She almost didn't hear the doorbell ring, deep into her piano practice.
Annoyed by the interruption, Kaede doesn't really want to give them what they want, which is her attention she's dedicating to her piano. Nobody separates her piano from her when she's practicing. No one. She continues playing the piano, hoping the stranger will go away, at least until she's done practicing this very important piece for her recital next month.
The doorbell rings a second time, then a third time. Sighing, she eventually parts from her instrument to go open to the annoying stranger. They better have a solid reason to disturb her, otherwise, she's going to be pissed.
Sadly for her, Kaede doesn't have one of those fancy eye thingies which would allow her to see who is so desperate to see her. As such, she resolves herself to opening the door and see for herself who it could possibly be, unlocks and opens to them.
"Yes?"
Whatever frustration she had before, it's now gone. Before her eyes is a guy from her apartment lot, she'd say one of her floor neighbours, buried in two scarves, a coat and probably three sweaters as far as she can see. She can't tell if the guy's always been this naturally deadly pale, or if it's really paler than whenever she happens to see him. It's like his face is sinking under his dark blue hair, and his grey eyes can barely look at her. It's not helping that he already has long, thick, sweat-drenched bangs.
What's strange, is that it's not even that cold around here. In fact, it's pretty warm, for a cold month of March.
"H-hi… I'm one of your neighbours, and…"
The guy coughs heavily as soon as he utters some syllables, and Kaede is pretty certain she's hearing a crackling sound in there somewhere.
"I know, we've waved each other hellos before. What do you need?"
It seems like her piano will have to wait longer than she'd expected. These things happen, sometimes.
"D-do you have… cough medicine…?"
He does sound like he needs her entire stock of cough medicine at the moment.
"Of course! Come in, I won't bite you."
She gestures the guy to enter her flat, which he seems reluctant to do. She sighs, grabs his arm and drags him inside, with nothing to oppose her gestures, and closes the door once he's inside.
"Please sit down on the sofa, I'll be back shortly."
Kaede rushes to her bathroom, where she opens her cabinet. She doesn't have a lot of pills left, but has an unopened bottle of cough syrup given to her by her twin sister (a leftover present from that time she had the flu, if she remembers correctly). She decides to go with the syrup: considering the hacking coughs she's hearing from her living room, she's unsure if he can swallow pills. Certain he's running a fever, she also picks some ibuprofen she has lying around her cabinet. Oh, and a thermometer.
"I'm back!"
Kaede is sure he wasn't bent in half on her couch when she left to go to her bathroom fetch the medicine she almost dropped when seeing that.
"You're okay?!"
She rushes to him, quickly putting the boxes and bottle on the couch right next to him. His cough is powerful enough for her to almost hear every alveola of his lungs wheeze in despair.
"What am I saying, of course you're not okay."
Grey eyes shyly lock onto hers.
"I-it's nothing, I… I'm just a bit sick…"
"You're funny. I doubt this is just a small cold."
She puts a hand on his forehead, right under the larger bang between his eyes. Not only are both the palm and the back of her hand instantly soaked: she almost got burnt there, like when she would not put enough cold water in her bath, or when she'd grab a warm mug right when she shouldn't.
"You're burning up! Did you go to a doctor?!"
It's not that she's angry at him… Maybe just frustrated, because that guy clearly doesn't take much care of himself, and she hates that. She hates that because sometimes she does it, too involved in her piano practice, and then she gets lightheaded because she forgot to eat and drink in hours. But that's also not what she's supposed to think about right now.
"N-not yet…"
Kaede frowns.
"B-but it's nothing, just a tiny fever… Please, just gimme the medicine so I can go back to the agency…."
The blonde woman feels a bit remorseful now. It seems like he just wants to go back to work and went by his flat to get some medicine he didn't have. But on the other hand, she can't let him go back outside when he's coughing up a lung and runs a God-knows-how-high fever.
"I don't need to be a doctor to know you're not supposed to go to work when you're so ill. Why are you even doing that?"
"There's been a serial murderer on the loose, and… My uncle's office is swamped with requests about that, and about other disappearances of pets and persons alike… So I have to lay a hand…"
"Hmm, I see…"
The situation is a bit tougher than she thought, but Kaede likes a bit of a challenge, and she's acutely aware she's going to succeed in her idea.
"Why don't we make a deal?"
"A deal…?"
"If your fever is higher than 40, I'm calling an ambulance. If it's lower than that, I'll just drive you back to work, okay?"
He sighs.
"Okay…"
Kaede grabs the thermometer, pushes the medicine on the side and sits next to her neighbour.
"Here, open your mouth."
