radio star

xvii. always the truth

"Hello?"

"Meiling, you sound so unexpectedly pleasant when you answer the phone."

"Bite me."

"I'd rather not."

Meiling smirked as she pressed her phone to her ear with one shoulder while continuing to type away at her computer. She squinted at the screen as if it would make what she were writing make more sense. "What do you want, Eriol? It's a busy morning, you know. These press releases are such a pain in the ass sometimes."

"Ah, I'm sorry to interrupt, then. But I have a favor to ask."

"What's that?"

"You know the Bunka Gakuen Museum Ball is coming up in two weeks."

Meiling sighed. "Don't remind me. It's throwing all of my scheduling off track. But anyway, yeah, why do you mention it?"

There was a pause. "I don't have a date."

Meiling's eyebrows rose, and then she began to laugh.

"Don't laugh at me," Eriol grumbled from the other end of the line.

"Sorry, sorry," Meiling said, regaining her composure. "I just wasn't expecting this. Isn't your phone full of clingy women who would die to go with you to this thing?"

Eriol let out a sigh. "All of the press will be there, and I'm not looking for anyone to make anything of it. If I take you, there's no personal pressure and there's also no media speculation."

"Ouch. And here I was, thinking you wanted to take me so you'd have a beautiful, witty woman on your arm on the red carpet for once."

"That, too," Eriol replied, and Meiling could hear the smirk in his voice.

"I'm sold, then! Forward me the information."

"Will do. Let me know when you're free. I'll send a driver over to take you to Chanel for a fitting."

Meiling squealed. "You're spoiling me. I'm used to going to these things in my big PR handler power suits, you know."

Eriol chuckled. "It's protocol. You'll need a nice dress."

"Well, you can count on me—I'll find something really classy," Meiling said with a smile. "Thanks, Eriol."

"No, thank you, Meiling. I owe you one."

"Don't worry about it! It'll be fun. I'll be the best date you ever had."

Eriol scoffed, but Meiling could still hear the smile in his voice. "I'm sure."

"Bye, Eriol." Meiling put the phone down as the call ended before turning back to her screen. She heard her inbox alert her to a new email, and she clicked over to see that it had a red exclamation mark next to the subject, indicating urgency. She sighed. She'd been getting a lot of those these days, and they were rarely good.

What now...?

Her eyes narrowed as her eyes scanned the contents of the email. Indeed, this was definitely not good.

Sakura tried to find words to express her surprise and confusion—or perhaps even just a "hey" to start with—but she could not seem to force any kind of noise out of her throat. Instead, she stared at him with wide eyes, feeling her cheeks heat up and panic churning through her stomach as she rapidly imagined various horrifying scenarios that could have occurred while she had been intoxicated.

Syaoran had slept over at her apartment. There was no other explanation as to how he was here now. But how had he gotten here?

Syaoran set the glasses he held down on Sakura's desk before walking up to her. "You're awake, then," he said calmly, which only seemed to add to Sakura's distress.

Eyes still wide, Sakura felt herself nod slowly. "U-um," she finally said, but she couldn't manage to push any more noises, let alone words, out of her mouth.

Syaoran scratched his head. "I, ah—I guess you don't remember... You wanted me to stay over last night."

Sakura's jaw dropped slightly, and she suddenly felt her heart stop in her chest. "I—I asked you to stay?" she squeaked.

"Yeah."

"Um... In my living room?" she asked in that same small voice, hoping she hadn't gone so far as to ask him to sleep in her own bed with her.

"Well, you were pretty gone, and you asked me to sleep in your room with you..."

Sakura's eyes widened once more, and she listened with growing mortification as Syaoran quickly continued after having realized the possible misconceptions that could arise from his previous words. "I mean, nothing happened—we just slept. I think you just didn't want to be by yourself—"

"Oh, my God." Sakura slapped her hands over her eyes as she collapsed backwards into her chair. As she'd feared, embarrassment came over her in waves, sending an unpleasant, sour feeling all through her body. "Syaoran, I'm so sorry," she groaned.

"It's okay, really—"

"No, it's not okay," Sakura said, her voice muffled by her hands. "That was so ridiculous of me, so totally out of line—what I was thinking, I couldn't even tell you—"

"Sakura, don't—"

"God, I turn into such an idiot when I'm drunk, I always get so stupid and it was just so inappropriate—"

"Sakura. Stop it." Sakura felt Syaoran pull her hands away from her face and guide them back down into her lap.

