She waited for what seemed like hours. In reality, however, the wait time Yumiko waited for was a mere eighteen minutes. The blonde-haired girl waited for a particular brown-haired boy to meet her up on the rooftop for lunch, but he was a no show.

Repeatedly tapping her foot on the ground as her shoes made a satisfying click, impatiently tapping her index finger of her crossed arms on her sleeve, her face progressively began to show an annoyed expression. Where in the hell is he?

Yumiko could wait no longer, stopping herself from leaning against the concrete wall and pushing her way through the metal door next to her. She began to wander the halls, subtly and discreetly checking each classroom for the boy. Of course, her first objective was to check his home classroom, 2-J, but she would rather not go there because of a particular black-haired beauty that she very much despised. It's not that she found herself better than the girl known as Yukino Yukinoshita. Well... Maybe just a little bit when it came to one area, but that was beside the point. She despised her because Yumiko hated Yukino's guts essentially, and there was one incident where she showed up to her classroom one lunch period, but as much as she hated to admit it, it was that encounter with her during that time that made Yumiko rethink her approaches toward some people. But with her way of speaking and how she pretty much speaks matter-of-factly, Yumiko might think that Yukino is a rather pompous bitch (even though it's probably the opposite when it comes to the two of them). But she shook her head. Why was she even thinking about here in the first place?

She had one goal in mind right now and that was to find her childhood friend, Y/N L/N, to give him a piece of her mind.

Well, that's what she would've liked to think.

Yumiko ended up wandering into the annexed building that was a bit off from all the other classrooms. The classrooms in the annexed building were mostly used for clubrooms. Reason why she wandered into the annexed building is because she began to hear a particular noise. Music.

But not just any music. It was a specific tone that she's heard so much. Yumiko wasn't much of a musical person herself, but she did dabble a little bit into some of the genres because of her friend. She was aware of his dream to become an aspiring musician one day and so he would share his love of music with her. She even began to sing with him on some of the songs he'd show her. One of the few past times she enjoys whenever she's with him, aside from the times she'd drag him around on outings and what not.

In fact, when she heard the music play, she began to unconsciously hum to the song and pick up her pace. Her heart skipped a little as she ended up smiling unknowingly. I mean, yes, she did enjoy singing with the brown-haired boy, but she's never smiled this widely. But even still, the moment she heard his voice being echoed throughout the halls made her feel compelled to hurry up and join him. That excitement of hers, however, was soon shattered as soon as she appeared by the door and peered through the window.

There Y/N sat, acoustic guitar in hand as he gracefully strung away at the strings, a close-eyed smile on his face as he contently sang. Sitting across from him was a girl she had never seen before, nor had Yumiko ever heard Y/N mention to her at all. A dark, but vibrant purple color to her hair, along with pretty dark blue eyes that went very well with the black uniform of Sobu High. The girl herself was also using a guitar, her rhythm and tune in perfect synchronization with L/N. They were singing very well together, there was no denying about that. But that wasn't what concerned Yumiko. No, it was far from that. Y/N just looked happy... Far much happier than he had ever looked. At least, that's what it looked to her in her point of view.

The smile he currently held was something she had only seen when they were children.

She soon found herself taking off from the scene, when normally she would probably burst in through the door and begin to question him. But for some reason, she couldn't do it. She couldn't find the courage to do so. Her brain found it hard for her to contemplate the scene that was playing before her. This somewhat unfamiliar feeling begins to well up within her chest.

Yumiko could possibly identify what this feeling was, having felt it when it came to another particular boy she's grown a fondness for. But she didn't want to think it was "that" feeling for the brown-haired boy. It couldn't possibly be it...

Can it?

---

The final school bell rang throughout the school. Those that were belonging to clubs would obviously stay behind to do their club activities. But if you had no other business to attend to during school, the only choice was to go home. What was the point if you had no reason to stay behind, after all.

Y/N got up from his desk and stretched his arms before hoisting his school bag over his shoulder and exited the classroom. Taking his phone out of his pocket, he checked LINE for any new messages from Yumiko... And much to his surprise, he didn't get any. Weird. By now, if he hadn't responded to any of her messages, she'd be bombarding him with a bunch of pissed off ones by now. Or perhaps stomping all throughout the entire school looking for him.

But he soon received one. Not from Yumiko, but one from his mother. It was Eleanor telling him to hurry on back home. Putting his phone back into his pocket, he was about to continue onward, if it weren't for a certain purple-haired girl ramming her shoulder into his back.

"Yyaaahh!"

"Gah—!" Y/N jolts forward and nearly tumbled over. Recovering, he turned around and gave Erica an annoyed look. "What the hell was that for?"

"Hmm? What was what for?" Erica feigned innocence and stuck her tongue out in a playful manner.

"Whatever. Anyway, what're you doing here? Shouldn't you be going over to your new club now?"

"Hmm? Oh, that? I already told the gals I would be coming in tomorrow. I've still got to set up my place to stay if I'm going to be attending school here."

Y/N hums nonchalantly and begins to carry on, "Oh, I see. Good luck with that, then."

Erica slaps him upside. "What the hell!? You're not even going to offer your help in settling me in!?"

"Ow! You didn't have to do that, you damn idiot!" He begins to rub his face, the left side of his cheek being the area Erica slapped him at. "I would if you had told me earlier, but I've gotta head home now. My mother made it sound like it was really urgent."

