(fanfic) APH- Lovely maid Yao- Chapter 18

Chapter 18

 

A couple of days passed since Yao’s last day of work.

It was a very relaxing evening, and since it was his cousin’s turn to prepare the supper, Yao saw this as a perfect opportunity to focus on his homework and try to catch up with the important details he missed on his last Mathematic class. Unfortunately, until now, there has been barely any progress. There was nothing to distract him in his room, but, somehow, he always ended up wondering about something else…such as what could Ivan be doing on evenings like these? 

As much as he would like to ignore it though, in some way, Yao felt strange for not seeing Ivan as much often as when he was at work. Of course, he saw the Russian at school, and this one wasn’t shy to proudly point to everyone that they were “close” friends. Not that he minded being seen with Ivan, but when the blond decided to shout his name quite loudly in the halls, Yao did felt embarrassed to have the attention of all the curious people on him. However, at the same time, he thought that maybe he was not yet used to this; after all, his cousin Yong did the same thing and he got accustomed to it… 

He wondered how Ivan’s injury was. The blond told him it was “fine” this afternoon, yet the Chinese was still curious to know if Ivan even took care of his injury like he should.

The Asian looked at his clock to see that it was almost eight. 

  

 If he were presently at work, he would be closing the café and Ivan would have been waiting to walk home with him; they would probably be talking about some subject, or maybe he would be scolding the Russian for some “unusual” comportment. No matter what, he was sure that Ivan would be smiling because Ivan always did. Every time, the blond always gave him a very cute smile…even when he was in pain; it wasn’t like Yao would honestly declare that, but this was one of the things that he admired from Ivan.

Without realising it, Yao was too much in his thoughts and slowly forgot to continue with his homework. Instead of answering his math questions, he started to unconsciously draw on his notebook a little sketch of Ivan smiling. 

 “AIYAA!! What is wrong with me?!!!” Stupid Ivan!!” The Chinese screamed to himself. His brain was so strange recently. He always ended up remembering things that he didn’t really wanted to, or to feel easily embarrassed when the subject was about his “stalker”.

And all this was because of Ivan! If this one wouldn’t come to see him every day and be so friendly to him, he wouldn’t have been distracted by such trivial things. Stupid Ivan! Stupid, yet cute stalker Ivan…

He looked at his small sketch, quickly thinking that he should erase it, but at the same time…there was nothing wrong with a sketch, as long as nobody sees it…though, on the other hand, it’s maybe for this reason that he needed to erase it.

“ANIKI!!! The supper is ready—” Yong shouted, not bothering to knock on the door before entering Yao’s room nonchalantly. 

“I’m not doing anything!!!”The older one rapidly snapped, hiding the sketch that was in his notebook. 

“…”

And there was a very awkward moment of silence between the two cousins.

“What?”Yong asked confused by what his cousin said.

“…What?”Yao repeated, unsure of what to answer.

“I came to tell you that Kiku finished preparing the supper.”The Korean replied still confused.

“Great! I-I’ll come soon aru…”Yao said, however he still didn’t removed his hands from his notebook…which was only making the younger Asian curious.

“Aniki…are you hiding something?”Yong inquired staring at the particular notebook.

“N-no! Don’t be ridiculous, Yong! What do I have to hide?”The Chinese answered uneasily. He was trying the best he could to sound casual; unfortunately, he knew that he wasn’t a great liar and actor. 

“…”

Well, if Yong didn’t know his cousin better, he would suspect that the other was hiding explicit and inappropriate pictures in his notebook…but that would be nonsense! After all, they were talking about Yao; his older cousin who was slightly prudish and obstinate about always being honourable and appropriate. 

There was no way Yao would be hiding perverted stuff…right? Just to make sure, Yong made a mental note to clandestinely check this notebook later. 

“…Okay…Well you should come before its cold, da-zee!”Yong finally announced, leaving the room.

Once the Korean was gone, Yao gave a small relieved sigh; he couldn’t believe that—the always so curious— Yong was content with the plain excuse he gave. Though, he had to admit that the Russian was causing him some small unexpected problems…what should he do?

***

The sun was rising and slowly Ivan tried to wake up for school. Usually, he would have some troubles waking up early for school, but recently it was miraculously like a piece of cake. 

