Chapter 1:

Who Knew Getting an A was Such Hard Work


L.A.: We're back

Amu: For realz this time.

L.A.: I'm L.A. writer and host

Amu: And I'm Amu her muse and antagonizer.

L.A.: So, I wasn't going to come back to the Yu Yu world for a long while

Amu: as in a few years

L.A.: but the other day a plot bunny came from nowhere, latched onto my face, and wouldn't stop screaming write me until I agreed to do so.

Amu: Seriously, the plot bunny was intense.

L.A.: So, here you go. A brand new story from yours truly. Just a heads up, this has nothing to do with Pencils and Paintbrushes. So don't confuse the two. That is all. Now enjoy!

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Yu Hakusho. Seriously, I should though. Especially since I was attacked by a plot bunny.


I was lost in his eyes. Our souls were one. It was as if he understood me. I leaned in and…

"Puked from the sheer stupidity of this writing," Cora muttered as she wrote a comment on the side of the paper she was reading.

Cora hated creative writing class. The assignments didn't make sense and, according to her teacher and fellow peers, she wrote horribly. Of course she wouldn't have even been in the class if it hadn't have been for her best friend, Mina. She remembered the day that led to her downfall all too well.

"Please, Cora," Mina had said. Her short black hair and bright green eyes gave her almost a puppy dog look when she wanted something. And, she was really using it to her advantage. "I've always wanted to take creative writing. I won't know anyone in the class and you have free period during that time. So, why can't you?"

"Because I suck at creative writing," Cora said.

"I bet you're not that bad," Mina said.

Cora's eyes narrowed. "In second grade, we were required to write a short story. I wrote one about a dog. I got a C because according to my professor I didn't try. You don't give a second grader a C unless you think they suck. Sad thing was that I worked all night on that story."

Mina laughed sheepishly. "Well, that was then. You've grown a lot since then. I bet you're ten times better."

She wasn't sure how, but Mina had miraculously persuaded her to join the class. Just as Cora had predicted, she was failing miserably.

Their new assignment besides editing each others' works was to write about a place or thing that inspired their writing. At lunch that day, Mina started to gush over the millions of different places she loved to write about and the people who inspired her. Cora, on the other hand, came up with a big fat nothing.

"Just go somewhere were you feel comfortable writing," Mina had said. "I bet your muse will find you there."

So, Cora had decided on a small quant café a couple of minutes away from her house when she left school that day.

After correcting a couple of pieces and paying for a piece of cake, Cora sat down at a table with a pen poised over a blank sheet of paper waiting for inspiration to hit her.

Once again, she was left with a big fat nothing.

So, like most writers who are in denial of their writer's block, Cora allowed her attention to focus on something else, namely her reflection in the napkin suspensor in front of her.

She was average looking for a fifteen year old. She had straight brown hair that fell to her shoulders and her eyes were blue. Of course most people didn't even know her eye color due to her glasses covering them.

Cora scrunched her nose in disgust. When she was young, she had had a serious eye infection that nearly caused her to go blind.

Her ophthalmologist had tried everything to save her eyes. As a last resort, he performed a risky operation. By some miracle, she survived and ended up gaining all of her eyesight back.

The only side effect was that her eyes would always retain a sensitivity to changes in light. Because of this, Cora was required to wear rose-tinted glasses.

I actually do see the world through rose-colored glasses, Cora thought. Mina said it made her look artsy. Cora thought it made her look like an idiot.

She let out a yawn. Trying to think of something to write about could be tiring.

She took off her glasses so that she could rub her eyes. What she wouldn't give to have some inspiration. As she opened her eyes again, she found herself gazing out the window. Her eyes widened as she noticed a strange passer-by.

A dog was busy bobbing and weaving through the crowd. It looked like a golden retriever with gray fur. It paused for a moment to glance at the café. Its head was cocked and, if Cora didn't know better, she would have thought it was reading the specials of the day.

Seconds later, it turned its attention back to the sidewalk and began to walk away.

Fascinated with her new discovery, Cora quickly packed her belongings and headed for the door. Her hand reached out for the door handle when an important thought occurred to her.

She needed to put her glasses back on. She silently thanked her memory as she put her glasses back on. If she hadn't remembered, then her eyes would have when she went out into the sun and the sudden change in light caused her eyes to feel as if they were on fire.

She quickly went out the door to chase after the strange dog only to run into someone.

"Sorry," Cora mumbled as she readjusted her glasses.

"Cora?" a male voice said. "I'm sorry, I didn't see you there."

