Sorry this took a bit. This is longer than the other two. X_x The response on this piece was so lovely that this really should've been posted sooner, so you have my heartfelt apologies. *bows*

Thank you to Guest #1; I can't stand dull scenes, so I do try and keep things moving along. ~ Thank you to Guest #2, especially for that glorious mental image of Naru as a turtle. ~ Thanks to ; I am hoping that your single dot meant that you enjoyed. ~ Thank you to Amthyst; Naru and Lin are quite attractive, but in the anime world, so is everybody else, so. ~ Thank you to lovenarumai; I'm always entertained by the possibilities presented by Naru and Lin. ~ Thank you to RaisedOnRadio; Yes, I did make the cover myself on MS paint. XD It took a bit. ~ Thank you Guest #3; Fret not, the conclusion is here. ~ And a final thank you to Nommie DaCoolest Meister; I am very glad that you enjoyed.

The reason for the delay on this is that—once again—Naru became extremely OOC in the end and I had to rewrite the majority of his lines. I tried to err on the side of caution, but be warned: Past this point, there is MAJOR fluff and a heck of a lot of NaruMai. You have been warned.

Disclaimer: I do not own Ghost Hunt. If a whole sentence is in italics, it means they're speaking in English.

Please read, enjoy, and review.

~oOo~

Chapter 3

~October 9th, 1999: 10:14 pm~

"That was a glorious waste of time!" Noll was venting to his adoptive father as they walked home from the festival. Gene was running along ahead with their mother, and Lin and Madoka were walking behind them in uncharacteristically awkward silence.

"What happened?" Martin Davis chuckled. "I thought Genie taught you how to dance?"

"He did, but nobody wanted to," Oliver replied glumly.

"Young master Davis spent the majority of the night hiding in a broom cupboard," Lin commented dryly, causing Noll to whirl around with an embarrassed cry and aim a vicious kick at Lin's shin.

"Sounds like our Noll," Martin grinned, catching Oliver by the shirtsleeve before a fight could erupt on the neighbor's front lawn. "You realize of course…" he started to tell his son.

"I know," Noll cut across him sourly, not in the mood for a lecture, no matter how deserved or well-intentioned. "I've got to come out of the broom closet if I want a chance with the girl."

"Exactly," Martin said soothingly, ruffling Oliver's dark hair affectionately. "You'll get her next time, won't you?"

~March 14th, 2001: 10:38 pm~

"Naru!"

He looked up to see Mai dashing towards him, eyes sparkling in the lights, face bright pink.

"They're doing a slow-dance next!" she announced, grabbing him by the elbow. "Come on!" She tugged him out into the sea of dancers before turning to face him. "You'll have to teach me—I've never slow-danced before. I'll probably suck at it."

He tried not to wince at her light language. "Are you sure that you wouldn't rather be dancing with 'Kyo-senpai?'" he couldn't help asking sharply.

She dropped her eyes. "How'd you know about that?"

"I have my ways, 'Tani-chan.'" He clasped her hand in his and let his other hand rest lightly against her waist as the music started, trying his best not to think too much about it. It was just a dance—not supposed to be weird. But it was, and Mai was so tiny that he was almost scared to touch her.

"Please don't call me that," she pleaded, trailing a hesitant hand over his shoulder, obviously equally uncomfortable with skin-on-skin contact. They both winced, but neither of them let go.

"Tamaki's a big mouth," she whined. He continued to look at her imploringly as they started to sway in time with the melody. "Okay fine," she admitted in a rush, crumbling under his stare. "Some people did ask me to the dance, but they were all last minute, I swear! They all asked after I'd asked you."

"Would you rather be with one of them?"

She shook her head fiercely and let a bit more of her weight drop onto his shoulder, actually allowing him to lead her in the dance. "No—I like being with you, Naru. I was even having fun until you started being an overprotective prick."

They danced in silence for a few minutes following that two-sided comment, Naru struggling to not think about the hand that was resting against her hip and come up with something to say that wasn't snarky or work-related. Why were all of their civil conversations about ghosts?

"How're your English lessons coming along?" he asked lamely.

"Okay," she said noncommittally.

"Try me," he challenged, leaning in a little closer so he could look down at her. She seemed small to him—barely coming up to his nose. "I'm fluent."

She gave him a look. "You would," she accused. "Uhm…" She paused, then slurred out, "Tonight you look very beautiful, I think."

He couldn't help scoffing a little at her attempt and fired off a quick, self-indulging sentence about how pretty he thought her dress looked on her, knowing that she wouldn't understand.

