Beyblade Fan Fiction ❯ Perfectly Incompatible ❯ Chapter 2 ( Chapter 2 )
[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]
By: DefiantVixen 
Anime/Manga: Beyblade Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Romance | Type: Other | Uploaded On: 05.29.2009 | Pages: 3 | Words: 3.8K | Visits: 361 | Status: Completed
Anime/Manga: Beyblade Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Romance | Type: Other | Uploaded On: 05.29.2009 | Pages: 3 | Words: 3.8K | Visits: 361 | Status: Completed
Perfectly Incompatible
Summary: A few of the mothers from his hometown think it’s time for him to settle down, but Michael can’t stand the girl they chose for him; Mariasha! What happens when he gets into a fight with Mariasha and ends up lost in a snow storm? Who will come to his rescue?
Pairings: Michael/Kai
Disclaimer: I don’t own the Anime Beyblade or any character associated. I do own Mariasha “Maria” Evans. She is an original character and all likeness to people living or dead is purely coincidental. This character is not on based one anyone else’s character design, again if any likeness, it’s purely coincidental. There are also minor Ocs in this story as well, eg; Michael’s mother and great aunt.
Warnings: Kai is a girl in this story. The use and introduction of a female Original Character. Any fans of OCs and OC pairings should leave now. Anti-OC pairings and blatant bashing of my own character. I created her; I can do what I want with her. And I plan to.
Gripe for the Day: Don’t you just hate it when a Suethor writes a Mary Sue and then surround her with minor OCs, there for the sole purpose of reminding the reader over and over again how utterly amazing and special the Sue is, and how she’s prefect for her love interest, even though he’s a jerk and not worthy of her? If she was truly special and wonderful, we shouldn’t need to be verbally told. Many Suethors fail one important rule of story writing; Show, don’t tell. Then again, if the author was any good, she/he wouldn’t be writing Sues in the first place!
AN: Hello again, everyone. How are you today? In this chapter we learn how Michael knows of Kai’s gender and I hope you get a small chuckle out of it, it involves yet another cliché that was pointed out to me by G-Wing Gurl.
Any comments and suggestions are always received warmly, while flames are used for some belly laughs after a long day at work. I hope you will enjoy this chapter and don’t be afraid to let me know what you think.
-
Chapter 2:
Walking over to the unsuspecting female, Michael could not help but grin to himself as he remembered how Kai revealed her gender, not just to her teammates and fellow bladers, but to the entire planet!
It all started at a press conference at the BBA where Grev were involved. During question time, the room fell silent when a girl called Kairi stood up and asked Kai how he could abandon his unborn child and use her the way he did. Of course, the media immediately jumped on the story, firing off rapid questions to Kai about his relationship with Kairi.
Kai, of course, said there was no relationship, prompting Kairi to claim that she was pregnant with his child and how dare he try to get out of his responsibility to look after her.
Michael remembering watching on live TV in his Tokyo hotel room as Kai began to tremble with anger in his seat, his eyebrow twitching violently, in a way never seen before.
Abruptly taking to his feet, Kai narrowed his eyes, his expression dark; his jaw clenched tightly and said in a clear and steady voice that Kairi was not pregnant with his child for several reasons. He then proceeded to list those reasons; number one being that he had never seen Kairi before in his life. Two, he never knew she existed. Three, he would never jump into bed with a slut like her.
Yeah, he actually said slut, which got a few protests, but with the dark aura he was emitting at the time, no one dare say anything too harshly to him.
But number four really clenched the deal. Slowly, he unwound his scarf around his neck and slipped off his shirt, revealing thick bandages around her chest. She then said in a loud, commanding voice that she was actually a girl in gender and was not even remotely romantically interested in girls what-so-ever.
Especially not attention seeking sluts who are merely trying to fulfil a sick fantasy of theirs.
And so, since he was in fact a she, there was no way that Kairi could be pregnant with her child!
After the initial shock wore off, Michael found himself laughing out loud with the rest of his teammates, even Emily thought it was hilarious as she was often the victim of jealous fangirls’ rage.