"It's fine," her eyes widened as she saw who it was. "Shuichi?"

Shuichi Minamino, the boy in every girl's dream at Mioh Private Academy. Although she wasn't necessarily attracted to him, she could see why the girls would fawn over him. He was handsome to begin with and with his long red hair accenting his bright green eyes, she wouldn't be surprised if he turned out to be a model.

She realized she had been staring at him in confusion for several seconds so she quickly said. "You didn't happen to see a gray dog pass by, did you?"

"I don't think so," Shuichi said.

Cora sighed as she looked around. The dog was long gone. "Darn it."

"I'm sorry," Shuichi said politely.

"It's not your fault," Cora said. She waved as she began to walk away. "See you around."

Shuichi waved back as he continued walking the other way.

It sure was strange running into Mioh's most wanted boy, Cora thought. She paused as she glanced back at his retreating form, frowning. Come to think of it, what's he doing here? Doesn't he live on the other side of town?

She shrugged the thought off as she continued to walk. She had other thoughts to worry about, namely her creative writing assignment. The image of the gray dog popped in her head. The more she thought about it, the more she realized she wanted to write about the dog.

"Why not," Cora said to herself. "With my track record, it wouldn't hurt."


Several days later, Cora found herself shifting nervously in her seat. While her teacher prattled away about the mechanics for good writing, Cora was thinking about her creative writing assignment. For once, she actually felt like she had written a good piece.

Finally, the teacher began to hand back their assignments. Cora crossed her fingers under her desk as the teacher reached her.

The teacher looked her up and down, placed her paper on Cora's desk, and said. "I look forward to reading more from you."

Glancing down, Cora couldn't believe her eyes. She had gotten an A-.

As the teacher continued to pass out papers, Mina leaned over and whispered. "So, how did you do?"

Cora held up her paper proudly for Mina to see.

"Congrats," Mina said.

"What about you?" Cora asked.

Mina held up her paper. Naturally, she had an A+.

Well, Cora hadn't expected to become an awesome writer overnight. At least she was finally in the A range.

As Cora told her congrats, the teacher went back to the center of the room.

"Class," she said, "we will continue with your writing assignment. I want you to expand on your inspirations. Please submit a two page excerpt to me delving deeper into your inspirations by Friday."

The bell rang and everyone began to pack up and leave….well, almost everyone.

Cora was still glued to her seat as her face went pale. "Shit."

"What's wrong?" Mina asked as she slung her backpack over her shoulder. "You've finally found your muse."

"My muse happens to be a random dog I saw walking down the street," Cora said as she banged her head lightly against her desk.

"What?" Mina said, her eyes wide with disbelief. "You just chose a random thing to write about? What were you thinking?"

"I didn't think this was going to be a multiple assignment thing," Cora said as she stood up and grabbed her bag. "What am I going to do?"

"You can always make it up," Mina said.

Cora gave her a look. "You do realize this is me we're talking about."

"Well, then, you need to find that dog," Mina said.

Cora smacked her forehead as she groaned. She either failed or she'd find the dog. "I guess I know what I'm doing this afternoon."


It was around five in the afternoon and Cora was irritated. She had spent all day after school searching for the dog and all she accomplished was becoming soaked in sweat and utterly tired.

As she walked into a park, she took the opportunity to plop down in a nearby bench.

"I must be desperate," Cora said with a slight laugh. "I'm looking for a phantom dog in a city." Her glasses fogged up, so she took them off to clean them. Thankfully, her glasses had already helped her eyes mostly adjust to the sunlight so she only felt slight pain as they finished adjusting.

As she cleaned her glasses, she took the opportunity to look around the park. It was very rare that she took her glasses off outside. Her eyes usually wouldn't have time to adjust to the sun's strong light and generally caused her severe pain. Whenever her eyes did behave, she took advantage of it. It was nice, every once and awhile to see the world as it was without the rose tinged lens.

Her gaze traveled over to the park bench across from her and froze.

Sitting on the bench was the gray dog. It was also looking around. Its gaze stopped abruptly at her. It cocked its head as it stared at her.

Unconsciously, Cora cocked her head back.

They stared at each other for a few more seconds before the dog began to shift back and forth.

It quickly hopped off the bench. It began to trot away only to pause for a moment to throw a backwards glance at her before continuing on its way.

Immediately, Cora was on her feet. She wasn't about to let this opportunity pass her by.

As she hurried after the dog, she slipped on her glasses.

The dog vanished.

