pass the time and she might have played unfair sometimes, but they were the only things she had left. At least Madara spared her a glance. None of the humans ever did. They acted as though she didn’t exist, and the times when they did acknowledge her presence, they always treated her like some spectacle.

So what was wrong with calling these youkai her friends?!

Reiko gritted her teeth. She would rather die than admit that to anybody.

“Fine, be that way,” Reiko said and she turned around to leave.

She hadn’t gone far when Madara spoke up. “Give me the Book, and I’ll consider the match.”

Reiko looked over her shoulder and met Madara’s eyes. From the intensity of his gaze, she knew he was being serious, but he hadn’t even lifted his head from his paws, so Reiko guessed Madara wasn’t about to forcefully take the Book from her.

“It’s dangerous,“ he went on, reiterating what he had said countless times. “Those names are not something a human should handle.”

She knew that. He’d told her countless times too. These papers were contracts, binding the youkai to her will. They couldn’t refuse her if she were to call for them. Those who controlled the Book would control the youkai.

“Are you that desperate for power, Madara?” Reiko asked icily.

Madara’s gaze didn’t waver from her own. They stared at each other for so long that Reiko started feeling guilty for what she said. She wouldn’t say that the beast was only trying to look out for her, but Reiko knew that if Madara had truly wanted the Book, he probably could have tried to take it by force. If he tried. Though Reiko could probably easily defeat him.

The slight change of expression on Reiko’s face was enough for Madara to know that at least some part of his point had come across. He broke eye contact first, shifted to lie on his other side, and opened his mouth in a huge yawn. Reiko waited for him to say anything more, but Madara was silent except for his steady breathing.

Reiko sighed. She understood why Madara never accepted her challenges. The names were the youkai’s lives. If something were to happen to the Book, their lives would be in danger. She didn’t know what Madara would do if he ever got his hands on the Book, but for some reason, Reiko knew he would protect it. Madara was one of the strongest youkai she ever knew. The Book would probably be safe with him.

Staring up at the sky, Reiko silently promised that she would return the names someday. But not today. The Book was the only solace she had in this sea of animosity.

~ END ~

[winterune]

A First for Everything

Summary: A day after Natsume’s birthday and his friends prepare a party for him. 

@natsumeweek 2019 Day 2. Prompt: Adventure/experience 

Happy belated birthday, Natsume! I planned to write something yesterday but couldn’t fit it into the prompt, so here is my birthday fic for our lovely boy, Natsume ^^ (Btw I’m setting the fic on Natsume’s 2nd year of high school)

Read on AO3.

~*~*~*~*~

“A karaoke place?” Natsume asked as he read the sign of the building they were about to enter, dread filling his heart. Nishimura was grinning from ear-to-ear beside him.

“What are we doing in a karaoke place?” Natsume asked slowly, his attention shifting to friend, not really wanting to hear the answer.

“Of course it’s to celebrate your birthday,” Nishimura said matter-of-factly. Natsume winced slightly, already guessing that would be the answer. “I mean, you practically dropped a bomb on us yesterday when you said it was your birthday and we had no time to buy presents let alone give you a proper party—”

“But that’s why I asked you all to come to the party Touko-san planned,” Natsume protested, because really, they didn’t need to go all this way. 

He never even had parties before. He had tried to stop Touko from planning one, but Touko was persistent and she wouldn’t budge. Natsume figured they would have a normal, modest party at home, but instead, Touko had gone all out with the dishes and Shigeru had bought a really delicious strawberry cake from a bakery near his workplace and both of them had insisted Natsume invite all of his friends. And yet, when he told them all about it yesterday, everyone was dumbstruck and none of them wanted to come, saying how they needed to go on an immediate gift-shopping and that Natsume had to keep the next day free of any schedule.

“That was your quality time with your family, Natsume,” Kitamoto piped in. “We,”—Kitamoto emphasized, his finger moving around the circle of four boys—“have to have our own party.”

So here they were, in front of a karaoke place. Nishimura and Kitamoto pulled Natsume inside, half forcing him to follow. He glanced at Tanuma beside him, who also had a somewhat worried look on his face.

“Did you know anything about this?” Natsume whispered when Nishimura and Kitamoto had gone off to book a room at the reception.

“I knew they were planning something, so yeah I guess? We couldn’t a reach a decision yesterday so they decided to take the matter to their own hands and told all of us to go home,” Tanuma explained.

By all of us, he meant Taki and Sasada too. The girls hadn’t arrived yet. They had separated away from the group when they spotted a cute little store by the street and told the boys to go first.

Natsume was nervous. He had never been to one of these places before. Before living with the Fujiwaras, he had heard his classmates would sometimes talk about going to one after school. In his mind, this place was loud, and dim—a place where people hung out. Now that he was really here, he realized it wasn’t exactly was he had thought it was, but still it made him felt out of place.

Maybe they should have changed out of their school uniform first. Right when school was over, they had dragged him away and boarded a train to the next town over, never saying once where they were going.

The entrance doors slid open and in came Taki and Sasada, right around the time Nishimura and Kitamoto finished booking their room.

“Did you buy anything?” Kitamoto asked.

“Sure did!” Sasada replied, lifting a small pink bag to the air.

The attendant came over and told them their room was ready. But just as they were about to follow him, Taki suddenly said that she needed to go to the bathroom and Sasada told everyone to go first. So the boys left them, and with each step, Natsume felt his heart become heavier.

He never had a reason to come to this place even though he was curious. But, did he really have to sing?

***

A couple dim lamps lit the room that was big enough to fit 6 people. A large TV screen on one side, a set of red couches on the other, and a coffee table in-between. They took their seats and Kitamoto and Nishimura sang the first song, a pop song that Natsume had never heard of. Natsume glanced at Tanuma when he noticed his friend was tapping his foot to the rhythm. Tanuma shrugged with a resigned grin. “They’ve been playing the song everywhere it just kind of stuck in your head after a while,” was what he said.

Even so, Natsume had never once heard the song before. Should he watch more TV? Or go out to places more—places that didn’t involve youkai? Because that was it: on almost every day of his daily life, there was always a youkai involved. Be that Nyanko-sensei, or the Dog Circle, or some random youkai seeking to have their names returned or to take the Book for themselves. If not, one way or another, Natori would appear in his life, or he would somehow get entangled with the exorcists.

Seeing his friends singing and swaying to the rhythm of the song, he realized once again that his life was far from a normal one.

When Taki and Sasada joined them, they were indignant that the boys hadn’t let Natsume pick the first song. “It’s his party, for God’s sake!” Sasada exclaimed.

“No—No, I’m good,” Natsume stammered, flustered. “You guys just…sing first.” He tried his best to smile but he knew his smile was strained. It was one thing that he couldn’t sing, but what was he doing in a karaoke when he probably didn’t know any of these songs? He couldn’t possibly tell them that, after all they had gone through to plan this out.

Sasada glared at Nishimura and Kitamoto and Natsume had half a mind to stop a fight on the brink of exploding when Taki said, “Well, if that’s what you want…what if we let Natsume-kun sing last?”

Natsume whipped his head toward Taki, eyes wide, jaws slightly ajar. She raised her eyebrows questioningly at his shocked expression.

“Save the best for the last, as they say,” Tanuma agreed with a nod.

“Wha—?” Natsume’s head whirled toward Tanuma this time, and before he could put any cent into the conversation, Sasada was already clasping her hands together and said, “That’s a great idea!”

Beside her, Nishimura was scowling and he said to the microphone, “That was our idea too, you know.”

“Wait, you didn’t say anything about that!” Natsume protested. He had thought if he didn’t speak up and just let everyone had a good time, they would forget that he hadn’t sing anything.