The look of utter devastation on Kairi’s face was a classic! Rick swore that if you slowed the picture down you could see her ego and sassiness shatter into a million shards in just five frames. It was so funny, especially of all the shit she was accusing Kai of. Kairi looked gutted and the media promptly turned on her, labelling her a harlot while trying to coax answers out of Kai as to why she had been hiding her gender.
However, Mr. Dickinson was left to answer all questions as Kai had slipped out the back to calm herself down, shirt still off and in her hand that was balled into a fist.
Kai hated losing her temper like that and she would feel bad afterwards, but it still made Michael laugh whenever he heard stories about Kai shattering yet another fangirl’s dream of being Kai Hiwatari’s soul mate or true love or chance of becoming the only female blader on either the team Grev or the Blitzkrieg Boys.
Tala once asked Kai if she wanted them to change their team to the Blitzkrieg Bladers, but Kai nearly threw a fit. She refused to let them change their name simply because she was a girl, which got a few chuckles from Tala. It was as if he was expecting that kind of response.
Funnily enough, it seemed that practically all the strange and deranged fangirls –even the mention of one- caused Kai to act insanely out of character.
She could not stand them and by all the stories that she had told him about the encounters male Kai had with them, Michael understood completely.
Back then he wasn’t that close to Kai, but even he knew Kai wasn’t an egotistical player, an abusive jackass, a demented rapist or someone who would drag an unconscious girl home instead of the hospital. With all the weirdos and maniacs in her life, she would be a lot more cautious.
Hell, anyone should be these days. Honestly, were these girls so naive that they thought men they didn’t even know would treat them like princesses? If he woke up in a strange girl’s house, he would be freaking out.
Really, though, where the hell did those deranged idiots get those appalling character traits from, anyway? Why would they make up such crap just so people would feel sorry for them?
Michael must admit, though, Kai was funny when she was irritated or annoyed about something she was passionate about. Her eyebrow would twitch dangerously when she was annoyed, but when she was pissed, her whole body twitched with suppressed rage. Depending on the circumstances, she would either give the person annoying her –usually a fangirl- a scathing, soul-crushing, make your heart stop beating verbal smack down that would sting for weeks afterwards!
But if words didn’t get the point across, a glare of blatant hatred followed by an utterly painful backhand usually did the trick.
Kai was not a violent person by any stretch of the imagine, she was just passionate about what she believed in and she absolutely hated it when people told blatant lies to either make themselves appear more important and special than they really are, or to win the sympathy vote from the people around them.
However, he didn’t like it when Kai became so infuriated, like with Kairi, that her body would tremble for about an hour or so, depending on how angry she was, afterwards. She would deliver a scathing insult, easily pointing out all faults in such a way that left no room to argue and then stalk off to calm down. Her hands would tremble and she would appear like she was actually shivering intensely from the cold.
Kai was not very good at keeping such intense emotions in check outside the Beydish, so she really hated getting angry like that. It didn’t happen often, but it was enough to leave her rattled.
No one knew of that little fact, so how did Michael know? After her revealing and confrontation of Kairi on TV, he went for a walk and found her sitting on some stone steps in an alley way, her head and in her hands, her body shivering as her shirt sat idle on her lap.
When he approached her, she was a little embarrassed by what happened, but didn’t want to talk about it, and Michael respected that. If Kai said she didn’t want to talk about it, than no one made her. Besides, what was there to talk about, they all knew Kairi was just an attention seeking brat who didn’t care who she hurt to get into the limelight.
Sitting there in that alley way, Michael could not help but note how oddly vulnerable Kai was and how those brats actually affected her. By the look on her face when Kairi stood up with those grossly unrealistic claims, those events happened far too often. It’s no wonder Kai snapped the way she did.
Hell, even Michael himself had been on the receiving end of some wild accusations himself, mostly from girls who claim to be his high school sweetheart, or some shit like that. They pranced up to him and hung off his arm like he was suppose to know them or something. When he asked who the hell they were, they would get all snotty and huffy with him, accusing him of forgetting about them.
Really, how could he forget someone he never knew?
With nothing but sympathy, not pity, in his chest, Michael took off his jacket and placed it around Kai shoulders as he sat silently with her as she calmed down to the point that she was no longer shaking.
