Beautiful Stranger
A Seiya/Usagi alternate reality fanfiction
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Sailor Moon and related characters are copyright of Naoko Takeuchi and Co. But you knew that. If you want to be notified of new chapters, send me an email at drive_me_mercury@hotmail.com. (Perhaps this will help curb the death threats caused by my erratic updating habits ^^;)
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I was bored. We were supposed to be writing an impromptu one-page reaction to some poem the teacher had just read from a book, and the paper in front of me had a whole one-and-a-half lines. I could care less about this particular insignificant assignment; my problem was I had a million things on my mind at the moment.
It was mostly Yaten, and something she had said to me earlier. She hadn’t said it outright, but in so many words, she was dropping another hint. Yaten was dissatisfied, I knew. She’d already said so. She didn’t want to be an idol anymore. Or maybe she simply didn’t want to be a boy. The stress of school had gotten to us all, and it didn’t help that our schedule had only become busier once classes started. After all, this idol business had only been a joke, an experiment. We’d never expected to become as popular as we were, never expected it to get so out of hand. I, for one, thoroughly enjoyed it. I loved the feeling of being on stage, and the fact that thousands of fans were screaming just for me. It could get to be too much at time, and there were definitely stressful moments, especially when we had to bear the weight of our hidden identities, but you had to just go with the flow of it. Homework was a bottom priority. I, unlike Yaten, didn’t care that I was practically failing in school.
Going from one concert, promotion, and recording to the next, it could get crazy. There were disappointments along with the successes, and the music industry could surely be brutal at times. The thing about roller coasters is, they didn’t stop. Not until the end. The truth was, I didn’t want this to stop yet. Yaten did. If Taiki felt the same way, she wasn’t letting on. Right now, I was choosing to ignore both of them.
The second thing that was bothering me, that I couldn’t put out of my mind was what Odango had said earlier, Then why do wear the necklace? Dammit, why had she said that? As if I had some unresolved psychological issue. I wore the necklace because I always had; I liked Chinese dragons when I was a kid. It had nothing to do with the woman who gave birth to me. I’d lived my life without giving her a second thought, so why should I now? I didn’t even know her. It wasn’t Odango’s fault, I knew, but I wished I could put it out of my mind now.
Odango. I watched her head in the seat in front of me, bent in concentration over her paper. I needed to focus my mind on something. Specifically, how I was going to ask her on the final date. I was pretty sure she would say yes, but that depended on whether she considered the previous two times as dates or just an outing as friends. The bet was riding on her answer. Oh, screw the bet. I wasn’t doing this for Taiki and Yaten anymore. I was doing this… alright, I didn’t know why. Because I enjoyed tangling myself in a web which I was going to have a hell of a time getting out of. Yet somehow I was drawn to her…
I found myself thinking about her more often. God… I needed to stop thinking so much. In front of me Odango’s head rested on her hand, propped up by an elbow on the desk. From the way her head jerked now and then I wouldn’t be surprised if she was dozing off to sleep. Her long, silky blonde strands of hair fell over her shoulders in waves, surprisingly graceful, considering who they belonged to. She was wearing little pink ribbons around her buns, today – childish…but that was just like her. Her hair was pulled up but at the base of her neck were short little wisps of hair – little golden tendrils that escaped the confines of the hairdo and curled against her skin. Almost unconsciously my head reached toward the little curls… just to touch them to see if they were as soft as they looked… just to twirl one around my finger to see how it felt…
“Fifteen minutes is up – please hand in your papers now!” My arm snapped back like a rubber band.
Usagi turned around rubbing her sleepy eyes, a little bit of drool at the corner of her mouth. Blushing slightly, I handed my two-line paper forward to her so that the teacher could collect them. She looked down at it, then back at me with raised eyebrows. I simply shrugged.
I leaned forward and whispered, “More than you wrote down, I’ll bet.”
She replied back, “At least I got a nap out of it. Remind me never to copy off you.”
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I prepared to ambush her after school, but had the tables turned on me. Two girls in brown uniforms (I didn’t even ask how they got into the building, since they obviously went to a different school) pounced on me when I was barely out of class. Taiki and Yaten managed to slip away, and I, of course, could never turn down a fan’s request for an autograph (okay, so the fans were my weak spot). A few of the male classmates gave jealous looks as they passed, and I felt like saying, “Hey, it’s not my fault I make a handsome bishounen. Go record your own CD.”
Once I got away I hurried across the campus and was lucky enough to spot a blonde head retreating down the sidewalk.
“Yo!” She turned.
“Need someone to walk home with?”
“Sure.”
“Shooo…!” She let out a long sigh after we had walked in silence for a while. “I am doomed! I’m going to fail Literature class and get held back another yeeeaaar!”
“Is that the least of your problems, Odango?”
She gave me a confused look as if asking what that was supposed to mean. “So join a study group or something,” I said. “Hey, maybe we get together some night at my apartment to study?” (Where did that come from?)
Now the look was accusing, suspicious. “Late-night study sessions at your apartment?”
I backed away. “T-totally innocent! C’mon!” I declared. She wasn’t as naďve as she seemed, I guess – not that I’d had anything like that in mind!
