This is what happened when you procrastinate on writing a collab but still force yourself to write...something. On Mahagony07 request for more adjectives, I went through this and added a whole bunch of adjectives everywhere XD. Enjoy and REVIEW!

Disclaimer: I don't own Shugo Chara. 'Precious Secrets And Beautiful Liars' by TheLingeringWolf=most of the story's inspiration. 'Got to be perfect Not' by bleachlover1999=Rima's original disguise. The story is also influenced by Durarara

n o t e xp e c t e d

Rima POV

"Do you have an ace?"

"Goldfish."

"Yaya! That's the tenth time you said goldfish!"

Yaya smirked deviously. I heaved a playful sigh, thinking that if Kukai had stayed longer, Yaya and he would have been able to relate so much.

Glancing around the room, the spacious interior made me relaxed. There was so much room, yet everything was so neat and nice-looking. If it wasn't for the dirty, orange basketball lying around along with a few faded hoodies, the room could have been easily mistaken for a plain girl's room.

"Rima? Rima! It's Rima's turn!" Yaya's cheerful voice brought me back to reality.

"Okay, okay," I said. I asked Nagihiko if he had an ace. He did. I laughed at him for awhile.

Soon, the card game concluded with Yaya winning. I suspected that Nagihiko let her win on purpose, but I didn't get how that was possible with such a simple game as Goldfish.

Yaya left the room to use the restroom.

"I guess I owe you more apologies," said Nagihiko. Strangely, there wasn't a trace of unwillingness or hesitancy in his statement.

"Really?" I asked, "I don't think there's much more for you to apologize about except for being annoying."

"There is."

"Oh?" I looked at him expectantly.

"I'm sorry, for when we first met, I must have been insensitive. The way I looked at you? It was pure skepticism and rudeness. Also, I didn't really do much, except question you weirdly when you fell down and your hat fell off. I mean, you looked really pretty, but that's not an excuse...," he trailed off. I waited for him to continue. "And then after that, on Tuesday, I patted you on the head without your permission. That's when all the rumors started too. And I've been nothing but rude to you and..."

I held up a hand to stop him from talking.

"Wait, you didn't bring me here just to have a chance to apologize, did you?"

He looked at me with an impossibly blank look, but his honey-golden eyes gave away what I need to know.

I sighed again.

"Sorry," he stammered out.

"You're so immature sometimes," I giggled, "You don't owe me anything, what you did for me helped me get a new start. It was more than I could have asked for from anyone. That alone is too much to repay, you don't owe me anything; it's the other way around."

"But―"

I stopped him again.

"Gosh, time flies by so quickly. Was that really Monday? Just earlier this week? Doesn't feel like it. It's been the longest week of my life. I don't even remember half the stuff you mentioned."

"You don't?"

"Nope!"

We looked at each other incredulously and started happily laughing.

Laughing was something I remembered. I remembered the morning Nagihiko boldly asked to be my friend. I remembered dragging him up to the rooftop so we could just argue and laugh. I remember that being a beginning.

Maybe to him it started before that, but to me, it started then. Then, he was no longer just a classmate of mine.

"Oh, and sorry about kicking that ball to you so hardly, I should at least apologize about that," Nagihiko casually added.

"That was on purpose?" I exclaimed, astounded.

"Uh, yeah. Call it gut reflex or something. Let's just say I like getting my stress out by doing physical stuff and for some reason you were in the way, so I just kicked it."

"Huh? That makes no sense!"

Nagihiko grinned happily.

"I know. Sorry about that."

"Was it love?"

"Yup! I was in love with you so I wanted to make you notice me. So I tried to cause you harm,

so you would know I existed."

We laughed again.

Because that was just so absurd.

Kukai POV

I frittered the crumpled piece of paper in my hand and the shreds flew away from my grasp, filling the air with ripped up paper.

"Hey, no littering," a harsh, clear voice pierced through the day. I could feel a glare being directed towards me as I playfully grinned as I looked to see who had spoken.

"Sorry, sorry, can't you see I'm in my rebellious phase?" I replied.

The girl talking to me smirked. I smirked back at her.

She was a tall girl with long, blonde pony-tails, workout clothing, and huge sunglasses. The air around her was rigid yet intriguing.

It was the air of a celebrity.

I attempted to retrieve some of the pieces of paper that I had thrown into the air, hoping to please her. She looked at me, but her intent was not apparent, since her shiny, black sunglasses covered a lot of her face.

"You look like the type that can eat, kid. How about this? If you can eat ramen faster than me, then I'll forgive you."

Kid?

She didn't seem that much older than me.

I looked at the tall girl for awhile before carefreely saying, "Okay!"

\

"Here," a man thrust a crinkled paper towards me, practically pushing it into my grasp.

The force the gruff old man used to give me the paper pushed me away from him slightly.

I lifted an eyebrow.

