Of Truth and Lies
Chapter 2: Lucky Getaway
LAST SCENE REWRITTEN
Takumi woke up with a start. He looked around, quite shocked at the unfamiliar surroundings; then he remembered that it was already a whole day after his freedom from that awful jail.
He got off from the couch he slept on last night, and wandered around the small apartment. Still, it was a lot better than that smelly prison cell. Shamelessly opening the door on the right, he found a small room with a bed consuming much of the space; and in that bed was a sleeping Misaki, wonderfully unaware of the person who just came in.
xxx
"Turns out his account was just useless," Tora said, throwing a thick folder towards his secretary.
He turned his seat around, boringly gazing at the morning city view through the glass wall.
"What's my schedule for today?" he asked, not sparing his secretary a look.
"No targets for this whole day, Igarashi-sama, just school."
Tora frowned. He even wondered why his father let him attend college when he knew almost anything there is to know about the whole world, through the help of brilliant tutors and seventeen years of home-school. He sighed, and went on to prepare himself for just another day of school.
xxx
A few seconds after Misaki heard her door creak open, she jerked up from her bed and picked up the nearest object, flinging it towards the door. Takumi's eyes widened at the sight of the lampshade approaching him, and it so happens that he wasn't as lucky as yesterday. His forehead got hit quite hard and he dropped with a loud thud on the aged wooden floor.
"Ugh, shit," he muttered, rubbing the swell on his forehead.
"Wha – oh damn, I'm so sorry, Yamato-san!" Misaki quickly came to his side, fussing all over the pinkish swell. "Are you okay? Should I –"
"Yeah, I'm fine."
"How were you able to get in my room anyway? It was locked."
Takumi looked confusingly at the girl beside him. "It wasn't locked, really. I just thought I'd –" he thought for a moment "– get proper permission to leave. You've already done too much for me . . ."
"It wasn't much; I just gave you a place for the night, that's all," Misaki said with an awkward smile, picking up her broken lampshade. "Now what should I do with this," she muttered, going back to her room.
He stood up and placed his hand over her shoulder. Takumi smirked; she shivered slightly upon his contact, so that must mean her feelings for him have started to build up.
"I'll repair it. It's my fault it got broken anyway."
"No! No, no, no way, absolutely no way. I threw this at you, now you have a pink bulge on your forehead and it's all my fault."
"Come on, Misa-chan," he said, squeezing her free hand and leaning his face closely to hers. Just a straight stare to her golden brown eyes and she was already blushing mad. "Let me fix it."
"All right!" Misaki said dismissively, slamming the lampshade on Takumi's hands. "If you'd like to go now, then it's okay."
"Thanks, but I just thought of this," he said, now in a casual tone, "I don't have a job yet to afford my own place tonight, so do you mind if I –"
"AGH!" Misaki yelled all of a sudden, stomping her foot and turning around hysterically; muttering a colorful stream of swear words under her breath.
Takumi blinked at her sudden actions, but he realized it all. She was the type of girl who wasn't submissive to love, and now she's getting confused about her feelings for him. He smirked inwardly; the plan was going on smoothly.
Maybe tonight would be a good choice to end it all for her.
"Are you okay, Ayuzawa?" he asked in his overused tone of false concern.
"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. Don't worry about me. I'm just being stupid for a while," Misaki said, slapping her cheek. "I'm making breakfast."
xxx
Shintani was sitting on the bench under the shade of the pine tree in their college campus' park, waiting for Misaki to arrive. He anxiously checked his secondhand wristwatch, 7:48, she should have been already here by 7:15 because Misaki wasn't obviously the kind of person to go to school until the last minute.
For the umpteenth time, his eyes scanned the crowd of students slightly blocking up the campus entrance. There was still no sign of her.
"Ne, ne, Shintani-kun," Sakura, who was sitting beside him with Shizuko on her other side, said with a cheering smile. "Don't worry, maybe Misaki-chan just overslept."
"Misaki hasn't overslept in her whole life, Sakura," added Shizuko, her usual nonchalant expression plastered on her face again.
"But Shizuko-chan~ I'm trying to cheer up Shintani-kun here~"
Shintani just showed a small smile at Sakura. "It's okay, Sakura-chan, I'm sure Misaki just had a small problem with her morning."
"Hn~ Maybe you're ri – AH! Misaki-chan!"
He quickly turned his head around when Sakura started waving at another direction. Indeed it was Misaki, her hair slightly ruffled and a few more bandages on her hands, nevertheless, still with a smile gracing her face.
"What happened, Misaki? I was . . ." Shintani lowered his voice and looked away awkwardly, ". . . getting worried about you."
"Sorry for letting you worry, Shintani. I just had a few problems at my apartment, that's all."
"Oh, right, well, uh, how about we go to our first period's classroom now?"
"Of cou–"
A loud squeal coming from a group of girls quickly took Misaki's attention. Out of curiosity, she tried to find out what the girls were squealing about, then she saw the familiar hair color of platinum blonde – Tora Igarashi, school heartthrob.
Misaki's smile drowned into a scowl. There wasn't really anything to admire about him. He was simply an arrogant, spoilt brat and son of a rich business tycoon or something; sure, he had looks, but a little voice in Misaki's head keeps on telling her that there was always a glint of perverseness in those eyes.
Tora was waving gallantly at the girls who had sparkling eyes at him, complete with a pearly white smile. Misaki snorted. "They're acting like high school teenage girls! I mean, it's completely childish to be screaming at such a pervert like that guy!"
