Hey! First of all, thank you for giving this story a shot. I've changed my mind about whether I should post it or not about a hundred times, but then I finally decided to just do it.
It's my first attempt of writing a story, and English isn't my first language, so I apologize for spelling and grammar mistakes (though I hope I already found most of them).
And I'd really appreciate reviews (all your thoughts and any kind of feedback) so I can learn from my mistakes and try to improve. But now enjoy :)

Disclaimer: I own nothing, but sometimes it feels like the show owns me.

Chapter 1 - Decision

"Oh, come on, old man!" he heard the voice a little behind him. Although he almost ran out of class and tried to outpace him, his friend was just to tenacious and persistent to let go and kept pace with him. He closed his eyes with a heavy sigh, halted his movements and turned around to confront his friend.

"Mike, I've already told you like a thousand times: I don't know yet if I have to move out from home or if I can still stay. And even in case I really have to leave, why do you think I'd move in with you? It's not like it's easy to have you around all day at university, and I doubt that you're any less pain in the ass at home than you are here, so -" He couldn't finish his sentence because Mike cut in.

"Harvey. This is really important. Damn, if you want me to I'd even beg you on my knees." Hearing and seeing his friend so desperate, Harvey couldn't help but smirk, and he raised an eyebrow.

Mike saw the look on Harvey's face and and opened his mouth again to continue his speech only to shut it again.
"Okay, maybe I sounded a little bit too desperate with that," he admitted slowly, narrowing his eyes a little. Harvey stifled a laugh and tried to come across as serious as possible. "No Mike, absolutely not. You should practice this more often, maybe someday it can be useful to appear with such blank despair."

Now not able to hide his amused expression anymore, Harvey grinned at his colleague who was now pressing his lips together and more or less playfully punched him on the shoulder.

"Ouch! That's my bad shoulder and you know that!" Harvey exclaimed with a hint of anger and pain in his voice while he was holding his shoulder.
This time it was Mike's turn to grin, although at least he did it with a twinge of regret and a slightly apologetic expression.

"Well, maybe I'm a little sorry, but you deserved it nevertheless!" Mike started the attempt of an apology, still pouting about being accused of being hopelessly frantic. Then he went back to an earnest manner and looked his friend straight in the eye.

"Harvey, I'm serious. I can't force you to do anything, but please at least think about it. I really don't want to live alone with two women in an apartment, and if I don't find an alternative for our last tenant, the two might come up with the really-not-so-amazing idea to find another girl as a roommate. And I promise you, I wouldn't survive with three of them!"

Carefully listening to his friend's words, Harvey took some time to let them sink in, and finally he gave in. "Fine, I'll think about it. But I don't promise anything further!" He could almost sense Mike's relief and saw the corners of his mouth move up a bit.
Then he remembered a part of their conversation he still wanted to comment on. "And for the record: Only because you're such a genius and smart ass and were able to skip like 3 years, don't you dare ever call me old again! You're not that much younger."

Mike obviously heard the hidden threat in those words and also recognized the warning look on Harvey's face, not to mention the finger Harvey was pointing at him with. But he wasn't able to restrain himself from letting a "Yes, Sir!" escape from his lips.

Harvey had already walked away a few steps but at this words he abruptly turned on his heel and looked daggers at the smaller male. Said person gave him an apologetical smile and almost ran away as fast as possible, disappearing in the crowd of students surrounding them.

Now finally left alone, he sighed again and ran his fingers through his hair. He hadn't been a hundred percent honest with Mike, he had never actually thought about moving out. Until now he had never really considered looking for a residence nearby the campus because he didn't live that far away and it just wasn't on the table. Admittedly, his parents had asked him once if he wanted to move out but then never spoke of it again.
But given the fact that the current situation at home was more than a bit tensed and difficult, he could really use some distance from his family. Moreover, he already had a side job at a law firm, so the financial aspect would also be manageable.
Therefore, the only thing remaining to deal with before fixing his decision was convincing his parents of this plan. He sighed one last time before he set off to drive home for this day.

—

At first he wasn't exactly sure about how he should approach the topic of him wanting to move out, but then during dinner he decided to just raise the subject. Surprisingly, his parents both took it calmly and assured him that it was quite a good idea. They told him that only recently had discussed that, in one of the rare moments they didn't fight or ignore each other. And even his little brother Marcus, who at first was a bit taken aback and stared at him with big teary eyes, ultimately grinned at him and promised him to visit him now and then in his new home.

