Disclaimer: Death Note ain't mine.
EDITED!! NOW IN 3rd PERSON POV!!
CHAPTER 26 - UNPROMISING SOLUTION
Keiko awoke to silence. What in the world was going on…?
Oh… right… she was back at her apartment because she'd been sent home to attempt to pull herself together.
So far, the endeavor wasn't working.
And apparently, Keiko had been getting far too little sleep lately, because it was now close to 12:30. She sighed heavily and got up to change from your now-wrinkled suit into a pair of flannel pants and a tank top. You're pathetic, she told herself scathingly. You're supposed to be solving a murder case, but instead, you're crying your eyes out over yourself. How selfish can you get? Just put it out of your head, for Pete's sake!
Easier said than done.
With a sigh, she went to her bookshelf and grabbed a volume of Vampire Knight with which she hoped to distract herself, but for some reason, it just wouldn't grab Keiko's attention. Frustrated, Keiko abandoned the volume and headed over to the computer for some mindless entertainment of Solitaire while listening to some GazettE while she was at it.
This passed the time for about ten minutes, and Keiko then realized that she hadn't eaten anything for a good fifteen hours or so. She fixed herself a TV dinner, which did make her feel a little better. But she had no dessert. Dessert reminded her of Ryuzaki, and she didn't think she could take that sort of reminder in her worked-up condition.
After eating, Keiko sat at the kitchen table for several minutes, and finally remembered the hair dye she'd been meaning to use for a while. That would give her something to do, anyway, and it might even afford her some amusement when she saw the reactions of the task force—it was bright, shocking, deep purple. Bored enough to do anything, Keiko began by bleaching her hair a couple times (A/N: YIKES!!), then dyed it all purple, and proceeded to cut her hair into a very chunky pixie cut. After deciding that such a look was simply too tame, she re-bleached random streaks of her hair to give her an interesting colorblind tiger sort of look.
Then, coincidentally, her cell phone rang, beeping stoutly the theme song of Bleach just as she was finishing cleaning up the mess she'd made in the bathroom. Keiko fumbled to pick it up, and saw the number displayed on the front. Ryuzaki. She flipped it open, expecting it to be either him or Watari, but not wanting to embarrass herself with a wrong guess (especially if it was a task force member using one of Ryuzaki's phones), she simply said, "Yeah?" in a bland voice.
"You really aren't feeling your best, are you?" wondered Ryuzaki. "You didn't guess who it was."
"Did you call me up just to harass me?" she snapped rather dully, flopping down on the couch.
"No, I called you to ask why you weren't here."
Keiko glanced over at the clock. 18:27. "Good question," she remarked slowly, remembering her agreement to have returned to the hotel at six to discuss… herself. But she didn't want to do that much anymore… it was too weird to discuss her own screwed up psyche. "Probably because I was just in a bad mood this morning. It's making a mountain out of a molehill, is all…" she said blithely, hoping that Ryuzaki would believe this. Up 'til then, she'd managed to push it out of her thoughts… and bringing that up again was like he'd poured lemon juice over a paper cut.
There was a pause. "Mm, that you continue to lie is starting to worry me," he said at length. "If you aren't here in the next hour, Watari will come drag you back here, kicking and screaming, or with a tranquilizer dart in your neck, whichever you prefer."
Keiko frowned. "I don't really fancy either of those options…"
"Then make sure you're here within the hour," he said simply, and hung up without so much as a goodbye.
With that, Keiko snapped her phone shut and grabbed a giant, hooded sweatshirt she'd gotten from To-oh, back in the day. It was old, worn, comfortable, and warm. What more could she ask from a sweatshirt? She grabbed her keys, purse, and some cash on the way out, and locked the door behind herself, before attempting to hail another taxicab.
The whole ride there, Keiko brainstormed about how she was going to worm your way out of this one…
Not much came to mind.
When she arrived at the hotel, it was after seven-fifteen. Keiko trudged up the stairs, hoping to stall a bit, but upon reaching the fourth floor with a dully burning sort of pain in her legs, she switched to the elevator. It wasn't worth the climb up twenty more stories.
With a heavy heart, Keiko knocked on the door. She had a distinct feeling that she was walking to the executioner's block…
Watari opened the door for her, letting her in with that sweet, old smile of his, but he said nothing as to her wild hair. Ryuzaki heard Keiko's entrance, and nodded cordially, escorting her into the living room. "Now…" he began without preamble as he sat himself in an armchair, adjacent to Keiko's seat on the sofa, "what is going on? And what did you do to your hair…?"
