F O U R

Chapter four:

W A K E:

S H U I C H I

It hadn't been his intent to stay over at Botan's apartment, and he couldn't remember falling asleep. However, Shuichi Minamino found himself on that same pink sofa he had sat comforting the blue haired girl on when he woke- and her nowhere in any of the rooms. He had made a round of the apartment looking for her, but her absence was clear- and not even a note to tell him where she had gone. Shuichi sat back down on the sofa, exasperated. She wasn't pulling another vanishing act, was she? No- Botan wasn't stupid. She knew he would be able to find her if she did try to cut ties with him again. It was more likely that she had stepped out for a bit, and hadn't bet on him waking up when she left- no. That wasn't it. It was most likely that she had bet on him waking up, and had planned her little outing so that she would be gone when he did.

He couldn't blame her, really. It would be more than a little bit awkward, after what had transpired the night before. Baring her heart like that could not have been easy, and it was likely the pink eyed girl needed time to calm down before she faced him again.

With his decision that sitting around waiting for Botan to come back would not be a good idea for either of them, Shuichi stood up and did one more round of the house, this time looking for an object instead of a person. It felt a bit like snooping, so the dark eyed young man did his best to limit the possible locations so as not to pry into her personal things. Botan was a fairly practical person, so she would keep something like a pen and paper in a convenient place. This hypothesis was confirmed after a very short venture into Botan's bedroom- which felt very intrusive, so Shuichi walked out and closed the door behind him almost as soon as he had found what he needed on her dresser. Still, he had noticed some details during that short search.

Most everything in the room was girlish colors- shades of pink and purple with sunny pops of yellow- which fit Botan's personality well enough. A few exceptions to this were her clock (an odd little green cat-shaped thing with eyes that followed him around the room), a blue stuffed animal that was obviously hand-made and very familiar looking, and a blue picture frame sitting next to the notebook he had found. He had been a little surprised to see it- Botan had seemed so unable to handle anything related to their friends, he had to wonder why it was there. He realized, though, why she had that picture sitting front and center on her dresser. He realized it when he saw his much younger face in the picture with the young faces of all of their friends.

That photo was more than five years old.

He couldn't be sure when it was taken- perhaps around the end of the Dark Tournament? All he could be sure of were the ages of the photo's subjects. He, Yusuke, and Kuwabara in middle school- and Hiei at the very least looking as if he could be- and Botan... This photo was likely a great source of Botan, because of that one fact he had noticed when his eyes drifted to Botan's grinning face.

Five, six- those years ago, Botan had been the one to appear older than the rest. A high schooler among middle schoolers, she seemed. A time when human aging did not seem real to her.

He spent a few moments gazing at that picture- at all of the smiling faces (and the one frowner) gazing back at him. Yusuke and Kuwabara with huge goofy grins, Hiei frowning but resigned, a small smile on his own face, and- his eyes rested on Botan's face yet again. A bright, happy grin spread across her face, her eyes bright with joy. He could tell just by looking at the picture- even if he couldn't remember when or where it had been taken- that she was having the time of her life. It wasn't an expression Shuichi had seen on her face in a while, and he couldn't help but smile back at that happy image. Then, remembering what he had come for, he quickly tore a page from the notebook next to the frame, grabbed one of the three or four pens sitting on the dresser, and left the room, carefully shutting the door behind him.

B O T A N

Botan stuck her ponytailed head in the door, looking the apartment carefully over to see if Shuichi was inside. To her relief, he seemed to have vacated, so she opened the door fully and stepped inside. As she locked the door, she did one more scan, in case he was hiding somewhere. Realizing how ridiculous the thought was, Botan laughed a bit self-depreciatingly. She was beginning to get quite paranoid, wasn't she?

Heaving a sigh, the immortal flopped down on her sofa. How fortunately she had timed her return- Shuichi had gone, just as she had hoped. The thought was a bit cold, but Botan knew for a fact that she wasn't up to facing Shuichi again after what had happened the night before. She really didn't think she was up to ever facing him again, but he had made it quite clear that that wasn't an option. She had thought about it, though. Most of the pink eyed girl's walk had been spent thinking of new ways to avoid Shuichi.

If she changed apartments- but if she was still in the same building, he could find her easilly. That plan was out the moment it was born. Perhaps, she had thought, if she moved to a new building- somewhere on the other side of town? After all, Shuichi had been able to find her so easilly because he had been to her building before- if she went somewhere else, somewhere he had never been to, then maybe- but, no. It had become clear to her that, if Shuichi wanted to find her, he could- no matter where she hid.

