Disclaimer: I do not own the rights to Hot Gimmick, I'm just borrowing the characters…

Chapter 8– The Unthinkable

Hatsumi couldn't sleep that night. Something just didn't sit well with her at all. It was an uneasiness that made her just queasy enough to prevent rest of any kind, so she was forced to pace around her room. Her thoughts wandered to her sister's opinion of the clothing she wore. Hatsumi didn't think it was all that bad.

She strode over to her closet and opened the door, pulling out outfit after outfit, realizing finally that maybe that was why people failed to notice her. She was invisible in these out of date clothes. 'But I love all of them, each one has a memory attached to it. How can I just give them all up when I don't even want to be considered "hip". Just because Akane has tons of friends and about 50 boyfriends at a time doesn't mean that it's what I want from life. By wearing these clothes, I'm letting everyone know that I'm my own person and I don't live to anyone else's standards but my own.'

She dropped the sweater set she was holding and walked to the window, watching as the rain began to fall outside. A lot of people didn't like the rain, but Hatsumi felt free in it. She glanced back at the clothing strewn around her room and walked back over to put it all back in her closet. As she was finishing, she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror and went over to study her features.

Stripping off her pajamas, she stood naked in front of the full length mirror, looking for some sort of physical flaw with the scrutiny of a woman's eye. Her breasts were about average for an Asian woman of her size and stature. Her build was thin, but curves were evident in her form. She didn't think that she was physically unattractive, but her features were probably hidden under the bulky clothing she preferred. 'Out of sight, out of mind,' she always thought. There were so many teens in her school who had gotten raped, or who had babies, and she just didn't want that out of life. If she hid behind her clothing and anonymity then she would never be bothered. It had worked thus far, but she couldn't help feel a little jealous of those girls who flaunted what they had. She had always wanted to, but, then again, there was that nagging fear that if she did, she would regret it. 'Even so, what's a little skin going to hurt? I'll ask Akane to go shopping with me for some new clothes. She'll probably agree. Making me over has been a small project of hers for some time now.'

With that decided, she strode back to the window and watched the rain which was falling in huge droplets. She longed to feel the rain on her bare skin, to be bold enough to just stand outside and let it wash away her old self. 'Why not,' she thought devilishly to herself, 'it's 2 am and there's no one else around the alley here. Why not just take the chance and do something out of the ordinary for once? Why not do something outrageous?'

She bent down and slowly opened the window to the fire escape. The rain started coming in the room because of the wind so she moved all of her possessions off of the sill and climbed out into the cold fall air and the even colder rain drops. Hatsumi stood there for a moment and raised her arms to the dark heavens. She lost herself in the cool feel of the night and the fall of the rain against her naked skin. Suddenly, however, she was snatched from her reverie by a chilling voice down below her.

"Hello, Slave," it said


Subaru was uneasy that morning, he had been waiting outside for Hatsumi to arrive to school but hadn't yet seen her, and it was almost time for class. 'This isn't like her,' he thought to himself. 'God, I hope she's okay.' He scanned the crowds again, hoping to catch a glimpse of her among the students milling around outside of the school, but couldn't seem to spot her.

'I wonder why she's not here, is she sick? No, she would have called me this morning to tell me something was wrong…" his thoughts again wandered until they suddenly rested on the conversation he had with Ryoki the afternoon before. It seemed so innocent to Subaru at the time, but what if Ryoki had malicious intent? "If that bastard does anything to her, I swear that I'll kill him," he swore to himself out loud.

"What was that?" asked Akane, stepping out from behind him and startling him beyond the capacity to speak. "What are you talking about?"

Still sputtering, he said, "D-d-d-don't do that, you scared the crap out of me!"

"Jeez, Subaru, you're such a baby. You realize that you would have seen me if you hadn't been in your own little La-La-Land, right?" She poked him in the arm a couple times until he flinched.

"Stop it, would you? I'm trying to keep an eye out for your sister, I haven't seen her yet, and you're just being a distraction. Go hurry off to kindergarten, or whatever grade it is you're in."

Akane pouted. "I'll have you know that I'm in eighth grade, not kindergarten. And for your information, Hatsumi wasn't at home this morning. Mom was looking all over for her, but you know how she is sometimes, she'll disappear for a while and then turn up. I bet Shinogu knows where she is, he always does." She turned around and stalked off, leaving Subaru at the front doors, contemplating her words.

Suddenly the bell for first period rang, interrupting his thoughts and bringing him back to reality. 'Crap,' he thought, 'I'm late again!'


"Move out of my way, stupid freshman!" Ryoki exclaimed while pushing his way through the clustered students in the hallway. He was in a particularly bad mood, since, after coming home late last night soaked head to toe, his mother felt the need to punish him. She still wasn't comfortable with him wandering around outside in the city without someone with him, but after dark? Forget about it. She had grounded him. He still couldn't believe it. 'Who grounds a 16-year-old, anyway? I'm too old for this stuff,' he thought.

"Move, asshole, you're in my way." He pushed a fairly large boy out of his way. Lucky for him, the boy decided to push him back, responding in a colorful rainbow of foul language. Ryoki took it as a chance to vent his accumulated anger and slammed him into a locker. Just as the boy was about to punch back, one of the girls with him stopped his fist, mid flight.

