Chapter Three

A/N: This chapter was re-uploaded on 4/6/2017. I tried to keep it as close to the original as possible. Hope you enjoy!

The following day found Yamucha strolling aimlessly around the halls during second period. He was excused from his English test because he had been sick for a few days during the lesson, and was expected to go to the library during that period so he could get caught up. He saw no point in rushing to get there though.

As he was walking by the slightly ajar door to the janitor's closet, someone reached out and pulled him in. Surprised, Yamucha had to stifle what was going to be a very unmanly shriek. It was pitch black in the closet and he could see nothing, but by the way the person's long finger nails pressed into his shoulders he could tell it was girl.

But was it friend, foe…or Bulma?

Yamucha quickly dismissed that thought. He knew there was no way it could be Bulma; this just wasn't her style. He hoped to God that it wasn't Juuhachi-gou or Chichi ready to kick his ass again.

"Hiya Yamucha," the person breathed seductively.

It was Rae.

"Uh… hi," he said.

"I was just thinking about you and your girlfriend…" Rae whispered in his ear.

Yamucha trembled as her warm breath ghosted over his skin. But he forced himself to focus.

"Bulma?" he asked.

"Yeah, her. And I was thinking that we could still be together…without her knowing. You know what I mean…" she said as she stepped back and finally turned the light on.

Yamucha blinked rapidly as his eyes adjusted to the change, then zeroed in on the seductive-looking bombshell standing in front of him.

"Hmm… Well, I gotta think about it…" he said while smirking.

"Don't give me that. Yesterday you were more than ready to come home with me, but I said no because you have a girlfriend. But, since you don't seem to care about her much, I'm just saying maybe we could be together," Rae said as she crossed her arms over her chest.

Yamucha couldn't help it as his eyes followed her movements and he found himself ogling her.

"Of course you know I'd rather be with you…" he said as he stepped closer to her.

They stared into each other's eyes for a beat before Yamucha leaned down and kissed her.

"Well then," she said, blushing slightly as she stepped back and gave him a flirtatious smile. "You can meet me back in here at the end of fifth period. Your girlfriend won't follow you if you say you're going to the bathroom, right?"

"Right," he said before kissing her again.

She pushed him away.

"There'll be time for that later. I gotta get back to class. Remember. Right after you're finished lunch, okay," she said.

"Yeah," he answered. "Right."

Rae ran her hand seductively down his chest, red-polished finger stopping right at the buckle of his jeans before pulled away. She winked at him right before she turned and left.

Yamucha let out a soft whistle and shook his head as he watched her retreating form through the gap in the door. He knew he had better get to the library, but he decided getting to the bathroom was a greater priority instead. Rae had left him in dire need of 'relieving' himself.

When the bell rang, signaling the end of third period, Bulma found herself almost not wanting to go to fourth period study hall. Something that was decidedly uncharacteristic of her since study hall was one of her favorite periods. This was because she never actually needed to use the period to "study;" she always spent the time decompressing, or catching up on gossip with her best friend. Right now, however, none of that had any appeal. Instead, she had a sudden urge to be with Yamucha.

"Hey, girl!" Chichi called as she fell into step with Bulma. "You're going to Study Hall right?"

"Why should I?" Bulma asked. "You know I don't need it…"

"Just because you're smart doesn't mean your best bud in the world doesn't need your help," Chichi giggled, not noticing that Bulma wasn't sharing in her humor.

Bulma was clearly distracted, and because she wasn't giving Chichi her undivided attention it was easy for her eyes to be drawn to the person she had just been thinking of. She could see Yamucha walking down the hall a few yards ahead of them.

"Ya-chan!" she called, breaking away from Chichi and hurrying towards him.

Chichi stared after her, an expression of dissatisfaction on her face, but she rolled her eyes and walked into the study hall without her.

Yamucha turned around and smiled at Bulma as she approached. When she came up beside him, he threw his arm around her shoulder.

"Hey, babe. What's up? Don't you have study hall right now?" he asked.

"Mm hm. But I won't be late or anything," she said.

Yamucha reached his locker and they both came to a halt. Bulma was quiet for a few moments as she watched him work on opening his lock.

"Yamucha, we haven't gone out in a while. Why don't we go out to the movies with Goku and Chichi this Saturday night?" she offered while smiling.

"Aww man, Bulma. I can't. I gotta work," he said.

Bulma raised an eyebrow.

"Yamucha, you never work on Saturdays…" she said.

"I know," he said, with a sigh. "But I gotta cover for some jerk that broke his leg the other week."

Bulma frowned. That sounded convincing enough. And she wasn't willing to accuse him of lying if it could actually turn out to be true that he was filling in for someone who was hurt.

"Oh… okay," she said, unable to hide her disappointment. "Well, maybe next week then?"

"Yeah, sure," he said as the bell rang.

He smiled and gave her the peace sign, before running down the hall.

"Yeah… bye…" she said quietly.

'We're never going to go out again… And I bet he's lying about having to work. Yamucha's always been a really good liar, I can give him that, but it takes one to know one, and I'm a good liar too…" she said determinedly to herself as she strolled into study hall.

As the group sat together in the normal spots, digging in to their lunches, Bulma noticed that Yamucha was barely paying any attention to her.

'Well, less than he usually does,' Bulma thought angrily.

She glanced in the direction he was looking and saw Rae Angelico turn around.

Bulma really hated that girl. Rae had been a complete bitch to her last year. Bulma watched on as Rae winked at Yamucha and blew a kiss to him. In that moment, Bulma thought a fuse had blown in her head. She stood up from her seat next to Yamucha and, standing behind him, pointedly flipped the girl the bird. Rae flushed and quickly turned around as Bulma sat back down.

