Technical Difficulties (Brother's Conflict)

Chapter 14!

Guys i really don't understand the timeline for this show like I think the uh-wedding was in like late summer cause it was outside but that's literally episode three and then episode 4 starts at sOmE point and then its fucking Christmas so like im doing the best I can 

ಥ_ಥ ~Author losing her mind while doing this instead of her last coursework before her break

It had been about two weeks since the wedding, currently it was time for breakfast before the teenagers would be leaving for school. However, Ukyo took great care in noticing that Mei wasn't at the table even though she usually would have been much earlier. The two hadn't really spoken since the Wedding, though the situation wasn't hostile Ukyo still felt a bit guilty after what he had said. He turned to Ema, "Do you know if Mei is awake yet? If she doesn't come down soon she probably won't have enough time to eat breakfast.."

He took in the slightly exasperated look on Ema's face as she let out a sigh. "She's in a crunch right now to submit her work by the end of the week. I had gone in there to convince her to hurry up but she just shooed me out and said she was almost done. She'll probably just be a little late to school today or attempt to cram all of my notes tonight if she doesn't show."

Ukyo felt a bit taken aback at the news that Mei was the type of person to let work affect her studies and even her attendance at school. Yusuke chimed in, "Yeah now that you mention it she always used to have these spells where she'd look dead tired and then suddenly be late or absent for a day or two and then act like nothing happened. Everyone was theorizing she gets sick easily or something."

"Well now you know the secret is just pure procrastination." Ema laughed a bit at her own statement, slightly amused by the fact her sister never learns even though she does it everytime. 

"Now that you bring it up, what exactly is her profession? I've never gotten the chance to ask.."

"Oh-actually my sister is a mang-" A groan from the top of the stairs interrupted Ema and drew the attention to it, the original question forgotten. There was Mei, her shoulders slumped, her black oversized school sweater she rarely wore instead of her beige one now sliding off one of her shoulders. Ema recognized that the girl only wore that black sweater, which almost completely covered her hands, if she was at high risk to fall asleep in class. 

"Good mornin.." She dragged out her syllables to the point that the end of morning was barely an audible sound. As she came down the stairs it was now noticeable that one of her socks had completely slid down from its spot above her knee, adding even more to her disheveled appearance. She sat at the table with her eyes practically closed, leaning forward slowly like she was going to fall asleep from just sitting there. 

"Mei! Are you sure you should be coming to school today?" Ema looked sincerely worried now, usually the black haired girl would've stayed home if it was this bad. 

The teen in question suddenly sat straighter like having been brought out of a short nap, blinking furiously while picking up her utensils so she could begin her breakfast. "Mmmm, usually I'd stay home but I don't have too many more sick days I can claim before the school asks for real doctor's notes so I don't want to waste them if I'm still awake."

"Oi dumbass, I don't mean to rain on your parade but you're clearly not awake enough to even make it to school."

"Tomato, dear, I've been to school feeling worse-"

"Tomato?!"

"As I was saying, I also have an emergency item for this circumstance." Suddenly she pulled her bag onto her lap, reaching in almost her entire arm as though the school bag were a bottomless pit. She pulled out three energy drinks after a little difficulty, putting them in a line on the table. "See? Prepared."

She packed away two of them and cracked open the last one, trying to get a good amount of energy before trying to get to the station to go to school. Everyone was watching her with varying levels of concern and thorough exasperation, expecting her to drink it like a normal person. Instead of taking a normal sized drink, she simply chugged over half of it in one go, still looking apathetically tired as she brought the can away from her mouth. "Speaking of emergencies..aren't we all going to be late for the train soon?"

The other two teens froze, checking their phones in unison. "Ah! You're right!"

"Sorry Ukyo-nii we have to hurry!" Yusuke gulped down the last of his rise and began running up the stairs. Ema was about to follow suit but instead had to turn around and grab Mei's collar, now dragging the girl up the stairs with her since she still didn't have the motivation to move just yet. 

Ukyo watched after them with a slightly amused sigh before he looked at Mei's barely touched food. He knew she seemed to constantly have a very small appetite despite exercising, he'd seen the pull-up bar in her room, but anyone going without any breakfast was bound to have a hard day. He tried not to frown as he cleaned up their dishes, "She really needs to take better care of herself."

123

The day went by uneventfully, the trio still getting to school on time despite their late start. Mei had somehow made it through on just her energy drinks and propping her head up to force herself to look at the board, though she did end up sleeping dreamlessly through most of English. When the three finally got home, Ema and Mei were talking in the living room about some sort of game nonsense that was hard for even Mei to follow. 

Eventually, Tsubaki and Azusa joined them in the room. "How're my cute little sisters this evening?~"

He immediately glomped on to the closest girl, who happened to be the half asleep Mei. "Eh, the hell are you doing?"

She tried to push him off but instead it just came off as a limp sort of nudge to his chest with her hand. She made a few incomprehensible noises of annoyance before a yawn interrupted her grumbling and she practically would have fallen over if it weren't for the fact that Tsubaki was still hugging her. "You alright, Mei?"

Azusa spoke calmly from the other side of his brother, his hand itching to punch the idiot in the head but not wanting the silverette to take down the unsteady girl with him. "Mm, I'm just tired because my deadline was tonight so I stayed up and finished everything for work the past couple nights."

"You should really take better care of yourself." Tsubaki muttered while looking down at the girl in his arms who was still facing towards her sister rather than acknowledging him. 

"Oh right did you need something?" Tsubaki looked like he had been wounded by her cold response, finally releasing her to dramatically hold his chest. 

Before he could even start his complaints about Mei giving him a hard time, Azusa spoke up.  "Yes, actually. We wanted to invite you both to an event this weekend. We're going to be presenting one of the new games we're acting in and wanted you both to come see. As long as you're not busy of course."

"Oh this weekend huh? I'm not doing anything else..what about you Ema?"

"Hm?" Ema looked a bit startled as the conversation finally turned back to her, but she quickly responded. "I'd be happy to go too!"

"Alright then its a deal!" Tsubaki's bubbly nature returned.

"Yay.." An unenthusiastic cheer came from Mei as Tsubaki bounced back to hugging her in his excitement. 

'I really just want to sleep for the rest of time itself, but I guess this is fine' She let out a long sigh and allowed the silverette to continue holding her because she wasn't sure if she could stand still without falling over anymore. In fact...if horses can sleep standing up...she also would like to try that...

Guys my break finally starts now, not like it's going to be much different in terms of sleeping schedule or leaving the house but I finally no longer have to write about fucking classical literature so i'll take what I can get