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"MORNIN'," NIKORU SAID THROUGH A LARGE YAWN, still in her pajamas and her wild bed hair looking, well, like her normal hair. Nikoru was blessed with not having a horrible bed head — unlike Jurine, who needed a good hour to tame the animal residing on her head.
Rubbing the sleep from her eyes, Nikoru walked past where Jurine sat at the dinner table, dressed in her school uniform with her legs tucked against her chest. A sudoku book nestled on top her knees, eyes narrowed and biting on her bottom lip in thought.
Thankfully the swelling had gone down over the weekend and some of the bruising as well. She was still healing from the injury, so she was unable to wear her glasses for at least two weeks. Contacts were a fucking pain, one she, unfortunately, had to deal with for now.
"Hey, Juri, where's the orange juice?" She looked up as Nikoru stood with the fridge door open, her brain still booting up. Nikoru turned her head to see the pitcher in front of Jurine. "Oh! There it is!"
Meeting her cousin's eyes, Jurine poured the remains of it into her glass, just enough for one, before setting the pitcher down. Taking the glass, she chugged a couple of gulps loudly before answering, "Nope. We're all out." A loud burp jumped out. "Mark it down on the list."
Nikoru narrowed her eyes. "Uh, Juri, you are aware that it was orange juice right? You hate citrus."
"Why of course, Nikoru." Jurine tilted her head, letting out a noncommittal reply, "My nose is broken, remember? You wouldn't want me to take too long to heal, would you?" She smiled an innocent smile, though she knew very well Nikoru could see through it.
Nikoru raised an eyebrow at Jurine using her full name, but she dropped the issue since she was still half asleep, turning back to the fridge.
"You know what? I'll just have milk. I was gonna have cereal anyway." Nikoru set the milk on the counter, then nudged the stool tucked away in a corner to help her up the counter to get the cereal her dad kept on the top shelf. "Nikoru the Reporter feels like— Ahhh!!" Nikoru let out a scream and chocolate pelts of cereal rained down on her when she opened the cupboard.
Jurine's mouth curled for a moment in a smile before it flattened, watching her cousin spazz out.
Her high-pitched scream echoed through the house, and moments later the two girls heard thundering footfalls as Nikoru's dad — and Jurine's uncle — Kosaku Midorikawa ran into the kitchen, half of his face still covered in shaving cream and his long brown hair up in a messy bun currently falling apart.
"Why the fuck do I hear screaming at 6:45 in the morning? Is there a fire? Did the sky cave in?" He saw Nikoru on the counter, and the contents of her cereal spilled around her and on the floor, and he immediately relaxed. He ran a hand through his messy hair. "Sweetheart, I told you that you don't need to use so much strength to open the cereal. It isn't super-glued shut."
"I didn't do anything! Look at what she did!" Nikoru held up her box of cereal which had a long gash across its middle that went right through the bag itself. Someone had taken a knife to it. "Jurine murdered my cereal, Daddy! She is a cereal killer! She is evil!"
