Disclaimer: I don't own Yu-Gi-Oh!

Chapter 7: Worries

Tea groaned and looked up at the atomic clock. 12:45 am. She groaned again. These days were dragging on forever. Heck, she still had three full days to spend here…at school…with Seto Kaiba.

"Could you keep it quiet over there, Gardner? Some people are trying to get back to sleep," Seto suddenly commented.

"Well, sorry! Geez! I don't know about you, but I hate how slow this godforsaken weekend is going," she sighed.

"Join the club," Seto commented. "Believe me, you're no day in the park to hang around with."

"Well," Tea sat up, retorting, "you yourself aren't exactly a day full of sunshine, either."

"Tell me Gardner, do you always express your obvious thoughts?"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Anyone could tell by your constant bickering that you absolutely abhor me, so why come out and say it?"

"And I'm sure the feeling is mutual! But, what makes you think I abhor you? For all you know, I actually might be trying to get along with you! I might be trying to actually like you!" She stopped as the words escaped her mouth. Oh crap. She hadn't meant to say it like that…. Tea was so glad the flashlight wasn't on, so that she couldn't see the look on his face.

Why…why had she said that? What if he took it in the wrong way? As he probably did! Crap, crap, crap, crap, CRAP ALMIGHTY! Where had she heard that phrase before? Oh yeah! YESTERDAY MORNING! And here, it wasn't even the 13th anymore, and the effects of bad-luck were still around her.

But she could still feel his eyes on her.

Yet, again, luck wasn't on her side.

Because Seto had the flashlight.

He flicked it on, and pointed it in her direction, "What did you say, Gardner?" He smirked. Dang, this was getting good.

She flushed, slightly, "It's…not what you…think! That came out…wrong!"

Seto chuckled, "I believe previous evidence denies that fact." Tea looked confused for a second. Then it dawned on her. Oh, crap. The dang picture….

"That…thing…meant nothing. I was-"

"Daydreaming," Seto put in for her.

"Yes, and- I mean, NO! I wasn't daydreaming! Those were two TOTALLY different people!" Tea's face got redder and redder by the second. And Mr. Kaiba still had the light.

"Really now…. Then why is your face going all red?" Seto couldn't contain the grin. He was SO winning this.

"I'm…I'm…really hot. Yeah…burning-" she fanned herself to make it believable.

"Hot? Gardner, let's not get ahead of ourselves. I, personally, wouldn't go as far as to say you're…hot." Of course…part of his head was probably screaming out "Liar, liar, liar, liar!"

Realization slapped Tea across the face. He was playing with all of her words!

"Why you insolent JERK! YOU KNOW THAT'S NOT WHAT I MEANT!" Tea stood up, ready to teach this guy a lesson. She stomped across her aisle, and viciously shoved aside the chair to the desk that separated them. Of course…even though he was Seto Kaiba…that comment he had made had hurt her…in a way.

Seto switched off the flashlight, so that the room plunged into total darkness once more.

"I don't give a dang whether or not the flippen flashlight is off! You are still dead!" Tea yelled. Seto stood up; ready to move away, so that when she reached his desk…no one would be there. It would be a wonderful game.

However, there was a slight complication.

Due to two factors: one being that Tea still had her knees injuries, and they were still severely wrapped up and painful, and two, that it was pitch black in the room; she tripped over a leg of the desk. Not being able to regain her balance (due to her injuries) she fell forward, and tried latching onto something nearby.

That something happened to be:

Seto Kaiba's shoulders.

With the sudden force and weight of her on him, Seto had no choice but to involuntarily shift quite a bit of his weight onto his broken foot and ankle. In doing so, a sudden wave of pain rushed up his leg, making his knee buckle. This brought the two crashing down to the floor of the aisle. They ended up as a heap and tangle of limbs.

Yet, coincidentally, there was a certain tangle to these limbs.

Tea's arms where still around Seto's shoulders, trying to keep from inevitably falling. She was also practically sitting on his lap.

Seto's leg (with the broken foot) was stretched out, and his other leg stood up, bent at the knee. Having tried keeping the force of Tea from plowing into him less forcefully, he had grabbed her slightly, to try and stop her. Coincidentally, he had grabbed her by the waist.

And for the finishing touch, they're heads were oh so close to each other's, being that Tea was looking up at him, in a surprised way. And by proximity, I mean that their noses were a hair's width from touching.

The flashlight had dropped from Seto's hand in the fall, and dropped over on the floor, rolling around. In the process, it turned on. However, the light wasn't really directed towards them. Only a few rays reached the two.

