Rule Number Nine:
Sometimes, life asks you to pick one of two things.
You just have to go with the one that feels right.
oOo
It felt like an eternity before they pulled away from each other's embrace. Sakura gazed up at the pair of amber eyes that was looking down at her deeply.
"So..." she tried breaking the silence. "What now?"
And she failed miserably.
Syaoran sighed and opened his mouth in attempt to say something; however, rather than hearing words coming out of his mouth, they heard a loud—very loud—scream. Sakura started to panic when she saw Syaoran's date standing in the doorway with a pile of clothes lying on the door beside her feet. The woman seemed pale and looked like she was about to faint any given moment. Sakura didn't blame the woman—she probably would've had the same reaction too if she caught her date inside the dressing room with another woman. Not to mention that he was holding her waist, and she was holding onto him as well.
Yup. Definitely not a sight any woman would want to see.
"L-Li-san?" the woman was so shocked; her voice came out as a quiet squeak.
"Hi," he greeted her casually. Sakura couldn't believe this guy! How could he have been so calm at a time like that? Wasn't he worried at least a slight bit? Apparently, he wasn't. "Wait for me." He bent down to whisper into her ears before walking away with the other woman, who turned to give Sakura a very resentful look.
Sakura stood by the wall and observed quietly as she watched Syaoran talked to the other woman. Judging by the expression on the woman's face, whatever Syaoran was saying to her must have not been so pleasant to hear. Sakura's eyes widened when she saw the woman slapped Syaoran across the face and stormed off angrily, steams trailing behind her.
Syaoran sighed and walked back to where Sakura was standing. "That was a wonderful conversation," he chuckled.
"How can you laugh after that? She just slapped you!"
"It's nothing," he said.
Sakura didn't believe him. "You have a hand mark on your face and you tell me that it's nothing?" she scoffed. "Did it hurt?"
"Will you kiss my boo-boo if I say it did?"
"You are hopeless," she said exasperatedly. Leave it up to Li Syaoran to find a flirty joke out of everything. And she meant everything. It was almost unbelievable.
zZz
Darn it, Sakura!
Think of something to say. It's not that hard. Just open your mouth and say something already damn it!
Sakura was having an internal civil war with herself. One, she hated the awkward silence between them. Two, just the fact that he was sitting beside her on the couch was somewhat... er... disturbing—it wasn't that she didn't want him to sit beside her... it was just disturbing in a completely different way than literal definition of 'disturbing'. And three, he was such a neat eater.
She had no idea why that little fact bothered her, but it did. Just watching him neatly take small, petite bites of his slice of cake aroused the desire inside of her to take the rest of the chocolate cake and shove it down his throat or something. It was a good thing that he was a neat eater—hell, Sakura was pleased to see that, but it made her looked bad. There he was, eating in perfect manners and all that crap—then there was Sakura, whose eating manners shall not be discussed to the public.
Sakura didn't want to know what he thought of her. She was waiting patiently for the 'Boy, you have some appetite' comment to come eventually because that was what most people had said to her in the past. She supposed she was just worried about her image in his eyes, and that was why his 'neat' eating habit annoyed her, because he was just too darn perfect at everything. Typical guys weren't supposed to be neat eaters. Their 'typical' image was to wolf everything down—but Li Syaoran wasn't one of the 'typical' guys. He just had to be one out of the bunch.
Great. I just had to like the oddball in the crowd.
Wait... did she secretly admit in her mind that she liked him? Since when did she decided on that! She didn't remember anything about 'liking' him per se.
Hoeeeee! I am so, so screwed.
Sakura jabbed a forkful of cake and stuffed it into her mouth, hoping it would calm down the thoughts running through her head. Unfortunately, she forgot to do the math. Mix anxiety, nervous syndrome, denial, internal civil war, a mouthful of cake, rushed swallowing and no chewing together and she got one thing: choking.
"Are you okay?" Syaoran looked at her with concern.
She nodded after gulping down a glass of water. "Y-yeah."
Ohh... wonderful. Silence again.
"Pretty good cake, huh?" Sakura wanted to smack herself in the face so bad.
He nodded. "Yeah."
"Yup..."
Sakura, you are truly... positively... absolutely... pathetic.
"What were your plans?" he asked all of a sudden.
"W-what?"
"You seem dressed up," he said. "I know you didn't dress up like that to stalk me."
Sakura groaned. "For the last time, I wasn't stalking you."
"Whatever you say, babe."
"Stop calling me babe!" Sakura was letting the heat get to her head. "I was just walking around."
She was walking around until she decided to check out what he was up to, and then she ditched clubbing to enjoy a nice, relaxing dinner of chocolate cake with her roommate. So technically, she wasn't lying—she was only telling the partial truth. A little white lie was always good, right?
"How did you know that I was in the dressing room?" Sakura decided to ask, still puzzled as to how he even knew that it was her.