Thanks to technology, Ivan saved all the pictures Francis took of Yao on his computer before erasing them. He even printed some of them to put it on his bedroom’s walls and he thought it was absolutely wonderful waking up in the morning with Yao’s picture being the first thing to see.

 It was like the perfect way to start a good day and it always made Ivan so cheerful. He never knew that Francis was good at taking pictures, especially with a cell phone. Of course, nothing was better than seeing Yao in real life. 

The blond quickly prepared himself and went to the kitchen, he wasn’t surprised to see that his older sister already cooked breakfasts for Natalia and him, and was washing the dishes this early in the morning. 

“Good morning Onee-chan!” Ivan greeted her cheerfully. 

“Good morning little Vanya!”She greeted back, quite surprised to see that Ivan was already awakened.

Ivan simply gave a quiet grumble when he heard this nickname. His older sister always called him like that since he was young. He was used to it; however, now that he was taller than her, he thought it was strange when Ukatarina still called him “little Vanya”. Of course, she was too oblivious to realise his “small” dislike about the subject.

“Onee-chan, do you need help with cleaning the dishes?”Ivan suddenly inquired. Before being answered, the younger brother rapidly took a plate and started to wash it.

“Aww thank you so much Vanya. It’s so nice of you to help me!”She said, happy to see her brother offering his help. She really liked to clean and do the chores when she could, but it was always great to have a little help from her siblings, from times to times. It was so nice of Ivan to offer his help, even if he hated to clean the dishes so much…

But then, Ukatarina took a small moment to remember that her siblings only offered their help when they were in trouble…

”…”

“What?”Ivan said, noticing that his sister stopped washing the dishes and was now looking at him with blank eyes.

“What do you need, Vanya?”Ukatarina bluntly asked. Her expression was clearly showing that she was worried about Ivan’s intentions.

“Hum, well actually Ukatarina, I need money…” Ivan honestly answered. He knew that his sister would realise his intentions sooner or later, though he was surprised that she guessed it this quickly!

“Money?!” She repeated, almost dropping the plate she had in her hands. ”D-didn’t father give you money this week?”She inquired uncomfortably.

“Da! But I …need more…”Ivan replied slowly.

“More? Why? Did something happen to you, Vanya?’” The older one inquired completely anxious.

Of course, she was already imagining the worse and worrying about nothing; that was so typical of his older sister!

“Nyet, nothing happened! I only gave some of my money to a very important friend of mine. He really needed it.”Ivan explained, deciding to be honest with it. Actually, he wasn’t lying, Yao was a very important “friend” and he did needed money to see his family in China. He sincerely thought that this was a truly kind and generous excuse. Unfortunately, his sister apparently didn’t share the same opinion, since she was starting to have tears in her eyes.

 “Aww, Vanya, if you need to give money to your friends in exchange of their friendship, they are not real friends!”She commented sadly, in the verge of crying. 

It would be horrible if her brother’s friends were just using him for money! Her poor little brother always had some difficulty to make friends. She only hoped he wasn’t bullied by them. Ironically, she was too oblivious to come to the conclusion that Ivan was far from being the one who was bullied.

Nonetheless of her good intentions, on the other hand, Ivan thought that this sounded like an insult! What was that suppose to mean? Does that mean that even his older sister didn’t believe he could have honest friends?

“Kolkolkolkol. Onee-chan, this is not how it works!”He replied bitterly. 

***                            

It was lunch time and Ivan couldn’t, once again, wait to be at the end of the day.

Today, his group of friends decided to eat at the cafeteria and Ivan had to admit it was a good idea, since autumn was starting to come and it was rather cold outside. In addition, the weather outside was incredibly gloomy; it would probably be starting to rain at any minute.

However, Ivan seriously didn’t care much about the weather; he was too distracted by Yao. To his luck, the table where his friends and he sat was directly facing the one where Yao and his cousins were. Therefore, Ivan had the direct view on Yao’s face which he was really grateful for that.

