Chapter Five.
The beginning of the end.
Regan silently cursed Mariah for leaving her alone with him. Oh God, she was seriously likely to embarrass herself now. Her face was on fire. She could see herself in the mirror, and him, leaning in the doorway, cool as a cucumber. Bastard. Why was she so nervous around him?
Clearing her throat and turning, still pretending to search for something, Regan ducked into the wardrobe and began rifling through clothes. Kai wandered over and sat down on the old sofa that had been dragged into her room from the living room.
Regan took a few deep breaths until she felt her face cool down, then smiled and turned around.
"So, what do we think?" Kai asked, his eyes fixed on hers. "Do I need a makeover?"
"Oh absolutely," Regan replied tartly. She stood just to the side of him and plucked at his hair. "This'll have to go for a start," she said playfully. Kai grinned and batted her hand away.
"You're all ganging up on me," he muttered. Regan laughed and flopped down on the other end of the sofa, pulling one knee up to her chest and leaving her other foot flat on the floor. The wind chimes that hung inside the outer screen door jangled softly in the late September breeze, filling the room with the warm glow of autumn. Kai closed his eyes and leaned back, his head tilting onto the back of the sofa. Regan watched him in silence, her eyes roving across his face, his arms, his whole body.
She sighed.
"Just think, in a few weeks time, Moscow will be under snow," she said quietly.
Kai made a low chuckling sound deep in his throat.
"Do you miss it?" She asked suddenly.
Kai opened one eye and looked at her.
"Miss what?"
"You know. Russia. White winters, pine forests, mulled wine."
"Ice skating on the fountain," Kai added mischievously.
Regan laughed.
"I remember that," she said with a smile. "God, I thought your dad was going to kill us when he found us."
Kai smiled.
"Yeah… I guess I do miss it. I'll tell you what I don't miss though," he said, turning to face her. Regan's heart gave a nervous clench as his cerise gaze fixed on her.
"What?" She asked, trying to keep her voice steady.
"Always being alone," he said quietly, and suddenly stood up. Regan bit her lip and tried to stop the tears as he slouched out of the room, hands deep in pockets.
Why the hell had she brought up the subject of home? It was such a stupid thing to bring up. Idiot, she cursed herself. Tala and Kai had always been like brothers. They spent half their lives together, and once, when she was very small, Regan had asked her mother why, if they were like brothers, they didn't spend time with her, as she must obviously be both their sister. Alexandra had laughed and told her that boys didn't like to play with their little sister's. It was too un-cool.
They would spend the whole of October and November knee deep in snowball fights, hot chocolate, and wet clothes, the wind in their hair and snow on their cheeks. Christmas was the only time of the year that Kai and Tala were separated. Every year without fail, Kai's parents would take him to stay with his grandparents in Minsk. Alexandra and Nicolas would always take Tala and Regan to stay in Arkhangal with their grandparents, or London to stay with Alexandra's sister. Either way, Kai would always spend Christmas in total isolation.
Tala hated going to stay with relatives as much as his friend, but Regan loved it. It was in Arkhangal that she learned to ice-skate, Nicolas holding her hands as he led her out onto the surface of the frozen lake, her horror at seeing the shadows of large fish swimming beneath her through two feet of ice, terrified that they would break through the ice and swallow her up, the shadows always bigger than the fish themselves.
Daddy! Don't let go! She had cried. But Nicolas had just laughed and continued to guide her over the ice, his laughter freezing in front of his face in the cold air. They were some of her best memories from her childhood. Those holidays were when she and Tala were closest. When he started going off BeyBlading, all around the world, Christmas just wasn't the same. You couldn't have a snowball fight with only one person.
Two days later, Regan and Kai had a blazing row and stopped talking to each other. Kai just ignored her and seemed to carry on as usual, but Regan sank down into herself and refused to come out. Nobody was really sure what the argument was about. It seemed to be caused by various small things that added up to one very big thing. Whatever it was, it cast a dark pall over the dojo.
Everybody noticed the sudden gloom that fell over Regan. She spent her whole time in the living room, painting. She barely got any sleep, insisting that she wanted to get the whole room painted by the end of the month.
"She's probably homesick," Max had said, as they watched her slowly push her food around her plate long after they had all finished eating. Rei wasn't so sure.
