Author's note:

Okay, I take back my stand about not writing multi-chapters. I can't keep this one short so this might drag on for at least 8 chapters. The reviews I received from my fanfics earlier had motivated me to write even more. Thanks for reading my work and I hope that you'll enjoy this!

Spring: Fated Meeting

Aomine Daiki woke up from his afternoon nap to the sound of shouts and banging on the door. It sounded as if it was coming from downstairs but he was too sleepy to make any sense out of it.

He lives in a 2-storey high apartment complex containing only eight 1-bedroom apartments. The owner of the complex is a 68 year old widow by the name of Amai Suzume whom the residents will fondly refer to as 'Obaasan'. She herself lived in one of the apartment units in the same building while the rest are rented out as her source of income.

Aomine shifted positions and closed his eyes, hoping that the noise will go away so he can carry on with his nap. Finally, the banging stopped but there was more shouting now and Aomine started to hear things getting trashed around. As Aomine was about to drift back to sleep, there was the sound of panic knocking on his door. The knocking continued up to the point that it was getting too obvious for Aomine to ignore.

"Aomine-kun? Aomine-kun? Are you in? I know you're not working today so can you please open the door?"

It was the lady owner, Obaasan. Aomine dragged his feet to the door and opened it with a rude "what?".

"Aomine-kun! There are gang members downstairs harassing one of our tenants! You're a policeman! Please help."

"Well, I'm not on duty today and this area isn't exactly under my jurisdiction….…"

"AOMINE-KUN!"

"Yeah, yeah. Fine, I'm coming down. Let me grab my badge first," grunts Aomine as he started scanning his room for his police badge.

There was still a lot of commotion when he arrived downstairs. He noticed the other tenants peeking through their doors curious on what's going on but too afraid to actually step out and take a good look for themselves. Only the Obaasan was making a brave stand against the troublemakers, pleading with one of the guys to stop whatever they're doing right now and leave peacefully.

"Oi! What's going on here? Police!" said Aomine as he flashed his badge to two guys standing outside Apartment Number 3 which seemed to be the origin of the problem.

His appearance startled them and one of them rushed in to speak to someone. Not long after that, another three men came out, one of them sneering at Aomine while another spat near Aomine's feet before making their way out of the building. Aomine stayed calm despite knowing he was outnumbered so he was glad when they left without beating the lights out of him first.

"Thank you Aomine-kun! It's a good thing you're here since they won't listen to me… Ah––," said the landlady, turning her attention away from Aomine quickly as she rushed to the aid of the tenant who was harassed by the gang members earlier.

Aomine's job was done. He should have just returned upstairs to his place but his sense of duty and honour prompted him to go after the landlady to see if she needed anymore help. As soon as he stepped into the room, he saw how badly the place was trashed. Everything seemed to be in pieces and there was broken glass scattered dangerously on the floor. The tenant must have really pissed someone off, probably borrowed money from a loan shark and was unable to pay back his debts. He walked into the bedroom to see his landlady hugging a blonde guy with tearful amber-coloured eyes, comforting him with kind words. He looked to be about the same age as Aomine and he noticed a single blue hoop earring on his left ear. He didn't seem hurt but he looked terrified based on his pale complexion and trembling lips.

"There, there Kise-kun. It's alright now. We have a nice policeman here to protect us. Did they hurt you? Let's go to my apartment for a while. I'll make you a nice, warm drink and I'm sure I still have some nice cakes in the kitchen," said the landlady to the tearful blonde.

"You can come along too Aomine-kun," the landlady gestures towards Aomine.

Aomine thought that it was the right time to go back to his room but his stomach started growling at the mention of tea and cakes so he decided to tag along the duo to the landlady's apartment.

At the landlady's apartment, while she was preparing the food and drinks in the kitchen, Aomine scowled at the sulking blonde as he couldn't stand seeing grown-up men cry. Somehow, he has calmed down and has started to take in short, deep breaths. The silence was getting really awkward for Aomine but Kise broke it first.

"Umm… Ah… Thanks for your help… Sir, " he spoke in a timid voice.

"Aomine Daiki. Your friendly neighbourhood cop," replied Aomine sarcastically.

"Aomine…cchi…"

"Hah? Are you calling me names now?"

"Huh? No. No. I… I usually add –cchi to the names of people that earned my respect. Like in this case, you saved me and I'm really thankful for that."

"That's stupid."

"Ahh… Sorry," said Kise sadly.

"So how much money did you borrow from them?"

Kise looked up at Aomine through his glazed eyes, biting hard his lower lip but didn't answer.

"Oi! Are you listening to me? Stop acting like the victim when you brought this upon yourself in the first place!"

"Aomine-kun! Stop being mean to Kise-kun!" a shout from the kitchen was heard.

"Huh. I'm used to people like you. I've caught enough little schoolgirls shoplifting who bawled their way out of their predicament and made me look like the bad cop! Are you planning to cry your way out of this one too?"