"Sakura, I'm not an idiot. I saw you under the table in the ice cream parlor," he answered with a chuckle. She knew that ice cream parlors were evil places—not only did they sell products that go straight for your waist and weight, they were bad hiding places also. "Then I saw you in the library," he continued. "And I saw you again in the coffee shop and all over the mall. At first I thought I must've gone crazy or something like that."
The girl quickly rolled her eyes. "So you went even crazier and threw a lingerie into the dressing room?"
He laughed. "I couldn't resist myself."
"What if it was another woman inside that room?"
He shrugged lightly and cut himself another slice of cake. "All the same, I'd just work my charms."
"So you'd push her into the dressing room and hold her, too?" Sakura hadn't realized that her words were full of bitterness and disappointment until they came out without a warning. She quickly got up and said, "I think I'm heading in for the night."
Before she could take a second step though, Syaoran grabbed hold of her wrist and pulled her towards him. Sakura struggled to get free at first, but she realized that it was no use so she gave in. Her knees weakened almost immediately when she felt his hot breath against her own. The gap between them decreased with each second that passed by until she felt the imperceptible touch of his lips against hers—so soft, just like her dreams. Except that this was real, and he was actually kissing her.
Sakura's brain stopped functioning completely. She felt tingly by his kiss.
He pulled away and gently placed a chaste kiss on her forehead. "And you said you weren't an idiot," he said.
"Syaoran...?" Sakura didn't know where to begin her questions. She had so many questions she wanted to ask him. Where should she even start?
"If it's a stupid question, don't ask."
She ignored that side effect to his personality. She was going to let smug Syaoran get away with it once, because she only wanted to deal with the man standing before her at that moment—the one that held her breath close to his with the skip of a heartbeat.
"Do you... like me?" she asked.
"I told you if it's a stupid question, then don't ask."
"But I'm serious!" she pouted. "Well?"
"Put the math together, Sakura," was his answer and it was satisfying enough for her.
Sakura smiled. "Just to let you know, I'm not really good at math. My dad had to hire four tutors to teach me long division."
"You're not serious, are you?"
"Why?"
"Why what?"
"Why do you like me?"
"I was hoping you could tell me the answer to that question," he answered. "I've never asked a girl this before, but... Kinomoto Sakura, will you be my girlfriend?"
And that was all Sakura could take before her legs completely failed on her and she started collapsing. Luckily for her, Syaoran caught her in his arms, holding her ever so tightly against his body. Was this what people meant by 'sweeping a woman off her feet'?
Sakura wasn't sure if he had swept her off her feet, but he definitely swept something of hers.
"Y-you're not serious, are you?" she finally found her voice a few seconds later.
"Do you think I'd joke about something like this?"
"B-but..." she started stuttering, not sure how to answer him. A part of her wanted to say yes, but another part told her that it would be wrong if she should say yes. She was betrothed—engaged to another man. Even though she didn't know her future husband's face, she was still promised to another man. It would be unfair to Syaoran if she agreed to be his girlfriend. But then again, wasn't it unfair to her?
"Sakura...?" She looked up into his eyes, finding herself to call upon all of her willpower to stop herself from falling into a deeper pit.
It was impossible to resist the man. It was as though he was calling out to her—just standing there and calling out her name ever so tenderly. Damn. She hated his stupid charms. His stupid irresistible charms that blew her mind away in the matter of days.
What was she supposed to choose from—follow her needs or what she knew was the 'right' thing?
The choices were unreasonable as they were difficult to choose from. After all, Sakura knew that doing the 'right' thing was important if she should live up to look at her father in the face. If her dear father found out that his daughter was having (or was going to have) an affair while she was engaged, he would probably die in shame and disowned her. Then there was the problem with Syaoran.
On the other hand, a woman had her own needs. And because Sakura was a woman—whether she was a true woman or not, she was still a woman—she had her needs as well. Call her selfish, call her spoiled, call her bratty—but just call her a woman.
It was a necessity.
Other than needs, Sakura wanted to say 'yes' mostly because she felt complete with him. She had never felt that way towards anyone else before. Although she couldn't say how much she liked the man, but she could say that she liked him more than she was supposed to. Sakura knew she would regret her action later on in the future if she let the opportunity slipped by her.
"A-are you positive that this is what you want?" she found herself asking, scared of hearing the answer herself.
What if he was just playing with her? What if he was going to laugh any given moment, telling her that it was just a joke, and that she believed him? What if... what if he was only looking for a good time?
All of the possible answers scared her. She knew that she liked the guy, but did she like him that much to be hurt if everything—his words, charms, and feelings—turned out to be nothing but thin air? She hoped she didn't have to find out.
He assured her with a gentle smile. "Is that a yes?"
Sakura took in a deep breath and did some more mental thinking.
"Do I get a raise after this?"
He laughed and pulled her closer. "Sorry, but no."
Sakura leaned into his body.
Because this, she thought. Feels right.