"Ahaha..." Erica had sheepishly laughed and began pushing the tips of her index fingers together. "You see... The thing is..."

"Huh? What's wrong now?" Y/N only looks at her with confusion.

---

A deadpan expression sits on Y/N's face. "Are you serious...?"

Turns out the very reason his mother urged for him to come home quickly was to help move someone's belongings into one of their many guest rooms in their manor. Never did he imagine that the person staying within their guest room was said friend who said that they were going to need help settling in.

He slowly turned his head toward her with annoyance. Erica only responded with a beaming smile in kind, letting out a "tehe" as she hit the top of her head with her fist in a somewhat nonchalant, and unapologizing way. A tick mark only grew on top of his head and he looked just about ready to punch her.

"What the hell is this?"

"Just exactly what it looks like."

"Okay, but why exactly my house?" Y/N only raised an eyebrow whilst keeping his annoyed expression. "Can't you just, I don't know, rent an apartment or something?"

Erica looks at him surprised, letting out a gasp. "What? L/N, you don't mean to let a poor, defenseless girl like me live on her own? You're so mean! I can't believe you're so unthoughtful."

"Shut up," he glares.

"Well, turns out our dads knew each other pretty well. Who knew, right? Anyway, I got in touch with your mom and this house has an extra guest room apparently, and here we are now. So! From today and onwards, we're gonna be roomies in the same house! Nice to be boarding with ya!" She gleefully cheers, jumping onto the bed like a little kid as she begins to roll around on the uncovered mattress.

He sighed, "What are you, a little kid? Stop rolling around like that and help me with all your stuff."

"Aahh.~ That's so boring, though," she pouted, sitting up as she crossed her legs and stared at him. "You're the man in this house. You take care of it."

"Since when were you a person who cared about gender roles?"

"Pssshh! Don't sweat the small stuff, I'll leave it to you!" She quickly jumped off the bed and pat his shoulder, dashing out the door as she winked at him. "I'm taking a bath now, so have fun!~"

"Hey, wait—!" His voice had fallen on deaf's ears as she had already left.

Y/N merely grumbled to himself and got up and began to tend to the boxes. Unfortunately for him, the butlers and the other servants in the house were currently away.

What a predicament.

---

About forty or so minutes passed by. Y/N spending this time organizing his new roommate, or rather, housemate in this situation, tidying up the room and fixing up her luggage and what not.

Vacuuming the carpet floor, dusting off the desk and shelves, and exchanging the dirty bed sheets with new ones. Well, no one had actually used this guest bedroom in a long time, so he wasn't sure what sort of bacteria had accumulated on the covers... Or what sort of acts were performed on them.

Pushing those thoughts aside, he opened up Erica's suitcase and took a gander at what he was working with. Just the normal things, clothes and other necessities like body soap, shampoo, toothbrush, and some amenities to be placed in the room for decoration. He decided to allow his guest to arrange her clothing, mostly the bras and panties, having them remain at the bottom of the suitcase whilst he organized the sweat shirts, t-shirts, shorts, pants, and others in the dresser nearby.

The rest of the things were placed on the desk, Y/N wasn't sure how Erica wanted the rest of the things to be placed in the room, he wiped his brow of slight sweat. Taking a look around the room for a moment, examining whether he should still fix a couple of things or just leave it be, he decided with the latter option.

Nodding to himself, Y/N exited the guest room and headed downstairs. His stomach growled and rumbled in hunger, realizing that he hadn't eaten anything for dinner yet. And it just past 9 o'clock.

"Mother, is there anything—" Y/N called out, only to realize that there was no one in the kitchen. He soon notices a note on the nearby island table.

It read: "Will be stuck in the office tonight speaking with my editor. Order whatever you'd like for yourself and your friend for dinner. Love, your mother."

The last bit of the note ended with a heart, including a small doodle of herself that displayed her doing a goodbye kiss of sorts.

Y/N sighed. He understood, of course, but that didn't mean he liked the fact that his mother was always out late in the evenings, especially when it was for work. At the very least, she was around for a majority of his life and attempted to be there, unlike someone else.

In any case, he noticed that his mother had left her credit card on the table for him to use in order to make purchase for whatever their dinner would be. Heading back upstairs, he pushed open the door to the guest room. He had given enough ample time for Erica to freshen herself up after her long shower... But he should've knocked.

"Hey, my mother will be stuck in the office, so what do you want—What the fuck—!?"

Erica notices him, perking her head up as a towel was over both her shoulders. However, the towel did little to hide the imagination of her upper body... Nor did she seem unfazed at the fact that her peer had a full view of her exposed top.

"Hmm? What's up, N/N?"

With a flushed face of embarrassment, he dashed over to the bed and took a tank top off the pile of clothes and threw it at her, "Put some clothes on, god dammit!"

She stumbles back and fell over, "Ack...!"

Starting today, this would lead to many precarious and awkward events for the L/N teen. It couldn't get any worse than this, being stuck in a room with a half-naked girl... Right?

Surely there wasn't a simple someone that would be enraged over this... Oh, wait. There was one.

He should probably make sure that she doesn't find out about this. Who knows what would happen if she did.

[Chapter Eleven] | Roommate?