The guy does so without any conviction, barely opening it, before she manages to slip the small stick under his tongue. It only takes fifteen seconds or so for it to beep loudly. She gets it out of there and look at it.
She grabs her phone.
"W-what are you…"
"A deal is a deal. I'm calling an ambulance."
"I-it c-can't be that high… Please, just… just drive me back there…"
Kaede doesn't reply to his desperate pleas. She just focuses on her call, telling her address, explaining the situation to the office lady. Instead, she just shows him the thermometer, glaring at him and his pathetic excuses to attend work when he can't.
Once the call is over, she turns to him again.
"Listen, huh…"
Oh, that's right. She doesn't know his name.
"Listen. I'm sure you really want to help out your uncle, and that's very nice of you, no doubt there. However, I'm certain you can't think, moreover walk, straight right now, so we'll just bring you to the hospital where a professional can diagnose you with whatever death plague you have running down there, and you can take medicine in consequence and, most of all, rest!"
She then looks away.
"It'll sound stupid, but what's your name? I don't think we've been properly introduced. I'm Kaede Akamatsu, and I'm a pianist."
"Shuichi Saihara, detective-in-training and student…"
"I've heard this name before. Saihara, I mean. I think my sister once had gotten help from there with her pet. I didn't even know detectives could be asked with finding pets!"
"Reminds me of a case I oversaw a long time ago…"
Saihara's head falls on her shoulder, still coughing.
"How long have you been sick?" she asks, more worried than she can be frustrated now.
"I dunno exactly, I'd say a few days…"
She hears sirens in the distance, gently pulls away and gets to grab two coats, hers and a spare one she has. They have similar heights, and he's slimmer than her, so it'll probably fit him.
"They'll be here soon. Let's go, okay, Saihara?"
She lands him her hand. He takes it, and she feels how cold his palms are.
Kaede isn't exactly sure of why she's stayed there. They don't know each other that much, and she learned his name like… an hour ago, at most. Yet she's still there, waiting for the doctor to come back and tell her what's wrong with her neighbour.
Instead of him, she sees a young, shy-looking, purple-haired nurse walking to her, fuddling with her fingers nervously.
"M-Mrs K-Kaede A-Akamatsu…?"
"Yes?"
This nurse sure looks very nervous. Perhaps she should try to crack a joke to make her untense a bit.
"Y-you're requested b-by s-someone!"
"Oh?"
"F-follow m-me please… If you don't mind, t-that is…"
Kaede gets up and follows the nurse through sterilized corridors, blue doors with names of people she didn't know framed on them, seeing families and medical staff alike roaming through the hospital like globules in blood vessels. Like notes on a music sheet. It's a bit too busy to her taste, but she still makes her way to the door with, for once, a known name.
The nurse over-politely excuses herself out, stuttering that the man she brought there requested her. Kaede's still madly curious about why he's even wanting to see her. They barely know each other. He's cute, but they barely know each other.
When she enters the room, Kaede spots the doctor, and her neighbour in the bed, with a mask on his face. The atmosphere is heavy, air weighing down on her shoulders.
"H-hello…"
"Hello, Mrs Akamatsu. Glad to see you stayed behind and accepted the request."
"Don't stress it."
She glances at Saihara. He doesn't seem to be unconscious: in fact, she's sure he's staring at her right now. Her eyes go back to the doctor.
"What does he have?"
"Acute pneumonia. Nothing that cannot be treated, but serious enough for your friend to have to remain here."
He's not her friend. Not yet, at least.
"If you will excuse me, I will give you two some privacy. He has requested for you."
She barely has the time to wave him goodbye that the man has already left the room, and that she's all alone with a guy she, in fact, doesn't know much about. "Friends" clearly wasn't accurate. Well, now that she's there, she just has to make small talk with him, right?
Kaede gets closer to the bed, to the point where she purposely tries avoiding the guy's mask covering his face, or the weakest glaze she's ever seen.
"So… Hello again, I guess."
He probably can't reply, what is she even doing?
"I told you it wasn't just a simple cold," she tells him in a calm tone, before sighing. "You're lucky I was there, otherwise you may had gotten complications. What if you passed out in the street when nobody could see you?"
Saihara just lowers his head.
"Akamatsu…?"
His voice is very hoarse, and it's the weakest sound too, but she's still somewhat happy he can still speak.
"Yeah?"
"Thank you…"
A smile draws itself on Kaede's face.
"Don't stress it. If you want to repay me, just take care of yourself, okay? I don't want to see you sick again, you know?"
She looks up, unable to retain the heat she feels coming to her ears.
"You can always say hello to me whenever you feel alone… We live on the same floor after all."