I LIVE! Sorry about that serious delay, folks. Let's just say that personal life, as well as (Ahem) elections and the pandemic still raging in my country, took a toll on me but I'm back, ladies and gent! On to the show~

Chapter 5 : Real Strong But Not For Long

"Sora, is that you?" Taichi asked back. Sora nodded barely. Kari's mouth dropped in surprise. The three were staring in silence for a while.

However, within seconds, a huge grin escaped Sora's lips as she exclaimed, "Tai! Kari! Oh my God! It's so great to see you two!" Sora practically glomped Tai with a quick pounce that almost made Tai lose his footing in surprise. However, the brunet quickly recovered from the shock, and grinned hugely, returning the hug.

"You remember us?" Tai managed out, the grin on his face growing at this delightful realization.

Sora laughed slightly, "Of course, I do. How could I forget the guy who pulled at my ponytail while calling me 'Carrots' when we first met?"

"Sora, I was five years old. Cut me some slack!" Tai said, his face flushing red in embarrassment but his eyes were shining, clearly expressing the joy he felt over this reunion with a friend. Kari chuckled at this humorous exchange.

Kari said, smiling, "Glad to see you again, Sora."

"Wait, is that the barrette I gave you for your birthday? Holy shit!" Tai exclaimed as Sora blushed, causing this sort of reaction where the two started laughing. Sora was sure some people were staring at these two as if they were psycho killers with problems they hadn't worked out yet.

"What brings you two back to Tokyo?" Sora asked, composing herself and letting go of Tai, scolding herself for causing a scene.

"Oh, we moved back to Odaiba." Tai stated, almost matter-of-factly.

"Really?" Sora gasped in awe. "Holy crap, Tai, Kari, that's awesome! It's nice to see you guys back."

Kari gave Tai a pensive look at Tai's statement. It was pretty bold of Tai to say that when they were currently living in a hotel, which, to put it frankly, was by no means a stable home.

Sora was also curious and decided to ask more of Tai's life in Edogawa, "So are you going to this university or-?"

"Nah. As much as I'd like to gain more education, I'm actually looking for a job here. Our uncle up and left us, the bastard, didn't tell us where he was and hasn't appeared since. I said, 'fuck it' basically, and we decided to head off to Odaiba to start a new life." Tai said, taking a bite out of his food. Kari was about to tell Sora the full story but then paused herself. It probably was better to wait. She wasn't sure if she (and Tai) were ready to drop the bombshell on Sora the type of man Akihiro was. And besides, well, Tai wasn't technically lying on the fact that his uncle couldn't be trusted.

"I see…" Sora said, stunned to hear how the sibling's uncle had neglected the two like that. "So have you got any jobs yet?" Sora asked.

"Oh just a few interviews. Crossing my fingers that they went well." Tai admitted, briefly looking up to the ceiling as if asking for any diety up there that he'd have a job.

"You know, I think that the university has some job openings here and there." Sora added, pensively as she recalled a few signs she saw passing by.

"Oh well, they're probably for the students. And I'm not a student." Tai chuckled sheepishly.

"Not really. I think non-students can apply for the jobs too. It's like some jobs here and there as baristas, shop clerks, stockers, you know, the usual." Sora assured Tai.

"Tell you what. I'll consider it." Tai nodded, before saying, "But enough about me. What about you?"

"What about me?" Sora asked in surprise.

"How's life treating you? Whatcha studying here?"

"Botany."

Tai and Kari jumped in surprise at that as the latter repeated,"Botany? As in studying plants?"

"That's the definition of it." Sora nodded, taking a sip of her juice and then asking, raising an eyebrow in curiosity, "Something wrong with it?"

Tai explained, "It's just you never struck me as someone who'd want to study plants. You would tell me how much you hated that your mom would want you to take classes in ikebana and all that." Tai explained before furrowing an eyebrow in suspicion, "Unless if she's forcing you to study in-"

Sora laughed slightly before explaining, "Absolutely not. It was a choice I made on my own free will. I mean yeah, I used to hate ikebana but then I took a course with my mom for her birthday and saw it wasn't bad after all. Also, working in the local garden for the community service requirement also helped. It was so interesting to see how these plants and flowers develop and what makes them unique."

"Here I was thinking you'd grow up to be a soccer star." Tai muttered playfully.

"I can still kick your butt in soccer even if I haven't played it seriously in a while," Sora joked back grinning. However, her grin disappeared as she noted something on the bare arm of Kari's. A bruise that was healing but was very noticeable.

"What's that on your arm, Kari?"

Kari's heart skipped a beat and as did Tai's. Kari cursed herself for wearing a sleeveless shirt when her wounds hadn't healed completely yet. They wanted to believe that leaving Edogawa, and by extension Akihiro, would finally stop all those uneasy questions and awkward explanations about those bruises and how their uncle was like. But it appeared that Akihiro still managed to give Kari one bruise during their last argument with him.

"I bumped my arm into a door." Kari stated, her voice almost robotic to Sora's concern. She had been used to lying to eagle-eyed solicitous teachers and concerned (or curious) students about where those bruises came from. She always managed to never use the same excuse at a row for fear of suspicion.

"I lost my footing on a hiking trip with my family and I scraped my elbow. Crazy, isn't it?"

