Yu-Gi-Oh! Fan Fiction ❯ Arubaito ❯ Party ( Chapter 9 )

Ch 9 (Party)

 

A/N: I find it hard not to be predictable. I think, if I ever have a chance to write another lengthy fiction in the future, I will try harder to find a plot with more surprises. Until then, I hope you can stand reading whilst thinking: “Oh yes, I see where this is going.”

-Etsuyo

 

Review Replies:

 

Passing Reader - I can picture it too, probably because he would take his cell phone everywhere. We are so reliant on technology these days…

 

JoeysGal - Of course I care! Half the reason I check my email each day is to see if mm.org has informed me of an update from you! UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE!! -coughs- erm yes, and thanks for another wonderful review! (and for hitting send twice so you spammed it) -huggles-

 

Black Angel Reaper - Thanks for the review! Very glad you like it ^^ Despite clicheness… Yay for gashapon! I got some when I was in Japan too… but at the time I wasn't into anime so I just got some generic ones, and I think some Disney ones as well…

 

Dragonlady222 - I hope they do too. We shall have to see. Thanks again for the double review!

 

Aknkkskd - LOTS of k's. Yes. I see. It's some sort of acroynmnmnmn you kids are using these days. I have never understood America. O.o But kudos! Glad you liked it! Keep reading~

 

 

Disclaimer: Not only do I not own Yu-gi-oh! (property of Kazuki Takahashi) but I also do not own Nintendo, Zelda, Monopoly, Starbucks, all day and night deli's, Pizza, Ryou's stripy shirt, a can of coke, two dollars and ten cents, a car, a ball, a cat, red gloves, a helicopter, some chocolate, or a bus ticket.

 

***

 

“Well why don't you just take my heart and rip it out and throw it on the floor and stamp on it then!? Because that's what it feels like you're doing!”

“Wait… you don't understand!”

“Neither do I… what's this chick's problem?”

“Shhhhh!”

“Oh, I understand just fine. You're in love with her!”

“No! Listen to me, I love you.”

“LIAR!”

“He probably is you know. Look at the way he looks all evil and stuff! …Definitely screwing around with the other chick.”

“I said SHHHH!!”

“Melissa, please!”

“…Just tell me one thing; why her? What makes her better than me?”

“Maybe she has bigger breasts?”

“Jou! Shut up!”

“What? She probably does.”

Anzu hit him with a pillow.

“I… I can't tell you.”

“You always say that! But why can't you? John, tell me… tell me why it is… who is she, really?”

Anzu gasped mid-attack; she moved and clutched the pillow tightly to her chest instead of using it as a weapon. Her eyes had widened at the pause in conversation, the moment tense. The dramatic music was proof of that.

“What's with the gasping?”

“Melanie is Melissa's sister. The one she thinks John has been seeing. But he's only been interested in finding out more about her because she used to be his wife. Although she died in a car accident last season, and now Melissa is carrying his baby. But she doesn't know that Melanie was also pregnant before she died and that the evil doctor took the embryo out and planted it into Allison's body, so Allison is also carrying John's baby. And now Melanie is back from the dead! And she wants to get rid of her sister for moving in on her territory and marrying John four weeks after her funeral. And only she knows who really died in the accident! Also, John's half-brother Michael thinks that Allison's baby is his, but he's in love with Melissa, so he tried to kill Allison's baby by making her OD and now Allison is in hospital with a coma and Melissa just found out John has been seen talking to some strange woman so she thinks he's cheating on her and is in love with someone else and now she's asking him who it is and so will he tell her about Melanie!?”

“…You know, I think I'm going to get something to eat.”

Anzu didn't move her eyes from the screen whilst Katsuya got up and left her to it. His head was beginning to hurt from the recital.

They had been watching a DVD of one of Anzu's favourite soap operas, which Mai had introduced her to some years before. It was an English TV show, which explained the English names. They needed to watch it with subtitles of course, and had to wait for DVDs to be released with these in Japan. Mai being Mai had downloaded illegal subs of every season months ago upon their actual release, but Anzu being the kind spirited person she was had bought the legal discs when they came out anyway. Today's disc was today's purchase, and she had eagerly explained that she couldn't wait until later to begin watching it. Say, when she wasn't in Jou's home surrounded by male friends who watched for two minutes and then either burst out laughing, into tears, or walked off shaking slightly with their eyes widened in fright.

Katsuya's reaction reflected somewhat a mixture of all three as he went to join Honda in the kitchen. He had excused himself for food but in reality they didn't have any yet. Yugi and Ryou had gone out to get some kind of takeaway. It might have been pizza.

“I commend you. You managed to survive the longest. Here, have a prize.” Honda offered Katsuya half of a biscuit he was currently eating.

“Tempting, but no thanks.” He opened his fridge and peered inside. He was starving, why couldn't fast food be ready just that much faster? He made a noise that was somewhat a cross between a whine, a groan, and a growl, knowing that he probably shouldn't drink the chocolate sauce straight from the bottle. “Maybe if we call them they'll get here quicker?”

Honda looked like he doubted the logic in that, “Uh yeah… maybe.”

The boys exited the kitchen, which was getting cramped with two people as it was. Katsuya didn't have a very big apartment - he was a student, there was no way he could have afforded one. As it was he had to live miles away from his college and workplace just to rent something even this size.

They were still speaking as they re-entered the lounge room, and this earned them a very loud “SHHHH!!!” from Anzu, accompanied by a quick glare.

“But how could that be true, my sister is dead! Are you trying to tell me someone else was killed that night?”

“I'm not sure Melissa… I'm just not sure… Maybe it was Melanie's twin sister Miranda?”

The front door suddenly opened, and voices sounded from that vicinity.

Upon hearing this Katsuya said “Oh thank God!” at the same time as Honda said “Finally!” and both mentally added `Because I don't think I could have taken much more of this.'

They rushed to help with the pizzas. Many boxes had been ordered; when presented with hunger there was seemingly no limit to how much pizza any one of them could devour. And everyone seemed to be hungry tonight.

“Thank you.” Ryou said as Honda took some out of his hands.

“Good timing,” The brunet returned, “The show was just about to take another turn for the spastic.”

“Eh?” Yugi questioned, clearly having forgotten about the soap opera drama that he and Ryou had left them to deal with, as Katsuya took the top most boxes that were threatening to block the smaller duelist's vision.

“Melissa was just wondering whether the man she thinks John is having an affair with is her supposedly dead sister Melanie's twin sister Miranda.”

They stared at him. “Pardon?” Ryou tried after a moment.

Yugi laughed, “I think you've been watching it a little too long Jou!”

