Strawbeby – sorry. I haven't loaded a new chapter in a week (?). But good news! I'm over my writers block and I'm continuing writing the main outline/plot of my story. And Rachel is coming back into my story after taking a 2 (?) chapter break. But like all of you care! Now on with the story!

What the Tide Brings In Chapter 5 – The Lily Pad and Rachel's Beginning

By strawbeby

Jimmy, Amy, Mitch, and George stepped out of the little train station in Ryuteki, the tiny beach town that was right on the northeast shore of Japan. While Jimmy called a cab for the four of them, George, Mitch, and Amy unloaded their suitcases from the train (almost half of them Amy's). This cabby wasn't as accepting as their last one on the matter of four teenagers along with their luggage being in his cab, though, so Jimmy called a second one for George and Mitch, the arrangements under the recommendation of Amy. So they all piled into a cab, and on their way to their hotel, they got their first good look at the town that they would be staying in for the week.

Ryuteki, the small beach town just north of Misawa, was a quaint town, relatively unknown to tourists out of an hours range, despite the boardwalk that had been built about 50 years ago. Mostly it was permanent residents who lived there, but once a year Jimmy's school, who had been sending students there for a reward for about 60 years, filled the town with upper high school students looking forward to the spring break. It really was a clean town, looking like a college belonged somewhere nearby. It contained 3 different restaurants, one hotel (which had its own restaurant along with the others), a bank, a post office, and then the coup de grace was the board walk. On it there was every fun ride imaginable from bumper cars to a large Ferris wheel. There were vendors of various treats like cotton candy and taffy, and of hot dogs and French fries. The stores on it offered many unique souvenirs. Most of the time the boardwalk was only in operation during the summer time. But the town made an exception when Jimmy's school came, opening everything to cater the needs of the rich city kids.

Mitch, George, and Amy might have enjoyed looking at the town on their cab ride, but Jimmy's mind was on something of a different variety. Every new site brought up a different memory of years gone by. The train station reminded him of when he, Rachel, and a group of their friends snuck out at, like, three in the morning to run into Misawa to grab some Taco Bell, just because Rachel had had a crazy crave for some of their cinnamon swirls. Then when they got back they tried to convince that they had been there the whole time by telling them that they had gotten the tacos from the restaurant. The souvenir shops reminded him of the time when Rachel dared him to sell a box of foam visor hats that all said Ryuteki on them, and he ended up placing them on every tree on town. The Ferris wheel on the board walk told him that he had promised Rachel that he would ride it with her last year, but he ended up getting sick, and she nursed him back to good health. Then they stayed in his room the whole night playing Monopoly, and joking it up by pretending with the fake money to bribe the other to do stupid things. Rachel even almost convinced him to streak through the town for Park Place and Boardwalk. I was all better by the next morning, but I still can't help feeling that I ruined her evening. I wonder what would've happened if I hadn't gotten sick, and we rode the Ferris wheel together.

Jimmy's thoughts were brought to an abrupt halt when the cabby stopped the car and shouted "So are you gonna pay me or what?" Jimmy got out, paid both of the cabbies then helped the others unload the cars. Then they turned around to take a good look at the place that they would call home for a week. The Lily Pad was a quaint little inn, the outsides painted an overall color of white with big bold forest green around the windows and window shutters. There were actually three buildings that the hotel consisted of. One of them was an over all lodging house, with a total of 87 rooms and 6 sweets. It included 4 floors, the first three including the normal rooms and the top reserved for the sweets. The sweets were never supposed to be given out to the students and reserved for what little supervision that the school sent, but there were always about five of them that ended up having a student either sleeping in it, or renting it. The main building, which is what the four were facing at the time, included the lobby and 24 more rooms. If you loved an ocean view you'd probably throw down a good amount more of money to get these rooms. Again the building was a 4 floorer, the first was the whole of the lobby, and the other three were of course lodging floors. The third building of the Lily Pad though was the hot spot of the hotel. There you could visit their underground pool, the fancy restaurant, the pick up and go sushi bar, the arcade, the salon, the gift shop, the hotel's dance club Frogger, or the hotel spa.

