Christmas Stalkings

Author: crystal_rose

Rated: PG13

Rating :

Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Twas three days before Christmas
And all through the mall
Sales clerks were stirring
And having a ball.

All the sale tags were hung
By the windows with care
In hopes that buyers
Would soon be there.

And in a small booth
Were two people, bored
Of watching the madness
Of the last-minute horde.

Tension ran high
In the small cardboard booth,
Serena and Darien
Have a big problem with truth.

They loved each other—
It was as plain as can be,
Except for two people
Who were too stubborn to see.

Three days till Christmas—
Will they reveal their love?
Fat chance—that would be
A miracle from above.

On with the chapter!
Get on with the show!
‘Cause I ran out of rhymes
A long time ago.

Serena lowered the hat on her head and ducked behind a lamppost, watching Darien stroll down the street. She had gotten up extra early that morning—surprising, given that it was Sunday—to stake out Darien's apartment. She couldn't believe that Darien—dear, sweet, stuffy Darien—was really Tuxedo Mask, the hunky superhero who had starred in every steamy dream she had had since the age of fourteen. After spending a sleepless night tossing and turning—how she would've welcomed a steamy dream then!—she decided that she would follow Darien around this morning so that she could get to know him a little more. Besides, Darien in a track suit--very easy on the eyes.

And that was why she and her sleep-befuddled ass were outside Darien's posh apartment building at 6:30 in the morning, waiting for his gorgeous self to make an appearance.

She didn't have to wait long before she saw Darien step out the elevator in his workout clothes. He stretched his muscles almost right before her eyes (she had been hiding behind a tree next to the bench he was using for balance) before he started jogging down the street, leaving her there, mesmerized by his luscious form.

It seemed as if Darien was determined to run around the entire city that morning, much to her dismay. He first ran to the rose garden (her favourite part of the park),

past Cherry Hill Temple where he paused at the bottom of the stone steps for such a long time that Serena was beginning to wonder if he wanted to see Raye, past the mall before thankfully stopping in front of the Crown Arcade. Realizing that the lamppost was a flimsy hiding spot, Serena ducked behind a metal garbage can in the alley beside the arcade while Darien peered through the windows, as if looking for something or someone.

What the hell is he doing, she wondered. Didn't he realize that she was crouched behind a dirt-encrusted garbage can, trying to catch her breath while she waited for him to figure out where else to go? Couldn't he think of a less sweat-inducing activity as a form of exercise?

Out of the corner of her eye, Serena saw a small dog saunter towards her, its fur matted down with whatever gooey substance it was rolling around in. "Shoo," she whispered. "Go away, dog."

The dog must've been cut from the same cloth as Darien because not only did it not listen to her, it had the extreme nerve to lick her leg. Serena bared her teeth at the mutt and wiped her leg with the back of her gloved hand, grimacing at the doggie drool that coated it. Whoever said that a dog's mouth was more sanitary than a human's had obviously never been licked by a dog that's had its muzzle buried in wet garbage.

"Stupid mutt," she muttered under her breath and went back to watching Darien. How long is he going to keep this up, she wondered. He's been looking through the arcade window for the past ten minutes now. Feeling an unpleasant wetness on her ankle, she tore her eyes away from Darien, who was now leaning against the window, blocking out the glare of the sun with his hand, to spare a glance at her shoe. Great, the garbage can was leaking something on her foot. She grit her teeth and chalked it up as an occupational hazard. Then went back to watching Darien.

She was obsessed, and she wasn't embarrassed to admit it. And who wouldn't be obsessed with a guy who was as smart and as handsome as Darien? Despite his having tormented her throughout her adolescence, Darien had his momentary lapses of niceness. There was that time he gave her a ride home when the strap on her briefcase broke and all her books kept falling out, and the time he visited her at the hospital when she had to get her tonsils removed. There was also the time he accompanied her to the dentist because she was too scared to go on her own.

