Food Fit For A KING

Chapter 26:

"Order's up!" I snapped, placing the plates up onto the hot plate. My eyes shifted back down to the plates below me, adding this out of a plan and placing another object to another plate. After checking to see the plates had been taken, I put the next plates up and hit the bell again.

The restaurant was open, everything was beautiful and just as I wanted. Mr. Hoshiki was out with the waiting staff, testing them on the menu and making sure they had all they needed before pushing them out the door. It was insane today, our grand opening. Everyone and their mother was here. There was atleast a page long waiting list, and even all the council members came in to eat.

I was working on a meat and mushroom dish in my hand when I saw a shadow standing in front of the hot plate. I can't remember how many times I told the girls not to do that! Their food would be there soon! Snapping my head up to glare at whoever it was, I stopped at Mr. Hoshiki with a worried look.

"A table sent this back…" I blinked before looking to the plate.

The whole kitchen came to a screeching halt as I looked to it and eyed it with suspicious eyes. Gritting my teeth, I looked up to Mr. Hoshiki.

"…Why?" I hissed, grinding my teeth hard.

"The… the customer at table 12 says he asked for rare pork and says that's not rare…"

I slammed the plate down and looked at the man before turning to the kitchen.

"Jam, come up to the pass… I have to take this!" I hissed, ripping off my apron and storming around the long table of hot plates and metallic shelves for putting up plates. I rounded the corner and walked right past the man and right into the dinning room.

Table 12?

I turned into the dining room only to stop in my tracks as I saw them sitting there as pretty as they could, looking at me with smirks. With a scowl, I walked right up to the table with my hands on my hips.

"Was it necessary to make my whole kitchen think I can't cook a rare steak?" I questioned. Kankuro chuckled and threw his hands behind his head.

"Kimi… we just wanted to see how you were doing." Temari stated, crossing her right leg over her left, sitting on the right side of the table. There on the other side was Gaara, just blatantly staring at me with no blinking or any reason.

It all happened that night! Gaara and I were actually on the way to having sex with each other when Sian and Miyuko walked in on us, and I haven't seen or heard from them since. Miyuko refuses to take my messages and the boys claim he hasn't been home. Sian…I haven't gotten a glimpse of her since that night.

At that moment, I ushered Gaara out of my apartment and refused to see him since. Whenever he appeared in public I buried myself in work. Temari and Kankuro actually came back to town and went straight to see my restaurant, I did the small 'how are you? I'm doing fine, it's going well' talk before excusing myself to go help with this or that. I wanted nothing to do with Gaara until I got Miyuko back. However, it grew worse and worse as the days bore into a week then into two. Gaara would stop in public to stare at me, he would knock at my apartment door incisively when he knew I was home. I refused to open the door.

My brother hated me, and Sian, the only woman to treat me like a daughter was going out of her way to avoid me. My brother thought I was scum, and I was scum.

I was going to sleep with Gaara just to avoid telling him I loved him and now it had blown up in my face. But I had gotten what I wanted, the boys gave me space, I had my restaurant, I even cut my hair, that was pulled back into the shortest ponytail at the back of my head as possible. In the process, I gained hatred from Miyuko, rejection from Sian, and everyone in town thought Gaara was obsessed with me and now I was out of a kitchen that was going crazy with food orders.

"I'm doing fine." I sighed, crossing my arms across my chest. "Look, I'm a little bit busy, can we talk later?" I asked, eyeing them with a cocked brow.

"You won't." Gaara whispered, crossing his arms as well. I sighed and looked to the table.

"I promise, that I won't leave this restaurant till we do talk. But I have to get back to the kitchen… and Kankuro, you'll get a new rare pork pita." I stated. With that I turned and began to stalk away from the table, ready to explode. I couldn't deal with him till I fixed whatever was broken between my family and I.

"We'll be right here!" Temari called after me. I rolled my eyes and flicked a curt wave to them as I stormed right back into the kitchen.

"Well, do they want a new pork-?" I glared right at Mr. Hoshiki.