Seto stared at Tea, too shocked to say anything right then. Of course, what he was really staring at were her eyes….

God almighty…her eyes are gorgeous, Seto found himself thinking. He wasn't about to deny it either. But he was also receiving messages from her eyes. Yes, Seto Kaiba could read people's eyes. Some he saw very frequently back at Kaiba Corp. were fear and anger. His brothers possessed those of sadness, happiness, boredom, stubbornness, plead, and almost anything else to express their emotions and wants to Seto. Usually, there were only one or two emotions floating around the eyes of their beholder. But Tea….

Neither Seto nor Tea blinked. They kept stock still, waiting…just waiting for something to happen. This gave Seto time to study her emotions at the minute.

And this is what he saw:

Surprise…

Slight bit of Anger…

A twinge of…Fear…

And…

What?

There was a small increment of…

Want?

And that's when Seto's eyes widened. She really did have some type of feeling? He had just been playing games with her head. Were the feelings really…real?

But the increment was small…barely even noticeable. Either she was really good at hiding emotions; something Seto knew how to do very well, or the feeling didn't exist and Seto was just seeing things.

Of course, he missed one:

She didn't know she was falling for him.

Tea stayed stock still. What the crap was happening? Everything had flown by so fast…. First, she as ready to murder Seto…and know…good God…she was pretty much on top of him! And within…kissing range. Lard Almighty, why was she thinking that stuff at a time like this? Why was she even thinking it at all?

And why wasn't he shoving her off, or yelling at her to get off of him? Why wasn't she pushing herself off? Why was she thinking:

Gosh, darn it…why is he so dang, implausibly hot?

The two continued their staring games. It was sort of an unannounced blinking game: the one who blinked first lost.

Minutes passed; and each minute seemed like an hour.

Come on, Gardner, move, move, move! Tea commanded herself. Lord, I'm even starting to sound like him!

Seto noticed a definite change in her eyes. They hardened. That was a sign of sheer determination. But what was it that she was determined to do?

A spontaneous, loud sharp crack of thunder suddenly whipped through the outside air, catching Tea (and Seto, sort of) of guard, and scaring the girl half to death. Oh, she moved alright. And Seto had found a use for his muscles after all. Seto gave a small shudder from the shock, but Tea…had completely jumped, and accidentally made a slight and certain contact with Seto….

Earlier that day: 1:20 pm.

"My goodness, where is Tea? She should have been home by now!" Mrs. Rika Gardner bustled about the house, worried deeply.

"She's fine: probably out somewhere with those guy friends of hers or something, again," Rae replied from her room. She and Kari were dancing away to rock music in Rae's bedroom. They weren't in the least, worried about Tea…yet. Some cousins.

"In this weather? She knows to come home first. However, maybe you're right. I'll call up that Yugi boy and see…" Mrs. Gardner rushed for the phone.

Now, even though the school may not have had power, their house, a few streets down, still did. (A/N: Believe me, it's something that does happen. Sometimes, our friends a few streets down lose power, and we still have outs….weird.) And as Yugi was further away from the school as well, he still had power too.

Being in a total frenzy, she didn't bother to get the school address book and look up his number. Instead, she grabbed the slip of paper on the refrigerator, or Tea's friends' cell phone numbers (there for Tea's convenience, of course).

She found the small boy's number and dialed it. (His cell phone is one that doesn't really have problems with service and all…sort of like Seto's…before it ran out of power.)

Yugi laid back against the recliner in the living room. Suddenly, he heard a familiar tune sound. He sat up and ran over to the kitchen where he had dumped his cell phone. He picked it up and turned it on, whereas, immediately, the regular phone line in the house rang.

As he ran over to the kitchen phone, he answered his own, "Hello?"

"Hello, Yugi, dear, this is Mrs. Gardner."

"Mrs. Gardner? Oh, well, hi?" Yugi said, then picked up the other ringing phone. He spoke into that one, "Hello?"

"Hey Yugi!" a slightly familiar voice said on the other phone.

"Hey…uh…" he didn't quite remember who that was.

"Yugi dear? Hello?" Mrs. Gardner continued.

"Just a second, Mrs. Gardner," Yugi turned back to his phone.

"Mrs. Gardner? Yugi, if you haven't noticed, I'm not a girl," the boy said on the other phone.

"Sorry, not you…um…who are you?"

"Mrs. Gardner, dear," she answered.

"No, Mrs. Gardner, I mean this other person!"

"Other person?"

"It's me! Mokuba Kaiba!"

"Oh, hey Mokuba," Yugi sighed.

