Crush Sold Separately

By Luvracci

A/N: This is my first Yu Yu Hakusho fic! I've always admired Kurama, his speech, his personality—so this is mainly a KuramaxOC fic, with slight KuramaxBotan. The tense of the story switches from present to past, and so on. (My dad just read over my shoulder, and I had to tell him that "Minamino" was a product.) Enough said. Enjoy!

Ayumi Sato's POV

God, I thought, what the hell am I doing?

It was pretty obvious: I was on my first blind date. The official Blind Date. Yes, I know it's a huge turnoff for guys when girls act too nervous, but I just don't know how to play it cool. You see, I'm waiting for the guy to arrive, and I don't even know what he looks like. My girlfriends set him up with me, thinking that a boy would relieve of whatever stress I was carrying around. ("Ayumi, there are bags under your eyes...Ayumi, have you talked with any guys recently?...Ayumi, some of us feel that it's now or never.") So they set me up with some random boy from another school in the Tokyo district, make me stand next to the entrance at the mall, and duck inside a nearby store to spy on our "date."

I'm so nervous that I'm starting to think about running away, but I know that my friends are attentively watching me from the glass window. I look over, and there they are, standing next to a mannequin and waving to me. It warms my heart that they think this is so funny, it really does. I glare at them and mouth, When is he coming?

He should be here by now, the rightmost girl, Shizumi, mouths back. She was the one who came up with the plan and she has reassured me that he's good-looking and funny and totally laid-back, so I shouldn't be worried. "I showed him a picture of you on my cell," she said, "and he thinks you're really cute."

I had scoffed, almost amused by the idea, saying, "You're just saying that. And there's no way I'm going on a blind date."

"No, it's true! I swear, you'll really like him and he already likes you. Besides, a lot of guys at our school have crushes on you, so what have you got to lose?"

I grumbled, then sighed. "If I agree to this, would you stop bugging me?"

"Yes!"

Remembering this flashback, I think of how un-amusing it is now, and glare at her. Yeah, I don't see her sweating her make-up off. I should set her up with someone as payback, right after I deal with the current situation. Then, all of a sudden, the three of my friends start waving frantically. I look over at them, and follow the direction of their fingers. To my horror, there was my date, casually strolling in through the glass doors. We make eye contact and he smiles brusquely, then looks straight ahead of him and keeps on walking.

Puzzled, I look at my friends, who are all hysterically mouthing different things. I concentrate on what Shizumi's trying to say, and it seems like she's saying something like: Go talk to him! Go talk to him! I fix my outfit, which was my school uniform (navy miniskirt and white blouse), one last time, then pass the other people and catch up to him.

"Um, hi," I said, tapping on his shoulder. I smiled, hoping it was one of those lazy, sexy ones that disguised my nervousness.

He turned around. Damn, he was cute! He had large eyes with clear skin, and had gorgeous brown hair that was cut J-pop style, right down to the slanting bangs. He could be one of those singers in KAT-TUN, maybe a long-lost brother of Jin Akanishi. My heart basically did a back flip in my ribcage. Caught off-guard, he raises his eyebrows, then smiles. "Hi."

I can feel my heartbeat pacing faster. I have never talked to such a cute boy from such a close distance, and this fact didn't help me at all. But seeing his smile and hearing his welcome, I ask with regained confidence, "Ryuuchi?"

"Ryuuchi?" he echoes, furrowing his brows, and I am momentarily stunned. But he was the one my friends were pointing at. As soon as he walked in, they started jabbing in his direction. Wait, Shizumi did say that his name was Ryuuchi, right? I stare at him, and he is trying to avoid my astonished eyes.

"Uh," I stuttered, "you're not him?"

"Nope, sorry." He looks around, then looks at his feet, then looks back at me only to quickly look away again.

And then it hit me. Oh, fuck.

He was Ryuuchi. The only reason why he denied it was because he didn't like what he saw—me. All feelings of attraction toward him vanished and anger took its place. I crossed my arms and hissed, "You must think I climb over chain link fences to see the other side, don't you?"