He couldn’t deny that he would honestly prefer being sat next to Yao, but sadly his crush was with his cousins and he doubted that he would have the chance to be next to him, even if he asked them very kindly…

Although, Ivan was still more than happy to realise that the Chinese glanced every once in a while at him. Of course, each time the Russian looked directly at the other, Yao rapidly turned his head to look somewhere else or at his lunch.

After a while, Ivan had finally the chance to have Yao’s complete attention. Once he was sure that the Chinese was looking at him he mouthed a small “hello”. He was glad to see that Yao did the same. The blond quickly gave him one of his sweet smiles; which the other answered the same way.

Meanwhile, Yao was only wondering why his heart was beating fast again. Recently, this happened too much often and every time, it was because of Ivan.

As he was pondering, a thought drastically came to Yao; was he falling for Ivan? It couldn’t be possible, right? He simply couldn’t fall for someone just because of a hug and a kiss on the cheek; he wasn’t a five years old! 

On the other hand, the Chinese had to admit that Ivan did have qualities that made him very likable. In fact, he quite enjoyed the time spent with him; the Russian ended up being not as annoying as Yao expected him to be. Ivan also proved to be very kind and calm, despite the strange behaviour he had sometimes. Plus, he always had such a cute smile and adorable expression…and it was true that Ivan had a rather muscular chest…wait! Why was he thinking that?!!!  

The Chinese quickly shocked his head, hoping to forget about all this. In the end, no matter what, Ivan was always responsible for messing up with his head!

Slowly, Yao gave a quick glance at the other and noticed that the blond was still looking at him. Why wouldn’t Ivan stop looking at him? 

Rapidly Yao’s cheeks became red and he was starting to feel weird again. And all this was because of Ivan! He only wanted to smack his head on the table so much he was embarrassed of having such a ridiculous comportment.

“AIYAA!!” He expressed, much more loudly than he wanted. Almost immediately, the Asian realised that it made everyone close to his table looked at him in shock and confusion.

“Aniki are you okay?”Yong asked worried about his older cousin.

“Y-Yes…I just have a sudden headache aru.”Yao explained, completely shameful of his own behaviour.

“Do you want some pills for your headache?”Kiku proposed.

“I will take some after lunch, thanks Kiku.”Yao answered awkwardly, noticing that Ivan was still looking at him and smiling. Unluckily for him, he wasn’t the only one who noticed it.  

“Wait Aniki! This big nosed Russian with the scarf is looking at you suspiciously! He is intimidating you, isn’t he?” Yong snapped, giving a quick glare at the said Russian. How dare this “weirdo” intimidate his aniki? The Korean was more than ready to show him a lesson!

“What? No! Didn’t I already tell you to stop with that? He isn’t doing anything wrong.”Yao replied while trying to calm his younger cousin.

From where they were, the older Asian could see Ivan looking at him with an adorable smile that only made him blush again.

This made the cousins at the table stare at both Yao and Ivan in deep bewilderment. They didn’t truly understood what was going on, but this just made Yong even more worried. Actually, the cousins weren’t the only ones confused; at Ivan’s table, the three other friends didn’t understand what was going on either.

“What is going on?”Ravis quietly inquired puzzled.

“What?”Ivan asked, finally snapping out of his own little world of gazing at his lovely Yao.

“I-I mean, you seem really cheerful today.”Ravis quickly stuttered, scared of saying something that he shouldn’t.

“Da! I’m in a nice mood today.” The Russian admitted, completely happy with the day he was having. 

“Well it’s a good thing for once.”The Estonian silently murmured to himself. It was rare to see Ivan cheerful like he was today, but it wasn’t something they would complain about. In fact, they were all relieved to have a nice relaxing day. As an answer to the other, the three showed a rather awkward smile, all secretly hoping that Ivan’s good mood would continue.

“Ha! Yao!”The Russian suddenly said, noticing that the Asian family was getting up and appeared to leave the table.

“Yao-Yao!” The blond called again, getting up to approach the other. 

“Uh?” It didn’t take long for Yao to turn around when he recognized the familiar voice.

“ W-wait Yao! Can I ask you something da?” The Russian asked. 

As a gesture for agreeing, Yao walked closer to Ivan’s table to hear what the blond was about to ask, though he was actually a little shocked with Ivan’s attitude. Usually the blond would simply bluntly ask what he had in mind, not bothering to make it private.

