The car stops in front of Set Kaiba's mansion. I get out of the car, and then look up at my prison for the next week. There are no bars on the windows, or guards, only well manicured lawn and perfectly trimmed bushes in sight. I see no sign of incarceration, because the prison is only mental, a desire for safety. Which even now is only a desire, my security is as true as my relationship with Seto Kaiba.
His butler comes out to go park the car, and then Mokuba comes out a second later and hugs Seto. Seto smiles, ruffles his little brother's hair and I walk past as the scene plays out. It's in own little bubble. The smile on Seto's face is one of ease; one that is there so natural that the person it belongs to barely notices that it happened. It's full of brotherly devotion, love and protection bordering on that of a parent. Such a different person then I met in his office.
"How was school?" Mokuba answer with enthusiasm that is unnatural to the question, a conversation piece that parents use to figure out if their kids are doing drugs.
"Great, I got a 99 on my math test because of a negative sign and, 94 on my English paper. English never was my strong point. And is Joey staying the night?"
"He's staying until launch. I can't have him disgust my guests that badly." Mokuba's smile falters for a second.
"I get a videogame partner for a week, and good thing it's break." Seto takes off his coat, and his briefcase and hands them to his butler.
"Sir, dinner is served." The butler bows and leaves to put his coat away. While I follow Seto into the dinning room. There are two plates across from each other, and two forks on each monogrammed linen with each wine glass filled. Where's the third?
"I already ate, sorry Seto, since you weren't home and you have a habit of not coming home until around 10. So, I ate without you." Seto gives a small nod, and if he had the capability to blush from embarrassment, he would have. "Joey meet me in the game room after dinner, I'll wait for you to eat more sugar then necessary." After gives his brother another hug, he runs off. Great, so I have to eat dinner with Seto, alone. Did I spend enough time with him today? It will be so much fun getting reprimanded by him because I was never taught how to eat with a knife and fork properly. I take a seat and a salad is put in front of me almost immediately. I take a guess at the correct fork, the smallest one on my far left and stab my lettuce.
"You can actually learn, part of me is shocked." Back to our normal banter, it seems. I set the fork down and grab the dinner fork. Just to do something wrong, against what he said. But he's back to normal again, which I find comforting. Its something that's normal, and more importantly predicable. When the salad is taken away, I ask the butler for can of soda. He looks at me with uncertainty, but when the soup is served I get my can of soda. It totally doesn't go with the meal at all, but who cares? I grab the teaspoon for the soup.
"I have the urge to offer you beer, but it would seem to be too informal for the meal." I can't tell if that was a comment on the fact that I'm drinking soda, or that I hate water.
"I would decline anyway. Alcohol in isn't something I drink. I attempted to when I ate dinner with you before, but I realize I hate the taste. It isn't sweet in the least, and kind of tastes like vinegar. Which is great on salads, but you don't see people drinking salad dressing do you?"
"I would have assumed that you had."
"Drunk salad dressing? I never really had it to drink, so there is your issue." I smirk, I know that is not what he meant, but it was too easy.
"In that case, would you like some? It can be arranged." I don't think we can ever have a normal conversation; it's insults or ridiculous. For the record, I am fine, I prefer the Kaiba that talks about drinking salad dressing then any other Kaiba I've met so far.
"Your offer is much too kind, but I must refuse on the grounds that I just don't think that it would go with this meal. While my soda is pleasantly sweet to counter the spice of this soup, salad dressing would just over power the delicate flavors of the meal." I think I might have watched too much Food network recently (But then again "Cupcake wars" is the shit.) and, the butler walked in on that comment. I smile, and wait for Seto to reply. I hope that he gives me a serious reply, to confirm that he is a stick in the mud.
"One of the few thing we do agree on, that salad dressing would not go very well with this meal." He smirks, damn it. The butler takes the soup, and I want to ask for a cup of salad dressing. Just to see, what his butler would do and if Seto would react.
"How about ketchup? I mean the vinegariness of salad dressing would compliment this meal, but it's much too strong in salad dressing. But ketchup is sweet, but has a vinegariness to it that makes it delightful for this meal." The entree is put in front of us; I grab the salad fork and spear a tofu.
"That might be good, but I fear that the ketchup might go better with dried and fermented shark of Iceland and one condiment can only be assigned as the drink for one meal." First, ew, fermented shark and second, at least we're not yelling at each other, insulting each other nor I am getting forced to make-out with him.