“What are you saying, Natsume? Of course you’re singing,” Kitamoto said. “There’s no way the birthday boy doesn’t sing in his own party.”

“No, but, really, I don’t—you don’t have to—” He hated himself that he couldn’t even form a proper sentence. His friends probably thought he was being too modest, and maybe he would be if he wasn’t tone deaf, but in truth, Natsume really didn’t know what song he would pick and he didn’t want to embarrass himself in front of his friends.

But Sasada wasn’t having any of it and she brought her face to Natsume’s eye level, a frown on her face. “Natsume-kun,” she said. Natsume jerked at Sasada’s tone, as if she was scolding him. “This is your birthday party.” But then she smiled and said, “Live a little.”

Live a little.

The simple words touched something deep in Natsume. Having it ingrained in his mind and body for years, Natsume had grown to live a cautious life. Stay low. Don’t pull attention to yourself. Do what everyone tells you to do. You’ll avoid half of the trouble you’ll bring.

“O—Okay,” he mumbled quietly.

Maybe, he should live a little. For once, maybe he could stop thinking about youkai and the trouble he would cause his friends. For once, maybe he could try living in the present and enjoy the moment. Seeing his friends standing on their feet, singing songs he didn’t know, he found himself swaying with the rhythm from time to time. They would laugh at some of the song choices and giggle at off-key notes. They would choose songs everyone knew to sing together and before long, Natsume was already joining in the fun that he almost forgot his time to sing was almost there. So when Tanuma asked what song he wanted to sing, Natsume took a moment to realize he still didn’t know what song to choose.

In the end, he went with a really old children song he remembered from when he was a child and his friends chuckled at his choice.

“Sorry, I don’t know any other songs,” Natsume explained with a sheepish smile, standing in front of all of them. “It’s my first time to a karaoke and I never sang before so, sorry if I’m not good.”

“Wait,” Nishimura said, a hand up in the air. “This is your first time in a karaoke?”

Natsume nodded.

“And you never sang before?” Sasada asked.

Natsume shrugged.

His friends all looked at one another and he expected them to burst out laughing but instead, they shared smiles and grins, and then Kitamoto said, “Why didn’t you tell us sooner? We’d have brought you here earlier.”

“Well, there’s a first for everything, right?” Tanuma added.

They were right, as usual. The song started and Natsume tried his best to follow the lyrics. He stumbled in a few places but picked up his pace as the music slowly coaxed something out of his memory—of years and years ago, sitting in front of a television on a Sunday morning, a cartoon being shown.

It had been quite a popular show in its time and everyone knew the song. After a while, they joined in and suddenly, Natsume felt tears pricking his eyes. He never had a normal life and asking for one might be impossible, what was with all the youkai following him wherever he went. But being there, singing with people he could call his friends, made him think that it wasn’t truly out of reach.

All of a sudden, the lights went out with a crash and the girls plus Nishimura screamed.

“The hell?!” Nishimura shouted. It seemed he had tried to stand up so suddenly his knee hit the coffee table with a loud thud and he crashed back onto the couch, cursing under his breath. Everyone were talking over everyone else while Natsume stayed where he stood, unable to move, his hand gripping the microphone until his knuckles went white.

A youkai?! his mind frantically thought.

“Wait, everyone, calm down,” Tanuma said over the noise. “Taki, can you try the switch?”

Taki did, reaching up to the lamp switch above her. It didn’t work.

“Where’s the call-for-service button,” Kitamoto muttered to himself. There were buttons on the table and he reached out to punch whatever buttons he could find. Nothing happened.

A few minutes passed without any signs of the light turning back on, and Nishimura was heard muttering, “I’m getting a refund for this,” when suddenly, there was a knock on the door. Taki was closest to it, so she stood up, and opened it slightly.

The staff on the other side was saying how it’d take several more minutes to have the electricity back up. They left after they apologized and silence fell.

“Well, this sucks,” Kitamoto said.

“I’ll go outside for a bit,” Tanuma piped up.

“I’ll go with you,” Taki joined in.

Both of them left and the four of them were once again trapped in darkness. Natsume had gotten back to his seat and Sasada had turned on the light on her phone so they could at least see each other.

A few minutes later, someone knocked on their door again and Sasada stood up, saying how it must be the staffs with more news on the sudden blackout. But just as Sasada opened the door, the two people from the other side suddenly sang a Happy Birthday song and Natsume looked up, surprised.

Taki was entering the room with a little round chocolate cake on her hand, the candles 17 propped up on the surface. Tanuma and Sasada were suddenly singing the song, as well as Nishimura and Kitamoto who had stood up to stand and sing beside the others. Natsume was speechless.

The song ended and Natsume received the cake from Taki. “Make a wish,” she said.

Natsume still couldn’t process what was happening. “Did you plan all this?” was the first question he asked.

“Not the blackout, no,” Tanuma said.

“It kind of set up the surprise easier, huh?” Kitamoto added.

“But, when did you—?”

“Remember when I went to the bathroom earlier?” Taki asked. “Yeah, I was asking the staff if they could keep the cake for a while.”

“We bought it when we separated a while back,” Sasada said.

But he didn’t see any sort of box that even resembled a cake when they entered the building.

“Come on, the details don’t matter!” Nishimura said impatiently. “Make a wish! Then we’ll be able to eat the cake.”

Sasada slapped Nishimura across the head and it was such a mundane scene of Sasada and Nishimura fighting and arguing that Natsume found himself laughing. There was nothing to wish for because all his wish were already in front of him. His first surprise party with his first friends and his first time in a karaoke. A truly normal life might be impossible for him, but it was in moments like this where he could feel like he was any other seventeen-year-old boy.

~ END ~

[winterune]

A Monochrome World

A Natsume Yuujinchou Fanfiction

Word count: 2097

Summary: Natsume finds a newly-opened antique store on his way home from school. Inside, he finds room filled with framed monochrome pictures.

A/N: @natsumeweek 2019 Day 1. Prompt: Color/Monochrome. Not edited or beta’d. I’ll probably post an edited version on AO3 and FFN later. Thanks for reading^^ (edit:  I named my OC Seiji because that was the first name that came to me and I've always liked that name, but I just remembered that Matoba's name is Seiji and I'm too lazy to change my OC's name ^^; I'm sorry for that)

Read on AO3.

***

On his way home from school, Natsume came across an antique store. An old looking store that looked as though it came right out of a book. He had never seen it before. Was it new? He remembered Sasada mentioning something like it a few days ago. She and Taki had immediately went to check it out later that day.

A middle-aged man was sweeping the pavement in front of him. He noticed Natsume then, and looked up, an affable smile on his face. “Would you like to take a look?” he asked. His hair was already graying and his eyes were warm. There was something in his features that seemed rather inviting so Natsume found himself unable to refuse.

The glass panes at the storefront showed all kinds of little ornaments, lamps, music boxes, and so on. From the outside, the store looked small. It seemed cluttered if you look at it through the glass panes, but when you entered, the room suddenly became spacious and Natsume had to wonder if it was a trick of the light.

He wasn’t the only one there. A woman was looking over set of teacups atop a wooden dresser. A couple students were standing near the back peering into what looked to be a little snow globe. Natsume walked through the aisles one by one and was fascinated by the things he found: small trinkets behind glass shelves, drawers and dressers that looked to be at least fifty years old, a couple old Japanese dolls and statues, and several globes nestled in the corner.

Suddenly, he came upon a room with a pretty chandelier hanging from the ceiling and framed pictures hung on the wall all around. Big ones, small ones. Some were propped on desks or end tables. These pictures were pretty old judging from their monochrome color. A photograph of a couple and their newborn child in front of a house. Another was of the town years ago, with people walking in the streets. A lone table sat at the center of the room with only a single old camera sitting on top of it.