 “Since you are not working tonight, I thought that maybe we could go somewhere together.” Ivan started once he was certain that Yao was listening to him. The blond was softly blushing and was giving him a shy smile; Yao couldn’t believe how cute this was.

Aiyaa! Again with those stupid thoughts! The Chinese scolded himself.

“Actually, I do work tonight aru.” Yao finally said, expecting Ivan to be disappointed. 

“What?!”

And Yao’s expectations were indeed true.

“My schedule got changed because Mathias had something to do. I also work tomorrow for a couple of hours.”

“Kolkolkolkolkolkol~ That’s really unfair.”

“Well, this is how things work. If I would have an important thing to do, Mathias and Nicolai would also have to change their usual schedule for me. In fact, my schedule might be really changed for the next couple of weeks.” Yao remarked.

Well this just saddened Ivan, all these efforts to have Yao’s schedule and now it was changed. In addition, he was pretty confused with this answer; was that a kind way for Yao to say that he didn’t wanted to go out with him?

“B-but, tomorrow is Saturday and I finish at noon, so maybe we can do something after that… if you absolutely want to.”The Asian added, blushing in several shades of red, but doing his best to act as if he was asking a plain question.

“Da, I would love to! I will come get you at noon!” Ivan rapidly answered, beaming a big smile.

So Yao guessed this was a date? Flustered with this thought, he wondered why he accepted such a thing…although at the same time, there wasn’t anything bad hanging out with a “friend”. He was always busy with school and work, he was sure it would change his mind a little.

“So I will be able to see you tonight again da? That’s great! I really missed spending time with you at night, during these last days.”Ivan chimed, having his full cheerful expression back. 

“At night?!”The three at Ivan’s table expressed curiously at the same time, staring at the couple. Of course, as soon as Yao noticed the three curious pair of eyes on them, his face quickly went red. Even if Ivan was saying this with innocence, it did look like he was implying something else...

 “Aiya!! Stop saying stupid stuff like this aru!” The Chinese scolded the other.

“You always say that~”Ivan laughed, not taking the other’s comment seriously.

However, it didn’t stop the three other to look at them with interest which completely made Yao anxious. He was only happy that none of his cousins heard that conversation…

“I-I really have to go now…so I guess I will see you later.”Yao concluded, noticing that Kiku and Yong were waiting for him and that they seemed tense. 

“See you later Yao.” The Russian replied happily, watching his crush returning to his cousins. Ivan slowly returned to sit at his table and was surprised to see that his three friends were looking at him with a weird stare.

“What?”He added, not liking to be stared like he was doing something strange.

“N-Nothing!”They all said in unison, completely looking at a different direction. 

In truth, all of them were actually surprised to see these two talked so casually. They heard rumours about Ivan and Yao having a secret thing, but some of them would never believe it if they wouldn’t have seen it with their own eyes.

And from what they heard, apparently Ivan and Yao even saw each others at “night”? No wonder why Ivan was in a great mood recently; for once those rumours were true. In fact, now Eduard lost a certain bet concerning those rumours and owed Toris five dollars...

“I didn’t know you and Yao were a couple…”The young one stated with innocent honesty, though he still seemed a little shocked with this revelation.

“Couple?” Ivan repeated with a small hint of surprise.

“Ravis!!” The two other screamed, thinking that it would anger the Russian. For all they knew, maybe Ivan wanted to keep it a secret and would be anger of hearing about the rumours.

“S-sorry, I-I thought that—“The Latvian quickly explained nervously.

“We really look like a couple? Really?” Ivan inquired with a big smile before Ravis could finish his explanation.

“Y-yeah…?”

Taken aback by Ivan’s expression that looked exactly like a joyful child, the trio could simply nod unconsciously, hoping that they weren’t doing something that would frustrate the Russian.    

 Well this answer somehow made Ivan extremely happy; the simple fact that Yao and he looked like a couple was so wonderful to him, and was, therefore, a very good sign.

On the other hand, the three friends stayed in silence and in awe, during the rest of the dinner. All of them were truly puzzled with the scene of Ivan giggling happily like a child while eating his lunch. 

 (TBC)