Nina- First, I must say this chapter is a special thanks to tinkletimekelly! Thank you for taking the time to review every chapter. So this chapter is a special dedication to you for always saying the right words to make me update. And I must apologize for being a whole week late. I have no excuse. The readers have all rights to flog me the next time I say I'm going to have something up at a certain time and is late.
Replies:
Tinkletimekelly- Thank you for reminding me of that. I promise to keep side pairings, side pairings. I hope this chapter's as good as the last!
Sonata hirano- The complicated part is that Yami doesn't think of it as ignoring Yugi. He's seeing it as living his own life and just kinda forgot about him. There are lots of moments where Yami just decides to do what the hell he wants and screw the consequences. He's so busy doing what ever he wants, he doesn't realize that its pushing Yugi away. I hope this chapter will explain it better…
Silver Hunteress- Thanks for the review. And I completely forgot his name but that was who I was thinking about at first…
Chapter 4- Damn Niceness
Yugi knew he was being stalked. He could feel his stalker's eyes burning into his back. He first felt that disconcerting feeling of being watched about 3 days ago. It started generally around 9 in the morning and the feeling left sometime after 7 at night. It left him with a nervous feeling- after all who would stalk someone as boring as Yugi. All he did was go to school and play games. Worse, however, were the few hours he didn't feel the stare boring into his back. He felt alone without them, even when Ryou and Jounouchi where with him. (He had yet to tell them this for fear of how they'd react. Jou tended to over or under react and Ryou just worried too much). The most horrid part of it all was that he had no clue who his mysterious stalker was. Not one.
Today was an odd day, though. He had just sorta gotten used to being followed everywhere, and he almost begun to like it. And the eyes were late. By over an hour. What had happened? Had whoever had been following him abandon him as well? How long before Ryou left him? Jounouchi?
"Yug?" Jounouchi poked him, trying to get his attention.
"Huh?!" Yugi jumped, literally.
"Are you okay?" Ryou asked, concerned.
"Yeah, I'm fine." Yugi lied with a small smile. He didn't want to worry them.
They were unconvinced, but let the subject drop.
"Yugi, Jounouchi-kun? Can I ask a huge favor of you?" Ryou asked shyly.
"Sure." Jounouchi said as Yugi nodded.
"Can you help me move some stuff after school. Isis thought it would be less expensive to have Malik and Marik move in with me instead of having an apartment of their own. Less likely to get in trouble if I'm always around as well." Ryou explained softly, rambling.
"No problem." Jounouchi declared with a grin and Yugi made a small noise of agreement. "Marik and Bakura helping too?" He asked, genuinely curious.
"I doubt Bakura will help me with it and Marik tends to go where Bakura goes." Ryou frowned.
It was as if their names had summoned them, because that was the moment that both Marik and Bakura walked in the room.
"What the hell do you want my help with Yadounshi?" Bakura growled, walking over to Ryou, obviously in a bad mood.
"Just moving stuff to give Malik and Marik their own rooms." Ryou said, giving his darkness a hug. A hug that Yugi noticed was not returned. "Did you only just get here? Its past 9:30. Your more than an hour late!" Ryou lectured. It was obvious Bakura wasn't listening, but Ryou continued anyway.
"Shit! Yug, we gotta go, its 39!" Jounouchi cursed, grabbing his things.
'Crap!' Yugi thought to himself, grabbing his books and sprinting out of the room, trying to make it to his next class before his teacher. Before he could manage to even get out the room, he felt his shadow's gaze again. He stopped and turned to find out who it was. Amethyst eyes met garnet. Bakura. Flushing, Yugi turned and left.
Bakura sat in the back of the classroom, like he did every time he actually attended a class. Ryou, who had the undying urge to grill his darkness, sat with him. "Why were you so late?" Ryou started.
Bakura decided to humor him. "Marik."
"Are you coming home today?" Ryou continued.
"Probably." Bakura replied, nonchalant.
"Why were you staring at Yugi?" Ryou asked, finally broaching the subject he actually wanted to talk about.
"I wasn't." Bakura denied, some anger coming back into his voice.
"Yes you were. Why?" Ryou insisted, leaning closer.
It was then that the teacher came in. Thank Ra. That damned brat was getting on his last nerve, Bakura thought to himself as he focused on his normal ignoring teacher task, sleeping through class.
Once again, Yugi found himself completely not paying attention to class. Instead he spent the period wondering how his knew knowledge made him feel. He wasn't as scared as he should have been. Quite the contrary in actuality. Despite the fact that the man had almost killed him, his goal wasn't actually to hurt Yugi. Logically, he only wanted to hurt Yugi because it was the only way to hurt the pharaoh. And Bakura was hot. No one (not even Yami) could deny that. And Bakura hadn't tried to hurt him at all (although he could be following him with the intent of kidnapping him, although Yugi believed that Bakura wouldn't have been so obvious if that was the case. After all, he had known that someone was following him for the past couple of days).
He still hadn't quite gotten his thoughts together (although if he asked his feelings they'd say they liked this news a lot), when the class period ended. Great. Not only that but his stal- Bakura had returned as well. He couldn't tell if he was more comforted or disturbed by knowing who was following him. On the one hand, It was a good thing that it wasn't a random stranger with no motives following him. On the other, he could picture Bakura's garnet eyes burning through his back. Which just made everything he did even more awkward.