Honda was laughing too, “Yeah, anyone would think you were beginning to like that stuff!”

Katsuya glared in annoyance, “No way! I've watched 15 minutes of that show and I can safely say that it is possibly the worst piece of rubbish I have ever seen in my entire life. Honest to God, who makes up that kind of shit? And why on Earth anyone would find it interesting is beyond me.”

“Anzu seems to.” Ryou pointed out.

“Yes but she's a woman; they're weird like that.”

The other three boys nodded in thoughtful agreement.

Katsuya looked over his shoulder back into his lounge room. It was time to end the soapie.

He called out; “Pizza Anzu! You'll have to turn off your kooky show!” as he walked back into the room.

“I can watch and eat at the same time.” She informed him, her eyes barely moving from the TV set whilst he offered her a box. Honda sat down on the couch beside her, and Ryou next to him.

“Oh no.. um.. new house rule: No TV whilst eating.” Katsuya said quickly.

Honda turned to him with a look that asked clearly whether he'd gone insane. Food and TV went together like eggs and bacon. Like ducks and water. Like celebrities and divorce. Most of the time, you couldn't have one without the other!

“Fine.” Anzu smiled and turned the off TV, also stopping her DVD. There was a silence that followed only interrupted by the sounds of Yugi getting himself a drink in the kitchen. Katsuya took a seat opposite them on the floor (his small place didn't exactly come with many lounge type chairs) and looked from the television to the pizza to his friends all sitting there not eating and staring at him as if waiting for him to come to a better decision. Anzu looked somewhat victorious.

“Uh… guys?” Yugi placed a can of soda somewhat tentatively on the coffee table, breaking the silence. He then took a seat on the floor as well.

Finally Katsuya looked at Anzu and frowned, “Okay, rule is: no crappy English soap operas whilst eating.”

She looked a little put-out that they all hadn't taken to her interest as much as she had, but the announcement made them begin eating at least. And since she was just as hungry as the rest of them, she soon moved past the loss of her program. Plus it was only temporary, since as soon as she got home she would most certainly put it back on again and find out what happened next.

Unfortunately (or ironically) there was nothing remotely interesting to watch on TV once they actually turned it on, so (as per usual) they decided to resort to games instead. The Nintendo Wii only ever got played when Anzu was over, since some of the games actually required coordination, and this meant she had the opportunity of upstaging everyone else on a gaming platform. That and, the console was just more fun when other people were around. It had a fantastic interactive element, but it was so much more interesting throwing your arm through a plate glass door whilst other people were there to watch than it was to do so on your own.

Puns at the ridiculous choice of name aside, Katsuya regretted ever splashing out for the Wii. (Although truth be told he had needed to go thirds with Yugi and Honda for it, but they kept it at his house since this was the place they now convened at the most). Beating Twilight Princess was cool once, or even twice, but after that, and the initial marvel at the way the motion sensor was so totally awesome!! then it got old fast.

Once they'd all eaten to their hearts content, they decided to open a board game Ryou had been sent from England by his family. Katsuya couldn't pronounce it properly, but it was spelt “Monopoly”.

Ryou was the only one of them who could speak English perfectly. Anzu was decently aware of how to converse in it; since she still hoped to make it to America one day to study dance she had tried to keep up her language skills. However the other three boys had been forgetting things since they no longer studied it like they had been forced to in high school. Yugi had once said that studying Ancient Egyptian would have been more useful to him.

What this meant was that they all spent a considerable amount of time trying to guess what the rules were, just by looking at the pieces and board rather than tackling the English instructions. Finally, after picking himself off the floor from laughing so much at Honda's inability to properly say “Gaol”, Ryou attempted to explain it to them. He didn't, however, expand on the fact that it was probably odd this version of the game had decided to spell it that way in the first place.

Eventually they picked up on how to start, how to move and how to buy property. They eventually went so far as to actually enjoy playing, mainly by struggling with the English words and laughing over the stupidity of the other language. It had always struck Katsuya as incredibly dumb that one letter in their alphabet could have so many different pronunciations. Honda had always had a slight problem differentiating “a” and “d”.

“It's exactly the same just with a little longer line!” He had cried exasperatedly on many occasions in class.

Ryou found all of this thoroughly amusing. He didn't, however, bring up the fact that most westerners studying Japanese would probably have said similar things about their language. He would have been hit with a sheer wall of rebuttal had he done that.

Katsuya was the first to go bankrupt. Honda didn't spare him numerous jibes at the fact that this was entirely typical. He just took it all in his stride. Anzu began to loose money too, and eventually Honda followed. It became clear that although Ryou had bought most of the mortgaged property, Yugi still had the edge. Eventually the white haired boy forfeited.

Ryou declared that he should be getting home, and most other people murmured something in the way of agreement. Katsuya threw them all goodbyes as they left, then turned to where Anzu was still getting her DVD out of the machine, the last to leave the house.

He started stacking plates as she put the disc back into its case with an audible `click'. Then she stood, shouldering her bag, but hesitated before leaving. He looked up at her questioningly.

“Um, Jou… When we cleared the stuff off the coffee table to play that board game, I found this.” She produced a tiny white dragon from behind a couch pillow, where she had obviously stashed it upon finding it earlier, and held it out so he could see.

Katsuya immediately went bright red, unable to even will himself to hide his emotions for once; he'd completely forgotten about the little charm.

“Uhh…”

She smiled at his reaction, clearly amused. “What's going on, eh Jonouchi?”

“Nothing!” He replied immediately. “I didn't even realize that was there. Niita gave it to me.” He added the last bit hastily.

“Oh? Who's Niita?”

“She's Kaiba's PA. She's… weird.”

“Right.” Said Anzu, dismissing the woman immediately, “What I'm more interested in is why she gave this particular charm to you.”

Katsuya sighed heavily, he didn't think there was any way to escape retelling the story now. It wasn't that big of a deal anyway right? Although, he was extremely grateful she had decided to hide it and question him about it once his friends had left. If Honda had seen it there might have been no end to the pay outs he would have received.

Thus, he spilled the story of last Saturday.

“I see. And you just decided you might want to keep it then did you?”

“No honestly, I completely forgot it was there until now.”

She raised her eyebrow disbelievingly.

“Really!”

She turned from the charm she was holding back to him, “What do you think of Kaiba?” She asked seriously, having since already sat back down on the couch, bag beside her feet. He was still sitting opposite on the floor across the table.

Katsuya shrugged, “He's a prat.”

“You don't sound very convincing.” Anzu pointed out.

