Chapter Four
3 chapters in a single day? Guys, I'm on a roll!
"Believe in love. Believe in magic. Hell, believe in Santa Clause. Believe in others. Believe in yourself. Believe in your dreams. If you don't, who will?"
-Jon Bon Jovi
Sunday had come much more quickly than Ruri had expected, especially since most experiences told her that anything you waited for was going to feel like a long time. Her mother and father had been absolutely overjoyed when she told them she was going out that Sunday with a friend. Not surprising in the least. Ruri had never made friends since it always felt like she was intruding on a life she shouldn't have. A world she didn't belong in. That had only become more prominent when she had discovered she certainly wasn't in her own universe.
An hour later, she was dressed in casual clothes (courtesy of her grandmother who ironically had the most fashion sense in the entire family) that consisted of a short deep blue skirt and black leggings, a blouse with a large flower print, and a pair of beige mid calf boots.
Walking everywhere certainly kept you in shape, Ruri noticed as she looked at her reflection in the mirror.
"Ruri-chan! Your friends are here!" Her mother called from the bottom of the stairs.
Friends. Plural?
As she made her way to the door, her heart almost stopped when she saw not only Aoko, but Kaito and Hakuba standing in her doorway.
Aki was holding a pretty white rose and looked absolutely charmed.
Tomoharu, however, looked like he was silently plotting the best way to kill someone and hide the body.
Ruri glanced at her mother and was awarded a look that pretty much said "Good Job!"
She sighed and threw a goodbye to her parents as she herded her "friends" out the door.
"Just taking a wild guess, but, did Kuroba-san give my mother that rose?" she asked, once they were far enough away.
Aoko nodded.
Ruri glanced up at Kaito. Despite his best efforts to look nonchalant, she could tell he was shaken.
Ok then.
"So where did you want to go?" Aoko asked, doing her best to direct their thoughts somewhere else.
"Before that," Ruri stopped walking and turned to look pointedly at Hakuba and Kaito.
"Oh, uh, well, Kaito caught me leaving my house and wanted to tag along," Aoko explained.
Ruri turned her gaze solely to Hakuba.
"I asked if you didn't mind me tagging along on Friday," he smiled. "You said you didn't."
Ruri nodded and continued walking.
Clearing her throat, Aoko glanced at Ruri.
"Where would you like to go?"
Ruri tilted her head to one side to think and almost instantly blurted out, "How about a mall?"
Kaito was looking on his tablet at his newest target (a gem called the Cyan Tear) when he spotted Ruri coming out of a small anime store. He knew they had all split up when they had entered the mall but he thought Ruri had stuck with Aoko.
How cute, he caught himself thinking when she smiled fondly at the little trinket she had bought.
It looked like a keychain?
Ruri had felt her heart stop when she had spotted the anime store from halfway across the mall where she and Aoko had been trying on clothes. She had run over to the other girl and told her she was going to the bathroom for a bit and had pretty much sprinted the entire way to the store before collecting herself and managing not to run into someone.
She had spotted a cute little keychain that was only 200 yen and looked obscure enough that someone might not be able to get where it was from. It was a little purple rabbit with pink eyes and a big pink ribbon on one ear. She had bought it and was currently standing right outside the store, staring at it.
"I didn't know you like anime," a familiar voice made Ruri's blood run cold.