2/10/03- Oh my gosh, WHY did it take me so long to write this chapter?! I took me more than two weeks! GRR!!! Maybe it's because nothing really happened in this chapter, and it was BORING BORING BORING!!! Sorry to make you wait for nothing. And the next chapter won't come for a while, either… . Whatever. I managed to finish today because Kids WB is showing the DDM shows again and I got inspired. ^^ Yay, "Duke," whee!!! (Actually, I think the DDM episodes are dead boring. But it's fun to watch JUST because they're the episodes with the MOST oral attacks EVER!! *talks in a pouty baby voice like "Duke"* "I'm sorry that I had to do that, Yugi…!") I love the random help screen that just MAGICALLY appears after not being there the PREVIOUS episode! HAW HAW HAW!!!
…
DO ME A FAVOR?!?! PLEEEEAAAASSEE???? Take TOKYOPOP's survey for the next series to license and vote for Ojamajo Doremi, please? You can choose three, and if you can, also vote for Fruits Basket. ;D Vote with as MANY email addresses as you have!!! (I have five email addresses, so I voted FIVE times… no, SIX!! I used my brother's!! XD)
http://www.tokyopop.com/news/surveys/survey.php?surveyid=1001
THANK YOU SOOOOOOOOOOO MUCH!!!!!!! If you vote for Ojamajo Doremi, and tell me, I'll draw you a 300x300 picture of your choice if you want!!! *pleads pleads pleads*
Okay, you don't really have to vote. Just something to do if you feel nice and want to cheer me up! :X
Cinnamon Eyes
"You have a suggestion?" Hitomi looked at the boy standing in front of her desk. Hanada had never participated much in class discussions and was a bit on the slow side. Quiet and shy, his height reflecting his personality at 158 centimeters, he was the last person she'd expected a suggestion from.
"Woah, wait." Otogi ran to Hitomi's desk. "Hanada's got an idea for the booth?"
He nodded. "Uh… yeah."
The two class captains looked at each other. It was eight days before the festival, and needed to make a decision soon. After several suggestions, all of them on either end of the extreme- totally impossible or incredibly lame- they both had the same thoughts. It can't be much better than the "take the water out of the bucket with a spoon" game.
"What's your idea?" Hitomi sighed.
"Well, um…" The small boy fiddled with his fingers. "Otogi's good with dice, right? So… maybe a dice gambling thing…"
Otogi raised an eyebrow and looked at his partner, who wore a similar expression. "Um… Hanada?"
"Yeah?"
"Gambling is illegal in Japan."
Hanada stood in silence for a moment. "Well… you don't have to gamble for money…"
"Hanada…" Hitomi covered her face with her hands and leaned back in frustration. "The point is that we're trying to earn money."
"Wait, what?" Hanada blinked. "Isn't it that you can't gamble for money? You can use money to gamble, but you can't get money in return… right?"
She looked up at Otogi, eyes wide. "That's right…"
"Hanada, do you have any specific examples for the gambling game?"
"Use dice."
"Yeah, I know, but," Otogi rubbed his temples, "do you have any specific ideas for a dice game?"
The boy shook his head. "Can't you come up with something, Otogi?"
***
"Can't I come up with something… it's really not that easy…" Otogi mumbled as he left school for the day. "It took me forever to perfect DDM…"
"Yeah, but this game isn't going to be as complex as DDM, is it?" He looked down to the auburn-haired girl at his side.
"Oh, Hitomi-chan, hi…" He sighed. "So, we're doing a dice gambling game. Have you got any ideas?"
Hitomi stood in front of him, pointing to her head and frowning. "Listen, I've been concentrating on schoolwork. There's no knowledge of games up here; I don't have time to waste on them. How do you think I lost to you in our duel?"
"If you knew you were that bad, why did you challenge me?" Otogi laughed.
"Because you're annoying!!" She reached in front of her face to grab the collar to his school jacket. "Well, Otogi, we have to think of something. Care to come to my house?"
