Disclaimer - I don't own Rurouni Kenshin or Day-Glo green.

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Grocery Store

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Chapter 4 - Coworkers

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"Here you are," Kenshin said two days later.

Kaoru looked up from her chicken salad as Kenshin placed his own lunch – some type of fish fillet, fries, and a coke – on the table. She'd picked a table near the west door, figuring Kenshin would be able to pick her out easily in the crowded college food court.

She smiled as he sat down across from her. "Hey. I didn't think you'd come." After what happened Saturday night, she finished in her head.

"Couldn't resist the lure of the free meal ticket you gave me." His eyes followed a group of freshman girls walking towards the pizza area. "How do you work here everyday? I feel old just looking at all these kids."

Kaoru laughed. "You are old compared to them," she said, and then to soften the statement, "but you could be a grad student." He looked good in a suit, she admitted. She didn't usually see him until after he'd gotten home from work and changed into more casual clothing.

"I think you were supposed to reassure me, not push me further into a midlife crisis."

"I operate on tough love."

"So that's what you call it."

Kaoru nodded and stabbed at a crouton with her plastic fork. She didn't know who she was trying to kid – plastic forks did not stab croutons. Unless they were soggy. And if they were soggy, they weren't worth eating.

The fact that Kenshin looked good in a suit bothered her. He always looked good, although there was this one shirt with a horrible green dolphin pattern that he wore on weekends that really mess with her head. Sometimes, he actually wore it outside.

"So I get to see your office after lunch, right?" Kenshin asked, starting on his fish fillet. He pitched his voice just loud enough so she could hear him over the murmur of voices in the background, but low enough so that the frat boys at the next table couldn't, although Kaoru was one hundred percent positive they couldn't care less.

"You definitely get to see my office," she confirmed.

"Good. I want to compare and make sure mine's larger."

Kaoru rolled her eyes. "You win already. I share my office with another counselor, but she's reading applications at home today, so you won't bother her."

"I don't think I've ever bothered a woman with my presence in my life. They pretty much all like me."

His fish fillet was already half gone.

"What about your mother?"

He raised an eyebrow. "Why do you keep bringing my mother up?"

"I don't keep bringing her up. She's a woman too."

"Okay fine. Excluding my mother."

"And me."

"I bother you? Hmm. I guess you're right. I try hard enough."

"I knew you did it on purpose!" Kaoru said triumphantly, "That innocent act gets old." No lie, it really did. Although she wished he'd put on his innocent face after he'd kissed her Saturday night, then she would've known he didn't mean anything by it. But he hadn't, so she'd known he was serious, and he'd known she'd known he was serious, and she'd known that he'd known that she'd known that he was serious, and so on, and life was suddenly more complicated than before.

"I do not have an innocent act."

"You use it all the time on Megumi."

"If I teased her, she'd eat me alive."

Kaoru stabbed a piece of chicken and considered. "Eh, you're probably right."

"I know I'm right."

He finished his fillet and took a sip of his coke before starting on his fries.

"How's the food?"

He shrugged. "It's all right. I'm hungry. I had a meeting with a client this morning."

"Did it go well?"

"It turned out fine in the end, but it ran overtime, so that's why I'm a little late. Sorry."

"Don't worry about it," she said, and they fell into a small silence. But it was comfortable, not awkward like she'd feared.

And when she'd shown him around the office and introduced him to all her coworkers (he was right, women did love him), she walked him to the edge of the parking lot and he kissed her on the cheek and left. And that was okay.

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The first week in April, and Kaoru was temporarily free from work related homework. So Kenshin had driven her thirty miles out of the city and told her they were playing paintball. Now, Kaoru was covered in bright pink and yellow paint, but she'd finally found a hiding place where none of the teenagers they were playing with could shoot her. Her aim was fair, but their aim was scarily good. She hoped the Day-Glo-green paint would come out of the ends of her hair. She had to go to work tomorrow.

