Hitting the Mall, Part II:
Ryou's Confession

Ryou started off, a determined look in his eye. We followed him without any further comment, although Bakura did shoot him a "you're-insane-and-you-know-it" sort of look.

I caught up to Ryou. "Why are you so concerned? I mean, I know helping people is what we do, but you're obsessed with helping her or something!"

Ryou didn't even slow down. "Because she's just like I was. All alone, with no one to talk to. No parents; no friends; no…sister…"

"There she is!"

We all looked at where Malik was pointing. Mikey was sitting on the edge of the big fountain, crying to herself.

"Mikey!" Ryou called, as we raced over.

Mikey looked up. Her expression was startled. "W-What are you guys d-doing here?"

Bakura rolled his eyes. "What does it look like we're doing? Trying to figure out why you ran away from us!"

Mikey looked around at us, and we nodded. She closed her eyes. "I…I guess I thought you'd start making fun of me, because of what happened. Everyone does. It's like without my dad to run the business, I'm worthless to everyone."

"You're not worthless!" Yuugi exclaimed. "No one's completely worthless! Not everyone can hate you that much!"

Mikey nodded glumly. "Sure they can."

Everyone was quiet for a moment. Mikey sat with her eyes closed, head bowed. Everyone else just looked at each other, stunned.

"We don't hate you," Yami pointed out quietly.

Bakura nodded. "I don't know so much the other way around, though."

Terra laughed. "Especially not after you happen to have gotten pranked on by one of these psychos!" She whapped Bakura and John on the back of the head.

"Hey!" they exclaimed, gingerly rubbing the backs of their heads.

For the first time, Mikey laughed. She had a nice laugh; it was too bad she didn't use it often enough. "I like you guys."

Ryou grinned at her. "So, you up for being friends?"

Mikey tensed visibly. "Maybe," she said stiffly. Bakura raised his eyebrows.

Ryou shrugged. "If you say so."

Mikey was obviously uncomfortable. She looked around—and spotted an ATM. "Hey—I can grab some money out of that, and we can all go shopping!"

"Sure!" Terra said cheerily, before any of us could respond.

"But Terra—" John tried to protest, until Terra dropped her bags in his arms.

No matter what anyone said, Terra stood firm. She wanted to go shopping—and when she wanted to shop, everyone better get out of her way.

Finally, Kaiba had taken it for as long as he could. He grabbed Terra by the shoulders and shook her. "Onna (woman), has it not yet occurred to you that you have just spent two hours straight shopping at this mall?"

Terra was about to protest, but faced with Kaiba's relentless logic, she was forced to stand down.

"I hate you," she muttered, retrieving her numerous bags from John's arms.

"That makes two of us," Kaiba retorted.

John stretched his back, groaning. "Man—at the Olympics, they ought to have a race to see who can carry all of Terra's bags the farthest! Oh, my aching arms!"

Terra glared at him. "Are you making fun of how I shop?" she asked stiffly.

"Of course not! I could never make fun of that!"

Bakura sniggered.

Mikey laughed. "Well, then, I guess I'll be going home."

"We can walk you," Dean offered.

"Yeah!" Dustil piped up. "We're going that way, anywho!"

"Anyway," Malik corrected.

Dustil rolled his eyes. "Whaaatever."

Mikey rose to her feet, and we started off. I noticed Ryou watching her in that silent, secretive way that he watched anything. He was completely quiet—just watching Mikey, looking forward every now and then to see if he was going to crash into something.

Everyone chattered as we walked—but I noticed that Mikey stood slightly apart from the group. She was with us—but, in a sense, she wasn't.

"Hey, Mikey!" I called. Why are you all the way over there? The real stuff's on in here!"

Mikey smiled slightly, shaking her head. "I'm fine, thanks."

"Come on!" Merekai exclaimed, grabbing her arm. "You can't be serious! We're talking about waffles in here!"

"Merekai!" everyone exclaimed, sweatdropping.

"What? Waffles are cool to talk about!" She struck a silly pose. "Waffles-waffles-waffles-waffles-waffles-waffles-BLUUUEBERRY WAFFLES!"

Everyone sweatdropped again.

Mikey collapsed into laughter. She was giggling so hard she could barely breathe.

"You remind me of Marik!" she finally exclaimed.

Everyone else stopped dead in their tracks. "Who?"

Mikey laughed. "Not the Marik from YuGiOh, if that's what you're thinking—although she does have this obsession for being a pharaoh!"

Everyone except Malik began to snigger.

Malik looked around at the all. "It's not funny!" he said hotly.

"Yes it is," Yuugi pointed out. "Especially since Malik was the one who wanted to be pharaoh in the first place!"

Yami nodded, grinning. "Marik just took over from there!"

Malik rolled his eyes.

Mikey stared at him for a moment. "What's his problem?"