Natsume picked up the camera. It looked really old and seemed fragile at the touch. The lens was a bit greasy and when he tried taking a photo, the shutter wouldn’t work.

Why would something broken like this be sold?

That’s when he noticed a slight movement in the corners of his eye. Natsume looked up, but there was no one else in the room. Weird, he thought. He was about to shift his gaze back on the camera when another movement caught his eye, and this time it came from in front of him. Nothing was there but a framed photo of what looked to be a bustling city street. He’d have ignored it if not for the people walking inside the photo.

Natsume’s jaw slackened and he almost lost his hold on the camera. He couldn’t believe his eyes. The people—they were really walking, and talking. The cars drove past the frame only to return from the other side a few moments later.

He glanced at the next photo: a family photo in a veranda of a traditional Japanese house. Except that after a while, the group broke apart. The children stood up and played around. The oldest went and disappeared inside the house. The mother called to her children before rushing inside, probably to prepare for the day. The father picked up a newspaper and sat on the veranda, smiling at his children before shifting his attention to the paper in his hands.

This was so weird. How could this happen? He looked down at the camera still in his hold. This fragile old thing?

The photo after that was of a waterfall in the forest. Nothing out of the ordinary, except that he could see the water falling down the cliff and the occasional sway of leaves. He waited a moment and a black bird took off into the sky from a nearby tree.

Without thinking, Natsume held out a hand toward the photo, wondering if he’d find a hidden world inside, only to feel glass meeting his touch. The cool sensation brought him back to his senses and he retracted his hand, just as a deep voice called out to him from the door.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?”

The old man from the storefront stood on the doorway, his kind eyes boring into Natsume. Natsume hadn’t heard his approach. Granted, he had been too absorbed on the photographs to notice anything, but…something told him he shouldn’t take the old man lightly. His grip on the camera tightened and he took a step back, distancing himself—and the Book of Friends—from the man.

The store owner noticed it and his eyes widened ever so slightly. Then a wide smile graced his lips and he chuckled. “Please, do not be so alarmed. I mean you no harm,” he said. “My name is Seiji and I am the master of this abode.”

“Seiji-san?” Natsume repeated his name.

Seiji nodded. “Tell me, are you a relative of Reiko Natsume?”

Natsume blinked in surprise.

Seiji chuckled again. “No need to be surprised. The fact that you found this room by yourself is enough telltale of the power you possess. And the only human with such powers without any exorcist affiliation I know was Reiko.”

A youkai? was Natsume’s first thoughts, all the while wondering what this possible-youkai wanted from him—its name back, or the Book itself.

“And rest assured,” Seiji said as he entered the room and approached an end table, where a single framed photo stood. His eyes took on a faraway look as he gazed on the photograph there. “I am as much of a human as you.”

The words were already in his mouth but Natsume held them back, wondering how much he could trust this man. But Seiji knew Reiko and though his gut had told him to be wary, Natsume didn’t sense any malicious intent.

“You can see them?” he asked after a while.

Seiji looked up from the picture and met Natsume’s eyes. “Yes.”

“Are you an exorcist?”

“I am not. I am, let’s say, a collector. As you can see from my store, I deal with trinkets and ornaments, including magical ones.”

Natsume’s mouth was agape. “Are you telling me all those things you have there are youkai—”

“Heavens, no!” Seiji exclaimed. “They’re normal antiques. I store my other trinkets in another place such as this and only those with a certain level of spiritual power can see it. Such as yourself.” A smile, warm and kind.

From Seiji’s disposition, Natsume could tell the old man was sincere. If he’s not a youkai, there was a slim chance that he would know about the Book. What harm could telling him about Reiko do to Natsume?

“Reiko was my grandmother,” Natsume answered his previous question.

“Ah! So she made a family,” Seiji exclaimed in pure delight.

“But unfortunately, she has passed away.”

The light in Seiji’s eyes visibly dimmed, his shoulders sagging slightly, sorrow lining his features. “I’m terribly sorry to hear that,” his voice was a quiet murmur. He looked back at the picture on the table and picked it up, a wistful smile tugging on his lips. “I met her shortly in my youth and she left quite an impression on me. In fact,”—he looked up, a hand encompassing the entire room—“she was the one who came up with this idea.

“There was a youkai once who lived inside the camera. With every picture it took, it took away the people’s lives, trapping them inside the photographs it created. Not knowing about the youkai residing there, the camera became known to be cursed and that was when my father came upon it. He put it on sale in our store but no one wanted to buy it. A girl came by one day, and upon seeing the camera on sale, asked to have a look.

“I was in middle school back then and I wanted to get rid of the camera. To be honest, I was quite afraid of it. She came when I was minding the store by myself and I didn’t care to charge her when she asked for it. Curious, I followed her to a deserted place by the forest and I was surprised to see her tapping the thing and asking the youkai to come out. ‘I know you’re there,’ she’d said, as though coaxing a child to come out of hiding.

“She was carrying a baseball bat then, and if you think about, it was quite funny,” Seiji said, laughing under his breath. “Asking someone to come out with a baseball bat in hand, of course the youkai wouldn’t come out. So instead, she challenged it to a duel: that if it managed to capture her in its photograph in the next thirty seconds, it’d win, but if it failed, Reiko told it to write its name on a piece of paper and to leave the camera behind.

“I’d thought then how stupid the gamble was. Stupid…or brave. I thought of course the youkai would win and the girl would lose her life, especially when I saw how the camera started jumping and clicking by itself. But Reiko was fast and thirty seconds passed with the youkai not managing to capture Reiko in any of its shots.”

Seiji smiled at the framed picture in his hand. “Youkai are funny, aren’t they? For all their talk of immortality and power, they fell prey to the whims of a sixteen-year-old girl. And they are creatures of their words, so even despite any unfairness happening in a game, they would still abide by their promise. The youkai left after writing its name and Reiko picked up the camera.

“How mortified I was when she found out I had witnessed the whole thing. Reiko smiled at me when she gave me the camera back, and yet, I could not feel the energy she had had when she was challenging the youkai. She felt empty and resigned.

“She convinced me to take a picture of her. I was afraid, though I knew the youkai was gone. But there was nothing else we could experiment on, so I directed the camera at her and she smiled.

“When the picture came out and she didn’t disappear, I knew we had succeeded. But we noticed there was something different with it: Reiko in the picture was moving. She waved at us, walked around, jumped on a tree, danced. If we could hear anything happening in this monochrome world, I think we would have heard her laugh.”

Seiji finished his story and Natsume felt his throat closing up. The old man held out the frame in his hand and in it was that very same picture of Reiko, a girl his age whom he often saw whenever he returned a youkai’s name. Reiko was in her school uniform, a big silly grin plastered on her face, fingers held out to form a V sign. Then she laughed and she waved happily at them and twirled in her skirt before running around to jump on a tree and dangled off a branch.

Reiko looked happy.

“The youkai probably had resided in the camera for so long that some of its powers had been transferred to it,” Seiji went on. “So every time I take a picture of something, it’ll move. She told me I could make some business with it, but moving pictures are too much for normal people so instead I put it, and the pictures I’ve taken with it, on sale for the people who are in search for magical trinkets.

“Here,” Seiji handed the frame to Natsume. “For you. I wish I could have met her again.”

Natsume held the frame gently, his eyes refusing to leave Reiko’s smiling face. Seiji said Reiko’s gamble was stupid or brave, but it didn’t feel like that to him. Reiko gambled away her life, probably because she wanted to escape this world to live inside a virtual one. What would the world inside the photograph be like? Would everything be black and white? Would it be small and empty? Or would it be like a perfect copy of this world but you can go anywhere you please without anyone judging you?

“Thank you,” Natsume murmured quietly. Reiko was still smiling at him and Natsume found himself smiling back.