"Oh, do you like it?" she wondered, smiling brightly.
There was a long pause. His look of distaste made it obvious what he thought about it. She didn't care. "It's very… different," he offered at last. After another long silence, during which Keiko grinned perversely at his mostly speechless reaction, he finally said, "What is going on with you?"
Keiko inhaled a deep breath, then let it out. "Very little. I'm okay. Honestly."
"I don't trust you."
"Then why'd you bother asking, if you didn't think I was going to speak truthfully?"
He watched as Keiko crossed her arms belligerently. "I don't understand you at all," he said finally. "You come up here this morning with something on your mind, which you allude to in rapid French, knowing full well that no one else could understand it. Then you won't tell me what has happened when I ask, and you go home for the day, but instead of coming back, you have a mind to stay at home, dying your hair and doing Lord knows what, and still, you persist on keeping your secrets. Just what is going on?"
"You don't need to know. I'm just a fool."
"Watari, can you get out that lie detector?" called Ryuzaki in an almost lazy tone.
"You wouldn't dare," Keiko hissed, glaring mutinously.
"Mm, yes I would," he responded blandly, never removing his eyes from her.
"He's being facetious," Keiko yelled. "We don't need one."
"Do you honestly want to test me on that?" Ryuzaki asked coolly. "Don't toy with me. I will hook you up to a lie detector and quiz you on every subject possible until I find what the problem is."
Should I tell him? she wondered, panicking. It'll save him the trouble of having to give me that damn test…
What are you talking about? You can't tell him! And you can keep your reactions under control. He'll never find out.
Wha—!? He's L!
And you're Keiko Shintaro.
That has nothing to do with it!
On the contrary, it has everything to do with it, Miss Jizen Keiji. You could easily fool a lie detector.
Well, maybe not easily…
But you could still do it.
True.
But…
What?
Eventually, you'll end up just spilling your guts anyway, so why not just tell him and get it over with?
And give him the satisfaction of knowing that I'm a weakling who'll give in to his every freakin' whim? I think not!
But you do need to tell someone…
Give me one good reason why I should.
You'll feel better.
Besides that.
Masochist.
Blabber-mouth.
"Keiko…?" said Ryuzaki slowly.
"What?"
"Are you… ah… there?"
"Not entirely, though you could've ascertained that for yourself," she snapped. "Anyway, I'm not telling you anything."
"Watari, bring out that lie detector, please."
"One moment." Watari bowed and disappeared into one of the rooms.
"Now we'll see what's going on," he said smoothly, crossing his arms over his knees as he stared blandly at Keiko.
"I won't tell you anything," she declared stoutly, giving him an evil stare and making a point of calming herself down, so as to better fool the machine. He didn't react to this at all.
Thankfully, her state of absolute numbness rolled over her, and she took solace in the familiarity of the lack of feeling. For once, it was her greatest ally. The last thing she needed was a jolt of sorrow, a burst of adrenaline to give her away. To give her love away...
In a few minutes, Keiko was completely hooked up to the contraption, covered in nodes, indicators, wires, and other various devices. Watari left for the other room after that, knowing in advance that Ryuzaki would have asked it of him.
Ryuzaki looked up at Keiko across the lie-detector. "Tell me a lie."
Keiko knew it was to check the machine's integrity, so she sighed and announced, "The sky is orange with blue polka dots."
He frowned as he looked at the indicators on the device—nothing. "This isn't going to be easy. Could you tell me something that's obviously a lie that you would kindly react to?"
"How about 'I really wanted to come over here tonight,'" Keiko muttered scathingly.
Ryuzaki's eyes probed the dials and graphs. "Thank you." A hint of something untraceable became audible in his voice, but that was exactly the problem—Keiko couldn't identify it.
He interrupted her thoughts by plunging directly into the interrogation. "It doesn't seem like someone close to you has died," he mused then, gray-black eyes boring into her.
"No, they haven't." Unless you count my sanity and will to work on this case.
"And it doesn't seem like anything is physically the matter; you look fine."
Keiko didn't bother responding.
"So it must be something emotional," he mused. "Have any of your friends done something against you recently?"