Later that evening, when he was back in his room, he took his phone and scrolled through his contacts until he found the right one.

"Please tell me you decided to move in, these two will eventually drive me crazy or kill me if I don't get some non-female backup!" The person at the other end of the line didn't even bother to say hello but started right away with the conversation.

Although he knew that no one was able to see it, Harvey raised an eyebrow before he answered.
"Mike, do you think I called you because I like hearing your voice and listening to one of your endless speeches?"

"No, I don't think that. But I know that you sometimes - and by sometimes I mean very often - seem to do something nice, but eventually it turns out that the very opposite is the case."

Harvey suppressed a laugh by biting his lip before he continued. "Seriously? You're still mad at me for that? In my defense, I think she honestly had wanted to go out with you before you brought me as your wingman to ask her out, and it really isn't my fault that she changed her mind for my benefit. If anything, it was your fault, I mean everyone knows to never have a wingman that looks better than yourself." At the end of his sentence he already had a big grin all over his face because he was well aware of how much Mike hated it when he brought that up.

He could almost see Mike rolling his eyes, and he heard a loud sigh.
"Man, sometimes I ask myself how we became friends and why we still are."

"Don't worry, you're not the only one who wonders about that!" Harvey laughed. He paused a little before he started with the reason why he originally had called.

"Well, but back to more important topics. As a matter of fact, I'm indeed calling to talk with you about the apartment. I wanted to tell you that I thought about it and that I've come to a decision."

"And?" Mike inhaled sharply and wasn't sure if he was ready to hear the answer to that question.

"If you promise me that I won't hear you complaining about anything every day, I'll move in with you."

"YES!" Mike whooped, "Thanks Harvey, that means a lot to me. I owe you one!"

"Don't promise anything you can't keep," Harvey sneered, and then added, "but I mean, I can't let those two girls make you feel uncomfortable. I still need you for our group works and our exercises, and I need you sane and without any damages."

"Wow Harvey, I'm quite impressed. Your speech was so emotional and touching, it made me feel so sentimental. I have no words for that," Mike answered dryly.

"I was trying really hard, I'm glad you liked it," his friend joked before changing the subject again. "Anyway, I don't think you ever told me, so what are the names of your roommates? Do I know them?"

"Oh right, I always talked about the flat itself and not your future fellow inmates. Well, I think you only know one of them, Rachel Zane. She also studies law, so I guess you must've at least seen her at some point."

"Yeah right, I think I know her. Dark brown hair, olive skin, Robert Zane's daughter?"

"Yup, that's her."

"What about the other one?"

"That's Donna. Donna Paulsen. I don't know that much about her, but she's a good friend of Rachel, studies acting, and she also is the one who's been living in the flat the longest.

"Okay, well, I'm pretty sure I don't know her, but at least I know their names now," Harvey mused. "Can I come and visit you at some point? I know, I've already been to your place once and you've showed me like a ton of pictures during your first week in and couldn't stop describing how awesome it is. But I'd like to see it with my own eyes again."

"Sure, no problem," he assured, "Though I hope you still want to move in afterwards, sometimes it can be a little messy in here."

"Well, considering how my room looks most of the time I don't think that this would be a reason for me to change my mind about moving in," Harvey appeased with laugh.

"Yeah right," his friend chuckled, "I almost forgot that."

"I doubt that you ever forget anything with your photographic memory, unless you're getting old", Harvey teased him.

He only got a deep sigh for an answer. "Okay, I think we're done for today. What about we end our conversation right here and you come and visit your future home on Friday?"

"Sounds like a decent offer," Harvey agreed with a nod.

"Great, then it's settled."

Harvey was about to hang up when he heard his friend starting to talk once again.
"And Harvey?" Mike's voices sounding like a warning, "Please don't ruin everything by sleeping with either of them."

"What?!" he exclaimed bewildered and shot his head up, "Why the hell would think that I -" He stopped in mid-sentence because Mike had already hung up.

"Damn Mike, what is even wrong with you," Harvey murmured to himself. With a shake of his head he put his phone away and laid down on his bed. He exhaled audibly and stared at the ceiling, thinking about Mike's last comment.
He was well aware of the fact that he was notorious for getting around in the women's world quite a lot, but probably nobody knew that deep inside that wasn't exactly what he wanted to continue doing forever. On the one hand, he liked being coveted by the girls and envied by the guys but on the other hand he realized that this wasn't exactly the only main goal he wanted to achieve in his life.

