Little Star
-
-
Chapter Six.
-
-
"Serenity!" My brother burst out of the door to his apartment, arms wide, ready to give me the usual hug hello. Unfortunately, Mokuba had been the one doing a slightly spastic knock on the door, so Joey nearly ran him down.
I stood on tiptoe to wave over Mokuba's shoulder. "Hi, Joey."
Joey looked the younger Kaiba brother up and down, and then frowned. "What the hell? Serenity, you didn't really break up with Duke, did you?"
"What?"
My tactful brother ran a hand through his shaggy hair – it needed trimming, as usual. "Isn't he a little young for you? …And where are his shoes?"
I blinked and looked down. Mokuba was barefoot.
"Joey!" Mai shouted from inside the apartment. She stuck her head out of the kitchenette. "What the hell is wrong with you?"
"…What?" Joey said, glancing between her and Mokuba – and at the latter with a slight scowl. "What'd I say?"
"Just invite them in, would you?" Mai's floating head disappeared again.
"Oh, yeah, come in… She's cooking… Something… good." Joey stepped backwards, holding the door for me and Mokuba. "Sorry, Serenity, but I saw the news… Hey, you must take after me! Giving Kaiba a piece of your mind like that! I'm so proud…" Joey joked, one hand over his heart.
It must have been one of his slower days. Honestly. Believe it or not, my brother can be smart, but his smarts aren't always connected to his mouth. In fact, they're frequently disconnected.
Almost permanently, one might say.
Okay, Joey is a LITTLE dumb about most things. But who isn't?
Mokuba didn't seem bothered by Joey's attitude, but I mouthed the word 'sorry' at him as Joey shut the door, anyway. The barefoot hellion was looking around the room with some curiosity. Mai had somehow managed to take Joey's Duel Monsters and sports junk and still make the place look stylish.
He picked up a photograph. "Actually, I'm Serenity's new employer. Is this Paris?"
Joey squinted and walked over to him. "Yeah, Mai an' me were there for a tournament in… What? Employer? You - " My brother did a long double take. "…Holy shit, Mokuba?"
Mokuba grinned. "That's me."
Joey immediately leaned over and gave him a clip across the head, then pulled the shorter male into a one-armed hug. "I haven't seen you since… Since…"
"A long time?"
"Maaaaaaaai, it's Mokuuubaaaaaaaa!" Joey shouted, turning his head only slightly so most of his lungpower went into Mokuba's ear.
This time Mai walked out of the kitchen, threatening Joey with a wooden spoon. "Gee, you don't say? Get them a drink!"
She was always like this when I came over. Surprisingly, Mai loves to play hostess. I think she gets a kick out of having a permanent, comfortable home with my brother. If they'd had a baby, they would have been the perfect family. As it was, they had a cat named Mr Tibbly, and he hated me.
Just thinking about him made me look around the room to make sure he wasn't within scratching distance.
"Tristan was just telling me that he'd seen you in town. And that you got weird."
Mokuba pouted, his lip ring sticking out rather prominently. "Weird?"
I decided to head for the kitchen before the inevitable happened. What the inevitable was, exactly, I wasn't sure, but I had a sinking feeling about it all the same. It seemed like bringing a walking, eighteen year old sex symbol to my older brother's for dinner had to be a bad idea. Especially when said symbol was not only brother to your brother's old mortal enemy, but also attempting to employ you.
"Hey Mai, what's - " I stopped. Doom was not in the living room with a punk kid billionaire and Joey. Doom was in the kitchen with Mai, and he was (for some reason) wearing her frilly purple apron, standing at the stove.
"Hi Serenity." Tristan smiled at me amiably.
I tried to figure out what he was doing here. "Hi… Tristan… This is a surprise." I'd just been talking to him, afterall. I'd just been telling him I was going to dinner at Joey's. Ah. Joey: 'Tristan was just telling me.' Not 'Tristan was just telling me the other day.' Oh no. 'Tristan was just telling me as he was standing in the kitchen making linguini.' Perfect.
"Serenity!" Mai enveloped me in a perfumed hug, then held me back at an arm's length to scrutinise my face. "You look tired."
"Ah, I've been busy?"
Mai glanced out the door into the living room. "I can see that."
To my very extreme horror, I felt my face begin to go red. "What?"
"Screaming at one Kaiba, throwing wine on your boyfriend, bringing another Kaiba to dinner…"
Mai hugged me again. "Tell me later," she whispered in my ear. I liked hugging Mai. I don't really do that whole girl-hug-hello thing, and with Mai it's a little awkward since she's so much taller than me. But she and Joey had been together so long, she was well on the way to becoming a sister. And Mai was always so confident, I felt like when she hugged me a little bit of it might rub off each time. She was a reassuring person to be around.
