I'm back! And this time you guys only had to wait a week. Anyways, this story is moving right along. Here's chapter 4, enjoy!
DISCLAIMER: I OWN NOTHING
She felt groggy, as if the world tilted 70 degrees to the side. And besides the pounding pain in the side of her head, Tsukuyo's senses distinguished nothing else. Placing her hands down to level herself and regain balance, her fingers skimed across the silkiness of fabric. A down comfort to be exact. Her tightly shut eyes shot open, a headache ensured as her eyes adjusted to the light filtering in from the window blinds. Wait a second, she adorned her windows with thick wool curtains, not horizontal wooden blinds. Tsukuyo sat herself fully upright. Preserving through the pain of her headache, she slowly glanced around the room. Barren white walls greeted her, the room was sparsely decorated except for the small desk in the corner with its stack of books that reached the ceiling. The longer she stared at these books the quicker Tsukuyo realized that they were not in fact books. Before her stood dozens upon dozens of volumes of JUMP manga. The pieces of the puzzle gradually came together and she sighed at the realization. It did not take the lawyer in her to guess that this room belonged to the hateful man named Gintoki. She slouched in the bed, condemning herself for an unclear reason, but nonetheless hating herself even more. Tsukuyo tried retracing her steps, the same as when she reviews her cases. She stilled remembered a majority of last night. Kagura had invited her to dinner but she regretfully found Gintoki waiting for her at the restaurant instead. Tskuyo slouched down even farther in the bed, allowing the covers to completely hide her body. And there was wine, a lot of wine. She remembered everything up until the 4th cup, everything afterwards was a blur. Well then, Tsukuyo was going to be hating herself for a long time. However, by the looks of things, she was fully dressed, although in a foreign tee shirt and a pair of female shorts. Two questions immediately popped in her mind. One, how did she get dressed? Hopefully a drunk Tskuyo still at least had the motor abilities to dress herself. And two, why would Gintoki conveniently have a pair of spare female shorts? And the tee shirt as fit as if it was designed for a female. It did not quite add up. Tsukuyo lifted the covers and planted her bare feet on the cold wood flooring. Gintoki needed to invest in a carpet. With light steps Tsukuyo made her way to the door and creaked it open, every few steps she leaned against the wall for support. The hangover only continued to reinforce the severity of her predicament. She heard bustling further down the hall, a soft cling of metal against metal and the sound of sizzling . She still proceeded with caution down the short hallway. As she reached what appeared to be a living room-kitchen mix, Tsukuyo dreadfully saw the owner of the house. She wanted to escape, to run back to the barren room with the JUMP manga, but he already made eye contact with her. Fuck, she was stuck.
" I see you managed to not drink yourself in a coma." He casually said while flipping what indeed was eggs. She frowned.
"I graciously thank you for the concern. Now a piece of advice from me." She pointed to his topless body, " maybe put on a shirt or you're going to get splattered by the oil."
The permy haired man shrugged, " I don't really care. And goodness woman, telling a man what to do even in his own home."
She blushed in embarrassment. She desperately clang to the meager shred of dignity she had lift but that proved difficult in her current predicament. She was in shorts and a tee-shirt and nursing a pounding hangover all in the home of a man she met less than a month ago. Yup, there went that remaining dignity. She mumbled a barely audible "sorry" to the perm haired man. Gintoki smugly smiled, he heard her loud and clear.
Tsukuyo mustered a bit of courage and asked the question of the day. " So Gintoki," she started out slowly, "did anything happen last night? Like between us?" she asked with such shame that it made her stomach churn with disgust. The man deviously grinned.
"Well, well. Don't you have a very dirty mind." He joked. " Fret not young knave, I am a man of virtuous pride. Besides, you're not my type, sorry."
Tsukuyo wasn't even mad at his comment. She let out a sigh of relief, their relationship was complicated enough. She answered him with a soft "oh." He grinned again.
