365 Days of Starshipping (Part 2)

Santa Hats

12/13/19

The day before the party, Haou decided he wanted to have a day out, which of course meant that Jack took the day off to challenge him - Yusei was glad Crow hadn't taken any jobs for that day (he'd decided to take the chance for a break thanks to the party), so he was able to help him manage the chaos just in case and make sure it didn't get out of hand.

He should've known that Crow would've had some way of making it worse, though. It was just how these days seemed to go, even if they all looked back on it later and laughed at the ridiculousness of it all.

As it was, Crow had just seemed to remember something and ran up to his room for the moment, leaving Yusei with Judai's spirit on the couch and sipping at some tea while they watched Haou and Jack go head-to-head at some random strategy board game they found in the closet. Yusei was ninety percent sure that Judai had bought it, seeing as he'd never seen it before in his life, and was just one of those things that he'd maybe mentioned buying in passing before forgetting all about it - he wouldn't be surprised if that was the case, at least. It did seem like the type of game they'd have fun playing though considering it seemed to have a lot of resource management and required the player to think through where they wanted to put their pieces on the board.

"Alright, I got it!" Crow announced, re-appearing as he came back down the stairs holding a bag in his hands, "I found these while I was out about a week ago, but everyone was busy then so I kinda forgot about it 'til now."

"This ought'a be interesting," Judai mused, leaning his head closer towards him - Yusei may not be able to feel him, but it was still nice to have his presence close either way and he appreciated the gesture, "Especially if he's bringing it out while Haou's around."

Haou slightly raised an eyebrow at him, which Yusei held back a chuckle at and simply smiled instead, before everyone put their attention back on Crow as he pulled off the little piece of tape holding the bag closed and rummaged around inside of it.

"Ta-dah!" He chirped, pulling out... Santa hats?

"You bought those?" Jack asked incredulously, going to say more before getting smacked lightly in the face by one of the hats that Crow threw at him to wear, "Damn it, I'm not wearing it!"

"Stop being a coward," Haou stated, gesturing for Crow to toss him one before smirking at Jack as he put it on slowly and dramatically - Yusei didn't even know it was possible to put something like that on dramatically, but apparently you learned something new every day. Either way, the taunt worked exactly how it was intended to, and Jack practically slammed the hat on his head so as to not let the other one-up him.

"H-he actually put it on?" Judai gaped, speechless for another moment before slowly devolving into a snickering mess, "Oh my gods, I never thought I'd see him of all people in a Santa hat!"

It was, admittedly, a very funny image to see Jack and Haou, both now wearing very fluffy Santa hats, go right back to arguing and being extremely competitive over a board game. Yusei ended up getting a hat tossed to him too, and he obliged without any hassle, seeing that Crow had already donned his with a grin.

"I'll admit this wasn't my first thought of what would happen when I bought them, but I feel like this is better," Crow laughed, plopping back down in the chair he'd been using - as usual, he sat on it backwards as he was so fond of doing, and was partially the reason he was sitting on the chair instead of the couch. To be fair though, the main reason why was that he knew Judai was there watching and sitting with him on the couch, even if he couldn't see him himself.

"Tell him he's a genius, even if it wasn't planned."

"Judai says you're a genius anyways," Yusei repeated, turning to look fully at his cute Kuriboh, who was currently just coming down from his laughing fit. To his surprise, it seemed that Haou putting on the hat had caused one to appear on Judai as well, and he couldn't help but smile at the sight - it was just so fluffy and ever-so-slightly too big for his head, which made it even more adorable.

"Yusei? What it is it?" Judai blinked, noticing that he was staring at him now.

"You've got one on now, too," he pointed out, watching with rapt attention as the other looked up in confusion and tried to feel for it; the ball at the end of the hat flopped around as he accidentally pulled it over his eyes after moving his arms too quickly downwards.

"Ah- I guess I do! Seeing it on Haou must've made me think of wearing it," Judai mused, pulling it back up and peeking out at Yusei with a grin, "How's it look?"

"I'm getting a picture of you later," Yusei said simply, letting the statement speak for itself as he gave Judai a little smirk that caused him to glance away for a moment with an embarrassed-looking smile.

Honestly, it felt like doing all these holiday traditions with Judai was a Christmas present in itself.