"question 13?" Yugi's math teacher asked, completely interrupting his thoughts.
"Huh?" It was becoming Yugi's catchphrase. 'Huh?' with an adorably clueless look attached.
"Can you answer question 13?"
"Um…" Yugi faltered. He didn't even know what page they were on.
"Where's your book?"
"I forgot it?"
"Okay, look off of Miho's. What's the derivative of 3x4?"
Yugi simply stared, confused.
Luckily for him the teacher was a rather lax man and moved on to someone else. Yugi blushed in embarrassment.
"Yugi?" His math teacher called him after class.
"Yes?" He squeeked, still embarrassed.
"Do you need to see the nurse. Your not acting like yourself."
"No, I'm fine."
"Are you cer-"
"I'm fine. I just need to get myself together. I'm perfectly totally fine."
"If you're sure…"
Of course he wasn't. Even to Yugi it sounded like he was trying to convince more himself than the teacher. Still, Yugi smiled anyway and said, "Of course!"
The rest of the day continued much in the same fashion. Everyone noticed how lost Yugi seemed all day.
Bakura disappeared quickly after school. He probably wasn't going to help Ryou, just as the albino light had said. Yugi heaved a sigh of relief. Although he was becoming used to the sensation of being stared at… he still wasn't quite sure he was ready to accept it was
Bakura doing the staring.
Yugi, Jounouchi, and Ryou were joined by Malik and Marik about halfway between the school and Ryou's house. Malik was almost dragging the sulking Yami.
"Why do I hafta come?" Marik sulked like a petulant child.
"Because they're doing this for us, you ingrate." Malik growled back, mimicking an angry father.
"But I don't want to!"
"You have to."
"Bakura doesn't!"
Ryou chose now to interfere. "Malik, calm down. Even you have to admit moving things isn't much fun. Marik, I'm sure Bakura would love it if you helped us move. And you'll get to pick your room. If I do it I just might put Malik's room closer to Bakura's…" He said teasingly.
Malik smiled as Marik directed a glare at Ryou. "Not fair." He whined before giving up protesting all together.
Yugi couldn't help it. He giggled, unable to withhold the urge any longer. Jounouchi followed quickly with loud laughs.
"What's so funny?" Malik asked, glaring lightly.
"You guys!" Jounouchi declared between laughs.
"Yeah. Ryou's like the mom, Malik's like the dad, and Marik's the little kid!" Yugi said once his giggles subsided.
Ryou blushed. Malik looked away. Marik contemplated murder. Yugi and Jounouchi quickly stopped laughing, fearing for their lives. The group made it to the house fairly quickly. Ryou opened the door. "That's strange. I didn't think I left the light on…" Ryou commented as they stepped inside.
"You didn't." Bakura said, appearing from the kitchen.
"When did you get here?" Ryou asked.
"A little while ago." Bakura said, staring at Yugi, who ducked his head down to avoid the gaze.
"Come on guys, let's get this over with." Jounouchi said.
Moving the stuff had been a long and tedious process. Ryou had more junk in his house than any one person should ever have. It had taken a little over two hours and Ryou decided to reward the group with food afterwards.
Yugi was grateful. He ate with as much enthusiasm as Jounouchi, demanded seconds and even thirds. By that point he wasn't sure if it was because he was hungry or because Ryou's cooking was just that good. He didn't stay for much longer as it was already getting dark. About halfway to the game shop, he and Jounouchi said their goodbyes. Jou lived the other way, after all. He had felt Bakura's stare on him since they discovered the yami had somehow made it to Ryou's house before they had.
"Bakura" Yugi started, swallowing the lump in his throat. He was nervous. "Instead of just following me, why don't you walk with me instead?" He hoped that Bakura didn't just jump out and kill him now. After all, Bakura had done nothing to really say it was okay to acknowledge him when he was being followed.
"Sure." Bakura spoke up from beside him, nearly giving Yugi a heart attack. He decided he didn't want to know how Bakura was able to do that.
The two walked side be side in a semi uncomfortable silence. At least, Yugi felt awkward because he didn't feel awkward but Bakura looked perfectly fine. Still, they arrived at the game shop all too soon for Yugi. He quickly unlocked the door and step inside. He hesitated. It should be alright, shouldn't it? After all, its only 6. Yami shouldn't be home for another 2 hours at least.
He turned. "Bakura." The thief had only just turned, either to leave or to do his weird disappearing act before he started just following (Yugi wasn't quite sure which).
"What?"
Yugi steeled his nerves. "W-would you like to come in?" He asked, congratulating himself for only stuttering once.
"… Sure." Bakura responded with a smirk.
Suddenly Yugi wasn't so sure he'd made the right decision.
Bakura had been just shocked when Yugi asked him to walk with him. Yugi was supposed to be too scared to do anything of the sort. He supposed the boy just had bigger balls than Bakura gave him credit for.
When they got there, Bakura expected Yugi to go inside and then he would go home. It was simple. Then Yugi just had to complicate things. He had to invite him inside. Although from what he'd seen it would be just him and Yugi. The old man had been gone for a few days and the damned Pharaoh usually didn't show up for a couple of hours later. Just the sheer possibilities of what he could do with that much time alone with him made Bakura smile.
Oh, damn it all. It was that damned niceness of Yugi's. If the boy wasn't so nice, nothing would have happened because he would have never went inside and…
Damn niceness.