Hey everybody. I've got nothing to say today besides that this chapter will be about Kaoru and Kenshin completely. XD I find it sort of amusing how I made Kenshin think. What do you think? -Ditox-chan
She was today. She was tomorrow. She was everything I could think about, the reason why I attended my soccer games with such excitement. The reason I could not sleep at night. The reason I couldn't focus on my schoolwork. She was my sun, my moon, my stars.
And she happened to be the only girl in the entire school who didn't know I existed. She brushed past me in the halls between classes, chatting away to her friends. She didn't spare a glance when I stepped into the same classroom as her. In her eyes, I was just another face in the crowd.
But soon, I began to understand. Just as I was the idol for the wide capacity of girls of our school and didn't care about them at all, she was the idol for the men and did not seem to notice. She was an A student. She was popular. She was the loudest cheerleader and the most athletic female of all the juniors. She was the girl even the senior men wanted to date. And she did not care.
This thought led to how many things the two of us could have in common. But it would never matter because she could not see me through the other admirers. I was just another faceless dreamer in her cloud of worshippers. But I did not want to be another one of her followers and dreamers. I wanted to meet her fully. I wanted to know what she thought about; what she daydreamed of. What her picture of the perfect boy was. If I could just find that one point out, I could be everything she demanded. I could make myself that way. I wanted to know her favorite color and her favorite song.
But most of all, I needed to know her name.
A few days after the game, I impatiently waited for Sanosuke to sit at our table. By now I had been enveloped into so many friendships I was disallowed to sit by myself. Sano was beaming with pride. I hurried through the lunch line as quick I could to be first at the table so none of the other guys could hear me. If one of them knew I liked that girl, someone would freak. I had already sworn to them that I was disinterested in all the girls.
Once Sano sat down, I elbowed him quickly and pointed to the girl a few tables down. "Sano, what's her name? The one with the ponytail." He squinted his eyes a little, then looked down at his tray and sorted through his food as if it were no big deal. "I'm surprised you haven't heard of her," he replied simply. "Her name is Kamiya Kaoru. One of the better-known girls to the guys around here." I gazed at her anxiously. He must've noticed because he began to chuckle and muttered, "Even as popular with the women as you are, you don't have much of a chance with that one."
I spun around and demanded, my voice cracking, "What? Why?"
He munched on his sandwich slyly and mumbled, "First of all, you apparently don't know anything about her. Doesn't make too good of a relationship if you have no idea who she is." He pointed his fork at me. "Second of all, she's taken."
My heart lurched. "T..Taken?" I stuttered, eyes dropping to the table half- heartedly.
"Yep," he replied calmly. "By that guy over there. You should know him." He pointed his fork a couple tables away. I squinted my eyes and mumbled, "That one... with the glasses?" Sano nodded, continuing to chew in silence while I pondered the matter.
He had brown hair. It was messy and a little long, but nearly not as lengthy as my own. He wore purple sunglasses on the edge of his nose. His eyes were joyful and he was laughing with the other jocks he was sitting with. I knew him as soon as I saw him, but I didn't want Sano to know that. His name was Enishi, and he was the best soccer player on the varsity team. He must've been that reason Kaoru had not noticed me – she was too busy cheering for his brown-haired nerd. How could she like that creep?
He pushed everyone on the team out of his way. Although he was obviously the best, it was Seijuro-san he was afraid of. When he would bully someone or whatever, it was Seijuro-san who got on his case, and at one point had threatened to have him kicked from the team. Enishi had been sulking; the rest of us cheering in our minds.
I was broken from my thoughts at the sound of Sano's chuckling. "So, you've finally got your eye on a girl, huh? Took you long enough." He chewed his chicken with a sly grin. "I take it you don't like Enishi like the rest of us. You're on his team. I don't know how you can stand the jerk." I sighed hopelessly, tempted to slam my face straight into my potatoes.
"C'mon, don't be discouraged. I have a plan for you." Sano laughed. I looked up at him slowly as he began to explain. "You see, Enishi is overprotective. He has a younger sister named Tomoe, right over there-"he pointed a few tables away. I lunged over to see her. Definitely not my first pick, but she was, uh, all right. "Now, you might be a little disturbed by the rest of my plot, but heck. If you really want Kaoru for your own, you need to both date Enishi's sister and get to know Kaoru better. If Kaoru begins to really like you a lot, she'll find that Enishi is pretty nasty when he sees how poorly he's treating you for dating his sister."
I nodded. He continued, "When she sees Enishi for what a jerk he is, she'll break up with him. And then considering that you'll know her so well by then, you have the chance to ask her out and then everything will be just peachy." He slurped his soda a moment. "The catch is that you might get into a fight or two with Enishi, I wouldn't be surprised. You'll also have to find some sort of reason to break up with Tomoe."
I shrugged sheepishly. "What if Tomoe says she doesn't want to date me?"
He snickered. "Aw, heck. She's another one of your fans, trust me on that one. So, what do you say about the plan?"
I sighed. Did I have much of a choice at that time? Or was I really that desperate enough for this Kaoru chick? I didn't like the idea of 'using' Tomoe. Or maybe – just maybe – she will be more than just another one of my "fans." I smiled at the thought.
And so, the plan went into progress. That day at study hall, I asked Tomoe out. It wasn't the best experience of my life, but Sano had walked me through the dating process during biology. It was more than I thought, that it was... Tomoe was actually pretty shocked at first.
"M.. Me?!" She gasped, clutching her notebook tightly. I felt my face flush, slowly nodding. She smiled brightly and replied calmly, "Well, all right. Don't see any pain in it."
I grinned sheepishly. "I have a game after school today. Would you like to come?" I had never planned on asking a woman to come watch my team get ordered around by Enishi – but Sano said that he would never know we were dating unless he heard Tomoe cheering for me in particular. I hadn't been wild on the idea, but at least it made some conversation between Tomoe and I.
She seemed pretty excited about the thought. "Sure! I don't have anything going on after school. Maybe you can come to my field hockey game tomorrow afternoon? I wouldn't mind."
I smiled. "This one would be delighted."
Hey everybody. XD You know, I just thought up the next 5 chapters while writing this one totally off the top of my head. Now, personally I don't like Tomoe all that much for my own reasons, but I'm already so excited for writing the rest of the storyline. I think that Sano's plan is really clever... or maybe I'm just crazy. XD ALSO - for you Enishi fans, I'm SORRY ;-; I needed a villan sorta and to tell you the truth, I'm a big Enishi fan myself. ;-; (And Enishi does have brown hair. It turns white later, according to the OVAs.) Please review!