He frowned, knowing she was probably right. He sighed; well, he'd just spilled one confession so what could it hurt to spill another. “I don't know. I don't think I hate him. It's weird.”

“Mmmm?” She tried to press him to continue. She was well aware how little boys liked to share their emotions, and how well they handled talking about them out loud. She felt as if she had been blessed with just this much already.

He debated telling her the truth about the `closet incident', but for the moment just couldn't bring himself to do so; “Like, he doesn't seem that much of a wanker anymore or something. When he first took over Nobita's job I thought he would fire me for sure, or at least make my life a living hell. But he didn't do either of those things. He didn't even fire me after I bashed his head against the storage shelves!”

Anzu nodded in agreement, and showing that she was paying close attention to what he had to say.

“But he's still Kaiba. He's still arrogant and glares at everyone and looks like if he smiled it would cause him immense amounts of pain. I dunno… he just seems… less so of that? He's, you know, tolerable.” Katsuya stopped, not quite sure he was explaining it properly and not sure at all of how to continue.

Anzu quickly took the sign and jumped in, “Wow. I never thought I'd hear you say something like that.”

He rolled his eyes, “Shut up. This doesn't mean I actually like him or that we're friends or anything. I just don't hate him. There's a difference.”

She smiled, “Yes but coming from you that's significant.”

Why did he suddenly feel like she was his therapist?

“Ah well,” sensing that this conversation should be continued at a later date, Anzu stood up; “That still doesn't really explain why you're holding on to a cute little Blues-Eyes White Dragon, but I'll let that slide for today.” She grinned at him and headed towards the door, placing the figure on his counter as she passed.

“Uh… yeah… about that. Thanks for not, you know, bringing it up around Yugi and them.” He said, following her a little way.

“No problem. I figured that wouldn't have put you in a good position if it had been something a little more significant.” She winked, still smiling.

Katsuya gaped, was she implying…

“Relax Jou! Your secret is safe with me.” She teased, laughing at his reaction.

“But I'm not… it's not…” He spluttered.

“Ha ha, I know. Don't worry, even if it was I wouldn't care. You're my friend no matter what you do.” Then she smiled genuinely, reassuringly. And he found himself smiling appreciatively back.

“See you later then!” She said, and then turned and left. The door closed loudly behind her and Katsuya just stood there for a moment thinking. Eventually he turned and let his eyes travel to the tiny figure left on the counter. He glared at it in frustration, but finally, after what seemed like a long time, he pocketed it. Then he began the laborious clean up process that always ensued after having lots of people over. Luckily with pizza, there weren't many dishes.

 

***

 

“So this copy's mine?”

“That's what I said.”

“I'll just get to work reading it now then, shall I?”

“That's… what I said.”

It was a commonly accepted truth that Monday was one of the worst days of the week. Fact was, it followed Sunday and came before Tuesday, and it was the first of, in Seto's case anyway, six working days to follow. Being the first, Monday came with the somewhat depressing thought that your weekly burden was only just beginning, and that there was so much more to come. At least by Wednesday or Thursday one could be comforted by the knowledge that you were over half way there… Not long now. On Monday, however, you could not think any of these things; rather you were stuck with the disgruntling information that it was no longer Sunday, and that yes, you were back in this wretched place once again.

This Monday was particularly aggravating. Currently the main cause of this was sitting opposite him reading. And, it was perfectly fine to read. But there was something somewhat unnerving about having a business acquaintance sit at your desk and just read in silence, when you were trying to get on with your own work. Yahada wasn't watching him or anything, he was fully engrossed in the report Seto had given him to look over, but he hadn't expected the man to sit there on the spot and begin it. Not only did he have his own office on a different floor, but there was even a break room on this one, or if he really couldn't have survived a room smelling of spilt microwavable soup, then there were a couple of business lounge chairs set up in the CEO's office that at least would have taken him out of Seto's immediate line of sight.

Feeling that it would only be more awkward to mention it the longer the minutes ticked on, he interrupted the silence with; “Uh… you can take your time with that. Perhaps you would like to read it later?”

Luckily, Yahada was one to pick up on subtle hints, “Oh of course! Sorry. I'll…” He closed his open report and made to stand up, when the door to Seto's office opened.

Niita bounced inside. “How're things going?” She had a habit of checking up on him at regular intervals.

Seto ignored the question, “Is there something you need?”

Apparently she, in turn, was already ignoring him also. “Oh! Hello, sorry I didn't realize you were in here.” She smiled apologetically at Yahada.

The taller man blinked, “I passed you on the way in.”

“Oh, of course.” She looked a bit doubtful however. “I'm Niita.”

Yahada inclined his head, “Yahada Youshi.”

“And I'm Kaiba Seto. I'm so glad that we had this chat.”

Niita turned to him, looking like she really wanted to poke her tongue out.

Yahada finally stood up, “I'll get back to you about this later, Kaiba-san.” He waved the report a little in indication.

“Oh, where are you going?” Niita sounded slightly whiney, like she didn't want him to go and leave her all alone.

“Uh… to my office?” Yahada, at full height, was actually quite tall. She had raise her chin considerably to look him in the eye; she was slightly shorter than Jonouchi after all.

“Oh, okay. Well, come back and visit anytime!”

“This isn't your house, Niita!”

“In fact, come to my birthday party at the office this Friday! I'm afraid I'm out of invitations but you can take a look at Kaiba's.”

Seto groaned, not that stupid party again. He didn't want to imagine how much mess that was going to cause.

“Um, I'll think about it.” He smiled at her, nodded to Kaiba, then left, closing the office door behind him.

There was a moment of silence.

“He seems nice, doesn't he?”

Seto resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “I don't know. Now do you actually have anything to tell me or do you just enjoy wasting my time?”

Niita looked like she didn't understand the question, “Huh?”

He glared, “Why did you come in?”

“Oh… um… Just to see how things were going.”

“They're fine. The door is over there.” Seto pointed at the more than obvious door. Maybe he would install a green flashing `exit' sign, just for further clarification.

Never one to miss an opportunity to use her teaching degree skills, and to right the actions of others, Niita replied; “You know, if you started being a little nicer to people, you might find that not everyone is as heartless and evil as you seem to think they are. You also might find that you get a positive response.” She added a little `humph' for emphasis.

“You sound like a text book. Thank you so much for the information, now will you please leave? I have work to do.”

Niita sniffed, but did leave after that, closing the door a little more violently than usual.

