The Kami-sama Conspiracy
Paulo Coelho wrote in The Alchemist,
"When it's meant for you, the world will conspire with you to have it."
Or something like that.

Summary:

Li Syaoran and Kinomoto Sakura had started off at the wrong foot.
So far, the only opinion that they share is their mutual dislike for each other. It's bad enough that they were neighbors and classmates, but Kami-Sama has one more trick up His sleeve: Sakura's father decides to marry Syaoran's mother! They grudgingly conspires with each other to break their parents apart. But will they be able to pull it off without trying to kill each other first?

The answer is yes. And that is when one of them starts believing that one cannot live without the other…

A/N: I wrote a part of this chapter during a three-hour ride back to the city. At night. I couldn't see a damn letter of what I was writing hehe. But I managed to decipher it afterwards, and here it is! Hope you like it! Please R&R!
Warning: Slight OOC, AU
Genre: Romance/Humor/Adventure
Disclaimer: I unfortunately don't own any of the CCS characters. (sigh) But the plot is mine. MINE. (copy-paste Sakura's death glare here)

Story thus far…

Syaoran just arrived from Hong Kong and was unluckily appointed to unpack his sisters' mountain-load of stuff. He was tired, bruised, hungry and alone. He thought that nothing worse could happen that day as he walked around an unfamiliar town to find food. Until he met Sakura, who was having dysmenorrhea then. Touya had just ignited her dynamite and Sakura was so pissed off that she left her brother with an injured toe, deciding to get dinner for herself alone. She thought that nothing could piss her off more than having to be woken up badly on one of her worst days. And then she saw her cherished Kero being kicked mercilessly by a chocolate-haired boy...

Round One: Fight!

Sakura stopped at a street corner and held on to a wall as she braced herself for a stab of pain that she knew would come.

It did, and she almost screamed out loud. She mentally cursed Touya for this. If he hadn't bugged her the way he did, she wouldn't be here worrying about what to cook for dinner. She, of course, was just kidding when she said that she'd eat dinner alone and leave Touya to fight with roaches for mere morsels. Even if Touya really gets under her skin, she couldn't let him sleep with an empty stomach.

She felt another stab of pain sear her tummy. Because of that, she almost scratched the concern she'd thought for Touya.

The pain passed finally and she began to take small steps. Oh, the pain of being a woman. Sakura briefly wondered if it runs in their blood. Having dysmenorrhea, she meant. Tomoyo, her cousin, doesn't seem to be suffering the severe effects of menstruation. She hadn't bothered to ask Tomoyo's mother. And Sakura couldn't as well ask her dead mother, Nadeshiko.

How long has it been, okaa-san? Is it ten years already? Sakura counted. Then counted again. Math had always been her weak spot at school.

Yes, it had been a decade already since her mother passed away. Her memories of her were few but Touya was old enough to remember much about their mother. If there was one thing that she and Touya passionately agrees with, it would be their love for their late okaa-san.

Her most cherished memory of her mother was the time when Nadeshiko let her help in the kitchen. Her mother never raised her voice at her even when she spilled the milk. Or dropped half a dozen eggs on the floor. Or accidentally turned up the stove's heat causing the hotdogs to burn. Nadeshiko just smiled and taught and guided her patiently. She was on the verge of tears when Nadeshiko crouched in front of her and cupped her face. "Sakura, cooking is not just about how much salt you're going to put in Touya's scrambled eggs, or how much sugar you'd put on Fujitaka's coffee. It's sometimes about remembering how they'd be happy to have someone they love help sustain their lives with each meal you prepare."

Sakura had looked at her mother questioningly then, not understanding a thing.

Nadeshiko smiled again and said, "If you think about how happy they'd be with whatever you'd serve them, think about how happier they could be if you cooked it right just for them."

Sakura didn't know how it happened, but she did understand that. After that one lecture, she promised to learn by heart her family's most favorite food and how they liked it. Her mother died a few weeks later.

When Nadeshiko died, Sakura promised to be just like her. She vowed to take over the kitchen. It was one reason why she couldn't bear to starve Touya. Touya had been loyal to her ever since she stubbornly declared that she would rule over the skillets and spatulas. Touya never spat any of her cooking—even at the time when her cooking was bad enough that not even the garbage would welcome it.

