bakerstreet | The Meet-Cute Meme

The Meet-Cute Meme

It's amazing how many beginnings, in stories and in life, are based on chance. A serendipitous encounter, a chance meeting, a happy accident -- life would be dull if it weren't for the curveballs flung by a playful universe. Just when you think you've got your life figured out -- splat! -- everything changes.

You may have just had a meet-cute, in which two potential romantic leads are thrown together in a contrived and atypical, oftentimes, but not always, over-the-top manner.

In short, the meet-cute is a solution to a perennial screenwriter's problem: "We have a love story between two main characters who will presumably bicker for 90 minutes and then fall in love in the last 10. If they're so dissimilar, how do we get them together in the first place?" If the meeting itself is kind of a joke (a chance collision, a mistaken identity, a hookup with a stranger who turns out to be your ex's lawyer the next day), it's a meet-cute.

We've had plenty of memes that deal with being in a relationship and even some that look at the ends of them, but here's one about the what-comes-before: the meeting!

HOW TO PLAY

Comment with your character and preferences.
Tag around.
Use the RNG to determine your prompt or just go with it.

PROMPTS

No Good Bad Day: Everything is going wrong. You've spilled coffee all over yourself, missed you bus, and things aren't looking up. And to add insult to injury, you've run into somebody! Shouldn't they look where they're going?
Is This Seat Taken?: The last seat on the bus/plane/carriage/dragon is next to a mysterious (or not so mysterious) stranger.
Table for Two: All the other tables are filled, so you're placed with someone else when you thought you'd be dining alone.
Love Hurts: You've accidentally fallen off of something, driven your car into a snowbank, or any other number of calamitous things. You're not badly hurt - though you may be dinged up - but you definitely need help. You need a good Samaritan.
Hope That Didn't Belong to Someone: You've accidentally ruined an item, and you have to meet the owner. Hope they won't be too mad...it wasn't really your fault!
Wait, Them?: You met someone earlier, didn't get on, only to learn later that the two of you will be working together in a close capacity. What can you do? Maybe you can ask for another partner...
No Rest and Relaxation: You're staying at a hotel or a cabin, only to realize that your room has been double booked. Well, you're not leaving. The other person will just have to!
They're After Me: You were having such a peaceful day before that asshole came running by, being chased by the [insert authority figures here]. Why'd they have to pull you into it?
Saved: ...or the shoe's on the other foot, and they've saved you from danger. Doesn't mean you have to like them, though.
Thought You Were Someone Else: You never forget a face- except when you do. Or think the face is someone else's. Maybe someone you cared for...
Arranged Marriage: You've never met this person, but you hope you like them, for the good of your...oh, DAMN IT. You hate their guts.
Ooops, I Did It Again: You totally didn't mean to run over that guy or hit her over the head with a frying pan. You're not heartless enough to not nurse them back to health, right?
I Have a Proposition: You're not keen on each other, but you're working together for your own purposes. But at least feelings won't get in the way...nope.
WILDCARD

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It felt as if the day just couldn't get any worse - he had lost to Marvelos (and almost got killed in the process - thankfully, Marvelous probably wouldn't come after him, since he thought Basco really was dead) and after that, he had run into Zangyack soldiers. Sure, he had defeated them, but now he was so damn tired that he felt like he was about to collapse in the middle of the corpses of Sugomin. He really don't need the day to further deteriorate, but knowing his luck as of late, it probably will.

Kotoha was late. Kotoha was late and Takeru had requested a meeting for fifteen minutes ago. Sure, usually it didn't matter that he had called a meeting because it was commonplace and more importantly she was always there. Punctual and ready to listen. Now that she was late however, the fact that Takeru had organised a meeting was at the forefront of her mind.

She was late and Takeru had requested this meeting and she was late.

What's more, she'd offered to take some supplies off of Genta's hands and deliver them to the Shinkenger's shared base. It was hard to run with what seemed like a ton of sushi ingredients and equipment but she was just about coping. That was of course, until oof.

What had just happened? It seemed as though she had ran into someone. The sushi flew, the soy sauce flew, the pickled ginger flew. Clumsiness was nothing new to Kotoha but she had been so sure that her path was clear, although the divided concentration between looking down at the pile in her hands and checking it wasn't about to fall or topple off and actually looking ahead might have been the unfortunate cause.

Of course. He'll have people crash into him just the same day he's bloody and almost died more than once. At least he manages to stay up on his feet, well, barely. The whatever sort of liquid (because who's heard of soy sauce?) he was hit with wasn't the nicest feeling, either. And it smelled.

He glared through his bangs at whoever it was and froze.

Oh dammit shit hell fucking-- wasn't she a Shinkenger? This day was just getting worse and worse, wasn't it?

He backed away and blinked soy sauce out of his eyes and picked away ginger from his sleeve.

Considering she had nothing in her hands any more, they were free to fly to her face in shock. Her eyes widened as she looked the man up and down.

"A-ah~! I'm so sorry!" A split second later and she was on him faster than she could draw a sword, rubbing vigorously at his clothes and wiping his face with her sleeve and apologising over and over again.

