Lunchtime

Disclaimer: I do not own DN Angel


It all started as an easy remedy to get rid of those extra bars of chocolate...

Then, before I knew it, it had grown roots and established itself as a habit.


Monday, at lunchtime…

Satoshi stands in line among his classmates, eyes fixed on the thick bundle of stapled papers tightly clipped in his hands. For the nth time, he's been reviewing all that are written on it, and he is on it again because of nothing but sheer boredom. Suddenly, he feels his sleeve being tugged from behind by the elbow.

"Childish", he thought. He moves his head slightly to the side and peers over his shoulder, only to see a small piece of chocolate being held so near his face at the level of his eyes.

"Do you want some?" says the voice behind the mysterious annoying stuff.

Wide eyed, he blinks in surprise and asks, "What's… that?"

"Uh, I think it's what they call… ketchup." said the brown eyed girl, rolling her eyes. She held it a bit away from him, and said "It's white chocolate… apparently. Would you like to have it? Nobody else wants it… and I've had too many sweets than I can handle today."

Considering doing nothing and chewing on something, the latter sounded better. And even if he had cursed sweets all his life, white chocolate suddenly sounded so appetizing.

"I'll have it, thank you."

"Yipee! Here ya go" Risa exclaims and shows a wide, wide grin.

He takes the chocolate and tosses it into his mouth.


Tuesday, lunchtime…

"Pssst. Hey…"

"Yeah?" Blue eyes emerge for a moment from being completely immersed in the words of yet another set of papers, this time, twice as thick. He pushes his glasses up and turns his gaze down again to the next page.

"Pssshh. Don't you get tired—no—sick of staring at piles of papers like that?" she remarks, raising an eyebrow.

"I don't stare at them, Harada-san… I read them." he answers, not sparing her a look.

"Whatever…" She shrugs and takes a box from her pocket. "here… take the last piece."

He looks at the box quizzically. "What's that?"

She sighs and once again, rolls her eyes. "I told you, it's ketchup!" She offers it again, "Do you want it?"

"I'm not very fond of sweets, Harada-san. So, no thank—" before he had the decency to decline courteously, the same white stuff arbitrarily (and jokingly) branded as 'ketchup' was tossed into his mouth. He almost impulsively spitted it out but she immediately covered his mouth.

"DON'T ever dare waste something as precious as chocolate!" she said with an expression of utmost urgency painted on her face, as if he were to throw away buckets of gold in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.

The situation was so unbelievable that he couldn't help a gulp, consequently making him swallow the sweet unwanted stuff. Seeing her precious white chocolate safe from reckless disposal and therefore, going to waste, she removed her hands from his mouth, and smiled sweetly, like she just saved a whole rainforest from burning down. But in truth, she hasn't. In fact, she had just caused his temper to ignite and set ablaze.

"If you badly wanted to save it, you should have eaten it yourself!" he said.

"I've had enough of my share, and Im watching my weight, so I gave it to you." She said, rather nonchalantly. "Besides, that was 'charity'." She bluntly added.

He would have told her how angered he was but had chosen to sigh away the rest of his speech, as he wasn't a man of many words. He just took a deep breath which he usually does to compose himself, pushed up his glasses, and walked away, leaving behind a sly, victorious smile on the face of his utterly stubborn classmate.


Wednesday, same time as yesterday…

No words. Just a cunning smile and he knew he was, again, up for trouble.

"What now?" he huffed, just wanting to dismiss her fast.

"Have some.:)" she said, offering a box with a 1x1" piece of white chocolate. "It's ketchup, don't ask anymore."

"If I said I don't want it..?" he rolled his eyes, expectant of defeat.

"I'd make you have it anyway," came her quick response. "Besides, as you may have observed, I didn't ask if you wanted it. I 'told' you to have it. Soooo..."

"Alright, alright… now leave me alone." He sighed as he took the box.

"Jaa, ne.;)" she winked and happily strolled away.

Annoyed as ever, he opened the box. But as he did, his hardened expression instantly melted into a tiny, subconscious smile. There, carved in wacky letters, a simple five-letter word that blew away his exasperation: S-M-I-L-E.:)


Thursday, lunchie lunchie...