The four teenagers entered the hotel, leaving their luggage outside for the time being, then Jimmy rang a bell on the reception desk to get assistance. From behind it popped a bald head which saw his clientele (is that the right word?). Then the head broke out in a wide grin and the rest of the body followed it as the man said, "Was that Jimmy Kudo who just rang my service bell? When I asked Rachel 'Why isn't Jimmy here?' she simply told me that you were a jerk who loved his cases more than people. So I assumed you two were fighting again like normal! Boy, was I surprised to here you call only minutes afterwards requesting a room!"

Mr. John Cartier, the manager of the hotel was a fairly short, bald headed man, his main feature of hair being the burly black mustache along his mouth. Though this was only Jimmy's third year coming to the event, Mr. Cartier had taken an uncle like role the first year after Jimmy had caught a thief for the hotel. He was a nosy little widower, always curious about the happenings of the teenagers. But Jimmy trusted the adult role he took on for him, and had always told Mr. Cartier what he thought. This was probably because Jimmy knew that Mr. Cartier read Sherlock Holmes, and felt safe with his advice.

In response to Mr. Cartier's reaction, Jimmy lifted his hand up to absentmindedly ruffle his own hair then said, "Yeah, well, she doesn't know that I was planning on coming. Rach's really gonna be ticked. But I got other things going on, as well. Did you make sure that there were two sets of bunk beds in the room, like I requested?"

"No," Mr. Cartier replied. "All of the bunk beds are in use. I'm giving you your normal room of course. The stain where you kicked a plate of spaghetti, I think at Rachel, but it ended up splattering all over my clean wall, it's still there. I did give you two beds, though. I don't see why in heavens name you need them, either."

Jimmy's facial expressions gave a momentary look of irritation then he said, "Mr. Cartier, I'd like you to meet Ariel, Michael, and Greg. They have to stay with me in my room for the week." He had to give the three of them, who were not paying attention a bit to the conversation before them, a kick before they realized that their "names" had been said. They each gave a little smile and said hello before Jimmy returned to the point of the conversation. "If you haven't noticed, Ariel is a girl. She won't like sleeping in a bed with a guy for a whole week."

Stubborn opposition shone across Mr. Cartier's face as he said, "Well, I'm sorry but I have no other rooms. It looks like one of you guys will have to take to the love seat as a bed. But beyond that, there's nothing I can do. Now it looks like you have little to no luggage so I'll leave you here with your keys. I will see you later Jimmy." With that he threw two pairs of keys onto the desk for them, scurried, then disappeared beyond the door behind the desk. No luggage my butt! Jimmy thought. He knows that we left our luggage outside and made a quick getaway so that he could be a lazy old fart!

So the four teenagers went back out to where their luggage still sat, and drug the suitcases to the main lodging building of the inn, and to the fourth floor where Jimmy's "usual" room was. Meanwhile, Rachel was enjoying a diet cola outside, on the patio of the hotel's sushi bar. She was in the presence of two others, one of them only shutting their mouth when someone else actually succeeded at interrupting her or to take a healthy slurp of her lemon lime soda. The three were really lucky, snagging a table at that spot. The tables were usually packed, but they had managed to get there just before their fellow peers.

"Ryan is a senior this year and he's already decided where he's going to college at," Serena Sebastian said to Rachel as if the guy wasn't sitting right at the same table as them. "He's going to Harvard to study to become a layer, and he's already received credits for it in high school." She looked over at the one in topic as he nodded and said, "Yeah, early decision."

She continued boosting her cousin up as much as she could to her friend. "Rachel, you might think that he is too rich, but actually he gives most of his allowance to the different homeless shelters around the city. He is terribly sympathetic with low finances because once his best friend had ended up being like that. Of course, when Ryan found out he invited his friend and his friend's family to stay with him until they got back up on their feet."

"Yeah, he and I were really close."

"And for the last couple of breaks from school he goes on trips with Greenpeace to try and save the rainforests. He's been to almost all of the continents trying to convince the dignitaries to become more kind to the environments around them. A couple of them had even been convinced to donate up to $100,000 to the cause."

"Yeah, it feels really great to make a difference like that"

"And did you know, Rach, that at Ryan's school he was voted most likely to become an influential politician. He's really..."

