radio star
v. gratitude
Sakura wiped in vain at her nose for what had to be the tenth time before sighing and pinching the bridge of her nose again. Really, though, who knew a nose could bleed so much?
She looked over at Syaoran, whose eyes were focused on the road, one hand lazily hanging out of his open window and the other on the wheel. They had not spoken a word since they had gotten into the car; Sakura felt supremely uncomfortable.
She cleared her throat, unable to take the strange silence anymore. "Um. Thank you for taking me to the hospital."
"Yeah, no problem."
Sakura drummed her free hand against her lap. "So... How far exactly are we from it?"
Syaoran glanced over at her for a moment, took in her form, and smirked. She made a ridiculous sight—blood all over a once-immaculate white business shirt; large, obstructive camera hanging around her neck; a look of annoyance, bewilderment, and slight anxiety on her face. "A little antsy, are we?"
Sakura exhaled sharply at the smart remark and went back to staring out of her own window. She was just trying to be friendly. Asshole.
Syaoran had to stop himself from laughing out loud. "We're about five minutes away, don't worry."
Sakura heard the amusement in his voice, and unable to turn back to face him for the sake of her pride, opted instead to text her boss that she wouldn't be returning to the office anytime soon.
"I feel so baaaad," Yamazaki wailed. "I'm the one who sent her out there! All by herself, defenseless and alone! And now she has a broken nose!"
Chiharu sat opposite him across his desk, watching him with irritated eyes. "You're so stupid sometimes, Takashi. What did she say to you again?"
Yamazaki wordlessly handed over his cell phone, and Chiharu read the text from Sakura displayed on the screen.
"Got into a bit of an accident at the studio, too many people. I might have a broken nose, maybe? Going to the hospital to check it out. Don't worry!" An amusingly varied array of happy emoticons—no doubt intended to comfort—followed the words.
"Well, thank God, it sounds like she's not too concerned, and she says she might have a broken nose, not that she does for sure," Chiharu sighed, placing the phone back on Yamazaki's desk. "It's probably nothing big. But you," she said sternly to her boyfriend, pointing a finger at his chest, "you have got to be a little more careful with your demands! You should have known the number of people who would be there! What were you thinking? I mean, I told the girl she was good, but you don't send someone out there like that by herself! Have you seen her? She is tiny! She probably got run over by a mob of gossip-hungry photographers!" Chiharu raised a hand, feeling that now might be one of those times she could afford to smack some sense into him.
Yamazaki put his arms over his head and flinched, but he nodded. "I know, I know. I'll be more careful from now on."
Chiharu sighed, lowering her hand. "Good. You should offer to pay her hospital bill."
"Yeah..." Yamazaki frowned. "I really hope she's okay. She seems like the type who'd lie about her well-being so others wouldn't worry."
Chiharu walked around the desk and kissed him on the cheek. "I'll text her to see how she's doing and let you know. I'm sure she'll be fine. I have to finish my piece by three, so I'm gonna get back to work. See you on my next break," she said, walking over to the door. She gave him a smile before she left the room.
Her boyfriend was one of the kindest people she knew, but Chiharu secretly wondered to herself sometimes how someone so airheaded could successfully run an entire publication.
"Two hours?" Sakura's eyes bulged at the wait time the receptionist had just given her.
"It's just an estimation, miss, so it could be shorter, but I'm sorry. Afternoons are awfully busy, and unless it's a dire emergency, there's quite a bit of a wait on days like these," the receptionist said, gesturing to the large number of people sitting around in the emergency room lobby.
"I understand, but..." she glanced around, looking over at Syaoran, who had surreptitiously placed a pair of brown-lensed glasses and a baseball hat over his head before heading into the emergency room and choosing a seat in front of the television. No one had seemed to notice him yet, but Sakura was beginning to understand the magnitude of his celebrity, especially after a day like today. Someone was bound to recognize him soon.
"It's all right," Sakura said, turning back to the receptionist and smiling politely. "I'll just leave. This injury isn't really a big deal, and it wasn't even my idea to come to the hospital, anyway—"
"Miss," the receptionist said, her voice slightly alarmed. "I highly recommend that you stay for treatment, regardless of how long it takes!"
Sakura frowned. "I mean, it's just a bloody nose..."
The receptionist eyed Sakura's bloodstained shirt. "How long have you been bleeding?"
"I guess it's been about an hour now," Sakura said, sniffling a little. But there wasn't even that much blood anymore, she thought.
The receptionist shook her head. "Miss, I can't command you to, but I think it's in your best interest to get treatment."
