A/N: I want to tell all of you guys that every review really helped me to recreate and edit this chapter. So, in order to add some sort of "drama", I've finally begun working on what I consider to be an important part of Yamcha and Bulma's relationship. That would be uh... the end of it. Also, I do not dislike Yamcha's character. In fact, I find him both endearing and entertaining. So this is a fair warning to all of you Yamcha Hate Mongers. There will be no Yamcha-bashing in this fanfic. Maybe some good-natured ribbing, but not by any means some of the things I've seen on here. Not that I think it's horrible, just not my take. Anyway- enjoy!
DISCLAIMER: If I owned DBZ, Vegeta would actually win battles.
Wearing a purple shower cap, yellow latex gloves, and rain boots, Bulma came downstairs the next morning prepared to do some heavy cleaning. The kitchen was a disaster. Burnt rice still spattered the walls and neither her nor Vegeta had bothered to dispose of empty pizza boxes or throw away any half-eaten slices.
Bulma looked around in dismay. Where was she to start? Why had her parents given the gardener and cleaning men the week off? Sighing, she leaned under the sink and opened the cabinet. She took out a blue bottle of cleaning solution and a scour pad.
Vegeta should really be helping me, Bulma thought indignantly as she started scrubbing the stove.
She furiously shook the idea from her head. She wasn't about to press that issue.
Bulma looked out of the window near the stove and into the backyard. The Gravity Room was humming and even though it was very bright outside, she could see glowing red lights from inside.
The telephone rang and Bulma gave an exasperated sigh. It was bad enough she was cleaning without being told. Was it too much to do it without interruptions?
She clomped over in her too-large rain boots and answered.
"He's not here," Bulma answered brusquely, referring to her father's absence.
"Bulma?" It was Yamcha. "Who's not there?"
Bulma did not hang up as planned. "Sorry about that. I thought you were someone for my dad. He's been getting a lot of phone calls lately."
"He's not there?"
Bulma put the phone on speaker and began cleaning again. "Nope. Didn't I tell you this already?"
"No," Yamcha stated and he sounded annoyed. "You conveniently left that information out, Bulma. And what are you doing up this early anyway? Does he have you making his Royal Highness breakfast?"
For some reason, his snappish comment concerning Vegeta got to her. Bulma stood up and pounded her scour pad on the counter. "I am not making him breakfast. Is there even a reason you're calling me right now? I have a lot of stuff to do today."
That wasn't true. Bulma had only planned on cleaning the kitchen. If she didn't go right back to sleep afterwards, she had planned on shopping.
"I scored tickets to this action movie. I thought maybe you could come see it with me. It's supposed to be really good."
Bulma absolutely hated action movies. Besides, they always paled in comparison to any action she had ever been personally involved with.
"I don't know Yamcha," she said, "I'm really busy here."
"Fine," he said, sounding put out. "Maybe I'll see you later."
"Bye," Bulma said.
He hung up and Bulma put the phone on the counter and began scrubbing again. Rice was now littering the floor around her.
"Great, now I've got to sweep too," she complained.
The phone rang again and Bulma nearly cursed out loud.
"HELLO?"
"Dear, is that you?"
Coloring, Bulma bit her bottom lip. "Oh, hi dad." Way to go, genius.
Her dad forgave her rudeness. "How is everything there? You don't sound so well."
Bulma looked around at the chaotic kitchen and decided to stretch the truth. "Well to be honest, everything's perfectly fine. The house is immaculate, Vegeta and I are getting along nicely and-"
"That is fine!" her father exclaimed and Bulma could imagine him adjusting his glasses, as he always did when he got excited. "I'm glad to hear it!"
"How is everything there, dad?" Bulma asked, glad to hear his voice. It was beginning to dawn on her just how much she had missed him and her mother. "Have you gotten your award yet?"
"If only," her father sighed. "As it turns out, this weeklong convention is an endless assortment of speeches and unfortunately long ceremonies. Your mother and I haven't had a moment alone since we've been here. And she's dying to see the beach!"
There was a pause.
"Bulma dear, your mother wants to talk to you for a moment."
"Alright," she said, waiting for the phone to change hands. Thoughts of cleaning drifted cleanly away as her mother's voice came through the line.