~ END ~

***

Thanks for reading! More of my Natsume Yuujinchou fic here.

[winterune]

The Lonely God

Word Count: 2329

Late entry for @natsumeweek 2019 Day 6. Prompt: Gods / Magic

Summary: On the last day of a field trip, Natsume’s class were having a test of courage when Natsume found himself trapped in a looping path and he had to check what the cause was if he wanted to find a way back. 

~*~*~*~*~

The forest and hill behind the inn they were staying for the field trip was said to house a lot of ghosts. It was said that hundreds of years ago, a powerful, malevolent being was sealed in those hills and its contempt still remained until today. Incidents had been happening over the years that always ended up with missing people or someone turning up dead. Or, at least, that was what the locals said. Natsume didn’t know how much truth the story carried. Still, despite having dealt with youkai most of his life, walking down the dark narrow moonlit path up the hill by himself sent shivers down his spine and goosebumps raising throughout his arms. Thanks to the locals for telling him all these ghost stories.

Why did they have to go through this test of courage alone? They should have gone two at a time. They really shouldn’t have let Sasada be in charge with this thing.

A rustle on the bushes on his right side made him jump.

A huge head suddenly appeared and Natsume screamed.

“Can you be any louder?!” a voice he knew too well spoke up.

“Sensei?”

Natsume squinted in the darkness and indeed, he could see the black and orange pattern on the cat’s head. Nyanko-sensei jumped through the bushes and shook his body free of leaves and debris when he landed on the path beside Natsume. Natsume sighed through his nose.

“You didn’t have to scare me like that!” he said indignantly.

“Your fault for having a faint heart,” Sensei retorted. The cat turned around and headed up the hill. “Come on, let’s hurry up and finish this. There’s this manju shop I saw down the street and I want you to buy me some.”

Natsume scowled, but he had no other choice but to follow.

Shortly afterwards, they came upon a split in the path.

“Funny,” Natsume mused. “I don’t recall Sasada mentioning this.”

Nyanko-sensei was looking to the right, then left. He lifted his head higher and sniffed the air. “This way,” Sensei said, already marching down the right path.

“Hey, wait!” Natsume called him over. “Come on, Sensei, don’t go off on your own or I won’t buy you any manju!”

That stopped Nyanko-sensei in his tracks. He looked over at Natsume and glared at him. Natsume grinned at him.

Down the right path, Natsume followed his guardian’s lead, until they came upon another split. Nyanko-sensei chose the right path again. On their third encounter with the split, the cat was grumbling and muttering under his breath and Natsume started feeling something was not right. When they came across yet another split in the path, Nyanko-sensei screamed in frustration.

“OK, who’s doing this?” he shouted to no one in particular. He glared up the left path, as though he could see something in the dark.

“What’s wrong, Sensei?” Natsume asked.

Sensei clicked his tongue irritably. “Haven’t you noticed? We’ve been walking in a loop! Someone wants us to go up there,” he said, nodding up the other path.

Natsume had had a feeling there was something wrong with the left path. Something eerie and sinister. It was as though the air itself trembled. He had tried not to look directly there, but now that Nyanko-sensei had pointed it out, Natsume readied himself to face the left path.

Indeed, the path was so dark Natsume couldn’t see anything beyond the trees and leaves. It was as though the trees themselves were trying to hide whatever they were hiding inside.

Ghosts, came Natsume’s thoughts, along with all the stories he had heard from the locals.

“Maybe we should check it out, Sensei,” Natsume said.

Nyanko-sensei glanced at him and Natsume knew that glance. It was that glance that told him he was doing too much again, but there was nothing they could do. If they want to leave the loop, it seemed the only way was to go up the left path, deeper and higher into the hills.

“We won’t be able to get those manju if we can’t leave the loop,” Natsume said, using the one leverage he knew would persuade the cat-guardian. Nyanko-sensei narrowed his eyes, his scowl deepening, but knew he couldn’t refuse.

“Come on!” he said in resign. “The faster we get this done, the faster I can eat those manju.”

So Natsume and Nyanko-sensei went up the left path. The path felt different the moment Natsume stepped into it—denser, narrower, and more suffocating. It went up the hillside and with every step, Natsume felt his feet become heavier.

After a while, the trees ended and the forest opened up to a moonlit clearing with a red torii gate at the center and a small shrine beyond beneath a huge tree. The thick atmosphere seemed to be swirling around the shrine.

“Is that where the youkai is sealed?” Natsume asked warily.

“Seems like it,” Nyanko-sensei replied. In a poof, the cat transformed into a great white beast, and Madara growled at the shrine. “Let’s get this over and done with, Natsume,” he said. “You break the seal, I’ll banish it.”

Natsume nodded. Holding the waist bag that contained the Book of Friends tightly, Natsume walked up toward the gate. But he noticed it too late: the sudden stillness in the air, the slight change of wind, the rush of a black shapeless mass, and Madara screaming his name. He looked back, right as the sinister smile of a faceless man appeared before him and his feet had taken him through the gate’s threshold. Then everything vanished.

***

When Natsume opened his eyes, he was on the other side of the gate and the sky was bright and blue and cloudless. In the far distance, he could see black birds soaring high. It was warm, unlike how the place had been just moments before.

Natsume’s attention was drawn to the voices behind him and he saw the small shrine on top of a huge rock and a girl his age crouching before it. She wore a school uniform he recognized, dusty-blonde hair hanging down to her bust. The girl was laughing and Natsume knew who she was.

“Reiko-san,” he said without thinking.

The girl’s laugh stopped abruptly and she looked over her shoulder. Their eyes met and Natsume closed his mouth in surprise, eyes widening and blinking several times.

She could see him?! Let alone hear him!

Reiko cocked her head to the side. “Who are you?” she asked. When Natsume didn’t answer, Reiko stood up and brushed the dirt from her skirt. “How’d you get here? Are you lost?”

Natsume opened his mouth, but no word came out. How could this happen? How could Reiko see him? Even if some youkai magic were involved, usually, he could only enter a memory, not be present inside the memory itself.

“You can see me.” A statement, not a question, and from the frown and the slight crease on her forehead, Natsume knew that was not what he was supposed to say.

Reiko looked back at the shrine and Natsume could see the same old shrine ornaments there. Except, there was a man standing underneath the tree foliage just behind the shrine. A man with jet-black hair, kind eyes and a warm smile, wearing a worn-out yukata.

“I know you can manipulate the time, but what is this?” Reiko asked the man. She looked at Natsume again and there was a small smile on her face—a mixture of astonishment and displeasure. “A male version of myself from an alternate universe?”

Reiko couldn’t help but laugh but Natsume still couldn’t process what was happening.

Someone who could manipulate the time.

When Natsume looked at the man, he found the man was staring back, and for an instant, the faceless man and his smile flashed in his mind.

Is that the youkai? Natsume thought.

Reiko approached him and peered up into his face. Natsume realized that he was taller than his grandmother had been at his age. The same hair color, similar eyes. No wonder the youkai often mistook him for her.

Reiko held her fingers out to his cheek and Natsume felt the warmth in her touch. His eyes widened. This was real. This wasn’t just some flashback. He wasn’t just some apparition. He was physically here, wherever and whenever ‘here’ was.

Was he dead? Or did he just travel back in time?! The former seemed more plausible but he didn’t feel dead at all.

“And you made him look so real too,” Reiko mused, still not knowing it was her own future grandson who was standing right before her. “For a God with not enough power left, you did well with this one.”

Natsume’s eyes shifted again to the man in the yukata and the smile on his face full of resignation. Reiko didn’t say anything else but thank the man for his time and his name before leaving the shrine and passing through the gate down the hill. Natsume watched as the youkai kept a close eye on Reiko’s receding back before he turned his full attention on Natsume.