Rachel sat there smiling at Serena as if she really was happy that she was introducing him to her, but in her head she was thinking something else. Serena, I really don't want to be set up on this vacation. I only wanted to have a relaxing holiday on the beach. No romance. No stress. No little genius detective boys running around solving cases. No danger around every corner of every day. No stupid excuses from stupid detectives who are always on stupid cases and then they can never see you. Just the beach.

After a while Serena fortunately left saying that she had scheduled herself a spa appointment with a very cute massage boy. Which left Ryan and Rachel alone for the first time that they had met.

As they watched her round the corner to the spa, they remained in the silence that Serena left them in. But after a moment, Ryan spoke up. "A little over enthusiastic isn't she?"

Rachel finished a lengthy sip of her drink then replied, "Yeah, but that's Serena. She's got to do a back flip off the board before she can dip her toes in."

"Yeah, but she was right about something," Ryan said.

Rachel looked slightly doubtful, but replied, "Yeah? What?"

"You really are beautiful and sweet."

Rachel chose to focus on her drink, trying not to think of the blush on her cheeks. But if he wants to pay me compliments... she flipped her hair a bit, batted her eyes a couple of times, then said, "Really?" in a voice that sounded like it was made of honey.

Ryan, telling he might be getting somewhere Rachel, cajoled with, "Yeah. I could tell that you were not enjoying yourself when she was talking, but you put a smile on anyway just to please her. That's a really nice quality to have in a best friend."

Bat, bat. Bat, bat. "Thanks. You sound really nice, too. I mean, if it were me on your side, I would've end up slapping her and yelling at her to shut up. But you stayed really cool about it. And helping out with the homeless situation sounds like a really worthy cause to be spending your spare time on."

Ryan's bashful side took front seat as he said, "Yeah, well I, uh..." He caught a glance at his watch and was startled. "Oh, shoot! I have a reservation at the restaurant in 15 minutes. I better get going. Unless... Hey Rachel! Would you like to come and have dinner with me? My treat, of course."

Rachel dropped the flirt side that she had absentmindedly taken moments before to really think about it. But what about Jimmy? I mean aren't I supposedly "dating" him? Of course the jerk has never asked, never being here to. And he never will be! A guy like him would never deserve a girl like me, being such a pompous jerk! And Ryan's really nice, too! "Sure, Ryan. I'd love to have dinner with you!"

Ryan's face lit up like a light bulb as he told her to meet him back at the same spot in 10 min. Then he ran off through the door to the main building to get ready. He was one of those lucky ones that got a room with a great view. The only negative point was that it was reserved right next to Serena's (enough said).

Rachel then took off through the doors that led to the main lodging building, where she stayed on the fourth floor. Her mind was rushing with so much happiness that when she crossed paths with Mr. Cartier, as he was what she thought was trying to get her to pay for her cola., she didn't even hear him try and stop her with "Ms. Moore, there's something I need to -."Instead Rachel just kept running, while she shouted back, "I'll pay you later!" Greedy old man. She thought as she climbed the stairs to the top. Always wants his money now and never keeps tabs.

Rachel just kept running, not wanting to waste anytime in her preparation. She never even saw the guy come out of the room just before hers. Rachel kept running and in her excitement ran full force into Jimmy Kudo.

- - - - - - - - - -

Strawbeby – Don't you hate cliffies? I hate cliffies. But I'll give you a cliffie just to have fun! :) Please review my story! Give me the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (Just don't send me a picture of Richard! HaH!). I'm serious. What am I doing right? What am I doing wrong? I'll give you a cookie! O.k. maybe not a cookie. How about a hot dog? I guess I can't really bribe my readers to review – that would be wrong. But I am whole heartedly encouraging you to criticize me! Criticize me badly if you have to! I just want to improve my writing. And for you to keep reading "What the Tide Brings In"

P.s. I'm just saying I don't own hot dogs, Taco Bell, Case Closed/Detective Conan, or train stations. or Taco Bell's delicious cinniman swirl things (those are awsome). Misawa is a real city in Japan, I just used it because it looked like it was far away from Tokyo and in a nice position. I did make the town of Ryuteki up, though. I think that a ryuteki is an oriental flute. But if there really is a town of Ryuteki near Misawa let me know. I'd get a kick out of it. I wouldn't change my story to invent a new town, but I'd get a real hoot out of it.