Which brought her back to her current problem: What to have for dinner. For her and Touya and her dad, if in case he'd drop by home. Her father is very much a wanderlust these past few days. Last she heard, her father "dropped by" in Hong Kong.

Sakura was busy contemplating what to buy at the grocery store when she heard a familiar meow above her.

"Kero-chan!" exclaimed Sakura when she looked up at the location of the sound. She held her arms up as an invitation to an orange, bear-looking cat. The cat meowed again and jumped down to her. "What are you doing here? I've been looking for you earlier."

The cat meowed again in response. Sakura smiled. Her cat Kero has got to be one of the weirdest looking cats in the vicinity, but Kero was also smart. It has red-orange fur all over its body, marred with two white spots amazingly shaped like wings on each of the his sides. Kero's eyes have that intelligent, sharp look that most of the time stares fixedly at her brother; its nose have that proud, snobbish look that says it all. Its ears, unlike most cats, were not pointed but oddly shaped like a teddy's ear. Weird-looking or not, she loved Kero like a mother loved a child.

She cuddled him while walking. The gesture of petting her cat somehow eased her mind off the pain in her gut. But before she reached the next street intersection, Kero suddenly jumped away from her and disappeared among the crowd. Kero looked like he was on a mission, and having sensed a target, had immediately acted on it. Sakura could only sigh. She crossed the street and turned to her right to enter the grocery, a hand resting on her tummy.

Kami-sama must have heard his plea because Syaoran foundna good ramen house just a few blocks from his house. Rested and fed,
Syaoran thought he should be heading back right now. Knowing his family, his mother or sisters must have forgotten to bring their house keys again.

He stopped at a street intersection where some cars were passing by. He felt a light breeze caress his skin, the night neither cold nor hot. Syaoran looked up and saw that the night sky is dotted with bright, twinkling diamonds. For a moment, he felt like he was back in Hong Kong, sitting idly on top of the roof of their house just feeling the elements while watching the world fade into darkness, until the stars appear and the moonlight shine. He savored the feeling of "conspiring with the stars." It had always given him the feeling of hope: that after a hard day's work comes a promise of something beautiful.

Syaoran pocketed his hands and stared at the stars again. They were blinking and winking at him as if hinting that tonight is the start of something wonderful. He breathed the beauty of the night from where he was standing. For the first time that day, Syaoran felt that his planets were spinning right in their respective axis. Somehow, he felt welcomed at last.

And then he heard a soft annoying sound at his feet.

Syaoran looked down at his right foot and saw a yellow pug staring at him—all of its teeth bared and hair standing at the nape, its rounded ears on high alert.

Then the "dog" suddenly let out an angry meow at his feet as if he just offended its senses.

Syaoran thought that it has got to be the weirdest looking cat he had ever seen. It almost looked like bear. A winged bear-like cat, he added, as he saw a white wing-shaped spot at either sides of the animal. "Hey," Syaoran tried to coo the strange-looking cat by lifting his shoed foot and pretended to caress its back. But the gesture seemed to have made the cat angrier.

"Fine," Syaoran gave up and looked expectantly at the pedestrian stoplight. Apparently, some of his planets have still gone awry. Not even a cat (or a dog, whatever) could welcome him, albeit reluctant.

The light turned green for pedestrians and Syaoran started to cross the street. Then he felt that something actually bit him at the back of his ankle—through his jeans and through his sock. He looked down and saw that big orange cat's teeth still trying to bite a huge chunk off his leg.

"Hey!" Syaoran shooed the cat unsuccessfully. He tried to get the cat off him by kicking in the air but he yielded no such luck. People were already giving him weird looks. What did I ever do to deserve this? he asked himself for the second time that day.

He grabbed the nape of cat and tried to tear it away from his jeans, but the cat held on to him—tooth and claw and all. "Get off! Get off! I'm no rat, baka neko!"

"Don't you dare call my cat stupid, you jerk!"

But Syaoran was too busy fending off the cat that was oddly attacking him for some unfathomable reason. His patience was wearing thin already. He was too tired to be in this kind of unspeakable situation that Syaoran stomped on the floor on his last attempt to break free of the cat. With an ear-splitting screech, the cat finally let go and scurried to nearest lamppost, licking its tail.

"Finally, I thought—"

"Kero! Waah!"

Syaoran looked behind him and caught sight of a screaming and angry female running towards him. The next thing he knew, the female who was no older than him had hit his shoulders with a pink bag like he was a criminal caught in the act of violence. She looked at him with—Syaoran gulped—murder in her eyes.