“As you’ve heard, I’m the God of this small shrine,” he said.

“You’re not a youkai, then?”

The man sighed, the small smile never leaving his face. “At times, I do wonder about that,” he replied. “Whether I’m still the God I used to be, or if I’ve become too much of an ayakashi.”

“What happened?” Natsume asked.

“Nothing entirely special,” the God said. “I used to have a lot of shrines scattered throughout Japan, but fewer and fewer people worship me. Now, I only have this small shrine to call as my home and with no one to come for me, my powers start to diminish. I won’t be able to hold back the negative energy that has been going rampant in these parts for long.

“That’s when Reiko came along.” The God smiled. “You could say that her presence brightened my day. She gave me enough strength to fight off the dark energy for a while longer.”

It dawned on Natsume then what had happened to the God, and why he was led to come to the shrine. It wasn’t a malevolent being trapped and sealed in the mountains. 

“I have probably lost my mind to the evil in the time you came from,” the God said and Natsume couldn’t bring himself to nod. But the God understood nonetheless and he nodded, his movement heavy as though he was suddenly wearied.

“My powers allow me to see the past, present, and future, and I see that Reiko has died in your time,” the God went on quietly. A short pause, and Natsume swore he could see the God’s shoulders shook imperceptibly. When he looked up and met Natsume’s gaze, his eyebrows were drawn and his smile was thin. “Will you return my name to me? It’ll give me enough power to fend off the evil energy.”

Natsume nodded, even though he had a feeling the God didn’t really want his name back. But there was nothing else he could do. The God looked fine in front of him, but this was some forty to fifty years ago. The God in his own time didn’t look as warm nor kind as this.

“Thank you, Natsume,” the God said. “I will return you to your time now.”

The God closed his eyes and Natsume felt warm breeze all around him, pushing at him, cocooning him, and when Natsume opened his eyes again, he was back in the shrine, at night time, the malicious energy overwhelming him. Noticing Natsume finally back to his senses, Madara growled his name under his breath as he pinned the black, shapeless mass under him.

Taking a closer look, Natsume could just make out the face and the jet-black hair. The kind eyes had disappeared, the warm smile replaced by a sinister sneer.

“Natsume!” Madara growled again.

This was not a sealed youkai going rampant. This was a God being overtaken by the evil energy in this mountain, turning it into a mindless youkai, rampaging the land he had sworn to protect. Natsume grabbed the Book of Friends from his waist bag and performed the ritual.

The book flipped open to a page and Natsume whispered the God’s name, sending the black letters back into the mindless God. The black mass screamed and at once, Natsume was brought back into that bright clearing in the cloudless day, where Reiko challenged the God into a rock-paper-scissor match.

“I’ll still come here every day,” Reiko said, when Reiko won and the God wrote his name on a piece of paper.

The God smiled, though he knew Reiko would never come visit again.

Natsume opened his eyes and found himself lying on the grass. He stayed there for a couple more moments, staring at the star-strewn sky, and was it just him or did the sky look slightly brighter than it had moments before? The air felt lighter and the clearing seemed wider.

Nyanko-sensei appeared in his line of sight.

“You’re awake, Natsume?” the cat asked.

Natsume sat up and looked around. The clearing was empty except for both of them—the God nowhere in sight.

“He already left,” Nyanko-sensei said, answering the boy’s unasked question. Natsume looked at the cat beside him. “The moment you returned his name, his mind came back. But he didn’t have that much power left to begin with, so his name only gave him enough power to protect the whole mountain from the dark energy.”

“He’s gone?” Natsume asked.

Nyanko-sensei shrugged. “Who knows? He could be off somewhere taking a nice long break for all I care. Anyway, Natsume!”—Nyanko-sensei went up to his face—“You haven’t forgotten, have you?”

When Natsume cocked his head to the side, Nyanko-sensei scowled. “Manju! Man-ju! Come on! Let’s hurry before the store closes up!”

Natsume couldn’t help the chuckle as he watched the cat-guardian stalked away out of the clearing. Natsume took one last look at the shrine. He offered a silent prayer and murmured a goodbye before he followed Nyanko-sensei out of the clearing.

~ END ~

[winterune]

Who are You?

Word count: 845

Late entry for @natsumeweek 2019 Day 5. Prompt: Personality/Identity

A quick drabble set around the time Reiko first started taking youkai’s names, she unintentionally pissed a mountain god. So sorry if it feels rushed!

~*~*~*~*~

Reiko couldn’t believe the situation she was in. Dangling upside-down, vines and twigs held her ankle in a vice-like grip. The more she struggled, the more tightly the vines held her, so Reiko gave up on trying free herself. This was what she get for pissing off a mountain god.

“Who are you, human?” a deep, booming voice asked her. She couldn’t locate the sound. It came from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. It echoed in her ears and in her mind. It made the earth shake and the trees tremble.

Reiko had a mind to ignore the question, but she knew that would only piss the God even more. So she answered half-heartedly, “I’m nobody.”

“No nobody has as much power as you have,” the voice said. “Now answer me,”—the twigs and vines gave a little shake of her feet—“who are you?”

Reiko tried to control her irritation at being shaken like a sack of flour.

Who was she? She was Reiko Natsume, a new girl in town who just moved here last week. She could imagine what her new foster family would say when she came home all battered and bruised. Violent. Uncontrolled. She could almost feel the slap stinging her cheek that was bound to come. Though, maybe that would be better than the sighs, hopeless eyes, and utter indifference. At least, the slap would prove that she was real, that she existed, and that other people could see her.

“So, your name is Reiko Natsume,” the voice mused, a hint of a sneer in its voice, and Reiko whipped her head up, to the thick foliage of trees. She still couldn’t see the owner of the voice, but she assumed the God resided in there. Her face flushed red—either from mortification or from the blood rushing down to her head, she didn’t know.

“Hey! Don’t just read other people’s mind without permission!” Reiko shouted, vainly kicking at the vines and twigs and air.

But the God took no heed of her. “I’ve heard about you, Reiko Natsume,” it said. “I hear you’ve been fighting a lot of ayakashi, that you take the names of those you defeated. Tell me, what use have you of those names?”

What use? Because it was the only way those youkai would listen to her. Thanks to that, no one dared mess with her again.

“I just feel like it!” she said. “What’s it to you?”

“What’s it to me?” the God laughed. “Dear girl, do you know what it means when you take an ayakashi’s name?”

She didn’t, but she wasn’t about to admit to it.

But Reiko forgot that the God could read her mind.

“A name may not be sacred to you humans, but it is to us,” the God said. “When you take their names, you forge a contract with them. They are bound to your every will. If they do not obey, they will die. Is that the kind of power you seek?”

Power? Reiko thought. She never thought of it that way. No wonder lately the youkai had been avoiding her everywhere.

Then again, the notion of having power over all youkai was tempting. So what if they had to obey her every order? Wouldn’t that be something? See them dance to her every word and every phrase. After all they had done to her! After everything she had to go through. Being despised and shunned by her fellow humans. Being tortured and tormented by youkai. It was the least they could do for her!

Having these thoughts ran through her head left her feeling drained and Reiko realized not all of it were true. She felt the vines and twigs loosened their grip on her ankle as the tree gently lay her down on the ground where she lay motionless as the raw emotions she rarely let herself feel overwhelmed her.

“You are strong, Reiko Natsume,” the God said, and its voice was gentle and soothing that Reiko felt her throat close up, “but not as strong as you portray yourself to be.”

“You know nothing about me,” she murmured quietly.

A pause, and Reiko thought she saw a slight smile in her mind as the voice said, “How could I when you put such distance between yourself and others?”