Seto tapped his keyboard in agitation, he disliked Niita at the best of times, but when she decided he was due for another round of “telling you how to better correct your behavior” it began to annoy him even more. He didn't enjoy other people informing him of how wrong he was. He was well aware of how he treated other people. Other people annoyed him in their pettiness and irksome behavior. If he didn't like someone he wasn't going to simply be polite around them just so that they wouldn't bite back. He preferred to let them know how he felt, so that they could get out of his way and he could move on past.

He couldn't stand useless people.

This was one of the reasons he disliked Niita. Most of what she did held no purpose. She wasted time and her actions didn't always have a point. Seto was all about production, about getting things done. If something broke you fixed it so it could work again, or if it couldn't be fixed you got a new one.

Then there was upgrading. Sometimes, a tool simply outlived its usefulness. Newer models took the place of old ones, which eventually ceased to be stocked, and finally all broke and were dumped into waste, ultimately either melted down or decomposed.

Vaguely, this was the theory of evolution, and something Seto believed in. Someone had once explained it to him using the example of the giraffe. He couldn't remember the exact wording, and also having no real intimate knowledge of that particular species, but it went something like this:

The food of giraffes can be found in tall African trees. To begin with, giraffes didn't have such long necks, but thousands of years ago when all giraffes had shorter necks, they found they had trouble reaching the leaves of the high trees. As with any species, not all giraffes were the same. Some had slightly longer necks than others. These giraffes were able to reach the food more easily. Eventually, the shorter giraffes died of hunger, and the taller necked giraffes multiplied, and passed on the taller neck genes. But having so many slightly taller giraffes cut gravely into the leaves available on the lower branches of the tree. Eventually, the only leaves left were on the higher branches. The process began again. The slightly shorter giraffes died out, and the taller ones survived. They passed on their DNA, and giraffes' necks got longer and longer as evolution continued. The idea was that life, even as it is today, is still evolving. Our children weren't exactly likely to have elongated necks, the process took thousands of years to cycle. But maybe one day humans would change again. It was the survival of the fittest, and only the tallest giraffes were left.

Seto took a moment to try and remember why the hell he was thinking about all of this. Oh yes. Niita. Maybe she had simply outlived her usefulness too?

Okay that made him sound like some sort of mafia boss, ready to give the okay for someone to whack her off (which, as he entertained the idea for a moment, wasn't such a bad one). Certainly, however, once Yahada took over at Shichi he was determined to do something about her. It wasn't like him at all to begin with to keep on an employee he a. didn't like, and that b. could be entirely unreliable a lot of the time. He had just been snowed under with the take over and then the decline in production. He hadn't had time to work on any new game designs, anything that was to do with what he actually liked about this job. Because, believe it or not, there were aspects of it he enjoyed. So he was definitely going to have to fire her or… something… as soon as he had time to interview a replacement.

That confirmed, Seto found he almost couldn't wait for Yahada to take over. Not switching office's would be great but not having Niita around would be like winning a brand new car.

For any normal human being at least, Seto could buy any car he wanted. Hell, he owned a jet. Enough said.

But it would make him happier, and that was the point.

He finally turned back to his own work with renewed enthusiasm, it may have been Monday, but soon it would be Tuesday. Followed by Wednesday, which was almost Thursday. Which was almost the end of the week.

See, he found himself mentally thinking in Niita's direction, I can be a positive person.

 

Back-to-work-Tuesday came all too quickly for Katsuya's liking. He was starting to mildly feel the classic pressure of the `job, uni, social life' combination. Namely, that it was hard to juggle all three and not have at least one of them come crashing down onto your head. He felt that so far he wasn't doing too badly with this, after all he'd been working at Shichi Corporation for… uh… how many months now? 3? 2? 4? The timeline was getting a little blurry as the plot progressed.

Today's shift was particularly cold and boring. The central heating was being repaired so walking into the office presented a strange picture of most of the workers wearing their outdoor coats. They had set up a few stand heaters throughout the floor at strategic places, however unless ones desk happened to be situated right next to one, the effect wasn't really felt by the general population. The largest of these was located in the break room; this saw a dramatic 425% increase in staff breaks throughout the day, and a 239% increase in dawdling in front of it before getting back to their desks. Most people were too cold to engage in long conversation, friends greeted each other with a sneeze and a nod and then walked on by. It was the late autumn season, almost but not quite definably winter weather, so people were now developing colds from the change in temperature. The flu period would pass once it hit December at which point peoples noses would be too frozen to even consider the possibility of contracting something.

All in all this was adding up to be a particularly boring way to spend the afternoon. There was less enthusiasm about than a nerd at a football match. Katsuya found himself, having no defined workspace of his own to speak of, running between heaters and pausing briefly by them on his way from room to room. Naturally, Seto had his own heater in his own office. Oh the joys of being able to boss people around and order them to hand over their heaters. Upon commandeering the appliance currently warming up his office, he had considered using the phrase; “The heater or your life.” but felt it would have lost some of its appropriateness since he had not also been holding a gun.

With the lack of industrialized room heating, and his darting between `hot spots', Katsuya found himself back in Kaiba's office on more occasions than necessary that shift. At one point he had shamefully gone back to make sure he had received the right files, knowing fully well he had, but had instead used it as an opportunity to de-frost his hands. This time, however, his excuse was a little more legitimate, as he needed to hand the CEO some photocopying.

Katsuya entered without knocking, as usual, to find the taller man deep in thought instead of typing hastily or writing fervently as was the more common occurrence. He didn't even look up as the blond walked in.

“You and the wall having another staring contest?” Katsuya prodded, unable to let some of his grin escape his lips. When Seto didn't reply or even blink in acknowledgement of the other, Katsuya continued; “'Coz, you know, as hard as you try, the wall beats you every time. Guess that's another competition you can't win at.” He said in an off-handed kind of way, hoping it would irk the brunet enough to snap him out of his inner stare-provoking thoughts and back to the present.

It worked.

Kaiba shot him a glare, “It's called thinking.”

“You what?” Katsuya blinked innocently, maintaining his small grin.

Seto raised an eyebrow and barely repressed a smirk, “I'm aware the term is foreign to you.”

Katsuya bit back numerous swear words and took a deep breath before continuing, determined not to walk down that path that was sure to get him fired; “So what were you thinking about then, that had the wall begging for mercy?”

An essential part of the plan was to maintain conversation. Without it there was no reason to be in there, and with no reason to be in there he couldn't continue to bask in the supplied heat.

He saw Kaiba's eyes shift unwittingly back to check his computer. Katsuya followed his gaze and took a few more steps forwards to get a better look.

“What's that?” He asked, pointing to the pictures displayed on the screen.

“Work.” Seto replied curtly.

“Looks more like pictures of a theme park to me.”

“Perhaps you have forgotten what kind of business I actually run?”