"If they had, I would've clocked 'em," Keiko told him flatly, trying not to think about the kiss she and Kohaku had shared (her heart would've started racing out of sheer nervousness, especially in front of Ryuzaki, since she was trying to keep that little dirty secret from him… and what's more, she was still confused).
"A fact which gives me little surprise," he replied smoothly. After a few seconds of thought, he tilted his head and moved his thumb up to his mouth, expression twisting into one of meditative thought. After a few seconds, the tiniest flick of his eyes told Keiko that a light bulb had gone off in his head. "Does this have anything to do with the fact that you messed up the other day, when you couldn't remember Misa Amane's name?" Ryuzaki asked.
Like a bloodhound, she thought sullenly as she focused on maintaining a normal façade. "No, it doesn't," she said archly.
"Yes, it does," he said, looking bemused. Funny, he thought silently, the charts don't say ANYTHING. And yet, I can tell when she's lying… His mind began to wander, and he explained everything aloud, for Keiko's benefit, presumably. "If that is the case, it could be that you… are self-conscious to a very unhealthy degree—to the point of self-apathy, I would guess. I wouldn't put it past you. I remember some minor signs of that back in Los Angeles and Liverpool… so this must be a sort of build-up, as it were. You've been harboring feelings similar to these for months, possibly years."
" 'Signs?'" Keiko repeated dully, sounding languid and bored. She was NOT going to give him the satisfaction of knowing he'd hit the nail on the head. "What signs?"
He exhaled quietly in growing exasperation and readjusted himself. "Mm, when we first met, you said a few things about how your answers weren't 'anything anyone else wouldn't have thought of,' and 'I can't think of why you'd say I think like you. I'm not that smart.'
"Furthermore, you mentioned that you'd rather be dead than unemployed, earlier in the case. And I recall something along the lines of 'I don't like playing up my résumé,' because it made you uncomfortable." His lips twisted into a sort of smile—albeit a vitiated, strained sort of smile. "You don't like yourself, do you?"
That was it. Keiko's façade slipped for the briefest second, and her heart rate sped up, a result of the suppressed nerves. The beeping sound from the detector increased in frequency, and Ryuzaki's eyes honed in on a flashing light. His eyes bugged out, surprised, alternating between the machine and Keiko—she looked extremely calm… stony, even, inwardly angered over the failure of her plans.
Keiko was left reeling in the after-effects of her body's hormonal and chemical responses to the simple revelation. It was back, that horrible guilt, worse than ever... almost to the point where it was physically sickening. All she wanted at that moment was to squeeze something... to unleash her own self-directed flurry of emotion onto something else. She'd used pillows before, and even a teddy bear (though she felt a little guilty about inflicting "pain" upon such an innocent thing, later). The lack of response from these objects, however, was very faintly displeasing. But for a brief moment, Keiko understood why a body could be driven to murder... Instantly, she shook her head to clear it. Despite the fact that these thoughts and perverse desires lasted only a few seconds, it felt like a lifetime. "So what?" she asked coolly, her voice calm in contrast to the chaos that threatened to make her chest constrict to the point of implosion.
"So it's unhealthy, that's what," he retorted, turning off the machine.
Keiko set about stripping off all the wires and sensors associated with said contraption, and crossed her arms huffily. "I can take care of myself." The strange ache in her chest grew in intensity, almost as if it was trying to evoke some kind of penitent response from her.
"I beg to differ."
"I don't have time for this," she growled, rising to her feet. "I have better things to do."
Ryuzaki tilted his head and simply stared at her innocently. "Really? I can't think of a single one."
That made Keiko pause—she obviously did not comprehend that declaration. Again, the alien swoop of guilt and anticipation in her gut... Keiko swallowed heavily. As was habit, by now, after nearly seven years... seven bittersweet years since she'd been so thoroughly and publically spurned... she fell behind her mask of comedian. "That does not compute," she said brokenly, like a cartoon robot, making Ryuzaki smirk sadly. His amusement did make her feel marginally better, but not enough to fully alleviate the growing turmoil that had taken root within her.
"I'm saying right now that I am more concerned about your wellbeing than I am about 'whatever else' you wish to do—or think you should be doing, anyway."
Keiko's eyes cornered over to him as she crossed her arms belligerently. "As my boss or as my friend?"
"Both," he replied, blinking once. "And… as your boyfriend." That didn't make her feel ANY better at all. There was very little between them that truly resembled a couple in love, and Keiko wanted to seriously doubt any affection he had for her.