Reiko’s small smile was self-deprecating. She despised youkai; she hated humans; but most of all, whom she loathed was herself. She wasn’t strong, not in the least, but it was the only way she could protect herself. It became easier to hide behind a smile she didn’t mean, to close her heart and let things go by. She couldn’t let herself show weakness when she didn’t have anyone else to have her back. She couldn’t let herself get close if all she would ever receive were pain and loneliness.

As Reiko lay there on the forest floor, she felt warmth caress her head—so soft and gentle that it made tears prick her eyes. For the first time in years, Reiko wanted to cry.

~ END ~

[winterune]

Her Resting Place

Word count: 3358

@natsumeweek 2019 Day 3. Prompt: Role Reversal / Genre Swap.

This is a fantasy AU, in which magic exists but is outlawed unless under strict regulation. A circle of Court Mages serves the King and oversees the use of magic. A special magic academy exists for the young and untrained gifted. All unregistered mage are to be captured. Takashi Natsume is a young, powerful mage, known to be the grandson of the powerful mage, Reiko Natsume, who, after avoiding the Court’s Mage Registration, had been on he run to avoid the King’s men. And Takashi wants to find her. 

~*~*~*~*~

It started with a letter.

In the dead of night, a particular strong wind forced Takashi’s windows open, jerking him awake from his sleep. A single piece of paper fluttered inside and he caught it. On the paper was one line—the one line he had been waiting for months ever since Hinoe and Misuzu left in search of his grandmother: We’ve found Reiko.

As if right on cue, Takashi heard commotion from outside and the inky blackness of the night was suddenly dotted with the orange glow of fire torches. He leaped out of bed and hid behind the wall of his attic room, peeking through the opening of his windows. Several people had gathered down on the street, discussing between themselves. He recognized the color of some of their garb and Takashi felt his heart beat picking up.

Had he been found? he thought frantically.

Nyanko-sensei had leaped onto his shoulder and clicked his tongue at the crowding mass. “Well, it was good while it lasted,” he murmured, indicating their time with the middle-aged couple in this village was coming to an end. “Come on, Natsume.”

The calico cat leaped down and scampered off down the stairs. Takashi frowned. Did he really have to leave? He had thought that after finding Reiko, he would be able to go back here. The months he had lived with the Fujiwaras were the happiest time he ever had. They had let him in and let him stay when he was covered in bruises and dirt with only the clothes on his back and a ragged bag in his hands, with no home and no family, no money and nowhere to go back to. Here, he had made friends.

Takashi waited for another moment, hoping for the impossible, but as he’d feared, those people were heading toward this house.

“Natsume!” came Nyanko-sensei’s hiss from the stairs. He’d gone back up and peeked his head above the landing. A glare and a frown and Takashi could do nothing else but nod.

Was it a premonition? He had been feeling uneasy the whole day. He had been looking toward the horizon, as if expecting soldiers from the castle or, worse, the court mages and people from the Academy to appear to take him back. Because of that, he had even fallen asleep in his day clothes.

Takashi threw his cloak around his shoulders and pinned it in place. He grabbed his bag and with a look around once to make sure he didn’t leave anything important, Takashi rushed down the stairs in quiet feet. The house was still dark. He crept toward Shigeru and Touko’s room and opened the door a crack. The middle-aged couple were still sleeping soundly, but they would wake up in a matter of moments when the crowd came up the door and knocked on it hard.

He didn’t have time to say goodbye. He couldn’t leave anything behind. No one could know that the boy who had been living under their roof was an unregistered mage.

Takashi closed the door quietly and exited the house through the back door without looking back. In the cover of darkness, he ran toward the forested hills behind the house. He stopped when he was far enough, catching his breath, and ignoring Nyanko-sensei’s urgency, Takashi finally turned around. In the break between the trees, he could see the torches getting closer. He hoped that he was wrong, that they were not the people he had expected them to be—the masters of the Academy. But he was right, because they had stopped before his house and in the span of several moments, the lights turned on, and Takashi knew Shigeru had come to the door.

He turned around and left, praying that the Fujiwaras would be able to get through this safely.

After running some more through the trees in the dark, Takashi found a wide enough space with a break in the leaves where moonlight filtered in. He sat down and placed the paper on the ground before him. It was light enough for him to make out the words.

“Now, let’s find where they are,” he murmured to no one in particular.

Takashi grabbed his grandmother’s book of illegal magic from his bag and looked for a tracking spell. Well, illegal if he used the Court’s terms. He didn’t think it was all that illegal.

Magic was outlawed. The only way the mages could use it was to be one of the King’s mages and serve him. Reiko had powerful magic and she didn’t want to join them. It was just the King’s way of controlling them and using their powers for his own purposes. So she ran away and was then labeled as a rogue mage or criminal. At least, that was what Takashi had learned from the creatures Reiko had befriended.

Reiko had always been an outsider. The people feared her power and yet she didn’t want to abide by the King’s law. She never stayed at one place for long, but one day, Reiko just disappeared, and whispers of her gradually ceased. Some said she had died. Some said she had killed herself. Others said she had cloistered herself away to avoid worldly troubles.

And Takashi wanted to find her.

He found the spell then drew the runes on the earth with a stick. He placed the paper on top of it and slowly spoke the incantation. Nothing happened.

“Focus!” Nyanko-sensei reprimanded. He was sitting at the edge of the circle of runes, glaring up at Takashi.

“I know, I know,” Takashi said with an irritated click of his tongue. Ever since they met and he became Takashi’s self-proclaimed guardian, Nyanko-sensei had acted more as a reluctant teacher as he was a reluctant guardian.

Takashi repeated the incantation several times under his breath, memorizing it by heart. Then he shut the book and closed his eyes, one hand outstretched over the paper and runes and whispered the spell.

The runes lit up one by one then the air seemed to move. A gentle wind lifted the paper over the circle before it was engulfed in a ball of white light and a single light was projected deeper into the forest, northward. The wind died down, the paper fell back onto the dimmed circle of runes, but the projected light was still there.

Takashi shared a glance with Nyanko-sensei and with a nod, the cat transformed into a great white wolfish beast and Takashi stashed both the book and paper into his bag. He was about to climb onto Sensei’s back when a call of his name halted him in his tracks.

He knew that voice. His hands fisted in Sensei’s fur, fighting the urge to look back. He needed to leave, before any of the others caught up. But, he needed to see him, to ask if the Fujiwaras were okay.

Takashi turned around. A man in his early twenties with light brown hair was standing several feet behind him. He wore the maroon-and-gold cloak of the Academy with the Academy’s crest on his breast pocket. Takashi hadn’t seen wrong, then.

“Natori-san,” Takashi greeted back.

A conflicted look crossed his teacher’s face. Sometimes, Takashi would go as far as call him his friend. When he was still in the Academy, Natori had been the only one he could talk to. But he had to wonder whether Natori was only as kind as he was so he could find where Reiko’s book was.

“Are the Fujiwaras all right?” Takashi asked. He hadn’t let go of Sensei.

Natori was silent for a while. He had noticed the way Takashi was clinging onto his white beast, noticed Madara growling under his breath, ready to launch if he so much as did something suspicious. He noticed the white light projecting northward. A tracking spell, probably, leading to somewhere important. He had half a mind to ask where Takashi was going, or to convince the boy to come back, but his conscience wouldn’t let him. Takashi’s trust in him was broken and more than anything else, he wanted to earn it back.

Natori took a step back. “They’re fine,” he finally replied. Takashi felt a heavy sigh escaped his lips. He hadn’t realized he had been holding his breath. The Fujiwaras were safe. That was the most important thing.

Then, Natori added, “They knew nothing of a young mage going rogue, so we didn’t do anything to them.”