There was a moment, walking through a park painted with autumn leaves, when Botan considered ending her vacation entirely. It was the simplest solution- she could just throw herself into work and try to forget about everything. It wouldn't be that hard- right? She would forget eventually, wouldn't she?

However, Botan had worked hard to earn this vacation. Sure, she wasn't actually doing anything on her vacation, but her workload as head ferry girl got ridiculously heavy sometimes- she had earned a break from it all! If she went back to Rekai, Koenma would probably disregard the vacation time she had left and toss more work at her. At the very least, this vacation was a chance to rest!

All considered, this meant she had absolutely no way to avoid Shuichi.

With a heavy sigh of exasperation, Botan's head drooped on her shoulders. It was then she noticed the piece of paper on her coffee table. That hadn't been there before- she picked it up, scanning the neat, familiar handwriting.

Botan, it said, I've gone back to my dorm for now. Thank you for allowing me to sleep on your couch. I'm sorry I had to impose on you like that. Pink eyes reached the final line of writing, an inch or so below the rest- seemingly written as an after-thought.

That picture on your dresser is a bit old. You might consider having a new one taken.

Only moments after reading that line, Botan crumpled up the note and threw it angrilly against a wall. She cursed uncharacteristically, "Damn it, Shuichi! That's my business! I'll keep the old photo if I want to!" How dare he- that photo was personal! What was he doing in her room, anyway? Botan brought her palm to her forehead in frustration. He had a point, though. Holding on to those old memories certainly wasn't doing her any good. Still, getting a new photo would require seeing her friends. So he was on about that again.

With a groan, Botan stretched across the couch, resting her chin on the far arm. As she did this, she noticed an odd lump in her couch. Sitting up and reaching between the cushions, she retrieved the book she had shoved under them the day before- but that wasn't the lump she had felt. Furrowing her brow, she dug further between the pink cushions. Finally, she found the offending object- a small leather wallet. She considered it with more than a bit of confusion. Her wallet was yellow and shaped like a cat's head- this definitely didn't belong to her. So, how did it get there?

The blue haired girl opened the wallet up, looking for some form of I.D.- to her surprise, familiar dark eyes looked up at her from the photo on the card she found. So, that was how it had ended up in her couch- it must have fallen out of one of Shuichi's pockets.

This posed a problem. Shuichi would notice it was missing soon, and would probably come back to look for it- but Botan still wasn't ready to see him face to face again. So, she would just call him and ask where she could deliver it to (and make sure he wouldn't be around when she did)- but, as she picked up her phone. her mind drew a blank. What was his number again? The pink eyed girl couldn't remember a digit of it. Oh, wait- my cell phone!

The immortal grabbed her little purple cell, going into her phonebook to find- absolutely nothing. "Oh- that's right- I erased it... Crap. Well, it ought to be in my call history!" However, she soon remembered that she had cleared that too. Botan had absolutely no means to contact Shuichi and tell him about the wallet. She groaned pitifully. She knew the name of the university he was attending, so she could probably find his dorm just by asking someone who worked there, but... If she couldn't call him first, she would have no idea whether he was there or not- so, whether she wanted to or not, she might end up having to face him again far before she was ready to.

She could wait for him to call her, or come over again- it was entirely conceivable that he would. It was the when that was the issue. Shuichi was a pretty nice guy (well, most of the time, anyway), so he would probably give her some time to get things sorted out on her own before he tried to contact her again- but he would probably need his wallet pretty soon, and he might not immediately think he had left it in her apartment.

Botan let out another groan. Through her efforts to avoid him, she had made it nearly impossible to not go out and meet him in person very, very soon.

So, what could she do but grab a coat and head right back out the door?

This was how Botan found herself- after much searching and going back and forth between various offices and employees- standing in front of Room 242, Honors dormitory. The wallet was clutched in her tense, nervous hand. It would be easy, she told herself. If she could just hand him the wallet and leave, she would be fine.

Just as she gathered her courage and reached up to knock, she heard a voice coming from down the hall.

"He could be busy, Yusuke! You really should have checked with Shuichi-kun before we left!"

"Yeah, you've said that ten times already, Keiko. We're already here, so what would be the point of calling now?"

"I'm saying you should have done it earlier!"

Botan stood frozen, staring at, but not seeing the door, as the squabbling voices drew closer and closer. She wanted so much to move- to run- but her body wouldn't heed her mind's orders. Those two voices definitely, without a doubt, belonged to Yusuke and Keiko Urameshi. Two people she hadn't planned on seeing again- ever. Two people she hadn't wanted to know about her presence in ningenkai. Two people coming right toward her, about to turn the corner and see her still form in front of Shuichi's door.