"Hey Serenity, can you please pass me the cheese?" Tristan asked, with more hope than cheese seemed to warrant.
I broke away from the embrace and walked over to the fridge. It was usually either completely decimated, or it had every inch packed out with food, depending on if Joey had been near it that day. Today it was full. I rummaged around a bit.
"This is a surprise." I smiled, trying to be polite and not yell at him for catching me by surprise.
Tristan smiled back. He always smiled back. "Yeah, I was actually here already when I called you, we just wanted to see how far away you were. You got here a lot faster than we anticipated, though."
"So would you if you were travelling with Speed Racer."
"Huh?"
"Mokuba gave me a ride."
And just like that, Tristan stopped smiling. "Oh, he is here?"
"Didn't you hear Joey's squawking?" Mai butted in.
"I was cooking," Tristan replied. He didn't seem to see anything funny in that, though I saw Mai suppress a smile as she turned away from him to rummage for some rosemary in the cupboard.
That was what he was like, though. I knew well enough. Whatever Tristan was doing had his full attention, usually to the exclusion of all else. I suppressed a sigh. The day had not been great before I was humiliated in class and faced death on the drive here – every day got off to a bad start when your boyfriend climbed out of bed, showered, dressed, ate his breakfast alone, and then went off to work without talking to you.
I wasn't grumpy, really. I was just in one of those moods where it's easy to focus on the bad points of bad things. Tristan wasn't really a bad thing. He was a good guy, and he tried to be a good friend to me. He just reminded me of bad things.
So many hang ups. I shook my head, trying to clear it.
"Oh!" Mai exclaimed. "Joey!" she shouted through the doorless frame, into the living area.
"Whaaaat?" I heard him call in response.
She turned back to me. "He's never going to offer you a drink. I'll get it. What would you like, Serenity?"
Good question.
-
-
-
Dinner was turned out to be interesting. Joey and Mai sat as they usually did, with Joey at the end of the table, Mai at his right. It wasn't that Joey had one of those master-of-the-house personalities… He'd informed me solemnly, after I'd teased him about it once, that if he sat opposite Mai he was too far away, and if he sat next to her, he had to turn sideways to look at her while he ate, but if he sat at the end and she sat at once side, he was both next to her and facing her.
It was disgustingly sweet.
Of course, if Joey had realised that, he wouldn't have told me, but he was so infatuated with his tall blonde Amazonian that he didn't even realise he was infatuated. Mai realised, which is why she put up with him as the 'head' of the table.
Anyway, once they sat in their usual seats, I took mine where I usually do opposite Mai.
I was afraid for a moment that Mokuba was going to be murdered by Tristan as he leaped into the chair next to me. If looks could kill, Mokuba would have been one charming, mohawked cadaver. As it was, that left Tristan either sitting at the other end, or facing Mokuba for the meal, and he chose facing Mokuba.
Apparently because it afforded him the best place to glare at the eighteen year old from.
Joey was oblivious to all this.
"So Serenity, what happened at that charity thing anyway?"
All eyes were on me. "Uh…" I tried to swallow my mouthful of linguini. Mai and Tristan's combined efforts had proved very tasty, but it was hard to enjoy that with three of them watching me.
Three of them. Mokuba already knew the details, and he was enthusiastically concentrating on his pasta.
"I wasn't feeling well from, uh… Saturday… And I had a little disagreement with - " I hesitated. Calling him 'Kaiba' with Mokuba next to me seemed wrong. But calling him 'Seto' out loud would imply that a level of familiarity that we didn't have. However, Joey started nodding, so I assumed I didn't need to say his name at all.
"Yeah, and then, Duke came over, but since I wasn't feeling well, when he offered me a drink I felt kind of sick - "
"- and tore across the room like a drunken prom date on a rampage," Joey finished for me.
Mokuba snorted, apparently choking on a piece of pumpkin. Tristan automatically glared at him. I think Mai kicked Joey under the table. I just rolled my eyes.
"I guess so."
"So what's this about Mokuba employing you? Why are you quitting the restaurant?"
Mokuba glanced up at Tristan, who was looking at me, his mouth parted slightly in surprise. Oh, what tangled webs we weave…
Mokuba picked up the conversation, apparently in case Tristan's spluttering caused a minor disaster. "Why wouldn't she? I'm offering her a job in the field her degree is heading towards, and she won't be on her feet the whole time."
"You're not working with Kaiba, are you?" Joey asked, bluntly. "I mean… The other Kaiba."
