Work Text:
Natsuki only made chocolate covered strawberries for the Valentine’s Day meeting because she found a fun-looking recipe for them online. And there just happened to be strawberries in the fridge that would go bad in a few days, so she had no choice but to make them! She didn’t even know they were Yuri’s favorite. Why would she even know that? Sure, Yuri had reblogged that recipe she made, but she hadn’t even realized that it had been her! Natsuki had forgotten she’d even followed Yuri, she’d just accidentally done it and never bothered to unfollow her!
But, even if she didn’t make them for Yuri or anything, she was hoping she’d like them. The only reason she wasn’t worried about Sayori or Monika liking them was because they always liked whatever she made! Yuri did too, but she never gushed about them like her other friends. She could only be the best cook in the club if she could get everyone’s unyielding praise, right? So yeah, maybe she had made them for Yuri, but only because she wanted her to finally adore her cooking as much as their other clubmates.
She sat right by the tray with the chocolate covered strawberries when she got to the library. It was annoying to have to go all the way there just to have their book club, but with school on break and no one willing to hold it at their house, it was the best meeting place they had. Plus, they had a lot of good mangas at the library, so she could covertly check them out and keep the entire works of CLAMP under her bed all break long without using any of her allowance.
As lame as she thought Valentine’s Day was, she still felt compelled to check out a romance manga to read while she waited for the others to get there. Mostly just because they’d had it on display for the occasion, but she’d heard Chobits was cute so she didn’t mind reading it that day. And it was cute, even if it was kinda creepy for a dude to fall in love with a robot. Maybe Yuri would like it; she loved that kind of speculative fiction stuff. Not like she cared what Yuri liked or anything, but it was always good to get more of the club to recognize manga as legitimate literature, and especially someone as snooty about it as Little Miss Reads Victor Hugo For Fun.
Speaking of which, Yuri wandered in the meeting room they’d reserved soon enough, her bag overflowing with very heavy looking books. “Oh, Natsuki, you’re here already?”, she questioned, setting her bag down with a little grunt.
“Dad dropped me off an hour ago,” Natsuki explained, slipping a Pokemon card in her book to keep her place. “And what about you? Don’t you live here?”
Yuri chuckled, raising her hand to her mouth all cute-like. Who did she think she was impressing, anyways? “You’re not wrong! I mean, I don’t live too far from here, so my mother drops me off here most days while she’s at work.”
“Don’t you get bored of it?”, Natsuki questioned. “I mean, you read so fast that I’m sure you’ve gotten through everything interesting three times over.”
After a moment of thoughtful humming, Yuri shook her head. “No, I wouldn’t say so. They’re always getting new books in, and besides, it’s always fun to reread stuff you like! Plus, they have a Wii here, so-”
“Wait, they do?”, Natsuki interjected. “Where?”
Why did Yuri grin like that when she said that? Geeze, what was her problem, being all smiley? “Well, Sayori probably won’t be here for a while, and Monika has piano practice until one, so I could show you!”
“Alright, let’s g-” As Natsuki stood up, her eyes fluttered back to her chocolate strawberries. Oh, right, she needed to get Yuri to love her food! “Wait, first…” She shoved the tray in Yuri’s face.
Yuri gasped a little. “Oh, Natsuki! These look amazing! Thank you so much!”
She took the biggest one with the prettiest swirls of white and dark chocolate off the tray and ate it in one bite. Natsuki studied her face closely, paying attention to how her eyes lit up and her mouth curled into a smile. She had succeeded without a doubt.
But, instead of a confident, bragging declaration of victory, Natsuki found herself stammering. “D-do you like it?”, she asked.
Swallowing sharply, Yuri nodded. “They’re amazing! You’ve really outdone yourself, Natsuki!”
She wanted to laugh. She wanted to say that of course she outdid herself, because she was always fantastic at making sweets. But, she found herself with warm cheeks and a broken stutter instead. “W-wow, th-thank you…”
Yuri took another strawberry- a much smaller one, and took the tray from Natsuki’s hands, setting it down on a nearby table. “That’s so sweet of you… And on Valentine’s Day too… You really are sweet, Natsuki.”
“I- I-” Dammit, why wouldn’t her mouth work? She was supposed to laugh at being called sweet! What was Yuri doing to her?
Her clubmate smiled and all of a sudden, Natsuki found one of the chocolate covered strawberries in her mouth. “Here, you should enjoy what you’ve made too,” Yuri said as she took another one off the tray for herself.
Natsuki couldn’t think at all. Yuri loved her strawberries… She couldn’t even convince herself that she wasn’t thrilled. She really had been trying to make her smile like that, right? Because making Yuri smile was the best victory she could get.
“I’m g-glad you like them,” Natsuki stammered out after she’d gotten her own strawberry down. “I’m glad…”
“Natsuki, I know how you feel,” Yuri began. “I’ve noticed you looking at me.”
“I don’t look at you!”, Natsuki exclaimed, her voice and brain finally getting back on the same page.
Yuri shook her head. “You don’t need to feel bad about it. It makes me happy, whenever I see you looking over at me while I’m reading.”
Her face burned as she struggled to keep eye contact with Yuri. She was smiling wider than she’d ever seen her before. Natsuki was almost certain that this was when the background would go all pink and sparkly if this were a manga. Her heart pounded as she realized what was going on.
“Hey, guys, guess who finally got here early!”, Sayori exclaimed, grinning proudly as she swung the door to the meeting room open.
Her eyes fell on a bizarre scene: Yuri and Natsuki were kissing rather intensely, a half eaten plate of chocolate strawberries beside them.
Sayori slammed the door back shut in embarrassment and ran off. Maybe she should just play Smash Bros until Monika got there…