First Date

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The echoing whinny of a mechanical horse could be heard as Celty raced through the streets of Ikebukuro, en route to make a delivery to Russia Sushi. As usual, some small crowds of spectators gathered by the sides of the street to catch a glimpse of her whizzing by. She was sure that by now all the fuss would have subsided. Many people had already seen her without her helmet and her neighing motorcycle wasn't an unusual presence anymore in the city. But she supposed she was still something of an urban legend, and the city was forever crowded with hordes of people. Even though many had already seen her, there were many more who hadn't. Pulling around the street corner where Simon usually stood, she pulled her motorcycle to a slower speed as she approached the towering Russian.

"Celty! Lung time nooo see! Do you wunt to eat sahm sooshi?" ((Celty! Long time no see! Do you want to eat some sushi?))

Horribly pronounced Japanese aside, the man was as friendly as ever. Celty had to admit, he was one of her favorite faces around the city. She put up a hand to wave a polite, "no thank you" to his sushi offer, then pulled out the small package she had for him. With a bright smile, he took the package from her with exuberant thanks. She nodded and was about to take off again when he put up a hand, saying,

"Weigh-it jahst a meenute. Jahst hold ahn fer a meenute, will you?" ((Wait just a minute. Just hold on for a minute, will you?))

Celty watched as he bounded into the sushi restaurant with his package, then watched as he came dashing back out, his pamphlet stack restocked and holding two small slips of paper in his other hand. He waved them at her, handing them over with a wink as she took them hesitantly. Looking down, she saw two tickets to the local indoor amusement park, Sunshine Namja Town. Tilting her head back up at Simon, he gave her a big, toothy grin and patted her shoulder warmly.

"Two teekits fer you to haff sahm faahn!" ((Two tickets for you to have some fun!))

He threw out his arms on either side, waving them widely, perhaps to indicate just how much fun the place would be. Pocketing them within her riding suit, she nodded in thanks and revved up her engine, taking off at beyond the speed limit. As she weaved in between cars in traffic, she thought about Simon's recent gift. She really had no use for amusement park tickets. Chances are Mikado or Anri might be interested in them, and it would probably give the two kids a perfect opportunity for their first da--... She had nearly swerved her bike into a car passing on her right, and as the car honked in annoyance, she sped on, driving on the lane dividers and shaking her head to regain composure. Come to think of it, she and Shinra hadn't ever been... Well, they both worked so much anyhow. They didn't really get vacation days...

Rounding around the block where Shinra's apartment was, she pulled the bike slowly into the elevator, her thoughts swimming. I mean, it never hurts to ask, right? What was the worst he could say? No? Fidgeting nervously, she hadn't realized she had reached her floor until the door had closed up again after opening. Jolting out of her thoughts, she pressed the button to open the door again, then stored the bike in the makeshift garage they had on their floor. Pulling out her apartment key, she slowly opened the door, listening for Shinra's voice to greet her as she walked in the door, but there was nothing but silence. Maybe he had been called in to work today. Closing the door behind her, she took off her helmet and wandered into the living room, plopping herself down onto the sofa. If she could let out a sigh, she would have. Instead, the wisps of smoke from her neck puffed, and she leaned back into the cushions, pulling her knees up to her chest and wrapping her arms around them. How would she even go about asking?

But before she could even formulate the possible questions, she heard a click coming from the door and the door opened, Shinra walking in with arms full of groceries. Panicking slightly, she bolted off of the sofa so that she was standing up straight, but then didn't move from the spot. What should she do? Should she have been doing something? Should she welcome Shinra home? Oh, she was no good at this. She slumped back down onto the sofa, sure that Shinra would hear her bumbling about.

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Shinra hummed happily to himself as he closed the apartment door behind him, arms full of groceries. Today was a good day for him; he wasn't called into work, Shizuo didn't pop in with any random injuries from a run in with Izaya or vice-versa, the weather outside was nice and brilliant, and everything was just plain peaceful.

He placed the groceries on the kitchen counter carefully and put the frying pans and other utensils he had knocked over earlier into the sink. Earlier, he was trying to make something for himself since his beautiful Celty was out, but he had accidentally tripped over a bag of flour laying innocently on the floor and everything came crashing down. Because of this, he had to go out and buy more food so that he could actually have something to eat later that night.

Regardless, it didn't put a damper on his mood and he was able to go out and get the groceries feeling as bright and happy as he did before the incident.