Pressing her eye to the peephole at the back of her hiding place, she spotted Kenshin stalking one of the teenagers. Kenshin was also a scarily good shot. And he was almost too agile. He was the only person she'd seen who hadn't been shot once so far. Well she'd fix that. Kaoru checked her glow-in-the-dark watch. Only two minutes left of this hell people called a game.

Kaoru aimed the muzzle of her paintball gun through the hole at Kenshin. He'd know what angle she was shooting from of course, so the instant after she shot, she'd have to leave her hiding place and make a run for it. Those teenagers would probably start shooting at her in point two seconds flat, but she was already covered in paint, so it was a small sacrifice to a greater good. There was no way she was staring at Kenshin's paint free face for the entire forty-five minute drive back to the city.

Kaoru took the shot. Then she bolted from her cozy hiding place and shot off like a rocket in the other direction. She wasn't too successful with the stealth and silence thing, because right away a couple teenagers started chasing her. A blob of yellow paint landed on the tree in front of her, right at eyelevel. That definitely would have hit her head. Kaoru put on a burst of speed and dove behind a giant tree trunk that had fallen almost directly across the path. Breathing hard, she checked her watch, only a minute left.

She summoned the courage to turn around and peek over the top of the giant rotting log, at the path she'd just run down. The teenagers were about twenty feet away, but they'd turned in the opposite direction and were busy shooting at someone else. She could pick them off from behind right now, but that was asking for it. Kaoru sat down on the ground and clutched her paintball gun. There was no way she'd ever let Kenshin take her here again. Simply no way!

Kaoru heard the teenagers run away and breathed a sigh of relief. They'd either taken out the other person, or been overwhelmed by the other person and decided to run away. Only thirty seconds now. A foot crunched the leaves behind her on the path. Kaoru froze. She was guessing the teenagers had been overwhelmed. She willed the seconds to tick by faster as the steps drew closer. If even the teenagers had run, she'd go down faster than an alcoholic at an open bar. There was no way she could bolt and make it behind a tree, either. The person was too close. Time itself was against her.

"Boo," Kenshin said.

Kaoru tilted her head up and there he was: grinning and nauseatingly paint free.

"This game has been TERMINATED," the recorded voice said over the speakers positioned throughout the fenced in paintball area.

Kaoru breathed a sigh of relief, took off her helmet, and ran a hand through her barely shoulder length hair. Big mistake. She'd forgotten her hand was still wet with yellow paint. "I can't believe I missed you!"

He raised an eyebrow. "So it was you that shot at me. Yeah, you missed by a couple feet, tipped off the kid I was stalking too."

Kaoru stood and started to climb back over the fallen tree trunk.

Kenshin whistled. "Wow. I think you're going to have to sit on garbage bags."

"Excuse me?"

"You're not getting in my car any other way with all that paint over you."

Kaoru jumped off the log and landed on Kenshin's side of the tree. "So why didn't you tell me to bring a change of clothes?"

"I didn't think you'd be so bad at running and hiding," Kenshin laughed. "Dinner in a restaurant before we get back, my treat, says out of everyone, you're the person who got hit the most."

Kaoru snorted. "Dinner in a restaurant, your treat, after I get back home, shower, and change, says I'm not."

A half hour later, Kaoru was the most colorful person at the local diner.

"No, no, I loved playing paintball," Kaoru assured the waitress who'd taken their order. The only thought that comforted her in her embarrassment was the hope that she'd never see any of these people again. But even if she did, they probably wouldn't recognize her.

"I hate you."

"Now, now. Is that any way to treat the man who's buying you dinner?"

"If this paint doesn't come out of my hair, you die."

"Well don't try to shoot me. I don't think that would work out for you," Kenshin replied mildly. "Hey, remember when I said I was dating again?"

Kaoru stopped obsessing over her hair. "You said you were dating again?"

"You don't listen to me?"

"I listen. You never said that."

"The first time you ever came over to work on applications, I said it was lucky for you that I didn't have a date that night."

"Oh yeah, you did say that," Kaoru remembered, glancing around guiltily for the waitress. She'd just gotten a smear of pink paint on the table cloth. "And I didn't take you seriously. So does this mean you were serious?"

