The plain and simple fact of the matter was that Naru was acting like a stalker. He followed Mai around when she was out, took pictures of he when she wasn't looking and had even rummaged around the office, finding every photo of Mai and sticking it in his book. He wondered how long it would be untill he rummaged around in her waste paper basket to find a used tissue.
He shook his head. He was over his head. Mai had been avoiding him for the past week, ever since the incident in the Tunnel of Terror.
His gaze drifted to his favourite picture of Mai. She was sitting at her desk, her hair held up in a bun using a pen, while she propped her elbow on the desk and rested her cheek on her hand. The sun was setting casting an orange glow into the office threw the blinds and she seemed to glow. Her large eyes gazed into the distance and her pouty lips parted slightly. Naru heard Mai yell a good bye before leaving the office. He quickly walked over to his window which looked out onto the front of the office and growled when he saw Mai kissing The Bastard Formally Known As Yasuhara softly before lacing her thin fingers with her own, laughing joyfully as they both walked.
He wondered how The Bastard Formally Known As Yasuhara would feel if he found out about him and Mai.
Naru agreed with the girl that they were being unfair to him, but he couldn't help it. Every time he set eyes on her, he wanted to lay her down on the nearest flat surface and, to use a British expression, shag her senseless, not caring who was in the room.
Mai had long since discovered the art of throwing herself out of bed in the morning. She'd kick her covers right off before swinging her legs off the bed and jumping up.
"OUCH!"
Granted, she thought, as she hopped up and down holding her left foot, that it wasn't always the safest way, esspecially when she was so confused about a certain situation that she hadn't put her laundry basket away and put one foot on the rim, almost falling over. She muttered curses to the evil laundry basket as she exited her room heading for the bathroom.
Mai always thought about things in the shower. In fact, she was sure all of her greatest ideas-such as wearing that really cute new skirt with her old shirt, causing a completely new outfit, and working out her math problems.
But today as the spray of hot water washed over her she didnt feel any problem solving skills coming on, or great idea.
Instead she felt sick.
Yasuhara.
Naru.
Which one did she love more?
Well, she convinced herself, it wasn't love with Naru. Only attraction. A simple animal attraction.
But it wasn't love with Yasuhara either.
Yes she'd told him-only last night infact-that she loved him.
She wished she could use the good old, cliched 'I love you but I'm not in love with you'
But she couldn't. It just spilled out.
Granted, he had said it first as they sat at a table in some romantic candel lit restaraunt. And Mai, being Mai, had said it back because she didn't want to hurt his feelings.
Because Mai hated upsetting people.
Yet here she was, cheating on the man who loved her with a man who most likely saw her as some sort of toy.
And her 'friend'/rival Masako was in love with Naru. It would hurt her if she ever found out aswell.
As Mai dried herself off and went to her room to get dressed-a orange tank top and kaki green cargo skirt-she wondered if it was ironic that both she and Naru were objects of unrequited love, and they seemed like they had a magnetic attraction.
After school Mai stood infront of the notice board with a dumb expression on her face. Right there. Third down. Mimi Marquez---Mai Taniyama.
When she was 16 Mai had discovered her love for musicals. Singing, acting, dancing, all of it. And even more to her suprise, she was good at doing the three things. She could belt out a song that would echo around the schools auditorum with out a microphone, keeping the pitch and tone perfect, cry on cue and have a range of emotions flicker onto her face effortlessly and could move around the stage like she had been taking dance lessons from age 2.
For the previous two years she had the leads in the schools musicals-Satine in Moulin Rouge and Cosette in Le Miserables-and this year...she was Mimi in Rent, one of her favourite musicals.
Scanning the cast list she blushed realising Kaoru Hitachiin, one of the Hitachiin twins who was here for a transfer programme from some really posh school, would be her love intrest Roger. It was a well known fact that both of the twins were, for lack of a better word, godly. They were on the same level as Naru, but in a different way. Where as Naru reeked of bitterness and professionalism, the twins exuded mischiviousness, imaturity and humor.
With a smile she ran down to the drama department. The first rehersal began in just under 2 minutes.
Mai smiled at her fellow principal parts as they stood in a circle, away from the chorus. Mr Inada, the director, had given them their scripts and told them to get familer with them whilst he talked to the rest of the cast, giving out the odd solo line or walk on part.
"So, Mai, I hear you're pretty good at this kinda thing." Kaoru said with a smirk, standing next to Hikaru, his twin, who was to play Collins with Haruhi Fujioka as Angel. Mai knew the reason Haruhi was cast as a male part was because she had no chest to speak of and short boyish hair. She was sure none of the males would have wanted to play a transvestite.