He burst into smiles. "Really, Hitomi-chan?!?!?"
"Don't kill yourself, now." She smiled at him. "I'm not going to run this thing myself, you know. You have a change of clothes, or are you going to spend the day in your school uniform?"
"I've got a change."
***
Otogi scribbled sketches and ideas on paper, crossing most of them out, as Hitomi watched on. He looked up at her after a while. "Are you going to help at all, Hitomi-chan?"
"You know, I would…" she sat up, "but I sort of know nothing about dice."
"Ah, that could cause a problem."
"You think?"
He held out his hand. "Well, then, I'll teach you." From his hand he dropped a small cube. "That's a die. "
They sat still for a moment, Hitomi staring at him, who was smiling back.
"I know what a die is!" She threw it at him, and hit his forehead.
He chuckled. "I could have dodged that, but I wanted to see how your throw was. It's utterly horrible, Hitomi-chan."
"Well, of course!" She pouted. "If you're not going to help me, I'll leave you to do this on your own."
"I was kidding, relax…" He gave the die back to her. "See you have to sort of grip it in just the right way and throw it with the right force that will cause it to land where you want. Watch." He took a second one out of his pocket. "I'll try to roll a three, okay? Now, I'll grip it like this, and then…"
He rolled a three, and pointed at it ecstatically. "WOW! Hitomi-chan, will you look at that?! I ROLLED A THREE!!!"
"I noticed."
"Okay, now you try. Roll a three."
Hitomi formed her fingers around the cube, trying to imitate Otogi's demonstration. Then she threw the die, which landed on five.
Otogi came to the other side of the table and knelt behind her. "Here, I'll help you along so that you can get the right feel for it, okay?" He placed the die back in her hand, and helped to place her fingers in the right spots. Then he placed his hand over hers. "When I say so, let go of the die." He swung her arm and said, "Now!"
They let go, and the die rolled on the table, eventually landing on a three. "Yeah! You got it, Hitomi-chan!"
She blushed. "It was only with your help, though…"
"You know how to throw it now, though, you just have to remember the speed and slope of the throw." He looked at the clock. "Eh, it's getting close to dinnertime…"
"Really?" She checked her watch. "Yeah… but we still have to work on this, we've come up with nothing. You can stay for dinner, and we'll continue afterwards if you want."
"That's fine with me." He stood up, legs cramped from sitting on them for so long. "Hey, by the way, where are your parents? I haven't seen them at all…"
Hitomi walked to the kitchen and started opening cupboards. "They're at work. They won't be coming back until late tonight; neither of them finished high school, so they have to work really hard." She sighed. "How do noodles in a cup sound?"
"That's fine." Otogi hesitated, then went to join her in the kitchen. "So…" He tried to think of a way to keep the conversation going. "Is that why you study so hard?"
She nodded as she filled a kettle with water to boil. "That's mainly it, I guess. My mom dropped out in the middle of her junior year, and my dad never went to high school. They aren't home much, but I know they're working hard because they love me and are trying to support me."
Otogi stood behind her and hugged her around the waist. "They're not the only ones," he whispered in her ear.
Hitomi paused. "Are you proposing to me, Otogi?"
"What? NO! I didn't mean it like that!" he hissed quickly. He turned her around. "If I did, I'd be looking you in the face."
She blushed. "Um…"
Otogi sighed and walked out of the kitchen, throwing himself on the couch. "You're so confusing, Hitomi-chan…"
"Me?! You're the confusing one!" She took the boiling water off the stove and poured it into the cups. "You tell me that you'll wait for me while I think, but you still continue to make moves on me! And the next minute you act as if you don't even care!"
"Is there something wrong with occupying myself while I wait?" he asked calmly.
"You indicated that you wouldn't bother me!" She threw the cup of noodles at him.
"Hey! That's hot!"
"I don't care!" She plopped down on a chair, scowling. Suddenly she burst out into a fit of giggles.
