"I don't know why I have to be here," the tall brunette grumbled.

"Hey come on. Minato's been waiting for her to show up all summer. I don't know why you can't even go meet her."

"Damn Arisato," he grumbled, tugging on the collar of his shirt. School didn't start up again for another three weeks, couldn't he just meet her later? This heat was killing him. "I'm not even close to the guy."

"Just meet her Akihiko. I mean, you even fixed up the place so she could move in without any issues, right?"

"I'm still pretty sure he thinks I'm super sketchy."

Akihiko grew silent for a moment. "Well I mean, you did do drugs once."

"That literally only happened once. And it was fucking high school, dammit. Let it go, Akihiko." He let out a loud sigh. "You know what, whatever. Let's just get to those guys' place already."

The girl sighed in the back of a taxicab as she pulled her auburn hair back into a ponytail, re-pinning her hair for what must've been the twentieth time.

Her brother had arranged for the driver to meet her at the airport, but she was still ridiculously worried nonetheless. Her old school had been fine, but this one had so much more to offer. The Kirijo group hadn't been messing around when they created a college to add to their many ventures on Tatsumi Port Island. It had all the classes she wanted to attend and get under her belt before she was kicked out into the real world. Besides, it wasn't like she had friends at her old school.

"—iss Arisato?" a voice cut into her thoughts and she looked up startled.

"Y—yes?" she asked looking to the front.

"We're here." He pointed out the window at the tall four-story building.

"Right," she agreed, looking at the building. It was a dark brown, all around, the only exceptions being the gray stone steps, green bushes, and black iron fences surrounding the bushes.

He looked at her for a moment. "Would...would you like me to go get your bags?"

"Bags..." she trailed off, still staring at the building. "Oh! Bags! Right, right—" she fumbled, taking her seat belt off and nodded to the driver. "Some help would be amazing."

"It's what I'm here for," he smiled.

She opened her door, still in a daze. "Right."

The front door had been open as she and the cab driver moved to enter the building.

Quite literally.

"Um," the girl paused, still slightly startled. "Hello there."

She'd been standing outside of the place for a solid five minutes, the driver—she'd remembered his name to be Fujikage—arguing back and forth about actually opening the doors, Fujikage heavily in favor of opening the "damn" things and the girl all over calming herself down and quite possibly turning back. Finally she'd reached for it upon a slightly strained comment from Fujikage about how much luggage she'd decided to bring and made him carry when the door had swung open, greeting her to the face of a rather gruff man with gray eyes mid-speech.

The tall brunette blinked for an awkward moment. "Hi."

He drew in a long breath and turned his head back to look behind him. "Yo Arisato. I think your sister's here."

"Really?" She heard scrambling and the guy moved aside to reveal her blue-haired twin rushing up to her. "Finally," Fujikage muttered, causing the girl to send a glare his way before Minato nearly tackled her. "I'm so happy you're here!"

The girl gently patted her brother on the back, desperately trying to avoid her luggage crashing into him.

After him squeezing her for another minute, he finally let go, directing them to the elevator, the tall guy following behind them.

As they filled the elevator, Minato kept his goofy smile on his face, a sharp contrast to the awkward look still on the brunette. After a few seconds of listening to the upbeat elevator music, Fujikage hummed along, causing the redhead to shoot him look.

Shrugging happily, he pointedly ignored the girl until Minato spoke up again.

"Did you arrive all right? There weren't any problems with the flight, were there?" her brother asked.

"Nope, it was perfectly on time," she smiled. "Thanks for hiring Fujikage there to pick me up too."

"Oh course!" Minato was beaming. "Remind me to pay you once we get inside."

The boy with bleached hair nodded. "Sure thing."

Another few moments the elevator finally dinged open and Minato filed into the hallway, Fujikage trailing behind.

The girl looked at the boy still waiting.

He looked away for a moment, his gray eyes seeming determined not to meet hers before holding an arm out. "After you."

Her eyes widened. "A-ah! Yes! Thank you!" she hurriedly replied. Taking a step to move past him, though, his hand reached out towards her, landing on the handle of one of her suitcases.

"I'll carry that for you," he told her. She nodded once.

"Right. Thank you." The pair walked slowly, the other two already down the hall.

"So. You're transferring in from another college?" It was a question, but it sounded like a statement when he said it.

"Yeah." She snuck a glance at the brunette. "I went to a pretty small school so they didn't have many class options. I was able to take some core classes, but that was about it."

Another moment of silence.

"S—so do you go to school here?"

He took a measured look at the girl before answering. "Yeah, I do. Pretty sure everyone already here goes to the Uni." He looked away. "You're a second-year though, right?"

"Yes."

"Myself and a few others are third-years here. Don't worry too much about all that formality shit, though."

"Oh, um, thank you..." she trailed off for a moment, realizing that she didn't know the man's name. "I'm Minako Arisato by the way," she smiled.

Again, his gray eyes met hers. They were cold, but she couldn't help the bubble of curiosity she felt building.

"Pleasure."

"Mm..." she trailed off until they came to a stop before a closed oak door with the number "303" plated on it. Neither one of them reached for the handle, even when a few sounds came from the other side. This would be the beginning of her new life, a new start. This would be a beginning. She reached for the handle hesitantly.

"We can wait another minute if you need it." His voice came, and Minako jumped.

"You don't mind?" She didn't know if she could meet his eyes.

"Nope."

Minako took a shaky breath, attempting to calm herself.

"I'm Shinjiro Aragaki, by the way. Arisato probably didn't tell you."

She snuck a glance at him. He was composed as ever, her bag slung over his shoulder. "No, he didn't. Thanks Aragaki."

His lips moved into somewhat of a frown and Minako caught a spot of blush on Shinjiro's cheeks. "Don't mention it."

And she opened the door.

She wasn't sure where this specific door would lead, if anywhere.

She didn't know if she was even making the right choice here.

If she succeeded here or not was teetering on a fragile balance.

Could she handle it?

Would she handle it?

She wasn't sure. And honestly, she was scared.

But maybe it was a good kind of scared, laced with anticipation.

Maybe even something more.

Thank you for reading the first chapter and intro of Open Doors!

I've had this College AU stuck in my head for a while and I'm glad to share it with you.

If you enjoyed this and would like to see more, please follow, favorite, and review, every contribution means a great deal.

Original Character Aito Fujikage belongs to user Kira989282. Be sure to check out her Persona 3 Portable story Broken Promises!

I'm also going with the Western semester timings of the school years ending/beginning with the summer despite Tatsumi Port Island being in Japan. I'm sorry for the inaccuracy, but I didn't realize that I messed the timings up until I'd written more things down the line and I don't really want to change what I have so far. Sorry about this if it bothers you!

Anyhow, I hope you join me for the next chapter!

- Miss Kai