Work Text:
Sakura is tired.
She's been working a lot these days, being a secretary in a famous company in Tokyo. Sakura has been living on her own for a while now, visiting her family once in a while back in Tomoeda and, having all the house chores and adult responsibilities, plus the extra hours she's having in the past month, so to say that she's tired is an overstatement.
So when she gets to the nearest fast food restaurant and notices it is crowded, Sakura sighs heavily as she goes to the line. After what seems to be forever, Sakura manages to get her food- a cheeseburger, some fries and a soda- and it takes even longer to find a place to sit. Sakura concludes that she's going to need to share a table with someone, unfortunately, because her social battery is at the lowest at the moment. But she manages to get to a table where a young guy near her age is sitting and politely asks if the seat is taken. He blinks in surprise, because apparently he was lost in thought, and lets Sakura sit with him, much to her appreciation.
But then something strange happens. Sakura is reading one of the articles that were assigned for her to read for work, and munching her fries distractedly, and... the guy from across the table gets some of her fries.
She frowns. Not that she is opposed to sharing, but he could have asked, couldn't he? Sakura shrugs to herself and turns her attention to her article again, getting more fries in the process.
Then it happens again, and Sakura frowns even deeply. What the heck? Why is he eating her fries? Why didn't he order some if he wanted them? Most importantly, why is he getting her fries without asking? Sharing a meal is something profoundly intimate in her humble opinion, and there she is, apparently sharing her fries with a total stranger. The thought makes her irritated and she grabs a handful of fries, earning a funny look from the guy. Sakura raises an eyebrow to him but doesn't say anything, turning to her article again and focusing better on it.
Then the guy stands up, carrying his tray with him, and... taking her fries away from her. What? Sakura looks around at her table and suddenly realizes, as she picks up her articles, that her fries were there all along, laying underneath them. What about the fries she ate? Well, apparently she ate his fries instead.
Sakura places her hands on her face as it gets redder and redder. She can't believe she was so stupid. Okay, she's been tired, but it wasn't an excuse to be so rude to a total stranger, even though it was an accident.
Okay, okay, Sakura Kinomoto, concentrate. Maybe you can find him and at least apologize. It's the least you can do. She stands up, even though her meal is unfinished, and rushes towards the exit.
She finds him, luckily, and shouts to him, "Hey!"
He turns around with a frown and Sakura notices that his face gets softer as he sees her. "Hi?"
"I'm sorry!", she shouts again, trying to control herself not to cry out of frustration. He approaches her as she keeps talking, "I'm sorry for eating your fries, I feel so stupid! I was so concentrated on my work stuff that I didn't realize I was eating your fries instead of mine!"
He is right in front of her when she is done talking, and, instead of being angry as Sakura expects, since he is way too serious, he presents her with a small smile. "It's okay."
"No, it's not!"
"It is!"
Sakura feels like crying again, but she breathes deeply to calm herself down. "I'm sorry. Can I buy more fries so I can make it up to you?"
He opens his mouth, then closes it, like he is thinking seriously about it. "Okay, just because I'm still hungry."
She feels even worse, and she hides her face with her hands. "I'm really, really sorry. I feel so stupid!"
"Don't feel stupid," he says sympathetically. "I noticed that you were very concentrated, so I didn't say anything. I didn't want to disturb you."
They start walking back to the restaurant. She says, "I was the one disturbing you! You should have said something."
He shrugs. "Probably. But you are a nice person, and don't call yourself stupid for that."
Sakura stares at him as they get on the line. "You think so?"
"Sure." He looks at her with a funny look again, very similar to the one he gave her before. "Syaoran Li."
Sakura blinks, then realizes that it is his name. "Oh. Kinomoto. Sakura. I mean, Sakura Kinomoto."
Syaoran smiles, which makes her smile back, and they start talking. Apparently Syaoran is an immigrant from Hong Kong, living on his own ever since he started college, which makes her stare at him in awe. He is fluent in three languages- Cantonese, English and Japanese- and is studying to become a businessman. Nothing like Sakura, who is studying Literature and Creative Writing to be a book translator, but Syaoran seems to be quite interested in her field, considering he is bilingual like herself.
They take their order and take a seat at the apparently only free table in the whole restaurant, talking about life in general.
Until Sakura suddenly feels it. The presence of a Clow card. She looks around with a serious expression, but nothing out of the ordinary happens.
Syaoran raises an eyebrow to her. "You feel it too, don't you?"
"Eh?" She abruptly turns to him.
He stands up with the fries in hand. "I feel it too, but I'm curious to know why you can feel the presence of a Clow card, Sakura Kinomoto."
"Well...", she starts saying, but Syaoran is quick to make time stop with his sword and one of the Clow cards. "How...?"
"Do you have Sleep with you?"
"Yeah...?"
"Put everyone to sleep, quick!"