He had crouched down so that he was eye level with her, and as suddenly as Sakura's heart had stopped, it started back up again at twice its normal pace. His face was very close to hers, but more than the proximity, his expression threw her the most. He was definitely amused, as she saw that the corners of his lips were tilted up towards his lower lids, and he appeared to be trying not to laugh. But there was also an ambiguous, warm emotion in his eyes, something that made them softer than usual—and she was certain it wasn't just the morning light. It was something else—fondness, perhaps? Maybe even tenderness, she thought, but she quickly dispelled the idea. Whatever it was, it made her nervous.

"It's okay," he said. "I didn't mind. I didn't want to leave you alone last night, all things considered."

Sakura stared back at him, unable to tear her eyes away, before she managed to find her voice. "Well, um...thanks," she mumbled. "I'm just really embarrassed... I'm really sorry."

"But why? Nothing happened. I don't think any differently of you," he stated, although that last part wasn't entirely true. Even though he'd only managed four hours of sleep, he'd awoken in a perplexed daze, because sleeping with her had felt so inexplicably, perfectly comfortable—as though he'd done it plenty of times before.

"You promise?"

"I promise."

"Okay." She paused, and then sheepishly added, "I didn't, like... drool on you or anything, did I?"

Syaoran stared at her in surprise for a moment before throwing his head back and laughing. "No, not at all."

"Well, thank you for, um... staying when I asked you to," Sakura mumbled. "I don't know what I would have done without you."

"You'd probably have bled out on the bathroom floor," Syaoran responded, still chuckling. "You really are clumsy."

Sakura looked down at her bandaged hand and managed a smile. "I'm more graceful than you think, you know! You've just caught me at bad times."

Syaoran snorted. "Right."

"It's true!" Sakura insisted. "I used to do speed skating in middle school, you know. That requires some balance."

"Okay, okay," Syaoran chuckled. "You're not a klutz. I just have yet to see proof of that."

"Fair enough," Sakura said. "So, how exactly did this happen, anyway?" she asked, holding up her injured hand.

"I didn't see it, but I think you slipped on your bathroom floor and tried to grab at the counter. You knocked a glass off of it in the process, and I think you tried to pick the glass up by yourself."

Sakura cringed, feeling fresh pinpricks of mortification. It was predictable enough that she had been a complete fool last night, but she hated that Syaoran had been around to watch. "Was it bad?"

"Well, of course I'd have preferred if you hadn't gotten hurt at all," Syaoran responded. "But no, you don't need to go to the hospital or anything. We should probably change that bandage this morning, though. It was a deep cut, and you don't want an infection." He stood up and walked over to the desk, grabbing the cup of water and handing it to her and sipping on the mug of coffee. "I made coffee, by the way. I hope you don't mind."

"Oh," Sakura said in surprise, taking the glass from his hands. "I don't mind. Thank you."

"Drink," he ordered. "There's no way you're not hungover right now."

Sakura stuck her tongue out at him before taking a sip of water. She glanced down at her dress, which was dotted here and there with drops of blood from the night before. She cringed, and she realized that she must have looked like a disheveled mess. If she had the energy to muster more embarrassment, she would have blushed again, but she sighed exasperatedly to herself. Syaoran had already seen the worst of her last night, anyway, she thought.

"I think I'd better change and get ready for the day," Sakura said, and to her surprise, she felt a sense of dread in the pit of her stomach. She thought she would be relieved to let him leave, but instead, she could only foresee how empty she would feel after he had gone. "But, um... Before you go, I could make breakfast? It's the least I could do," she found herself adding hastily.

Syaoran grinned. "Breakfast would be great."

After shutting the door of her restroom, Sakura leaned against it and sighed to herself. She was in so deep, she realized, much deeper than she could have ever imagined. Removing herself from this situation the way she needed to do—she still had yet to tell him she'd quit her job, she remembered—was going to be much more difficult than she'd anticipated, and not just because of her feelings for him.

She leaned over the sink to wash her face, and as she splashed the water over her skin, she felt her head spin a little. Syaoran had picked her up, had stayed to take care of her, had stayed the night because she asked him to do so. She wondered what sleeping with him had been like—whether he had held her, or if their arms had just grazed each other's, or if they'd slept completely on the opposite edges of the bed. And she marveled when she realized that even now, even in the morning after the haze was gone and embarrassment pervaded her thoughts and memories of last night, he was being impossibly kind. As much as she could have kicked herself for being so stupidly drunk last night—and not remembering much of it at that—she felt giddy and somewhat grateful that it had brought Syaoran here.

