"In all that nonsense i never had time to start dinner, so how about we go to Johnny's?"

"Like a date?" Taiga asked.

"Sure, if you want to call it one. Are you going to call everything we do together a date?"

"Sure, I like calling it that. Maybe I'll call them all dates, retroactively," then Taiga thought for a moment, "or maybe not, since the goal was usually the opposite of having a relationship together."

"Fair."

So they went off to dinner, Taiga finding it underwhelming without Minorin there to spoil her and Ryuji unwilling to spend the extra money to get her fill.

"Some date," Taiga sighed, "I'm not even full and we hardly talked at all."

"Sorry, I'm still really tired from that whole mess earlier," Ryuji yawned, "I just want to go home and go to bed."

"That does sound nice," Taiga yawned back, "I'm so tired I probably couldn't even make it home..." she said exaggeratedly as she leaned against someone's fence.

"Well, good night then, I'll see you in the morning," Ryuji answered as he continued walking away.

"Hey, where are you going? aren't you going to carry me home?!" Taiga shouted back at him.

"I guess I can," Ryuji answered as he squatted down to let her climb on his back.

Taiga climbed on, and, standing, Ryuji said, "If this is what you wanted you should have just asked."

"You're supposed to pick up on it by yourself. It's more... romantic that way."

~~~~

"Since you need to get moved out before the end of the month, I figured we ought to take your stuff out of your apartment and bring it to mine."

"I don't know..." Taiga replied, unsure as they walked through the door to her apartment, "I have a lot of stuff here... are you sure there's room?"

"Well... no, I'm not. We might have to get rid of some clothes, and we probably don't need to take all your silverware and plates and stuff..." he answered, starting toward the kitchen.

"Well then we'll have to go through all of it and pick out what I want to keep and what I can leave," Taiga stated, "and that could take forever..."

"I'll help you decide. That way we can get through it," he answered, "together."

~~~~

Taiga wasn't the decisive type.

She'd bought all these clothes, for one reason or another, because she'd liked them at the time, and whatever Ryuji did to try to appeal one dress over another amounted to little progress in over six hours.

"I'm hungry. Can we have a lunch break?" Taiga asked impatiently as Ryuji held two lacey dresses in front of her.

Dropping his arms dejectedly, he replied, "We haven't made hardly and ground on this yet. Can't you at least try to pick a few more to get rid of? I don't care if you close your eyes and point randomly, just pick or I'll pick for you."

"Can you?" she ejected excitedly.

"Wh- huh?" Ryuji cried, surprised. "I didn't mean that seriously, they're your clothes. You really should pick."

"This is taking too long and I don't even care. Just pick the ones you think are prettier and then make me some lunch."

"What would I know about which one is prettier? I probably haven't even seen you wear most of these, and what do you care about my opinion anyway?"

"Like I said, I don't care. It doesn't matter who picks."

"If you don't care, why don't you just pick randomly?" Ryuji cried.

~~~~~

"What were we talking about again?" Taiga asked, uninterested.

"It doesn't matter. Let's go eat."

"Yay~"

Taiga was well aware that she had won.

The two went back to Ryuji's house and he made them lunch. Unusually for her, Taiga was standing in the kitchen following his movements and watching intently as he cooked.

"What are you making?" Taiga asked.

"Soba noodle-soup. We had some boxed noodles around so I figured it would be easy enough."

"Are you putting meat in it?"

"I can if you want me to, but we'll have to go buy some later if you want any in your dinner."

"That's fine. I'll pay for it."

"Are you sure? Since your dad skipped town you probably won't be getting any money off of him."

"It's fine. I think I'm going to get a job soon. I'd feel bad mooching off of Ya-chan..."

"If you're up to it, I'd say that's a good idea."

"Of course I'm up to it." Taiga paused. "Maybe you could teach me how to cook."

Ryuji stifled a laugh, "I don't know about that. Every time you've tried to cook anything you've burned it, and in any case I do all the cooking here already. The kitchen's a little small to have you in here all the time with me."

Taiga looked embarrassed, as well as a little morose. "You're really good at cooking. If anyone could teach me, it's gotta be you. If I'm even half as good at it as you are I could get a good job in a kitchen or something."

Ryuji thought for a moment.

"I guess that's true, although I'm not so sure I'm the teaching type. How about we start with this?"

"A-are you sure?! Okay!" Taiga said excitedly. "I'm gonna cook the hell out of these noodles!"

"Why don't you start by rinsing them off in the sink? I'll boil a pot of water."

~~~~

Under Ryuji's watchful eye, Taiga managed not to burn anything, something only she would be capable of when making a soup, and their lunch turned out edible: in fact, it tasted quite good.

"I've gotta say, Taiga, I'm impressed," Ryuji complimented her.

"It's all thanks to you. Maybe you should get a job teaching people to cook, or you could have a show like that British chef on TV!"

"I don't know about that second idea, but maybe you're right."

Yasuko then opened her door and came into the roon.

"Something smells good~! Is there enough for Ya-chan toooo~?" she asked.

"Of course there is, you're always welcome," Taiga answered.

Yasuko grabbed herself a bowl of soup and sat down at the table.

"What are Ryu and Taiga-chan up to today?"

"Well, we were cleaning out Taiga's closet, but I guess we got sidetracked." Ryuji replied.

Yasuko giggled and began eating.

"Mmmm! Delicious as always Ryuji-chan!"

"Actually you don't have to thank me. Taiga cooked this meal." Ryuji said, pridefully.

Yasuko looked amazed, "Really~?" she said, looking toward Taiga.

Taiga nodded.

"That's a-maz-ing!!!" Yasuko exclaimed, hugging Taiga tightly.

"W-Well, I couldn't have done it without Ryuji telling me what to do," Taiga gasped as she was suffocated by Yasuko's mammalian protuberances.

"As long as you don't get too good at it! We don't need a house-wife and a house-husband!"

Taiga and Ryuji both blushed.

"Y-yeah..." they said simultaneously.