"What's this?"

"Read it," with that, he left with his two underlings, minions, scurrying after him.

\

We walked into the nearest ramen shop, Ramen Taro.

I smirked, I was a regular there, and if the old man was here...

"Ah! Hey, Kukai! Are you getting your usual? Or are you going to ask me to whip up

something crazy for you?" a bald man behind the wooden counter asked, grinning.

"Yo! How are you doing, man?" I greeted the owner of the shop.

The girl whipped her head back to face me, hair flying.

"You've been here a lot?"

"Yup!"

"Hmm~," she thoughtfully hummed. "This is my first time in this shop," she smiled.

Her smile was blinding. Even with her glasses obscuring her face, you could see her face lighting up with her smile.

If she takes off her sunglasses, she might look as pretty as Rima, I thought.

I looked at the metallic clock on the wall; it was about four in the afternoon. If I ate now, I would be too full to eat dinner.

In fact, I realized that I didn't know why I was in here in the first place.

To get forgiveness of a girl I just met off the streets?

Ha.

Rima would have laughed.

My mind was wandering towards Rima a lot, but I figured it was because she was probably

the girl I felt the closest to now. She seemed closer to me then Amu, who I had spent a good two years with. That, now that I thought about it, was weird. Maybe it was because Rima and I just clicked, like we had the same mindset.

But then again, if Rima and I had the same mindset, then Nagihiko and she probably had similar personalities.

I had plenty of things to do, and meeting the tall, blonde girl wasn't on my list on things to do, but I didn't mind.

We made our way to the counters and sat down, side by side, when the old man leaned in, in front of us.

"She your girlfriend?" The man asked jokingly.

"No," I said. I turned to face the blonde, "It would mean the world to me if you were, though."

"Nice try," she said.

"Your orders?" the old man brushed away any awkwardness.

"Extra firm, extra large ramen special with seafood," said the girl.

I whistled.

"Are you sure you can eat that all?" I questioned.

"Of course," she answered haughtily.

"Okay, then I'll have the same as her," I told the old man.

"Coming right up!" He left the country and went to the kitchen.

The girl unwrapped her disposable wooden chopsticks gracefully, positioning it on her hand. I, however, propped my elbow on the counter, resting my cheek on my hand while facing her. I watched her, smiling.

She looked up towards me.

"Are you some kind of creeper?"

"No, just wondering what your name was."

She huffed, "Then shouldn't you tell me yours first?"

"Okay, okay," I lifted my hands up in defense, "I'm Kukai, Kukai Souma."

She lifted an eyebrow.

"Middle school?"

"Uh...yes. What about you? What's your name?"

"Utau. Hoshina Utau. High School."

"No need to act so haughty about being older," I scoffed.

She glared at me. I was still at first, trying to make seem like it wasn't bothering me, but soon, I was uncomfortably squirming under her wrathful gaze.

"Okay! Here you go! Eat it while it's hot!" The old man thankfully interrupted, setting two huge, steaming bowls of ramen in front of us.

"Thanks for the food!" Utau and l exclaimed in unison.

"Okay...," Utau spoke. I braced myself as we started a countdown.

"3."

For some reason, it seemed fun.

"2."

Even more so, it seemed natural.

"1!"

We dug into our food.

The old chef walked away to take other orders as we glomped our thick, heavy noodles and chewed our shrimps, scallops and boiled eggs.

It was delicious.

Even though I was eating it at fast as possible, I was marveling at how good it tasted. The old man never ceased to surprise me with his cooking skills.

Also, the firmness of the noodles was perfect with the rest of the ingredients. The yellow noodles were thick, it complimented the flavorful soup, and the ingredients were just the right

amount of chewiness.

The sunlight from the fuzzily tinted windows leaked inside the shop, glistening on the metallic clock. the clock ticked and ticked, combining with the sounds of people greedily slurping their ramen soups and noodles. It wasn't a busy time of day, four wasn't exactly a convenient time to eat, but yet, the shop was full enough. Murmurs filled the shops as people conversed. Part-time workers walked in, ringing the bells connected to the door, wanting eat after their l

long, tiring, work shifts, without breaks, ended.

The door opened again and the familiar sound of the bells rang throughout the shop as the owner of Ramen Taro greeted him. The open door gave the shop a quick burst of unfiltered light, making the silver, metallic clock flash, reflectively.

As the store's door closed with a soft click, both Utau and I raised our heads at the same time

to competitively exclaim:

"Finished!"

\

"I won. You got a problem with that?"

"But one piece of green onion shouldn't matter," I playfully whined.

We were walking down the noisy, busy streets of the city. I walked along the road, on Utau's left side.

"Yes, it does."

"Hmph."

Utau was still wearing her sunglasses. I noticed that she wore them even inside Ramen Taro.

"Utau? Why didn't you take your sunglasses off while eating? Didn't the steam fog it up?"