"Nothing," Bakura said quickly. "It's just that Malik and Marik are his favorite characters, and—"

"Hell no Marik isn't one of my favorites!" Malik exclaimed. "Personally, I'm glad he's gone!"

"You would be," Bakura muttered.

Mikey looked at Dean. "Are they always like that?"

"That's barely anything" he replied. "You should see them when they're really ticked."

"And that's nothing compared to when Koran and Ahkama go at it hammer and tongs!" Dustil said smugly.

As if on cue, Bakura stretched out his leg, catching his foot around Yami's ankle.

"Omaesan! (Hey!)" Yami exclaimed, nearly losing his balance.

He glared at Bakura, who was whistling. "What was that for?"

"What did I do?" Bakura asked in an innocent tone that was obviously false. "I'm just walking! 'S not my fault you're a klutz!"

Yami growled at him. "I'm warning you, touzoku (robber)—"

Bakura grinned. "Hey, you started it!"

"I mean it, Bakura—"

Bakura put on a high-pitched voice, and pranced around girlishly. "Oh, look at me! I'm Atemu, the all-mighty, pansy-ass ruler of Egypt! Whoops, the Shadow Games got away! Oh well, I don't care in the least!"

"That is it!" Yami snarled. He sprang at Bakura, tackling the tomb robber to the ground.

"Hey, break it up!" John shouted. He and Dean dove into the fray, pulling the two of them apart. It took all of our combine forces—except Kaiba, who never did anything—to stop them from jumping each other again.

"You two should know better!" I admonished. "Please try to control yourselves!"

Bakura drew himself up proudly. "A tomb robber is capable of controlling himself whenever necessary." He smirked, glancing at Yami. "Unlike his highness-ness over there."

Yami growled again. "Chikusho kusemono (damn thief)," he spat.

"Yami!" Yuugi exclaimed, his tone reprimanding.

Yami turned to look at him. "What?"

Mikey, meanwhile, had a strange expression on her face. She was murmuring to herself, and I caught a bit of what she was saying; "Bakura…Shadow Games…Yami…?"

She noticed I was looking at her, and jerked her head up. She peace-signed, grinning sheepishly.

I noticed that Ryou was still watching her. Something was up, and I knew it.

"Oh, this is my stop!" Mikey pointed at a large two-story building. It looked rather pretty, really—despite the face that it was starting to fall into disrepair. Kaiba took one look at the place, and visibly fought back laughter.

Whoa—rewind a sec. Kaiba? Laughing? Something wasn't right here.

"See you!" Mikey called, before entering her house and shutting the door.

I looked at my watch; it was almost one o'clock. "All right, guys, we'd better get home. It's getting late."

"But can't we just get one round in at the arcade?" John and Bakura begged at the same time.

Yuugi looked at us. "You have an arcade here?"

Dean nodded. "It doesn't have a lot of high-tech games—just stuff like Pac-Man and Centipede."

Malik shrugged cheerfully. "No clue what those are, but hey! There's always time to learn a few tricks!"

I rolled my eyes. Boys. "Fine, we'll go to the arcade—but only for an hour, 'kay?"

"Got it!" was the response from John, Dean, Dustil, Malik, Yami, Yuugi, and Bakura. Simultaneously, they let out a whoop. The three 'real' boys raced off down the street, while the others followed.

I suddenly noticed that Ryou had hung behind with the rest of us, head down, hands in his pockets, eyes shaded by his bangs. I walked over, and tapped him on the shoulder.

"Ryou? You okay?"

Ryou started, and glanced up at me. He smiled sheepishly. "I'm fine."

"Are you sure?" I asked skeptically.

"I'm sure," he replied. His voice had a distracted tone.

I glanced at Terra, Merekai, and Kaiba. They were waiting for us at an intersection, seeing as how we had fallen a little behind. "You guys go ahead," I called to them. "Make sure they boys don't blow up the arcade!"

Terra and Merekai nodded. The three of them hurried across the intersection and out of sight.

"Now," I said firmly, turning to Ryou. "What's up with you?"

Ryou looked at me for a minute, and let out an explosive breath. "She's beautiful, she really is."

"Who?" I asked—but I figured I already knew the answer.

"Mikey," Ryou muttered, blushing furiously.

I looked at him, and sighed. "Ryou, Ryou, Ryou…in love, with no one to turn to…"

"Way to rhyme," Ryou muttered.

I shrugged. "It's a gift. Anyway, what you have to do right now is stay quiet about it, and don't look at her too often. If you do, people will know something's up—that's how I figured it out, you were staring at her. If you're going to watch, do it quietly. If she talks to you, don't get embarrassed. And whatever you do, do not tell her how you feel unless you're sure she feels the same."

Ryou sighed, looking up at the sky. "But…I'm worried. Even if she does like me—will it be because of me? Or because of this illusion I'm wearing?"

I shrugged, pushing open the door to the arcade. "Worry about that when the time comes. Now—Dance Dance Revolution, anyone?"