"Oh," I said, pulling up short.
"She was going to take my virtue!" Emi laughed from behind the blonde. "Save me, Aria!" That's right; the American's name was Aria.
"Stop saying weird things," I chastised Emi. "She's going to think we're perverts."
"You are a pervert, though!" Emi crowed. The American grinned at me and cocked an eyebrow curiously.
"Th-That's not true," I protested, strangely embarrassed.
"That's too bad," I thought I heard Aria mumble, but I couldn't be certain over Emi's loud laughter.
"That is sooo not true, Aria!" Emi laughed loudly. "We're all perverts! Even Kasumi, but she'd never admit it."
"I don't even know what you're talking about, honestly," I sniffed.
"What are we talking about?" Mizuki asked, coming in from the kitchen. She looked over at Aria and waved, smiling brightly. "Hi!"
"About how we're perverts," Emi answered, pushing Aria forward slightly.
"Oh? Oh, yeah, we are, huh?" Mizuki grinned.
"No, we are not," I said. "Don't encourage her, Mizuki. You know how she gets."
"But it's true, right?" Mizuki said, pulling Aria gently into the living room. "Remember that camping trip in May when I almost burned my nipple off?"
"Getting too close to the campfire when you're making s'mores is not perverted," I sighed.
"But! I wasn't wearing a bra!" Mizuki declared with pride, as if she'd streaked through the streets.
"Again," I said. "Not perverted."
"Then what counts as perverted?" Mizuki asked, cocking her head slightly to the side.
"Ask her," I gestured toward Emi. Mizuki looked over at her expectantly.
"We are. I bought some magazines in Osaka and we are totally doing all of the things in those magazines!" Emi clenched her fists as if deciding on some great and terrible course of action.
"What magazines?" Mizuki, Aria and I all asked at the same time.
"HoHoHoHo!" Emi fake laughed. "You will behold their glory tonight! We will be debauched!"
"She doesn't have anything," Mizuki said, turning back toward the kitchen.
"Nope," I answered, following Mizuki to give her a hand.
"I do too! I do!" Emi called to our retreating backs. Mizuki and I ignored her and started dinner.
"That was amazing!" Aria breathed, sitting back from the table. "Tempura is the best!"
"The Tempura was all Kasumi," Mizuki said, jabbing her chopsticks in my direction. "I just did the rice and sushi."
"Well, my compliments to the chefs," Aria breathed, leaning back further on her hands. "I ate too much."
"Can I have the rest of your Tempura, then?" Emi asked, staring alternately at Aria and the Tempura on her plate. Aria nodded and Emi began scavenging through the food left, picking out the tempura that looked the best to her.
"How do you eat so much?" Aria asked. If I was honest with myself, I'd asked that very same question many times. Emi's capacity for food was practically legend. I'd never seen a girl eat so much, especially a girl her size. Standing at barely 152 cm and weighing at most 40kg Emi didn't seem like she'd even have room for all the food she could eat.
"She has a tapeworm," Mizuki replied. Emi shot her a withering glare.
"No, I do not have a tapeworm!" Emi huffed indignantly.
"She is a tapeworm!" Mizuki laughed, ducking the napkin Emi hurled her way.
"I have a healthy appetite is all and I like food," Emi snapped.
"You eat enough for six people, Emi," I kidded her.
"I have an active metabolism is all! It's one of my abilities!" Emi protested.
"I thought being able to spot nice people was one of your abilities," I pointed out to her.
"Oh, Kasumi, you poor child," Emi patted my knee patronizingly. "I have so many abilities. One day I will teach some to you." I stuck my tongue out at her and began gathering up the plates to wash them. "Wait! Don't take all the rice! I'm not done, yet!"
"See?" Mizuki said, sipping her tea. "Tapeworm."
"Waste not, want not!" Emi lectured, piling more rice on her plate. I shook my head and headed into the kitchen to do the dishes.
"I'm going to take my bath, now, ok?" Mizuki called to me from the living room.
"Yep!" I yelled back, opening the cupboard to the right of the dishwasher. I had spent so many hours at Mizuki's house I probably knew where things were as well as Mizuki herself. A few moments later Emi and Aria appeared in the kitchen, carrying the last of the dishes from dinner with them.
"I really want to thank you all for inviting me," Aria said, standing taking some dishes I'd rinsed and putting them carefully into the machine.
"I'm glad you could come," I said. "I admit, I was a bit surprised Emi had already befriended you, though I shouldn't have been, really. Emi moves fast."
"What can I say? It's-"she began before I cut her off.
"One of your abilities, yes," I finished. She grinned at me, scraping rice and sauce off the plates into the trash.
"Do you have sleepovers often?" Aria asked. I thought for a second.
"Once a month or so?" I asked Emi.
"Yeah, I guess once a month or so. More often when we've got midterms and stuff like that," she replied. "You should come every time! You can be one of the mouseketeers!"
"Musketeers," I corrected her.
"What's a mouseketeer, then?" Emi asked, trying to figure out where she'd heard it from. Aria and I looked at each other and shrugged.
"If it's ok with everyone I'd love to come," Aria replied, looking at me oddly.
"It's fine with me," I shrugged. "After all, we're friends, too, right?" Aria smiled and nodded.
"And I'm sure it's fine with Mizuki, most things are fine with her," Emi said. "It's a plan! Now we have even more brainpower for our studies!"
