Beyblade Fan Fiction ❯ Evra's Big Mistake ❯ Chapter 7 ( Chapter 7 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Rei's Neko_gurl: Hey there! I'm soo sorry that it took me so long to update this. But it's here now so enjoy.

'Here she is,' said Fenn, who was pulling on his jacket and preparing to lock up. 'What happened, Evra? We were beginning to think you had fallen into the tumble dryer.'

Evra didn't even hear him. She was to busy looking at Hungry and Homeless.

With his shiny clean hair.

And his red crewneck sweater worn over a dark blue shirt.

And his black trousers and highly polished black shoes.

Slowly, very slowly, she breathed in.

And his Christian Dior aftershave . . .

'Time for that explanation now?' His light eyebrows lifted slightly as he spoke. 'I could take you out to dinner if you're hungry. Or if you'd prefer, just a drink.'

Evra had a small but interessted audience. Bex, Corinne and Lucy, all with their coats on, were loitering at the desk, clearly dying to know what she'd been getting up to in her spare time.

He's spent the last month sitting outside the shoe shop up the road, she marvelled. Between them, they must have walked past him at least fifty times.

And none of them had the slightest idea who he was.

'Why would I want to have dinner with you?' Evra squealed, outraged by his colossal nerve. 'I mean, seriously, how gullible do you think I am?'

'So,' he grinned at her, 'Just a drink then?'

'No.' Evra backed away as he reached into his back pocket. 'No dinner, no drink, no nothing. How do I know you're not a raving psychopath?'

Having pulled his wallet out of his pocket, he said in a reassuring voice, 'Actually, that's a good sign. If you really thought I was a psychopath, you'd keep it to yourself, you wouldn't accuse me of being one. I'm not anyway,' he went on, sliding a card out of the wallet and holding it towards Evra. 'I'm a journalist.'

Evra looked at the NUJ card. It belonged to someone called Kai Hiwatari.

There wasn't a photograph on it. 'All this tells me is that you mugged a journalist and stole his wallet.'

Her expression was truculent, she shrugged and passed the card back.

Fenn intercepted it.

'Evra, come on, lighten up. The guy's a journalist. He was researching a piece about how it feels to be out on the streets. You blew his cover and called him some terrible names, but still he's forgiven you.' Fenn reached for the door; it was time to lock up and go home. 'For heaven's sake, let him buy you dinner.'

Evra hesitated. Behind Fenn, Bex was saucer-eyed and nodding so fast her eyelashes were in danger of flying off.

Nothing on Bex was real.

'Just something simple, a pizza maybe,' Kai Hiwatari -- if that was his name -- gave her a nod of encouragement.

Sod that, Evra thought indignantly, he owes me more than a lousy pizza.

If he's taking me out to dinner, we're going to somewhere expensive.


They went to Langan's Brasserie, on Stratton Street. It wasn't a restaurant Evra had ever been to before, but she'd heard enough about the place from clients at the salon to know it probably cost a bomb.

Well, good.

As far as Evra was concerned, the bigger the bomb the better.

And she was going to order the priciest thing on the menu.

'I'm glad you changed your mind about coming out,' said Kai Hiwatari, when the waiter had taken their order.

'I didn't have a lot of choice.'

Evra fiddled with her cutlery. She still had a terrible urge to punch him. He had humiliated her and she couldn't forgive him just like that.

'I've got your wine glasses in the car, by the way. You left them behind yesterday.'

His eyes were friendly. He was willing her to smile back at him.

'Look what do you expect me to do?' Evra demanded stroppily. 'Say thank you and apologise for yelling at you? Because I don't see why I should. You make a fool of me, you let me give you sandwiches . . . and chocolate . . . and a crappy old scarf . . . Do you have any idea how stupid that makes me feel?'

'Okay, let me explain.' His voice was soothing, as if he were dealing with a toddler on the verge of a tantrum. 'I couldn't give your food to a genuine homeless person but I made a donation to the Salvation Army, so someone else could have a hot meal on your behalf. And any money I was given went to them too. You don't have to worry,' he assured her, 'nobody missed out.'

Except me, thought Evra, and all the times I shared my luch with you when I could've ate the whole thing myself.

Depriving oneself of chocolate wasn't the easiest thing to do. Heavens, it ws practically an unnatural act.

Evra sighed, silently mourning the loss of all those Mars bars.

'So how long d'you have to keep this up?' Curiosity finally overcame belligerence. 'Seems like a lot of work for one article.'

'I've finished. Friday was my last day.' His dark eyes registered amusement. 'You can even have your scarf back as well, if you like.'