"Seeing as I am such a gracious man, I will bless you with my delicious cooking." Tsukuyo did not even attempt to make a retort, she passively stood there and nodded her head. " And while you're at it," he said, " Go knock on the first door in the hallway and wake up the girls. They must be starving by now, especially that one, her monstrous appetite will be the death of me."
"The girls?" Tsukuyo asked. And here she thought Gintoki passed as a decent human being, apparently not. Housing multiple females in the fairly small apartment caused Tsukuyo's opinion of him to worsen once again. What a lecherous man.
" Before you get any funny ideas, rude woman, the two girls are Kagura and her friend Soyo."
Kagura and her highschool friend? He was definitely a lecherous man. As if reading her mind, Gintoki quickly continued his sentence. " I called Kagura over last night because I knew you would flip out if it was only the two of us in my house. You would probably sue me and throw some fancy legal terms in my face." Well, he wasn't wrong. " But I didn't know where you lived and it was already late at night so I did the next best thing, I had Kagura crash over as a witness to my innocence. And because I felt that maybe inviting one student to my house could backfire on me, I had Kagura call her friend too. It's like a big party at Gintoki-sensei's house now!" he said with false enthusiasms, " Obviously Kagura was more than happy to come over and that basically leads us to where we are currently, me cooking eggs and you watching me cook eggs. Any questions?"
" Well then, that was a lot to take in." Tsukuyo said, still processing and rationalizing Gintoki's decision. It could have been worse. It was here fault for getting drunk and at she now knew that nothing had transpired last night. She rubbed her aching forehead, " Okay, I guess I'll go wake the girls then."
"You go do that." He said and then resumed his egg making.
By the time Tsukuyo bought both girls to the dinning room Gintoki had thankful put on a shirt. He even poured her a glass of water while the two girls were handed orange juice, he was more courteous than she initially gave him credit for. Kagura did not ask any questions at breakfast, neither did her friend Soyo. They acted as if this was a common occurrence. Sleeping over at their teacher's house and then enjoying a breakfast cooked by the said teacher did not faze them in the slightest. The inner workings of a high school girl's mind were beyond Tsukuyo's comprehension. Kagura babbled on about how much she loathed the homework for her math class, at which point Gintoki interrupted and called her lazy. Kagura then proceeded to arguing with Gintoki, while this transpired Soyo calmly watched from the sidelines. This felt way too normal.
Tsukuyo turned her head to face Soyo, " Am I missing something here?"
The raven haired girl smiled, " Not in the least. Kagura and Gintoki-sensei are always like this."
"No,no,no." she said waving her hand, " what I mean is this whole situation?"
"Situation?" said repeated confused.
"Yes. Two female students staying over at their male teacher's house can be interrupted very ambiguously."
Soyo smiled again, " Well then we just have to make sure no one else finds out. Besides, Gintoki-sensei only invited us over to make you feel more comfortable, Tsukuyo-san."
"More comfortable?"
She nodded her head, " Yes, Gintoki-sensei knew you would react very negatively to waking up in his apartment after a night out with each another. You logically would jump to the conclusion that he may or may not have committed a indecent act, however, with us here, we acted as a buffer." She pointed to Gintoki, " Although he looks like the inconsiderate type, Gintoki-sensei does really care. He's really not a bad guy at all Tsukuyo-san, if you give him a chance I can guarantee that a diamond is underneath all that dirt."
Astonished, Tsukuyo silently stared at Soyo. This was wisdom beyond her age. And Tsukuyo let two main pieces of information sink. Number 1, perhaps her initial impression of Gintoki was too hasty. She deemed him to be lazy, worthless, basically a pathetic excuse for a man, but those are incredibly critical words that she possessed no evidence to support. Tsukuyo bit her lip, lawyers should act more on reason and less on emotions. Second, it occurred to Tsukuyo that everyone ( just Kagura, Soyo, and here mother) were trying to set her up with Gintoki. Did he even know of their true intentions? Or was he playing dumb? That seemed to be the case rather often. As of right now Tsukuyo was only certain of one thing, her uncertainty in the feelings she had towards Gintoki. Ughhh, exactly for this reason did Tsukuyo avoid romance and men like the plague.