"I was in the park and this kid accidentally threw a basketball at me in my face. That's why I have this black eye. It's no big deal, really."

"Oh gee, I'm so clumsy. I was playing tag with my neighbor's kid I was babysitting for and I tripped on the pavement. How silly of me, huh?"

However, while these excuses worked on the teachers, unfortunately, or fortunately, they wouldn't work for Sora. Sora wasn't sure if she wanted to question Kari yet. Tai perhaps. But then again, that would seem rather invasive of her. However, one thing was certain. While she never truly met Tai and Kari's uncle, she had a slight gut feeling that if she did meet him, she wouldn't like him at all, even barring the fact he had, in a sense, separated the two from her.

"So lunch break, huh?" Tai asked.

"Yup. My class doesn't start until one-thirty." Sora nodded, briefly glancing at the clock and nodding to herself that she still had plenty of time to eat and talk with her two old friends.

"I should let you eat. Nice seeing you Sora." Tai nodded, him and Kari readying to leave but Sora exclaimed anxiously, "Wait! Don't go. I'd like to talk with you another time. I still live in the same apartment I did when we were kids."

Tai smiled slightly and nodded, "I'll catch you this week. Whether it's here for a job interview or see you in your apartment. I'll see."

"I say you should visit." Sora nodded, "My parents will be so happy to see you two..."

"I can imagine." Kari grinned.

"See you on the flip side, Sora." Tai called back as he and Kari left. Sora waved goodbye, the grin on her face still there. This was something she couldn't wait to tell her parents and her friends. She also couldn't wait to see them again at another time.

The hotel reminded Tai of an old horror movie the lazy Literature teacher in grade ten had shown the class instead of actually teaching anything worthwhile.

Soft jazz music played in the lobby constantly, in fact Tai was willing to bet that jazz was the only thing the hotel staff ever played.

While the interior was very tidy, it was also very old-fashioned in terms of furniture and decor. Tai and Kari doubted that the hotel had ever seriously decided to give it a makeover in the past years. While they were grateful to have a place to stay for now, they sometimes jokingly wondered if this was still 2006 or that they had somehow traveled back to 1956 and they would meet their grandparents as young adults.

The hotel also didn't have a lot of guests. In fact, Tai sometimes would lay awake in the wee hours of the morning, unable to fall back asleep, thinking he had to be dead. Not a single sound or peep was coming from the hotel, to the point it made Tai uncomfortable. He wasn't asking for something like Yakuza gang members beating each other up or two hormone-addled lovers to be humping on the walls but it did feel eerie at times to be awoken and hear silence in a place where you'd think there'd be sound. There is no way that this place to be so quiet while I'm alive, Am I dead? Has Akihiro found me and killed me in my sleep?, Tai, in one early morning, thought in his mind before placing his hand on his bare chest, feeling the constant heartbeat and sighing in relief. A strong heartbeat, but for how long? How long before it just stopped? Tai didn't know but he wasn't going to stop until his heart did.

As they got to the hotel, Tai and Kari were greeted by the silence and jazz songs that they had come to know and tolerate, or at least beginning to tolerate. Going up to the thirteenth floor and opening the door to room 1304, Tai and Kari slowly went in. Tai sat down to the desk and fired up his laptop to check any emails and updates on the job interviews. There was one and to his great disappointment, when he opened the email, the words "we've decided to forward with other applicants" were the first things he read on the email.

"Fuck." Tai muttered in irritation. He knew that it wasn't their fault and that he wasn't entitled to be handed a job as quick as a snap of one's finger but it was frustrating to see those words.

Taking a glance at Kari who had opted to prepare for her upcoming school by reading her old text book in case the teacher wanted a quick review of what she learned, Tai sighed to himself, tapping his fingers anxiously.

There was no way he was going to come crawling back to Akihiro. Not just for his sake, but for Kari's sake as well. He wasn't going to quit. Not now, not ever. Akihiro could rot back in fucking Edogawa for all he cared but he was never going to give Akihiro the pleasure of his loss. He was going to make his mother and father proud, wherever they were.

Remembering Sora's words a while back, Tai quickly began to search up 'Waseada University Jobs' in the search engine and began to apply to any of them possible. He wasn't going to give up. He didn't want to give his uncle that satisfaction, wherever he was.

Chapter 5, there it is! Not a lot but hopefully something. Hopefully the next chappie should pick things up~

There are a couple of reference notes :

The chapter's title, "Real Strong But Not for Long" is a reference to a lyric from Janet Jackson's 'Black Cat', a song about a young man living on the edge and disobeying his elders and society.

Yes, the famous hair clip/barrette has made another appearance. It's a Taiora staple after all lol.

The mention of Tai and Sora's first meeting involving Tai pulling at her hair and calling her 'carrots' is not only a homage to Anne of Green Gables but also the TaioraWeek2020 prompt I wrote which can be found in my profile under the title 'Courage and Love Through the Years'.

I based the hotel itself on a couple of hotels I visited and mixed it with the design for Disney World's The Twilight Zone of Terror. If you guys have ever stepped into the interior at least watched some clips online, you'll understand.

I do not own the characters here. I do however own the story idea and I do also appreciate reviews, especially constructive ones. Thanks for reading~