"Hey…" a familiar voice with an unfamiliar tone. His eyes immediately shot up from his book in alarm to look at her face which was, for the first time, lacking a lustrous smile.

"Hey." He moved to give her space beside him, wordlessly telling her to sit down and talk about it. She just, however, claimed the space set for her and sighed, resting her chin on the palm of her hand.

Somehow, he knew none of his expected conversation would spring up anytime then, as she didn't look like she wanted to talk about whatever was wrong. Nonetheless, he closed his book and dropped it on the table, and assumed a position similar to hers, ready to take part in a "silent conversation."

For several minutes, she only sighed and sighed. Finally, she rested her chin on her arms which was folded on the table before them.

"You know what," she finally spoke, although softly. "They ran out of white chocolate."

Satoshi wanted to drop dead at that moment. 'Is this all she is sulking for?" he thought. But he right away concluded that there must be more to it. So he went on listening quietly.

"They gave me this, instead" she childishly muttered as she tossed an unopened box of dark chocolate on the table. "What a pun, huh?" she added under her breath, referring to Dark.

He couldn't suppress a chuckle from her last remark. But somehow, that last thing just made him understand.

"It's yours. It isn't sweet, so no need to get annoyed." She later said.

"No." this simple declaration of refusal made her turn her attention to him.

"You don't want it, too?" she innocently asked.

"I meant," he said as he opened the box "no, have your share, too. I think I see the problem. You always choose to dwell on the sweet stuff, so when only bitterness remains, you get so lost." He divided the chocolate in half. "Here you go."

She glanced at it for a moment, then just returned her chin on her folded arms, simply saying "I don't want it."

"You eat chocolate as your refuge, am I right?"

"Kind of." She shrugged.

"You love sweet chocolates 'cuz they make you forget stuff." he narrated like he was only reading her like a book. "and you hate dark chocolate because it has the opposite effect, is that right?"

"You're creeping me out. Don't act like a shrink to me." She joked with a smirk.

"Anyway, here. Have your share." He insisted the half of the bar to her. "You see, I could only help you out of your problems; I can't take you out by myself. So I'm taking half the burden; the rest is still up to you, though."

She brightened up with the bit of wisdom he just shared to her. She frowned as she tasted the bitterness of dark chocolate in her mouth, but as the bitterness melted into sweetness, so did her frown into a smile. Then she exclaimed, "It isn't so bad after all!"

He smiled, too, as the dark chocolate melted inside his mouth and revealed the subtle sweetness it preserves for those who are willing to endure all its bitterness.

That's more like it, Harada-san.


Friday, lunchtime…

It all started as an easy remedy to get rid of those extra bars of chocolate...

Then, before I knew it, it had grown roots and established itself as a habit.

"So?" he spoke as soon as her shadow was cast over the book he was reading.

She chuckled and handed out a familiar box. He was surprised, however.

"Why—" she cut him off and sat beside him.

"I have a new favorite." She gladly announced as she broke the dark chocolate bar in half "but I would only eat it if I have someone to share it with. Here you go, have some 'mayo'."

He smiled. And he knew from then on that he wouldn't have to rant or argue just to eat chocolates… and that his lunchtimes, though with hints of bitterness, shall continue to be sweet and worth looking forward to.

End.:)


A/N:
**I missed making oneshots, so here.:)
**I'm really sorry about the very very late update on the story "LOST". Thing is I'm in some sort of writer's block phase. It feels so much like a burden to be editing and writing stuff, so, yeah... you could guess the rest. But I'm on my way to finishing. I'll upload them altogether when I get them done. Sorry for the long wait! Thanks for leaving reviews, as well.:)

**The 'ketchup' and 'mayo' thingy is something based off my own experience. I usually gave a friend some chocolate during lunchtime for no reason, until it became a habit, and we just randomly called white chocolate 'ketchup' and dark-colored ones 'mayo'. crazy, but I really miss that.:)

Please tell me what you think about this one.:)