Why I Hate Kai #16 : He can pout for way to long.

   I sighed. I can't believe I was saying this but I liked irritating-obnoxious-brat Kai more than sulky-sad-depressed Kai. I sighed as Kai sat there staring sadly into he twirled his fork into the noodles another hundred times.

  "Kai." I said, trying to get his attention.

  He ignored me.

  "Kai!"

  Still ignoring.

  I prodded his hair with my fork, (Ew! That wasn't sanitary at all!), that's what got his attention.

  He rushed to fix the perfect flame like spikes as I wiped the fork furiously with my napkin. After giving up I grabbed the chopsticks instead and struggled to pull the noodles apart.

  "Kai, if you want her to ever love you again you have to apologize." I spoke in my best reasonable voice.

  "Why does Jay have to ruin everything, she had no interest in a relationship before-especially boys." He groused.

  I rolled my eyes. "It's called puberty dummy. When did you start looking into dating?"

  He didn't answer.

  "Look Mr. Raincloud, this isn't the Moron's fault, it's yours for being a moron. So, if you're going to fix this you have to accept that your sister is going to start dating guys. And maybe it's going to be a jerk who shatters her heart. Or maybe it'll be a perfectly semi-decent guy like Jay." I continued, staring him right in his stupid sad eyes.

  "Who knows! Besides at least it's not someone like Brad or Ben!"

"It's Chen." Kai corrected as he sulkily stuck some noodles in his mouth.

  "Pretty sure it's Ben." I waved a hand. "Unimportant, all that matters is that you give your sister some breathing room and maybe even talk it over. Discuss your sappy little heart and all that Halmark garbage."

  "Wow, Isla James suggesting that I talk about my feelings." Kai said teasingly. Dropping the damp sponge mood for just a second so he could poke fun at me.

  "Whatever. We should get home." I glanced at the darkened sky.

  Kai nodded. We stood and paid. Split the bill evenly right down to the dime, turning a deaf ear to Kai's attempts at chivalry.

  We began walking down the dark road. There were many cars out but when we got off of Main Street it became more empty.

  Kai was chattering on and on about who knows what when suddenly a gang stepped out of the shadows.

We stopped, my eyes staying on the group of kids. They were decked out in typical shifty street kid stuff with skull shirts, tattoos, piercings, and the killer hair doos and don'ts.

  They took a threatening step towards us and Kai stepped in front of me, to my annoyance, and out out his hands in the universal stop motion.

  "Hey guys, we're all friends here." He said warily.

  "Except for us." I piped up, shoving Kai aside and pointing between him and me. "He's just a whiny kid I tolerate."

  The gang laughed, a creepy forced laugh, exchanging looks.

  "Ever heard the expression that friends don't get special treatment?" A girl with some really ugly black roots with her bright purple hair.

  The group then pulled out knives and began scraping them with a horrible noise against the brick wall of the abandoned building.

  "Just so you know," I spoke again, eyeing the blades at the same time as fighting Kai to stand in front. "I'm broke and so is this guy so the best you're going to get is the nickel I gave him."

  "I said you could keep the nickel!" Kai hissed.

"Well you're so naive I just slipped it in your pocket." I retorted.

A blue guy with a nose ring lunged at me, knife out, but Kai was suddenly there, his hand gripping the boy's wrist tightly. His brown eyes suddenly flashed, the more amber steaks in them becoming more prominent as he twisted Blue's wrist painfully.

  Blue yelped out and fell down to his knees, struggling to try and get Kai to release his hold.

  "GET 'EM!" Purple screamed and the four others ran forwards as well. Kai slammed the boy down with an elbow to the head before uppercutting one of the twin green haired kid's and doing a quick spin and kick to the other.

  His fighting was good. To good. He was like a warrior, using expert level moves. A red haired girl charged at me but my hand went into my pocket, fingering my keys I narrowly missed a punch before jabbing the sharp end of the key under her rib cage. Right where it would wind her.

  That made her fall to the ground, gasping. Kai finished off the rest with a few quick blows. The sounds of sirens sounded and he grabbed me arm before yanking me away when the officers came

  We stopped in an alley, panting heavily.

  "Look," Kai scrambled for an explanation. "I take karate and-"

  "You're the fire ninja." I interrupted quickly.

  His eyes widened, his face freezing in a way that shows how he's such a bad actor. "I'm...trained by the fire ninja."

  "Yeah right." My brain was whirling when I thought about how stupid it was that I hadn't known before.

  I mean, I never cared about what anyone really did but it was so obvious. He always wore red. He always had to go to the bathroom during the attacks, (I had assumed weak bladder when he was afraid), and being able to have the fire ninja himself at the birthday party. A little voice had been thinking that somewhere but finally I realized it.

  "No, I'm not the fire ninja., Kai continued to deny. "That's crazy, it's almost as crazy as Lloyd being the green ninja-" his hand flew over his mouth and he cursed.

  I raised an eyebrow. "You gotta get better at this."

My hands raked through my hair. Oh my god, they're all the ninja. That's so crazy, it made my head swim.

  "Oh no, are you having a panic attack? What do I do?" Kai said anxiously, he wet to hold me or something weird like that but I shoved him roughly.

  "What are you thinking you crazy jerk!" I found myself yelling. I yanked him hard by the collar of his jacket. "You could get hurt, you could die, you could...."

  Kai blinked. A small smile forming. "You care about that?"

I smacked him in the chest again. "Yes, I do you moron! You're my best friend!"

  There I said it, Kai Smith had grown on me. He stared at me like I had grown another head. I kept on shoving him back until he grabbed my arms and sat me down.

  "Hey...hey...I'll be fine. Everyone is fine. Leif's fine, and he has the most awesome cast ever let me remind you." Kai said.

  I rubbed my temples. "Oh my god, you stupid idiot! You were flirting with me!" I glared at him accusingly.

  Kai looked sheepish. "Was I? I don't recall...."

  I let out a laugh, a little to loud, a little hysterical but it was good.

  I was calm now.
 
  "So...best friend huh?" Kai brought up, a wild boyish grin on his face.

  I rolled my eyes and lightly shoved him. "Maybe."

  "Really?" He looked so excited. "Are you serious? I at least thought I'd be a lower than Harry. "

  "Please, make me look more pathetic." I scoffed. "Harry's like a fun uncle. You're pretty much the only one I've hung out with in forever."

  "So I outrank Jay?" Kai waggled his eyebrows.