Her eyes narrowed, and her gaze turned to the floor, lest she see some false sign of supposed "affection" and deceive herself into the ridiculous notion that Ryuzaki loved her, wanted her, needed her... "You say that like you're contractually obligated to ensure my happiness."
Ryuzaki shook his head. "Mmm, no, but I would like to ensure your happiness." He didn't give any explanation as to why this was so, but Keiko, betraying her curiosity, glanced up to see again that strange flicker in his eyes. He lifted his thumb to his mouth, inserting his jagged nail between his teeth. "What's been troubling you?"
"I thought we'd ascertained that."
"I meant in further detail." He waited patiently for Keiko to sit back down, which she finally, slowly did, never breaking the gaze that connected them.
Keiko snatched a faux-velvet pillow and hugged it tightly to her chest, whereupon she decided to tear down her boundaries. Not only had Ryuzaki managed to get this far to determine the source of her distress, but something in his demeanor implored her to speak… and it was too hard to go on any longer over something so dumb. Better to just lay her irrational stupidity out in the open and put herself out of her misery. Yup, this was it—Keiko's last few moments as Ryuzaki's girlfriend. And it hadn't even been that much fun while it had lasted. She sighed sadly and looked down again. His piercing stare was too much for her to take. "Okay. When… when I messed up the other day, I felt really stupid, and… I don't know…" But she stopped. What, was she going to tell him about her little inner duels? That conflict within threatened to engulf her about every second of every day? That these facts mad her as good as a lunatic in an asylum? That Kohaku had kissed her, and she'd kind of liked it? That this made her only wish for Ryuzaki to act that way towards her?
"But that was merely the catalyst," he theorized. "Just the fact that your pride was a little marred from a simple mistake couldn't have taken you this far. You're much stronger than that."
"I'm a fair actor," Keiko countered with a noncommittal shrug. I'm not strong… not at all… It's ridiculous for him to think so.
But isn't that a good sign?
Really? Ryuzaki is L, and the world's greatest liar, to boot! It wouldn't be hard for him to fool someone like you into thinking something false.
He rose from his chair and began to pace the room, muttering quietly to himself as he thought. At last, he padded off to the kitchen for Lord knew what, emerging a few moments later with two pint-sized cartons of Häagen Dazs ice cream and a pair of spoons. He handed one to Keiko—cookies'n cream flavored—and took a strawberry one for himself. After settling down beside her on the couch and taking a bite of the stuff, he returned his gaze to her. "I have reached a conclusion. You apparently haven't been overly fond of yourself since before you even took up that case in Los Angeles, five years ago. And so, with this little mishap, you feel angry with yourself for having been upset at your embarrassment, because you should have just dealt with it, but instead, you allowed yourself to think that you were more important than you believe you are, and now, you're a mess, because you're just compounding your guilt. You don't want to admit to me the reasons why because it would seem selfish, especially during a case in which we're focused on trying to save others."
There followed a long, loud silence. "That's about the long and short of it, yeah…" And Keiko blinked back a tear, staring into her ice cream. Please… don't cry! That's the last thing you need right now… He's got enough to deal with at the moment besides your sanity.
But isn't that what I'm trying to fix—my cracked sanity?
No, it's what HE'S trying to fix. You don't have to meddle with it.
Since when did it become his affair?
Since you decided to leave it be, I suppose. Either way, don't try and bother with it. You'll just get yourself hurt.
The cold of the ice cream numbed her hands, and she focused herself on the numbness. I must be like the ice cream: numb to my feelings and cold to anyone who's dumb enough to get close and aesthetically pleasing on the outside, like on the carton, so that nothing appears out of place. Maybe then he'll leave me alone.
"No one could ever love a cocky, worthless idiot like you…"
NO!! SHUT UP!! GO AWAY!!
Face it, Keiko—you WANT to break up with Ryuzaki. You know it would save you heartache later on, when he got bored with the relationship…
Maybe I should… even though I love him…
"Stop it," said Ryuzaki softly. "You're doing it again."
There was virtually no escape, so Keiko just turned away from him and took a bite of ice cream, stolidly.
In an instant, he was before her, holding her shoulders so that she was forced to face him. "Talk to me, not that voice inside your head."
"I'm not insane, you know," she said guardedly.
"Mm, not technically speaking, no," he said in agreement. "It's not a voice, per se, more like your shoulder angel and your shoulder demon."
"Oh, how appropriate," Keiko scowled.