"What? What is it?!"
"It's you, Otogi!"
"What about me? What's so funny?!"
"It's just…" She tried to calm herself down enough to talk properly. "It's just you!"
"What?" He sat up. "I don't get it!"
"Neither do I!"
"What?! You…" He picked up a die and playfully threw it at her. "Take that!"
"Hey!" It skimmed past her ear and she grabbed it, throwing it back.
"Your throw is still horrible, Hitomi-chan!" He took two more and chucked them in her direction.
"You're so mean!" Soon they were engaged in an all-out dice-throwing war.
"Ow! That one almost went in my eye!"
"You almost got one in my mouth!"
"Lucky die…"
"WHAT?!"
"Hey! You can't throw five at once, Hitomi-chan! Fight fair!"
"Bite me!"
"I'd love to."
"SHUT UP! YOU IDIOT!!!"
***
"Otogi, it's ten o'clock." Hitomi's eyes drooped shut. "We're no closer to coming up with something than we were five hours ago."
She leaned her head on his shoulder, and he pushed her off. "Your fault."
"My fault?!" She shook herself awake. "You're the lazy dice master who started throwing stuff!"
"Ah, well…" Otogi brushed some black hair out of his face. "The problem is that most dice gambling tricks have a low probability of winning."
"Ahh…"
"We don't want to get in trouble with anyone…"
"Mmm…" Hitomi's eyes closed again, and her head slammed onto the table. She blinked a few times, then shouted, "Oh my GOD!!"
"Hitomi-chan!" Otogi pulled her up and pushed her bangs up to look at her forehead. "Are you okay?!"
"Oh my god! It's so simple!" She didn't seem to notice her partner's worried actions. "Why didn't we think of it before? It's so simple and…" Hitomi swore out loud.
Otogi jumped. "Hitomi-chan! Oh, god, she's delirious!"
"I'm nor delirious, you idiot." She slapped her forehead. "Oh, god, we're so stupid…"
"Hey, now! I don't mind when you only call me stupid, but…"
"You're so weird!"
He grabbed her shoulders. "What's gotten into you?!"
Hitomi smiled up at him. "It's such a simple game, Otogi. Why didn't we think of it sooner?"
"You thought of a game?!"
"Yes!" She eagerly grabbed five dice, suddenly wide awake. "We have five dice, right? So, the player can choose one number from one to six, and how many times that number shows up on the roll is how many points they win. Since there are five dice, there's a pretty good probability that their number will show up. Now… how about four?" She threw the dice, which landed on 3, 5, 1, 4, and 3. "See? I got one four, so I win one point. We can have different prizes depending on how many times the number shows up!"
Otogi sat there, thinking. "Huh… I think that just might work! We'll have to roll the dice from a cup…"
"You'll teach me how to do that, right?"
"Of course!" he smiled. "But it's getting late, I should go home…"
"Nooooo!!!" she whined, clasping onto his arm. "I'm just getting into this!!"
He fidgeted uncomfortably. "But… well…"
"If it gets too late, you can stay and sleep on the couch or something."
Otogi stood up and scratched his head. "Do you think that'll be okay?"
"As I said, my parents get home really late," she replied, standing up as well. "They're always so tired, they don't notice anything."
He rubbed his chin and smirked. "So, you mean, they wouldn't even notice if we-"
"You pervert!" she cried, hitting him upside the head. Then she paused, blushing. "But, no, they wouldn't notice."
"That's so cool, Hitomi-chan!"
"You know what? I changed my mind. Go home."
Otogi crossed his arms. "I was just kidding, you know."
"I know," she smiled. "So was I."
He was silent a moment. "Kidding about what part…?"
"Oh use your head!" She grabbed a pillow from the couch and threw it at him.
Laughing, he caught it and tossed it back onto the couch. "Hey weren't you tired?"
