'It was a dream,' she thought to herself, 'it was all a glorious dream.' And indeed it seemed to be. She'd opened her eyes that morning and there was nothing under her bed, nothing suspicious lurked in her closet, and on her way to school she saw no hitchhiking ghosts in the car. She took a deep sigh of relief, releasing every bit of stress that had been built up over the whole affair. That Youko was probably just a hallucination induced by too much cotton candy and lack of sleep.

'Speaking of lack of sleep,' she yawned, arching her back like a cat and stretching her jaw out as far as it would go. 'Confound that Kuwabara and his blatant disregard for school nights!' He insisted they ride every ride and play every game in that carnival at least twice, which took them far into the wee hours of the morning. And then at the last moment, Yusuke remembered a certain mission they'd come for and spent another hour doing that, but by then no one could quite remember what the mission had been so they left. Just like that. She had arrived home at roughly five in the morning and got up an hour later when that annoying blaring of her stupid dancing happy face flower alarm clock with the smiling apple next to it that wished to disturb her morning with its stupid little song. Botan almost wished her great aunt hadn't given it to her. But she couldn't refuse the gift...it was... ahem... "antique"...yeah right. The price tag was still attached.

The song went: "Everywhere that..." Then there was a pause as the creative yet sad clock attempted to register Botan's name as she had typed it in on the little keyboard on the back. After a long while, long enough of a time for the stupid alarm clock to ring a loud wild clang that sounded like a fire alarm followed by a loud buzz. After the awful buzz that invoked hair-ripping insanity graciously ceased…the song continued. The alarm would obtain a robot like voice and say 'Botan' as bow tan, making her sound like an ointment for a red faced, sun burnt woman who had a problem with water and refused to lose weight. Then the singing went on: "BOW TAN--- went---BOW TAN--- went---BOW TAN---went...that apple was sure to go! Doot doo doo doo doo doo doo, doot doot doo doo DAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Blah blah boom!" And the apple would spin crazily.

Getting out of her car, Botan turned slowly toward her grandmother who was worried sick over...something...probably still going on about the dark rings under Botan's cotton candy eyes, but her Genkai wouldn't worry too much about that...

"Botan! I still don't believe you stayed up so late last night! Who was supposed to wash the dishes? Who?! I had better things to do like practice martial arts!"

Martial arts…what kind of grandmother did that? Obviously Botan's grandma did…didn't she know that most normal and non-special grandparents just sit and watch TV? But she wasn't normal was she? But at least she was special. Botan sighed. Her grandma was completely obsessed with the old arts. The old woman's old pinkish-purplish hair, dead as curly limbs of string, was now swinging as she continued to ramble about her own matters.

"If I don't practice I won't be in tiptop shape for getting an apprentice!"

Botan sighed and said, "O.K. Grandma, sure, I'll improve." Though Botan only half meant this, she was too tired to care much about what came out of her mouth. She just wanted to slump over and sleep! With a tired wave to the martial artist in the car, she turned and walked slowly toward the school's entrance; ignoring the strange looks from people as they had overheard her conversation with "Grandma Martial Artist".

The blue-haired girl slumped forward on her desk, the tiresome drawl of the teacher calling roll sounded far away as she drifted into dreamland.

"Shiseido?"

"Here!"

"Toyota?"

"Here!"

"Honda?"

"Present!"

"Mitsubishi?"

"Yep, here."

"Isuzu?"

"Heeeeerrrrrreeeeeee! Here! Here! Here! Here! I'm here! Hah…haaah…."

The class stared at the strange, panting, energetic child for a moment before looking away. Looks like someone had too much coffee that morning. The teacher readied a nurse slip and noted in her mind to send the child to the office. She smiled queerly at the coffee-affected student.

"O.K.…Kusabana?"

The classroom was silent. The teacher called once more, louder this time.

"Kusabana?"

Still no answer. The teacher called once more, raising her voice even louder.

"Kusabana!"

A girl leant over and prodded Botan with a pencil, "That's you, Botan!"

"What? Oh! Here!"

The teacher nodded her head curtly, "Yes, Botan, and I'd thank you to pay attention during roll call from now on."

"Will do, Mrs. Subaru!" Botan replied, saluting smartly and sending the rest of the class into silent giggles.

However, the teacher seemed slightly less then amused. Sending an icy glare at Botan over the rims of her spectacles, she cleared her throat before glancing back at the attendance sheet.

"Hitachi?"

"Here!"

Botan breathed once again, having successfully dodged a bullet. She turned to the girl who had alerted her, "Thanks, Keiko."

"No problem," said the brunette. "But you don't look so good. What happened?" She said spotting the dark rings under her eyes.

"Oh, it was just a late night. Had trouble sleeping, you know." Botan said with a yawn.

The rest of the class was miserable for Botan, always on the constant verge of falling asleep. Each attempt to focus on what her teacher was teaching resulted on her vision becoming blurry and her seeing double. And those many times she actually did start to nod off Keiko prodded her with a pencil, which was once helpful, but was now becoming painfully annoying.

