Just Smile Forever~A Mikaze Ai Fan-Fiction

Working Together?!

A/N: On the side is a book trailer made for the book that I mention in this chapter, called The Bear by Claire Cameron. Please check it out if you're interested! It was an amazing and touching story :)

"How are we supposed to be doing this?!" Reiji-senpai whined for about the twelfth time since we had gotten the parts.

Camus-senpai grunted, looking intently at the instructions, "are you sure Mr. Saotome bought these tents in Japan?"

"Is it not in Japanese?" Ranmaru-senpai asked in a frustrated tone. He turned around and snatched the booklet out of Camus-senpai's hands, and looked over it, "yes it is!"

"But aren't instructions supposed to be.....easy, and not confusing?" Camus-senpai shot back.

"What does that have to do with it being made in Japan?" Ranmaru-senpai asked tiredly.

Ai-senpai calmly stepped in the middle of the two bickering men, and took the booklet. Examining it, he sighed, "these instructions are easy, Camus. If you would follow it step-by-step, we would've been done by now."

"What does that mean? Where I came from, everything was already built for us! We had to do none of this.....this...." Camus-senpai sputtered, waving his scepter (which he somehow remembered to bring along as well) at the pile of sticks and the cover of what was supposed to be our tents.

"It's a fun experience, though!" Reiji-senpai cheered, even though he seemed to be in the process of breaking a pole into two parts.

I bit my lip, "can I see the instructions, Ai-senpai?"

He looked up momentarily before going back to flipping through the booklet, "do you know how to read and understand this?"

After that conversation I had with him, he seemed to be acting no different than before. But I couldn't help but cringe a little every time I had to talk to him. He was too good at reading people. I didn't want him to know anything more.

I nodded, "I think so."

Instead of giving me the booklet, Ai-senpai marched over and stood beside me, "then let's figure this out together. Reiji, Camus, and Ranmaru seem hopelessly lost and confused."

I blinked in surprise, but nodded quickly all the same, "s-sure."

I peered at the booklet, and slowly turned it to the first step. Looking at the poles on the ground, I sighed.

"Why don't one of us read the instructions while the other actually does it?" Ai-senpai quickly suggested, "that'll be the most efficient way as of right now."

"That sounds good. Who...." my question was answered when Ai-senpai gave me the booklet, and bent down.

"Um...." I quickly read over the paragraph, "pick up the pole that has red stripes around the ends, and push it through the holes on the tent that have the same colour."

I looked up just in case Ai-senpai wanted me to repeat anything, but he seemed to have gotten everything perfectly memorized. He did exactly what I said without a moment of hesitation, making me wonder if this was the first time he had put a tent up.

And so 35 minutes later, Ai-senpai and I had finished putting up the five tents. Since they had the same instructions, he had almost seemed to memorize the instructions that had applied to the first tent we built, and with every other tent added on he seemed to have built it faster and faster.

I looked up triumphantly to realize that everyone else had cleared away to stand at the edge of the clearing, just observing our work. Reiji-senpai was the first to clap enthusiastically.