Part Two: His Secret

Chapter Nine: The lost art of conversation

Kari watched as the apartment door closed behind her brother and let out a slow breath. Seeing Tai semi-naked and then dressed in something more punky had been quite stirring. A thought about going to her room for some alone time crossed her mind, but a quick glance at the living room clock told her that would have to wait for later. For she was due to meet her friends in just over half an hour. Instead, she went to the bathroom, found her tub of wax and messed up her hair. Having already dressed in her black jeans, green weirdo t-shirt and black choker, she just had to collect her denim jacket and decide on footwear and she would be ready to go.

In her bedroom, she took said jacket from the wardrobe followed by what had once been a pair of white converse. However, two cans of spray paint had rendered them half black, half neon yellow. Fetching her music player from her desk, she put her headphones on, found Ommadawn on the device and pocketed it. Lastly, she picked up a small backpack into which she put her purse a hairbrush and the tub of wax. Her headphones were liable to flatten part of her hair and so she might need to reapply. Leaving her room, Kari walked to the apartment door, put on her converse and left.

Outside, the sun was slowly beginning its descent and although the sky was relatively cloud-free the air temperature had noticeably dropped compared to that of two weeks prior. Autumn it seemed was in full swing now. Walking down to stairs to street level, Kari set off towards the pancake shop where she had agreed to meet the others. It felt almost surreal, she mused, leaving the house to go hang out with friends. She hadn't done this since last Halloween, almost a full year ago. However, that did not mean that she had not gone out. In order to make her family think that everything was still normal, she'd taken to going out once or twice a week under the guise of meeting friends. Instead, she would fully charge her music player and leave to wander the streets for a couple of hours, often going to sit in a park or a coffee house somewhere. On weekends she'd go into town to buy a CD or something from . She'd even went as far to take the train further into Tokyo and visit Harajuku street.

Walking for about fifteen minutes, Kari arrived outside the pancake shop and stepped inside. In a booth beside the window, she spied Yolei and Ken. Shifting her headphones down so they sat around her neck, she walked towards them. Laughing internally when Ken looked up and his eyes passed right over her. Apparently, Yolei had neglected to tell him about her new hairdo. A grin flashed across her face as an idea formed in her mind. Reaching the table she slid into the booth beside him.

"Umm, can I help you?" Ken asked

She did not turn to look at him, instead made eye contact with Yolei who not only managed to keep a straight face but actually managed to look slightly taken aback. "You looked bored. I thought I'd drop in and show you a good time," she said seductively, masking her own voice.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the boy's cheeks turn red. "I'm here with my girlfriend," he stammered.

She stifled a grin. Let's see if she could turn this up to eleven before he realised. "She doesn't seem to mind," Kari replied as she ran a hand over his leg.

Ken practically leapt sideways towards the window, but she followed him. Bearing down on him, she gave him a wicked smile as she gazed into his eyes, "boo!"

From across the table, Yolei burst out laughing as the boy looked into her eyes. "Kari?" he asked, sounding like he did not believe his own.

"Long time no see, Ken," she replied as she stood up and moved around to the opposite side to sit with Yolei.

"You look… different,"

"She looks amazing," Yolei commented as she reached over to give her a hug. "Nice to see you, Kari."

They broke off the hug and she turned back to Ken, "and you're supposed to be observant too."

"In fairness, it's been almost a year and you look markedly different," he said defensively.

She laughed and pointed to her crest of light, "know someone else that wears one of these?"

Ken's eyes fell on the wooden pendant, but it was Yolei that answered for him, "you had him that flustered from the moment you spoke to him, he wouldn't have recognised his own reflection."

"I wasn't that flustered!"

"Your face lit up like my hair, or at least it did after I rubbed my hand down your leg."

He opened his mouth to argue, but Yolei again beat him to the punch, "so you let other girl's rub their hands all over you, do you?" she said hotly.

A look of panic quickly covered his face, "I didn't… it wasn't like… Kari tell her!"