"Jam, refire on that pork pita." I hissed, looking right at Jam then to Hoshiki. "Don't worry, I know them, they were just trying to get me out of the kitchen," I sighed and rubbed my brow. Many chefs told me they needed to go take an air break and maybe drink a bit, but I told them oxygen only. No one was to get drunk under my watch. However, at this point, drinking wouldn't go over too badly. I would encourage it right now only under the circumstance I was allowed to drink as well.

XX

"Gaara, you've got to stop this, its becoming unhealthy." Temari spoke, eyeing me as I continued to sit inside the restaurant Kimi owned now.

I knew what she meant, but I wouldn't give up. I was not about to let Kimi let go of me that easily. I knew she had to love me, she just had to love me! I needed her to love me, and I wouldn't stop demanding the answer till she gave it to me. How badly I wanted to know.

The question kept me from thinking of anything else but that. How could she think that by seducing me she would get to delay the answer. I knew something was off when she tried to get me to…Well.

I didn't know what I wanted to do at that moment, but I knew it was far more intimate and intense than kissing. The whole night was blurry, I remember bits and pieces, all up until the end when her brother walked in. That scene I remember distinctly.

Her brother was furious and when Kimi kicked me out, I wanted to go back inside and see if she was okay. Her eyes when she kicked me out, they were disturbing, almost as if she was regretting being near me. The second I was clear of her room, Miyuko came up to confront me. There was a lot of shouting and throwing his hands in the air.

Then his last words that continued to ring in my head and wouldn't leave every time I saw Kimi, they just wouldn't stop ringing.

His words were, "DON'T YOU FUCKING DARE LAY A FINGER ON MY SISTER UNLESS YOU FUCKING LOVE HER, DO YOU HEAR ME YOU HEARTLESS MONSTER!"

Unless I love her.

His threat didn't hurt at all, his insults and threats didn't phase me or make me feel unsafe. He was merely human and a medic, not a ninja. Miyuko wouldn't be able to hurt me, but his words struck something in my mind as walked away from the scene.

Did I love her? Did I even know what love was.

"Gaara!" I snapped from my glazed stare at the door where she had left to.

"What?" I whispered, looking to Kankuro.

"You need to stop it, this obsessive need to get Kimi. Gaara, she's pushing you away because of it." Temari stated, leaning towards me.

"Yea, Gaara, give her some space."

I should give her some space, but I had been giving her some space. I could go into her apartment while she stayed inside ignoring my knocking, I could have very well kidnapped her and forced her to talk if I wanted. Then, just as the ideas popped into my head, her brother's words rang into my mind and I kept the ideas away. He was right in his own, demented way. I shouldn't even be doing more than kissing, I shouldn't even 'touch' Kimi unless I loved her.

It was because I knew this that I kept from full out following Kimi. I kept at as much of a distance as I could physically stand, hoping that I would figure it out.

"I… I can't." my words seemed jumbled and confused on my lips as I looked to the table. "I can't let her… I can't let her be." I spoke as firmly as I could, looking to the table with a sigh. My siblings stayed quiet for a moment. I didn't even need to look up to know they were trying to figure it out without having to ask me. They weren't having any luck, because if it were me, I wouldn't even know what to make of it either. I was crazy! I was insane… and I was lost.

"Why not?" Kankuro asked as quiet as could be.

I closed my eyes and pushed my head us as best as I could before dropping it and shaking it.

"Sian said she loves me and I want to know if she does." I sighed, running a hand over my face. "And Kimi told me if I made her answer it, she would lie so I don't… I can't…. I can't let her go knowing…. That she might love me."

XX

I stood in the kitchen, my palms sweaty against the pass table and the air in the kitchen freezing. I had been standing there for atleast 15 minutes after everything had been shut down and cleaned. I was literally all alone in the kitchen. The only thing keeping me from leaving was the mere thought that Gaara would be waiting.