“Oh yeah.” Katsuya mocked a thoughtful face and emphasized the `e', dragging the word out. When he had first met Kaiba, Katsuya recalled some of his initial thoughts being `Damn, must be fun to have a job playing video games all day long'. Now, years later, when he could finally see what it was the CEO actually did (and also the kind of person he actually was) he found he envied him a lot less. Because, you know, he didn't really sit around all day testing games. Or at least he didn't when Katsuya was around. Who knew what that man got up to at his other office.

“Maybe you should call it `KaibaTopia.'“

Seto rolled his eyes, “Maybe I should make you head of the Creative Development Department?”

“No seriously, and you could have these little talking Kaiba-dolls that you pull a string on the back and they say `Get out of my way, inferior human being.'”

“I'll be sure to make the suggestion, though I doubt it will take off.”

“It'll be huge!”

Seto found that by this stage his mouth had found its way into somewhat of an amused smirk. Who knew that there was a more entertaining way to converse with Jonouchi than to simply berate him for being an incompetent mutt?

Katsuya was grinning broadly in a sarcastic way whilst making the insane suggestions, although he could picture a kind of Kaiba talking doll that dished insults with every activation.

“I think the general population would probably disagree with you.”

“Oh yeah? We'll see. They'll sell faster than ice cream in July.”

“Interesting analogy. You should join marketing as well.”

Katsuya made a noise that sounded like `pfffft'. “Unfortunately not everyone can appreciate my creative genius.”

Seto turned back to his screen, “I think it's safe to say that it's better left untapped.”

Katsuya shrugged, and made to leave the office; he never expected to stay long, his presence not exactly welcome as far as he was aware, simply long enough to let the heat reach his bones, then it was out into the colder part of the floor again until he felt the need for another break. “Kaiba Corps. loss, really.”

Seto averted his eyes from his work to see him go. For once he didn't feel the need to have the last word, a reply really wasn't necessary. This was understandably an odd occurrence. Unfortunately, the incident was just adding more material to his folder containing suspicions about how he was beginning to feel towards the shorter blond boy. Today's striking revelation that he actually enjoyed talking to Jonouchi when the two were having a civil conversation was first off the top for contemplation. He began to hypothesize reasons for this. He wondered, for example, why he had never felt so inclined into dialogue in the past. He thought maybe it was because he had never given such an action a chance. When they had met it had always been at a dueling event, and so naturally Seto would always have been distracted by this fact. Also, he had forever (and still did) considered Jonouchi to be a somewhat second-rate duelist, compared to himself, and Yugi who was the only person he acknowledged as a rival. This meant that he had paid him little attention at all, although he certainly tried to make his presence very obvious. Now that they were working together, however, Seto felt the situation had changed completely. His earliest reservations at the fact had yet to be proved. Instead, the boy turned out to be a reliable worker. He had amazed the CEO by actually being useful for once, and giving him little opportunity to criticize. It in turn forced him to speak and associate with the blond in a less distracting situation. Essentially, it gave him a chance to actually get to know Jonouchi, and discover that maybe he wasn't as much of a pathetic, irritating dog after all. Which, rounding off back to today's deliberations, allowed him to discover that he now held an interest in what the boy had to say. He hadn't spent any real time with him, but theorized that if he had, that wouldn't have been so bad either.

That accepted, all that was left to do now was to work out all the other things he suspected he might have been beginning to feel towards his assistant. However those he wasn't inclined to touch with a ten foot pole, so he figured he'd done enough self-analysis for one day, and left it to continue to work on his project.

 

***

 

As was tradition, Friday came around after Thursday had finished. Katsuya didn't normally work on this day, and had been planning to use it as the perfect excuse to escape having to attend Niita's office birthday party. (Seto didn't have as much luck in this respect as he normally spent Friday's at his actual office, so would be there anyway when it started - he planned on leaving as soon as he was no longer within eyesight of the bleach-haired nail-polish-wearing sorry excuse for a personal assistant.) Unfortunately, birthday girl had made one of her customary check-up calls the previous afternoon whilst Katsuya had been in Kaiba's office. She had heard him through the phone and it had reminded her to reminded Seto to remind Jou that he should be coming, in fact she expected him to be coming to her party tomorrow. A pained expression had crossed his face as he had realized what the CEO was talking to her about.

Seto was retelling it in the way people tend to do so over the phone. The kind of: “Oh? Strawberries you say? Yes I'll get someone to pick them up for you at the fruit shop on the corner with the 24/7 and the Starbucks.” This was done so that another person who was in the room could understand what the person on the phone and whomever was on the other end in another location were talking about. Except in this case what Seto actually said was something more along the lines of: “Oh? Birthday party you say? Why yes, Jonouchi-kun is coming! He can't wait. He's practically jumping up and down with excitement.” Although naturally he said it in a less chirpy and more Seto-like way.

Katsuya wasn't, in fact, jumping up and down. He was waving his hands franticly to mutely plead for Kaiba to tell her he couldn't make it, but when the taller man reinterpreted this to her with the opposite meaning he quickly stopped and started mouthing death threats instead. As Seto was hanging up Jou launched a pen at his head, then quickly left the room muttering loudly about getting him back for this.

And so he had to make his own way to the party that night, and spent the whole trip wondering why on Earth he was bothering. For starters he had been forced into this by other people, and he had all the right to say no, and secondly he honestly couldn't exactly call Niita a friend. He'd met her on two occasions, be they recent or not, and found her to be an extremely odd and slightly irritating person. He blamed this, once again, on his `good-guy' nature. Since becoming friends with Yugi he had developed into a whole lot more charitable person. He just couldn't say no. Maybe if he'd actually had some other prior commitments tonight… but he did not, and so found himself stepping out of an elevator and deciding within ten seconds that he would find the first excuse to leave that became available to him.

He'd only been here once before, and honestly now it didn't look very different. It was still the same office, just with bad music playing. He'd heard these things usually ended up down the road at a bar somewhere, having an “office party” was probably just a handy excuse to have somewhere to convene, or a handy excuse to trash the place.

The music was coming from his left, so he followed it to its source. This, he presumed, must have been the break room. Someone had gone to a decent amount of effort, and Katsuya made the assumption that it might have been Niita herself. Not only because most of the balloons were red and pink, but because everything else together suggested such a level of uncoordinated colour that only really rivaled a two year old with a new set of crayons.

A few people bothered to glance his way as he walked in. Many of the responses to his presence were the same as Sasaki's had been when she had first laid eyes on him. That was, they seemed slightly astonished that someone like him was somewhere like here. Many of them suspected he might have been a new cleaner.