He didn’t asked why Kai she was concealing her gender for so long, but with a history like hers, he didn’t need to. Kai was unforthcoming about anything in her past, usually just giving a short explanation of either Boris or Voltaire and then mutter darkly under her breath with a faraway look in her eyes.
He didn’t know how long they sat there as Kai grasped at his jacket with her shaking hands, but he did learn of why Kai shook the way she did. He wasn’t sure why she felt the need to tell him why, maybe it was because she wanted to explain her weakness so he wouldn’t think badly of her and tell everyone later on.
Not that he would. It was oddly refreshing realizing that Kai was not the invincible stoic Beyblade captain that everyone thought; she was human as well.
Pausing by the counter to order a cup of coffee and a toasted sandwich, Michael slipped into a seat at Kai’s table, causing the female to look up from her paper, her red eyes widening with recognition and she reeled back slightly in surprise.
“Hey Kai,” Michael greeted with a half-smirk, half-smile at her reaction.
“Michael?” Kai said, as if she didn’t quite believe that he was here, in a small town, practically in the middle of nowhere. Talk about a small world.
“What are you doing here?” he asks as a petite middle-aged woman walked over to their table and placed the food that Michael ordered in front of him, giving the two a small smile and seemingly raised an eyebrow in questioning at Michael as to why he was talking with this strange girl and not making wedding plans with Mariasha.
Yeah, this country mum was also a Mariasha fan. When she tells the other mothers, shit will be hitting the fan. Not that he cared anymore, it was just an irritant and he had to suffer through those looks of disproval whenever he came to town.
“I could ask you the same question,” Kai said as she got over her shock a little and placed her coffee back on the table, folding her arms as she leaned forward. Truth be told, it was actually kinda nice to see a familiar face amongst the sea of strangers.
“I'm visiting my mother for a few weeks,” Michael explained as he took a sip of his coffee and grabbed his breakfast, eager to have at least something in his empty stomach.
Pushing the plate over to Kai’s side of the table, he offered her the other half of his sandwich. She didn’t want it, but he kept offering it, so Kai took it to save yet another argument about how she wasn’t eating enough and took a small bite, much to Michael’s approval.
Swallowing the small bite, Kai gave him a small look of surprise. “Oh, this is your home town?”
“That's right,” Michael said with a small smile, one that quickly took a teasing edge to it. “What about you? Still hiding from the media after that ‘coming out’ incident in Tokyo?”
“Don't remind me,” Kai groaned and appeared as if she wanted to drop her head onto the table in slight disgust. She then shook her head to clear it of the memories, the silverly gray tresses floating almost elegantly before her eyes.
Michael took a moment to study Kai a bit further and was amazed at how soft her hair looked when it was not in the usual spiky style she adorned when she was dressing as a guy. It framed her face delicately, giving off a slightly just out of bed look, but seemed elegant and natural on her.
“At least it stopped the fangirls from throwing themselves at me,” Kai continued, trying to look on the bright side.
Michael quickly swallowed the bite of his sandwich and laughed out loud, finding Kai’s response to the whole ordeal oddly typical of her. While she was not an optimist, she most certainly was not a pessimist, either. She just liked to deal with things and then move on.
“If only we were all that lucky, huh?” he said, which earned him a smile from the young woman. Kai’s smile were normally small, yet were meaningful. When she smiled, she meant it. Nothing like those fake, sickly-sweet smiles Mariasha used to get her way all the time.
“Where are you staying?” he asked as he finished his sandwich and was now sipping his still hot coffee. “In town at the hotel?”
“No,” Kai said as she shook her head, surprising herself when she realized that she actually ate the sandwich Michael gave her. “I went through Voltaire's records and realized that I owned a ranch here. It needs a little TLC, but it's liveable. It gives me something to do while the media hype dies down.”
Michael found himself frowning slightly, not exactly liking the idea of Kai being on her own on a ranch somewhere. He then realized that his day might not be a total lost; if Kai was fixing the ranch up, she might need a bit of help with something.
Besides, he would get to see if the ranch Kai was living in was actually liveable. She had a tendency to downplay a lot of things. “Do you need a hand with anything?” he asked.
