The Quintessential Quintuplets, Eternal Hearts

Chapter Twenty-Seven, I'll Let It All Burn

-Futaro-

Over the course of the next month after that day in the cafe, Futaro rarely saw Rokuro, he'd see him as he was going out to work or occasionally at school, apparently Rokuro's grades were so good that the school didn't require him to attend every day, he just had to show up twice a week. One day while he was at the quints house tutoring, he noticed Rokuro sleeping under the kotatsu that the girls had, his head in Ichika's lap because Nino was taking a break from it.

"What is he doing? Wake him up." Futaro said sternly.

"Leave him be, he's been working hard." Nino said quietly.

"What for? I don't see why he's working so hard." Futaro questioned.

"He's been working for your paycheck." Miku answered.

"He's still doing that? Have you all tried to tell him to stop?" Futaro replied.

"We have, but he won't listen." Yotsuba said dejectedly, Futaro looked at his friend and sighed, trying to think of what to do.

"I guess it couldn't hurt..to let him sleep a bit longer." Futaro said quietly, but as the words left his mouth, Rokuro groaned and lazily sat up, pulling himself out of the kotatsu.

"Uhn...hey.." He muttered, yawning.

"You're awake." Futaro said.

"Good morning, Rokuro-kun." Itsuki said with a smile.

"Morning...Itsuki-tan.." Rokuro said with a nod, he stood up and stretched before walking into the bathroom. As he did, Futaro noticed the bags under his eyes had gotten a lot worse.

"Is he gonna be okay? He can't be getting enough sleep." Futaro said.

"He really isn't, sometimes he gets three hours of sleep a day because he's requesting so much time for work, he's gotten a total of 9 hours this week, and he won't listen to reason, he just keeps working." Nino explained, Futaro scowled and crossed his arms, wondering what to do.

"Well we can't just keep letting him do this, he's going to work himself until he collapses." Futaro said sternly.

"We know, we just don't know what to do." Ichika said, Futaro thought a moment before remembering something.

"I just remembered, has Kazuhiro told you when his birthday is?" Futaro asked, the girls looked at each other before shaking their heads no.

"He's been so busy he's forgotten, or he just hasn't celebrated it in so long that he's forgotten... His birthday is on Monday." Futaro said.

"Are we gonna do something special for him, using it as both his birthday and a way to tell him to slow down?" Itsuki questioned, Futaro smiled and nodded, telling them what he was gonna do. Three days later he caught Rokuro in the hallway as he was leaving.

"Kazuhiro, come with me for a bit." Futaro said.

"I can't, I gotta get to work, maybe some other-" Futaro cut him off.

"You won't wanna miss this, come on." Futaro said, grabbing his arm and pulling him along, he surprisingly didn't fight it. Futaro guessed that Rokuro must've been so exhausted that he didn't have the strength left to do anything. Futaro sighed and walked Rokuro all the way to Revival quietly, as they entered, he saw the quints sitting in a booth waiting.

"Rokuro-san, you made it!" Yotsuba said excitedly.

"You're all here? What is this about?" Rokuro asked.

"We're worried about you Rokuro-kun, you're working yourself too hard." Itsuki said, standing up, Rokuro's eyes widened a bit and he laughed.

"That's what this is about? I'm fine, don't worry about me. I can keep going." Rokuro replied.