"Not anymore! We know what we're doing, and now it's getting interesting!" She sat down again. "Okay, so, let's have a prize for if your number is on one die, a better one if on two or three dice, and the best for…"
"Wait, wait." Otogi sat back on the couch, putting his hands up. "Where are we going to be getting all these prizes?"
"Don't worry, you can leave that part to me."
He peered at her, then leaned back. "Okay, then. Since we're using five dice, we'll have to roll them from a cup. Go get one, I'll teach you how."
"Okay, then." She stood up and headed for the kitchen. "I'll make us some tea also, okay?"
"That'll be lovely…" he breathed.
"Okay, now, stop. You're really scaring me." She took the kettle off the stove and filled it up with water again. Turning back towards the living room, she said, "Okay, I have green tea and…" She trailed off, seeing Otogi sleeping on the couch.
She crossed her arms and walked back over, smiling. "Really, you're unbelievable." He must have been tired, but didn't want to show it…
She fetched a blanket and covered him with it. "So much for teaching me how to roll dice in a cup, huh?" She stared at him a bit. He looks so calm and innocent when he's sleeping… completely different than usual… She hesitated, then reached out to brush his jet-black hair out of his face. Think about it, huh? Do I even know what I'm thinking? I certainly don't know what goes on in your mind… She sat on the floor and continued to look at his face, circling her finger around on his forehead. You're right, though… I should figure out how I feel about you… Brushing his hair out of the way again, she leaned over and lightly kissed him on the forehead.
She stood up, not taking her eyes off of him, and then turned to go into her own room. "Sweet dreams, Otogi…"
*^-^* Omake BLAH!!!!!!!! *^-^*
So, I've been dead for the past two weeks. Do you know what I've been doing while I was dead?
Well, first of all, I've been ignoring Makkusu ever since I put that last chapter up. I thought he was finally getting it on Thursday (we had a snow day on Friday), but he seems to still not be noticing now!
In Luigi's words… "What an oblivious person."
Either that or he just doesn't care.
Next, here's a nice long list of other things I've been doing:
Watching Ojamajo Doremi
Watching Fruits Basket
Worshipping Shigure
Building my websites
Laughing at Christian conversation hearts (I'm not making fun of my own religion, just the fact that there are conversation hearts with messages such as "Got God?")
Translating the last episode of Ojamajo Doremi
Avoiding looking at colleges
Forgetting that we have standardized testing this week
Being happy because we're supposed to take the writing test this week in our History or English class, both of which I had last semester and not now.
Doing FUN MATH!!
Being in my FUN MATH CLASS!!!
…with my FUN MATH TEACHER!!!!
Being sad because Ojamajo Doremi has ended
Trying to convince my parents to let me go to Spain this summer
IGNORING MAKKUSU!!!!
Realizing that I know enough Japanese to translate almost an entire episode of an anime *coughOjamajoDoremicough* by myself (and scaring myself in the process)
Doing cruddy art for the art class that I really shouldn't be taking because I'm not GOING to an art college and don't NEED to build a portfolio
Eating at Friendly's (MAB!! MUST GO THERE SOON!!!)
Doing almost nothing that has to do with Yu-Gi-Oh (except buying a few packs of cards; Mr. Volcano, the Witty Phantom, Bite Shoes, Boo Koo and Frog the Jam RULE!!!)
Worshipping Shigure (wait…), Yami Bakura's sexy chest, random Pokemon from Ruby/Sapphire and
Realizing that Ojamajo Doremi has been dubbed into Spanish and hoping that I can see it in Spain if I go
Stuff (WOO!!)
Drawing random pages from the MIDDLE of random mangas that I have come up with (Fushi no Senshi and Kyanpa~i!, to be specific…)
Babysitting (OW!! My arm is cramped from holding that kid for so long!!! STILL!!)
Not eating lunch and keeping the lunch money
Being thoroughly amused by the number of insignificant Digimon characters have been made into icons, with the most insignificant outfits as well
Trying- and failing horribly- to make chocolate from scratch
Being an idiot and starting a fansite to Ojamajo Doremi AFTER the series ended.