"The real Keiko is stuck in the center of all that conflict… and I want to see her again."
"She doesn't want to come out," Keiko murmured quietly.
"Don't tell me that," said Ryuzaki. He leaned in and kissed her tenderly, softly—comfortingly. Really.
Keiko stiffened, panicking inwardly. Ryuzaki, Kohaku—kiss, no, why?! ACH!! NO! He CAN'T find out about Kohaku!!
He will if you keep acting like this. Besides, isn't this what you wanted him to do all along?
Not like this, no!! Kohaku wasn't supposed to be in the picture at all!
So forget about him.
BUT I CAN'T!!
So tell Ryuzaki about him.
AND BE DUMPED?!
You love him, don't you? Doesn't he deserve to know the truth? That you're a lying, conniving two-timer who betrayed his trust?
Keiko was lost.
When Ryuzaki pulled back, he stared at her for a few moments, surveying her reaction. Keiko stared back, completely motionless. Her eyes didn't even follow him... she just stared into space... and his head happened to be in her line of vision. She was rendered completely speechless. Was this RYUZAKI, the world-famous detective L, showing her affection!? Was he actually kissing her without any sort of ulterior motive, not even testing her?! But in another ten seconds, all questions fled her mind and Keiko collapsed into him tearfully, grasping his shirt tightly. He squatted down before her, which was a much less awkward position for them both, and hesitantly put his arms around her trembling frame.
She knew that she should've pulled back and run from him then, run as far as she could... but he was so warm and comforting... and Keiko was tired of running. It never got her anywhere; she just ended up running back into herself wherever she ran.
"Ryuzaki," she sniffed, pulling back just slightly; one fist continued to clutch a handful of his white cotton shirt, and she stared down at the floor, tears coursing down her nose. "I... am really flattered... that you'd even want to... to be with me at all..." she began softly, hesitantly, forming a diplomatic reply as she went, "but... I..."
"Am I to presume that you aren't trying to suggest that we go our seperate ways?"
Keiko shook her head. "No... but you might want to after you hear..."
"Mm, I doubt it, but, hear what?"
Again, she shook her head, more furiously. Hot tears stung her eyes, and she grimaced. "No, no, no, no, no! You haven't heard what I did!"
Ryuzaki's gentle hand ran through her wild purple hair once before coming back down to her chin, lifting it so that she looked into his eyes, but she jerked away. "Mm, Keiko, calm yourself down. You're working yourself up over nothing."
"But it's not nothing!"
"If you do not wish to tell me, or do not wish to tell me yet, I will understand."
"Huh-uh... you deserve to know." Keiko took in a calming breath. "There's no easy way to say this... but I... kissed Kohaku..."
Silence followed, as she'd hypothesized, and Keiko slowly turned to look him in the eye. He did appear to be a little saddened, but not nearly as much as she'd thought he'd be! Then again, maybe he was just trying not to scare her away... in which case, did he still have some liking for her?! "I think in this instance, it would be best if you told me the entire story."
In a few moments, the entire story was spilled (from a very skewed and negatively biased point of view), and Ryuzaki listened with an impassive expression. Finally, he gave a slight breath. "Did he initiate the contact?"
"Huh?"
"Did he kiss you first?"
Keiko paused. "Well, maybe..."
"Do you have feelings for him?"
"No!" she exclaimed adamantly. "No, no, no! It's like I told you last night, he's a great friend—well, he used to be," she finished scathingly. "I don't think I'll be inclined to want to see him much for a while, the arrogant pinhead..."
"Mm, then I would advise you to cease working yourself into an unnecessary fit."
Keiko blinked in confusion. "What? You—you're not mad?!"
Ryuzaki shook his head. "I do not expect for you to be perfect. And while knowledge of this sort is rather disconcerting and disheartening, I admit, it is not the end of the world, nor will I ultimately be discouraged." He neglected to say aloud that for the first time in his young life, his jealousy was prompting him to inflict rather violent acts upon someone (namely, Kohaku Mizushima). But not only out of jealousy. No, he was also sorely tempted to punish Kohaku for having hurt his Keiko. Instead of voicing these urges (he deduced that it would only further upset Keiko), he continued his explanation of his reaction. "If it was your fault, then you are correct, it would upset me. But as the fault lies with another, that does not affect how I view you." No, how I view you is affected by your own overreaction and hypersensitivity, Keiko. I wish you would not torture yourself so needlessly... What occurrence could have prompted you to be so adamantly inclined to hate yourself? At her blank stare, he spoke further, this time, in a softer tone. "Keiko, I am... very fond of you. It would be a shame for something so ridiculous to destroy my relationship with my best friend."