Kise looked up at Aomine again and was about to say something but didn't. The tense atmosphere evaporated when the landlady came out of the kitchen and started serving them tea and cakes. Aomine scoffs, gulps down his drink and stuffed a slice of cake into his mouth before asking to be excused despite the landlady's protests for him to stick around longer.

As soon as Aomine was back at his apartment, he started rummaging through the pile of gravure idol magazines under his bed. He has a lot of pent up pressure after being deprived of his sleep. Flipping to a centre spread of Risa Shimamoto dripping wet in a skimpy bikini, he unzipped his jeans and was about to start getting comfortable when he heard a knock on the door. Based on recent experience, nothing good will ever come out from opening that door so Aomine simply ignored the intrusion.

"Aominecchi–ah–kun, are you in? Can we talk?"

Aomine could easily make a guess that it was the pretty blonde guy from before but since he was already in a compromising position, he pretended to be unavailable and Kise left shortly after not getting any response from the latter.

The next morning, Aomine was all set for work and was heading towards the main entrance when he caught a glimpse of Kise's apartment door slightly ajar. The gang members must have forced themselves in and damaged the door yesterday, he thought. Aomine stopped for a bit in his tracks and walked slowly towards Kise's place to take a peek inside. He was just curious if the place had been cleaned up and it surprised him to find Kise sitting against the living room wall with the place looking as trashed as it was yesterday. Kise didn't seem to notice Aomine though. He seemed to be in a daze, staring at the ceiling, lost in his thoughts. Had he been like that all night?

"Oi, what are you still doing here? Shouldn't you have packed up your things and moved into another town in case those guys from yesterday came back?" said Aomine startling Kise out of his daze.

"Huh? Ah, Aominecchi. Haha. Um, all I have now is in ruins. As much as Obaasan is sympathising with my situation, she still won't let me get away without paying for the damages done to this apartment. Fortunately, she's patient enough to wait for me to fix this mess. I will have about a couple of months to earn enough money to pay her for the damages."

"Fine then. Just don't borrow money from loan sharks anymore," said Aomine.

"I didn't borrow money from anyone! Stop saying that!" snapped Kise.

"Then what was the deal with the ruckus yesterday? You must have done something to piss off those gang members!" an annoyed Aomine snapped back.

"I… I really don't want to talk about it," said Kise as he looked away from Aomine.

Aomine rolled his eyes and was about to make his exit when Kise suddenly called out to him.

"Aominecchi, thanks again for yesterday… One of them was going to bash my face but you showed up before he had a chance to. I'll be in a lot more trouble if they hurt my face," said Kise.

Aomine guessed that Kise was starting to open up and decided to hang around for a little bit. He was still curious on why those people were after him.

"You can't handle little cuts and bruises pretty boy?" teases Aomine.

Kise blushed before he took a deep breath in and started narrating his story.

"My face is for making money… Since I'm a model. I'm still not that famous though. My agency has been unable to find much work for me lately so I haven't had much to do. But I still needed to earn a living… Then I saw this ad looking for amateur actors for an independent movie. I thought it'll be a good addition to my work portfolio so I sent my picture to the number on the ad… They called me back, saying that I got the main role. So uh, yesterday… I went to the filming location only to discover that it was at a warehouse owned by yakuza and they were actually filming a sex tape to sell for the masses… I freaked out and ran away but they caught up with me. Guess I really pissed them off for ruining their 'independent movie'…"

"Ha? What? Hahahahahaha. Why did you run? I would have never refused free sex!" laughs Aomine.

"It was GAY sex! There were two huge guys waiting to top me when I arrived! I had to save my ass!" Kise screamed back at Aomine who was still having a hearty laugh.

Aomine was almost in tears laughing and Kise regretted his decision to indulge the details with Aomine.

"So, hah. Haha. What are you going to do now?" Aomine asked.

"I plan to go out later to look for a cheap room to rent nearby. My father was transferred to Tottori for work recently so my family went along with him. Since I have work commitments here in Tokyo, I didn't go with them. I only just started living on my own here last week so it will be embarrassing for me to move back in with my family. My sisters will never let me hear the end of it!"

"Right… Why don't you just stay at my place then until all of this is over? You can sleep on the sofa. But you'll have to clean and cook and do a lot of things for me—" said Aomine without much thought.

"Eh? Aominecchi still wants to help me? You're sooooooo amazing! Yay!"

Aomine had no idea what made him invite the blonde to stay over at his place but upon seeing Kise's dazzling smile and his mood lifted up, Aomine thought that it would be too cruel to take back the offer he had just made on impulse. Well, the blonde did mention that it will only be for a couple of months and Aomine has been spending more time at work than at his apartment anyway so it shouldn't be much of a problem. If Kise starts to get really annoying, Aomine can always kick him out after having already helped enough.

"Oh, I don't think we're properly introduced yet. I'm Kise Ryouta. I'll let you call me Ryouta—"

"Kise," said Aomine as he threw his apartment key into the model's face and rushed out. He was already late for work.