I think that's all that I'll write. I did more stuff, but I'm probably boring you by now.
Oh! One thing…
chibi cat2- Yeah, I know. *waves it off* I know it's modern Arabic, and it's rather obvious that modern Arabic was not used in ancient Egypt. (I like to PRETEND it was, though! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) And since you corrected me on something I already knew, I shall correct you on something you probably already knew as well!
Run-on sentences are not… er… grammatically correct. But they SURE are fun to write! :D (Okay, I'm not making fun of you, at all. I just felt that needed to be said, and if you've been reading these author's notes up to know, you know that I'm a big kidder and if I say something that may be thought of as mean, I'm really not being serious at all. I'm hardly ever serious. Actually, I would really mean it if it was someone I hated… but it takes a lot to get me to hate someone! Unless you flame me horrendously and back it up with something stupid like, "you misspelled this word" or something like that. Or maybe "I live in Nevada and I've never seen a 45 dollar bill." I didn't receive that flame, but… this omake section seems to be "Umeko steals Luigi's stuff" or something like that.)
Yes, well, then… I'm glad you like my story. (One more thing… please don't take this as offensive at all, because I don't mean it to be… but it kind of annoys me when people criticize me on one tiny thing and then say, "Oh, but I like the story." I'm not saying that I didn't appreciate your review, it's just a little pet peeve I have.)
And don't worry about anything in this passage that may have offended you, because I really seem to want to correct things also; it got me into a lot of trouble in eighth grade, and the teachers accused me of "harassment," but I won't get into that right now.
Yeah… I hope I haven't driven you away now or anything, because I'd love to hear more of your input about my story! ;_;
Now I'll actually talk about the fic itself. I'm not happy with this chapter at all; my feelings are that I could completely cut this chapter out and it would do nothing to change the story (except for the development of the game, which isn't that important either, and a couple things that I am planning to connect to later chapters).
Hey, hey, look! Look, chibi cat2, Microsoft Word is saying that my previous sentence is a run-on! See, I make run-on sentences also… Bah. I'll stop now. (NOT MEANT TO BE OFFENSIVE! NOT… NO OFFENSIVENESS!!!)
If you can guess from what anime Hitomi's family situation is loosely based off of, you get a cookie! (Luigi, Mab, this is not a real offer.)
Also… as I was writing this chapter, I had a specific layout of Hitomi's apartment in my mind. So, I drew it out for you guys, since I'm a nice person.
http://www.boomspeed.com/yugi_h_2_oh/map.jpg
Tee hee, I'm such a nerd! I labeled everything as if it even MATTERS!!!
Okay… the apartment actually looks a lot like the condo my family lived in when I was in the first half of fourth grade. Huh… Was that intentional or accidental? I don't know.
You can kind of tell that my layout skills are not all that great… considering that the kitchen is the largest room in the house… and the couch and chair are facing away from the TV… Oh, well! Hitomi just has a crazy home!
That Secret Hideout… that was not supposed to be there. But there was all this SPACE that I had no idea what to do with, so I just made a secret hideout. And now, since I've made it unintentionally, I'm going to use it in some later chapter… somehow…
NO! I FORGOT TO LABEL THE STOVE! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!
That comes to the next thing. I have two chapters planned out after this… I'll try to think of more ideas, because I really want to keep writing this!!! Maybe I'll try to do something with Hanada… I mean, I gave him a height for chrissakes…
Anyway, if you have any ideas of what I could write after this, please tell me! I'd prefer it if you emailed them to me, but I really don't care. Put them in reviews if you want. I'm not guaranteeing that I'll use anyone's ideas; but it may get the creative juices flowing and I'll be able to come up with something on my own. If I do use your idea, I will give you full credit where credit is due! Yeah… that's it.
Oh, the next chapter may not come out for a month or so. I'm going to be concentrating on other projects and I'm going to try to make something special for you guys for the next chapter… Just so you know!
