Arcade Games
Klaroline One-shot
Third Person POV
Caroline wrings her hands as she stands by the pool table. Does Tyler know which route to take? She wonders. Caroline texted Tyler this morning, wanting to know if he was up for a date tonight. Some would say that she was tactless, for it was only two days ago that Klaus, the original pain-in-her-behind drowned Tyler's mom, the Mayor. Caroline simply wanted to know if her boyfriend wanted to get out of the house. Play some games, have a good night. That is precisely why she did not tell him to meet her at the Grill, far too boring. Everybody would be there, people would stop, give Tyler their sympathies, interrupt their night. And of course, he would probably be there. She texted Tyler the details, instructing him to meet her at Ralph's Game Centre, just outside Mystic Falls. She sighs as she checks her phone. They agreed to meet here at seven o'clock, but it is now half past. She decides to call him.
"Tyler, hay, where are you? Must I send the GPS co-ordinates again?" Caroline asks, nervously shifting her legs.
"Oh, hay Care. Yeh, sorry to tell you, but I have to stay in. Massive econ test tomorrow." He told her.
"That never stopped you before."
"I really have to study tonight. Sorry, babe, rain check on the date night?" Tyler asks.
"Yeh, sure, we can take a rain check on this date. I'll go home now. Can I help you study?" Caroline asks.
"Caroline, you'll distract me, but thanks for asking. I'll see you tomorrow, bye." Tyler puts the phone down before Caroline could say 'I love you'. Suddenly, a noise that only her vampire senses could pick up comes from behind her. She whips around; her blonde, wavy hair bounces on her shoulders.
"Hallo, love."
Caroline POV
"Hallo love. " Klaus' seductive accent greets me
"Klaus, hi." I shake the thought that his accent is seductive out of my mind.
"What are you doing here?" I ask him.
"I could ask you the same thing."
"You first." I cross my arms.
"Well, I was cruising around in my car, looking for a place to have fun tonight and I came across this. I half came up with the idea of an arcade game." He looks at the arcade games wistfully, and then turned back to me.
"What about you, love?"
"Tyler and I were supposed to go on a date tonight, but he has an Econ test, so he is studying alone. I was just about to go home." I sigh, really wanting to spend time on the games.
"Why don't you stay here?" he asks me.
"Well, because I'll be alone, and I just don't wanna be alone." I sigh.
"You won't be alone. I will be here, we could hang out tonight." He looks
at me, smirking.
"I don't think so." I pick up my bag and make to walk out.
"Caroline, love, I can see that you secretly desire to play these arcade games, as do I. Why don't we make a deal? We have fun tonight, play a few games. Maybe with one game, if you win, I won't bother you for one day. If I win, I can take you out for a date." I look at him, considering the idea.
"If I win, you won't bother me for a week."
"Three days, I won't live if I could not bother you for seven days."
"Five days, Klaus, take it or leave it." He smirks and holds out his hand. I glance down at it.
"In some countries, when somebody offers their hand in this manner after proposing a deal, you usually shake the hand." I roll my eyes and take his hand in mine. His hand is rough, as if he's done a lot of hard work in his life. His skin is golden, but well-looked after.
"Well, I suppose I could stay away from you for three days. Shall we explore the building?" he asks and holds his arm out to me. I blink slowly and then place my hand on his arm. He steers me to an old arcade game, labeled: 'Puckman'.
"Ah, Puckman, quite the original game." Klaus looks fondly at the game. I furrow my brow.
"Isnt it called 'Pacman'?"
"When it was first invented, it was 'Puckman', but then they changed it."
"Why?" I ask, confused.
"Well, sweetheart, with 'Puckman', one can often get confused. If one is in an arcade arena like this, well, its loud, humans will easily confuse it with the letter 'f', change the P to F...so it sounds..." Klaus stops and feeds a slot that is right there by the game with rolls of notes and coins just keep coming out from the bottom.
"How many did you put in there?" I ask, surprised.
"About 1 000 dollars." Klaus does not even look hindered by the fact that he put in such a lot of money.
"1 000 dollars!" I shout, "That's a lot, don't you think?"
"If you want, I could always put in more." He makes to push another roll in notes in there.
"No, no, its fine." I quickly out my hand on his arm. It's surprisingly warm and muscular. He looks at me from under his eyelids and I start to blush slowly. Spinning on the spot to face the games, I say:
"So, which arcade game should we try first?"