That made Takashi pause. So if he’d revealed to them who he was, they’d be taken in right now? he thought, but when he looked up at his teacher, he found Natori smiling slightly at him. It reminded him of something his teacher once said to him: to trust no one but himself. Maybe back then, Natori wanted him to be able to protect himself from others, because once people knew what you were capable of, they would shun you or take advantage of you.

Takashi knew the Fujiwaras were different, but he didn’t know how different. Time and time again, he wondered what would happen if he came clean and told them that he was a mage. A runaway mage, to be more exact. The grandson of an outlaw who possessed a Book of Summoning, filled with the names of all kinds of creatures she had met. This was the Book the court mages were after.

“I’m glad you’re safe,” was all Natori said, before he turned around. Takashi’s eyes widened. Natori didn’t look back when he said, “Go. I’ll lead them away.” With that, his teacher ran into the darkness and Takashi was left quite dumbfounded.

Sensei grunted. “I still don’t trust him,” he said in his deep voice.

Takashi decided not to think about it. What was important was that Touko and Shigeru were safe. He’d think about other stuff later.

Climbing on top of Sensei’s broad, furry back, he grabbed on before the great beast launched into the sky and flew northward, following the still projecting light.

***

A great white tree stood in a vast expanse of green plain in the far North, far from the outskirts of the kingdom. No wonder no one ever found her. This place was practically untouched. With mountains ranging all around, there was no populace in sight for miles and miles. Hinoe and Misuzu sat under the awning of the great tree. At the sight of them, Hinoe stood up and waved her hands up high.

Sensei landed on the plain with an exhausted huff after more than half a day flying. It was already the afternoon when they arrived and the setting sun painted the plain gold. Misuzu told him of a cave beneath the tree but they couldn’t find any opening. However, they were sure that Reiko was there—they had felt signs of a powerful spell on the tree.

Takashi walked around the great white trunk before he fished the book from his bag and flipped the pages. There had to be some spell here. To open a door? To uncover a secret? No, those didn’t seem like something Reiko would use. After flipping every page and couldn’t find any relevant spell he could use, Takashi closed the book and looked up at the tree, its leaves swaying gently with the wind.

Whether she was dead or alive, he didn’t feel like Reiko would hide away from the world. If she had died, Takashi felt that his grandmother would have known that her end was nearing and that she had accepted it. That was just the kind of person she was. She was not the type to cling onto her mortal life. In fact, despite her tendency to want to disappear from everyone, if she were hidden away from the world, it might not be of her own doing, but someone else’s.

Takashi looked into his bag and touched the rim of the Book of Summoning.

“Can you not open it, Natsume-dono?” Misuzu asked.

He could not, because there were no spells done on the tree that hid away the entrance to the cave. Takashi looked up again and lay his palm on the white bark gently. “Please,” he whispered. He didn’t know what he was doing. He didn’t even know if his hunch were right or wrong. But it felt like the right thing to do, so he asked the tree to let him in.

For a while, nothing happened. But then the air stilled and the clouds stopped moving. Even the sun stayed in its place as the tree began to stir from its core to the tips of its uppermost branches. White leaves and flowers flew away from the tree, dancing in a nonexistent wind, and a woman emerged from it, landing gracefully down before them.

The woman bowed deeply. “Good afternoon to you, Takashi-sama,” she greeted in a breezy, lilting voice.

“G—good afternoon,” Takashi stammered, flustered and bowing awkwardly at the waist, surprised at the fact that this…woman knew his name.

A small smile grazed the woman’s face, like an upward parting of leaves where her lips should be. “Have you come to see Reiko-sama?”

That made Takashi perk up. “She’s really here?”

“In a way.”

“Can we see her?” he asked. He couldn’t hide his enthusiasm. After some forty years missing, Takashi finally found her.

The woman nodded. With a wave of her sinewy limb, the tree seemed to tremble from deep within the earth. The bark on one side of the great white trunk disappeared, as though it had been an illusion, revealing a wide enough opening through which Takashi could crawl. He looked up at the woman, then his friends, and when they nodded, he went down to his hands and knees and crawled inside.

The moment he passed through the threshold, he could feel it—like a feather-light touch of a gentle wind—a barrier of some sort. He wondered whether Reiko had some role in setting up this elaborate hiding spot or whether it was solely the work of the tree and the woman—another creature Reiko had befriended. Takashi wondered if her name was in the Book.

“This tunnel stinks,” came Sensei’s voice from behind. Takashi looked over his shoulder and indeed, Nyanko-sensei had transformed back into a cat and was following him inside. Behind him was Hinoe. Misuzu wasn’t able to transform to a smaller version like Sensei could so he was forced to stay outside.

The farther they went in, the darker the tunnel became, until the fading light from the tunnel entrance wasn’t enough to light their way. The mark on Sensei’s forehead began to light up and in the sudden brightness, Takashi could make out an opening not far in the distance.

The tunnel opened up to a larger one where Takashi could stand on his feet without bumping his head. There was no breeze but the air felt cold, as if they’d gone so far underground where the heat from the sun couldn’t reach. He couldn’t fathom how Reiko could have lived here for forty years.

Holding the cat in his arms high, Takashi hoped Sensei’s mark would light up more of this mass of dirt, but the tunnel seemed to go on forever. The deeper they went, the more he thought if maybe this was a mistake. What if they had fallen into a trap and at the end of this cave was not Reiko but a huge monster giving life to the white tree?

The thought just crossed his mind when he noticed dim blue lights coming from the other end. “Is that it?” he asked to no one in particular. Ignoring Sensei and Hinoe’s warnings, Takashi rushed ahead, eager to leave the tunnel behind and find Reiko at last.  

The tunnel abruptly opened up into a large cavern and the sudden burst of light blinded him for an instant. Blue crystals jutted out from the rocks all around him, the light they emanated was enough to light the whole cavern. There was a shallow pool along one end and beyond was a small island with a huge crystal on the wall, the figure of a woman resting inside it.

Takashi’s mind stopped working, his body stopped moving, when he beheld the huge crystal. He almost didn’t realize when Nyanko-sensei transformed into a beast and dragged him with his cloak between his teeth over and across the pond to land on the little island, Hinoe close behind. He thanked Sensei absent-mindedly, his attention solely focused on the figure inside the crystal.

It was the face he had seen in the memories of the creatures he had met. A similar face like his, her brown hair shorter than he remembered it, her face creased with age. Despite that, she still looked young—young enough that people could mistake her for his mother. But Takashi knew that was not true.

The blue light emanating from the crystal seemed to pulsate with life. His heartbeat fell into rhythm with it. It was cold to the touch, so freezing that it stung. Reiko had her eyes closed, her arms folded over her chest. She looked peaceful and serene. Takashi didn’t know when the tears started forming in his eyes.

“She came here one day and lay down by the Tree,” the woman of leaves and flowers said, materializing suddenly beside him. “Both of them had been afflicted with illness and both of them were dying. What the mages do to the Land, drawing magic from the earth to build their cities and strengthen their forces, it was slowly but surely draining the Tree of its life. You see, this Tree is the Land’s source of life. When the Tree rots, the Land dies. Reiko-sama had known her end was nearing and she offered us the last remaining of her life.”

Takashi looked up at the woman then, and there was a wistful smile on her face.

“We had heard of her, of course, of the power she possessed. We did not think of her seriously. Yet, Reiko-sama just lay there until she fell asleep, and before we knew it, the Tree was already reinvigorated and she never woke up again.”

The woman gazed at Reiko’s body and bowed low. “We took it upon ourselves to protect her so we hid her away from the world,” she said. “Only those without malicious intent may pass our barrier to find her.”

The woman bid him goodbye before drifting away.

Takashi’s gaze shifted back to his grandmother’s peaceful face, made eternal by the crystal and magic. Reiko Natsume had indeed died. The rumors weren’t wrong. The body resting inside the crystal now was only the vessel of a soul that had long ago left the world. She let her magic drain away to help the Tree—the Tree of Life that had been dying thanks to the King who was still bent on building the strongest empire there ever was. No wonder Reiko didn’t want to join him.