"You cruel jerk!" Sakura screamed at Syaoran's ear before shoving him squarely at the shoulders, her pink bag and a plastic of groceries hitting him at the ribs.

Now what did I just do? Syaoran miserably thought as he rolled his eyes at the skies. Is this Your idea of something wonderful? he asked as rubbed his ribs. A/N: Line taken from Ms. Judith McNaught's novel, "Something Wonderful" :)

"How could you do that to my cat!" the auburn-haired female yelled at him. "Come here, Kero-chan. Here sweet kitty…" Syaoran watched the female cooed in a softer voice.

Sakura crouched in front of her cat thinking that Kero must have suffered trauma under the stranger's violent foot stomping. Sakura glared at the chocolate-haired boy who was checking his ankle and jeans.

How could anyone be so cruel to Kero! Sakura thought. The stranger must be giving off bad vibes like Touya to have annoyed Kero that much. That, she added as she glanced thoughtfully at Chocolate Boy's foot, or his foot must have smelled that bad.

Syaoran didn't need to hear the words; the look that her glacial emerald eyes had given him just told him so.

For a moment, Syaoran's eyes became mere dots as he sensed the disgust in the stranger's aura. I never really deserve this! He was rendered speechless and motionless for a moment as he tried to digest what had just transpired today.

Unpacking a mountain of boxes and being attacked by a strange cat do not exactly fall under lucky day. And now a female had just called him a jerk and was looking at him with unconcealed disgust.

What's the world coming to? Syaoran wanted to scream at the skies. The stars twinkled at the moon, then winked innocently at him. Some conspiracy.

Syaoran dared a look at the auburn-haired female petting the cat (that was still giving him weird looks). "Does your tail hurt, Kero?" the stranger asked the cat in a softer voice so unlike the one she had used on him.

The orange cat called Kero meowed loudly as a reply like it was in deep pain.

A pair of icy emerald eyes glared at him again. "Look what you did to him!"

Syaoran's jaw dropped. "What I did— Well, look what he did to me! He just created two huge holes at my jeans!" he sputtered, finally gaining back his speech facility.

"Nonsense!" Sakura butted. She was thoroughly incensed that Kero was hurt. Not even Touya had dared to hurt her cat, but this stranger just did! "If you weren't the jerk that you are—

"That's the third time you've called me a jerk, lady!" interrupted Syaoran, a vein painfully throbbing on his forehead already.

"You could have tried to pry him off you without resorting to violence!" Sakura continued heatedly as if she didn't hear him. She scooped up her cat and caressed its head.

"Violence!"

"You stepped on his tail!"

"You know I actually did try! Now if you had actually tried to look rather than started screaming like a pig—"

"And who do you think you're calling a pig?" Sakura rounded suddenly on him.

Syaoran believed that he had just been the unlucky recipient of a rarely seen super death glare. Slightly taken aback, Syaoran tried to calmly continue driving his point. "Point is, I tried. But your cat won't let go of me, and my ankle is already smarting from his bite!"

Sakura's emerald eyes narrowed at him. "You cruel jerk called Kero 'baka neko'." she spat.

"Well, he is!" Syaoran snapped back. His patience—whatever was left of it—quickly went down the drain because of the stranger's obtuseness. He just had dinner and his energy is already depleted. "He started growling—purring—at my feet for no apparent reason and followed me here—ow! Ow! What the hell was that for?"

Syaoran could not believe that an auburn-haired, green-eyed, pink bag-toting stranger had just stomped on his foot and grossly stuck out a tongue at him in less than a day's stay at his new country!

What is the world really coming to?

A/N: Hmm... It looked like Syaoran and Sakura got off at the wrong, er, foot. :p Gimme at least 4 reviews for this chapter and I'd be glad to upload the next one. Hope I'm not asking for too much, ne? Thanks calicookie1991:)

Up Next! He's got a neighbor from hell. But upon seeing Sakura at his new school, Syaoran grabbed Sakura and dragged her to an open stock room, bent on laying some ground rules. But Sakura just screamed at him, "You monkey, you locked us up at the stock room!"

"Like I'd do anything with you."

"The door is and has always been jammed. Congratulations. You managed to imprison us on our first day of school at a room where anyone rarely visits."