Root Beer Float (Kaito x Meiko)

Twenty-Nine

As hard as it had been for me to show up at Kaito's apartment, it was even harder to leave. Finally I departed with a promise to call him later. We had to plan a date as soon as possible.

On the drive home, I wondered what could be going on with Miku. Her teacher had said she was acting differently at school, was somebody bullying her? Was she struggling with her schoolwork? Something there must have been going on that we didn't notice here at home.

Luka was waiting for me at the door with a giant grin on my face. "Good morning! How did it go?"

"It was good," I responded. "Really good, actually. But not in the way you're thinking."

"Oh. Well, you still made up, didn't you?" She asked.

I smiled a little. "Yeah. We're better than ever."

"Yay!" Luka squealed. "Well, I'm not sure if you've eaten breakfast yet, but I made-"

"Actually, Luka, Kaito told me that we should talk to Miku. Apparently there's been something serious going on, but he didn't specify what. He said we had to hear it from her."

Her expression changed immediately. "Let's go do that, then."

She grabbed my hand and we headed inside to see Yohioloid on the couch with the twins, watching a movie. "Auntie Mei! Auntie Mei!" They yelped, jumping over to hug me. Of course, Yohioloid did not give me the same treatment. He barely acknowledged my presence.

Instead, he turned to Luka. "Babe, come sit with me again. It's cold without you."

"In a little bit," she replied, peeling his hand off of her. "We've got something to do first."

Not surprisingly, Miku was in her room, dancing to a song I had probably heard her play a million times. Her eyes lit when she saw us and she ran over to hug me.

Luka grinned. "I really should enroll you in a dance class, Miku."

"No thanks," she shrugged, still holding on to me. "I like being self-taught."

"I missed you," I chimed in, squeezing her a little.

She squeezed back and her voice became muffled in my shirt. "I missed you too. A whole lot."

Luka shot me a look. "Um, listen, honey- we wanted to talk to you about something."

"Hmm? What is it?" She brought her head up to look at her mother, and I noticed the mild trace of fear in her eyes.

I followed Luka to sit on the bed and she brought Miku into her lap. I cleared my throat. "So... as you probably know, I was with Kaito last night."

"Yeah?" She was becoming increasingly nervous. Something was definitely up.

I reached out and grabbed her hand. "He said there was something going on that you needed to tell us about."

It was quiet for a long minute.

"He wasn't supposed to say anything," Tears were flooding her eyes. "He was going to let me bring it up."

"So why didn't you, baby?" Luka asked, rubbing her knee.

Miku brought her hands up to her face, trying to hide the fact she was crying. "It would ruin everything. I don't want you to hate me."

"Oh, baby," Luka gently grabbed her wrists and pulled them away from her face so she could kiss her wet cheek. "There's nothing you could say that would make me love you any less, let alone hate you."

To keep her from hiding her face again, I offered to hold her hand. She kept squeezing it tightly. "Tell us what's going on."

She spoke very slowly, and sometimes paused for several seconds at a time, but this was nothing new to the two of us. We'd been dealing with trauma for years. "Yohioloid... he doesn't like me. He's m-mean, especially when you aren't watching. Usually he just insults me, but he lies, too... he's the one who said you'd hate me if I told you."