"Hi there honey!"
"Hey mom," Bulma said, smiling into the phone. "How is everything?"
"Oh, it's beautiful here!" Her mother gave a cheerful giggle. "There's even an ocean front! We've been really tied up with boring meetings so we haven't had time to visit, but I can't wait! There are so many cute lifeguards here!"
"Mother," Bulma admonished humorously, as she always did whenever her mother went on about the young men she encountered.
"By the way, how is Vegeta? Is he eating well?"
"He's fine," she answered truthfully. "Really mom, except for Goku, I've never seen anyone eat so much!"
Bunny giggled again. "Well he is a growing boy! Where is he now?"
"Where else?"
"You should check on him Bulma dear," her mother remarked casually. "He's here alone you know. He needs someone to mother him."
Bulma did not agree. "He's made it pretty clear that he doesn't need me checking in on him constantly."
"Bulma…." Her mother began in a disapproving voice and Bulma, rolling her eyes, heaved a large sigh.
"Fine, mother. I'll check on him."
"Now?"
Bulma counted to three. She reminded herself that her mother was only trying to help her and besides, she really did miss her.
"Yes."
Her mother squealed. "I won't keep you then! Bye honey!"
She had barely gotten the word 'Bye' from her lips before her mother had gleefully hung up the phone.
A moment later Bulma was walking across the backyard towards the newly fixed Gravity Room. The faint red light she had seen earlier became far more intense as she neared it.
The closest window was taller than she was, so she had to stand on tiptoes just to peer in. She wanted to do this quickly without disturbing the irritable Saiyan inside.
In the very middle of the room stood Vegeta, his back turned. Sweat poured down the length of his back, dripped hypnotically off of his shoulders and down his rippling arms onto the gleaming silver tile.
Bulma placed one latex covered hand over her chest to steady her breathing. She all but fell over as her legs wobbled beneath her. Bracing a boot against the side of the GR, she managed to continue her borderline stalker observation.
Vegeta put a gloved hand into the air, fired out a large red ball of light and released it. And suddenly it had hit the window Bulma was so amorously attached to. She screamed out loud and ducked. She stumbled backwards and hit the ground hard on her bottom, breathing heavily at her near encounter with death.
Whoosh.
The door to the chamber lowered with a hiss and revealed a short flight of stairs that led into the upper level. Bulma slid her eyes across the clean white steps until they rested on Vegeta's black stained trainers.
Her disobedient eyes floated upwards, ignoring her half-hearted attempts to focus her sights on something, anything else.
She tried not to take the mutiny of her appendages too unpleasantly. Despite what she thought about Vegeta, there really was no denying how handsome he was. And especially not when he stood in front of her, wearing only a pair of tight spandex shorts and laced up Capsule Corp. sneakers.
"What are you doing?" he asked of her, his gruff voice breaking her concentration.
Bulma colored, absolutely positive he was reading her thoughts. "Well, uh, I was just coming to check on you."
He furrowed his brow. "Nonsense, woman. I don't require anyone to check up on me." Suddenly his expression changed into one of incertitude and he pointed at her head. "What is that ridiculous thing you're wearing?"
Bulma blinked, puzzled. What was he talking about? She placed a hand on the top of her head, feeling something plastic and crinkly. She turned redder than before after realizing what it was.
"...It's a shower cap. I forgot to take it off."
She quickly freed her puffy cerulean hair from the confines of the embarrassing cap.
"I guess you didn't have these on your planet."
He raised an eyebrow. "Absolutely not. Nor those."
And he pointed to her giant rain boots.
Bulma raised one foot in the air to inspect them. She bit her lip and said, "I happen to think these are pretty cute. Look closer, they have tiny flowers painted on the side!"
"Absurd Earth fashions," Vegeta said darkly and he made his way back into the chamber.
Inexplicably, Bulma elected rather hastily to follow behind him and managed to leap inside of the GR before the door slammed shut behind her. She skidded to a stop in her slick boots and almost bumped into Vegeta, who was glaring at her from across the room.
"Get out."
He said it in his most menacing tone, one he had used when speaking to spineless combatants during his travels with Frieza. It had worked then and it would surely work now, on this flimsy blue-haired Earthling standing across from him with her hands on her hips.