"Hm? I think someone's already here to visit him, Yusuke. Excuse me, are you-

Moments after Keiko turned the corner, Botan dropped the wallet and took off, yanking the hood of her coat over her head as quickly as she could. It was a dumb move- she could have just put her hood up and walked calmly away- pretended to just be passing by Shuichi's room on her way somewhere else- but she had done the stupidest, most suspicious thing she could have done, and ran away.

Botan prayed Keiko had only caught a glimpse of her.

S H U I C H I

The dark haired young man was, of course, used to Yusuke's unexpected visits by now. He usually didn't mind unless he was in the middle of a paper or other assignment. Even then, it was only a minor annoyance. That day, though, Shuichi was not surprised to find he was more than a little bit irritated at Yusuke and Keiko's surprise arrival at his door. He admonished himself for it- they were his friends, and it wasn't as if they had meant to come at such a bad time, but... His mind was in a bit of a jumble, and he wasn't very sure of his ability to not let on that something was bothering him- much as he thought they should know about it, he planned on staying true to his word about not telling them that Botan was in ningenkai.

That plan was nearly destroyed by Keiko's preceptiveness and sheer coincidence.

"Hey, Kurama!" Yusuke crowed when Shuichi opened the door. Keiko greeted him a bit more calmly, with his proper name, before holding out a very familiar leather wallet. The brunette explained that she had spotted a younger girl standing in front of the door when she turned the corner, but when she called out, the girl dropped the wallet and ran.

"I guess I must have dropped it somewhere." Shuichi replied, with a good guess as to where he had dropped it and who had returned it. "She was probably just going to return it- you two might have scared her."

"I suppose so..." Keiko mused. "Weird, though- I mean, she looked awfully young to be dying her hair such a strange color- you would think her school had rules against that sort of thing." Shuichi fought to keep his expression neutral- his visitors must have gotten a better glimpse of Botan than he had thought. Or, at the very least, Keiko had.

"Eh? What color was it?" Yusuke wondered. "Pink, or something?" His wife shook her head. "No. Blue- light blue."

"Really? How odd." Shuichi said, trying to inject as much sincerity into his tone as possible. It was certainly going to be difficult to keep Botan's presence a secret now that Keiko had seen her. "Wow, I haven't seen anyone with blue hair since Botan left." Said Yusuke, giving Shuichi another jolt. Talking about her certainly wouldn't help- if Keiko got even the slightest suspicion that the girl she had seen was in fact Botan, Shuichi wasn't sure how well he would be able to dissuade her from the truth.

He was certainly having to run circles to keep the immortal's secret- Botan had better let the others in on the secret soon.

After the couple had left, Shuichi looked at the leather wallet Botan had returned to him. That was progress, at least. The blue haired girl had risked seeing him again before she was quite ready, all for the sake of returning it- he supposed she wasn't quite as angry as he had predicted over his little message. It was something- a small step.

Small steps...

An idea sprung to Shuichi's mind. Surely it would be a bit more time before Botan was ready to see everyone again for that new photo he had mentioned, but perhaps something on a smaller scale would help her to reach that point. He knew just how to do it, too.

A night, or a day ago, that little thought in the back of his mind would have nagged at him again- telling him that he was getting too involved. That thought did not rear its head now, and Shuichi did not notice its absence, or the greater change building that its absence signified. It was surprising for such an intelligent young man to be so unobservant- but it wouldn't be the last thing he failed to notice.

Reasons were changing.

A/N: Don't hurt me- I'm so sorry this chapter took so long! For one thing, the characters were not cooperating with me (which is for the best, I suppose- the original draft would've moved the plot much too fast to make sense), so that was an issue. Still, I think this version of the chapter turned out well. Also- woo! Relationship developement! In the last freakin' paragraph! I'm sorry. Also, also woo(!), Keiko and Yusuke showed up- and said maybe five lines! I'm sorry.

It's pretty bad that I'm apologizing so much, isn't it? Well, we are our own worst critics, I suppose. Not a lot of Shuichi this chapter- or does it just seem that way because of the huge block of Botan narrative in the middle? The chapters are usually divided more evenly, but... This one was a bit more about Botan. Most of the chapters are going to be Botan-centric for a while, I think. Shuichi hasn't come up against his wall yet, so there's not a whole lot to write about him outside of his involvement in Botan's situation. It'll get there, though.

You know, you wouldn't think listening to a loop of a song that had absolutely nothing to do with the current story would help me write so much, but it somehow did. Thank you, Rocky Horror!

Almost missed the obvious celebratory point- F O U R has reached chapter four. Okay, not really that big a deal, but one more chapter and it's my longest fanfic ever (don't look for a four chapter story on my author's page- you won't find it- I wrote it years ago and it was a piece of crap)! So, yeah, happy about that.