Now I feel that I need to talk about Ojamajo Doremi.
Now, if you know me, you know that I could just go on talking about it for hours on end. I'm not going to do that, because this section is long enough.
This last episode nearly had me in tears. Actually, I would have expected myself to go into tears when I first heard that OD was ending back in early December. I guess I've been in shock, and that's why I haven't cried.
Yes, I've been in shock for two months. So?
Anyway, this last episode… oh my gosh, it just tied up everything! Even the things that I'm sure everybody had forgotten about! Things that were introduced in the very first episodes were finally tied up! I mean, they resolved what couldn't be solved in the first few minutes of the first episode of the first season. I had completely forgotten about that, and I literally gasped out loud.
Now, you sort of have to see the first episode to understand that. The friends that I have force-fed it to (Luigi, Mab, I'm talking to you) can probably figure out what that last thing was.
To understand what was going on and understand the meaning of it all, you sort of have to have watched the series from the beginning… I'm not revealing the identity of Jooh-sama, but she has always been a very relevant character in and out of the Majokai (Witch World). And I've liked her ever since the first episode without even knowing it! HAW HAW HAW!!!
Well, I'll just do short rants about the main-ish characters now. (And I'm acting as if I'm talking to them…)
Harukaze Doremi- Doremi, you're so awesome. You DESERVE your steak! Marry Kotake, then you can RAISE COWS ON A FARM!!!!!!!
Fujiwara Hazuki- Your voice is annoying. End of story.
Senoo Aiko- Um… YAY!!!!
Segawa Onpu- Oh, come on! You KNOW you love Oyajide!! YOU MUST GET TOGETHER WITH HIM!!!!! Besides that… you're pretty cool.
Asuka Momoko- CHRISTMAS CAKE NI FRIED CHICKEN!! WA-OH!! WHAT IS THIS NOISE?! OH MY GOOOOOOOOODDDD!!! SHE'S STILL SLEEPING!!!! EVERYTHING IS PERFECT!! PLEASE HELP ME WHENEVER I NEED A HELP, OKAY????
Harukaze Pop- Um… you're kind of stupid, but your awesome points are racked up a bit just because you're a Harukaze.
The Baby- DDDDDDDDDIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The Pachy- DDDDDDDDDIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Yosei-tachi- YOU GUYS ARE THE BEST!! ROCK ON!!! Except Toto, you can just die along with your owner and her elephant.
Alexander T. Oyajide- YEAH! OYAJIDE!!! YOU'RE THE LORD OF THE DANCE, MAN!!! KEEP PURSUING ONPU!!! SHE LUUUUUURVES YOU!!!!
FLAT 4- Fujio, you're so cute and cool. Fight your enemies with your trumpet!! Leon… you're kind of weird. AND DON'T TRIP OYAJIDE, YOU BAD BAD BOY!!! Akatsuki… um… Akatsuki!!! Tohru, you're stupid. Give up on Onpu, your MASTER has dibs on her! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
Wait, no… the FLAT 4 is actually the FLOAT 5!! I forgot that Oyajide is included now! HAW HAW HAW!!!
Majorika- SAMBA!!!!!
Lala- SAMBA!!!!!
Baba- You're so awesome. You're the bomb. SAMBA!!!!!
Jooh-sama- …O.O OH MY GOD!!!!!! I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT YOU'RE *********!!!!!! Actually, it makes a whole lot of sense now that I think of it and I don't know why I didn't see it before.
Kotake Tetsuya- GO! CHASE AFTER DOREMI!!! *points to the sky with Momoko squint eyes*
SOS Trio- You really have no relevance to the series at all, but I DON'T CARE! YOU'RE SO COOL!!!!
Okay, I'm done! Sorry if I bored you!!
Next Chapter
Chapter 7: Te o tsunaidemo ii desu ka? (May I hold your hand?)
Wait, scratch that, next chapter is the Valentine's Day special. So now I have 3 fics to write by Friday… . Oh, WELL!!