Both girls burst out laughing at the scene before them. Unfortunately, for them at least, they were denied their two on one advantage by the appearance of Davis.

"Hey guys," he said by way of a greeting. Kari watched as his gaze fell upon Ken, "what's wrong with him?"

"He's just worried about what Yolei plans to do to him later on." She mockingly raised a hand to block her voice from travelling in the lavender haired girl's direction. "He's been letting other girls touch him."

"Ken, buddy, I didn't think you had it in you." Davis gave the other boy a light punch in the arm and sat down beside him. "Only you're not supposed to let your girlfriend find out."

"She was sitting right here when it happened!" Ken replied.

Kari raised a hand to stifle her laughter. Much like Izzy, for all of his intellect, Ken had a habit of putting his foot in it once flustered in a social situation.

"Dude, you don't do that sort of thing in front of the girlfriend. That's just plain suicide!"

"Know that from personal experience, Davis," Kari asked with a sly grin.

"I'll have you know I'm an upstanding boyfriend." She gave him a pointed look and he quickly backtracked slightly, "most of the time. Anyway, Ken's the one on trial here, not me."

"It's not my fault Yolei forgot to tell me about Kari's new look."

"Must have slipped my mind," Yolei said airily.

Davis winced and edged away from Ken. "Dude, you never blame the girlfriend for… well, anything! You seriously need to get a copy of relationships for guy's 101. It must be the only book you haven't read."

"That makes two of you," Kari laughed.

"Hey, I've…" Davis began but quickly stopped when she gave him another pointed look. He then looked between her and Ken. "What's Kari got to do with all of this?"

"I didn't recognise her when she sat down and thought she was some stranger," Ken answered.

"I may then have proceeded to have a little fun with him," she laughed.

"It wasn't funny," Ken replied, still sounding flustered at the whole affair.

"It was pretty funny from where I was sitting," Yolei giggled.

"What was pretty funny?" a new voice said from the outside edge of the table.

Kari, along with everyone else turned to look at the final member to arrive; Cody.

"Ken's been letting other women touch him in front of his girlfriend!" Davis said before Ken had the chance to explain.

"Didn't he read relationships for guy's 101?" Cody asked.

At this Ken virtually exploded, "Kari caught me unawares because Yolei didn't tell me about her new look!"

The new arrival let out a hiss, "you should never blame your girlfriend for anything."

The rest of the group, minus Ken, burst out into an uncontrollable fit of hysterics. When she could eventually see straight once more, Kari saw the look of confusion on Cody's face. "It wasn't that funny, was it?" he asked as he sat down beside Davis.

"Yes."

Ken's sole response of, "no," drew another bout of laughter.

Only once everyone was seated and slightly more settled did Kari remember that she still had her headphones on around her neck. Slipping them off, she put them safely inside her backpack along with her music player. She waited until Yolei had finished explaining the full story to Cody and Davis before saying, "should we order?"

"Shouldn't we wait for TK?" Ken asked.

"He didn't want to come," Yolei said.

"Yeah, trust him to be the party pooper," Davis chipped in.

"He had a perfectly good reason to say no," Kari said softly, "We shouldn't hold it against him."

"Why are you defending him?" Davis retorted. "Out of everyone here, you should be the last one doing that."

"While he might have hurt me, I hurt him a lot more. He has every right to avoid socialising with me."

"I want to know what happened to his wrist," Cody said before she had the chance to change the subject. "I heard someone ask him about it and he told them to mind their own business. That's not like him."

Kari bit her lip but remained silent. She hadn't told anyone, save for Yolei who had put two and two together the day after it had happened and, as always, came up with four. Fortunately, she did not have to worry about the lavender haired girl saying anything as she had already asked her not to.

"Let's order," Yolei then said, bringing the conversation back to where it started.