Takashi touched the crystal once again, letting the cold seep into him. He found himself smiling through the tears that were threatening so hard to spill. Takashi never knew his family. Both his parents died before he could remember properly and ever since, he had been moved around his relatives’ care, no one wanting to take care of a child-mage. Until one day one of them decided to hand him over to the Academy and he started hearing the tales of Reiko Natsume.

If not for the glimpses of memories he’d seen from the creatures in the Book of Summoning, Takashi probably would still wonder if this Reiko really existed. If, by chance, people were just mistaking him to be her grandson thanks to their shared surname. But he was here now, in front of her, and she was real, and she had mattered—mattered enough that the spirit of a dying tree decided to encase her body in a crystal deep within the earth.

“I’ve finally found you, Reiko-san,” Takashi whispered. The dam finally broke, releasing tears streaming down his face.

~ END ~

[goodlucktai]

see where this thing goes

@natsumeweek 2019 day 2; experience

read on ao3

“I’m mad at you,” Ogata says to Natsume by way of hello, and follows it with a warm hug. Behind her, Shibata is seething, and looks as though a hug is the last thing on his mind if Natsume dares to get within arms reach. 

“Thanks for giving us like a two minute heads up, Natsume, I can’t imagine what we would have done if you made it any easier to shop for you.”

Natsume hugs Ogata back, but he looks confused. It’s basically been his default setting since lunch. 

“I’m not-- am I hard to shop for?”

“Buddy,” Kitamoto says, even putting a caring hand on Natsume’s arm. “You’re the absolute worst.”

“But you don’t even need to,” Natsume starts, and then sort of loses where he’s going with it when all of his friends give him variations of the same displeased expression. Rallying, he tries again: “I’d like anything you got me, really. I can’t see how that’s difficult.”

“That’s exactly why!” Satoru bursts, going so far as to throw his hands in the air. “It moves the baseline. If anything we get you is already good that means we have to find something great. The pressure is quadruple what it would have been if we were shopping for someone normal, like Tanuma. Ugh,” he adds, giving Natsume a look that is equal parts affectionate and annoyed, while Tanuma looks as though he isn’t sure whether to feel pleased or insulted. “Why do you have to be all cute about this? What did we ever do to you?”

Natsume splutters, “I am not being-- “ but Taki overrides him with a clap of her hands. 

“We’re wasting valuable time here, people,” she announces. Which is true, they’ve been lingering in the food court and bickering amiably for the last twenty minutes. “Natsume can’t come shopping with us, he has to wait here. Who’s keeping him company first?”

For some reason, everyone turns to Satoru. And, okay, sure, he was going to volunteer, but they don’t need to look at him like it’s obvious. He scowls, which their friends take for cheerful assent, and then he and Natsume are swiftly abandoned.

“Well, then,” he says disdainfully, “we’re getting pancakes and they can all starve.”

“You’re all way too enthusiastic about this,” Natsume mutters, following Satoru through the crowd toward the bright display at the Hawaiian Pancake Factory. “It’s not a big deal.”

“If it’s not a big deal, then just let us do what we want,” Satoru says reasonably. “Now pick out a dessert.”

Natsume rolls his eyes, all put-out, but he steps up to the counter next to Satoru, close enough their shoulders bump. A year ago he would have jumped back at the contact with a quick sorryIdidntmeanto but today their arms are a warm point of contact, and when Satoru pushes him playfully, Natsume pushes right back. 

It’s fun just being around him. Satoru would go just about anywhere if he knew Natsume would be there, too. 

It’s companionable and they never run out of things to talk about, but the sweets don’t last them very long, even with all the extras they piled on, and Satoru wasn’t made for sitting still. 

“Come on,” he says, hopping to his feet about twenty minutes after they sat down in the first place. “It’s not fair that you should have to wait here the whole time. Let’s go look around.”

“If one of our friends see us, we’re dead,” Natsume points out, following along anyway.

“I’m dead,” Satoru says. “You’ve got nothing to worry about.”

Almost immediately, they run into Ogata, who furiously whips a shopping bag behind her back as though there’s any chance Natsume could see through the opaque white plastic. She’s on the other side of the hall, and not quite rude enough to shout at them from there, so they make their escape.

There’s another close call when Tanuma and Shibata come out of the store Satoru and Natsume were about to wander into, and at that point Satoru is beginning to wish they’d just stayed in the food court. 

“Over here,” Natsume says suddenly. He grabs Satoru’s hand, so they don’t get separated in the crowd, and leads the way unerringly around kiosks like he’s following an invisible guide. 

The store they end up in is small and tidy, carrying things like overnight bags and travel guides. Natsume forgets to let go of his hand as they step inside, and Satoru is too distracted to notice. 

“This is kind of perfect,” Satoru says, returning the clerk’s greeting as they pass the front counter. “Since we’re taking that trip soon.”

“Oh, you’re right.” Natsume’s face lights up in that really special way of his, his eyes impossibly dark and warm. “Can we go look at the maps?”

Satoru watches him sidelong as they peruse vacation destinations that are way out of the price range of a handful of high school students, studying the softness and the lightness of him, and asks, “You’re really looking forward to it, huh? Our trip, I mean.”

Natsume shrugs, but he’s smiling. “I am. I moved around a lot, before the Fujiwaras took me in, but it feels like I didn’t get to see any of those places I lived in. There must have been so many things that I missed. So it’s nice to go places with all of you, because I get the full experience, you know? And then I get to come home.”

Satoru’s heart is beating. It always is, and maybe he takes that for granted most of the time, but he knows it’s beating now, because he can feel it everywhere. It’s racing, like it’s trying to run away from him and catch up to some spectacular epiphany his brain is having just around the corner. 

Natsume is right beside him, smiling down at a picture of Mt. Fuji in the travel guide, hand curled loosely around Satoru’s like he really doesn’t realize it’s still there. He’s really close and really far away at the same time, and it strikes Satoru that that just isn’t fair. 

“Oi!” Kitamoto calls from the storefront, the string handles of a paper bag hanging from his hand. “You had one job, Nishimura!”

“Oops,” Natsume says with a crooked grin, moving away to join the cluster of their friends outside the shop. “Guess we’re not very good at sneaking around.”

“Guess not,” Satoru parrots, watching him go. He looks down at his hand-- empty, now-- and then over at the picture of Mt. Fuji, and somewhere in between the two something on the shelf beside him catches his eye. 

That’s it, he thinks. Perfect.

His friends are arguing cheerfully when he catches up to them, hurriedly cramming his purchase into his bag before any of them take notice. He gets a lot of flak from all sides for abandoning his post, until Tanuma points out that Natsume had a good time and that was really the whole point. 

Ogata and Shibata go home, but promise to be there for the party, since Natsume procured Touko’s glowing permission to invite absolutely everyone. It’s a lively affair, and the Fujiwaras are generous hosts, and Natsume has mostly shaken off his uncertainty about the whole thing by the time his friends are pressing their presents into his hands.

When Natsume unwraps the box Satoru gives him, and holds up a gleaming camera for the rest of them to admire, Satoru fidgets.

“It’s, you know,” he says. “For all the things you’re going to see.”

And sure, he’s out ten thousand yen, but a look like that on Natsume’s face would have been worth triple that much. 

[raichana-artblog]

@natsumeweek 2019 - July 1st - Colour

I really wanted to focus on the colour of Natsume’s eyes and have everything else be muted. I figured the Manga pallet owuld work best for that.

I really wanted to do something for every day but unfortunately July is just too crazy so i’ll finish as many as I can. I hope you enjoy!