Their first course arrived. Evra dived greedily into her scallops.

'Bet you were glad to be able to wash your hair.'

'I washed it every night,' said Kai Hiwatari. With a shrug he added, 'And rubbed Mazola into it every morning.'

Ugh, imagine.

'Still seems like a lot of work for one magazine article.'

He laid down his fork and smiled slightly at Evra.

'What?' She wondered why he was looking at her like that. 'Do I have cream on my chin?'

'No. This wasn't for a magazine article. It's for TV.'

'Don't be daft,' Evra scoffed, 'you need cameras for TV. You need lights, and those clapperboard things, and directors with megaphones shouting Action.'

'For Lethal Weapon, maybe,' said Kai Hiwatari, 'but not for a documentary. Not this kind, anyway.'

'You still need a camera.'

He nodded.

'I know that.'

'And you definitely didn't have one.'

'Actually, we did. In the shoe shop.'

Oh, good grief. Evra almost choked on a scallop. If the camera had been strategically positioned behind him, that ment . . .

'Are you telling me I'm going to be in this documentary?'

'Oh yes. The producer's crazy about you. If he has his way,' Kai Hiwatari looked as if he was enjoying himself, 'you'll end up a star.'

Evra was appalled. Terrible mental images spiralled through her brain, of all the times she had raced up the road to see him in her scruffy black jacket with the wind and the rain splattering her hair in all directions. And in next to no make-up.

Oh God, and when it was cold her nose always went bright red, like a Comic Relief one.

'That is so unfair,' she blurted out, loudly enough to startle the couple at the next table. 'Why couldn't you have warned me? What am I going to look like?'

Amused, Kai Hiwatari said, 'According to Tony, everyone's going to fall in love with you.'

'Oh yes, and by this time next year I'll be a supermodel, all five foot six of me.' It wasn't funny. Evra quailed, imagining the hideous footage they must have of her on their beastly hidden camera. 'Couldn't you just do some of the filming again?' she pleaded desperately. 'Give me a chance to comb my hair and put on a bit of make-up?'

Not to mention a Wonderbra.

'You shared your lunch with me. How you look isn't important.'

Ha, thought Evra, only a total man could think that.

'You could blur me out,' she had a brainwave, 'have one of those splodgy things covering my face, like they do with criminals who aren't allowed to be identified.'

'Look, if you're really against this,' said Kai Hiwatari, 'you can always say no.'

She gazed at him, startled.

'I can?'

'Obviously we need your permission to use you. If it bothers you that much,' he said simply, 'refuse to give it.'

'Oh!'

Evra was taken aback. She hadn't expected him to say this. In fact, secretly, she was quite taken with the idea.

If only she could appear on it looking . . . well, a bit better.

More of a human being, basically. And less of a dog.

Yuck, dilemma.

Kai Hiwatari had finishe dhis first course. 'You're dithering. Maybe you should just say no.' Nodding at her plate, he aded, 'I won't get stroppy and march you out of here, if that's what you're worried about. You can finish your meal. Although . . .'

Evra hurriedly forked the last scallop into her mouth before he could change his mind.

'Although what?'

'No, I was just thinking it would be nice publisity for the salon.' He shrugged, indicating the Fenn Lomax logo on the front of her parma-violet T-shirt. 'But that wouldn't benefit you, would it? Only your boss.'

Only her boss?

Evra's brain leapt to attention. Kai Hiwatari might have dismissed the idea already, but that was because he didn't know her.

It was actually a powerful incentive.

The prospect of massive Brownie points wasn't to be sneezed at. Particularly by a humble employee who couldn't help feeling sometimes that she was only hanging on to her job by the skin of her teeth.

For instance, thought Evra, someone like me.

Actually, quite a lot like me.

'Publicity for the salon would be good,' she agreed cautiously as their next course arrived. 'I'd be happy with that.' Her lamb cutlets glistened in the candlelight, weakening her resolve. 'Oh, I don't know . . . it's just the thought of all those people seeing me on TV and yelling, "God, look at the state of her, what a loser." They'd probably think I fancied you.' She winced at the idea. 'That I'm so sad, ugly and desperate that chatting up beggars and bribing them with sandwiches is my only hope.'

It would have been nice if, at this point, Kai Hiwatari could have protested, 'Oh now, come along, you're not ugly!'

But he didn't. Chivalry clearly wasn't his thing. He just smiled that irritating half-smile of his again and said, 'Okay, they might think that.'

Thanks alot, thought Evra, deeplt miffed.