"N-no reason," she said.

I glanced at her and decided not to pry. Prying wasn't my thing. I realized, while walking, that was probably why I had many friends but not many close friends. Also, that was, sadly, probably why Nagihiko and I had become friends so long after we first met. Maybe, in a way, I'm an socially awkward person that covers it up by smiling all the time. Maybe I should just

look at all the human flaws in the world straight on.

At that, I copied Nagihiko' reactions to himself and forgot I ever thought those thoughts.

Not really. I remembered it later, while in my room, willing myself to fall asleep.

There are time when even I need to learn from Nagihiko. I sighed and Utau looked at me suspiciously, probably wondering why I suddenly sighed.

"So..." I started up the conversation again.

"Why are you following me?" Utau asked.

"Because I can?"

"N-nevermind." she turned away, gazing at something at the right of her. The dispassionate look on her face said that she didn't particularly care about the dress display she was looking at.

"Do you live around here?" I asked smoothly, hoping to be casual.

She looked towards me.

"I'm trying to visit a friend."

"Trying?"

"I don't know where she lives, she moved not too long ago, but I don't know where her house is or what school she transferred to...She only told me the name of the city she was moving to."

"Hm..."

"But whatever, it's not like you'd know her."

"Yeah," I said, but I felt a premonition. I had an urging suspicion, but I didn't what it was.

"Well," Utau said, wandering away slightly, "I'm going to see if there are any leads anywhere, I think my brother knows this city well..."

"Okay," I said, "Good luck!"

"Bye!"

We parted ways.

Utau, it seemed, was heading towards the direction of the park. I, however, wandered towards a shopping square in efforts to forget the unpleasant things in life.

The time spent with Utau hardly satisfied my cravings for abnormance, proven when I walked into a sports good store and banged my fist against the plain, white wall at a secluded corner.

I rustled my auburn hair, combing it harshly with my fingers, and finally, settled down against the wall, hands over my ears.

I wanted to stop seeing the world.

Not die. Not get injured. I just refused to believe there were cruel people in life.

Rima POV

I tightened my hair band as I got up from my position on the floor. As if on cue, Yaya opened the door of Nagihiko's room, complaining about how she got lost coming back from the restroom. I patted her head in lazy efforts to comfort her, despite the fact that she was only about an inch shorter than me.

"I can't believe I just realized that!" I exclaimed, "Yaya's shorter than me! And we're the same age! That's...AMAZING! I never met anyone that was shorter than me before" I turned to Nagihiko, excitement brimming in my honey-gold eyes. He smirked at me.

"That's mean, Rima," Yaya pouted.

I huffed and suggested that we go to the mall.

They grudgingly complied, but I could tell that Yaya didn't want to go and Nagihiko didn't feel

like going.

I could understand Nagihiko, he was a boy after all, but Yaya seemed to go to the mall often as she had a lot of fashionable key chains and bow ties. There was no real reason for her to dislike going to the mall. But then again, there was no real reason I wanted to go.

I brushed aside their hesitancy and basically dragged them to the nearest shopping center.

Normal POV

Yaya was fidgety. She kept an eye out, hoping that her friends haven't chosen to hand out at that particular shipping center Rima dragged her to. The last thing she needed was to be questioned but her friends. More than the last thing she needed, it was the last thing Yaya wanted.

Flipping her head everywhere, she thoroughly scanned everywhere possible, uncomfortably craning her neck to peek inside the shops through thirty clear, glass windows.

Rima hit her on the head.

"What's wrong?"

"Um, you know, my friends..." Yaya said.

"Oh. Those people. I don't think they'd be here, isn't there that huge sale at the mall 3 miles from here?" Rima said reassuringly. Yaya breathed a sigh of relief.

"Thanks."

"Just wondering but do you switch to first person when you're serious or something?"

"Nope! Yaya only speaks in first person because Saaya was always annoyed with Yaya and said Yaya should speak normally, so now, when Yaya really has to, she speaks in first person. Yaya just thought it would make more sense to Rima if I used first person just now."

Rima looked at Yaya skeptically, processing what Yaya just said in her brain.

"Right." Rima said simply.

"I don't think you should have changed yourself for your friends," Nagihiko joined the conversation.

"Easy for Nagi say!" Yaya stuck out her tongue at him, "Nagi's practically the school prince!"

"True," said Rima monotonously glaring at Nagihiko.

"Hey!" Nagihiko retaliated.

It looked longer on Docs, all well. Fillerish, forshadow chapter. New arc next chapter. No more friendships. Romance FULL SPEED AHEAD.

Sorry for any grammar mistakes. I didn't want Jo-chan to beta this along with the 5k collab part I wrote. Check it out! It's on her account: Squishu.

CHEERS!

OMG DURARARA IS SIMULCASTING!

~KiMi