"I have to get back for my 9am practice soon." She suddenly heard Kagura say.
"Oh, then you better hurry. It is already 8:30." she heard Soyo reply.
Tsukuyo bolted upwards, she had a meeting with the assistant district attorney at 9!How had she forgotten?!
"I gotta go!" she said, "Meeting.9. I'm going to be late!"
She quickly ran back to Gintoki's room and changed into her cocktail dress from the night before. She could deal with her hair while in the cab and as for makeup….. the assistant district attorney has seen worse. Grabbing her coat and clutch, she fumbled to the door.
"Gintoki! Where are my heels?!" Tsukuyo shouted from the hallway.
"The shoe cabinet to the left, first one!" he shouted back.
"Thanks!" and with that she bolted out of the apartment.
Kagura slyly looked at the perm haired man. " You guys are basically married."
He rolled his eyes, " Give me a break. This is all your fault you little instigator. How are you going to make it up to your Gin-chan now Kagura? Huh? The rude woman probably thinks I'm a pedophile for housing two of my students in my house. My reputation!" he cried while holding his head." It's gone!"
This time Kagura rolled her eyes, " Don't worry about it Gin-chan, you never had a reputation in the first place. Besides, you'll be thanking me at the altar. You're welcome, Gin-chan."
Kagura's words caused him more anxiety than relief. " Soyo! Help a poor man out!"
Soyo giggled, " Don't worry Gintoki-sensei, I will vouch for your reputation if anything happens." He let out a sigh of relief. " Also, I promise to bring a great wedding gift with me, Gintoki-sensei."
"Not you too, Soyo! Come on! Me and that rude woman are not getting married! If I had to marry anyone it would be Ana Ketsuno, the lovely weather lady from channel 7."
"Never say never Gin-chan, you would be surprised how the world works sometimes." Kagura replied quietly to herself. Soyo gave her nod of approval though. The gears of fate had already been set in motion.
Tsukuyo pushed the glass door open. The aroma of freshly brewed coffee and hot-out-of-the-oven bread engulfed her. She could really use a cup of coffee right now, the stronger the better. With a quick scan around the small shop, Tsukuyo easily located the woman she was looking for, she hurried on over, it was already 9:05.
"Sorry I'm late Amano-san. A series of unforeseen circumstances came up."
A women around the age of 45 and wearing a perfectly pressed blazer and dress pants looked up, she raised a brow. " I can tell. Did I miss the dress code memo? Little black dress and heels at 9am? I would say that either your sense of fashion become more daring or you had a crazy night."
Tsukuyo flushed pink, "Like I said, unforeseen circumstances."
The assistant district attorney chuckled, " It's not my place to pry, you are a grown woman after all." She pointed to the manila folders on the table. "I have a new case for you, and this time I made sure that it doesn't involve a sexist politician."
"Thank you." The fatigues blonde said. " After the night I had I cannot wait to immerse myself in work once again."
" If what I am thinking is correct then I would avoid your mother like the plague." Amano-san said as she opened one of the many folders. "She would have a field day if she found out."
The mere thought of her mother finding out caused her to shiver. Tsukuyo's mother would never discover of this incident, not over her dead body!
First off I apologize for potentially getting any facts wrong. I actually have very limited knowledge on what a district attorney or the people in the D.A's office even do, I'm a biology major for a reason. Regardless though, I will try to further educated myself in the ways of lawyers. Also, I want to apologize for the inconsistency in language. I am conflicted on how I should write Tsukuyo's dialogue, she is suppose to be a very intelligent woman,however, I feel that her profession does not subject her to being articulate every waking moment of her life, I think. I will try my best to improve so please bare with me for the moment being. I hope you guys enjoyed!