Mokuba laughed. "No, my brother wants nothing to do with my ticket to stardom."
"You're already a star," I pointed out.
"More stardom! It's so sparkly. I need more of it!"
I coughed, trying to cover a laugh. That hadn't even made sense, but whatever. No one else seemed to care. Mai and Joey had taken the new Mokuba in a stride. Hey, one of their best friends still went around in a dog collar talking about dead kings; I guess Mokie would have to work harder to shock them.
"So wear something with sequins," Tristan suggested. His tone was not quite friendly. I was becoming more and more uncomfortable at this dinner.
Tristan really, really was NOT happy around Mokuba. Surely he wasn't that jealous? Me and Mokuba, that was kind of ridiculous. Then I heard my own internal monologue repeat back to me the words I'd thought of earlier… Walking sex symbol.
Okay, maybe not that ridiculous.
But it was still ridiculous! Really. Mokuba was younger than me. It was almost like having another brother around. One that was extremely flirtatious. Okay, that was just wrong…
I shook my head again.
"No?" Joey asked. "What do you mean, no?"
"What?" I'd tuned out their conversation.
"I asked if you liked the pasta," Mai said. She frowned at me.
"Sorry, I was totally away with the fairies. It's delicious, as usual."
She seemed sceptical about my excuse.
-
-
-
I offered to do the dishes. Since Mokuba and Joey had decided the perfect finish to the evening would be a video game, and Mai had declared there was no way either of them were going to be a match for her (which, perhaps, was part of the reason why she is a good match for my brother… What can I say? The girl loves games…), unfortunately, that made the kitchen the perfect place for Tristan to get me alone.
I tried to concentrate on the soapy water sloshing around the pink rubber gloves. Mai and Joey had a dishwasher, of course, but Mai didn't like putting her pots and pans in it, for whatever reason. I picked up the small, green, bristly towel-thing and started scrubbing at the large pot the pasta had been cooking in.
"So you're quitting your job?"
I glanced at Tristan. He was standing to my right, leaning against the countertop, there to dry the dishes I washed, and put them away.
"Looks like it."
"I suppose that's good. I mean… No more strip club."
I glanced over my shoulder towards the living room. Mai, Joey and Mokuba could all be heard laughing, as computer-programmed car tyres squealed their way around an electronic course. They wouldn't hear him.
"I guess not."
"But I thought you liked it there."
I gave Tristan a Look. He had an innocent expression on his face. "Yeah, I love lying to my boyfriend and having to phone you to bail me out all hours of the morning when things go wrong."
"Oh yes, how is Duke?"
I felt my throat tighten. Silly. Must have been all the steam from the hot water. I scrubbed furiously at some burnt cheese. "He's fine." My voice came out thicker than I'd expected.
"Are you sure you're okay?"
"I'm fine." We're all just fine.
"I guess he'll be glad that you have a new job."
That's when I felt my stomach drop down to my sneakers. Oh god. Duke wasn't even speaking to me for 'consorting with the enemy' (his words, not mine) at a party and making a scene. What if I actually went to work for a Kaiba?
"Although, you turned him down because you wanted your independence, so I guess he might think it's a little odd that you're going to let Mokuba do you a favour."
I felt my teeth clench, like it was involuntary, and scrubbed even harder at the large steel pot. I could feel Tristan's eyes on me. His tone was so casual… Too casual.
"Funny that you find Mokuba easier to get along with than your own boyfriend."
I whirled on him, and the foamy water whirled with me, a line of it splattering against Tristan's grey-green shirt. His lovely face was carefully blank. "You know, Tristan, how I get along with my boyfriend really isn't any of your business!"
Tristan looked down at me, and spread his palms up in a placating gesture. "I'm just concerned for you, Serenity. As a friend."
"Why does being my friend give you the right to belittle Duke all the time?" I tried to keep my voice down, to avoid drawing the attention of the others in the next room. They might not hear a conversation, but they'd definitely hear shouting.
"I was talking about you, actually."
"Oh, whatever, Tristan! It's never about me, is it? It's always about you and me! And 'you and me' stopped existing about a year ago!"
A pained look crossed his face, and his lips pursed. "Look, Serenity, I just don't want you to get too entangled with Mokuba and forget what's important."
"And what would that be?" I hissed. "You?"
Tristan's eyes narrowed, and he took a step toward me, narrowing the short distance between us. I had to press the wet, pink rubber gloves against my own stomach to keep from touching him. He had a familiar look in his eyes, and my heart almost skipped a beat. Damn him, it wasn't fair that this long after breaking up he still affected me. I shouldn't spend so much time with Tristan.
