Disclaimer: I do not own the Kenshingumi; all you lawyers, please don't sue me. And all you readers, please take note: I don't own anything I quote.
Chapter 4: Moving Day
Kaoru looked around the small apartment with a sense of pride.
After years of living in horrible dormitory housing, and dealing with cafeteria food, she was finally on her own.
Although, she had to admit that she would miss the cafeteria food.
Yahiko was struggling up the stairs, trying to carry four boxes at once and clearly two seconds away from not carrying any of them.
"Don't hurt the chocolate!" Kaoru yelled, sprinting to catch the top box as it started a slow slide downwards. She loved her brother, but occasionally he had no clue about what was important in life.
"Sheesh, ugly, keep your shorts on..." the teen muttered under his breath.
Things probably would have degenerated from there, boxes or no, if it hadn't been for the cheerful voice yelling up the stairs.
"Hey, missy! Hey, brat—you up there?"
"Up here, Sano!" Kaoru yelled cheerfully.
Sano had apparently picked up a load of boxes from the moving truck before heading upstairs, and he deposited them, following Kaoru's directions, before giving her a bear hug.
"Can't believe you finally got your own place! Once we get all this moved in, I say we go out for dinner and celebrate!"
Kaoru raised one eyebrow and said, "And I suppose that, since you're so kindly helping out, I should so kindly pay for dinner?"
Sano shrugged. "Well, it would be the polite thing to do..."
Drat, he had a point. Now how to get out of this situation with her wallet reasonably intact?
"Once we're done, we'll order a bunch of pizzas, and I'll hook up the TV and DVD player, ok?"
Happy that there was going to be food, Sano said, "Deal, Missy! Now, what else needs to come up?"
"Um...well, we need to unload the truck, Sano... By the way, didn't Megumi come with you?"
"The Fox is downstairs by the truck.. said something about being better at supervising than lifting..."
Kaoru grinned. "Well, when you're down there, tell her to come on up and supervise things up here for a bit!"
"Yeah, but then how's she gonna admire my muscles when she's up here instead of down by the truck?" Sano winked. "Will do, Missy; no worries. By the way, I invited another friend to help out—well, he volunteered when I told him I was helping you move. He wasn't sure when he'd get here, but he said he'd make it when he could."
"Great! The more people I can cajole, beg, or bribe into hauling boxes and furniture, the better! And, speaking of hauling boxes, what are you doing just standing around shaking your feathers, Rooster-Boy? Get going!"
She shook her head and laughed at his expression as he went down the stairs, then went back to unpacking books and putting them on her shelves.
'Dictionaries... English literature... American literature...Biology... Cookbooks... Cookbooks? Huh...' Clearly another "subtle" attempt by Misao to give Kaoru more self-confidence in the kitchen.
She doubted this one would have any more success than the last twenty.
Sighing, Kaoru emptied the box and went down to help carry things up the stairs. With luck, they could get everything unloaded and the van returned and still have time to set up her bed and the futon couch before ordering the pizza.
Sano and Yahiko were engaged in heated debate about the best way to man-handle the couch up the stairs, with Megumi serving as referee and occasional consultant.
"Look, we need to take it apart first, it won't fit around the stair corner!"
"And I'm saying that if one of us goes up to the balcony, we can lift it up the outside of the building and in through the window!"
"Listen, feathers-for-brains, the only thing that's going to happen if we try to lift it up the outside of the building is that the couch is going to smash to the ground, and then Kaoru's gonna hurl us out a window!"
"Gentlemen!" Megumi said, loudly enough to halt the other two mid-brawl. "I think that the options are clear: either we take the couch apart now, or we call Katsu, or wait for Kenshin to show up and all of you together can figure out a way to manhandle it up over the balcony. Kaoru, what do you think?"
"Well... Sano, when did your friend—Kenshin, right?—when did he say that he was planning on showing up?"
"I'm here!" said a voice from somewhere behind Kaoru.
There was something about it that was very familiar, something that touched a chord in her memory that her brain was fairly sure it didn't want to go anywhere near...
"Kenshin!" Sano called out cheerfully, "Glad you could make it so soon, man! We're trying to get this couch lifted up to the third floor—care to give us a hand?"
"Well, I knew that this was important... Hmm.. Sano? I think that the best bet is to take the couch apart and carry it up piece by piece... that's a very solid frame and we don't want anything to happen to it."
Her brain's efforts not to connect that voice to anything were reaching a fever pitch as Sano said, "Hey! Kenshin, here you are hauling furniture and everything, and you haven't even met the lovely lady who's gonna be the one providing the food and beer afterwards! Kenshin, Kaoru; Kaoru, Kenshin..."
She was sure she hadn't turned around, but suddenly her lovely view of the ground was disrupted by a pair of dark brown leather boots and a pair of black jeans...
Kaoru looked up to see bright red hair that threatened to escape from a low ponytail, violet blue eyes with slight hints of amber sparks in their depths, a broad and guileless smile, and a face whose left cheek was marked with a pair of scars, crossing each other...
And fainted dead away.
Author's Note: Just when you think you've gotten rid of that pesky demon problem...
In this chapter I don't own: Hmm.. not really quoting anything in this chapter. Probably because it's too short.