"B-best... friend...?"
He gave a tiny nod. "I suppose that isn't saying very much, considering that you are one of my two friends." He didn't have to explain that his only other "friend" was Watari.
"Huh-uh," she slurred, rubbing the tears from her eyes. "I... well... I'm... flattered..."
Ryuzaki blinked quickly, seeming just faintly self-conscious, but he recovered before Keiko could really tell if she'd seen any kind of change in him at all. "Mm, well... that said, is it safe for me to think that you are, at the least, somewhat better?"
Keiko gave a colossal sniff and nodded. "Why do I always end up in tears?" she mumbled thickly, peering at him with bleary red eyes.
"Hm, I would like to think it's because crying is a sort of self-therapy, and I just help you get the courage to do it."
"I'm sorry," she muttered then, looking down. "I shouldn't be… you probably think I'm really stupid and dumb and weak…"
"No, I don't." His eyes were calm as they explored her face. "I think you're just lonely and confused."
She snorted in derision. "Yeah—'confused' is the word. I'm such a dumbass—I'm sorry…"
"Don't say that." His tone was soft, but adamant, and his hands held Keiko's face gently, but firmly. "I recall having said to you on our first meeting that I dislike it when people downplay their own intelligence, as you are so blatantly doing. You are one of the most brilliant minds I know."
"Oh…" She realized he was right (at least, the first part)—but by now, it was a force of habit. "Whoops…" A tiny smile managed to peak at her lips.
His eyes searched her face for a sign that she'd really taken in his words. "I know it seems out of character for me… but I really do care about you, and I can't stand it when you are… out of sorts. And I believe I mentioned before how much I hate it when people downplay their intelligence. You are a GENIUS, and if I hear anything contrary to that from you, I shall resort to shoving broccoli down your throat."
Keiko gave a weak half-smile. There was a pause, broken by a small sniff from her. "Gosh… you're like a boyfriend and psychiatrist—and sometimes a drill sergeant—in one. And I'm like a mental patient."
"That's not entirely true," he said slowly. Ryuzaki blinked at her. "You just pretend you're tougher than you are, but when something shakes your world, you turn back into your sensitive self."
"Yeah…" She wiped her eyes, rubbing her mascara across her face. After a glimpse at her blackened hand, Keiko sighed. "Oh, well." She wiped the stuff off on her sweatshirt carelessly. More than anything, she wanted to just forget that she'd just been a total, over-sensitive imbecile, and move on with life, so she hazarded a suggestion. "Ryuzaki… C-can I stay for a bit? Can we play cards or something?"
He frowned slightly. "I don't have a deck of cards." But she took his lack of argument as his understanding her feelings—that is, that he realized that she was finally… okay, at the least.
"I have one in my purse," she said, brightening. That was all it had taken to pierce that concrete shell around your heart (A/N: Ha! "All"… Just a lie-detector test, that's all. No big.) And Keiko began to feel whole, more complete… like something nightmarish and dark had just left her. In a way, it had.
"You're the kind of person who'd carry cards with them at all times…" He smiled softly. "I'm glad to see you're back to normal."
"Me, too." Keiko, rather touched by his smile, sat back down next to him, cards in hand. "Thank you, Ryuzaki."
"Not at all," he responded, turning a pale shade of pink, which made her chortle as she dealt the cards, wondering if he'd ever get used to the concept of being in a relationship. Probably not…
"Keiko?" Ryuzaki began tentatively.
She looked up at him slowly. "Yeah?"
He hesitated... "Are you ever going to dye your hair back to normal?"
And Keiko laughed and laughed, happily letting her relief spill past her lips in an audible form. After such an emotional experience, her mirth turned to sheer giddiness. Oh, dear heaven! Ryuzaki… I freakin' love you. When she calmed down, she shrugged. "Maybe. I thought I just needed a change, I guess. Now… any threes?" she asked him, peering over the top of her hand.
"Go fish…"
Okay, so call it melodramatic, but this chapter is actually important... Thanks for the reviews and those who put this on alerts/favorites!! You guys rock my socks clean off. Seriously--my feet are as bare as the day I was born. Review, if you please! It would make my day!