"Er…" she hesitated. "I sorry. My English is…not good. You are too fast."

"I said you looked cute," he said in Japanese. "But you shouldn't call a man 'beautiful.' Men are 'handsome.'"

Her whole face seemed to light up despite his condescending look. "Then you're 'handsome.'" Her hand slipped from his shoulder to the collar of his shirt. "I don't think I've ever seen you in a tie before, come to think of it."

"Yeah, I don't really like them," he shrugged, being careful not to nudge her hand off. "It's too formal."

"Heaven forbid you look your age," Mai quipped sarcastically, and then, "…Are you bored, Naru?" she asked out of the blue.

"What? No, I'm fine. Why?"

She lowered her eyes and leaned into him a little. "Because you look like you' don't want to be here," she admitted in a small voice.

"No," he insisted. "I'm enjoying myself now."

"'Now'?" she quoted.

"Yeah, now that I'm actually dancing with you instead of talking to your buddy, having to hear about how the whole school's in love with you."

She looked surprised at that, as if she hadn't realized how charismatic she really was. "The whole school doesn't love me," she said softly, her cheeks coloring.

His hand pressed a little harder on her waist. "Not the way Wannabe-san tells it. Which begs the question of why you're here dancing with me, your boss, making things incredibly awkward for everybody involved when you could have the pick of the school? Are you bored, Mai?"

She glared up at him. "God! For somebody so smart you can be such an idiot!" She punctuated her exclamation with a slap to his chest. "You…you never look at me twice, so why do you have to start caring now?" she continued hotly, tears making the corners of her eyes sparkle. "You don't look at me when I wear a pretty dress, or when I ask you to the biggest dance of the year, or when I dance with the most popular boy at school even though he's a perv, or when I try my English on you even though I know that I'm terrible—you never look at me like I'm anything more than your dorky little pain-in-the-ass assistant, bringing you tea or the newspaper or something…! Why can't you just for once see that I'm a girl, and I'm trying really really hard to impress you?"

"Why would you want to impress me?"

"…Because I'm always looking at you, Naru. No matter how much of a jerk you are, it's always you. It's always been you. But…I get it. I'm not smart enough for you. I'm not…perfect enough for you. So sorry for wasting your time. You must be bored out of your mind."

He stiffened, digesting what she had said. In the meantime, she pulled her arm off of his shoulders and untangled their fingers, pulling away from him to run back towards the entrance, white dress streaming out behind her.

~October 9th, 1999: 10:17 pm~

"Of course I'll get the next girl," Oliver grumbled to his father as they stepped onto the sidewalk leading up to their house. "Gene can't steal every girl I like."

"Oh, I don't know," Martin laughed, watching Gene sweet-talk his mother into a later curfew. "But it's okay to fight him for her a little, if you really love her."

Oliver Davis nodded smugly, bad mood evaporating. "Alright," he said determinedly. "And I'll win too, just you watch."

~March 14th, 2001: 10:56 pm~

Without really thinking he ran after her, dodging high-schoolers and not caring that they looked at him like he was crazy. In all honesty, the only thing he could really think about was that he wasn't thinking about anything. His mind was white—blank—except for one thing. One person.

He caught up to her in the entrance corridor. "Mai!" he barked, but she didn't stop. "Mai, wait!" He lunged for her and caught her wrist, tugging her to a stumbling stop. "Mai, listen to me… Don't be an idiot."

She sniffled pitifully and wouldn't look at him.

Realizing that this was as close as he was likely to get, he plowed on regardless, the words tumbling from his mouth in a disorganized rush, his mind still a blur. "Mai, you're the only girl I've ever treated like a girl. You are the only girl I've ever teased, you're the only girl who makes me actually think about whether or not I want to hurt your feelings, and you're the only girl who can give it back to me as fast as I can throw it out, and you're amazing. You're stupid and irrational, but I don't even care because in moments like these you're just so damn perfect that you make me stupid and irrational too. I can't think straight around you. And just because you didn't notice me looking doesn't mean that I wasn't. You are the only girl who I worry about, the only girl I lie awake thinking about, the only girl I call by name, and the only girl I've ever danced with, and any time spent with you—while not necessarily productive—is never wasted."

She blinked tearfully up at him and wiped her nose incredulously on the back of her dress sleeve. "Really?" she hiccupped.

"Yes," he said breathlessly. "You're my dorky little pain-in-the-ass assistant, Mai."

She blinked slowly, unsure. "I...wow, Naru. You really—"

There was probably an end to that sentence, but it was cut off by Naru—plucky Naru—leaning in to kiss her.