She turned away, sticking her nose in the air. “Yeah…I’ve heard about idols like you.”
The guy who takes advantage of any pretty girl he can – because he’s rich and handsome and famous, and could have any girl he wanted. And when he’s done with her, throws her away. That wasn’t me – or was it? Not in the way she was thinking… but wasn’t I using her just the same?
“But…” a gentleness softened her eyes to pools of marine blue. “…you’re different, Seiya. I can tell.”
Why? Why was I different?
I didn’t have the chance to ask her even if I’d wanted to, because she took off suddenly with a call of: “Race you to the next block!!”
She ran to the end of the sidewalk for me (still walking) with hands on hips. “Slowpoke.”
“Aw, but you need the exercise, from all those doughnuts you eat.”
I ignored her glare and shoved my hands in my pockets, preparing to ask what I’d been waiting to all day. I was surprised to find my stomach tied in a nervous knot. After all, it wasn’t that big of a deal – I just needed her to agree to this final rendezvous and then I could prove to my ‘sisters’ that I could charm any chick I wanted to, or prove to myself that I was just as good as any guy with a penis, or something idiotic like that. Part of me almost wished she would say no just then, because I was afraid what had started with an (almost) innocent bet was getting out of control, and I didn’t know what to expect next. Not because of her, but because of me. I no longer was sure how I was going to react around her, and it was freaking me out. Case in point: my sudden batch of nerves when I’d never had trouble speaking my mind to any man or woman in my life – not even before a crowd of a thousand people. But I had never been known to back down from anything, and didn’t plan on starting now.
“Ne, Odango – what are you doing Friday night? That is… if you’re not busy, how would you like to go on a date?”
“Date?” It was the first time I’d used that actually word when asking her.
“Of course, Odango, date.”
She blinked for several moments as if she didn’t understand, then said: “Will there be food?”
I hung my head, smiling and feeling suddenly relieved. Honestly, this girl was hopeless. “Yes. I will take you out to dinner.”
“Whoopee!” She started jumping up and down.
“I take that as a ‘yes’.”
“Wait a minute.” She stopped as if suddenly remembering something. “You’ll be paying for dinner, right? Because I already spent my allowance at the game center.”
“Yes, I’ll pay. With a few exceptions, of course: There’s a 500-yen charge for every extra dish you order, 10 percent if you want water, ice cubes are 50 yen each, and you’ll have to bribe the waiter out of your own pocket if you want the private candlelit table.”
“Ano… but- ”
“Will you relax? I’m kidding.”
“Ahahaha…” she laughed, sticking her arm behind her head. “I knew that.”
“I’ll pick you up around seven.”
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That had been Monday. It was two days later when Makoto confronted me in the locker room. There were few other students hanging out at the other end of the room, but for the most part I was by myself, exchanging my “inside slippers” for my “outside shoes” in preparation to go home. I didn’t pay much attention to the person who was standing a few lockers down, until I realized she was simply standing there. I looked up to see the brunette called Makoto, arms crossed.
“Yoroshiku,” I nodded with a crooked smile, as was my usual habit when acknowledging other students or fans, and went back to tying my shoe.
“Kou Seiya-san,” she said, not smiling back, “I need to talk with you.”
“What is it?”
“What are your intentions with my friend, Usagi Tsukino?” The question was laced with a hint of accusation.
I was taken aback some, but didn’t show it. A panicked question flashed in my mind, Had she found something out? Casually: “I’m not sure what you mean.”
“You asked her for a date.”
“I’m sorry. Was there a reason I shouldn’t have?”
“I’m just saying, if you hurt her, I won’t forgive it. And if you intend to take advantage of her,” she punctuated this with a meaningful look, “you won’t get away with it.”
She was certainly a protective friend, I’d say. And what had I even done? I straightened. “Kino-san, I assure you I would never want to hurt Usagi.” It was the truth. She was so sweet, who could ever hurt her? You could. You’re going to.
Her expression softened a bit and she looked down. “I apologize for being rude, Seiya-san. But I want you to understand… Usagi-chan is a dear friend of mine. She acts and feels like a child, and she’s sensitive, even if she doesn’t always seem so. Frankly, I don’t trust you. Don’t take it personal. It’s just that I’ve had my own experience with famous men – idols, whatever. And if I seem a little overprotective of her, it’s because I am. Maybe if you’ve been around her enough you can understand… she has that innocent sweetness. And I don’t want to see her feelings hurt because of this.”
Innocent sweetness – of course I could understand that. It described Odango perfectly. And while I couldn’t help be a little offended that she thought I was some heartless jerk, Odango was certainly lucky to have such a caring friend (even if she had just practically threatened me with bodily harm – well, she hadn’t said ‘bodily harm’ in so many words, but I had a feeling…)
I picked up my bookbag and said with a slight bow, “No need to worry. I promise I’ll treat your Usagi like a princess.”
She nodded, seeming satisfied with that. As I turned to leave, she added, “Listen – she likes you. Don’t you dare break her heart. She doesn’t need that again.”
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Notes:
Yoroshiku: roughly, “best regards” or something similar. Can be used for a greeting as well.