This time, there was no mistaking it: he looked up and his face turned red, red from guilt. He pushed his bangs away from his eyes—a move that I usually found sexy, but now I was just pissed off—and he said, "I'm really sorry, but I just...uh, I mean...you're really pretty, just like your picture, but I thought you would be..."

"Be what? You thought I would be what?"

"...Skinnier," he finished, cringing his shoulders.

I was so shocked that my mouth flung open. My reaction seemed to make him fidget even more, and he quickly added, "I mean, you're really cute, but I'd prefer someone more petite—like, skinnier and shorter...obviously, you're not fat or anything, but I like smaller girls."

"Skinnier?" What did he want, a pipe cleaner? I was probably one of the lankiest girls in my class! If I lost any more body fat, people usually told me, I would officially be ranked underweight. And as for my height—I was taller than average Japanese girls, just a little, but he was making me feel like Goliath the Giant.

"You wouldn't understand," he said, shrugging again.

"Do you like anorexic girls?" I could feel other people's stares on me, but I couldn't stop. "This is ridiculous!"

"No, no, of course not. I mean, I like girls with a smaller body size so I can feel bigger," he said, pressing for the logical side of the argument. "I like making girls feel petite. And, well, you're not so petite. You're probably, what, only half an inch shorter than me?"

"So you're saying that you don't like me because not only am I too fat, but I'm too tall," I stated flatly. If I had heat vision, he'd be melting away before my eyes. But he wasn't.

"Listen," he said, this time with more firmness, "I wasn't trying to insult you or make you feel fat. Why don't we hang out here for a little while, since you and I are already here? It'd be a waste to let a Friday afternoon go."

I recognized the tone in his voice. I couldn't believe it, the freak was actually starting to pity me. "No, thanks," I said icily. "I have to go." With that, I turned and left pro-diet pill boy to scavenger hunt for his next victim. Still fuming, I walked into the store that my friends were hiding and, as I suspected, they had seen the whole thing.

"Oh my god," Shizumi was the first to speak up. "What on earth happened? We saw a lot of this," she said, and crossed her arms.

"You didn't tell me he liked bony midgets, Shizumi. He told me that he'd find me more attractive if I were skinnier and shorter. Do you believe it? Obviously, he's seriously self-conscious about his own body. Maybe instead of himtelling me to try a weight loss program, I should've told him to try some milk," I all but spat out the last part.

"Ayumi, we're so sorry we set you up with him. We just had no idea he was such a jerk! Please forgive us?"

I stared at all three of them and I had to smile. After I reassured them that it wasn't their fault, and yes, we could all meet up tomorrow, I grabbed my backpack from Shizumi and waved good-bye. I walked outside and headed for the underground staircase, which leaded to the subway platform. Okay, so who cares that one guy in Tokyo finds me unattractive? To be honest, I didn't really think he was that cute anyway, so ha!

I dug inside my bag for my subway pass, and found it. I shoved it into the mouth of the turnstile, only to have the machine spit it back out. What's going on here? I pushed my hip on the steel bar. It didn't let me pass.

I tried another turnstile. This one didn't let me pass, either.

"I think your ticket expired," a girl standing next to me said. "You might need to buy a new one."

"Are you kidding me?" I whined, pitying myself for the terrible day I've had. She smiled weakly and I watched, helpless, as she inserted her ticket, turned the bars, and crossed to the other side. I didn't have enough money for a new pass. I thought about crawling under it, but the guy at the ticket booth was glaring at me so I didn't risk it. First, some guy calls me heavy and gigantic, and now even transportation wasn't giving me comfort.

I dialed my friends, but they had already left the mall by now. Which means that, hallelujah, I was going to be stuck and here until my mom can come and get me. In three hours.

I flopped onto a nearby bench. I was excited all week, and this wasn't how I imagined my Friday turning out to be. Maybe if I'd countered him, I thought, I could've made him like me. Instead of blowing up, I should've just giggled and said it was okay and charmed him.

A mother and a son, descending the stairs, immediately caught my attention. She was...so masculine. Her face is too far to see, but I can make out a snarl of dyed red hair that practically screams 'mid-life crisis.' And as for her fashion sense, she was wearing a pink pantsuit that looked like it belonged in the 70's. But the most shocking thing was probably her body. I couldn't make out any breasts or hips, but the distinctly wide shoulders are making me second-guess about what gender she is. To be precise, she has the head of a girl but the body of a guy. They were approaching the turnstiles, nearing where I was sitting. I heard her say:

"Do you have your ticket, Suichi?"