"Well...erm"
"Don't be modest!" Aiko Chigusa, a girl in the year below grinned. Aiko was tiny with jet black hair and large dark eyes. She had always been the second lead female part in the plays-Nini in Moulin Rouge, Eponine in Le Miz-but was never bitter about it. She respected Mai's talents and idolised the girl and was now Maureen in Rent. "Mai's like, our school star! She's already had 3 colleges asking her to go to their Peforming Arts Department on scholerships and it's not even Christmas of her senior year. And after she wows them as Mimi, every Performing Arts school in Japan will want her"
"Shut up Aiko." Mai blushed at the praise, thumbing threw her script.
"Alrighty!" Mr Inada yelled coming onto the stage. "Lets dive straight in. We have four weeks to get this down! Rehersals will be after school everyday for the principal parts and every tuesday and thursday for the chorus! They'll begin at 3:15 and end at 6:00"
Mai's eyes widened. Naru wouldn't be happy.
"Since La Vie Bohem's gonna take most work, we'll start with that...you four!" He pointed at four people from the chorus. "There's a long table in the wings, bring it onto the stage and put it down so the end of it is facing the audience"
The four scuttled off and they got ready to begin.
At 5:50 Mr Inada aka Slave Driver, called an end to the rehersal.
Mai was exhausted. They had worked on the scene for hours before finally perfecting it. She hadn't kissed Kaoru in the scene-Mr Inada wanted the all the kisses to be explosive on stage, not rehersed.
Sitting down on the edge of the stage she groaned. Someone had shook the table while her and Haruhi were on it for their part and she had fallen off, bruising her hip and shoulder.
Suddenly from her school bag a loud ring tone came on. It was the theme tune to The Omen, the ringtone she had chosen for Naru's number only. It seemed appropriate.
"Hai?" She said as she flipped open the phone.
"Where are you? You're two hours late. I've been calling you since 4:15"
"Sorry Naru, I was busy.." She refrained from mentioning the play. The jerk would only use it against her. "I'll be there in 20 minutes"
With that she yelled a hurried goodbye to everyone before bolting out the school auditorum.
Mai had been in the office for 30 minutes when the door opened, sitting next to Yasuhara, his arm around her. They had no customers, all the others were sitting around in the office and drinking tea. So who could it be?
The question was answered when Hikaru and Kaoru came into view, both with the exact same slightly intrested yet slightly bored expression.
"Kaoru? Hikaru? What are you doing here?" Mai asked nervously, standing up. She had refrained from telling the others about her being in the play, considering they would taunt her and embarrass her about it.
"You left your script at school." Kaoru said holding the script up and handing it too her.
"Mai! You're in another show and didn't tell us? What this time?" Ayako asked curiously.
"She's Mimi in Rent." Hikaru explained, taking great pleasure in the young girls face growing redder and redder every second. "You mean she didn't tell you"
"Hikaru!" Kaoru muttered elbowing him in the side. "Don't make fun of her! If you make her hate us, I'm screwed! I've got to work with her"
It was at this point that Naru exited his room and paused. He was used to seeing all the irregulars-of course, he wanted to throw Yasuhara out-but he was possitive he didn't know the identical redheaded boys.
"Kaoru's Roger, Mai's love intrest." Hikaru grinned at his brother.
Naru stiffened.
"Ah, Naru-chan!" Bou-san grinned at him. "Mai's got another lead role in the school play! She's Mimi from Rent"
Naru froze a smirk on his face. Madoka had forced him to watch it with her once when she was bored. He knew who Mimi was.
"You mean the stripper with AIDS and a heroine addiction"
Mai glared at him.
"Honestly Mai. A prostitue in your first show, now a stripper"
Mai, just to piss Naru off for the last comment, sat herself down on Yasuhara's lap, giving him a light kiss on the forehead.
No one but the twins noticed Naru's whole form stiffen before he turned around and went back into his office.
They looked at each other with raised eyebrows.
"Well Mai!" Kaoru tossed the script on the coffee table. "See you tomorrow! Oh and if you want, when you get some spare time, you should come over to our place, we can rehearse. Hikaru and Haruhi will be there too"
"If I can get any time off work." Mai nodded with a smile, placing her arms around Yasuhara's neck.
The twins left, with yells of goodbye and a slammed door.
Mai couldn't help but think, as Yasuharas arms snaked around her waist, that she really had everything. A loving boyfriend, a good education, 3 college scholerships already and a job she enjoyed.
But Mai didn't feel happy. As she sat in Yasuhara's lap she couldn't help but think back to the Tunnel of Terror and the few kisses he had stolen from her since then, when she hadn't managed to avoid him completely.
Mai couldn't help but think back to the night that started it all.
And she was beggining to wish she had never turned 18.