AN: Just a little ficlet I wrote after reading chapter 170. Some minor spoilers, but if you haven't read the chapter, you probably won't notice them. One warning though is that this fic ends on a highly unsatisfying note. I will take suggestions on how to fix it, but for some reason these two just wouldn't say the things I wanted them to say! I have another fic for ch 171 coming up as well. Will post tomorrow night!
Better Left Unsaid
It wasn't until she started avoiding eye contact that he realized he'd messed up big time. When he didn't see her around the LME building, he'd assumed that their schedules no longer coincided up now that Dark Moon had finished filming its last episode. But then he'd run into her leaving Sawara-san's office and her expression had just sunk at the sight of him. When she greeted him, she'd turned red and stammered and fled as if she couldn't stand to look at him. There was no pleasant banter, no inquiry after his eating habits, no- ah, and that's when it hit him. That ridiculous dinner at his apartment, the inedible chicken omurice, the exposing of his cowardice to her exacting eye. She'd lost respect for him, she was too embarrassed to even speak to him. Her image of her acting-sempai had been shot and now she had no reason to really speak to him at all. He needed to fix this. He wasn't going to lose what he'd worked for so long and hard. The chance to be by her side, even if it was only for moments at a time, was better than going back to mere acquaintances. He had to fix this.
He cornered here outside of the LoveMe lounge the next evening. Well, not so much cornered as walked up to her as she was leaving it, though the look on her face made it seem otherwise.
"Mogami-san. Good evening." He kept his face neutral, knowing his smiles sometimes frightened her. She still bowed to him politely to reply to his greeting but he knew now that it was merely out of habit. Before she could make an excuse to leave he blurted out, "About last week, I need to explain." He'd said it to forcefully and her eyes had met his in surprise. He cleared his throat and continued. "I think I may have made you uncomfortable with my behavior at my apartment after the stunt mishap, and I wanted to apologize. When I asked for your help, it was because" because my dead friend told me it required a girl's magic? No, as much a fairy enthusiast as she was, Kyoko would never expect him to believe in magic of all things. How could he say this without making it worse? This was all Rick's fault! "It was an exercise recommended to me by someone and he said it required another person so I asked you because-"
"An exercise? Oh I understand! It was to help you get back to your role after the shock of the stunt. An acting exercise!" Her 'eureka' expression quickly folded as her brow furrowed. "So you were playing a character?" He quickly caught on to that thread. This he could work with.
"That's right. What you saw was just another character I was trying on to shake off the stunt. I wasn't Tsuruga Ren at that time." Now to drive the point home, "you didn't change your opinion of me because of that little act, did you?" She went wide-eyed and shook her head vehemently.
"Never!" she screeched. "I only started to think that maybe Tsuruga-san and I weren't so different, but now I see you are way beyond me." A look of relief passed over her face, and he was suddenly glad that he'd explained this to her and brought her regard for him back to where it was. "You really pulled me along with your role. I was feeling very sorry for you. I almost crossed the line!" She bowed in apology. "It definitely won't happen again!" She looked up at him then, uncertainly. "Does this mean you don't need Princess Rosa, after all?"