"Mokuba?" Mrs. Gardner inquired.

"Alright, hold it! Okay, you two, sorry Mrs. Gardner, I'm on two phones here! Please wait your turn! Thank you. Now, Mrs. Gardner, you first. What is the nature of your call?" Yugi asked, rather calmly, seeing that he had practically been on the verge of screaming not five seconds before.

"Well…I was wondering if you had seen Tea anywhere. She isn't home yet…"

"You mean, she never came home from detention?"

"No, dear."

"I'm sorry, I haven't seen her. Try Joey, or Tristan, or anyone else on that slip of paper of hers," Yugi grinned, knowing that was the only place Tea's aunt could have gotten his cell phone number.

"Alright. Thank you." And she clicked off.

"Alright, Mokuba-"

"Tea's missing?"

"Yeah. So what did you w-"

"Seto is too. Noa and I called Kaiba Corp. to talk to him, but he wasn't there. Noa has gone asking other employees, and servants if they've seen him, but otherwise, we can't find him. Would you know where he is?"

"I'm sorry, Mokuba, but the last time I saw him was at school. I can't imagine him still being in detention with Tea…I mean, the teachers left the school didn't they?" he more thought to himself, than said to Mokuba.

"Seto got a detention?"

"Huh? Oh, yeah. Tea did too."

"Well, this day is full of surprises," Mokuba pondered aloud.

"Sure is," Yugi replied.

"Well, thank you anyway, Yugi. Bye!"

"See ya," Yugi replied, then heard the phone click off. He walked back to the living room, and plopped down on the recliner again, reaching for the remote. All of the sudden, the power flicked off. His eyes widened. He hoped Tea was okay….

The power suddenly slipped away from the Gardner household. The music that had once flooded from Rae's room, stopped, putting the entire house under the spell of silence.

"MOMMY!" Ran and Kari came screaming out of their rooms.

"Relax, girls," Mrs. Rika felt around for the cabinet containing the flashlight. She found it and yanked the drawer open, digging around for the light. She smiled triumphantly when she found it and turned it on, running out the room to her daughters, who were cowering, hugging each other in the hallway.

"Come here, you two," she gestured. They wasted no time in running over to their mother. Rika was seriously worried now. Where was Tea? Was she alright?

The three suddenly heard a door swing open. Rae yelped, and Kari clutched tighter onto her mother. Rika slowly led the two others back down the hallway, and sprayed the light across the living room. The light then landed on a body, lying against the door.

"Tea?"

"Hmm? No, darling, it's me," Kaz Gardner stood straight and came over to her.

"Oh, I thought it might me Tea. Kaz, she's missing! I don't know where to find her!"

"Didn't she come home after school?" worry and tid-bits of anger flashed through

his eyes.

"She had detention, so-"

"DETENTION?"

"Kaz, calm down. She had detention, and I was expecting her back by now, but she's gone. I called her friend, Yugi, but he hasn't seen her, and…oh Kaz! What if she's out there, all alone, in this horrible storm? Where is she! Kaz, we have to find her!" Mrs. Gardner broke down.

She loved her niece terribly. To her, Tea was like a third daughter. After all, she had loved the girl's mother; her sister; so much. When Tea's mother died, it was all too much for Rika Gardner to bear. They were then blessed with the Mazaki's new baby girl, Tea.

Not long after that, Kaz and Rika had two daughters of their own, but Rika never paid more attention to hers than to Tea. In her eyes, Tea was her daughter. No matter how much Kaz ha his philosophy on, 'We may have adopted at a mere five months old, and she may have been living with us since that time, but that still does not make her our daughter. She is still our niece, and therefore, is still part of the family, and will be treated as such!'

Little did they know that Tea still was at school, and for the most part, she was okay. Sure, right about now, she was bandaging up Seto's foot…and therefore was about to come into close contact with him…in which eventually, she really would kiss him…and then- Well, to sum it up: heck, she was better than okay. What girl wouldn't be just okay if she was, at midnight, I must add, the one kissing Seto Kaiba? For the second time, albeit.

Well, I was pondering on whether or not to give you guys more of the story, going back to Seto and Te but…I decided to give you guys one of my all famous cliffies! Haha! I am SOOOO evil! Yep! Anywho, I know the chapter was kind of short, but…it qualified for a chapter. In my terms, (un-spaced) 5+ pages on a Microsoft Word Document (size 12, Times New Roman font…God, I sound like me teachers!)…and this one was six. So, yeah, that's what you get. But hey! It's an update! BE HAPPY! AND PLEASE REVIEW!