"O-okay!" She grabs her necklace, which transforms into a staff, and invokes Sleep as quickly as possible. The time continues suddenly, but everyone is thankfully asleep.
Syaoran looks around. "I believe the Clow card is..."
"There," Sakura points towards the kitchen.
He blinks. "How...?"
She ignores his question as she walks, leaving Syaoran no choice but to follow her. There, everything is turning into sweets- the table is made of chocolate, the utensils are made of cotton candy... and there is a big mountain made of ice cream, in which stands a creature that resembles a girl on top.
Syaoran poses with his sword, but at the same time Sakura exclaims, "Hey, I know! Throw your fries!"
"What?"
"Trust me, Li-kun!"
Syaoran blinks. "I barely know you!"
"Come on, we might not have another chance! Throw your fries at the table or something!"
He frowns, but does what she tells him, throwing the fries at the now chocolate table. They hear a yelp and the creature resembling a girl comes flying to the table, seemingly upset.
Before the creature can transform the fries into sweets, Sakura invokes the power of the staff to capture the card, but the creature yelps again and flies around the kitchen, trying to hide. Sakura huffs and opens all the cupboards, trying to find...
"Where is it?" Sakura asks herself out loud while she searches.
"What?" Syaoran asks her.
"Salt!", she exclaims. "The only way to catch her is using salt or something!"
Syaoran blinks and looks around, trying to find it as well. Then he spots some kilograms of salt hidden in one of the higher cupboards. "Found it! Catch!" He throws one at Sakura, who easily grabs it.
They throw salt all around the kitchen until the both of them corner the creature and Sakura is able to capture Sweet.
Sakura sighs as her staff becomes a necklace again. Then she turns to Syaoran with a smile. "Hey, thanks."
"For what?"
"Salt." She smiles. Then she frowns. "I'm sorry, your fries..."
He blinks, blushing a little. "Y-yeah, well..."
Sakura frowns more as she recaps what happened. There are more important questions than the fries. "Why do you have a Clow card? How do you know about all of this?"
Syaoran sighs heavily, but quickly realizes people at the restaurant are waking up.
Sakura looks around and tells him, "Let's go, I know a place where we can talk."
And that is how they end up in a playground, at eleven in the evening, sitting on the swings. Syaoran is quiet ever since they left the restaurant, which makes Sakura a little nervous.
"So..." Sakura trails off when he stares at her very intensely.
Syaoran starts, "My family is descended from Clow Reed. I am the one who is supposed to be the Clow cards master."
His tone is very stern, which makes Sakura shiver. But she talks anyway, "Kero-chan said it's my mission to recover the cards, since I was the one who freed them."
His face becomes even more serious. "Kero-chan? You mean Kerberos?"
She nods. "He's my friend."
"You... you are calling the mighty Kerberos 'Kero-chan'..."
"Li-kun, you look a bit pale."
He shakes his head, seeming very consternated. "Is this my opponent? Really?", he asks towards the sky.
Sakura frowns. "What?"
Syaoran sighs. "Look, you seem to be a nice girl, and Kerberos might have chosen you as his candidate, but the cards are mine to be."
"What? No!" Sakura has her eyes wide open. "I promised Kero-chan I would do this! The cards were in my father's house for starters!"
"That can be true," he says, "but I am a descendant of Clow Reed..."
"That doesn't mean I should give you the cards or whatever! They're my friends!"
"Friends? They're cards," he says, seeming confused.
Sakura shakes her head. "I like them very much and they are my friends, not tools!"
Syaoran sighs deeply. "Okay, look, Kinomoto. Let's not fight, okay? We can figure this out. Somehow." He places his hands on his face and huffs. "God, this is going to be difficult."
Sakura blinks a couple of times. "Well, we did capture that card together..."
"Ha!", he says, "I was only in your way. You figured it out a lot sooner than I would."
"Hey, you helped with the salt," she points out.
He freezes for a moment, then he nods. "Touché."
She smiles softly. "Li-kun, we can help each other! I don't mind if you have some of the cards. If we split the job it is going to be easier to stop the befall of Earth! Or something."
Syaoran gazes at her, which makes her blush a little bit because of the intensity. After hesitating, he says, "Fine. But on Judgement day, we are going to know for sure who is going to be the true Clow cards master."
She smiles openly at him, who looks surprised when she says, "I'm sure everything is going to be alright!"
Somehow, a strange wind is around them when Sakura says that, which makes her ask herself what that is supposed to mean. Syaoran looks even more surprised.
"It seems like we are a team now."
"Yes," Sakura says.
"Well in that case," he says, grabbing his phone, "give me your number so we can keep each other posted." His face turns red. "Only for magical reasons."
Sakura smiles. "Okay! Oh, also," she says as she grabs his phone to type her number, "I need to buy you fries some other time."