The voice was definitely a guy's, and he sounded young—he was probably in high school, like me. I willed myself not to look at his face. What kind of guy, and a teenager nonetheless, would advertise long hair?

My thoughts were soon interrupted by the click-clack sound of shoes. From the staircase, a horde of schoolgirls, wearing identical pink uniforms, tried to catch up to him. One of them called out, loud and clear: "Minamino-san!"

Stopping in their tracks, the guy named Minamino and his brother turned around. The girls caught up to him, and one of them stepped forward and held out a packed lunch, neatly wrapped in a baby-blue handkerchief. "Minamino-san, I made a bento... We were wondering, um...would you like to have dinner with us?"

"Konnichiwa, Kinoshita-san, everyone. Sorry to..." he paused right here. Minamino used the Japanese language in the most polite—and educated—way possible. "...disappoint all of you, but I really must get home."

I perked up. This was really, really funny. His voice had gotten softer, nicer. Even though his back was turned to me, I'll bet he's smiling apologetically. I know how he feels.

"Oh," the girl says, and her face drops.

"Gomen nasai, Kinoshita-san." After a few more invitations from the girls—and a few more polite 'no thank you's from Minamino—they finally go away, shuffling together, their lonesome baby-blue box like a sign of their humiliating rejection. The little boy had already crossed onto the other side. When Minamino took out his own ticket from his pocket, I caught a glimpse of his face.

Let me just say, he was a hundred times prettier than Ryuuchi.

I gulped, instinctively, like a sneeze.

He had deep, emerald eyes and thin lips, almost resembling a girl's mouth. His red bangs hung over his peachy skin, framing his small jaw. The only red-haired, green-eyed people I had ever seen were freckled American kids on Kodak ads. He was Japanese, though, and his pigments were incredible; were they colored contacts? I tried, but I couldn't draw my eyes away. And as if he had heard me gulp or, more likely, sensed that he was being stared at, he looked at me—and I sat there like a deer caught in the headlights.

"Er," I blabbered, "Sorry." I felt heat rising up to my cheeks. Did I just say I was sorry? Um, yeah, I think I did. It was as if I had just admitted, Sorry for, y'know, staring at you.

His face fell into one of those sweat-dropping ones: slanted, apologetic eyebrows with a small smile. The same expression he probably gave to those girls. Mortified, I grabbed my canvas bag and pretended to rummage inside it. I was still blushing when he finally inserted his ticket and stepped into the subway with his brother. As soon as he was gone, I exhaled slowly. I'd be surprised if he doesn't remember me after today.

Compared to the Ryuuchi incident, this was ten times more humiliating. I felt as if Dignity and Pride threw themselves out the window, committing suicide. I should've drawn my eyes away when I had the chance. I shouldn't have said I was sorry. But the pressure to say something was too large, and I had to say something. I should've said, "Sorry, but what do you use to color your hair?"

I took out my compact case. If we locked eyes, at least it wouldn't be so bad if I looked good, right? This was my last hope. With what was left of my confidence, I peered into the mirror. No such luck. All my eyeliner had evaporated, leaving my dull brown eyes to fend for attention by itself. Most of my lip-gloss wore off, too, and my mouth was chapped and dry. I threw it back into the bag, officially defeated.

He probably thinks I'm weird. But then again, he's probably used to girls staring at him all the time. And now he thinks I'm one of them! I'm the one who's used to having the upper hand in the game. Was there always going to be one guy, the guy, in a girl's life where he makes her feel as mysterious and feminine as a log?

Please, oh please, don't make me run into that guy ever again, I silently prayed. With my eyes heavenward, I asked the gods above for forgiveness, for mercy, for fucking pity. If you care about my well-being at all, then you will never make me cross paths with the boy named Minamino from this day onward!

Little did I know that this wasn't the last time I was going to see him.

A/N: Well, this marks the end of chapter one. Please review if you'd like, and constructive (NOT destructive) criticism is welcome. Thank you for reading!

Luvracci