Doukei

'What am I doing?' Usagi mentally groaned while she slipped her dry shirt on. As she looked around the room, she realized it must belong to Yuuhi. She quickly forgot this all together as the sweet smell of food drifted to her nose. A soft knock sounded from the door and she smiled to herself.

"You can come in, I'm dressed." She called. The door popped open and Yuuhi appeared in the door way with somewhat of a sheepish grin.

"I just realized that you have no idea how to get to the kitchen." He said with a small laugh. Usagi smiled brightly and followed as he walked off. When they entered the kitchen, the aroma of the food hit her full force and she sighed with contentment. Several dishes were spread across the table, all of them still issuing small clouds of steam that hovered in the air momentarily before disappearing all together.

"Wow, it looks so yummy. Did you cook all this yourself?" Usagi asked dreamily. Yuuhi reddened as he nodded.

"Yeah, cooking is one of my main hobbies." He explained. More like obsession these days, his mind chided. It was true that he'd been cooking more lately, and the most complicated recipes he could find; anything to keep his mind off of Aya and Tooya really. Suzumi was worried about him and Chidori hadn't visited in a while. He knew that neither of them knew what to say to him any more.

"Hey, you okay?" Yuuhi snapped back to reality as he felt Usagi tug on his shoulder, her blue eyes turned up towards him with worry written in them.

"Oh, um, yeah I'm fine. Sorry, I kind of drifted off for a moment, why don't you sit down?" He said quickly, flushing with embarrassment as she giggled at him. Even so, as he turned away to sit in his own seat, Usagi's eyes glazed over. She knew that look that graced his features, for she'd seen it in her reflection every day for the past year. Perhaps her stumbling upon this particular shrine was no coincidence, or perhaps her naivety was sneaking up on her again.

'I'm looking too much into it.' She told herself as she began to pile things onto her plate. So absorbed in her thoughts, she didn't notice Yuuhi staring at her with disbelieving eyes. Once she had filled the plate to the point of collapsing a small table, she grabbed her fork and began shoveling everything she could reach into her mouth.

"Aiee! This is so good! You're like a chef, how do you do it? Will you marry me?" Usagi asked, starry-eyed. Yuuhi reddened once more and laughed as she dove back into her meal without even waiting for a response.

Okay, so maybe some things you never lose with age. Yuuhi shook his head in bewilderment and started on his own plate, glancing over at the rambunctious girl before him every now and again. Though she ate about twice of what he consumed, they both finished eating at about the same time, and Usagi insisted on helping wash the dishes. True, it had always been her least favorite chore, one that she simply abhorred, but it would be rude to leave all the work to the guy who'd been nice enough to save her from pneumonia.

So, armed with elbow length rubber gloves and a sponge she began to scrub at the dishes one by one, handing them off to Yuuhi for rinsing and drying. She stared out of the window above the sink and watched wistfully as the snow danced through the air beyond it. The sky was dark blue from the cloud cover, deep as the color of Mamoru's eyes.

'Did I do the right thing? I'm so scared that I'm just being irrational and self-serving, that I'll end up crawling back to him on hands and knees looking like a fool.' Usagi nearly jumped out of her skin when she felt someone nudge her in the arm. Chest heaving, she realized it was only Yuuhi and flushed with embarrassment.

"I thought I'd lost you for a minute, you okay?" He grinned. Usagi looked down at the dish in her hand to find that she'd stopped scrubbing all-together and nodded.

"Yeah, I'm fine." She said softly. Before Yuuhi could respond, a call of "WE'RE BACK!" echoed through the shrine. Yuuhi face faulted as Suzumi burst into the kitchen with her arms full of groceries.

"You know Yuuhi, you're cooking escapades are starting to cost a small fortune. I'm buying spices of plants I never knew existed. If you weren't such a fantastic cook I'd simply downsize us to instant ramen! Oh my, who do we have here?" Suzumi blinked as she noticed the blonde girl standing next to Yuuhi, gloves dripping with soapy water and eyes full of wonder.

"Oh, um, Suzumi this is Usagi Tsukino. It was snowing so I invited her inside to have lunch. Usagi, this is Suzumi. She's my sister-in-law who owns the shrine slash dance school thing." Yuuhi said sheepishly. Suzumi dumped her groceries on the counter and rushed over to the blonde girl. She circled her a few times, which left Usagi quite perplexed, and then let out a triumphant 'aha!'

"She's quite the looker and seems very sweet; you should ask her out Yuuhi." Suzumi proclaimed, patting him on the back encouragingly and winking. Yuuhi reddened. Suzumi turned back to the unusually quiet blonde. "Where are you staying, dear?"

"Um...well..." Usagi began, completely at a loss for words. Suzumi smiled.

"Perfect. I would love for you to stay here at the shrine with us. We have a spare bedroom right net to Yuuhi's and he cooks enough for a small army at every meal. We'd love to have you." She said warmly.

"Er...I don't exactly...have money..." Usagi began awkwardly. Yes, this whole leaving Mamoru to find a new life was definitely a bad idea; especially since she had no job, no money, and nowhere to really go. Maybe she was still immature.

"Oh please, dear, I don't need any money. You can stay for free." At the blonde's uneasy expression, she added, "Of course, if that really bothers you I suppose I could come up with some chores or something you could do."

"That would be wonderful. Thank you so much." Usagi said, bowing. Yuuhi shot Suzumi a look that clearly said, 'I know what you're trying to do.' Suzumi countered with an, 'I could really care less.' Usagi missed the exchange completely as she rose back to her full height.

"Come on, hun; let me show you to your room." Suzumi said, and led Usagi out of the kitchen with her gloved hands still dripping with dish water.

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Hmm...I think this is one of the longest chapters...review!!