427 Chapter two, 2018, field trip: 1

Winter break ended and the short third trimester began. For the second years it came with both a period of enjoyment and a lot of worries. Exams were a lot more important than they had been last year, but long before those the last week of January promised a small adventure with friends.

One long week in the Kansai area. Osaka and Kyoto were on the itinerary, which probably meant a short visit to Kobe and Nara both. Those weren't places unknown to Christina. She had visited both of the larger cities several times during her previous life, and the hatsumode she never got to spend with Ulf turned into a shoot in Kyoto.

She fidgeted as she packed the last pieces of clothes into a large bag. Most of it was empty, but the section with her clothes bulged in protest of being abused. The empty sections were for new clothes and souvenirs. Her fidgeting however wasn't the result of a protest. While she had visited the cities before she had never done so together with someone she wanted to share the experience with, and that made her nervous.

Ryu might still be a boy barely growing into manhood, but he was her boy. Lingering feelings for Ulf didn't change that she had fallen in love with the prince charming of their school. Not because he was prince charming; that was just a part of him, but because he'd been there caring for her when she had no right to expect being cared for.

'I always thought I'd make this trip with Ulf.' But she hadn't. Not really. They were falling apart before they even slept together. That first summer when he broke down after watching a suicide held both the beginning and end of that love. In the end she couldn't compete with the memories of the wife he lost to that other world.

'I hope you make the most of it,' Christina thought and smirked. A little jealousy always accompanied the moments she saw Noriko and Ulf share together, but these days it was a healthy kind of jealousy, or at least as healthy as was possible. Ulf's first woman in this world was doomed, and Christina had been that woman. The second only had to compete with that first one.

'Only. Damn, Noriko, you make me proud of all strong women out there!' Because Christina knew perfectly well what kind of competition she represented herself, and Noriko had bulldozed right through it with all of her a metre and a half. 'Yeah, my kind of girl!' Jealousy be damned. If anyone deserved Ulf it was Noriko. The question was if Ulf deserved her.

The smirk spread into a thin smile, and after that a happy grin. Christina had long since stopped fidgeting, and now she shouldered her bag and left her luxury flat. A home these days. Another thing she had Ryu to thank for. Occasionally they spent their nights here, and Ryu's parents both knew and accepted it. Ryu, however, didn't accept that she treated it like a hotel room, and piece by piece it took the form of a home.

The lift dropped her at the entrance floor, she waved at the uniformed guard sitting behind the reception desk and left through sliding doors with her personal body guard in tow. Outside the pair Vogue assigned to her waited, as always, in a car, and the four of them rode, not to Tokyo station, but to the Shin Yokohama one.

While a detour it was also a more discrete way to leave Tokyo. She'd take the Shinkansen from a station that was less likely to be swamped with journalists who knew exactly when the Himekaizen second years departed for their field trip west. That thought brought a growl to Christina's face. Journalists stalking the students because of the sensational foreign model was one thing.

'Damn, if they only stalked me. I'm used to it.' Another eight students were shuttled to that station as well. The old gang plus Hitomi. Friends of a girl raped didn't make journalists drool. Friends of the raped daughter of a US ambassador did. The backlash of that disgusting story hadn't died down. If anything it blew up again when Kareyoshi was incarcerated.

She leaned back in her seat and caught some sleep. Sleeping on the go was a superb Japanese habit Christina had adapted to as quickly as possible.

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Her body guard tapped her shoulder when they arrived, and she left the car and grabbed her bag from the trunk. It hung from her shoulder as she entered the station, not her body guard's. He wouldn't be of much use if burdened by her luggage.

Inside the gang waited. One person left it and met her. Ryu. Always Ryu who showed how he cared. It warmed inside of her, and it told her she had been right to move on when her heart broke from her own actions. 'Thank you Ryu for loving me! Thank you Ulf for letting me go!'

Ryu hugged her and moved her bag to his own shoulder. He made it look like it just happened to slide over to him, but she could feel how he snaked under it when he hugged her.

In difference from Ulf Ryu truly was a natural athlete. Christina wondered if he had inherited it from his mother. She always seemed so much more lively compared to his father. The thought of the serious man rolling around on the ground like a cat made her giggle, and she shot Ryu an apologetic smile when he gave her a nonplussed stare.

"What did I do?" he asked.

"Oh, you didn't," Christina said. "Maybe your father did."

"Huh?"

She threw an arm around him and followed him back to their friends. "Nothing. Just forget it," she said.

Ryu's eyes widened in slight annoyance, but she noticed how he decided not to pursue the matter.

Christina grinned and threw Hitomi a glance. "Isn't it time we found you someone?" she said in an attempt to get a reaction out of the always calm beauty.

"I don't think so," came the curt reply.

"How so," Christina said. If she had started it she could as well push the provocation a little. Right now she felt an unexplained need to be a little mean.

The girl lit up in a stunning and surprisingly malicious grin. "I don't think Ryu would like it very much."

'Huh? What? What!'