"Nope! I don't think I will!"
She turned her back on him and began to walk around, her rubber boots making loud squeaking noises on the tiled flooring. "It's starting to smell in here. Don't you clean up?"
"I don't clean, woman."
She faced him, her blue eyes shining in the reddish light. "Well, you ought to, Vegeta. Otherwise it's going to reek in here!"
The woman continued walking around, sniffing loudly. "Really Vegeta. I thought you were a prince! Weren't you required to learn about hygienic principles as a kid?"
Vegeta glared at her. "You have no room to talk, woman. Walking around here dressed like a circus clown!"
Her cheeks turned beet red and she threw her bright yellow gloves onto the floor and stomped the ground. "This is cleaning attire!"
"Stop behaving childishly!" he reprimanded her, feeling as though he were having an argument with a badly behaved toddler.
"Stop ordering me around!" the woman exclaimed, blowing hair from her eyes. "I'm serious, mister! I've just about had it with you lately!"
"I've had it with your ugly face."
This comment, this rare joke that Vegeta elicited created the response he had been seeking. Her eyebrows rose into her unruly blue hair, her eyes widened and her mouth formed an 'o'.
"I am not ugly Vegeta!" she all but screamed at him, moving forward so that he was within a foot of her loud, irritating voice. "And look who's talking! You in your… in your spandex! Can't you wear anything that fits?!"
Vegeta was taken back and he looked down at his shorts, coloring. "These are training shorts! And if I'm not mistaken you're the one who presented them to me!"
"Well, let me present you with this!"
And she flung out her right hand, every finger down except for one slender one directly in the middle.
He had grabbed her wrist almost instantly, and though his face remained stoic, Bulma could tell that he knew exactly what her affectionate gesture had meant.
"Let go of me, Vegeta!"
His fingers clenched around her svelte, flimsy wrist. They were rough and calloused. Bulma let out an intake of breath when he pulled her closer to him, his dark eyes perforating her own. This was done with a seriousness she had not encountered since her first meeting with the Saiyan prince on Namek.
"Make me."
His tone was ineffable, and though Bulma was to some degree certain he would not harm her, a part of her was still unsure. And it was that part which began to wish she had learned not only self-control, but how to exhibit it around murderous Saiyans.
"Vegeta?" she voiced apprehensively, no longer looking into his eyes which had not left hers, but at his fingers, which were still clasped around her wrist. "You're hurting me."
His fingers slowly uncoiled from her flesh. Bulma pulled away almost instantaneously so that she could look down. There were blue marks beginning to show already. This did not frighten her, merely enhanced her anger.
"Look at what you did to my wrist, you jerk!" she shouted at him, flinging her wrist in his face so that he could see what the mind-blowing atrocity he had committed.
It was so odd and even she realized it. Her fear had dissipated almost the instant he had released her, her certainty that he would not harm her intentionally had been re-established. And though she stood there in the midst of the red lit Gravity Room, engaging in another verbal spar with Vegeta, Bulma was uplifted by this slight display of humanity.
"Honestly, I don't even know what your problem is sometimes!" shouted Bulma, poking him in the arm. "I mean, come on. We're on Earth now. For the last time, act civilized!"
Vegeta narrowed his eyes. "Do you listen to yourself when you go on like that?"
Bulma exhaled deeply and looked him straight in the eye. "Do you?"
He snorted. "Obviously not."
"Well, it would do you a great load of good if you took someone else's opinion into consideration once in awhile." Bulma raised a bright turquoise eyebrow. "Like for example, the fact that I am not ugly. To tell the truth, I'm quite possibly the most attractive woman you've ever come into contact with."
Vegeta snorted once more. "You would be wrong."
Bulma flushed, but was more intrigued by Vegeta's avowal. "Oh, is that so? I don't believe you."
"Whether or not you choose to believe what I say is no matter to me," he said with a derisive drop of his shoulders and nonchalant gaze in her direction.
"I don't believe that either," Bulma said casually, wondering just where this conversation was going to lead the two of them now that they had finished an argument. Would they start another or leave in peace?
"I don't know why you can't admit it Vegeta," she said and she stepped back and began to openly check him out. "It's not as if I haven't told you a million times that you're cute."