A cursory glance at the menu was all Kari required to make her choice; two pancakes with banana and blueberries, accompanied by a grape soda. A waitress came over and took their order, after which conversation turned to the obvious; her. Fortunately, Yolei had already been armed with enough knowledge that she was able to answer half the questions on her behalf. Everything from her shoes, the odd detail which Ken had noticed, up to her hair was asked about, along with her more internal changes.

"I still wouldn't rule out an evil Digimon in disguise," Ken eventually said, once everyone seemed satisfied with what they had been told. "This new look Kari has an evil streak."

They all laughed, however, he was essentially correct, Kari thought. About the evil streak, not the Digimon part. It amused her somewhat to think about it in such terms. Some of the jokes, the commentary, the whole business with Ken… the way she acted around Tai. She'd never had the confidence to act this way before. To be so bold. Yet, it had not been a conscious choice on her part to do so. It seemed that having suppressed herself for so long, to the point she was little more than a grey blur, had led to her having little clue about her personality. It seemed that the quick succession in which she'd changed her outside wardrobe, had her hair dyed and then the burden of her secret lifted, had opened her up to trying new things. So far she knew that old Kari's selflessness had been turned down a few notches, that she had a newfound desire to make herself happy and, of course, the manifestation of the evil streak. That last being a personal favourite.

"Or an evil twin," Davis offered up as an alternative.

Kari gave Davis an ice-cold look, tilted her head and then said in a soft monotone, "or maybe I just snapped." She then held his gaze, unblinking.

The boy visibly backed into his seat. "Ok, so you can be really creepy now, Kari," he said as he rubbed the back of his head with a hand.

She made him sweat for a few seconds more before laughing.

"As the bearer of the Digi-egg of courage, you really do lack backbone, Davis," Yolei then said as she joined Kari in her laughter.

"To be fair, she did look quite creepy," Cody offered in way of support for Davis.

"Agreed," Ken added. "I wouldn't want to get on your bad side now."

Kari pondered this notion for a moment. She'd never had a 'bad' side before. In fact, Sora was the only person she could recall lashing out at and even that had been a spur of the moment decision brought about by an uncontrollable burst of anger. It remained to be seen whether or not new Kari had a 'bad' side. And she suspected it would only be revealed when someone crossed her.

Their food arrived and the conversation quickly turned to school, then through topics such as movies, music and other such things. When it reached video games, she cheerfully dropped the turtle shell that she had kicked Tai's butt twice at Mario Kart and then at Killer Instinct. The latter of which, while they had agreed to call it a draw, she claimed victory in as she had technically won the most individual rounds.

"There is no way you beat Tai," Davis declared in defence of his idol.

"Want to put that to the test," Kari challenged, metaphorically throwing down the gauntlet.

"You're damn right I do," the boy retorted. "I can't have you spreading such lies and sullying your brother's reputation."

She gave him a smile, "ok, if you insist."

"Fine, my place once we're done here."

Kari looked around at the rest of the group. "Are you guys ok with watching me shove a green turtle shell up Davis' backside after this?"

"I'll happily watch you make him cry," Yolei replied a little too enthusiastically.

Cody sighed and shook his head, "he won't shut up till you do so why not."

"Way to have faith in me, Cody," Davis replied hotly.

"I'm afraid I'll have to pass," Ken then said. "I'll have to leave to catch my train home after this."

"Aww man, I was going to name you my second," Davis exclaimed.

Yolei laughed, "what in case Kari pounds you into the ground after only one race and you need someone to finish for you."

"There is no way she's going to beat me!"

Kari turned to Ken, "we'll walk you to the station first," she said before rounding her gaze on Davis, "before I go find a new home for my turtle shells."

"You are so going down, Kamiya."

They finished their food then rose to leave. At the cash desk, Yolei insisted on paying for her. Owing to the fact she'd made Kari buy her a crepe the previous week. They then walked Ken to the station before starting the journey over to Davis' house. It had been a thoroughly enjoyable evening so far, with the only blemish being the absence of TK. So much so that Kari scarcely gave a passing thought to Tai and how his date with Teiko was going. After so much time alone it was nice to be with her friends.