D/C: I don't own Rurouni Kenshin…but I honestly would've settled for Sano!

Hi! I'm back! Sorry for the long wait, but I've been grounded, and I only got ungrounded this week. Anyway, thank you so much for the reviews! I didn't expect to get such nice feedback on my story…so thanx! And now, without any further ado…I give you chapter 3!

CHAPTER 3:

Megumi Takani just sat on her bed, crying. She knew she must look pathetic, but she just kept on crying; it made her feel better, anyway. She buried her face in her hands and cried. Sano just stood by, looking utterly confused and worried.

'Er…Megumi? What's wrong? What happened?' he asked cautiously.

'Everything's wrong!' she said, looking up at him with tearful eyes. 'Everything in my miserable, lousy life has gone wrong! Business is crashing, colleagues are avoiding me, and people on the street just keep insulting me! It's all gone wrong!'

'Because of Taito…right?' Sano said quietly.

'And I had nothing to do with it! It wasn't my fault! I didn't go and tell the kid to go jump of the bridge!' she choked. 'But everybody seems to blame me for it…so I blame myself for it too.'

Again, she put her face in her hands and cried. Sano sighed and went to sit next to her. He rested a hand on her bare shoulder. 'Megumi, what did I tell you when I went to your office the other day?' he asked gently.

'You told me that it isn't my fault, and that I shouldn't be blaming myself for it,' she told him.

'Yes, exactly, so…' Sano started.

'But I can't! Nobody's helping me do it! Even you didn't help!' she said angrily, and looked defiantly at him, brushing his hand off her shoulder. 'You said you'll help, but you didn't!'

'But I did come back, didn't I?' he said. 'I came back for you now…'

'Yeah? And what did you come to do, Mr. Sagara? You think you can help me? How? You want to go change all those ideas the public have created about me? I'm sorry to disappoint you, but even magic can't do that,' she said coldly. She had stopped crying in this moment of anger.

'You know what your problem is?' he said angrily. 'You have no sense of fun!'

Megumi blinked at him. 'Excuse me…no sense of what?' she said, her eyebrows raised.

'You know, all you think about is your job, and what people think about you, and what they say about you,' he told her. 'Didn't you ever stop to think about yourself, Megumi?'

'No…because then it'll be egotism,' she said flatly.

Sano sighed, exasperated. 'See? That's what I'm talking about, you're just so professional about your life…loosen up a little!' he said.

'Well…I do loosen up from time to time,' she protested. 'I got to the country club with my colleagues and we really have fun.'

Sano rolled his eyes. 'Yeah, I've seen what you people do for fun,' he muttered. He started counting off his fingers. 'You talk about politics, medicine…you sometimes play cards…but you never gamble! That's not exactly what I would've called fun!' Megumi opened her mouth to protest but he continued talking. 'I know where you could go…there's this really amazing place where you could go and sit down in the dark, and there are these moving pictures…and the pictures tell a story…'

'Ha ha, very funny,' she snapped, while he grinned, looking extremely proud of himself. 'I've been to the movies a fair few times, Sanosuke, so don't go thinking I don't have any social life…I have quite many friends.'

'And where are those friends, I'd like to know?' he said challengingly.

'Huh?' she said, confused.

'I said, where are those friends? A person who leaves you when you're facing a problem is not your friend, Megumi, because real friends don't do that sort of thing,' he said softly.

Megumi fell silent. Much as she hated to admit it, this guy was right. Her so-called friends had abandoned her as soon as the word of she being responsible for Taito's death had spread around. They just left her one by one, and in the end, she had found herself all alone. She had never had a real friend.

She looked up at his handsome face, and her eyes welled with tears. He looked stricken when he saw that she was about to start crying all over again.

'No, Megumi, don't start crying again!' he said quickly, waving his arms frantically. 'Crying isn't the solution for everything!'

Megumi nearly laughed at his frantic gestures, but she just wiped the tears away from her eyes. 'You're right…I'm sorry,' she whispered. 'Ok, Sanosuke…what do you suggest I do?'

'Okay…first of all, we have to take your mind of your work, you can't probably deal with your problems when you're all stressed like that,' he told her. He snapped his fingers together. 'I know, let's go out for lunch!'

Megumi blinked again. 'Together?' she said.

'Er…yeah,' he said, frowning a bit. 'I've got to watch over you, haven't I? You didn't consider this a date, did you?'

Megumi flushed. 'No! Of course not!' she said heatedly.

Sano smiled. 'Good,' he told her. 'We're all agreed then! Where do you want to go for lunch?'

Megumi was thinking about something when he spoke to her. She noticed him looking expectantly at her. 'Er…what?' she said.

'I asked you where you wanted to go for lunch,' he said.

'Oh, anywhere decent…I really don't mind,' she said absently, and returned to her thoughts.

Why, though? Why wouldn't you want to go on a date with me? Is something wrong with me? Are you scared of the thought of having a date with me? Am I that horrible?

Sano was still watching her intently. 'Don't be silly, of course you're not,' he assured her.

Megumi stared at him. 'Huh?' she said, confused.

'You were just asking me if you're that horrible, and I told you you aren't,' he said simply.

'But I never asked you…you can read my mind?' she cried, feeling alarmed.

'Oh, you were thinking?' he said, and smiled sheepishly. 'I thought we were doing some form of telepathy!'

'Don't you ever do this again!' she said angrily. 'Those thoughts are private!'

Sano was now smirking. 'Yes, I gathered,' he murmured.

Megumi's flushed a deep shade of scarlet. 'Get out! Out! I need to get changed!' she shouted, pointing at the door.