Yamucha was dumfounded as Rae abruptly stopped her flirting. He turned around and immediately had his head shoved into his lunch, courtesy of Bulma. She held her hand down on the back of his neck so he couldn't get back up.

Vegeta, Juuhachi-gou, and Krillin jumped up as the food splattered all over the table.

"Fucking awesome!" Vegeta laughed.

"Serves him right," Juuhachi-gou agreed.

Krillin and Goku just laughed at the scene.

After a few more moments of listening to Yamucha's pitiful spluttering noises, Bulma finally let him back up. His face was dripping with what looked like lasagna.

"What the hell did you do that for?!" he yelled.

"You seem to find something very interesting over there!" Bulma yelled back.

The whole table turned around and looked in the direction that Bulma had pointed out and all eyes rested on the form of Rae, purposefully trying to ignore the scene going on only a few feet away from her table.

"Not her again…" Juuhachi-gou mumbled.

"Why do you have to be such a bitch?!" Yamucha yelled.

"Why do you have to be such an obvious asshole?" she screamed back.

"Fuck you!" he yelled.

"Go to hell!" she screamed.

Yamucha looked like he had a few more choice words he wanted to retaliate with, but instead he gave her a dark glare before turning on his heel and storming out.

"Uh- Yamucha…" Bulma started but he was already gone.

She blinked in surprise, as if she was just now processing what she had done.

"Oh my God!" Bulma cried as she burst into tears. "I can't believe he just left like that!"

Vegeta was the only one that noticed that the girl Yamucha had been looking at had also gotten up and left when Yamucha had stormed out. He uncomfortably slipped in next to Bulma and watched as Chichi tried to soothe her. But Bulma seemed inconsolable.

"He's gonna break up with me!" she howled.

"Don't let him," Juuhachi-gou said, frowning.

"Yeah, you should dump him first," Chichi suggested.

Bulma put her head down on the table and started sobbing again. Vegeta inched away from her.

"Um…I'll be right back…" Vegeta said trying to get away from the uncomfortable scene.

"Yeah…Okay," Goku said absently. He was clearly concerned for Bulma.

"Bulma…" Chichi started after Bulma had composed herself a bit. "Why don't you go and get cleaned up…"

Bulma nodded as she stood to her feet. Chichi and Juuhachi-gou got up as well.

"Do you want us to come with you?" Juuhachi-gou suggested.

"No, that's okay," Bulma smiled. "I'll be fine."

"Okay…" Chichi said uncertainly as they slowly sat back down.

Bulma quickly made her way out into the hall, mind set on making it to the bathroom. Enough people had already seen her crying for the day. However, as she walked past the custodial closet a strange sound caught her attention. She stopped for a second to listen and soon realized what she was hearing. There were people in there. And they were clearly enjoying themselves.

'Heh, they can't even wait until they get home' Bulma though ruefully.

She was almost past the door when she heard someone exclaim, "Oh Yamucha!"

She stopped in her tracks and backtracked to the door.

'I can't be hearing this right…' she thought to herself. Tried to reassure herself.

She slowly put her hand on the door knob and turned it hesitantly, not sure if she really wanted an answer. When the door swung open she saw exactly what she hadn't wanted to see: Yamucha and that Rae girl, and they were both almost naked. As the door completed its swing open, Yamucha looked up from kissing Rae's neck. His eyes widened once they took in the sight of Bulma.

"Oh fuck…" he whispered.

Bulma felt like her heart was going to explode. She had had a number of hints that Yamucha had cheated in the past, but she had never actually had to catch him in the act.

"Wait, Bulma…" Yamucha started.

But Bulma was hearing none of it. She slammed the door in his face. And even as she did that, she knew he would make no attempt to follow her. The next thing she knew, she found herself running down the hallway, with tears streaming down her face. All she could think of was getting far away from the scene she had just been forced to witness. Anywhere but there.

As she ran, the tears continued to flow, blurring her vision. She ran with all her might. If she hadn't been so emotionally overwhelmed, she probably would have thought better of running so carelessly. But she was so stunned she felt as if her mind was on autopilot. Then next thing she knew, she found herself slamming into something hard. As she bounced back, preparing herself to fall, she realized it was not a something, but a somebody. And although she was bracing for impact, she never actually hit the ground. The person she had bumped into reached out and grabbed her by the wrists, steadying her.

She looked up and stared into the ebony eyes of Vegeta. She gasped, relieved to see a familiar face in such a stressful moment, and buried her head in his shoulder.

Vegeta was shocked; he hadn't expected this, but instinctively he put his arms around her in an awkward embrace.

"What happened?" he whispered.

Bulma looked up and squeezed her eyes shut, wanting to block everything out.

"I—I saw Yamucha -…. He was in the closet with that girl," she said in between sobs, before burying her head back in his chest.

He couldn't do anything else but hold her.

They stayed that way for a few minutes until Bulma's body stopped shaking from her sobs. When she had calmed down, she looked up at him. Her face was tear-stained and her hair was disheveled, but to Vegeta she was beautiful.

She blushed slightly and stepped back.

"I'm sorry," she whispered.

"It's whatever," Vegeta said, shrugging, and taking on the cold outer appearance that he usually had.

The bell rang for the end of fifth period, startling them both.

"You gonna be okay?" he asked.

"Yeah" she said and smiled.

They held eyes for a moment, before looking away. Then they went their separate ways.

A/N: That's all for now! Quite a short chapter, but things will get lengthier as we go on.