My lips parted in surprise, as he continued to stare at me. That was it, wasn't it? He didn't want me to stop spending time with him.
"You're still jealous!"
Tristan rolled his eyes. "Of what, exactly?"
"If I get a respectable job, I won't have to sneak around behind Duke's back just to get paid, and I won't have to come to you with all my little problems!"
"Fine! I admit it! I don't want to have even less of you in my life than I do now!"
And then he did it. I hadn't been expecting it, though perhaps I should have been. Tristan reached up and grabbed me, one hand at the small of my back, the other cradling the back of my head, and he pulled me towards him. He kissed me. For a moment I didn't know what to do – I could hardly believe he'd done it. Kissing me in my brother's kitchen.
His lips, his tongue, it was something I was so familiar with.
And then I started to suffocate. Not physically, but mentally. I squeaked and began to struggle, but Tristan was so much taller than me. Oh god, what if someone walked in? My brother – Mokuba – he wasn't letting me go -
I did the only thing I could think of. I kneed Tristan. Unfortunately, that caused him to bite down on my lower lip in surprise, and I shrieked and shoved harder at his chest. He pulled away, gasping in surprise, and like my hand had will of its own, I felt myself backhand him hard across the face.
He recoiled sideways and leaned his hands against the kitchen countertop. The white imprint of my hand took a moment to fade from his skin. A moment in which I could hear the others still laughing and racing in the living room.
I was breathing heavily, and not for good reasons – though I suppose if Tristan's kiss had been welcome, it would have been romantic. Clandestine. It was a romantic declaration. In the movies, girls are always swayed by those, right? They just tend to melt into the man's arms, reigniting their former passion. They want someone to take that decision away from them. I don't know if that was what Tristan had expected to happen – I think he must have honestly expected me to welcome him with open… Arms. He wasn't the type to force himself on a girl. Why would he need to? He was handsome, strong, a nice guy, really…
Except at that moment in time, I hated him.
I blinked and snapped off the gloves I'd been washing the dishes with. The front of my knit top was wet – and Tristan's, where I'd pushed at him. We'd knocked a pan and a spatula back into the sink and water had splashed across the counter.
Tristan looked up at me, stricken. "Serenity, I'm sorry, I thought - "
"Save it," I advised him, shortly, and marched out of the kitchen, smoothing my hair as I went.
"Joey, I'm so sorry, but I forgot about an assignment that's due and I really need to leave," I heard myself saying.
My brother, Mai and Mokuba all stared at me in surprise.
I smiled - it felt weak even to me. Joey opened his mouth, like he was about to say something, but then thought better of it. Yes; for once, he thought. And I was glad. Mokuba stood quickly, a look of concern on his face.
"Sure, I'll drive you home, 'Renny! I prefer racing my own car to virtual ones, anyway." His tone was much lighter than the weight in his expression.
"Hey, you better drive safely with my little sister next to you!" Joey spluttered. His previous thought was obviously forgotten.
"Joey, chill; I was winning the game, wasn't I?"
"I was just about to overtake you!" Joey protested. "One more lap and I would've been way ahead of the both of you."
"Oh, Joey." Mai shook her head, and stood to walk me to the door. "Good luck with the - " she paused almost imperceptibly, " - assignment. Give me a call when you get the chance, okay? We never got to catch up. Looks like you have a lot going on." She hugged me again, and then a moment later Mokuba and I were out in the hall, the door to Mai and Joey's safely shut behind us.
Mokuba regarded me with scrutiny, his large, dark eyes taking in my somewhat dishevelled appearance, and pale face. "Your lip's bleeding," he said, offhandedly. He reached out and wiped his thumb carefully across a small section of my chin.
"I - " I what? I didn't know what to say to that. That washing dishes was hazardous task? That I'd been attacked by stray utensil?
He shrugged, and smiled brightly. "Come on," he placed his hand on my back, and started herding me down the hallway, towards the elevator. He didn't seem pushy, but comforting. "Let's get you home, then. I might even drive at a reasonable speed. Can't have you biting your lip with anxiety this time; apparently it's had enough of a beating for today."
Well. At least my shitty day wasn't going to end up with me splattered on a windshield. Small consolation. I almost would have preferred that, about now.
-
-
-
Author's Note:
Another chapter bites the dust. (Or the big one? I can't decide.) Zomg review replies! I can finally respond to things! And I will respond to any and all replies I get on this chapter. However, I'm going to be offline for about three weeks so they'll probably be delayed responses this time around. Feel free to point out typos, I know there are bound to be some in there; I wanted to get this out before I abandoned you all. Thanks for reading, as always, and I hope you liked it. Oh, the angst.