"Don't touch him, he's the principal's son. Do you want to get into a shit load of trouble if he goes crying to his mommy? Just leave him alone."

"This prick has got it coming, I'm just helping by putting him in his place," the kid responded, still not letting up his grip on Ryoki.

"I'm telling you, this is trouble, don't do it," she whined.

"Whatever," he said, dropping Ryoki, "he's not worth my time, let's go."

Ryoki sagged against the locker he had been pressed against and straightened his glasses and hair, glancing around him fretfully. Everyone seemed to be avoiding his gaze. He retrieved his backpack, which had been lost sometime in the fray, and upon inspecting the contents, was pleased to see that nothing had been taken. 'I guess being the principal's son has certain perks…but that's about all there is to the job.'

Checking his watch, he realized that he had two minutes to be sitting in his first period French class. Ryoki still didn't understand why, as a foreign exchange student, he was required to take a foreign language. 'Probably at my mother's insistence,' he mused to himself, 'She's always trying me to become more worldly, whatever that means.'

Ryoki took off for class and then realized it was the only class he had with Hatsumi. He would get to see her after her long night, this would be fun.


Hatsumi awoke and stretched her aching limbs, wondering why she was so sore. She was sleeping on something uncomfortably hard, and it was rather chilly. Her eyes suddenly flew open with the realization of what had happened the night before, with Ryoki. She looked around herself and recognized the gazebo and then realized that her mother was probably panicking about where she was at the moment. Hatsumi didn't think she had ever been so irresponsible as to stay out all night without telling her mother where she had gone. This was a whole new sort of trouble for her, and she had a feeling she was really going to get in trouble this time.

Her thoughts turned to Azusa, and how helpful he'd been last night. She couldn't believe that he wasn't mad at her last night for waking him up at about 3:00 in the morning. He had welcomed her into his house with open arms, and soothed her tears, inviting her to stay in the guest room, but she had refused. 'I always feel safer out here in the gazebo, anyway,' she thought to herself. She smiled again at how caring Azusa had been the night before.

'And then there's Ryoki,' she thought to herself, 'I can't believe what a sick bastard he is.' He was going to make her rue the day she ever picked up those stupid papers with the answers to that economics class. It wasn't even in her curriculum for the year, so what she would have been doing with them in the first place, she had no idea, but she still couldn't get Ryoki to believe her. Hatsumi didn't really think it mattered anymore to him, though, so she had stopped trying.

Last night… Last night had been… Last night had been confusing, and very, very scary, she decided at last. Ryoki had seen her when she went outside naked, which she shouldn't have been doing anyway, but the tone in his voice when he had spoken to her had chilled her to the bone. Those words…why did she always shudder when she heard those words?

Hatsumi's stomach growled, reminding her of the time. 'I should really get back to the apartment. My mom's going to kill me as it is, but if I don't come back now and tell her what happened, I'm as good as gone.' She got up off of the bench she had been occupying just as Azusa came out with a plate full of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and a pitcher of milk in one hand, and two glasses in the other.

"I thought you might be getting hungry out here, so I brought some sustenance for you. I also thought that you wouldn't mind me eating out here with you, but if you would rather, we can go inside," Azusa said, offering her a sandwich.

"You didn't have to do this, Azusa, letting me stay here is more than I could ever hope for; that and you not getting mad at me when I came here last night soaking wet and crying like a baby," she stated. Hatsumi didn't like being dependent on people.

"Well, I tried to make you stay in the house, but you insisted that you sleep out here in your gazebo. I would have been more than happy to make up a bed for you and have you stay in one of the guest bedrooms. I wasn't kidding when I said that you staying here would be perfectly fine. If it's a haven that you want, then it's a haven you shall have. The house is too empty most of the time, anyway, you staying there would cheer things up some."

Hatsumi was so flattered by his words she could only smile into his perfect face. She couldn't believe how nice he was being to her. It's not like New Yorkers to be nice to others, so why is he doing this for me? 'Through all of this stuff that's happening in my life, I must say that it's nice to know that I have somewhere to go when things get too unbearable. I had almost believed I had lost this place when I found out it had been sold.'

She took a sandwich from his outstretched hand, tears coming to her eyes, and then she hugged him. 'I really think that things will work out this time, with him, I feel like anything and everything is possible, I feel so free…I can't imagine a world without him in it, I just pray that he feels the same way…'

Hatsumi knew of only one way of making sure. She dropped her sandwich onto the floor, wrapped her arms around his neck, and pulled him down for a kiss. Sandwiches and milk flew everywhere, Azusa being so startled that he dropped everything. His hands now free, he returned the hug and kiss as ardently as she was giving it. For a moment, it was truly rapture.

Author's Note- For those of you who have been diligently checking my story to see if there has been any update on it, I apologize profusely. I have not really been able to write, and the several times that I attempted to do so, the chapter was lost and I had to begin again. Now that I have resumed (hopefully from where I started) I hope that you will again resume reviewing me and giving me ideas as to what the hell I'm going to do with this plot line, since it is starting to deviate drastically from the original (for those of you who actually read Hot Gimmick). Any and all input is appreciated and I will try my best to respond to your comments. Happy reading!