I loved him, and it was breaking my heart to be avoiding him. It shattered me not being able to scream at him that I was in love with him. Gaara deserved to know, he had the right to be happy and have happiness. But I was keeping him from that, all because…

I shook my head and let out a sigh. Sooner or later I had to face them, but I wasn't ready. I needed to be an ice-cube first.

That's when the kitchen door creeked and my head lifted to the backdoor. It wasn't locked yet, but there wasn't anyone in this world that would come into my restaurant to steal or beat me up. Biting my lip, I looked to the door, standing up straight as footsteps were heard coming my way.

There, in the kitchen way was Miyuko holding a small desert rose and an apologetic look on his face.

It took less than 3 seconds for tears to burst from me and for me to launch myself into his arms.

"MIYUKO!" Whimpers and tears stained his professional suit. My brother just wrapped his arms around me and pulled me close, burying his head in my short hair.

I rubbed my face into his chest, missing his scent and his soft clothing. He rubbed my back and kept his face in my hair as I cried into his chest.

"I'm sorry, Miyuko…" I whispered, pulling from his embrace. I looked to his face, rubbing my nose and tears onto my sleeve and trembling from my tears. I was expecting his 'I accept your apology' face, but instead I saw tears and he was smiling at me. Miyuko placed the rose on a table near us before cupping my face in his palms.

"You don't have to say you're sorry. I'm sorry, Kimi. I was keeping you from being happy, I always have. I wanted you to be little Kimi, because if you were still my baby sister… Mother wasn't dead, father wasn't ill, the boys were grown up, and everything was under control. But Kimi, you're grown up and… I'm too stubborn to admit, you're becoming a woman who knows what she wants." He explained before chuckling, "even if what she wants is against every fiber of my being… I'm going to have to suck it up like a man." He stated, kissing me on the forehead.

I laughed lightly through my tears as my hands cupped his.

"Now… that doesn't mean I agree you having sex at your age!" He blurted out, looking at me sternly.

My eyes crinckled with laughter as I wrapped my arms around him and burried myself into my brother.

Yes, my Brother, Miyuko was back. No longer the angry, controlling brother he had been for the last month or so. My brother, the overly loving, generous, over protective brother.

"You don't have to worry… I'm… I'm not going to be having sex anytime soon…" I whispered with a sigh.

"That's good, but why the sudden change of heart?" Miyuko chuckled, pulling back to look at me, "Kimi… is everything alright?"

I bit my lip, I was trying to keep the flooding from escaping but the tears were coming back as I looked to my brother. He was finally back to who he was, but I was still the over emotional, blubbering Kimi that fell apart when her heart became all lost in fog and her own stubbornness.

"No…" I blubbered, wiping my eyes with my sleeves again.

"What's the matter… did he leave you?" Miyuko growled.

"No!" I blurted out, the tears beginning to choke me. "But I might have to leave him…" I trembled, grabbing my brothers hands. I knew it, here it came. My whole heart wasn't able to shove the emotions back down and there wasn't any work to cover it with. The emotions were coming and I couldn't run or work. Damnit!"What? Why?" Miyuko asked, holding me close, running his hands up and down my back. I began to full out sob. All out sobbing, the tears, the hic-cups, the near snot in my nose, my head spinning, and the trembling uncontrollably.

"I love him! Miyuko, I couldn't help it and now I don't know how he feels! He wants me to tell him but if I tell him and he doesn't feel the same or doesn't like the answer… he's going to leave me! I know he will and I can't take that. I recovered from loosing mom, and dad… but I can't recover from loosing him. I just can't!" I cried into his chest, my arms shaking as I clutched onto the back of his jacket. "I was trying to keep him from asking me if I loved him or not but now… I can't loose him and I don't know what to do!"

I was gone. Goodbye strong, independent, able to keep her emotions in check Kimi… Hello blubbering emotional wreck Kimi!

Author's Note:

Thank yal all for reviewing, sorry I can't answer back this time, It's near 2 in the morning where I am and I'm tired, just finished it! =) Yay! No cliff hanger... enjoy... i...go... bed...now...ZZZZZZZZ