Her mother phoned religiously, every Friday evening to check up on her. Regan would sit for as long as her mother talked to her, face dark and brooding. She was becoming reclusive and drawn. Even Tala stopped bugging her for fear of what she might do if she got really upset.
But Rei had his suspicions about what had made her so sullen all of a sudden. One evening, after another supper of painfully awkward chat as Regan pushed food around her plate for twenty minutes, then threw it away and went back to her painting, Rei and Tala were left to clear up the table. Every so often, Tala would glance up from the sink and look at the living room door, before shaking his head and turning back to the dishes. Finally, after twenty minutes of nervous twitching, Rei threw down his dish towel and put his hands on his hips.
"Okay, you obviously know what's wrong with her, so why don't you tell me instead of just watching her mope?"
Tala looked up and shook his head.
"Believe me, if I knew, I would have sorted this out long ago. But she's just not talking."
"Well, what do you think is wrong with her then?" Rei asked patiently.
Tala shrugged.
"Home sick?" He suggested.
"Believe me," Rei said. "I know home sick when I see it and that most definitely isn't home sick."
Tala was silent. Rei sighed.
"Look, you're her brother. Why don't you take her out, cheer her up."
"Oh, right yeah. Like that's gonna help," Tala snorted and went back to the noodle pan.
"You got any better ideas?" Rei asked, drying off the pan as Tala passed it to him.
The Russian shrugged.
"Nope. Look, all I know is that since last week she's been acting like a total recluse. Maybe Mariah said something to her?"
Rei shook his head.
"Mariah said she was fine when she was with her. And she was okay before that, because she was busy fixing me up with Mariah."
Tala grinned.
"That's Regan for you. Don't worry about her. She'll be fine in a few days."
Rei wasn't so sure though. Mariah was equally as worried. She and Rei had been on another two dates since then, and both times, Regan had shown little or no interest, a far cry from her mischievous excitement the first time. When Mariah tried to talk to her friend, Regan shrugged, muttered excuses and asked to drop the subject. After a million and one attempts to get her to open up, Mariah gave a cry of frustration and told her she was absolutely bloody impossible, before storming out and telling Kai that whatever he'd done, she hoped he was sorry. Kai! Rei didn't know what the hell had happened, but somehow, he had a feeling that Kai had something to do with it.
He cornered the silver haired Russian the next evening, slipping inside the room he shared with Tala and sitting down cross legged on the end of his bed. Kai glanced up from his book and took his headphones out.
"What's up, Furball?"
"Something's wrong with Regan, and it's got something to do with you," Rei said, holding Kai's stare. Kai shifted slightly and sat up a little bit straighter.
"Don't have a clue what you're going on about," he replied.
"Don't give me that shit," Rei sighed, his virtuous patience beginning to run out. "She's running on a low ebb, and I think you know why."
He hadn't come in here uninformed. He'd questioned Mariah extensively about the afternoon that she seemed to think was when it had all started. She told him everything, from the fact that Regan wouldn't look Kai in the eye, to the fact that she had cried through the whole night after they had the row. Rei suddenly felt incredibly angry on Regan's behalf.
"Look," he snapped. Kai gawped at him, surprised to see the mild mannered Asian looking anything but calm. "I like Regan. She's a nice girl and she doesn't deserve this-"
"Deserve what?" Kai asked coolly.
"The way you keep bloody ignoring her. You practically slammed the bathroom door in her face this morning and it's just not fair!" The last bit came out as a snarl, and the neko-jinn was surprised to find that he had balled his fists in anger. Kai looked slightly taken aback by his friend's anger.
"Well what the hell do you want me to do?" He snapped.
"Apologies," Rei spat back. "I know it's a physical impossibility for you to feel any kind of remorse, Kai, but you've been a complete arse lately, and it's really starting to get on my nerves."
Kai rolled his eyes and gave Rei a flat look.
"So what exactly do you want me to do?"
"Why don't you take her out for dinner by way of saying sorry? Maybe she'll be good enough to accept that as a decent enough apology, because I imagine it's the best she's going to get of you!" He shouted, before turning and stalking out of the room, swearing in Chinese and slamming the door across so hard that the whole wall shook.
Still sat on his bed, Kai rubbed his face wearily and shook his head. If this was how he could treat the people he loved, he'd hate to think how he treated the people he hated.
Reviews please. All criticisms loved very muchly.