Their relationship wasn't all one-sided, she reflected. She had once helped Darien baby-sit for Jordan, a toddler whose mother fell victim to one of the worse Negaverse attacks she had ever witnessed and was drained of almost all her energy. It was touch-and-go for a while, but she managed to pull through after being in a coma for two weeks. Then there was the time she had to nurse him back to health when he got into a minor motorcycle accident while Andrew was in Africa paying Rita a surprise visit. Serena felt bad for the guy; having to deal with three bruised ribs and a hairline fracture to his right forearm wasn't easy for a guy who lived on his own. So, out of the goodness of her heart (and, admittedly, because she wanted to see if Darien's home matched his ugly green jacket. It didn't, she was relieved to find later) she arrived at his door, offering her housekeeping services to him. He was so amused, he didn't even bother to make her clean. In fact, he even made her a cup of hot chocolate and invited her to stay and watch a video with him. And surprisingly, they had fun that day.

She was so busy reminiscing about that day that she didn't see the bothersome dog staring at her leg with a hungry gleam in its eye. The low growl that escaped from its throat got Serena's attention, though. She froze, turned her head slowly, her eyes widening as she realized that the dog was about to pounce on her leg.

"No! Stay back!" Her scream was cut short when the little dog launched itself onto her leg, sending her crashing against the metal garbage cans behind her. Her terrified wails mingled with the soulful howls of the dog as it continued its deadly assault on her leg.

Where was she, Darien asked himself for the hundredth time since he left his apartment. It was almost 11; even Serena would've dragged her curvy ass out of bed by now.

A clatter from the alley next to the arcade distracted him from his thoughts. The following scream had his blood chilling in his veins. "Stop! Get off me!"

Serena! Adrenaline pumping through his system, Darien raced towards the alley, ready to save Serena from her attacker. By the time he got there, his mind had already gone through hundreds of scenarios, from Serena being raped by an escaped convict, to Serena being abducted by aliens. Hey, he was one-sixth of a magical evil-fighting team that helped protect Japan and the world from the Negaverse—alien abductions were mundane compared to what he went through every Wednesday afternoon at the park.

He saw red at the sight of a bawling Serena, sprawled on the dirty ground, frantically waving her arms and legs to dislodge…a dog? A closer look at her furry attacker had him choking back a smile. His heart melted though at the sight of her tears, and he decided to save Serena from her rather curious predicament.

"Hey! Get off her!" Two steps, and he was gripping the dog by the scruff of its neck, and yanked it unceremoniously off of Serena's calf. He set the struggling dog down on the ground and glared at it menacingly. "Don't you know that when a lady says no, she means no?"

The dog managed to look chagrined and unrepentant at the same time. His tail thumped enthusiastically on the ground, an ear flopping over one eye, giving him a rakish look. Try as he might, Darien couldn't help but smile at the ugly dog. "Wait here just a minute." The dog sat down obediently and yawned.

Serena had watched the exchange with ever-reddening cheeks. She was so embarrassed. Of all the people in world to witness her very public humiliation, it had to be Darien! She took a shaky breath and attempted to stand but the pain in her hip from when she fell prevented her from doing so.

"Are you okay?" Darien crouched down low so he was at the same eye-level as Serena. Her face burned with humiliation, which she was trying valiantly to hide by lowering her face.

"Yeah," she whispered. To her horror, she felt the sting of tears in her eyes and tried to blink them away. Her lower lip trembled, and before she knew it, she was crying all over again.

Darien's heart melted, and he gathered her close, patting her on the shoulder. "It's okay, Serena. At least he didn't bite you."

Serena cried even harder. "It was worse!"

Darien shook his head. "No it wasn't. Come on, stop crying."

"My leg was sexually assaulted by a dog!" she wailed. "I'll never be the same again!"

Darien closed his eyes, and an image of the dog humping Serena's leg entered his mind. He couldn't help it; he started laughing so hard, his shoulders shook. Serena pulled away, and glared at him through her tears. "It's not funny! My body was brutally violated, and all you do is laugh!"

"Well, come on, Serena," Darien said in between snickers. "If you could've seen yourself, you'd be laughing too. And you've gotta admit, this could only happen to you."