Sakura bit her lip. She really didn't have time to stick around for two hours. What was the worst that could happen if she left? Well, your nose could get permanently disfigured, she thought to herself out of nowhere, and with that, she sighed in resignation. "Right. Could I see those forms, please?"
After filling out the hospital forms and receiving a cold pack, a box of tissues, and a stern warning from the receptionist to stay sitting up while she waited to be called, Sakura trudged over and sat down dejectedly beside Syaoran. "The wait time is pretty long," she muttered to him, "so you can go if you would like. I can take a bus home or call my friend Tomoyo to pick me up, because she'll probably be out of work by the time I'm done here. I'm sure your schedule is busy."
"How long?"
"About two hours."
Syaoran glanced over at her for a moment, his lips pursed in thought, before finally shrugging. "I'll stay."
Sakura looked at Syaoran in surprise. "You don't have things to do?"
"I do, but how shitty of me would it be if I just let you stay here by yourself? Besides, we've already wasted an hour of the time I would have spent recording, and now I'm just not in the mood anymore. If I'm doing a good deed, my agent will probably let it slide."
Sakura balked at his careless attitude, but she couldn't complain. It would have been lonely, she thought, to wait at the hospital by herself. "Well... Okay. Thank you."
Syaoran nodded.
They waited for about an hour, both of them watching the television idly. Or, rather, Syaoran watched the television, while Sakura pretended to watch and then looked over every so often at Syaoran, thinking over and over how bizarre her life had become in the last few days. She was in a hospital, waiting to get treated for a bloody nose, sitting beside Japan's most famous celebrity as if it were nothing. He had wiped the blood off of her face not too long ago. She wanted to laugh hysterically at the idea of it.
"So, this little injury of yours," Syaoran said suddenly, bringing her out of her thoughts, "it happened because you're a paparazzo, right?"
"Isn't that a little obvious?"
"Well, I'm just trying to gather my thoughts here. I guess the real question is, why the hell are you a paparazzo? You're really not fit for it, you know." There was no hostility in Syaoran's voice as he said this, but it still made Sakura uncomfortable.
Regardless, she felt compelled to answer. "I mean, this wasn't the path I intended to wander down..."
Syaoran laughed. "Isn't that a little dramatic? You're a paparazzo, not a prostitute."
"Don't be so vulgar," Sakura retorted, but a blush spread over her cheeks.
"Sorry, sorry," Syaoran said with a chuckle. "Continue."
"Anyway," she went on, "I didn't want this job. I worked really hard in college to become a good journalist, and I graduated with high marks and everything! After graduation, I decided to take a couple of years off to build a good résumé for graduate school, but I had a hard time finding a job that could boost my credentials and pay enough for me to sustain myself. I didn't have a lot of connections, so getting a job with an esteemed magazine wasn't easy. I had an interview at one point with a very good publication, but I choked during the interview and didn't make it through. And I couldn't just wait around for a job to fall into my lap, either, so then, I was working for awhile as a waitress—"
"Why didn't you just ask your parents for help? With the money, I mean," Syaoran interrupted, frowning.
Sakura smiled a little at the concern on his face. In his own way, it seemed he was very naïve. "My father has enough burdens without having to worry about my rent and my expenses. I wanted to be independent."
Syaoran grunted in response. That was somewhat admirable, he thought in surprise.
"In any case, my best friend was concerned about me, I guess, because I was really struggling, and she sort of tricked me into going into this interview with Glimmer—that's the place where I work—because she made it sound like it was a real magazine, not a tabloid."
"Wait, wait—she told you this was a publication called 'Glimmer,' and you thought it was going to be a hard-hitting magazine?" Syaoran snorted.
"I mean, I didn't expect it to be anything great," Sakura said defensively, "but I wasn't familiar with celebrity gossip in any aspect until a few weeks ago, so give me a break, okay? I didn't even know who you were till I was assigned to get pictures of you."
Syaoran's eyebrows rose, and his jaw dropped a little. "You hadn't heard of me...at all?" he said, his voice a little weak.
Sakura shook her head. "I mean, I'm sure I'd seen your face around on billboards and ads and such before, but I just never took notice of that kind of stuff."
Syaoran seemed to deflate a little in his chair.
"Are you all right?" Sakura asked. He looked a little funny all of a sudden.
Syaoran nodded, unwilling to admit that his ego had been wounded quite a bit. He had never once met someone who hadn't heard of him before. That was definitely a first. "Go on with the story. Sorry I keep interrupting."
Sakura stared at him some more, perplexed at his odd behavior, but she shrugged and continued after a moment. "Anyway, I went in for the interview and I tried to decline when I realized it was a celebrity gossip rag, but my boss is the nicest guy, and he practically begged me to stay on for just a year. He said he had connections—I know it sounds a little dubious," Sakura said at Syaoran's responsive snort, "but whether or not it's true, the pay is a lot better and I really do need to start work with some kind of publication," Sakura finished with a tired sigh, staring idly out at the space before her. "Even if it's a tabloid."