Katsuya had sternly not bothered to dress up. He supposed even some of these people would look slightly more humane if they had not all attended coming straight from work. So they were, therefore, all still in their `work clothes', which consisted of a sea of dark blacks, browns, and grays. Jou was wearing jeans and a dark green jacket, so blended nicely with the decorations but not with the people. He was used to it, however, being blond amongst a genetically black-haired race of people had its disadvantages. Then again, so did having tri-coloured, spiky hair that was twice the size of your own head. At least he didn't envy Yugi in that area.

He scanned the sea of heads trying to find the person who had actually asked him to come. Then, as if by some sixth sense Niita suddenly burst out of the crowd before him. Looking up straight at him her smile instantly became broader.

Katsuya noted, with some disdain, that she appeared to already be slightly inebriated, “Jonouchi-kuuun!” She threw her arms around his neck and gave him a tight hug. He recoiled automatically, trying to back away from the onslaught. Luckily she let him go after a moment and took a step back. “I'm glad you came! I don't really know you very well but I think you'd be a nice person if I did.” She nodded in what she clearly considered to be a thoughtful way.

“Have a drink.” She suggested as an afterthought, then proceeded to grab his arm and pull him in the direction of food and a cooler presumably containing alcohol. She waved and smiled and greeted every single person she passed. Katsuya noticed the reactions from them were quite mixed. Some threw her looks which suggested they would have been happier addressed by a person trying to steal their wallet, others replied enthusiastically and smiled back.

Getting lost in the middle of a crowd of people he didn't know was not what he had hoped to do. Then again, he had no idea what he had hoped to do. He also noted, passing the employees, that he was easily the youngest person there. Niita herself was young, but still beat him by at least five or six years.

His thoughts were interrupted abruptly by Niita thrusting a bottle of something into his chest. He caught it before it could fall to the ground, she obviously hadn't been inclined to keep holding it until he took it. In fact, her attention had already switched to someone else.

She's even more absent-minded when tipsy. Katsuya thought, not even glancing at what she'd given him, and putting it on the table behind him. Sometimes, drinking led to a feeling of relaxation. Relaxation led to being okay with whatever situation was presented. He did not want to be okay with being here. Even if the alcohol was currently free. It was an inhibitor. And it would stop him from carrying out his plan of leaving as soon as possible. It also inhibited other things, like rational thought, driving, hand-nose coordination, the ability to sit straight on bar stools, motor skills, judgment of the attractiveness of a person of the opposite sex, knowledge of the periodic table, and why petrol and lighters shouldn't be friends. It also took down the wall that normally reminded you that you were a bad singer and don't dance well.

It did, however, enhance your ability to sleep on the floor.

Katsuya wasn't keen to entertain any of that right now.

“Not drinking tonight?” Everyone just kept interrupting his brain it seemed. He turned to see Yahada smiling down at him. Jou couldn't help but return it; he was a nice guy, and it was infectious. He had discovered this having to show the taller man around the office for the afternoon. He apparently had the patience of a rock, putting up with Katsuya's lame attempts to find things to do to give Kaiba time to finish his work for the whole afternoon without complaining once. Yahada was just an all around nice guy, even if he did have a slightly annoying quality of repeating everything you said on occasions.

“Oh no. Um, I uh… don't know how long I'll be staying.” Katsuya's voice took a dive in pitch and the reply ended up as more of a whisper.

Thankfully, Yahada laughed, “Yes, I'm not quite sure how she managed to rope me into coming either. Perhaps it is simply because she is abnormally enthusiastic about these things?”

Katsuya shrugged. Niita was not a person he wanted to analyze.

Yahada took a contemplative glance at him, and seemed to come to a private conclusion. “I was just handing back some reports to Kaiba-san, who seems to still be in his office. I think someone should go and drag him out for the party. He wouldn't want to miss having some birthday cake.”

“They have cake?”

It was Yahada's turn to shrug. “I hear she came close to hiring a clown. I'm pretty sure there's going to be cake.”

“Hmmm… well, you're right. Cake is important. I'll go and see how he's doing.”

“Okay.” Yahada gave him a nod, and then they both walked off in separate directions. Katsuya figured going to harass Kaiba was probably going to be more interesting than trying to strike up a conversation with whoever else was attending the party. He was pretty sure suits like them wouldn't be interested in video games.

It was easy to navigate his way back to Kaiba's office. What he had discovered of the floor so far wasn't big enough to merit getting lost in. He hovered in indecision for a moment in front of the door, unsure of whether to knock or just barge on in like he did at Shichi. At last he decided to open the door, and then knock on it.

Kaiba appeared to be getting ready to leave, although he did, however, pause and look up as Katsuya walked in.

“Oh, it's you.” Seto said with slightly more enthusiasm than a person discovering gum under their desk.

“Yes me. Don't forget, you were the one who said I was coming to this thing. So are you ready to emerge and receive a birthday hug from Niita?”

“I'd rather be hugged by Boa Constrictor.”

Katsuya rolled his eyes, “Well, y'anno, some of us didn't even have a choice.”

Seto was packing away his things, moving around the room to find various papers and folders and, from what Katsuya could see, might have been a hole puncher.

“My pity for you knows no bounds.” Seto replied monotonously, no longer bothering to maintain eye contact, since it inhibited him from carrying on with his task.

“Yeah yeah. Anyway, are you coming out for this party or not?”

“No, I'm leaving now.”

“Hey! You made me come all the way over here for this stupid thing!”

“Jonouchi, no one made you come here. This was an act of your own free will.”

“You agreed to it on the phone when I was telling you not to.”

“If you really hadn't wanted to come, you would have called her back and apologized for yourself. You can't let other people make your decisions for you. Are you really that pathetic still?”

Katsuya glared. “No.”

“Good then.” Seto picked up his briefcase and headed towards the door.

“Wait… hey… that's not the point!” Katsuya protested, following him out. Seto waited for him to leave the office before turning around to shut and lock it. An idea passed through Katsuya's mind, and by the time the CEO had made sure the only way to get in now was via battering ram, the blond had disappeared. He actually wondered where he had gotten to, but dismissed the thoughts as he reminded himself he needed to leave before Niita or any of her comrades could spot him.

Coat swishing in a way that laughed in the face of gravity, Seto strode down past the other empty offices and towards the elevators. He'd almost made it when he heard that dreaded voice halt him. It literally made him wince. If he had been much younger, and not as insanely rich, he might have felt somewhat like a child with their hand in the cookie jar. Caught, just as he was about to escape.