“Sure, if you want to help,” Kai said as she gave a small shrug, seemingly expecting Michael to ask if she needed any help. That was just a part of his nature and it would be nice to have someone there to give her a hand if she needed any.
Living with her teammates Grev for so long had made Kai acceptable to loneliness. The silence of being out on that ranch all by herself was almost deafening. And it had only been a couple of days!
“Nothing major needs fixing, just the garden. I haven't been out into the back garage yet. I shudder to think what I would find there.”
“I see,” Michael hummed as he took another sip of his coffee. “Well, no point in tackling the garden now. Snow season is just around the corner.”
“Yes, I realized that when the frost was getting thicker in the mornings,” Kai said as she placed her now empty coffee cup on the table, near Michael’s empty plate. “How bad are the winter storms here?”
Michael winced at the memories of almost getting cabin fever for staying inside so long from childhood. “Some of the worst I've encountered.”
“I see,” Kai said with a frown and then sighed lightly, almost making her long for the mother country, Russia. “Well, at least my house will be warm and secure if anything should happen. I’m actually in town to pick up a few things like drapes and such, you know, make the place look a bit homely.”
“Oh, well then I’ll give you a hand,” Michael quickly offered as he was eager to do something more constructive than hiding from his neighbour all day long. “I’ve got nothing planned for the day anyway.”
Kai tilted her head to the side in question. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah, give me something to do,” he said, trying his best to stop himself from actually begging. Chances are Mariasha doesn’t know Kai or that she has a ranch here, so it was perfect for Michael to hide at all day if needed.
“Alright then,” Kai said as she gave him another small smile. “Thank you.”
“How long have you been in town now?” Michael asked as soon after her unveiling at Tokyo, Kai disappeared from sight, everyone assuming she was hiding from the media vultures that were hovering about everywhere.
Kai ran her hand through her hair in thought. “About a week? Some of the women here have been watching over me. They're quite nice, if not a little nosy, if you know what I mean...”
“Believe me; I know exactly what you mean,” Michael said through gritted teeth and gave her a forced smile. “Why don’t I show you around?”
“Sure,” Kai said as she leaned down and grabbed a small shoulder bag and placed it on her shoulder. “You can tell me some embarrassing stories about your childhood,” she lightly teased.
Michael gave a somewhat shaky laugh and scratched the back of his head. “That will take all day,” he replied.
A soft look appeared on Kai’s face as she took to her feet. “I loved to hear them,” she said, giving Michael the indication that she didn’t want to know because she thought they would be great blackmail material later on, but because she was genuinely curious. She didn’t have the best childhood, so it was nice to hear about other’s carefree childhoods.
Michael gave her a charming smile and took to his feet as well. He gathered the dirty dishes and cups and took them over to the counter. “We’re leaving now, thanks for the coffee!” he said as he turned to leave.
“No problem there, Love,” the woman said as she gave them a wave and a smile. “Say hi to Mariasha for me.”
Michael bit down on the inside of his mouth to stop himself from groaning and rolling his eyes in annoyance. “Sure...” he muttered and took Kai by the elbow, hurrying the both of them outside.
Kai was slightly surprised by Michael’s reaction, but let him take her elbow none the less. Even when they stepped outside, he didn’t remove his hand and she could tell he was annoyed about something, and that name that was mentioned had something to do with it.
“Who’s Mariasha?” she asked, surprised by a foreign feeling of jealously when she realized that it was a girl’s name, but she quickly pushed that aside and focused her attention on him again.
“My next door neighbour and she’s a royal pain in the ass,” Michael said as he gave a long suffering sigh and slowed down, his hand slipping from Kai’s elbow to the small of her back so he could lean forward and whisper into her ear.
In a town like this, ears of meddling mothers were everywhere.
“All the town biddies think we would make the perfect couple,” he explained
“I see,” Kai said as she gave him a sympathetic look, feeling slightly relieved that she wasn’t his girlfriend or something.
“I can’t stand her,” Michael carried onto say as he gave another suffering sigh. “She makes my skin crawl.”
“Why?” Kai asked, curious that the usually laid back Michael was so annoyed about something. “What has she done? Be completely honest with me, you know I won’t get offended.”