She looked again at her reflection as she patted her face dry. She knew that she would have to tell him today that she had quit her job. She hated the idea of not seeing him anymore, so much that it made her stomach churn.

And as an afterthought, she wished dearly that she could remember what happened last night.

Syaoran made his way towards the living room, looking around finding himself amused at just how many photographs Sakura had lying around her apartment, again with largely the same people. He crouched to get a better look at one that sat on an end table in the living room of Sakura as a small child, held by her mother at a theme park while her father held hands with a young boy whom Syaoran assumed to be her brother. He noted with amusement that Sakura looked the same, cheerful and bright-eyed, wide emerald eyes crinkled as she smiled a toothless smile at the camera while she held onto a blue balloon.

He stood when he heard footsteps down the hall, and he watched as Sakura came in dressed in simple cutoff shorts and a long-sleeved t-shirt, her hair slightly wet from the quick shower she'd taken and her face devoid of any makeup.

His eyebrows rose. It was the most dressed-down he'd ever seen her, and yet, he thought she looked—

"What?" Sakura said, tilting her head to the side.

"Ah," he said in slight surprise. "You look—normal."

Sakura giggled. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Syaoran shook his head. "Sorry," he said. "I mean, aside from last night and this morning, I don't think I've ever seen you out of work clothes."

Sakura realized in surprise that this was true, and she looked down over herself. "Is that...okay?"

"Yeah," Syaoran said quickly. "Yeah, it's okay. I was just surprised—I'd never—" He paused and smiled to himself. "You look nice."

"Oh, uh—well, thank you," Sakura murmured, feeling a blush creep up her neck.

All was quiet between them for a moment, before Syaoran said hurriedly, "Let's redo the bandages on your hand before you start cooking."

They sat back in their spots from the night before, Syaoran on the coffee table, where they had left the first aid kit open, and Sakura on the sofa.

As he took her hand and carefully unwrapped the gauze, Sakura looked up at him fleetingly through her lashes. Suddenly, she was nervous.

"So, are you okay?" Syaoran asked. He finished unwrapping the gauze and tossed it into a waste bin that he'd brought over and set down beside the table the night before.

"What do you mean?"

Syaoran frowned as he examined the cut, which didn't look infected, but appeared to be painfully deep. "Do you remember what happened last night? Some guy was following you around. He tried to grab you when I picked you guys up. I could've killed him."

"Oh," Sakura said, remembering once more. "Yeah, I'm fine—I remember. He was creepy, but he didn't hurt me. I'm relieved you didn't get out of the car... Can you imagine how much trouble you'd be in right now if someone had seen you?"

Syaoran rolled his eyes. "I can't believe you had time to think about something like that when you were being harassed." Still, he felt the corners of his lips tilt up into a smile. "Thanks, though."

Sakura smiled back hesitantly, and then she let out a sigh, knowing she'd have to tell him now. It had been hammering away at her all morning, and prolonging the wait did not seem to help as much as she had hoped. "Um... So..."

Syaoran glanced up at her, pausing. He frowned at her expression, the way her eyes darted toward the ground before he could meet them and the way the corners of her mouth turned down as she chewed on the right side of her lower lip.

"Everything okay? I'm not hurting you, am I?" he asked.

"No, not at all," Sakura responded, shaking her head. "I, um... I just have something to tell you."

Syaoran sat back for a moment, although he did not let go of her hand. She looked more worried than he had seen her in a long while, and he realized suddenly that seeing her so distraught unsettled him as well. "What is it?" he asked softly.

Sakura forced herself to keep her eyes trained on Syaoran. "So, I—I quit my job yesterday... And I know that probably means you won't have time to see me anymore," she said quickly upon seeing that Syaoran had frowned and then open his mouth to speak. "But I totally understand, and I've been so grateful for everything you've done for me, Syaoran—and so happy that we got to be friends—so if this is the last time we get to see each other—"

"Sakura, wait a second—what are you talking about?" Syaoran's frown had grown deeper, one eyebrow raised in exasperation. "What do you mean, 'if this is the last time we see each other'? Don't be dramatic, of course it's not."

"H-huh?"