The consequences of that class were several perfectly round bruises dotting her arm and her outstanding citizenship grade dropping to a mere satisfactory. Mrs. Subaru abhorred those who slept in her class.

Naturally when the bell rang, Botan quickly made her escape. But the minute she stepped out the door she remembered the painful news. That was only first period. There was five more coming.

"I can't do this," she groaned aloud. 'Maybe if I splash some water on my face it might wake me up,' she thought hopefully.

Shizuru's bladder had been ready to burst when at last the bell rang. She was the first out the door, and she made straight for the nearest Girl's Bathroom which, unfortunately, was clear across the school. Using dirty word to describe her loathsome luck she broke every track record in school history rushing across the courtyard and through the bathroom door. Finding the nearest stall she went in and locked the door behind her.

Now, this of course is where she did her "business", but I don't think you want me to describe that to you and, frankly, I don't want to. However what she heard while she was...relieving herself, you may find of some interest.

It was not soon after Shizuru arrived that she heard the door to the bathroom open soon after followed by the sound of shoes against the floor. Normal, yes? Well wait and see. Water from the faucet could be heard as it was being turned on and let run, water splashing. Probably some girl washing her face, Shizuru mused. She might be coming out of Biology; they after all were dissecting frogs this week. And that girl might have made the mistake of gauging the frog's eyeball, which caused frog juice came squirting out like Old Faithful.

Her attention was drawn by the faucet being turned off and the sound of paper towels being torn roughly from the roll.

Then, much to Shizuru's surprise, the girl gave a startled gasp. 'What? Did she find a pimple?' she thought sarcastically.

"You!" The feminine voice cried, which she only vaguely recognized. Was the girl talking to her? Probably not, but she hadn't heard anyone else come in.

"It wasn't a dream. It wasn't a dream," The girl at the faucet sounded panicked. Who the devil was she talking to?

"Argh! Would you stop saying that? I'm not your savior or whatever, okay?"

This was getting weird. No one answered.

"Are not!"

There was a pause, "Are not!"

Had Shizuru been forced to fill in the blanks she would have guessed whatever this strange girl was talking to had replied with, "Are too!" However, in actuality it had been a rather cold and proper "Yes, you are."…but Shizuru would never know.

"I don't care what any mirror, says! They're probably faulty anyway; one of them said I was going to marry this guy I don't even know..."

There was yet another pause. This girl was two sandwiches short of a picnic.

"Would you please just leave me alone?"

Apparently, the answer had been "no" for the girl's anger was instigated further.

"Argh!" And then there was the sound of the door slamming.

Shizuru waited for quite some time after the girl before timidly peaking out from behind the stall door. The bathroom was completely empty. Slowly creeping out, she took one swift look around her to be safe before dashing out of the bathroom as fast as she could. It had surely been an interesting visit to the bathroom.

Sorry about that. Nijiko had computer problems. Credit for this chapter largely goes to her. So give her a big hand, folks!

-Frith

I hope you guys enjoyed that. Did you guys like the clock? It took a while but I love the clock…hee hee. And just a note to everyone that I have a new story I put up a while again that got a sad number of reviews…two of them…due to the very late posting time; so I was wondering if you guys wanted to check it out. It's based on "The Stepford Wives" and is a Cardcaptor Sakura/ Cardcaptor fanfic. EriolxTomoyo. I'd love if you all would read it…; And of course check out my own KB fic! Just search Nijiko-chan and you'll find it!

-Nijiko-chan

And it's Nijiko! And I'm replying to the reviewers this time! Yay!!!!!

Reviewer Notes!

Hakudoshi-chan: Oh yes, I agree. Botan is lucky to have a hot stalker. It's always the heroine that gets the gorgeous guy…and they usually are completely normal girls who seriously want a normal life, but don't get one. Like for example: Fushigi Yuugi and Ayashi no Ceres. Yep...lucky. Oh! You live in Japan? Cool! Wow…so Fan fiction readers really do come from everywhere! That's so cool. And I've heard of Hikaru no Go. Interesting…. Do you know Inu Yasha? I hear the last IY movie is coming out.

Lady of Roses: Thank you! I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Sakurasango: Hmm…do you know Cardcaptor Sakura and Inu Yasha…'cause Sakurasango…you know…Sakura from Cardcaptor Sakura and Sango from Inu Yasha? ; And you love this story? Yay! I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

Kagorin: Thank you! You have a cool name that's fun to say! I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

PassionateAngel: Thank you! And yes, it's not so bad at all to have Youko follow you! Tee hee… I hope you enjoyed this chapter!

NekuraHime: Now aren't you the perfect grammar student! You're very good at editing…hey…maybe you could even be one of my editors for a fic…that's a thought…we'll see. And after I saw all the corrections I felt silly, but it was kinda funny too…usually I correct people…; But I liked the correcting…Frith and I will keep trying to not make many more mistakes…because your bio says you hate that…and of course it's not good to have mistakes… anyways! I feel like a teacher..ugh…and we're your heroes! Awww..thanks!