Serena folded her arms across her chest and lifted her chin in defiance. She glared at the dog grinning lecherously at her. Then she looked at Darien who was watching her with amusement. And felt her anger melt away. Still, she couldn't give up too easily, could she? "It could happen to you, too, you know. Then we'll see how you like it," she replied stubbornly.

Darien raised his eyebrow skeptically. "Sorry, I don't swing that way, and I don't think that dog does either." A thought struck him, and he frowned speculatively. "What were you doing here, anyway?"

"Uh…" Serena cast her eyes about guiltily, the dog forgotten. "I saw something shiny and came here to check it out."

Darien smiled at her indulgently. "You're so weird."

Serena laughed guiltily. "Yeah, that's me alright. Girl with the talking cat."

"'Girl with the talking cat'?"

Serena bit her lip. She really needed to learn to think before she spoke, or else Luna was going to kill her. "Uh, never mind."

"So what were you really doing here?"

"I told you: shiny object." Her eyes searched the ground for something that remotely fit that broad description. She spotted a bent spoon, possibly from the arcade, and pointed triumphantly at it. "See! That spoon is shiny! Shiny spoon!"

"You risked your leg getting raped by a dog…for a dirty spoon that Andrew probably threw away?" Even his feelings for Serena couldn't keep the skepticism out of his voice.

"For your information, I didn't know that that dog was in this alley before I went in after…that spoon." Sensing that he didn't believe her, probably with good reason, Serena pushed herself off the ground and trotted towards the spoon. Upon closer inspection, she found that ants were crawling all over the spoon. "Uh, on second thought, I have plenty of spoons at home; I don't need any more."

"Not that spoon, at least," Darien muttered under his breath. He rose to his feet and glanced at his watch. It was almost lunchtime. "Say, are you hungry?"

Serena nodded, and as if on cue, her stomach grumbled. "Come on, I know this small food stand that makes great tempura. I just had some teriyaki from there, and it was amazing." Her eyes widened in surprise as she realized that he was referring to the food stand from yesterday. "You like tempura, don't you?"

Serena nodded her head, unable to form words. Did he get Sailor Moon tempura…because he knew it was my favourite? She shook her head and decided that it was just a coincidence. After all, tempura was cheap and plentiful, and Tuxedo Mask probably didn't have much on him after his transformation. Darien's wallet probably went into safekeeping after he activated his transformation, and the money he had yesterday was probably emergency money provided by the tuxedo. Yeah…

They walked in silence down the few blocks to the food stand. When they got there, they noticed a small crowd had formed around the little booth where the owner was shouting excitedly and pointing to a newspaper. "Come and get the Superheroes' Special! For a special introductory price, you too can have what Tuxedo Mask and Sailor Moon had for lunch yesterday, provided by me! Here's the photo to prove it!"

Serena glanced at the picture and saw a picture of Tuxedo Mask preparing to hop away onto the lamppost with a plastic bag imprinted with the stand's logo. "Well, I'll be damned," she said softly.

Darien winced, his cheeks turning red from the indirect attention. He didn't know that an amateur photographer was in the crowd, or he wouldn't have come down at all. He spared a glance at Serena, who was staring at the picture of his alter ego like a gaping fish and felt a rush of jealousy. She never looked at me like that, he thought peevishly. Someone pushed him from behind, firing up his annoyance even more.

"Let's get out of here, Serena. We'll never get anything to eat at this rate." Without pausing to think about it, he grabbed her hand, missing Serena's surprised gasp and the blush that followed, and pulled her from the crowd, heading in another direction.

"Slow down, Darien! Where are we going?" Serena had to practically run in order to match his long strides. She tugged on his hand, still unable to believe that it was enveloping her own.

"I know this great little place near the university," he said, slowing his pace to let Serena catch up. "I go there all the time. You'll love it."

He was right; she did love it. The small restaurant was modeled after one of those French bistros she had only seen in foreign movies. The lights were dimmed, and the music playing over the speakers was soft and jazzy. The tables were small and close together, encouraging the diners to sit closer together. The intimacy of the place wasn't lost on either one of them, and soon they were having a conversation about their plans for the future.