He smirked. "I'm not a person who likes to waste my time. And if we just cut it off here, the last few months of meeting you would have been a pretty massive waste of my time, don't you think?"

Sakura felt nervous excitement brewing in the pit of her stomach, but she wasn't sure if she was hearing him right. "What—"

"Sakura, we're friends," he said. The playful chiding in his voice was gone, replaced by a gentle sincerity that engulfed her as he spoke. "We're good friends. I don't need you to have a camera on you. I just..." he paused, hesitating for a moment, and then he looked her square in the eyes. "I want you around. I want to keep seeing you... If that's all right with you."

"Oh," she breathed, and she felt whatever had been building in her stomach explode into little streams of happiness all throughout her body as a weight simultaneously seemed to lift off of her shoulders. "Y-yes, that's okay," she managed, breathless.

Syaoran nodded with a smile. "Good. So, what made you quit? Why all of a sudden?"

"Huh?" she asked again, feeling whiplash from the sudden turnaround in topic as she still reeled from the sweetness of his previous words.

"Why'd you quit?" he repeated, going back to work on her hand.

"Oh, right. Ah, well, I don't know," Sakura said uncomfortably, raising her free hand to touch her neck as she looked off to the side. "Just—ethically, I never quite agreed with it... And I just need to get serious about writing and all..." she trailed off.

Although these reasons were real, Sakura felt that she was lying to him. The first and foremost reason she had decided to quit was, in fact, because she had fallen much harder for him than she had ever anticipated, and she was desperately trying to prevent herself from getting any deeper in and hurting herself. But how would she even begin to tell him something like that?

Syaoran stared at her quizzically for a moment, but much to her relief, he seemed to accept her reasoning without much question and nodded. "That means you can go write the kinds of things you've always wanted to write now, right?"

"Well, it's not that easy—I need connections to start that far ahead, so I'll have to lay a lot of groundwork and build up. I'll probably write freelance while I get a desk job, something like that."

Syaoran thought about how easy it would be to get Eriol to recommend her for a job at a magazine of her choice, and he glanced down at his phone momentarily.

"But I think I can do it," Sakura said quickly upon his silence. "I'm excited to try."

He looked back up at her, surprised out of his thoughts. Of course. Perhaps, he thought, she wouldn't need him to pull any strings. For although he wanted to help, he also understood that this was Sakura, who had so determinedly shouldered her responsiblities on her own and gotten this far out of her own accord. It wouldn't be fair to take that away from her. He nodded. "I have no doubt that you'll be successful, then."

Sakura's lips curved up into a soft smile, and she murmured a "thank you" as she looked back down at her hand, which Syaoran was now wrapping in a fresh layer of gauze.

She shut her eyes as the warmth of the moment settled in on her, opening them only when Syaoran let go of her hand, gently placing it back on her lap.

"All done here," he murmured. His eyes met hers, and they were glowing with such tenderness that it simultaneously startled and soothed Sakura. "How about breakfast?"

Syaoran let one arm hang out of his open car window as he steered with his other hand. He had left Sakura's apartment only moments ago, and although he did not regret anything from the morning or the previous evening, he realized that their relationship had fundamentally changed in a matter of twelve hours.

Of course, there was the matter of having slept over on purpose, something that Syaoran had never expected himself to do. But even more than that, they had officially phased out the business aspect of their friendship. Syaoran had never particularly cared for it, and it had been rapidly diminishing anyway, but it had been a good ruse—it had allowed him to call the relationship one thing even with the awareness that it was turning into something entirely different. Now that that was gone, it was time to face a dangerous truth. He was so comfortable with Sakura that it was beginning to get uncomfortable; not that he needed any more proof, but his stay at her apartment had proven that ten times over.

"So, those people in that picture of you at the amusement park... Are they your family?"

Sakura looked up from her bowl of rice in momentary surprise before nodding. "Uh huh. My mother and father and my brother, Touya."

"Where are they now?" Syaoran asked, realizing that he had never really heard much about her family.

"Well, Touya works for the Japanese Embassy in America, and my father is a professor in Tomoeda, my hometown. My mother passed away when I was five... So that would have been about a year after that photograph was taken."

"Oh," Syaoran said quickly. "I'm sorry to hear that."

"Thank you, but it's okay. It was a long time ago. We loved her very much, but we've had a lot of time to come to peace with it. I do miss her, though," Sakura added, although her tone remained cheery.

