I really loved writing this AU, and so I'll probably be adding more to it later on. And, at the risk of sounding desperate, please, please leave a review if you enjoyed the story (or didn't enjoy it, which is fine too as long as you're not rude about it). I enjoyed writing this story, and would absolutely appreciate any form of feedback you guys would have to offer!
"Mest?" She pokes her head into the room. "Are you alive?"
She's met with a faint groan, followed by a rustling of what she can only presume to be discarded drafts.
"...I'll take that as a yes." A quick look across the room and her eyebrows furl in anger. Huffing, she puts her hands on her hips. "When was the last time you cleaned your room? Have you been eating? And what is that-!" She immediately rushes to pinch her nose, nearly gagging in the process. "Have you showered in the last few days?"
"Can't...shower..." The voice is raspy and faint. "...Must...write."
"Mest..." She's beginning to get a headache now, and she's not sure whether it's from the smell or his inability to take care of himself. "Go and take a shower."
"But-"
"Now."
She hears a grumbling, and he finally emerges from a stack of crumpled paper. Normally, seeing him would send a wave of butterflies through her stomach, but today, seeing him only made her eyebrows furrow deeper, frown droop slighter.
He looks nearly emaciated: he's sallow, cheeks sunken in, eyes barely floating over a sea of dark bags. His hair is a mess of grease, piled into a collective mass atop his head. There's uneven patches of stubble bursting forth on his jawline. And beneath his shirt, his wrists seem much thinner, hand connected to shaky, knobby fingers. Said knobby fingers reach out for a pen.
"No, Mest." She forces her way into the room now, carefully traipsing around every piece of paper on the floor. Really, he's so disorganized with his work that she can't tell what's trash and what's novel. "It'll only take a few minutes, and while you do it, I'll cook up something really quickly for you."
"There's a deadline tomorrow." He stares blankly at an equally blank sheet, before taking up the pen and scrawling all over it. Hastily, she snatches the sheet of paper off the table, but his hand, as if possessed, continues to move as if it were still writing.
Incredulous, she takes a look at the sheet now in her hand. And yet...there's basically nothing on it; it's essentially gibberish. She can't pinpoint a single word on it, as there's just a mess of bleeding ink in squiggling lines running across the paper. She sighs.
"This is for your own good, ok?" Taking a tentative step towards him, she inhales deeply (for courage) and hooks her hands into his armpits. She musters up all her strength and, painstakingly, pulls him up to his feet. "Come...on..." She's panting now, pushing him in a zig-zag pattern (to avoid all that potential work of his on the ground) across the room, through the door, down the left side of his humble living/dining room, and finally into his bathroom. The moment his feet touch the cold tiled floor of the bathroom and he's forcefully awakened from his writer's enthrallment, she shuts the door in his face, swinging around to put her full body weight against the door.
"Wait!" He's banging against the door now; she can feel the resulting tremors on her back. "Wendy, the deadline's coming up in two days and I've only written half of what I need to!" He sounds so distressed that she bites her lip, seriously contemplating whether or not to let him out. His career means everything to him, and she knows he seriously can't afford to not write, what with the deadline coming up so soon.
But he also seriously can't afford another day without nutrition or a shower either. Or at least she can't afford for him to take another day without a shower.
"Just five minutes!" she yells, "And then you can get back to your writing!"
"Ugh!" He dissents, but regardless, she hears the shower turn on anyway. She smiles in relief, but really, she has to question, how did she get mixed up in his personal affairs?
She knows precisely how, though. Tying up her hair, she walks into the kitchen, taking a look in the refrigerator for anything remotely healthy she can make food out of.
Well, there are eggs. And beef that looks like it can last one more day. Oh! And lettuce. That's already better than usual, since the usual meant she would have to go out to the supermarket and buy ingredients for him.
And as she starts the fire and readies a pan, she starts to think about how they first met.
It wasn't exactly the most romantic way to meet someone. No, she takes that back. It definitely wasn't the most romantic to meet someone. It was probably up there in the top five least romantic ways.
She, a college freshman, was walking home from the university one day when she found a man passed out on the street. As a nursing major, she had immediately dropped to her feet, checking to make sure whether or not he was breathing or suffering from any form of critical organ failure.
But he was breathing just fine. And he didn't seem to be experiencing any pain. Nope, he was just there on the ground, passed out from what she could have only guessed to have been fatigue.
And, in hindsight it probably wasn't the smartest thing to do, but she had forced him up, and, leaning him against her shoulder, she had asked him for his address so she could help him home.
So that was the story of how she essentially dragged a grown man back to his apartment. Yet upon arrival, she was shocked to see his living room essentially overflowing with garbage. And then the man's stomach had started to growl. And she, too kind to just leave the man on his own, offered to cook and clean his apartment for him.
At that point, he reached out for her hand, shook it, and introduced himself simply as "Mest", before slinking off to his room.
Of course she had been shocked. A little angered too. But she was too honest to go back on her word, and instead of storming out (which she rightfully should have) she went right to work, cooking and cleaning as if it were her own apartment.