“God, where do I start?” Michael muttered as he subconsciously held out his arm for Kai to hook hers through, which she surprisingly did and then the two begin to walk in the morning light, their heads leaning toward each others as Michael begin to tell tales about all the things Mariasha has done to annoy him.
And there was a lot to talk about.
Summary: A few of the mothers from his hometown think it’s time for him to settle down, but Michael can’t stand the girl they chose for him; Mariasha! What happens when he gets into a fight with Mariasha and ends up lost in a snow storm? Who will come to his rescue?
Pairings: Michael/Kai
Disclaimer: I don’t own the Anime Beyblade or any character associated. I do own Mariasha “Maria” Evans. She is an original character and all likeness to people living or dead is purely coincidental. This character is not on based one anyone else’s character design, again if any likeness, it’s purely coincidental. There are also minor Ocs in this story as well, eg; Michael’s mother and great aunt.
Warnings: Kai is a girl in this story. The use and introduction of a female Original Character. Any fans of OCs and OC pairings should leave now. Anti-OC pairings and blatant bashing of my own character. I created her; I can do what I want with her. And I plan to.
Gripe for the Day: Don’t you just hate it when a Suethor writes a Mary Sue and then surround her with minor OCs, there for the sole purpose of reminding the reader over and over again how utterly amazing and special the Sue is, and how she’s prefect for her love interest, even though he’s a jerk and not worthy of her? If she was truly special and wonderful, we shouldn’t need to be verbally told. Many Suethors fail one important rule of story writing; Show, don’t tell. Then again, if the author was any good, she/he wouldn’t be writing Sues in the first place!
AN: Hello again, everyone. How are you today? In this chapter we learn how Michael knows of Kai’s gender and I hope you get a small chuckle out of it, it involves yet another cliché that was pointed out to me by G-Wing Gurl.
Any comments and suggestions are always received warmly, while flames are used for some belly laughs after a long day at work. I hope you will enjoy this chapter and don’t be afraid to let me know what you think.
-
Chapter 2:
Walking over to the unsuspecting female, Michael could not help but grin to himself as he remembered how Kai revealed her gender, not just to her teammates and fellow bladers, but to the entire planet!
It all started at a press conference at the BBA where Grev were involved. During question time, the room fell silent when a girl called Kairi stood up and asked Kai how he could abandon his unborn child and use her the way he did. Of course, the media immediately jumped on the story, firing off rapid questions to Kai about his relationship with Kairi.
Kai, of course, said there was no relationship, prompting Kairi to claim that she was pregnant with his child and how dare he try to get out of his responsibility to look after her.
Michael remembering watching on live TV in his Tokyo hotel room as Kai began to tremble with anger in his seat, his eyebrow twitching violently, in a way never seen before.
Abruptly taking to his feet, Kai narrowed his eyes, his expression dark; his jaw clenched tightly and said in a clear and steady voice that Kairi was not pregnant with his child for several reasons. He then proceeded to list those reasons; number one being that he had never seen Kairi before in his life. Two, he never knew she existed. Three, he would never jump into bed with a slut like her.
Yeah, he actually said slut, which got a few protests, but with the dark aura he was emitting at the time, no one dare say anything too harshly to him.
But number four really clenched the deal. Slowly, he unwound his scarf around his neck and slipped off his shirt, revealing thick bandages around her chest. She then said in a loud, commanding voice that she was actually a girl in gender and was not even remotely romantically interested in girls what-so-ever.
Especially not attention seeking sluts who are merely trying to fulfil a sick fantasy of theirs.
And so, since he was in fact a she, there was no way that Kairi could be pregnant with her child!
After the initial shock wore off, Michael found himself laughing out loud with the rest of his teammates, even Emily thought it was hilarious as she was often the victim of jealous fangirls’ rage.
The look of utter devastation on Kairi’s face was a classic! Rick swore that if you slowed the picture down you could see her ego and sassiness shatter into a million shards in just five frames. It was so funny, especially of all the shit she was accusing Kai of. Kairi looked gutted and the media promptly turned on her, labelling her a harlot while trying to coax answers out of Kai as to why she had been hiding her gender.