"Yes, Kaoru, I was serious."

"But that was back in… February. You've been dating for almost two months and I didn't notice?" Kaoru leaned back in her chair, paint stains forgotten. "What kind of friend am I?"

"I did have a reason for bringing up this subject, so if you'd stop talking…"

"Oh, sorry."

"Anyway, I just wanted you to know that you can stop worrying about me now. I feel single."

"I wasn't worrying about you," Kaoru told him, a little puzzled, but a little thrilled just the same.

"You weren't?"

"Nope."

"Not even a little?"

"Not really," Kaoru fudged. It was true that she'd been busy with her job and trying to keep up with Megumi in her flurry of planning for the wedding, so she hadn't had as much time to think much about Kenshin. But of course she'd thought of him. He was her friend and little things reminded her of him: like Captain Crunch cereal because that was his favorite, the baking aisle in the grocery story, and small business owners. Yes: all small business owners.

But she hadn't outright lied, because she didn't worry about him nearly as much as she did Megumi or Sano. They both needed her right now and Kaoru was confident that Kenshin could take care of himself when she wasn't around.

"Well that's disappointing. I thought maybe that was the reason."

"The reason for what?" she asked.

"Er, nothing."

She felt disappointed. "Refusing to answer my questions does not make you any more mysterious or sexy, nor does it add to your appearance," Kaoru told him.

"So you admit that I am mysterious, sexy, and almost unbearably attractive?"

"Kenshin: I'm covered in paint because of you. You're not getting any compliments."

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A week later they ate lunch in the college food court again.

"If I'd known my coworkers were going to like you this much, there's no way I would have brought you to work in the first place," Kaoru told him as she finished her taco salad.

"I can't help it. I'm entertaining."

"It's mainly, Linda, the counselor I share my office with."

"Your tiny office?"

"Yes," Kaoru said sarcastically, "My tiny office."

"So what does Linda have to do with it? I didn't meet her last time."

"That's the problem. The other counselors tease me about you and Linda feels left out of the loop. Her daughter's out of the house and married with a set of one year old twins. She lives in Oregon. I think Linda misses her and she's taking it out on me."

Kenshin raised an eyebrow. "Taking it out on you?"

Kaoru nodded vigorously. "Now that we don't have as much work to do, she spends her free time asking me about my weekend plans and who I'm dating. She's convinced I'm dating you – they all are. It's driving me crazy."

"I don't think I'd call that 'taking it out on you', but I do think my coming to visit again will only make it worse."

Kaoru nodded sadly. "But Linda's driving me crazy with guilt for waiting for a day when she read applications at home to have you drop by. And it's just us. Alone in a tiny office for eight hours a day, five days a week, minus lunch hour and bathroom breaks and staff meetings. We don't have enough staff meetings, but I've started drinking more water…"

"You look devastated."

"I am. I'd like to blame you, but it was my fault for inviting you in the first place. You have to go in there and win Linda over, Kenshin."

Kenshin leaned back in his chair. "You shouldn't have let me know it meant this much to you, because now it's going to cost you."

Kaoru accepted that. "How much?"

"One bottle of champagne, not cheap, and next Friday night."

"I was supposed to go out with Megumi to pick a location for the wedding reception."

Kenshin glanced at his watch. "Gee, look at the time. I might not be able to stop by your tiny office after all."

"Is seven o'clock alright?"

"Are you staying at least until ten?"

"Yes."

"Then, I guess I can make time to visit your coworkers again. And seven's fine."

Kaoru breathed a sigh of relief. Hell at work for the next three months until her coworkers forgot Kenshin existed, versus a bottle of champagne and three hours out of her Friday night. She was the first to admit that she hadn't spent enough time with Kenshin lately, and she'd already gone with Megumi to look at six different places for the reception. If Kaoru didn't go, Megumi would rope Sano into coming with her and he deserved it, considering the fact that he'd proposed.

"Don't worry. Linda's going to love me," Kenshin broke into her thoughts.

"She'd better."