He turned hesitantly to see Niita with her hands on her hips, leaning forwards slightly in a dramatic pouting pose. He noticed a half empty bottle of some generic brand of vodka mix in the hand leaning on her left hip. And there smirking stood Jonouchi, who, it was now apparent, had raced off to find her.

Seto was not a man to back down from his problems. He closed the distance between them and made sure to look as cynically as possible upon what was before him.

“You weren't thinking of leaving, were you Kaiba?” Niita asked in the kind of way that implied she clearly thought he was.

“Actually, I wa…” Jonouchi elbowed him squarely in the ribs. Seto coughed, and then managed to spare him a deathly glare. Katsuya grinned back. Niita didn't say anything, but looked like she approved.

“Nope, he was just coming to see you to wish you Happy Birthday. What kind of a boss would he be if he didn't make an appearance at the party of his favourite personal assistant?” The shorter man told her, enjoying watching Kaiba's shocked reaction.

Accepting this as fact instead of the incredibly obvious lie that it was, Niita broke into an immense smile; “Aww, thank you!” And then, just like Katsuya, she threw her arms around the CEO's neck and hugged him.

Seto looked almost like she had been a Boa Constrictor. He wasted no time in pushing her off of him. Again, she didn't seem deterred by this one bit.

“He also heard there was cake.” Katsuya said pointedly.

“Oh yes! The cake! Let's have that now!” She turned immediately and headed back into the room where the rest of the party goers were.

As soon as she could no longer see them Seto made to leave again.

“Oh no.” Katsuya grabbed his right arm rather forcefully and steered him in the direction of the party - if he had to be here, so did Kaiba. He was rather surprised, however, that the CEO didn't protest to this all that much. Seto was stuck with concluding that had it been any other person holding on to him, he would have.

Like the hugs, and the miss-matched decorations, and Niita's particularly shrill laugh when drinking, the cake ceremony was painful. She first attempted to rouse people to sing, but soon gave up on the idea after shouts of “Just cut the bloody cake already!” could be heard from multiple individuals in the crowd. Then, as it turned out, there wasn't even enough to go around. Seto received a piece because he was head of the company, they feared a termination sentence if he did not. Katsuya missed out, though he tried to remind himself that he could find something else to eat.

Niita finished handing her boss his piece and apologizing to Jou for not having enough for him too, when Seto announced that his driver was waiting, that he hated to skip out on her party like this, and that he hoped next year she could warn him of the impending date in advance so he could book a flight to England.

Katsuya viewed this as what could be one of the few (certainly the earliest) excuses to leave, and immediately grasped at it.

“I'm sorry, I have to go too.”

Niita turned her hazy gaze upon him questioningly, “Why? Where are you going?”

“Home,” He admitted, “But …ah… Kaiba offered to give me a lift so...” Seto raised his eyebrow but didn't say anything.

“Oh I see.” Niita winked at him. Katsuya rolled his eyes mentally, next time he spoke to her and she wasn't on the way to being drunk, he would really have to set her straight about all of that.

He shook his head anyway, to try and dissuade her from those thoughts. “It's not that…”

“Anyway,” Seto interrupted smoothly, “We have to get going.”

Let her think what she wants to, she'll have forgotten he was even here by tomorrow. The CEO nodded curtly his goodbye, and then wasted no more time in carrying it out. He heard Jonouchi say a farewell before following him.

You didn't notice how quiet it was in the halls until you had entered the room with thumping music and exited it again. Seto pressed the “down” button on the elevator and took a step back, waiting patiently for it to arrive. The blond came to stand beside him.

“Uh, thanks.”

The CEO gave him a sidelong glance, “I'm not actually going to give you a lift home.”

“Of course not,” Katsuya snorted, “I meant for just rolling with it and letting me have my excuse to leave.”

There was a “ding”, and Seto chose not to reply, they entered the lift together in silence instead. It was a long way to the bottom of the tower. Well, as compared to normal buildings which certainly didn't contain as many floors as Kaiba Corp. did. It was the tallest structure in all of Domino City, after all. He was carrying his briefcase in one hand, and the cake in a handy takeaway box in his other. Seto noticed Jonouchi was eyeing this rather hungrily. Even though he was hardly a master chef himself, Katsuya had a taste for many kinds of foods. Cake was sugary, sometimes creamy, sometimes chocolatey, and usually tasty. This one had looked like it was a mixture of all of these attributes. He was mildly disappointed that he hadn't gotten any.

His face must have reflected his trail of thought, because Kaiba suddenly said; “You can have it if you want. I'll only throw it out anyway.”

Katsuya grinned, “You on a diet or something?”

Seto, now looking straight ahead, rolled his eyes; “No, I'm just not hungry. I had a business meeting over lunch. The restaurant served large meals.”

“Oh.” Katsuya said, taking the cake that was being offered.

“Besides,” The CEO said in a slightly lower voice, as if to himself, “I hardly need to go on a diet.”

Before he even realized he was doing it, Katsuya was stealing a glance at the other man to confirm this. Kaiba was right; he really didn't need to lose any weight. It was slightly difficult to tell with the jacket, but as Katsuya's eyes trailed from his face, down his chest, to his torso, he realized he definitely agreed with the statement. The brunet might have even been toned, but he couldn't tell with all those clothes in the way.

Suddenly realizing where that thought was headed, and how far down his eyes had actually gone, Katsuya turned away so quickly he could swear his neck cracked. He thought his cheeks might have been scarlet, and thanked the Lord it was night time and the lighting in the elevator was dim.

“Yeah. Um, thanks, for the cake.”

Shit, how many more times was he going to stutter out a thank you tonight? He sighed, maybe it wasn't such a bad thing. It's not like Kaiba was flinging it back at him like normal or anything. In fact, as far as Kaiba's went, he was being quite pleasant. Sure, he wasn't eccentrically cheerful like Yugi, or laughed as much as Honda, but he had his own sarcastic quality that Katsuya found he was beginning to like.

Damn, another case of bizarre.

The lift clunked to a stop, and the doors opened with another “ding”. Seto didn't reply again, and they stepped out in silence. He nodded at the man behind the security desk who waved and said “Have a good night Kaiba-sama.”

Motion-sensored sliding doors opened at the entrance to the building, and Seto frowned when he couldn't see his car already there. He voiced as much, and then muttered something about calling his driver. He flipped out his cell phone and dialed.

Katsuya thought that it had gotten colder since he had last been out here. He pulled his jacket more tightly around him and automatically tuned out Kaiba's conversation with his chauffer. He wasn't sure whether he should just leave, or do the polite thing and wait around until the car came, so Kaiba wouldn't have to stand there by himself.