"Well, first we should probably take the coins." Klaus takes a container that lies there by the coin machine.
"Why don't we try: Puckman first? You can go, ladies first and everything." Klaus tells me. I shrug and reach for a coin to prop into the machine. Klaus props one in after me and presses the 'Multi-player' button. He chooses the blue ghost, (Inky) and I chose the Pac, the main player. The other ghosts are played by the computer. We start the game and I move around the screen, attempting to collect the small items and avoid the ghosts. The other ghosts run around, not really trying to catch me, while Klaus deliberately runs after me. I reach one of the fruits that enable me to eat the ghosts. I then eat the red ghost and run around some more.
"So, Klaus, why did you choose the blue ghost?" I quickly tap a button, just missing the yellow ghost.
"Well, blue is my favourite colour." We look at each other, my fingers are still on the buttons, his are absentmindedly moving his. He's staring at me, or rather my light blue eyes. The machine beeps in an upward and downward sound. I break eye contact with him and look back at the screen. Klaus' blue ghost reached my player and eaten him.
"Klaus, you distracted me!" he laughs a deep-throated chuckle which is very contagious.
"Come on, Caroline. Let us move on to the next game." He says, we take the tokens that spew out of the machine. We play a few more games and then reach an air hockey table. A young boy of about six is there, watching the board with a wistful look. He has pitch-black long hair and these beautiful sea-green eyes. I crouch down beside him and ask:
"What's your name?"
"Peter."
"Are you going to play, Peter?" I place my hands on my knees.
"I would very much like to, but I don't know how." His adorable squeaky voice makes Klaus crouch down beside me and ask in a surprisingly kind voice:
"I could teach you, my name's Klaus and this breathtaking woman over here is Caroline. She will stand there and we could team up and take her on. How does that sound?" his eyes wrinkle up in a smile, Peter nods.
Klaus pulls up a chair that is by one of the other games, picks Peter up, puts him on the chair and stands behind him. I walk to the other side of the table and insert two coins.
"Okay, Peter. All you have to do is hold the paddle and when the puck comes toward you, you have to hit the puck very hard, try to get it in, like this." I punch in '10', the total amount of goals and look up, just in time to see the puck glide toward me. I hit the puck back to Klaus, Peter's little hands are on the paddle and Klaus' are on top of his. We play like this for a bit, and then Klaus takes his hand off Peter's and tells him to try it. Peter sticks out his tongue in concentration and hits the puck. I slyly let my paddle move to the side, letting Peter score a goal. The game beeps, and lights flash over by Peter's side.
"Peter, you won!" Klaus grabs him and twirls him around. Peter giggles and soon we are all laughing.
"Peter, there you are!" a relieved voice reaches our ears. We look around, a middle-aged couple stands there, with a small container with very few tokens in and no coins. They must be ready to leave.
Klaus puts Peter back to the ground and he runs to his parents.
"Mommy, mommy, can we play a few more games?" his mom picks him up and says softly, trying not to let us hear.
"No, honey, we don't have more coins."
"Why don't you buy some?" he asks.
"We don't have money." Peter's face falls. Klaus scoops up about 5 coins and hands them over to me. He then gives Peter's father the container full of coins and a few rolls of tokens.
"Here, have it on us, mate." The man looks at us.
"Oh, mommy, daddy, this is Klaus and that's Caroline, Klaus taught me how to play this game." Peter grins at us.
"Are you sure?" Peter's dad asks Klaus, gesturing down at the container.
"Yeh, have a great night further. You have a very cute son." I say to them, stepping up beside Klaus.
"Thank you, you two make a very cute couple." Peter's mom tells me. Klaus looks back at me, his mouth quirked up into a sexy smirk and his one eyebrow raised. My cheeks start to blush and I stare wide-eyed at the parents.
"Oh, we're not, together or anything." I say slowly, Peter's mom is confused.
"I could have sworn you looked like you were together. Oh well, have a nice night!" they walk off and I try to get my blush back into control.
"Well, that was...riveting." Klaus says.
"To say the least. Oh, they have a karaoke machine!" I take Klaus' hand without really thinking about it and lead him over to the machine.
"Hay, you wanna battle?" a girl about 17 asks me, leaning over the railing in front of the game.
"Sure, but I choose the song." I say, the girl shrugs and I take two coins from Klaus.