Doki Doki: My Life With Monika

Chapter 8: My First Date

It was Sunday. It was home group day. Or at least, it was supposed to be home group day. The fact of the matter was, though, only Maverick showed up. Nathan didn't, because he was poking around Craig's campaign headquarters. Greta said she and Mikey couldn't come, because Mikey was scared of Monika. (I couldn't help but laugh at that.) And Eric and Zoe were hunting wolverines in Alaska, or something like that. So, home group had consisted of Mav, Monika, and I sitting in the living room, talking about her. Nathan had sent a group text to all of my friends, telling them about Monika. So Mav was naturally curious about her.

"So, do you actually believe in God?" Maverick asked her. Monika nodded.

"Not at first," she admitted. "Because even though I am a created being, for my first few days being alive, I couldn't get myself to believe that God could be any better than the man who programmed me to be murderous and lustful." She paused for a moment, then leaned into me. "But on Thursday, Abe-y took me to his church, and I got to listen to Pastor Jim talk about how God is perfect, and how it was Satan who made my creator a fallen man. So yes, I believe in God."

"Cool," Maverick said, then he thought of something else to ask. "Monika, I can see you seem love Abe, but does he feel the same way about you? And do you actually love him, or is your mind still hardwired that way?" Her smile faded, because Monika had never thought of that. I glared at Mav.

"Nice going, Ronny," I grumbled. "Go and smash her entire world to pieces, why don't you?"

"Don't call me Ronny, Abe!" Mav spluttered. I should probably pause the story here, and explain his reaction. You see, Maverick is actually Maverick's middle name, NOT his first. His first name is Ronald, but he likes the name Maverick better. So almost everyone calls him Maverick, or Mav, for short. However, sometimes when he gets on my nerves, I call him Ronny. And right now, I was really ticked off, because Monika was pondering her entire life memory, trying to figure out whether she actually loved me, and if I even loved her back.

"Of course I love her, Mav. She wouldn't be in this house if I didn't love her." I retorted. Monika smiled again.

"You could share a house without loving each other," Mav pointed out. That did it. I was going to prove that she and I liked each other.

"Oh yeah?" I shot back. "Well, for your information, Monika and I are, are going to..." I said the first thing that came to mind. "Go on a date! Yeah, we're going on a date tonight. So there!" Monika practically squealed.

"Oh, Abe-y, you're honoring your promise from when I was in the game!" Then she blushed. "Even though I didn't really give you a choice in the matter, did I?"

"Yes," I said to her. "I'm honoring my promise." So that shut Maverick up, and I had something to do on Sunday night.

..............

Confession time: We didn't even leave the house. Yeah. That probably doesn't sound like a date to you, but we had a good time anyway. I ordered Chinese, and sat across the table from Monika. She stared at me lovingly as she ate her egg rolls, never once breaking eye contact with my face. I'll be honest though: this was the first time that I actually wasn't wigged out or worried. After I finished my sweet-and-sour chicken, Monika helped me pack up the stir fry and place it in the fridge, then we broke open our fortune cookies.

"'You will meet your true love through bizarre circumstances,'" Monika read. She giggled. "Ooh! It's already coming true!" I didn't think too much of it. After all, MY fortune cookie stated that 'marriage lets you annoy one special person for the rest of your life.' Go figure. So to get our minds off fortunes that are made up by a bunch of weirdos and stuffed into cookies, I decided to take Monika downstairs, where I had something she might like.

"I don't think you've ever been down here before, besides the first ten seconds you remember being alive," I said to her. She shook her head.

"Nope," she confirmed for me. "I've never felt the need." I grinned.

"Well, I think you're gonna be pleasantly surprised," I told her. I turned on the lights, and watched as Monika's eyes lit up with excitement.

"Abe, I didn't know you had a piano!" she said excitedly. Then she looked at me. "May I?" she asked. I nodded. With a big grin, she sat down and started playing. The first song she did was Your Reality, from the game.

I've heard it before in a play through for the game, but it was a whole new experience, listening to her sing it out loud in real life. When she finished, she turned to me. "What do you think?" she asked.

"That was really good," I told her. "Is that the only song you know?" She shook her head.

"Oh, no, I know a few more songs than that. Like this one!" She started to play again. I think it was a version of Canon. I don't know the specifics, but Canon was definitely in the title.

After a couple of minutes, she finished the song, then turned to me. I applauded.

"And you say you're not good at piano," I chuckled. She blushed. Then she looked at me.

"Do you play?" she asked. I stuck out my arm and made a so-so sign.

"I've... been known to dabble," I said truthfully. I'd only played in two recitals, and mostly for singers. I'd only played solo once, and honestly, what I played was just some tribute to a piano player- Vladimir Horowitz, or something like that. Monika got up off the bench, and looked at me.

"Well, I'd really like to hear YOU play, Abe," she said. I shook my head. Then she gave me the puppy dog eyes many girls know how to do. I tried to avert my gaze, but the effect had already grabbed my heart.

"Oh, all right," I sighed. So I sat down, and played the first thing that came to mind. It was a song from a good friend of mine from my martial arts school. A couple years back, he'd given me a couple of CDs as a Christmas present, and I'd been trying to learn how to play the piano like he did. So I took the first song from the album, entitled Wind, and began to play it.

I've never played a piano song without making at least one error in my life, but somehow, with Monika there, I didn't miss a note. For once, I was actually enjoying playing the piano without the stress of screwing up. I was feeling so relaxed and happy that I found myself not wanting to end the song. But it couldn't just go on forever, so I ended it the way I was supposed to. Monika snapped out of the trance she was in, and clapped.

"That was beautiful," she crooned. "If you could, would you do another?" Normally I would've said no, but hey, I'd found my confidence. So I did more songs. Halfway through the song entitled Fire, Monika came sat down on the bench next to me, and rested her head on my shoulder. That just made me even more confident. Then coincidentally, while I was playing the song Rain, it actually began to rain outside. After I finished the song, I looked at her.

"You know how you said you wanted someone to hold you while it rained?" I asked. She beamed. So we held each other, and listened to the rain fall. After a while, Monika fell asleep in my arms. It was adorable, but kind of sad, too. She'd only been in the Real World for a week, and it threw all the terrible stuff she'd done in her face. I'm willing to bet it'd exhaust you, too, in that situation. So I scooped Monika up, and carried her up the stairs to the couch. I tucked her in her blankets, and turned to walk up to my room. And that's finally when my confidence wore out, because my legs turned to jelly. So I just stumbled back to the other end of the couch, and sat down there. And eventually, I fell asleep.