They stood under what technically passed as a verandah. Although the term itself brought images of a house to mind. So when tiny pieces of white started to fall, Katsuya couldn't feel them.

Ah, so that's why it's suddenly colder. Like some other people who had grown up in a country where it snowed every winter, Jou couldn't always see the fascination cold-deprived continents had with it. It was freezing, wet, caused traffic jams and major accidents, got in your eyes and hair and the temperatures needed to maintain it forced you to wear six layers of clothing to bed. Snow did have its uses; ice-skating was fun for those who could do it without falling on their asses every three metres, skiing was also fun for those who could do it without befalling the same consequences. Then there were snowball fights, as long as someone hadn't included a surprise rock in their missiles, and, when he had been younger, school closure days when the weather got too extreme. For him, any excuse not to go to school was a good one.

Katsuya also had to admit that the first snow of the season was the most tolerable and the best. Right now, it was just snowing. You could appreciate the fact because you weren't trenching through ankle-deep shoe-destroying wet white … water particles. It actually looked nice against the city backdrop, and the dark sky emphasized the contrasting colour.

He stepped out from under the overhanging roof into the falling weather. He looked up and it caught in his eye lashes and decorated his hair, but he wasn't bothered. It was kind of sappy but he felt he didn't mind walking home in this. May as well get a head start.

“What are you doing?” Kaiba asked, and Katsuya heard him click his phone shut, and then a rustle of his jacket pocket as he put it away.

“Training to be an Olympic sprinter, what does it look like?”

“Just because it starts to snow doesn't mean you have to stand in it.” Seto said, slightly huffily. His driver had apologized and insisted he was on his way and would be there soon. He detested having to wait in the cold.

Jonouchi turned to him and smiled, “Actually I think the first snow is the perfect excuse to do so. In fact, it's more like a mandatory requirement.”

Seto stared. Jou had never really smiled at him before. In recent times he'd gone so far as to laugh, and even smirk in amusement, but a genuine smile was new as far as the brunet was aware. Smiling suited the boy, he decided, it was a lot more attractive than the scowl he normal directed at the CEO. Snow had settled on the blond's nose, and with amusement Seto thought it looked like he'd been eating the cake a little too enthusiastically. It made him look innocent, and cute. The honest smile only made matters worse in this respect. He looked like a picture book, and Seto didn't want to shut it.

His cheeks tinted as he realized something; Jou was attractive, it had just taken a genuine smile for him to finally recognize it.

All of this passed through his mind in only a few seconds however, because as soon as Jonouchi was finished talking he reached forwards once again and pulled on Kaiba's arm to bring him out into the snow. In doing so he forgot to step back at the same time, and so they accidentally crashed together. Katsuya released his arm and laughed, giving another apology and taking a small step backwards.

Seto didn't realize he was staring. He hasn't stopped smiling.

Katsuya tilted his head to the side, “Ha! And now you have snow in your hair.”

The noise seemed to bring Seto slightly back to reality, he gave a small frown; “So it would seem. I hope you're happy.” He reached up to brush some out but couldn't seem to tear his eyes too far away from Jonouchi's face.

“Very.” Then he leaned in again slightly, this time looking at Seto with a critical eye; “You know, you look kinda pale…”

“It's… cold?”

Katsuya mocked a kind of thinking face, “Maybe that bump on your head did more damage than you first thought; only it took awhile for it to show?”

“My head is just fine.”

“I dunno, maybe you have some kind of feverish brain disease?” Katsuya raised his hand presumably to press it to Kaiba's forehead, probably mocking the kind of way a mother checks her children. Truth be told this wasn't exactly an accurate method of judgment. It didn't quite make it, however, Seto found his own hand had come up and stopped it in its movement. He wasn't going to dwell on why.

Katsuya blinked, and turned his gaze to where his wrist was caught; “Wha…Why…?”

“Because…” Seto said, face inches away from Jou's. He knew he was going to regret this in five minutes time, everything told him he was. But he closed the distance and did it anyway, because…

Because you looked cute smiling. This, is entirely your fault. The reasoning was pathetic, he knew, but it would have to suffice.

Katsuya froze, his eyes wide with shock. Holy crap, Kaiba was kissing him. A boy was kissing him and it was Kaiba and that was wrong. It didn't matter that it felt nice, or that it was chaste and unobtrusive, a boy was kissing him and it was Kaiba. Indecision tore him in half and so he didn't try to return it, but didn't push him away either.

After what was probably very little time at all, Seto pulled back. He let Jou's hand slip out of his grip and his own fall back down to his side.

The shorter boy looked slightly dazed, and the thought came unbidden to Seto's mind that at that moment, this actually made him look more attractive.

Oh dear.

Jonouchi was recovering quickly now. His expression changed back to shock, and he took a decisive step backwards. “…th' hell?”

Seto tried to think fast; what was he meant to say? Sorry? Apologize for kissing him? (…Was he even sorry!?) Maybe he should try to convince him the last few minutes were a figment of his imagination? Or maybe he should point behind him and shout “Look over there!” then whilst he was distracted run in the opposite direction?

…That actually didn't sound so bad.

“Um…” He tried, lost.

Jonouchi wasted no time in interrupting whatever it was he might have come up with, “I need to get home.” He didn't wait for a reply, he turned and left, almost running to make it down the street.

It hadn't even been five minutes and Seto regretted it. Although, he was wise enough to realize that the regret stemmed more from the rejection than anything else involved. Because now that he stopped and thought about it, there were other things involved. Jou was a) a person of the same sex, b) a person he had hated for so many years, but most importantly c) his employee. It broke so many rules of conduct it wasn't funny. Technically, Seto thought despairingly, Jonouchi could file for workplace sexual harassment… or something more legal sounding but that essentially meant the same thing, and he might even win. Although against the CEO's lawyers the likelihood dropped by about ninety seven percent.

He sighed. Yep, a very, very, stupid thing to do.

He was going to wonder whether the boy would even come to work ever again, when a car horn beeped. Shocked, he realized he'd been so entirely lost in thought he hadn't even heard his car drive up. Lights glared at him to his right, and after a moment he went over to them.

Seto slid wordlessly into the back seat, though the driver didn't need any to pull away from the curb and out into the traffic. He probably assumed the CEO was still annoyed for his tardiness, but it didn't bother the boy either way. He looked down at the briefcase he was still holding in one hand, to his other one, which was empty, but had held other things that night.

He thought; Tomorrow, I might buy a cake.

 

***

 

A/N: I don't care how cliché the snow was, I love cute moments. You should know this by now.

…

-flees-