His wariness slip just a little bit when she doesn't recognize him, but he was incredibly close to reel back when she leaped at him.

"Eh-uh--right--just--stop that.."

It was a bit hard to focus and this was weird. Really weird.

Kotoha was too busy focusing on the soy sauce to bother taking note of who the person was. Whether it was just anybody off of the street or some famous celebrity, she had inconvenienced them and it had to be righted. She was always doing stupid things like this and so she tried her best to make sure her victim - for want of a better word - was well looked after and sent off without the urge to curse her existence.

"But--!"

She looked down at his clothes and became firm in her resolve.

"I'm so sorry!" This time she had the chance to bow. "I'll replace your clothes! Ah! My place is near here, I can clean you up and lend you some clothes! I'm sure my friends will have some that will fit!" Yes yes. This was a brilliant idea.

Did she know who she was talking to? Or did she just not care? He was an enemy of the sentai teams--not that there was any meaning for him to try to gather the Great Powers anymore, because he wished to lay low--and that did not include owing a favor to a Shinkenger.

But.. he doesn't have anywhere to go, because Marvelous had already claimed the Free Joker as his and he couldn't hijack a Zangyack ship in the state he was in. "You don't need to replace them." However. "I don't think I'll decline getting washed up." Because he smells funny. Hopefully, no one would figure out who he was.

Kotoha smiled almost literally from ear to eat at him. She felt the urge to grab his hand and pull him along in her eagerness, but reminded herself that this person really didn't seem to be best pleased with her at the moment so she thought the better of it.

After bending to pick up the scattered ingredients, some of which were unfortunately ruined, Kotoha gathered them in her arms once more and began to walk in front of...

"Hey, what's your name? I'll introduce you to everyone when we get back!"

This girl was weird. Did she even know how abnormal it was to invite strangers to your place just because you spilled food? over them?

"Uh..." It wasn't the best idea to tell his name, even if she didn't know him from his face, it was fully possible that she had heard his name from the Gokaiger. And even if she didn't, 'everyone' was likely a reference to the other Shinkengers. Not good. But still. "Ba--Bastian." he lied. That was an Earth name, right?

"Bastion huh..." She looked back to him from her position in front. While she was looking elsewhere however, a stone on the pavement got the better of her and she stumbled before finally falling.

Kotoha rubbed her bottom pitifully as she righted herself with a mutter of 'ouch' before focusing on him once more. "That's a cool name!" She giggled.

This girl was not only weird, it seemed as she was clumsy too. But he's not going to comment on that.

And he'll smile, because it seems.. appropriate. "Thanks." Even if it's not his real name, it's good that the thought-of-in-the-last-minute name seem to work. This far, at least.

"It doesn't sound Japanese." She brushed herself off sheepishly and gathered her things yet again. Genta was going to be disappointed, she thought solemnly, because she insisted on transporting them. "Do you have foreign relatives?"

It didn't? Hmm, maybe not. He wasn't quite well-known in the difference of names between countries. "Yeah." Technically. Although, none from the Earth.

"Ah, that's amazing!" Her impending meeting with a disappointed Genta had temporarily left her mind as she imagined what it would be like to have foreign relatives or friends. She had only seen foreigners through the TV and they looked cool. "It must be fun."

"....not necessarily." He didn't have a planet anymore, nor a ship. And the only family that he had left, well, let's just settle for 'they didn't really like him'.

"Ah, really? I see..." She looked thoughtful. "I guess that would be the case after all! Family is family huh?" Although she herself had never had problems with her family and she loved them very much, she was aware that all families weren't like that. Maybe Bastion had familial problems like Mako did.

"I guess so." His family was... quite a messed up tribe of aliens, and he had never been popular among them, so.. Yeah. "I'm guessing that you have a better relationship with your family than I have with mine." Yes, time to move the topic away from him.

Upon mention of her own family, Kotoha grinned widely and nodded at him.

"Yeah, it's really just me and my big sister. I write to her as often as I can. I can't really be with her because of being a Shinkenger you see."

Happy topic to her, then. Possibly, he could urge her to keep on it.

"So you have a sister?"

As he thought - had known - she was a Shinkenger. No recognition showed on his face, however, since he already had that figured out.

"Yes. My older sister Mitsuba. Do you have any brothers or sisters?"

Damn. "No." Not any more.

"Ah, so you're an only child? Must be pretty lonely..." Kotoha didn't know what she would do without her sister as she was growing up, so she felt a pang of sympathy for everything that this boy was missing out on.

"Sort of." He doesn't clarify which part he was replying to. It was more complicated than that.

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The Meet-Cute Meme

so i really just can't resist, have a slight AU'd ep 48 = a 1

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o-okay i'm fessing up! i have only seen shinkenger so i'm sorry for any mistakes u///u

that's perfectly alright ^^

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bringing in a little bit of head-canon, if that's alright

no problems!

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ah so sorry! i forgot ;~;

that's alright, i got a lot busy