Gene had been wrong. He did know what to do with a girl.

Mai went completely tense for a minute, and then relaxed. She even made an unhappy noise when he pulled back for air a few seconds later.

She stared at him for a minute, and then giggled. The sound was so relieved and smug and cute, all at the same time, that he couldn't help laughing a little with her.

"Well…this complicates things," he sighed.

Her chocolate eyes widened. "What do you mean? Do you mean the whole boss-employee thing, because—in all honesty—that went completely out the window about twenty minutes ago…"

"I meant Lin. He's going to be all smug and happy and send a long gushing email to my parents, who will reply in equal gushy detail and the whole thing is going to be horribly archived and brought up at Christmas parties and…"

"Why are you always so crabby when other people are happy?" Mai asked, looking startled at the words 'Lin' and 'gushy' being used in the same sentence.

He didn't have a pre-prepared answer to that question.

Thankfully, she rolled her eyes and started talking before he embarrassed himself by blurting the first thing to come to mind. "I think you just enjoy being prickly," she said.

"I think that's it," he agreed contentedly.

"I enjoy the challenge," she said determinedly.

"I guess you'd have to," he agreed again.

"Stop agreeing with me," she snapped, hopping up the steps to get at his eye level, resting her hands on her hips. "I'm starting to wonder if that kiss screwed up your brain or something."

He smirked, recognizing her trademark anger to hide the fact that she was flustered. "First time kissing a boy?" he teased.

"Heck no!" she shouted. "How would you even know?"

"Because I think you would've laughed at me if you had any prior experience."

She blinked, belatedly figuring out the implications of what he'd just said. He raised an eyebrow, daring her to say something.

She looked on the verge of a snarky comment, but instead said, "Come on. Let's go back in. It's only eleven."

"Do we have to go back in?" he murmured, thinking about kissing her again just to delay the awkward transition back into populated society. Everybody would know that they kissed if they went back in together now. On the other hand, everybody would probably know by the next day of school anyway, given Mai's social connections.

"Oh…" he finally said. "This might make cases a bit awkward, what with Monk-San and Matsuzaki-San and Hara-San and…everybody..."

"This is just occurring to you now?" Mai burst out. "Jeez, maybe you should've thought about this sooner if you were worried!"

"Bit late now," he said dismissively, hopping up a few steps to lean in close to her and ask softly, "Are you really dead set on going back inside?"

She laced their fingers together instead, dragging him up the stairs. "Duh, idiot. The party's boring if you're only hovering at the edge."

He sighed resignedly and muttered to himself, "Got to get out of the broom cupboard."

"What was that?" she asked quizzically, but his sheepish explanation was lost in the music and light and sound and hope and chaos and timeless satisfaction of that one night, at that one high school, and in that one girl who had singled him out to dance with, and she was content enough—rocking gently in the circle of his arms—not to ask him again.

~October 10th, 1999: 12:07 am~

"Noll?" Gene whispered across the bedroom. "Are you still awake?"

"Am now," Noll replied fuzzily, shifting on his mattress to squint at the dark blob that was his brother. "What?"

"Are you mad at me?" Gene asked quietly. "For dancing with Robin?"

"I'm not mad at you, Genie," Oliver said exasperatedly. "Just let me sleep."

"I'm sorry," Gene blurted. "I didn't realize you liked her until it was too late. I'm really sorry, Noll. I mean, there was no way for me to know and I…"

"It's okay," Noll reassured him. "It was just a crush."

"But it wasn't a crush. How long have you liked this girl?" There was a rustle as Gene propped himself up an elbow to glare at Oliver.

"Awhile, I guess."

"Don't be modest. You've liked her ever since we switched to the advanced science track, haven't you?"

"I thought you said there was no way for you to know," Oliver huffed, bunching his blankets up to his chin.

"Well, it's obvious now that I see it," Gene said defensively, falling back onto his pillow with a sigh. "And I just want you to know that I'm really sorry. Look, I'll back off if you want, I swear. You can date her. I don't even like her."

"It's fine. I'm really over her," Noll said firmly, looking up at the ceiling. "I'll find somebody even better someday, and I swear that we'll be so perfect not even you will be able to separate us."

"Hope so," Gene said thoughtfully, and then sat up again. "But you really do have to stop being such a dork. No girl's going to fall in love with somebody as narcissistic and melodramatic as you."

"Somebody will," Noll said firmly. "She's out there, Gene. It's just a matter of being brave enough to find her."

Silence.

And then…

"Thanks for teaching me how to dance."

~oOo~

Thank you by dropping by this fluffy corner of. I hope you enjoyed.