'Then again, when they see you in the second half of the programme being interviewed . . . well, that's when they'll realise they were wrong, won't they?'

Interviewed?

Evra's glass of wine was halfway to her mouth. It stopped dead.


'Hang on, what interview?'

'It's a fifty-minute programme. In the first half,' Kai Hiwatari explained, 'we use the hidden camera footage. The viewers get the chance to make up their own minds about the people they see. People like you, who try to help, as well as the other kind,' he said evenly, 'those who yelled at me to get a job. Not to mention the bunch of kids who stole my money and gave me a kicking.'

Evra's eyes widened in horror.

'They didn't! Were you hurt?'

'Pretty bruised.' Briefly he pushed up the sleeve of his sweater, revealing a boot-shaped mark on his forearm. 'I won't show you the rest.'

'Bastards!'

Evra had forgotten all about dinner. The lamb cutlets were growing cold on her plate.

'Goes with the territory.' With a shrug, Kai rolled his sleeve down again. 'Anyway, so that's the first half. In the second, we run a series of interviews with the people the audience have come to know. Most of them good, some bad. You'd be one of the good guys, of course.' He paused for a second. 'That is, if you agree to appear.'

Oh well, this changed everything.

'Where would I be interviewed?'

Evra was by this time quite breathless with excitement.

'That's up to you. The plan is to interweave different strands. Walking on the street . . . at work . . . in your own home, if you'd be happy with that. You're a young girl, a salon junior,' he explained with enthusiasm, 'without much money yourself. If the viewers see you living in a crappy bedsitter, they'll warm to you even more.'

Crappy bedsitter?

'If my landlady heard you saying that,' Evra told him, 'she'd run you over with her wheelchair.'

'That was your landlady, was it? I thought she must be your grandmother.'

'Oh dear, now she's going to run over you twice.'

Kai shook his head.

'I'm sorry, I'm a journalist, I can't help asking questions. What were you doing out with your landlady yesterday, drinking wine on Parliament Hill?'

'She has arthritis. I look after her a bit, do stuff for her, in exchange for paying not much rent.' Forking up asparagus, Evra moved swiftly on to more interesting matters. 'So in these interviews I'd be able to wear nice clothes?'

'Of course.'

'And tons of make-up?'

'Well, ounces maybe. No need to go too mad.'

Was he laughing at her?

'And I could have my hair looking nice?'

Solemnly Kai Hiwatari nodded.

'So they'd definitely know I wasn't ugly and desperate.' Evra heaved a sigh of relief. 'That's fine then, I'll do it.'

'Great.'

Belatedly, a horrid thought struck her.

'Oh! Except there's one bit you mustn't show.'

'Don't tell me,' Kai Hiwatari intercepted her with a grin, 'the stolen gloves.'

Evra was indignant. 'How did you know?'

'Tony and I ran a few of the tapes this morning. That was his favourite bit.'

'Well he can't use t,' Evra said firmly.

'I did warn him.' Another broad grin. 'I had a feeling you might say that.'


The bill for the meal was astronomical. Evra determinedly didn't feel guilty; if Kai Hiwatari was involved in making TV programmes, he must be rolling in it.

Anyway, there was the small matter of the other lie he had told her. A totally unnecessary lie, Evra thought, considering that when he'd said it, his cover had been blown.

'You still haven't told me why you and your landlady were out on the heath yesterday, drinking wine ou tof Waterford crystal glasses.'

He was driving her home in his scruffy BMW. Evra, sitting next to him nursing the two glasses on her lap, cast a sidelong glance at his profile.

'And you haven't told me yet why you said you weren't married.'

The traffic lights ahead turned red. He breaked and turned to look at her.

'Because I'm not.'

He sounded genuinely surprised. Fine, Evra accepted that. You didn't have to be married to have a child.

'Okay,' she persisted, 'but you were with your son yesterday. Why did you say you weren't his father?'

'Eddie, you mean? I'm not his father.'

Men, honestly. You couldn't trust them further than you could kick them.

Kai Hiwatari's mouth was twitching. The lights turned green and he let out the clutch.

'Eddie's my sister's son. I'm his uncle.'

********************************************************** *************************************************************************** *******************************

Rei's Neko_gurl: Honestly Kai. You never said you had a sister. Care to introduce me sometime? *bats lashes*
Kai:No not really. I don't want you corrupting her mind with your yuri ways. *Gets whacked with a pillow*
Rei's Neko_gurl: *Laughing* Shut up. Till next time folks. Ja Ne. *Attaks Kai with pillow again*