"Have you always wanted to be a doctor?"

"Yeah, ever since my parents were killed and I had to stay at the hospital because of my memory loss I've wanted to be one." Serena knew about the accident that had orphaned Darien when he was just a boy from the time she was at his apartment "nursing" him back to health after that motorcycle accident. She knew he didn't like to talk much about that day, so she simply nodded. "You know, to ‘give back' to the people that helped me."

"I understand, Darien. It's nice that you were able to hang on to that dream all this time." Serena took a dainty bite of her grilled chicken sandwich. She could get used to all this civilized conversation with Darien.

"How about you? What are your plans?" Darien thought Serena looked perfect in this setting…with him. The soft lighting from the ceiling cast an ethereal glow on Serena's hair, and he was struck at how grown-up she looked. Then he remembered that she was turning 18 next summer, and he was turning 21. The age difference doesn't seem that big now, did it?

Serena blushed and lowered her eyes to her plate, tempting Darien to brush the pad of his thumb just underneath her dark lashes. And he very nearly did. "I've always wanted to be a housewife," she replied, looking up. Then she rolled her eyes self-deprecatingly and smiled. "Stupid, huh? I mean, I'm the girl who can't boil water without burning the bottom of the pot."

Darien chuckled, remembering all the pots and pans Serena had ruined during her cooking lessons with Lita. "I'm sure you'll get better at it eventually. Once you have to cook for yourself everyday, you'll be more motivated to try harder. After all, you wouldn't want to waste all your time cooking crappy food."

"You think so?" It was said with so much hope that Darien felt guilty for not having encouraged her more in the years that he had known her. Well, it was time to rectify that situation, he decided. After all, it is the Christmas season. What better time to start being nice to someone that at Christmas?

"Yeah, I think so. I was a pretty bad cook when I first started living on my own. It wasn't long before I got sick of my own cooking and had Andrew teach me."

Serena gaped at him. "You were a bad cook? But I thought you never did anything wrong."

Darien snickered, secretly finding pleasure at her opinion of him. "Hardly."

They took their time through dessert, stretching their conversation out another hour. Serena glanced at the clock mounted on the wall behind Darien's head, and frowned. "Oh no," she said regretfully. "I have to get home soon. My grandmother's coming over tonight so she can spend Christmas with us."

Darien sighed, and signaled for the bill. "It's okay, I just realized that I have to get started on my Christmas shopping."

"You haven't started yet?" The incredulousness in her voice had Darien chuckling.

"I'm almost finished. I just need to find one last gift, and then I'm done." Their waitress handed him a bill, which he paid, making sure to leave her a generous tip. As they were leaving the restaurant, he unconsciously placed his hand on the small of Serena's back. "I'll walk you home," he offered.

"Oh, that's not necessary," she protested even though she was doing cartwheels in her mind.

"It's no trouble at all," Darien replied, dropping his hand from her back. The back of his hand brushed hers, and he had to fight the strong urge to hold it again.

"Well, if you're sure." Who was she kidding? There was no way she was going to pass up this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

They made their way to Serena's house in silence. When they got to the door, Serena turned to him, her cheeks a rosy pink from the chilly air. "I had a lot of fun today, Darien. Well, minus the leg-rape, that is."

A gust of wind blew Serena's hair against her cheek, which Darien brushed away with his finger. Her cheeks turned redder, and this time, Darien was sure it wasn't from the cold. "Yeah, me too."

He noticed a dark shape by the window, and realized that he had an audience. Not knowing if it was her father or not, he decided to play it safe and back off before he met the business end of a shotgun. "I'd better go before the mall closes," he said reluctantly. "Do you have work tomorrow?"

She shook her head. "I have work on Christmas Eve, though."

"That's good, because I do too. I'll see you then." He brushed his finger along her cheek again, then turned around and walked down the driveway, whistling a jaunty tune.

Serena stared after him, watching him until she couldn't see him anymore. When she was sure he was gone, she squeezed her eyes shut and started jumping excitedly in her place. If she didn't know any better, she would say that Darien had the hots for her!