"I'm not very smart," Aria sighed.
"It's ok! Kasumi and I are smart enough for all four of us!" Emi enthused, clapping me on the shoulder.
"Don't get her hopes up," I admonished. "She's going to expect good grades studying with us. What she'll get will be disappointment and shame."
"That's true. Disappointment and shame." She repeated sadly. "Although I did get a 73 on our last math test. What did you get, Kasumi?"
"I don't remember," I admitted. "It probably wasn't great. Math is not my forte."
"You're more of an arts kind of girl," Emi said.
"Oh!" Aria gushed. "You're an artist?" I waved the question away.
"No, no, not me," I replied. "I just draw a bit here and there."
"I'd really like to see something you've drawn sometime," Aria said eagerly. "I mean, if that's ok with you, that is." A blush spread across her pale face like a dawning sun, causing her blue eyes to be even more striking than normal.
"W-Well I don't mind," I stuttered, feeling my own cheeks catch fire for some reason.
"I'm done with my bath! Who's next?" Mizuki called, staggering into the living room in a pair of blue spotted pajamas. "Hot. So hot." She gasped, flopping onto the pillows strewn about the Kotatsu.
"I'll go," I said quickly, getting to my feet and grabbing my backpack.
"I made the water too hot so be careful you don't pass out," Mizuki mumbled. Now that I looked at her Mizuki's neck was a deep red like a lobster, and she did look a bit like she'd cooked herself a bit. I closed the door of the bathroom behind me and got undressed. I dipped a hesitant toe into the water and quickly pulled it back out. What the hell? The water could be used to cook rice it was so hot. Why does she always do this? It's like she's trying to deep fry her brain or something. Well, I either had to take the bath and risk boiling myself or forego the bath and stink, I supposed. I sniffed myself hopefully. Maybe I didn't smell that bad… Ew. Gross. Nope, looks like I was going to get cooked.
"Ha, hah hoooly crap," I gasped as I put my foot into the water. "Ssss." I sucked my breath in as the hot water caused all the blood to rush to the surface of my skin. I should have taken the bath last, I thought. After several long moments of shifting from foot to foot, taking the chance to ease the pain I finally got used to it enough to lower myself a bit more. As soon as my butt hit the water, however, I leapt back up as if I'd been electrocuted, my hands immediately clutching one burning cheek with each hand. I glared down at the water hatefully. What the hell, Mizuki? How did she even get the water this hot? Didn't hot water heaters have some kind of device or something to keep people from flash broiling themselves accidentally? My father obsessed over electricity usage, so our hot water was usually hot only inasmuch as to have one cold tap and one lukewarm tap wasn't much of an option from a manufacturing standpoint. Mizuki's parents, evidently, didn't have the same obsession.
It took several long, painful moments more for me to immerse myself in the bath. Already I was beet red and suffering. I washed myself as fast as I could with the body wash I'd brought and then cleaned my hair, rushing through as well as I was able. The water had begun to cool slightly but it was still ridiculously warm when I dragged myself from the bath and began toweling off.
I rummaged through my bag and scowled. I pushed clothes to the side and dug deeper. Shirt? Check. Socks? Check. Panties? They were green with white stripes which had the added benefit of not bunching up into a wedgie too often and also didn't expose my cheeks, fitting nicely around my butt rather than haphazardly exposing half of the right and a quarter of the left or vice versa. They were cute and ideal. I had found them at a store in the mall in Tottori in September when I went with my mom and had loved them immediately. They breathed better than I had hoped, and I felt like they were made just for me and had forked over 2700 yen for them. I had also left them sitting on my desk at home.
I looked over at the panties I'd worn to school dubiously. No. That was not going to happen. Oh well, I thought, I did some quick math in my head and sighed. It would be fine. I guess I was going commando until tomorrow. I pulled my socks on and then my overly large T-shirt with Hatsune Miku gracing the front and checked myself out in the mirror. I had to continuously wipe the mirror with the towel as it fogged over almost immediately but the outfit worked without exposing too much provided, I sat carefully. I wrapped the towel around my wet hair and stuffed my school clothes into my bag.
"Why would you make it so hot?" I asked, emerging from the bathroom into the gloriously cool living room. Emi was talking excitedly to Aria who was staring directly at me as if expecting me to come out of the bathroom while Mizuki had sprawled face first onto the sofa like a bug meeting a window. As soon as she noticed I saw her staring she averted her eyes quickly to look back at Emi. What a curious girl she is, I thought absently.
"I didn't think it was that hot when I put the water in," Mizuki muttered into the couch cushion.
"It's always that hot," I complained, the sudden rush of cooler air invigorating me.
"Your turn!" Emi said to Aria. "I'm not good with hot things."
"Ok," Aria blushed. She got to her feet and picked up her bag. I put my bag down against the wall and slumped to the ground, taking care to keep my shirt beneath me. "I really like your shirt, Kasumi-chan!"
"Oh, thanks!" I said, pulling the shirt out slightly and glancing down at it. "I bought it online."
"I'll have to see if I can find it. I'd love to have one also," Aria said, clutching her bag to her chest.
"Oh, sure, let me know and I can get you the website I used," I said with a smile.
"Really? Th-That would be great!" She enthused, her smile becoming dazzling. "I'll go take my bath, now."
"Ok," I smiled back at her. She was really weird.