After the dishes were put in the sink, he reminded himself to actually wash them later and proceeded to put the groceries where they belonged, not feeling very hungry anymore. Once that was done, he sighed and walked into the living room, noticing the other occupant of the apartment sitting on the couch. A large smile crossed his face; there was his beautiful Celty! She had come home before he did! He started to run and did a little twirl in front of her before sitting on the other side of the couch.

"Celty! Welcome home!" He said happily, leaning closer to the love of his life.

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Oh great. Now he was sitting next to her, leaning in close like he always did with that stupidly endearing grin of his. Celty pulled her knees up to her chest again, resuming her fetal position. It helped her think. And thinking about it, it really wasn't that big of a deal. I mean, it didn't take an idiot to see that Shinra was head over heels in love with her for some reason or another. Of course he'd probably react to a date the same way he reacted to most things. He'd probably shout in delight and jump around the room, say something lewd, and then she'd punch him in the arm. Right. So why was it taking her so long to just go ahead and ask?

She knew her silence and her current position on the sofa were probably worrying Shinra, since his eyebrows were starting to furrow upwards. Unable to sigh, a wisp of black smoke puffed out from her neck. Without thinking about it, she began fidgeting again, wiggling her legs uncomfortably in her arms and bringing her shoulders up and down repeatedly. She supposed she could never give Mikado a hard time ever again for not being able to ask Anri out properly. She was having even more trouble even though Shinra's feelings were obvious. Well, there wasn't a rule that said that she had to ask directly.

Unzipping her riding suit, she reached into her cleavage to pull out the two tickets and held them out in front of Shinra's face.

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"Ah?"

Shinra's eyes widened as the two tickets were thrust in front of his face and he leaned back a little, blinking. He carefully took the paper slips into his own hands and read their labels. A large smile slowly started to spread across his face and he jumped up off the couch.

"These are tickets to an amusement park! Two of them! Which means you'd like to go there with me, right? Oh, how I've been dreaming of this day~!"

With both tickets still clutched firmly in his grasp, he started to jump and twirl around the room with glee. He didn't really care how silly and childish he looked at the moment; his beloved just asked him out on a date! Sure, she didn't exactly ask him out, but why else would she show him the tickets? He was pretty sure he understood the message anyway. But maybe...

He finally settled down after a few moments and sat back down next to Celty, suddenly looking a bit more serious. "...These are for us, right?" He chuckled nervously; maybe he shouldn't have reacted so quickly...

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If she could roll her eyes, she would have done so. Honestly, after all that effort, he had to double check her intentions? She nearly smacked him on the arm before she thought that it might not be the most affectionate thing she could do. Instead she pulled out her cellphone and immediately began texting on it. Holding it out to him, she held it out for a few seconds so that he could read the message.

"Simon gave them to me."

Pulling the phone back, she began to type the next bit and found herself having immense trouble coming up with what to type next. At this point, he was essentially making her ask him out again! And after she had already gone to the trouble of actually pulling out the tickets, which had taken long enough! Slowly, deliberately, she typed on the screen. "I was wondering if..." No. She deleted it. "I thought it would be nice if..." No. She deleted that too. "Would you like to..." No. Each message got deleted successively faster. "Shinra, you..." NO!!! She almost threw the phone across the room in frustration, but she would never do that. Her phone was a treasured object, a gift from Shinra. She would never deliberately destroy it.

"If you don't want to..." No no, that was silly. He had just been jumping up and down the room in delight, it was obvious he wanted to go. Celty would have glared at her phone if she could, silently demanding the message to write itself so that she wouldn't have to. She had to be able to do this. The hard part was already over. Suddenly, her fingers moved and the right message was painfully obvious.

"Of course, they're for us!"

Then putting her phone down for the briefest of moments, she threw up her arms and her black rider's suit was replaced by a black sun-dress in a wisp of black smoke. On her feet were black sandals with laces that wrapped up her calves, and on her head, she had created what looked like a black head-wrap, much in the manner of Grace Kelly. Sunglasses were placed over where her eyes would have been. She didn't much feel like putting on her riding helmet, it wouldn't go so well with the dress in all seriousness, but just going headless wouldn't do. Then she crossed her arms, fully expecting the explosion that was about to happen.