Sakura giggled. "Actually, Misaki-chan, Igarashi-kun has always been the gentleman, so it's kind of wrong to call him a pervert."
Misaki frowned wearily at her pink-haired friend since high school. "You're defending him, aren't you, Sakura?"
"Nawww, not really. I mean –" Sakura was shifting in her seat with a blush slowly appearing on her cheeks "– Kuuga-kun has always been my crush, and . . . ne~ Misaki-chan, why don't you just date Shintani-kun? He's been with you since you were kids."
Misaki flinched in shock. "Hey! Don't change the subject just like that! And besides . . . Shintani and I just consider each other as friends, right, Shintani?"
He replied with a small nod. "Yeah, just . . . friends. . ."
xxx
Pitch black darkness covered the skies of Tokyo; street lights formed circles of light on the pavements; and only the sound of crickets could be heard.
Misaki and Shintani were on their way home after their night shift in the supermarket. Turning around a corner, they saw a sight that widened their eyes and let the hairs on the back of their necks stand.
A young girl was being surrounded by a group of black-clad men, all holding weaponry. Another guy wearing a dark bowler hat, black shades fully covering his eyes, and he seemed to be wearing fancier clothing than the rest of the men. He was standing right before the shivering girl, talking to her.
Misaki's blood boiled at the sight. This was exactly why she disliked men: they take advantage of girls, leaving them scarred after their temporary happiness, an exception for Shintani though. She was ready to knock those men off if they ever did anything inappropriate to that girl.
But Shintani's hand stopped her from her actions. He pulled her back to hide from the armed men. "Listen, Misaki," he whispered as softly as possible. "Look at them, they have guns, and we don't. Do you think we stand a chance with your bare fists, Misaki? We should probably call the pol –"
Her spine shivered when another hand landed on her shoulder, a colder hand.
"Aw, come on, we live in an age where pizza arrives faster than the police, so it'd be no use to call them, anyway." It was a scary baritone voice, and Misaki could tell that he was near because cold, stinky breath tickled her ear.
"What is that?" She looked at the side of her eye – it came from one of the armed men.
"Kids, trying to call the police."
"WE'RE NOT KIDS!" Misaki suddenly yelled, shattering the silence of the night.
"Hold your tongue, you sh–"
Tightly gripping the man with the baritone voice, Misaki slammed his body onto the ground, gaining each gun's aim in the process. The man's body collided loudly with the cement, somehow creating large cracks on it since he was quite the muscle-man.
Misaki then turned to Shintani who was dumbstruck at her feat. He quickly took hold of his hand when something stopped her from doing so. Now, the guy in the bowler hat had his arm around her neck, limiting her breath. He was extraordinarily fast, and she admitted that. Then she felt something hard and solid being dug between her shoulder blades. 'A gun . . .'
"NO! Don't hurt her!" Shintani shouted, throwing his fist at the guy, but before he could even make contact with his face, the guy already had his gun pointed at the middle of Shintani's forehead.
Blood came seeping down from the slit on Misaki's front neck. The slit came from the guy's dangerously sharp dagger, which probably was slid from his sleeve onto his hand.
"Let us handle this, boss," said one of the black-clad men.
The guy shook his head, and then tilted it to the direction of the stuttering girl. Surprisingly, his men seemed to understand it. They shooed the girl away, whispering a few threats to her ear to stop her from reporting them to the police. The girl hurriedly bowed in thanks to Misaki and Shintani, then ran away as quickly as she could. Misaki wondered why he didn't just tell them verbally instead of shaking and tilting his head.
Misaki was twitching at the tingling sharp pain in her neck. When she found the chance to strike, she hit the guy's cheek with her elbow and swiftly slapped away the dagger from his hand. The gun slipped and she immediately stepped her foot on it, stopping its rotation on the ground.
The guy smirked, wiping away the blood from his mouth with the back of his hand.
Misaki looked at the guy with pure hatred and disgust. What was wrong with him? Was he mute? But certainly having a mute boss was ridiculous, so Misaki thought he was just avoiding to talk since she might recognize him somewhere.
With a snort, the guy turned around and walked onwards, gesturing his men to follow him. The man with the baritone voice walking in the rear was showing her a rude hand gesture. Once again, her blood boiled, but upon Shintani's warm grip on her wrist, she stopped, realizing that she just made enough damage to their future today.
"Let them go, Misaki," he said. "We can't do anything about it now. We're screwed, so we might just as well be careful to somehow extend our lives for a bit . . ."
Misaki felt bad for herself and Shintani. "Sorry, I burst out again, I was just too used to –"
"It's all right, at least you saved that girl." But his tone didn't come out right; he was probably more afraid of their fate from now onwards than her.
She turned around and enveloped Shintani into a very tight hug. Tears started to stream down her cheeks as she relayed her new woes to him.
'If only we weren't just friends, I should have done something better than this . . .' Shintani thought, patting Misaki lightly on her back.
xxx
So as you have noticed, I gave Shintani more lines and Tora not a single line (for obvious reasons) XD Thanks for your opinion about the last scene, crazyforcanines. I think this chapter improved quite a bit, and I'm happy about the improvement too! :3 And let us sing again:
(to the tune of We Wish You a Merry Christmas – even though it's nowhere near Yuletide season XD…)
Reviews please, my dearest readers
Reviews please, my dearest readers
Reviews please, my dearest readers
And I'll update sooner~