Syaoran watched her intently, trying to process the sudden turnover in his opinions on this strange girl. He still didn't necessarily agree with her decision to work for a gossip magazine, but he understood her motives much better now. And her strength of character was more prominent to him than it had been before. He never thought he'd see the day when a paparazzo had been humanized to him, but could he even really look at her as a paparazzo? Now, she just seemed like an odd stranger with a sad story who just happened to want his picture.
Impulsively, he reached out and ruffled her hair. She snapped out of her daze and looked over at him, a surprised look crossing her face. He held her gaze for a moment, unsure of what was going through his mind at that moment...
Quit it. She's a paparazzo. There's not a lot more to know.
And with that, Syaoran quickly uttered the first sarcastic comment he could think of. "And all of this ultimately led you to a severely injured nose, huh? You're a smart one, you are."
"Has anyone told you that those glasses went out of style about a decade ago? For a celebrity, you sure are lame," Sakura shot back, sticking her tongue out at him.
He opened his mouth to respond when the receptionist called Sakura's name, indicating that it was her turn to see the doctor. They both stood up, wandering down the lobby and through the open doors.
Figuring the doctor wouldn't notice—or perhaps, even if he did notice, he wouldn't care—that a celebrity was in his presence, Syaoran took off the glasses and shoved them in his pocket.
Well, maybe there's a bit more to know than I'd like to admit.
Sakura trailed behind Syaoran towards the exit of the hospital, shuffling her feet.
Syaoran paused and glanced behind him, causing Sakura to bump into his back with a muffled oof. "You're gonna fall over if you don't walk right, and then we'll have to go and see a doctor again."
"Sorry, I'm just so groggy," Sakura said, stifling a yawn.
Several hours had passed during Sakura's time in the emergency room, where it had been determined that the cut in her nose was so deep that it required cauterization and, consequently, the administration of general anesthesia. Although she was a bit more alert than when she'd first been roused, her mind was still bleary with fatigue, and it was all she could do not to lie down on the ground and pass out.
"We were in there for an awfully long time..." Sakura murmured, looking at the setting sun for a moment before getting in Syaoran's car. "Thank you for staying with me."
"It's nothing. Glad your nose is going to be okay," he said, tapping his own.
As the engine roared to life and they began to pull out of the parking lot, Sakura gave her address to Syaoran and then leaned her head back against the headrest and tried desperately to keep her eyes open. How embarrassing would it be if she fell asleep in Syaoran Li's car? She'd already humiliated herself enough in front of him today. She was tempted to try to start a conversation with him to keep herself awake, but in her clouded state of mind, it was difficult to think of anything to say.
"Do you think you'll get in trouble for missing work?" Syaoran said then, looking over at her momentarily.
Sakura tried to swallow her surprise; she'd never have expected Syaoran, who was, in fact, somewhat self-absorbed, to possess enough consideration to ask such a question. "No, I texted my boss earlier to say that I'd probably be in the hospital most of the afternoon. He's really nice, so he understood."
"Well, that's good." He paused before speaking again. "Er... So, before we left, I asked the receptionist to mail me your hospital bill. I'll pay for it."
Sakura's eyes widened as she looked over at Syaoran. "What? Why? It'll be so expensive!"
Syaoran merely raised an eyebrow at that, and Sakura blushed as she suddenly remembered that she was talking to a celebrity who easily made much more money than she could ever dream of.
"Cost isn't really an issue to me," Syaoran said. He hesitated before speaking again. "But I've never had someone's injury on my hands before. I want to pay so you won't sue me."
Sakura balked at that. The nerve of this guy! "Hey, I am not that kind of person—"
"Calm down, your blood pressure's going to rise and then you're just going to bleed all over my car again," Syaoran said exasperatedly. "Anyway, I figure you're not that kind of person, but I don't really know you, and I hope you'll understand that the business has taught me not to trust your kind. It's hardly an offer you can turn down, and you know it."
Sakura glared at him, feeling spite at his matter-of-factness, but he was right. She was in no position to turn down such a generous offer, regardless of how offensive the motivation behind it was. "Fine. Thank you... But you were never responsible in the first place, you know."
He shrugged. "You got injured while trying to do your job, which involves me." He looked over at her for a moment. "And I still think you could be doing better things with your life while you're trying to get your dream job, but you didn't necessarily ask for it. I can't really hold something like that against you."