Syaoran took a sip of his second cup of coffee and nodded. "I get it. My father passed away when I was young, too."

"I'm sorry, too."

Syaoran shook his head. "Same as you. It happened so long ago that I hardly remember what it was like having him around."

"If you don't mind my asking, did your mother ever remarry?" Sakura asked, tilting her head to the side.

"Nah. She didn't want to, and between my older sisters and me and managing the company, I don't think she really had time for another husband, anyway."

"You have sisters?"

Syaoran nodded. "Four of them."

"I've never heard you talk about them," Sakura said, tilting her head.

He smirked. "You'd know why if you met them. They're like unicorns on speed."

Sakura giggled, and Syaoran grinned as he spooned soup into his mouth. He looked up to see her staring at him, head tilted to the side, lips pursed, and wide green eyes curious.

"What?" he asked.

"There really is a lot we don't know about each other, huh?"

Syaoran frowned at that. "I guess you're right. I never thought about it until now, really."

"Well, neither did I," Sakura said, and she looked up at the ceiling in thought. "It's just strange... I never thought about it that way because I feel like I know you so well, for some reason. And then you tell me that you have four sisters and I realize I don't know much about your life at all."

"Huh," he murmured. He realized the truth of her words because he felt the same way. But somehow, even without knowing that Sakura's mother had passed away long ago or that she had an older brother who worked in the United States or that her favorite color was pink, Syaoran felt that he could have predicted how she'd react in most given situations or what her favorite book in the whole world might be or what kind of songs she sang in the shower with stunning accuracy. He felt that perhaps she could say the same. "Maybe we just know the most important parts of each other's lives already."

Sakura lit up and nodded vigorously. "Yeah! What a nice way to think of it." She smiled down at her bowl. "Still, I think now's as good a time as ever."

"To do what, exactly?" Syaoran was physically biting back a smile of his own at Sakura's sudden brightness. He felt like he'd been smiling all morning like a buffoon, and he hoped Sakura had not noticed.

"Syaoran Li, I'm going to learn everything I can about you from here on out," Sakura announced, pounding her fist dramatically on the table. She paused, and then giggled. "That sounded a little creepy, but you know what I mean. Non-stalker style, with your permission and all."

Syaoran gave up and broke into a full grin. "Non-stalker style sounds perfect."

So they had agreed to carry on like normal friends would, contacting each other when they had time and meeting up when their schedules permitted.

He would accept this, he thought. What else could he do? Uncomfortable as he was with the idea of falling deeper for Sakura in such a precarious time in his life, he understood from simple life experience that these were feelings, and feelings were uncontrollable. Actions, on the other hand, were much more controllable... He'd just have to be careful.

But isn't that what I've been trying to do? And look where that's gotten me, he thought with a snort.

He did find himself curious as to the real reason Sakura had quit her job. She had always been a terrible liar, and her discomfort and evasiveness had given her away immediately. He thought it out of his rights to press her about the matter, however, and thought that she might come around and tell him the truth with time.

Syaoran's phone went off, bringing him out of his thoughts, and he glanced down at the screen to see that Meiling was calling him.

"Hello?"

"Syaoran, where were you last night?"

Syaoran raised his eyebrows. "Last night? Ah... Well, I was at home..." He considered the option of leaving it at that and lying to Meiling, but he decided against it. After all, she knew the truth now, so there was no point in keeping up a charade. "I left, though, to go to Sakura's."

Surprisingly, Meiling seemed unaffected by the last piece of news. "Anywhere in between?"

"Huh? I did run by Purple Stripe to pick her and her friend up—some creep was stalking them all night."

Meiling let out a sigh. "So it was you."

"What?"

"I know it's your morning off, and I hate to interrupt it two days in a row, but do you think you could run by my office?"

"Right now?" Syaoran asked, surprised.

"Yeah, if you can."

"You're being weirdly nice. It's making me suspicious."

Meiling laughed, although it sounded tense. "Just get over here."

"Okay, I'll be there in ten."

With a sigh, Syaoran made a U-turn at the next light and headed down the familiar route to Meiling's office.

Tomoyo frowned at her reflection in the mirror as an assistant busily hemmed up the bottom of her floor-length, cream-colored lace gown. She turned her hips slightly to get a better look at the seam, zipped up to the waist, which was accentuated by a gold satin ribbon tied together in a bow.