However, Mr. Dickinson was left to answer all questions as Kai had slipped out the back to calm herself down, shirt still off and in her hand that was balled into a fist.
Kai hated losing her temper like that and she would feel bad afterwards, but it still made Michael laugh whenever he heard stories about Kai shattering yet another fangirl’s dream of being Kai Hiwatari’s soul mate or true love or chance of becoming the only female blader on either the team Grev or the Blitzkrieg Boys.
Tala once asked Kai if she wanted them to change their team to the Blitzkrieg Bladers, but Kai nearly threw a fit. She refused to let them change their name simply because she was a girl, which got a few chuckles from Tala. It was as if he was expecting that kind of response.
Funnily enough, it seemed that practically all the strange and deranged fangirls –even the mention of one- caused Kai to act insanely out of character.
She could not stand them and by all the stories that she had told him about the encounters male Kai had with them, Michael understood completely.
Back then he wasn’t that close to Kai, but even he knew Kai wasn’t an egotistical player, an abusive jackass, a demented rapist or someone who would drag an unconscious girl home instead of the hospital. With all the weirdos and maniacs in her life, she would be a lot more cautious.
Hell, anyone should be these days. Honestly, were these girls so naive that they thought men they didn’t even know would treat them like princesses? If he woke up in a strange girl’s house, he would be freaking out.
Really, though, where the hell did those deranged idiots get those appalling character traits from, anyway? Why would they make up such crap just so people would feel sorry for them?
Michael must admit, though, Kai was funny when she was irritated or annoyed about something she was passionate about. Her eyebrow would twitch dangerously when she was annoyed, but when she was pissed, her whole body twitched with suppressed rage. Depending on the circumstances, she would either give the person annoying her –usually a fangirl- a scathing, soul-crushing, make your heart stop beating verbal smack down that would sting for weeks afterwards!
But if words didn’t get the point across, a glare of blatant hatred followed by an utterly painful backhand usually did the trick.
Kai was not a violent person by any stretch of the imagine, she was just passionate about what she believed in and she absolutely hated it when people told blatant lies to either make themselves appear more important and special than they really are, or to win the sympathy vote from the people around them.
However, he didn’t like it when Kai became so infuriated, like with Kairi, that her body would tremble for about an hour or so, depending on how angry she was, afterwards. She would deliver a scathing insult, easily pointing out all faults in such a way that left no room to argue and then stalk off to calm down. Her hands would tremble and she would appear like she was actually shivering intensely from the cold.
Kai was not very good at keeping such intense emotions in check outside the Beydish, so she really hated getting angry like that. It didn’t happen often, but it was enough to leave her rattled.
No one knew of that little fact, so how did Michael know? After her revealing and confrontation of Kairi on TV, he went for a walk and found her sitting on some stone steps in an alley way, her head and in her hands, her body shivering as her shirt sat idle on her lap.
When he approached her, she was a little embarrassed by what happened, but didn’t want to talk about it, and Michael respected that. If Kai said she didn’t want to talk about it, than no one made her. Besides, what was there to talk about, they all knew Kairi was just an attention seeking brat who didn’t care who she hurt to get into the limelight.
Sitting there in that alley way, Michael could not help but note how oddly vulnerable Kai was and how those brats actually affected her. By the look on her face when Kairi stood up with those grossly unrealistic claims, those events happened far too often. It’s no wonder Kai snapped the way she did.
Hell, even Michael himself had been on the receiving end of some wild accusations himself, mostly from girls who claim to be his high school sweetheart, or some shit like that. They pranced up to him and hung off his arm like he was suppose to know them or something. When he asked who the hell they were, they would get all snotty and huffy with him, accusing him of forgetting about them.
Really, how could he forget someone he never knew?
With nothing but sympathy, not pity, in his chest, Michael took off his jacket and placed it around Kai shoulders as he sat silently with her as she calmed down to the point that she was no longer shaking.
He didn’t asked why Kai she was concealing her gender for so long, but with a history like hers, he didn’t need to. Kai was unforthcoming about anything in her past, usually just giving a short explanation of either Boris or Voltaire and then mutter darkly under her breath with a faraway look in her eyes.