Cora paused in her walking as she looked around. There was no way the dog could have gotten away that fast.

As she stood there, a thought occurred to her. She took off her glasses bracing herself for the pain she knew was coming.

Once her eyes refocused, she could see the dog again. It was almost to the fork in the paths.

Cora slipped her glasses back on then took them off quickly.

The dog disappeared only to reappear when she took her glasses off.

"Weird," Cora said. She didn't have long to dwell on that though because the dog had just turned left and was out of her eyesight.

She hurried after it, praying that it wouldn't be distracted by a squirrel and bolt before she could find it.

As she rounded the corner, she was immediately tackled by a blur.

Wide-eyed, Cora found herself staring into the face of the dog and it looked angry.

Snarling, the dog leaned closer to her face. "Why the hell are you following me?"

Cora squeaked. She couldn't have heard the dog talk. The male voice she had heard had to have come from her imagination.

The dog cocked his head to one side. "So, you can see me even though I am invisible… interesting." To her horror, the dog grinned evilly. "Too bad I have to kill you now. I just can't let the spirit detective find me yet."

A vine burst out from the ground towering above them.

The dog turned back to look at it with his eyes narrowed. "Shit."

Thorns appeared on the vine as it suddenly lurched forward.

Cora closed her eyes. "This can't be real. This can't be real." Just when she thought the vine would hit her, she was suddenly overcome with the feeling of weightlessness.

Opening her eyes, she found herself staring into the face of a handsome boy with short gray hair and bright blue eyes. He was holding her bridle style.

"Damn fox," the boy muttered. "Must have known I'd come to the park eventually."

Cora turned her attention away from the boy and back to the plant. To her surprise, they were currently twenty feet in the air with the vine trying desperately to reach them.

Cora yelped as she quickly buried her face in the boy's chest.

"Geez human, chill," the boy said as fell back to the ground and landed on his feet. "It ain't even after you."

He set her behind him. Holding out his right hand to his side, a long silver sword materialized in his hand. "Stay here," he said as he brandished his sword. "I have some weed whacking to do."

As he charged towards the vine, Cora noticed there was something off about her savior. For one thing, he had dog ears on top of his head and a gray fluffy tail.

"No way," Cora said as she shook her head. "That only happens in movies." Then again, she had just met a talking dog and been attacked by a giant vine. She was starting to think that anything was possible.

With one swift fluid motion, the boy cut the vine down the middle. It landed with a loud thunk on the ground. It flopped a couple of times before shriveling up and dying.

As Cora continued to stare at the vine carcass, the boy dematerialized his sword.

With his hands crossed, he stood in front of her and said. "Now, tell me why I shouldn't just kill you right now?"

Cora gawked at him as her brain tried to scramble around for words. "How…what?"

"I'm the dog demon, Atolla," the boy said through clinched teeth. "If you were following me, then you must be after me. I already have the spirit detective and his cronies on my tail. I don't need anyone else."

"Look," Cora said, finally finding her voice. "I was just looking for a gray dog I saw yesterday by the café downtown. I was doing a writing assignment and writing about it got me an A."

"That was me," he smirked, "so I'm your muse, huh?"

Cora bit back the sarcastic remark that was working its way up her throat. The last thing she needed was to give the demon more of a reason to kill her.

He studied her for a moment. "I'll make a deal with you," he said. "What I did just now is probably going to send the spirit detective running in this direction. I need a place to lie low, collect my thoughts, and plan my next course of action." He paused. "In exchange for sparing your life, you'll let me stay at your house."

"What?" Cora said. "No way. I live with my parents. There's no way they'll…"

"I'll be in my dog form," Atolla said, sounding slightly impatient. "It hides my spirit energy and will keep your parents from being suspicious."

"B-but," Cora whimpered.

"All I want is food and board," Atolla held his hands out. "Besides, why are you complaining? You get to keep your life and get your muse." He grinned at her. "Don't you want to get your A?"

And that was how Cora found herself that evening introducing her parents to her new pet dog, Atolla.

Suddenly, surviving creative writing class didn't seem like her only problem this school year.


L.A.: And that's the end of the first chapter.

Amu: Dang, and you thought I was a ridiculous muse.

L.A.: Anyway, just so you know, I don't have a set goal for when I'm updating. My top priority is Can I Keep You? since it is only a few chapters from being done. Though, considering how ridiculously aggressive this plot bunny is, it will probably be sooner. Plus the reviews help. Anyway, you know what to do. READ and REVIEW!