"Haruna, do you think this zipper is a little...conspicuous?" she asked her assistant, who glanced up at the mirror and peered at the zipper carefully.

"I didn't notice it until you said something, but you might be right—maybe we should tighten the fabric around that area and use a smaller zipper," Haruna said, her speech muffled by the pins in her mouth.

"Yeah, that's what I was thinking." Tomoyo sighed. "Good thing we've got a little time before this ball, huh? I feel like every time I try this dress on, I find something else wrong with it."

One of the many perks of Tomoyo's new job was her automatic access to swanky fashion events, the crown jewel of which was the Bunka Gakuen Costume Museum Ball, a prestigious annual event held by the museum each year to celebrate the opening of a new exhibit. Fashion designers and celebrities alike attended the ball, and to Tomoyo's delight, they wore only the best couture to the event.

Haruna laughed. "That's how it goes when you're used to designing your own. Although this dress is a lovely selection. I think you'll make a big impression at the gala."

Tomoyo smiled, easing down the nervous butterflies in her stomach. It was far too early to be getting nervous, she thought. "I hope so!"

"The hem is done," Haruna said. "You can take off the dress for now."

"Thanks, Haruna!" Tomoyo stepped down from the platform that stood before the three-way mirror in her dressing room and heard her phone go off. She quickly ran over to the vanity to grab it.

"Sakura!"

"Hi, Tomoyo. Are you busy?"

"Nope, just trying on my gown for the Bunka Gakuen Ball!" Tomoyo sang, shrugging on her blouse as she held the phone to her ear with her shoulder.

"Oh, right! That's coming up soon, isn't it?"

"Yep! I can't believe I have tickets to this—I've spent my whole life dreaming of going!"

"Well, I can't think of anyone who would deserve it or enjoy it more than you!"

"Thanks, Sakura. You know, I looked at the guest list, and your favorite Japanese rock star is going to be there," Tomoyo said with a grin.

"Ah, well, that doesn't surprise me," Sakura laughed. "Say, do you have some time to meet up? Some stuff happened, and—"

"Nothing bad, right?" Tomoyo frowned.

"No... At least, I don't think so," Sakura said.

Tomoyo remembered only then that Syaoran had dropped Sakura off the night before, and her eyes went wide. "Oh, my God! Does this have to do with Syaoran? I can't believe I forgot he dropped you off last night! I've been so busy with this ball stuff, I didn't even think about it when I woke up this morning—"

"It's okay, Tomoyo," Sakura said with a laugh. "But yeah, it has to do with him. If you're free, do you want to grab some coffee? I could use a cup myself."

"Yes! Stay put. I'm coming to pick you up!"

"Wow. You really can't get away with anything these days, huh?" Syaoran said wryly, leaning over Meiling's chair to get a better look at the picture on her computer screen.

"Well, you did. Kind of," Meiling supplied, leaning back a little into her seat.

The photo in question was a grainy one taken with someone's phone on the street outside of Purple Stripe, where Syaoran's car had been idling for less than a minute before Sakura and Tomoyo had piled inside. Taken from the driver's side of the vehicle, the photo showed Syaoran's grainy silhouette reaching for his seatbelt, and although it resembled him—because it was him—it was just fuzzy enough to be questionable and not particularly convincing. It had been posted to a message board with the question of whether the man in the car was Syaoran Li along with an account of how two girls had run out of Purple Stripe and gotten into the car before it sped away. Because the event hadn't been very conspicuous and most of the patrons on those streets had been drunk or distracted, only this photo had popped up onto the Internet. Still, it had been passed around from forum to forum until it had made its way onto celebrity gossip sites. Thankfully, as Meiling had pointed out, it wasn't quite enough to make it into the tabloids—this one would remain Internet speculation.

"I panicked a bit at first when I saw it," Meiling said. "But I think you'll get away with this just fine, as long as you lie low."

"Right—ow, Meiling, what the hell?" Syaoran said, rubbing his side where his cousin had punched him suddenly.

"How many times have I told you to be more careful?" she said sternly. "You got lucky! This could have gotten you into huge trouble. Huge. Please tell me what the hell you were thinking, going over there like that!"

"Look, I told you on the phone. They were in trouble."

"They could have gotten a cab like any normal clubgoer!" Meiling said, raising her hands in exasperation. "The public eye is on you now more than ever and you decide it's time to be a hero for your paparazzo friend?"