He didn’t know how long they sat there as Kai grasped at his jacket with her shaking hands, but he did learn of why Kai shook the way she did. He wasn’t sure why she felt the need to tell him why, maybe it was because she wanted to explain her weakness so he wouldn’t think badly of her and tell everyone later on.
Not that he would. It was oddly refreshing realizing that Kai was not the invincible stoic Beyblade captain that everyone thought; she was human as well.
Pausing by the counter to order a cup of coffee and a toasted sandwich, Michael slipped into a seat at Kai’s table, causing the female to look up from her paper, her red eyes widening with recognition and she reeled back slightly in surprise.
“Hey Kai,” Michael greeted with a half-smirk, half-smile at her reaction.
“Michael?” Kai said, as if she didn’t quite believe that he was here, in a small town, practically in the middle of nowhere. Talk about a small world.
“What are you doing here?” he asks as a petite middle-aged woman walked over to their table and placed the food that Michael ordered in front of him, giving the two a small smile and seemingly raised an eyebrow in questioning at Michael as to why he was talking with this strange girl and not making wedding plans with Mariasha.
Yeah, this country mum was also a Mariasha fan. When she tells the other mothers, shit will be hitting the fan. Not that he cared anymore, it was just an irritant and he had to suffer through those looks of disproval whenever he came to town.
“I could ask you the same question,” Kai said as she got over her shock a little and placed her coffee back on the table, folding her arms as she leaned forward. Truth be told, it was actually kinda nice to see a familiar face amongst the sea of strangers.
“I'm visiting my mother for a few weeks,” Michael explained as he took a sip of his coffee and grabbed his breakfast, eager to have at least something in his empty stomach.
Pushing the plate over to Kai’s side of the table, he offered her the other half of his sandwich. She didn’t want it, but he kept offering it, so Kai took it to save yet another argument about how she wasn’t eating enough and took a small bite, much to Michael’s approval.
Swallowing the small bite, Kai gave him a small look of surprise. “Oh, this is your home town?”
“That's right,” Michael said with a small smile, one that quickly took a teasing edge to it. “What about you? Still hiding from the media after that ‘coming out’ incident in Tokyo?”
“Don't remind me,” Kai groaned and appeared as if she wanted to drop her head onto the table in slight disgust. She then shook her head to clear it of the memories, the silverly gray tresses floating almost elegantly before her eyes.
Michael took a moment to study Kai a bit further and was amazed at how soft her hair looked when it was not in the usual spiky style she adorned when she was dressing as a guy. It framed her face delicately, giving off a slightly just out of bed look, but seemed elegant and natural on her.
“At least it stopped the fangirls from throwing themselves at me,” Kai continued, trying to look on the bright side.
Michael quickly swallowed the bite of his sandwich and laughed out loud, finding Kai’s response to the whole ordeal oddly typical of her. While she was not an optimist, she most certainly was not a pessimist, either. She just liked to deal with things and then move on.
“If only we were all that lucky, huh?” he said, which earned him a smile from the young woman. Kai’s smile were normally small, yet were meaningful. When she smiled, she meant it. Nothing like those fake, sickly-sweet smiles Mariasha used to get her way all the time.
“Where are you staying?” he asked as he finished his sandwich and was now sipping his still hot coffee. “In town at the hotel?”
“No,” Kai said as she shook her head, surprising herself when she realized that she actually ate the sandwich Michael gave her. “I went through Voltaire's records and realized that I owned a ranch here. It needs a little TLC, but it's liveable. It gives me something to do while the media hype dies down.”
Michael found himself frowning slightly, not exactly liking the idea of Kai being on her own on a ranch somewhere. He then realized that his day might not be a total lost; if Kai was fixing the ranch up, she might need a bit of help with something.
Besides, he would get to see if the ranch Kai was living in was actually liveable. She had a tendency to downplay a lot of things. “Do you need a hand with anything?” he asked.
“Sure, if you want to help,” Kai said as she gave a small shrug, seemingly expecting Michael to ask if she needed any help. That was just a part of his nature and it would be nice to have someone there to give her a hand if she needed any.
Living with her teammates Grev for so long had made Kai acceptable to loneliness. The silence of being out on that ranch all by herself was almost deafening. And it had only been a couple of days!
