My OC has a name! :D
It was twenty minutes past six. Atobe waited patiently as the waitress continued to blabber on about the main dish for the day. He stifled a sigh, but only as a sign of respect for the female across him.
Although she's clearly making it harder for him to do so.
"I'll just have a glass of coffee." She mumbled as she slammed the menu shut. "Lots of milk, lots of sugar, please."
At least she managed to say please, Atobe thought. He showed his signature smile and turned his attention to the waitress. "I'll have a cappuccino."
The waitress half-smiled. "Would that be all, sir?"
Seriously, who orders just coffee in an expensive Italian restaurant? "Yes, please. For now." He added the last bit just to appease her. This time, he didn't keep the sigh from coming as he leaned back on the couch and rested his hands on the table. He glanced at his watched and tried to mask the relief. Only 40 more minutes to go. The girl has a 7:00 curfew. A friggin' 7:00 curfew.
He silently thanked her dictator father. And her, of course, for being late.
Life in the university was already hard enough, and now his parents had to break this to him to make his life a little bit more miserable than it already was. Not that he's having a hard time with school, of course. Things had just gotten busier for him during the past few months—heck, years—with school, with tennis and a lot all else. He never really got to spend much time on pondering about stuffs like the one at hand.
He almost didn't notice her fingers drumming annoyingly on the wooden table. He kept his eyes on her as he idly thought of ways to make her stop.
At least, she's pretty.
"At least, you're cute."
He blinked, his train of thought slightly rattled. "Excuse me?"
She stopped all of a sudden, her eyes addressing him real quick. "It would've doubled my misery if you looked like one of those spoiled, cocky half-wits in school."
"You seem to hate your school quite a bit."
He couldn't detect any expression on her face at all, but he knew there was humor in her eyes no matter how hard she tried to hide it. "Not the school; the people." She looked at him swiftly. "No offense."
Atobe felt slightly appeased. It was cute to hear a schoolgirl call him cute. Though her little quip about his alma mater did quite sting. "Well, then I suppose you're now re-thinking your stand regarding this whole arrangement?"
Her face remained passive. "Not quite. You'd have to do better than that." She kept her gaze on him, but there was now a mocking look in her eyes. "But I doubt you'd try to do any better now considering the fact that you're also against this whole idea."
He held her gaze for a few moments before he finally spoke, "You're right."
Half a minute later, the waitress arrived with their glasses of coffee. They sipped their glasses in silence, Atobe absent-mindedly fixing his eyes on her. He watched as she frowned slightly, pouring yet another tablespoon-full of sugar on her seemingly tasteless treat.
How the hell do you strike a conversation with a seventeen-year old? At twenty, he seemed to have forgotten how being seventeen felt like. His life as a high school tennis champion seemed like a long time ago.
He felt a sudden rush of nostalgia as he unconsciously pondered upon this.
"Your beloved school is in good hands," he heard her say. She seemed to have a habit of interrupting his thoughts. "If that's what you're thinking."
"Oh, not at all," he replied. "I was wondering how your coffee could get any sweeter."
"Oh," she gazed at him briefly then chuckled quietly. "I'm a sucker for sweets. Funny, I actually thought my mom was gonna tell your mom that I like sweets. That way it's gonna be a little bit easier for you, don't you think?"
He smirked. He found the whole thing funny. Their date, the fixed marriage and how sarcastic they're both treating the whole thing.
"Yeah, I probably should've listened."
"My mom told me you like Greek drama."
"And I suppose you hate it."
She shrugged as she stirred her cup, "not really. Just not that familiar with it. I hate Greek history though. I was really bad at it last year."
Atobe felt content enough. Although she was still looking bored and PMS-y, at the very least, they were having a decent enough conversation. He took another sip of his coffee as he thought of all the possible scenarios their 'date' could've turned out to be, considering how much they both hated the arranged marriage, their parents and, probably, each other.
He just wanted to get this date over with.