As soon as she had finished cooking, she had called out for Mest, and he had slowly shuffled out of his room, took the food, thanked her, and shuffled back into his room, leaving her in astonishment. And at this point, she did storm out of his apartment, huffing all the way home.
The next day, however, she saw him passed out on the street yet again as she was walking home. And again, she had dropped to her feet and checked him for breathing and/or critical organ failures And once again, he was perfectly fine: just passed out. Still, she had picked him up on his feet, leaned his body weight against her, and walked him back to his apartment.
And once again, the moment they entered his apartment, his stomach had growled and she had had to cook something up for him. This was then followed by the same routine of him shuffling to the kitchen to get his food, immediately shuffling back to his room, and then her storming off in anger.
The third day this happened (which as you can guess, was absolutely the day right after that one), she had contemplated just ignoring the ingrate and walking by him. But after taking one step past him, she had quickly turned around and helped him up, walking him back to his apartment.
However, this time, when he came to get his food, she stopped him in his tracks and forced him to sit down and have a proper meal, as she had cooked two portions (because she had learned that, by the time she would get home from his apartment, it would be nearly midnight and her stomach would be attempting to eat itself in hunger). And that was the time he finally - finally - looked her in the face.
Although, she's not sure whether or not to regret that exact moment, as it had nearly made up for everything she had had to put up with for the past three days. Because, oh my goodness, under his shaggy mess of hair and ignoring all the tiredness of his features, he was actually really, really cute. Handsome, even.
And at that moment, it had become a daily routine for her to go to his apartment, make them both dinner, and possibly clean for him. All because, damn him, he was cute and she had probably been struck by Cupid's arrow (damn him too).
Thankfully, though, she had never had to drag him back to his apartment again after the third day, since she had given him a stern admonishment about not passing out in the street because why would you even do that? And amazingly, he had listened to her and instead of passing out on the street, he now passes out in the living room, which is definitely a step up from what it was before. And she later learned that he had been taking pictures of the outside scenery - for descriptive imagery purposes - those days before passing out from exhaustion.
"Ahh! Finished!" she says, wiping sweat from her forehead. She calls out in the direction of Mest's room, "Mest! Food's ready!" Mest had finished showering nearly thirty minutes ago, and had slunk back to his quarters to continue writing.
Sure enough, she hears his door creak ever so slightly, and the shuffling of feet coming from that general direction. Smiling, she divides the portions, making sure to give him slightly more, as he should be starving by now. "Here." She smoothly hands him his plate just as he arrives. "I hope you like it," she shyly adds. It's a simple meal of hamburger steak with poached egg, sitting on top of a bed of sliced lettuce.
He takes the plate and offers his thanks. Together, the two walk to his ratty couch, as he doesn't have a dining table, and take a seat. They eat in silence.
Nearly twenty minutes of said silence pass by before she realizes that he's stopped eating, and has instead begun poking his food. She's a bit irritated and, taking his plate and putting it down, she simply says, "Don't play with your food."
"Oh." Mest suddenly jolts in alarm now, shocked out of his reverie. He turns to her. "S-Sorry, Wendy. I didn't mean to. I was just...thinking."
"What were you thinking about?" she asks in genuine interest, her head tilting slightly.
"Just...the novel I'm working on."
"Oh? What's it about?"
He starts looking all around the room now, avoiding eye contact with her. She's annoyed with the blatant evasion of the question but waits patiently anyway, knowing that he'll eventually give in. As she waits, she notices now that his face is now clean-shaven, free of the stubble. And his eye bags now seem not as deep, not as dark. Probably, she muses, he just came out from napping.
"It...it's about..." he finally begins, shaking Wendy from her thoughts. Now training his eyes on his hands, which seem to be shaking a little on his lap, he says, "It's... about a good-for-nothing man who happens to be an author. And one day, he's passed out from the streets from exhaustion." He swallows now, seeming hesitant to continue. "...But then, a girl walks over, and he mistakes her for an angel. She takes him back to his house and, seeing the state of it, decides to stay for a while to cook and clean for him. The next day, she visits again. And the day after, she visits him yet again until she begins to visit and help him every day. Every day she comes, the man begins to mistake her more and more for an angel; every day she comes..." He turns to Wendy now. Cheeks stained a deep crimson, he looks her in the eyes and continues, "Every day she comes, he begins to fall more and more in love with her."
She gasps a little. Shakily, she asks him, "H-How does the story end?"
"Well, I don't know; I'm kind of hit a block." He sheepishly takes her hand in his, gently rubbing his thumb over her palm. "The main character wants to confess his love, but he doesn't know how the girl feels about him." Blushing an impossible shade of red now, he averts his eyes and asks, "What do you think she would say?"
She pauses. Taking a look at his face, which is hidden beneath splotchy red, she simply states, "I thought you'd never ask."
He snaps his head back to her in confusion. Forcing out a few awkward laughs, he has to ask, "Is that a yes?"
She leans across the couch and, cradling his head in her hands, she gently lays a kiss on his lips.
"...I'll take that as a yes."