Sakura felt her glare soften. She wasn't so sure what to make of this man, but in spite some of his harsher words, he'd done her many favors today, and he hadn't had to. "Thanks," she said again, her voice quiet. "I owe you."
"No problem."
"Is this the right place?" Syaoran asked as he pulled into the dimly lit parking lot of a meager-looking apartment complex.
When he got no response, he looked over at the passenger seat, where Sakura had fallen fast asleep, her head lolling to the side. He pursed his lips, wondering what to do; he hated to try and wake her, as she'd seemed groggy to the point of exhaustion, but the only other option would be to carry her up to her apartment, which... Well, that's way beyond my personal boundaries.
"Hey," he said, nudging at her shoulder with one finger, "we're here."
Still no response.
Sighing, he leaned and pushed her with his whole hand, shaking her shoulder. "Sakura."
She stirred, opening her eyes slowly and glancing around. "Oh, we're home."
Syaoran found a smile tugging at his lips at her chemically-induced cluelessness. "Yeah. Before you go, give me your number so I can text you mine."
Too exhausted to fully express her surprise, Sakura merely stared at him, curiosity written all over her face.
"So I can make sure you're all right," Syaoran clarified. "I want you to call me tomorrow and let me know how you are."
Sakura smiled at him. "That's awfully kind of you."
Syaoran didn't know what to say to that. "Well... Yeah. It's the least I can do," he muttered as he watched Sakura dial her number into his phone.
"Thanks for the ride. And for everything else. I'll see you around," Sakura said sleepily, handing him back his phone.
"Will you?" Syaoran said, raising a brow. He wasn't certain they ever would.
"Maybe never at this capacity again. But I need pictures of you to put food on the table, remember?" Sakura cracked a half-smile, and she waved goodbye before shutting the door.
Syaoran watched as she walked up to her apartment and let herself in, and he sat in his car for a few moments more. Images of her eyes swam in his mind again. He'd had to try all day not to stare at them and think about their uncanny resemblance to Mizuki's.
Sighing, he shifted gears and drove off towards his own apartment, swallowing the strange, uncomfortable feeling forming inside of him.
Bizarre, bizarre, bizarre.
Sakura's thoughts swam as she trudged her way through her apartment, flinging her belongings on the ground and changing into a large pajama shirt. Patting her dog Kero hello as he followed behind her, she collapsed into her bed, eyes closing as she began to drift off almost immediately. All of her hazy thoughts revolved around how positively strange this whole day had been.
Almost as if on cue, Sakura heard her phone notify her that she'd received a text message. Opening the phone, she felt a jolt of excitement that roused her awake for a brief moment. A text from an unknown number read:
"It's Syaoran. Glad you got in okay. Call me tomorrow, let me know you're well."
Groaning, Sakura closed her phone and let sleep overtake her. All of this, she decided in the back of her mind, would feel like a dream tomorrow.
Stunning blue eyes stared into hers as she wondered incoherently to herself what was going to come next. She'd been waiting so long for this moment that it was difficult to realize that it was finally happening.
"I love you," she managed to say. "Still."
The eyes softened. "I love you, too," he said back. He held her a little closer to him.
She was afraid to kiss him, not wanting to cross the line. That part of their relationship was over, wasn't it?
He didn't seem to think so. With excruciatingly slow movements, he leaned in toward her as he pulled her closer, and his lips met hers. She felt an explosion inside of her chest. This was it, she thought as his lips moved from her own to her neck. This was what she had been waiting for. What else could it be?
Her breathing shallow, she pulled away. "I can't—I can't."
He smiled. "Okay."
She leaned her head against his chest, and she felt tears forming in her eyes. "You know what I want... So now, the ball's in your court."
Gathering her courage, she forced herself to look into his eyes again, terrified of what he'd say.
The arms that were supporting her disappeared, she felt herself falling backwards into space, and just like that, he was gone.
Sakura awoke and looked around her, disoriented for a moment before realizing she'd been dreaming. Sitting up, she drew in a shaky breath and held a hand to her eyes, biting her lip as she felt hot tears roll down her face. It had been so long since she'd had a dream like this... Why now?
That's it for now! Not to worry, though—the next chapter should be up soon, because I have so much more to write. So, Syaoran and Sakura have established a basis for getting to know each other better now. I wanted to include more about Sakura's history here as I'd promised, but it was too much to put in this chapter, I think. The end dream, though, should clue you in a little bit—that definitely has to do a lot with her past! Next chapter, we'll see them forming a tentative friendship, more about Sakura's background, and perhaps the arrival of someone new—I'm not quite sure yet. Anyway, I hope this chapter was satisfying! Thank you for reading, see you soon! Please leave a review!
Love,
boreum dal