There was a moment of silence as they took a sip of their coffees, both seemingly intent on finishing their cups and dragging out the time. He stared outside and saw the first drops of what could turn out to be a heavy rainfall. He frowned as he thought of how he was going to get her home nice and dry. He was sure he didn't have any umbrella in the car, and he doubted she even brought any. Not to mention that the car was parked a long way from the main entrance.
But then there's a far more pressing dilemma at hand. He knitted his eyebrows. If it really came to it, he'd end up talking about the weather.
He was getting bored.
When he couldn't take it any longer, he fixed his eyes on her and was the first one to speak.
"What are you thinking?" he asked, rather impatiently, though he ended it with a tiny smile to mask his inexplicable annoyance. He wondered if he was the PMS-y one.
Her lips curled upward slightly, but she wasn't looking. She was running her index finger at the rim of her glass. Her eyes never revealed anything about her mood. Finally, she raised her gaze to meet his.
"My mother said that you're quite impatient," she said unapologetically, the tone of her voice dropping not a single hint of empathy. "She watched one of your games back when you were still in high school."
"Which one?"
She shrugged. "I don't know. I wasn't listening very well."
He thought about it for a moment, maintaining a neutral expression. "But that was a long time ago."
"It's not that long. You're in college."
"But that was a few years back. People change."
There was a slight pause, and she seemed to be contemplating about it for a second. Finally, she just shrugged it off.
"Whatever. As I was saying, my mom told me that you are impatient. Or maybe you were."
He grinned in acknowledgment.
"What else?"
"She said that I should strike a conversation with you as gaily as I can." A smile crept up to his face. "She even bought me this Tennis magazine so we could have something to talk about."
He laughed. A brief, genuine one that made her smile, though she quickly dropped it as soon as she realized what she was grinning at. She could see the amusement in his eyes.
"Look, I'm not good at this," she propped her elbows on the table and leaned in closer, "I just wanted to show you how boring I am so you'll, perhaps, beg your parents to not marry me anymore. I have no idea how you're gonna do it, but I trust that you will."
He smirked and eyed her evenly.
"For someone who's so against this whole thing, you're making it quite more entertaining than you probably should, you know?"
She shot him a glance then smiled. "Alright, then I'll make it less entertaining: I don't want to marry you."
Testy. Atobe gave her a lop-sided grin and leaned forward as well. "I thought we've already established that even before our conversation started?"
She grinned. "Right."
"So you want me to beg my parents to call of this engagement?"
"Yes. Perhaps they'd listen to you. Mine won't. They've seen how much I hated this."
"Well, maybe your hate wasn't enough."
"That's why I was trying to make you hate it even more."
He laughed again. "Don't worry. You did a good job." She nodded in approval. "And I plan on marrying someone of average social skills, thank you very much."
She smiled wider, seemingly letting the insult pass. "Good. You know, I like you quite a lot."
"And you're actually not half as bad."
She nodded. "Too bad we don't want to marry each other."
He took a sip of his coffee. "Just out of curiosity, tell me: am I not your type?"
"Not really. I don't have a type."
Atobe looked at her disbelievingly. "You don't?"
She looked sideways and seemed to be thinking of what she just said. "I don't. I'll marry the newspaper boy if I want to."
He smiled crookedly. "I figured you would," he remarked, and she seemed to have dismissed the subject with the faraway look in her eyes.
Nobody spoke for a moment or two, until finally he said, knitting his eyebrows, "There must be someone, for sure."
She looked at him questioningly. "What, you don't believe me?"
"Not one bit."
She shrugged, "I can't afford to have a type when it takes effort for people to even like me."
He thought for a moment. "Well, you may have a point." Another sip. "But that's sad. How could that be?"
"I don't know." Her smile was dry and mirthless, yet she looked at him knowingly, at Atobe whose looks and status probably never made him feel that way. "I guess people think I'm all serious and uptight. Of course, not." Her smiled faltered as she took a sip of her coffee. "Look, I even got a joke for you."
Atobe looked at her and thought about it for a moment.