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"R-really?!" He stepped back and allowed her to quickly switch into her 'park' attire. Shinra froze where he stood for a few seconds before yet another large grin appeared on his face. "Have I ever told you that you look absolutely beautiful?" Of course, it was a rhetorical question; he's told her that so many times that even he himself couldn't count it.

"Oh. I should probably get ready too, huh? I can't exactly go to an amusement park dressed like this." He gestured to his lab coat and grinned back up at her. "Wait right there!" Shinra spun on his heels and quickly ran off to get a new change of clothes. He wasn't like Celty; he couldn't just will himself a new outfit no matter how convenient it would be.

As if she would suddenly take back her offer if he didn't work fast enough, he grabbed the first set of casual clothes he saw and quickly ran back to her while changing along the way. He threw his lab coat aside and nearly choked himself while removing his tie. His shirt flew through the air and the light orange casual shirt was quickly pulled on. He nearly tripped as he slipped his pants off and awkwardly hopped on one foot as he tried to shove his legs in the khaki shorts he grabbed earlier. His efforts were futile as he tripped anyway and slid back into the living room with the shorts tangled around his knees.

"...Haha." Shinra laughed awkwardly and quickly stood to pull his shorts up. After a few short seconds in which there was a valiant battle with the button, he finally succeeded and shouted in victory as his shorts were put on correctly. He reached up to pull on the sleeve that was hanging off his shoulder and stood up straight.

He strode over to Celty once that was all done and over with and gave her a bright smile as if nothing had happened. "Alright! I'm finally ready! Let's go!"

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Celty almost laughed at the utter silliness that radiated from every pore of Shinra. Honestly, it was so easy to forget that he was in his mid-twenties at this point, for multiple reasons. The first reason was that he behaved so absurdly most of the time. The second reason was that she had known him since he was a little boy, watched him grow up and had been by his side for most of his life. She could never imagine that when she would be going out with that little boy on a date when she had first met him all those years ago. Well, it was now or never, and she had stalled long enough. Grabbing Shinra's hand, she pulled him out of their apartment and opened the door to the garage to pull out her motorcycle.

She hadn't yet considered the fact that her skirt would make it a bit difficult to ride her motorcycle properly, nor the fact that Shinra had never ridden with her. It also might not have been the best idea to go in the form of transportation that practically everyone in Ikebukuro recognized. For once, she minded being in the spotlight as the phantom of Ikebukuro. Tapping her foot, she wondered what the best course of action was here and began fiddling with the end of her headscarf, which was draped over her shoulders. Then she had it. She didn't think that scarf fidding ould lead her to the answer, but there it was. She grabbed Shinra and practically shoved him into the elevator, pushing her bike in as well. Ignoring all protests, she pulled him out of the elevator once they had reached the ground floor.

Once they were out of the building and out on the street, Celty looked one way down the empty road and then looked the other way. When she was satisfied that no one was in the immediate vicinity, she ran her hand over the motorcycle from the handlebars to the back exhaust and before their eyes, with a flourishing whinny, her horse transformed itself from a motorcycle into a black, top-down convertible sports car. Satisfied, she buckled herself into the driver's seat, then pulled out her phone since Shinra had remained glued to the sidewalk.

"Well, come on you."

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Shinra simply stood there wide-eyed before chuckling softly and shaking his head. "Good idea, Celty. That way you won't be recognized so easily!" He made his way on over to the passenger seat and buckled himself in, giving Celty a thumbs up with a smile.

As the car started to move, Shinra stared out the window at the scenery passing by. He wasn't really focusing on the view, however. More like thinking about his time with Celty.

She had been there for him his entire life(well, since he was four actually, but it wasn't as if he could actually remember much from before then), and twenty years after their first meeting, they were finally going out on an official date. Just the thought made him excited. He never imagined that Celty would be the one to ask him out; he had always thought it would be the other way around. Of course, he expected refusals, but he believed that if he kept pestering her about it, she would finally accept his offer.

He hummed and turned his head to look at the woman currently occupying his thoughts. He couldn't believe how lucky he was to have someone like that in his life, and currently taking him out on a date! It was almost too good to be true. Just in case, he reached over and pinched his own arm and flinched in pain. That hurt, so he wasn't dreaming. That was good.

"So..." he trailed off, trying to start a conversation. "You said Simon gave these to you, right?" He looked over to her, expecting an answer, before remembering that she could only reply to him via her phone, which she couldn't access at the moment lest they end up rear-ending someone. "Ah...never mind." Shinra chuckled and continued to look out the window.