“Nothing major needs fixing, just the garden. I haven't been out into the back garage yet. I shudder to think what I would find there.”
“I see,” Michael hummed as he took another sip of his coffee. “Well, no point in tackling the garden now. Snow season is just around the corner.”
“Yes, I realized that when the frost was getting thicker in the mornings,” Kai said as she placed her now empty coffee cup on the table, near Michael’s empty plate. “How bad are the winter storms here?”
Michael winced at the memories of almost getting cabin fever for staying inside so long from childhood. “Some of the worst I've encountered.”
“I see,” Kai said with a frown and then sighed lightly, almost making her long for the mother country, Russia. “Well, at least my house will be warm and secure if anything should happen. I’m actually in town to pick up a few things like drapes and such, you know, make the place look a bit homely.”
“Oh, well then I’ll give you a hand,” Michael quickly offered as he was eager to do something more constructive than hiding from his neighbour all day long. “I’ve got nothing planned for the day anyway.”
Kai tilted her head to the side in question. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah, give me something to do,” he said, trying his best to stop himself from actually begging. Chances are Mariasha doesn’t know Kai or that she has a ranch here, so it was perfect for Michael to hide at all day if needed.
“Alright then,” Kai said as she gave him another small smile. “Thank you.”
“How long have you been in town now?” Michael asked as soon after her unveiling at Tokyo, Kai disappeared from sight, everyone assuming she was hiding from the media vultures that were hovering about everywhere.
Kai ran her hand through her hair in thought. “About a week? Some of the women here have been watching over me. They're quite nice, if not a little nosy, if you know what I mean...”
“Believe me; I know exactly what you mean,” Michael said through gritted teeth and gave her a forced smile. “Why don’t I show you around?”
“Sure,” Kai said as she leaned down and grabbed a small shoulder bag and placed it on her shoulder. “You can tell me some embarrassing stories about your childhood,” she lightly teased.
Michael gave a somewhat shaky laugh and scratched the back of his head. “That will take all day,” he replied.
A soft look appeared on Kai’s face as she took to her feet. “I loved to hear them,” she said, giving Michael the indication that she didn’t want to know because she thought they would be great blackmail material later on, but because she was genuinely curious. She didn’t have the best childhood, so it was nice to hear about other’s carefree childhoods.
Michael gave her a charming smile and took to his feet as well. He gathered the dirty dishes and cups and took them over to the counter. “We’re leaving now, thanks for the coffee!” he said as he turned to leave.
“No problem there, Love,” the woman said as she gave them a wave and a smile. “Say hi to Mariasha for me.”
Michael bit down on the inside of his mouth to stop himself from groaning and rolling his eyes in annoyance. “Sure...” he muttered and took Kai by the elbow, hurrying the both of them outside.
Kai was slightly surprised by Michael’s reaction, but let him take her elbow none the less. Even when they stepped outside, he didn’t remove his hand and she could tell he was annoyed about something, and that name that was mentioned had something to do with it.
“Who’s Mariasha?” she asked, surprised by a foreign feeling of jealously when she realized that it was a girl’s name, but she quickly pushed that aside and focused her attention on him again.
“My next door neighbour and she’s a royal pain in the ass,” Michael said as he gave a long suffering sigh and slowed down, his hand slipping from Kai’s elbow to the small of her back so he could lean forward and whisper into her ear.
In a town like this, ears of meddling mothers were everywhere.
“All the town biddies think we would make the perfect couple,” he explained
“I see,” Kai said as she gave him a sympathetic look, feeling slightly relieved that she wasn’t his girlfriend or something.
“I can’t stand her,” Michael carried onto say as he gave another suffering sigh. “She makes my skin crawl.”
“Why?” Kai asked, curious that the usually laid back Michael was so annoyed about something. “What has she done? Be completely honest with me, you know I won’t get offended.”
“God, where do I start?” Michael muttered as he subconsciously held out his arm for Kai to hook hers through, which she surprisingly did and then the two begin to walk in the morning light, their heads leaning toward each others as Michael begin to tell tales about all the things Mariasha has done to annoy him.
And there was a lot to talk about.