Little Tiger

Move-in

Shigure turned away, refusing to elaborate on anything he just said. I was too stunned to speak. I looked down at his robe again then released it, letting it fall to the ground. I did not want it. I kicked it aside as I walked towards Shigure. 

"Do you need help with the boxes?" I asked in a level tone. Suddenly I was anxious to get him out of here.

Shigure glanced at me through the corner of his eye, holding two boxes in his arms and balancing them underneath his chin. 

"No, darling. I can do it myself, I wouldn't want you to throw your back out for my sake." He winked. That same, stupid lopsided grin was pulling at the corners of his mouth. He noticed my scowl and started to smile more. "Sorry, little tiger, I didn't mean to piss you off." 

Little tiger? 

"Stop glaring, it's just a nickname. Cute, right?" 

I did not think it was cute. 

"Anyway," he began strongly, clearing his throat, "if you want to feel useful, you can help carry my boxes, I suppose." 

I bent down and stacked two boxes on top of each other then carried them out of his bedroom, moving quickly ahead of him and storming down the hallway. I was so focused on getting Shigure's things in the car that I wasn't even paying attention to where I was going. I ran straight into Ayame. 

"Woah, Ko," he exclaimed, pressing his hands against the boxes and pushing me back lightly. I stumbled backwards and looked up. "Why are you in such a hurry?" 

"No reason," I mumbled. "Sorry, I wasn't paying attention." 

Ayame snorted. "You think? You almost ran me over." 

I peered over my shoulder and saw Shigure walking down the hallway with his boxes. I whipped my head around and sidled past Ayame. 

"Shigure," Ayame said warningly, "what did you do to harm our Ko-Ko?" Ayame's hand pressed against the top of my head. 

Shigure laughed heartily. "Nothing at all. I just gave her some of my hand-me-downs and she got all pissed off." 

I ducked my head to get Ayame's hand off and continued walking down the hallway. 

"Well I don't blame her. All of your hand-me-downs should just go straight to the trash." Ayame shuddered and followed behind me. 

Footsteps thundered towards us. I knew that it was Hatori without needing to turn around. He flew past Ayame and I, carrying four boxes with him. They were stacked past his head so he couldn't see at all. Silence fell between the rest of us as we watched him. 

"Well, I'm all moved out now," Shigure stated, disrupting our silence. "Those were the last of my boxes." 

Ayame's eyes were gleaming with pride as he watched Hatori. "That's our Tori," he sighed, pressing his hands underneath his chin. 

I rode with the boys in the car, I wasn't sure why I decided to come along. They didn't really need my help moving all of their things into their dorms and they didn't seem very grateful that I was accompanying them. But it was Sunday and I didn't have anything else going on and no one told me to stay behind or questioned why I was there.

Hatori sat in the passenger seat, staring at the clock intensely, as if he was trying to cast a spell on it so that it would reverse and they would be on time for move-in. If he didn't have the ability to stress us all out so much, we would have been laughing at him. Unfortunately, we were staring at the clock right along with him. I stopped after a while when I realized that I was not the one who was late.