Especially in this current case he didn't want to screw anything up, like he normally - or at least quite often - managed to do, because right now he almost couldn't wait to move out, away from his parents and their seemingly endless fighting. And he was pretty sure that having a fling with one of the flat mates would definitely fall into the categories big screw-up and huge and stupid mistake, so that was something he absolutely wanted to avoid.

He knew that Mike still had sort of a trauma of what had happened a few months ago. That girl that initially wanted to go out with Mike, but then the genius thought it would be a good idea to bring his best friend with him. Long story short, at the end of the evening this girl had decided to choose Harvey over her initial date, Mike. And the latter had never utterly been over this whole story.
He still couldn't help but chuckle at the thought of that, this story was probably going to be stuck in his mind forever. And though he was - at least sort of - sorry, he would never get tired of teasing Mike with it.

—

On Friday, Harvey stood in front of the white door and caught a breath, before he lifted his finger to press the doorbell. A few seconds later, a familiar face with a wide grin opened the door and greeted him with a blunt "You're late".

Harvey knitted his brows and glanced at the watch on his wrist. "Yeah, I'm like 30 seconds late, sorry for that."

"Oh, no problem, I get it. I mean, it's not like you're getting any younger, I understand. Must've been quite exhausting for you to get here. Such a distance, in your age!" Mike mocked his friend and feigned a worried look on his face.

"Alright, that's enough!" Harvey laughed, "Don't you think your joke is already getting a bit old?"

His counterpart smirked at this word choice and retorted, "The only one who's getting old here is you."

"Well, I guess there's no point with arguing with you about that right now, you just wouldn't listen, would you?"

"Nope," Mike answered, still having a shit eating grin plastered all over his face.

This time it was Harvey who let out a sigh. "Okay, now that we've agreed on this can I finally come in and -" He started but couldn't finish his sentence because a brunette appearing behind Mike interrupted him.

"Guys, your chitchat is really adorable, but would you mind to finally step inside and continue your apparently very meaningful conversation here?"

Mike blushed and turned around to her. "Uh, sorry, we were just, um, -" he stammered.

Her face softened and her lips curled up a bit. "Never mind, Mike," she took a few steps forward to the two men standing in the door frame, her look fixed on the younger one of them, "I was just wondering how long it would take you guys to finish."
After letting her eyes rest on Mike for maybe a second longer than it usually would have been necessary in that scenario, she averted them to the other man who was still standing outside, walked towards him and stretched out her hand. "Hi, I'm Rachel. And considering the weirdness of your conversation you must be the infamous Harvey Specter."

Harvey took her hand and shook it. "Yeah, that's me. Though I'd probably debate the 'infamous'. I mean I don't know what this guy over here," he nodded in Mike's direction, "told you about me, but I guess I'm not always as bad as he may describe me."

"Oh, don't worry, he mostly only tells good things about you," she chuckled at his words, "this was just because of what I get to know about you from my fellow students. Mostly the female ones." She tilted her head and raised her eyebrows with an amused smirk.

"Oh," he just stated, feeling slightly awkward and suddenly a bit uncomfortable in her presence, and raked his hand through his hair with an apologetic expression on his face.

"But don't worry," she added, "I don't really care about who you're seeing, as long as we get along well and you don't bug me I think we won't have a problem with living with each other."

Harvey smiled and exhaled relieved. The first confrontation with the one of the two people he was going to get to know today went quite well. And he was pretty sure that he wouldn't have a problem to get along with Rachel, he liked her.
And given the fact how he acted around her, Mike also liked her. Maybe a bit more than he should like his co-tenant.
He inwardly grinned about this observation and made a mental note that he had to rag Mike with that.

—

Though Harvey already basically knew the apartment, it took Mike about half an hour to show him around. The fact that the apartment was quite big wasn't the only reason it took so long, Mike just couldn't stop talking. Apparently, he was totally excited that his best friend would move in with him, and it was obvious that he was quite proud to tell him every single detail about literally everything in the apartment.

Harvey would never admit that to Mike, but he merely listened to half of his stories. While his friend was talking, he let his look roam through the dwelling.