"OK, well let's see it."
"Alright," she cleared her throat and showed him her index finger. "What's this?"
He stared at it and narrowed his eyes. "A stick?"
"No, it's a spear." She then started shaking her hand and Atobe watched as her index finger wiggled.
"Now what's this?"
He shrugged. "I have no idea."
"It's a shake-spear."
Atobe smirked and shook his head. "That was the worst joke I have ever heard."
The girl stifled her laughter, and feigned annoyance as she glared at him dangerously. "Oh come on, you laughed."
"I was laughing at the fact that you found it ridiculously funny."
She continued glaring at him, but only for a short moment before she broke into a round of laughter. Atobe couldn't help but smile. He couldn't figure out the overall mood of their conversation.
Their laughter gradually subsided, and the awkwardness once again started settling. Though they both wouldn't call it 'awkward,' they tried not to care any less. He slowly moved his gaze towards her, wondering what she could be thinking right now.
To his surprise, she was also staring back. He locked his eyes with her, and he grinned.
"OK, so let's talk about tennis."
She grinned back. "Alright, that's what my mom would've expected."
"So you'll have something to report back."
"And that would make her happy."
He nodded in amusement. "I'm not sure you'd like to talk about tennis though, considering that you don't know anything about it. And I really doubt you studied that magazine of yours."
She chuckled. "You guessed right."
"How about you tell me something about yourself?"
"Oh, typical date topics." She grinned. "That's cliché, and it's boring."
"Which is good, right?" his smile grew bigger. "We have to add more to that hate."
There was a glint in her eyes, and she nodded knowingly. "Right. Good. OK, so my friends call me Ai, and I like the color orange. I am allergic to shrimp, deep sea fish and a lot of other sea products. I also like martial arts movies and horror." She looked at him expectantly. "I hope that bores you."
"It does, believe me." He looked rather amused and thoughtful. "Though it makes me wonder, why orange?"
She was slightly startled by the question, as if he just said something out of script. "Oh. 'Cause it's the color of sunset. I like sunsets."
Atobe caught the momentary lapse and cocked his head to one side. "You didn't like my question?"
"No. It's just that you were the first one to ask me that. It's just weird, that's all." They both let it pass.
"Anyway," Atobe started. "Ai doesn't quite suit you."
"It doesn't? Well, what kind of name might be right for me?"
"Let's see. You look more like a Yuki."
"Yuki. . . like 'snow'?"
"Like 'snow.' Cold, hard snow."
She laughed.
"OK, if you prefer Yuki, then it's your call. Your turn."
"Alright. I'm all about tennis. No girlfriend, no nicknames, no food allergies. Nothing else but tennis."
She looked appeased. "That's boring."
He smiled wholly; amusement in his eyes. "That's heart-breaking."
It was 7:25 by the time they finished. She panicked when she thought about her dad and how his face would be all red with anger. She walked towards the door with purpose and grumbled as she looked outside. Atobe caught up to her and saw the reason for her sudden PMS-ing.
It was still raining. Atobe's former dilemma had come back to haunt him.
"My dad's going to kill me," she said under her breath, looking like a child denied of her treat.
"Don't worry," he reassured her. "I'll tell your dad we had such a good time."
Hearing the warmth in his voice made her smile, and she tried to avoid looking at him. Indeed, she had a good time. A whole lot better than she expected.
"Tell me: did you have a good time?" she asked, looking away, surprised at herself for even asking the question. She felt his eyes searching her face, but she didn't dare look.
"I did."
When she looked up, he had a faraway look in his eyes. She couldn't tell if he was telling the truth, but then he looked down at her suddenly and nodded. Solemnly, sincerely—she didn't know. "I really did," he repeated.
She looked away, but he could tell she was happy. "That's not good."
He ducked his head, but not before she saw his mouth move, the beginning of a smile.
A/N: According to Yahoo! Answers, yuki means 'snow,' or something like that. And ai means love~
I honestly don't know what to do with this. It's just something random I've thought about.