AN: Aaaaaand discount my fireball thing from the previous chapter. This pace is definitely not the speed as fireballs. Anyway, hopefully this chapter is all you hoped it would be, and sorry ahead for the cliff hanger. Y'all are great people for sticking around this long and putting up with all my tardiness. Thank you all for the support!
This chapter goes out to the 20 reviews and 13 favorites I have gotten so far. You guys are great!
It had been about two weeks since she last talked - err, wrote - to Kaitou Kid. Truth be told, rather than ignoring that creep on purpose, she had completely forgot about the website (and the Internet in general) due to Finals Week. She was even more scared for those tests than she was when her father had been admitted to the hospital after getting shot some how.
But finally, finally, the Age of Tests (as she called it) was over. Summer was abounding everywhere, and everybody was not happy. Reason for the melancholy: the heat.
It was waaaaaaaaay too hot outside. Nobody left the house without bringing at least five large waterbottles, and the few brave ones that did leave soon found themselves seeking AC-ed shelter. Kid had to have known this - he lived in the area, how could he not know? - and was being nice by not scheduling any heists. Aoko understood him more than she cared - it had to be hot underneath that suit!
Staying inside, though, was almost as bad as going outside was. It was dreadfully boring. Every time she booted up her second-hand computer, it would always overheat after two minutes. This meant, of course, no speaking to Mr. Kid. Not that she cared.
Then there came, seemingly out of the blue, a sudden break from the weather. Not a single person in Ekoda had seen that one coming. Even the meteorologists were stumped. This isn't to say that the cool(er) weather was unwelcome, though. People were stepping out of the houses in wonder as if they hadn't seen the light of day in years, and the children raced to the community playground so as to get some long-needed and long-wanted exercise. The downfall, of course, was the annoying tweens that walked around the neighborhood acting like they ruled the place, but Aoko didn't even bother caring about them.
It was time.
Gathering her wallet, keys, and other miscellaneous items in her purse, she called up the stairs a quick "Good-bye" to her father and exited the house. She was going to make herself go to that park as fast as possible and make sure she stayed there. She was not going to let herself back out. She was not a chicken, and she most definitely was not going to let this once-in-a-lifetime chance pass her by. She had missed too much already, stuck in her stuffy room without even Kaito to talk to (but he didn't matter anyway because she was still mad at him).
Her stomach was being a jerk to her today. It kept turning over and made her feel like there was a black hole forming there. With each step she took it got worse, and her posture became slightly bent in attempt to soothe the forming pain. Perhaps this wasn't such a good idea... perhaps she should go back home...
There was no way in Heaven, Earth, and Hell that she was going to turn back. Her father didn't raise her as a coward, and he certainly didn't raise her to run away from her problems. Ever since she went on that chatroom and spoke to Kid, he became her problem, and that was set in stone. There was no getting around Fate, especially when it didn't want to be changed. She would simply have to find a way to deal with this hurdle, no matter how big she found it to be.
A thought occurred to her, and as more drops of sweat trickled down her face, the more appealing the idea became. She stopped her slow stroll - going any faster would have fatigued her more than she would have liked in that weather - and strayed to a nearby vendor. Three dollars were given to the man's itchily grabby hands, and a tall water bottle was given to her. The price had been overpriced, but that was the price she had to pay for being so stupid as to leave her own at home.
Now she had no excuse to stall. And stall she did not.
Between her and the park was the gate. It was a simple, pretty thing, but written over with graffiti to the point of making even looking at it an unpleasant ordeal. It possessed that quality that only public park gates could have. This, of course, was lost on Aoko as she entered the area with visible anxiety written all over her face.
The place was very old, and had distinguishing characteristics of that fact. Weeds were abundant; the benches were broken and tilted; the path was half there, half not; the flowers had grown into a state that overbore the examiner; the trees were ancient and stood like they were sequoias. Still, it was one of the most popular and most-visited places in the town.
Taking in a final gasp of air, she stared at one of the old, rusted steel-and-wood benches and slowly sat down. She brought her hands to the crown of her head and began trying to smooth her hair, which had become frizzy in the humid air (it wouldn't hurt to look presentable to Kaitou Kid, after all, even if he was a criminal). Her hands stopped their movements, though, when a voice hissed out of the tree above her,
"Good morning, Aoko."