"That guy was on the prowl," he growled. "I saw it myself, okay? He was literally standing outside, waiting for them to come out when I got there. Can't we just let it go, since I got away with it?"

"Syaoran, you can't just keep doing stuff like that. Look, I know you want to act like your life is normal, but it's not. So sometimes, you have to think these things through a little more."

"Thanks," he said coldly. "I didn't realize that myself or anything."

"If you know it, start acting like it," Meiling bit back.

Syaoran sighed and leaned against Meiling's desk. "I'm not trying to cause you trouble, all right? Just—after all that shit that happened with Mizuki—I don't know... I just wanted company."

"So you went to go pick her up while she was wasted, and you went to her apartment? Because you wanted company?"

"It wasn't like that," he groaned. "I meant to just help her inside, but she ended up hurting herself and needed help, and then she asked me to stay over..."

Meiling laughed incredulously. "So you stayed. Because she asked you to."

"Well, I mean..." Syaoran rubbed the back of his neck. "Yeah. Nothing happened, though."

Meiling watched her cousin for a moment, how uncomfortable he seemed, how he wouldn't meet her eyes, and then she let out a snort. "Oh, my God. I can't believe this."

"What?" Syaoran said irritably.

"I cannot believe it. Syaoran, you are head over heels for a paparazzo. Like, completely hopeless. I mean, I knew you said you liked her, but I thought you'd get over it—but this?"

"You're exaggerating a bit, don't you think?" Syaoran snapped, although he knew that she was very close to the truth. It was completely out of character for him to do something so reckless, followed up by more recklessness, all for the sake of a girl. "And besides, she's not a paparazzo anymore. She quit her job yesterday."

Meiling raised her brows. "Why?"

"I don't know. She said something about wanting to get serious with her journalism career. But anyway, can you cool it now? She's not a threat anymore. Just a normal girl."

"On the contrary, if the press finds out about her, there's still her history. If they do any digging—which, by the way, of course they're going to do—and they find out that she was taking candids of you for almost half a year, things are going to get bad really fast."

Syaoran stared at Meiling in disbelief. "So you're saying that it's just always going to be like this? Always in secret, always hiding from the press?"

Meiling's face softened. "Syaoran... I just don't think this can work. You can still be friends, but even then, it won't be easy. You'd still have to be extremely careful. It just wasn't meant to be."

Syaoran's jaw hardened for a moment, but he said nothing. He stared at her computer screen, the grainy photo of him glowing back at him mockingly. Something very close to despair was beginning to come over him as he realized the full impact of Meiling's words. This had always been the truth. He knew that. He had just chosen stupidly to ignore it.

"Syaoran?"

He glanced over at Meiling, who was now looking at him with worried eyes. "Yeah."

"Are you all right?"

"I'll be fine," he said softly, although he had meant to add a hard edge to his voice.

Meiling leaned her elbow on her desk and rested her head in her hand. She sighed. "God. Sometimes you make things so difficult. Look, if it means that much to you... It must really be something special. Don't throw it aside just yet. Maybe we can figure something out. But I need to meet her."

Syaoran raised his eyebrows in surprise. "Wait, what—"

"I mean it. I won't be able to do a damn thing to help you out if I don't meet her. And I want to meet her tonight."

That's the end of this chapter! I know it's not the hugest cliffhanger, which may or may not come as a relief to some of you, haha. Thank you for the reviews on the last chapter! I'm glad everyone enjoyed the long-awaited fluff, haha. I know this chapter didn't have quite as much of it, but it's there if you look!

Per usual, I'm posting this chapter in a bit of a rush, so I haven't proofread the last half of it. Please let me know if you see any mistakes! My writing of this chapter was extremely disjointed—I'd open the document and add a sentence or two at times, sometimes even just a word, and then close it because I didn't know what else to write, haha. And then I'd delete pages of material and write different scenes altogether. Sigh. Still, I hope it came out cohesively. I've been trying to improve my writing a little bit lately, so I think I've been a lot nitpicker than usual, haha ;;

As a side note, the Bunka Gakuen Museum Ball isn't real, as far as I know. I modeled it after the Costume Institute Gala (or the Met Ball), hosted by the Metropolitan Museum's fashion exhibit at the Costume Institute every year in New York City! But it appears that many of our characters are attending this event, so we'll see what happens on the big night, hm?

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter! Thank you as always for reading, and please leave a review on your way out!

Love,

boreum dal