Because admitting that he found the diabolical woman standing in front of him to be of some attraction to him could not be in his best interest. So Vegeta said nothing and averted his eyes from her, sincerely wishing that he had never been ejected from his space pod all those weeks ago.
"I'm serious now," the woman said to him, stepping a little closer. "Do you…" She seemed to be choosing her words carefully. "Do you think that I'm pretty, Vegeta?"
Vegeta was taken back by the question. It had been a long while since anyone had asked his opinion and expected an answer. He became frustrated when he felt his cheeks warming and hoped that in the dim cerise light, she could not seem him blushing at her uncomfortable questioning.
He did not bother to look at her so that he could make his assessment. He had, quite against his own will, memorized her face in his mind and thanks to a recent event in the shower, her body as well.
"You are satisfactory to me," he answered stiffly. "And only that," he added once a smile began to present itself on her face.
Her eyes then spilled across his own figure and the Saiyan Prince stiffened, not entirely used to being observed in such an insouciant manner. More surprised he became when one of her hands shot out and grabbed at his left arm, squeezing a sore muscle. He tensed.
Before he could command the recalcitrant servant woman to remove her hands from him, she stepped back and looked at him wearily.
"I don't know why you get so edgy about me touching you. Is it normal for a prince to be this scared of women?"
Vegeta pushed her backwards away from him and she teetered, nearly falling over.
"A woman of your low class would not have been permitted to even look at me. It would have been a luxury. One even you could not have afforded."
"Oh." She lowered her eyelids. "Is that so?"
Bulma really had no idea what was getting into her, only that whatever it was, was clouding her usually credible judgment. She was beginning to view Vegeta in a way that was foreign even for her, an individual who was driven by every emotion known to womankind. What was this emotion she was feeling for him? Was it an emotion at all? Was it just another challenge?
She moved closer to her houseguest and he gave her a puzzled look. Without thinking about it further (because another moment's thought might draw her back into remission), Bulma grabbed Vegeta's wrist in her hands.
They were shaking, nervous hands. Now, this close to him, she could see the outline of his adam's apple, could feel his heart pounding under his skin. It's rhythmic pounding was trance-inducing.
"Get off of me," he ordered, but it was a command that lacked his usual self-assured conviction. Bulma could tell then that she was making him suspicious and agitated, or at the very least, paranoid.
"No."
It was a simple word she had uttered, but it was the very way she had uttered it that created the subsequent strained silence. Bulma could hardly believe how quickly she could change the atmosphere, let alone that she was speaking to Vegeta like this. In a tone so prurient and immodest of her.
Why did he let her hold his arm?
She began to see that there was something else that had been plaguing her thoughts recently. Something to do with a dream she had had only a few days after she had been introduced to the rugged, irritating Saiyan Prince. And how could Bulma not think about it, when Vegeta stood in front of her with gleaming skin, alluring golden-black eyes, and an ill-tempered personality that rivaled her own?
Bulma's pulse quickened, her decision made. It was now or never, wasn't it? Who knew when this opportunity might present itself again? Here in this moment she could indulge on her one dreamt illusion, achieve what her dreams had not.
He wasn't moving and neither was she, so wrapped up in her own fearful deliberations. Bulma heard her heart club at her ribcage, beating as though trying to break through.
You can do it girl!
And as she leaned forward, as the grip on Vegeta's wrist in one hand, and his arm in the other became more stringent, as she hoped that he would at least acknowledge the action she was going to take…. She felt as though she were watching herself from the outside.
There was a loud tapping on the Gravity Room's smallest window.
"Bulma!"
She leapt back from Vegeta as though burnt and turned towards the voice which had viciously ceased her initiative.
It was Yamcha. And from the look on his face, he had been watching her from the outside as well.
A/N: Might there be a plot to this story now? XD- no. On a side note, does anyone know the name of a fanfic about a teenage Trunks who uses a journal to write about his life with Vegeta? I read it a really long time ago and for the life of me I have no clue what it's called. I can remember bits and pieces of it (Trunks' birthday was in November, he and Vegeta didn't get along, Trunks falls for some monsters plot to... w/e). I probably shouldn't be doing this, but if anyone knows the name of this or where I could find it, I would revere you forever.