After the living room, the bathroom and the kitchen, which was actually not separated from the living room but sort of a part of it, they finally came to the individual rooms. There were four doors, one of them opened widely, one of them half opened and two of them were shut.

Firstly, Mike showed Harvey his future room, the one with the completely opened door. Not much was to see in there because it was totally empty, but they took a quick look at it in spite of that fact. Next, they entered Mike's room so that Harvey also saw a fully furnished room and didn't have to leave everything to his imagination.

"The rooms are all basically the same, so yours is probably going to look quite similar with all your furnishing," Mike continued talking.

Harvey just nodded and took another look around. The room wasn't too big but he liked the way Mike had everything arranged. And between all the pieces of furniture there was still enough space to move around freely.

Back in the hall, Harvey glanced at the two remaining doors. Just then he realized that one of them had something on it.

"Is there a reason why this one has '206' on it?" he asked astonished and pointed at one of the doors with his forehead slightly creased.

"Honestly, I don't really know if there's a deeper meaning behind it," Mike frowned for a second and before he chortled. "I never asked Donna about it. It has always been there since I moved in, but maybe Rachel knows something."

"Oh don't worry, it's not really important, I was just wondering," Harvey chuckled and shook his head. "By the way, where's Donna anyway? I haven't seen her, I thought all three of you would be here today?"

"Yeah, about that..." Mike began and ran his hand through his hair, "She told us in the morning that she won't be able to make it today. But she said that she doesn't really care about who moves in, as long as he isn't - I quote - 'a complete moron like the last one'. So I guess she trusts mine and Rachel's judgment to decide whether you're worthy or not."

"Wow, so if I'm allowed to move in I'm supposed to take that as a compliment? That I'm not a complete idiot?" Harvey asked dryly with an arched eyebrow.

A laugh escaped Mike before he was ready to answer. "I don't know, maybe you should ask her yourself when you see her. But I wouldn't attach too much importance to her statement. I don't know exactly what happened between the previous tenant and her, but I know that it didn't end that well for him."

"So actually the bar isn't set very high?" Harvey asked with a chuckle.

"Well, for you it still could be a challenge," Mike grinned, "I'm only gonna say yes if you don't behave like a dick like you usually do."

"Oh please," his friend countered teasingly, not taking his friend's comment as an insult, "as if you'd want anyone else to move in with you. Or anyone else could put up with you."

"Right," the younger man laughed, "you're probably not wrong." Then he turned more earnest again. "But seriously Harvey, I'm really glad you decided to move in here."

Harvey smiled at his friend. "I'm glad, too."

"I think this can actually work. And it's going to be fun." Mike grinned, and Harvey couldn't help but respond with a similar expression.
They both were clear about the fact that things wouldn't always go like they probably expect or want them to go. But even though it wasn't always going to be easy, they also knew that they'd get through everything, just like they always did.

The two guys didn't notice that Rachel was watching them from the living room. Her lips turned up at the sight of the two of them interacting with each other the way they did, and she shook her head a little. She had only gotten to know Harvey recently, but she could already see that despite - or more likely because of - their ribbings, his friendship with Mike was really close. And Mike undoubtedly burgeoned when he was around his friend.

A warm feeling flowed through her body when she thought about how excited and happy Mike had seemed when he first told her and Donna that he had a potential new roommate for their apartment.
Admittedly, she had had her doubts at first because she knew Harvey's reputation. But now that she had met him and had seen him with Mike, she was willing to connive at that fact, and to believe that this could work and actually turn out not be as bad as she had assumed in the first place.

The only thing that still fretted her a bit was what Donna would think about Harvey. She knew that the redhead trusted her discernment, especially when it comes to people. But she also knew that he was the kind of guy who was likely to cause trouble. And if he was only half as obstinate as she thought he was, the interactions between Donna and Harvey could become quite interesting and fun to watch and listen.

But for the moment, she faded those thoughts out and allowed herself to focus on the fact that soon they were going to have a new member in their household.

I'm sorry if the scene where Harvey talked to his family was a bit short, but I didn't want to focus too much on them.
And it's probably not really relevant (maybe a bit later in the story but even then only a little), but in this story Harvey doesn't have his issues with his mother.

I know I said it before, but thanks for reading, and let me know what you think, I'd really appreciate any kind of feedback :)
And depending on the response to this first chapter I'll upload the next chapter (that will also include Donna and Harvey interactions) in the next few days or so (the first 4 chapters are already finished).