Chapter 3: A game of information

A/N: Currently, I'm learning to drive, and what's really surprised me so far is how easy it is to hold a conversation while driving a car. Also; I've changed my plan for posting chapters; by the time you see this chapter, I will have another chapter. As it turns out, it won't even be on the same site as you'd expect, because I just started an original story called 'King of the Hill'. You will, however, be able to find it through my web page (The link to the site will be titled 'My new original story'). It won't be a reason for me to post any more chapters here, because King of the Hill has an RSS feed you can subscribe to.

Slightly after we got into the car, Tai got in to the driver's seat, as he would be driving for about half of the trip, and then Matt would take over at the rest stop nearest the midpoint of the trip. That meant that both Matt and Tai were driving for an hour. Sora sat in back with Kari and I.

As Tai started the car, I realized that I had a question I wanted to ask Kari, but hadn't yet.

"Hey, what happened to Tai?" I asked in a whisper, so that Tai wouldn't hear.

"What do you mean by that?" Kari whispered back.

"Well, he used to be so... overprotective of you."

"True. He went off to college." She replied, answering what happened, although not really why it mattered.

"What does that have to do with anything?" I asked.

"Well, he couldn't exactly protect me while he was at college, now could he?" Kari pointed out.

"True." I replied, still unsatisfied with the answer; it was too simple.

"During the first week he was at college, he didn't really have time to be anxious about not protecting me, and then after that first week of college, he had friends he had to keep up with, and he had insane amounts of work to do. Plus... He'd already mostly learned to trust me to protect myself by the time he went off to college." Kari replied.

"Alright, I'm catching JUST enough words to know that I'm being talked about." Tai said.

"Sorry, Tai." Kari said, hanging her head with guilt.

"It's O.K... Is it the change in my hair?" He asked.

I suddenly realized something that I hadn't realized before; he was clearly actually taking care of his hair now. It was shorter, and it actually looked combed! I had been so preoccupied with thinking about Kari that I'd never really given Tai more thought than the thoughts I'd given to his strange behavior.

"No, but that's interesting too. Why did you cut your hair?" I asked. In truth, my question was as much an attempt to avoid telling him what we'd actually been taking about, as I wasn't sure how he'd respond to being told he used to be VERY overprotective of his younger sister, as it was a question I asked out of interest... But I was interested.

"Ha. It started out as a bet to my roommate. I was going to ask a girl out, and my roommate said that he was absolutely sure the girl didn't like me. I responded by saying that I was fairly sure that she did like me. He bet me 10,000 yen (approximately $115) that I was wrong. Of course, I didn't have 10,000 yen to bet him, and I told him as much."

"So you bet that you would cut your hair?" I asked.

"Yep." Tai replied, laughing.

"And you lost." I summarized.

"No, actually, I won." Tai replied.

"Then why..."

"Because I wanted to look good when I asked her out, so I had my hair cut before hand." Tai replied, laughing.

"How'd the girl respond?" I asked, also laughing.

"Well, I asked her what she thought of the haircut, she said she liked it, and we talked for a while, and then I asked her out, and she said yes." Tai summarized, and then said, "Actually, I'm going to really miss her this summer."

"Wait, when was this?" I asked, surprised that Tai was still dating whoever this girl was.

"Towards the beginning of the year. The funniest part was when I came back to the room that evening, and my room mate said, 'I guess I win?'' Tai said, "When I told him that no, in fact, I had just had my hair cut before hand, he told me I was a 'fucking idiot.', and that how my hair looked probably wasn't going to change how Adriana responded to me asking her out."

"So the girls name is 'Adriana'?" I asked.

"Yes." Tai said, "That's her name."

"I'd tease you about having a girlfriend, but I think that probably wouldn't be wise, since Matt and Sora are dating." I said, and then something struck me.

I didn't know if Kari was single. I was jealous at the thought that anyone else might be dating her, but I swallowed both my realization and my childish jealousy.

"Yeah, and honestly, T.K, at least I have the guts to ask out the girl I like." Tai teased.

I blushed slightly, and tried to find a witty remark that wouldn't expose to Kari that I liked her.

"What is he talking about?" Kari asked, sounding slightly hurt.

Tai looked like he was about to say something, so I quickly responded, "Nothing!"

Kari no longer looked hurt, rather, she simply looked very confused.

I heard Matt mutter something to Tai, which sounded vaguely like, "Not cool.", and then something about 'immature'

Tai sighed, and seemed to shrug a little.

Sora, who apparently had understood what Matt had said, chimed in, saying "Matt's right."

"What is Sora talking about? What is Tai talking about?" Kari whispered to me quizzically, "What did Matt say? What is going on? Who do you like?"

I took a deep breath, "Honestly, your guess is as good as mine."

"On most of that, I believe you honestly don't know, but surely you know who you like."

I knew that lying wouldn't do me any good, but I had to find someway to dodge the question. After a moment's pause, I found an entirely truthful, but totally valueless response to the question.

"know is a rather strong word, Kari." I said, and had to hold back a laugh at the fact that I had answered the question in addressing her by name, and that it was so well hidden in the response that she would never realize it.

"Now you are just dodging the question." She said, "Who do you like?"

I really didn't want to answer the question truthfully, but I couldn't respond, 'none of your business', because it was her business, as I liked her.

"No, I'm just whispering in riddles." I replied.

"So it's a girl you don't know." Kari said, but from the sly smile on her face, she knew this wasn't what I was thinking.

I could always answer 'maybe', and I would answer almost any other question that way, but I wanted to answer this one 'quite the opposite'. Only that would quite obviously give away how I felt about her, as she was the person I knew best.

"No." I said, laughing, "Come on, you know me better than that."

I almost wanted to hit myself for everything after 'No', because I'd accidentally given her another hint that it was her I liked.

"So you aren't speaking in riddles, and you are being obnoxious on purpose." She said, "Also, why didn't you just answer maybe?"

She had missed her chance to ask me if I liked her, which would have been the best question to ask whether she thought I liked her or not; I would either respond with an awkward 'no' or a 'maybe' if I did, and a confident 'no' I didn't, and quite possible tell her who I did like. (Of course, the second half of the point was moot; I did like her.)

"I don't know." I answered. It was true, I didn't know why I hadn't just answered maybe.

"Which leaves me three options: Either you are terrible at hiding this kind of thing, you are lying, or you think I'll never guess." She replied, "So, tell me... do you think I'll never guess?"

"I don't know whether or not you'll ever guess." I replied, although I sincerely doubted she would, considering her obvious misstep about jumping at an opportunity to guess that it was her I liked.

"So you were lying?" Kari asked.

"Maybe." I said, shrugging, and effectively killing her line of questioning.

"So your terrible at this?" She continued, apparently in an attempt to pester me.

"Sure. Let's go with that." I replied, smiling widely.

"Alright, please. Why are you not telling me?" She asked.

"Well, first, who do you like?" I asked, smiling a little.

She blushed a little, and replied "Alright, I see."

"Exactly." I replied, smiling.

Kari raised an eyebrow, as if asking me, 'are you sure about that?'

I smiled, and tried VERY hard not to nod assent that, indeed, I knew perfectly well what I was saying. I felt slightly confused; She liked me, and I liked her, but I wasn't really ready to tell her that.