Sano held up his hands as if to ward her off. 'Okay, okay, you don't have to work up a sweat over nothing,' he told her, and turned around and headed for the door.

Megumi watched his back for a moment. 'Wait…Sano,' she said softly. He stopped at the door and looked around at her. 'Did you mean it? Did you mean what you said about me not being horrible?'

Sano smiled warmly at her, and his smile sent a tingling sensation throughout her body. 'Every single word of it,' he said softly.

-

'I thought I told you somewhere decent?'

Megumi just stood in front of the door leading into the rowdy restaurant. All over the windows were posters of burgers, fries, shakes, hotdogs, onion rings…and she didn't like it.

'Decent restaurants don't particularly have to be places where you spend ten dollars on a bottle of water, Megumi,' he seethed. 'Besides, this place has some pretty decent food…trust me, you'll like it.'

Megumi still looked hesitant into entering this fast-food restaurant.

'Don't tell me you've never been in one of those places before,' Sano said, looking highly surprised. Megumi slowly shook her head. 'Oh, God! Come on, you're going in with me whether you want to or not.'

Sano grabbed her arm with one hand and pushed the door open with the other. He dragged her into the restaurant and pulled her right to the counter. He let go of her and pointed at the wall behind the counter, where all the meals wee displayed on screen.

'Okay, this is called fast-food, Megumi, and it's really good,' he told her. She just narrowed her eyes at him. 'Now take your pick so we can go and find ourselves an empty table.'

'Um…' Megumi scanned the meals before her; a cheese burger…a chicken burger…a hamburger…a giant hamburger. She sighed; she wasn't used to these sorts of meals. She only ate in fancy restaurants which offered fancy food. Even her maid was accustomed to preparing nothing but sophisticated meals. 'I…'

'Do you want me to choose for you?' Sano offered.

Megumi missed the sarcasm in his tone. 'Yes, please, you probably know more about these meals than I do,' she mumbled.

'Okay,' Sano said. He turned to the guy who was waiting to take their orders. 'We'll have two chicken burgers with the fries and everything that comes along.'

'Two chicken burgers coming right up,' the guy said.

Sano turned to Megumi. 'You can go sit down, this may take a few minutes,' he told her. 'I'll take the orders.'

'You mean, they don't bring it to your table themselves?' she said incredulously.

'What world do you live on, Megumi?' he said, sounding really exasperated. 'Listen, you just go sit down, okay?'

Megumi held up her hands in a surrender gesture. 'Okay, okay, whatever you say,' she agreed, and wandered off to find an empty table. She found one in a corner and plopped down on a chair. She buried her face in her hands. 'What the hell am I doing here?' she groaned.

She looked up and took a glance around the place. Teenagers, families, and there was even an old couple, crowded the place. They were eating, talking, laughing…they all seemed so happy. She wondered why she couldn't be like them. Why she couldn't enjoy the simple joys of life as they did? She felt really bitter and jealous.

She had all the cash and the fame…these people looked like normal everyday people, and yet they seemed so happy with what they've got. She, on the other hand, was utterly miserable. It wasn't fair.

'Hey, look! It's that lady doctor from the paper!' some one nearby said, and Megumi jumped. She whirled around and saw a man, who looked like he was in his thirties, pointing at her. He smiled evilly at her. 'How's business going, doc?'

Tears stung Megumi's eyes. She looked away from the man, and balled her hands into fists in her lap. Stop it! Leave me alone! I did nothing to you!

'How come you're here, doc? Why aren't you off having lunch with your society of evil doctors around the world?' the man jeered.

Megumi tried to ignore him, but she couldn't. His words were magnified twice their volume in her ears and she couldn't block them out.

A lot of people were now looking and pointing at her, whispering to their friends and snickering out loud. Megumi found she couldn't take this anymore. She stood up and hurried to the door, pushing people out of her way as she did. She pushed the door open and went outside.

When the door closed after her, she started crying again.

-

Sano saw Megumi running out of the restaurant, and he instantly became worried. He looked around and saw that a bunch of people were laughing and jeering…he didn't need anybody to tell him who they were laughing at…Megumi.

He abandoned the counter and hurried to the door. He wrenched it open and stepped outside. He started looking around for her. He spotted her in the parking lot, standing beside her car, and was obviously fumbling with her keys.

He rushed forwards towards her. When he approached, he reached out to touch her shoulder. 'Megumi…' he whispered.

Megumi turned around and slapped his hand away. She glared at him. 'Leave me alone!' she screamed. 'I hate you! Look what your brilliant idea got me! More insults! As if I needed that right now!'

'Megumi, I'm sorry…I didn't mean…I didn't know this was going to happen,' he whispered.

'Yeah, sure you didn't,' she snapped. 'Don't you angels see the future or something?'

'No, we don't,' he replied. 'Or it would've made life a lot easier, don't you think?'

'I really don't give a damn,' she snapped. 'I just want you to go away and leave me alone.'

'I know you really don't want that, Megumi,' he said softly. 'You need a friend and you know it…why don't you tell me what you really want?'

Megumi's chest heaved up and down. 'You want to know what I really want?' she asked, and he nodded. Megumi shook her head and her fierce expression melted into tears. 'I just want to go home.'

A/N: Aw…wasn't that nice? So, tell me, how was chapter 3? Did it agree to your liking? I really hope it does, coz I want reviews! Lots and lots of 'em! Hehe, just review, people…and wait for my forth chappie to see how Sano works out Megumi's problem.

-ZEN.