"I would like to test that hypothesis, not the fermented shark meat that can wait for a different day, since I will probably be full after this. But I would like to test if ketchup would be delightful with this, not that your cook didn't do a fabulous job on this meal as it is. But the drink sometimes puts a meal over the edge to something that is unforgettable." Your move Seto.
"I must disagree with that move, Wheeler. For you see, as I have already said, I can only drink ketchup with Fermented shark. And this shark isn't some random shark; this shark is my beloved illegal pet shark. Since, you never did come up with a better illegal pet, I was forced to invest in a pet shark. In any case, I find it would disrespectful to my pet shark to drink ketchup with anything else. Even if it is in the name of science, which generally I find is a good reason for a lot, but I hope you understand how dearly I care for my beloved pet shark and would never live with myself if I were ever to disrespect the memory of my shark." Damn that was good. And he brought up our conversation from out date. Secondly, how did he just say that with a straight face?
"But don't you want to make sure that ketchup is the perfect condiment to drink while eating your precious pet shark. Also, I must compliment you in getting into the local food craze that sweeping the nation, very eco friendly of you."
"I didn't think that you would appreciated such a craze, as you so eloquently put it. Put since you have expressed interest in it, would you like to see to my greenhouse after dinner? It's relatively new, but all the vegetable that you are eating did come from that garden." His eyes sparkled every so slightly betraying his desperate attempt to hide his excitement over this garden.
"You didn't strike me as someone that would garden." And I think he realized that he was acting normal, that may be stretching it, to me.
"It cuts down on food costs, I may be billionaire that doesn't mean that I don't look for ways to cut costs." He says defensively. He has to feed, what, 12 people. That's bull, why would he want to share it if it was only practical, but I guess being the cold hearted CEO needs to be maintained. He can't be having me thinking that he has, OMG, interests outside of power and money. Oh wait, that is taken away by the fact that he owns a gaming company, changed from a weapon's dealer. But I don't call him on that lie. If it is going to make this week any better, I'll bite.
"If the offer is still up, yes. I have to have some time before Mokuba and I stay up all night with the help of sugar. I'm quite full from your home grown peppers, I assume." I say as I set down my fork. His fork stops for a spilt second before resuming its trip to his mouth. Didn't expect me to actually accept his offer. I smirk. He sets his fork on his plate and gets up; I follow him. That's down a flight of stairs, down a corridor, which we come to a locked door. Why would he really need to lock it? He takes a key out of the back of the picture of Mokuba that he has around his neck and unlocks the door. I step out of a platform with stairs going his plants. He closes the door behind him. The smell is amazing, dirt, water and very aromatic flowers and, almost rivaling the view of the greenhouse. Vines with little purple flowers reach towards the ceiling all around the room, and almost covering the railing of the stairs and completely covering the supports of them. On the ground, the room is carpeted in plants. There is a square of grass surrounded on three sides with healthy looking plants, and then pathways weave their way around all the vegetation. Tomato plants closest to us on the right, climbing their way up posts, still green tomatoes right along side the juicy ripened ones. A little over are vegetables I can't make out, but they're all growing on top of one another. Farther away start the strawberry plants and the raspberry bushes, with bright green leaves getting ready to bloom and bear fruit. Then starts the flowers, starting with rose bushes in full bloom. The traditional red, purple, yellow and white, two bushes deep and then another path. And then the roses completely cover the back wall. Orchids, well the ones that he has, whine around the one apple tree in the place. The day-glow ghostly green blooms, I didn't even know flowers came in that colour, are striking against the trunk. While violets and tulips cover the left wall. In the middle of the square of grass there is a table with a few potted plants, one pepper plant and a very dark purple orchid, almost black, among the trowels and gloves, with a stool tucked underneath. I start down the stair after him, he goes over to the rose bushes with a pair of clippers and a basket. He clips off a red bloom and sticks in the basket. The first thing is that the rose doesn't have any thorns on the stem, I mean not even one. I blink, and the rose has turned green. I take it out of the basket and look at it. Its fully green, as green it's own leaves. Why one would want a green rose is another story, but it is impressive. I knew that he is smart and all, but what that rose did was science fiction. I smell it, well it doesn't smell like a rose that's for sure, more cinnamon and sugar.
"For someone that I though barely had time to think," I start, but he cuts me off.
"Joey, why can't you just admit that this is impressive?"
Thoughts? Is Seto out of character? Also thank very much to "fire dragonheart" for telling me that my chapter was miss posted/had all formatting markers. I hope this chapter is easier to read then the other.