The next morning Yamamoto woke up a full hour before his alarm clock. And for once he didn't mind. The little cat was still laying on the bed beside him and meowed happily when it saw he was awake.

"Morning Uri-chan." Yamamoto smiled and reached over to rub the soft fur of its head. It purred appreciatively before standing up and walking over Yamamoto and hopping lightly off the bed. It paused in the doorway and meowed back at him as if asking him to follow.

"Alright alright I'm coming." Yamamoto laughed pulling the blanket off and swinging his legs off the bed and onto the floor. He stretched groaning before standing up and following the cat into his kitchen where it meowed for breakfast. Normally Yamamoto didn't eat much for breakfast, but he was up so early he decided to make a bigger breakfast. Maybe he could share it with Gokudera when he came. Yamamoto smiled to himself at that and wondered what the man would like as he searched through his fridge.

After giving Uri some fish and getting dressed for the day he went to work making veggie omelets and rice. Simple, but it sounded good and most people liked them. That and he didn't have many ingredients in his house, even though he liked to cook, he tended to make more sushi than anything else.

It was almost 8 when he finished making breakfast and about to start eating when he heard a knock at his front door. Grinning he stood and walked quickly to his front door with Uri following at his ankles.

"Morning!" He greeted as he opened the door. Uri hissed upon seeing who was there and stalked back into the apartment.

"Mornin." Gokudera replied gruffly. His hair was tied back in a tiny ponytail and a cigarette hung between his lips, wisps of smoke curling into the morning air. Yamamoto curled his nose instinctively.

"You smoke? He questioned as he stepped back and welcomed his guest in.

"Yeah, have since I was a kid." The smoker replied as he passed by into the house.

"Really? Your parents let you?" Yamamoto questioned as he closed the door. Gokudera paused, and Yamamoto thought his back looked stiff and wished he could see what kind of face he was making.

"No." Gokudera answered shortly and continued into the house, and Yamamoto felt he said something he shouldn't have. He followed and hoped he hadn't ruined the mood for the whole morning.

"Omelets?" Gokudera asked when he entered the kitchen.

"Mm, you want one?" Yamamoto offered.

Gokudera started to say something, but then looked away and merely nodded and sat down at the table. Yamamoto was a little confused but happily made the silverette a plate of food while trying to ignore the smell of cigarette.

After setting a plate of food in front of his guest he settled down himself and began to eat. His food was cold now after having been on his plate for so long but it was worth it. Gokudera pinched out his cigarette with his fingers before starting to eat. Swallowing Yamamoto asked, "Didn't that hurt?"

The smoker shrugged, "Not really." And continued eating. The raven couldn't believe that it didn't hurt but shrugged it off and continued to eat. Even though he would like this breakfast to last he had to leave for work soon. After a few moments of silence except for chewing, Gokudera cleared his throat. "You're a good cook." He complimented monotonely, not lifting his eyes from his plate.

"Thanks! My dad owns a sushi restaurant so I've been cooking since I was little." Yamamoto grinned.

"I see." Gokudera glanced up at the ravens grinning face and quickly turned back to his food.

"What do you do?" Yamamoto asked between bites of food. He didn't have much time but he wanted to learn as much as he could about his beautiful neighbor.

"Ahh, well, I…freelance." Gokudera answered slowly.

"Freelance what?"

"Services."

Yamamoto wanted to keep asking but had a feeling this was another thing the silverette didn't want to talk about. That made him all the more curious though.

"What do you do?"

His eyes widened at hearing the question, he didn't expect Gokudera to care. Though by the look on his face maybe he was just trying to change the subject. Either way Yamamoto was happy.

"Oh, in the mornings I help out at my dad's shop and in the afternoons I coach middle school baseball."

Laughing Gokudera asked, "You like kids huh? Shoulda known."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Yamamoto asked with a mock offended tone but a smile on his face.

"Just that you seem like a big softie." Gokudera teased.

"Ehhh?" Yamamoto whined before laughing. "Yeah I guess I am huh?"

Gokudera started to laugh when his face dropped. "Didn't you say you had to leave at 8:30?"

Head snapping toward the clock Yamamoto jumped up from the table, it was 8:29.

"Shit."

"Heh, the softie can swear?" Gokudera teased. Yamamoto flashed him a quick smirk as he quickly took care of the leftover food. When he finished Gokudera was gone and he assumed he had gone to find his cat.

"Damn it come here you – I don't have time for this!" Rang through the apartment and was followed by angry cat noises and the thumping of cat and human feet. Yamamoto laughed and went to help. He found the angry pair in his room with Uri having gotten on the shelf in his closet and Gokudera on his tip-toes trying to reach him. Yamamoto was hit with a wave of cute at the sight but quickly shook his head and stepped over.

"Here let me." Gokudera settled on his feet and turned to him.

"No I've got this, you're gonna be late." He argued. Yamamoto smiled and shook his head.

"I'm already late, this will just take a second." He insisted and reached for the cat. It glared at him but allowed itself to be grabbed and handed over.

"Are you a cat whisperer or something?" Gokudera asked as he took Uri making Yamamoto laugh.

"No, though I am good with animals."

"You seem to be good at everything."

"I try." Gokudera scowled at that but Yamamoto just laughed.

"Don't you have to go?"

"Shit!" Yamamoto ran through the house, grabbing his keys and began pulling on his shoes. Following behind at a normal pace Gokudera singlehandedly pulled his own shoes on while trying to keep the squirming Uri in his grasp. They walked out the door and Yamamoto quickly locked and shut it and took off down the stairs, calling a "See ya later" over his shoulder. He was half way down the stairs when he paused and turned back.

"Gokudera?" The man appeared at the top of the stairs looking down at him questioningly.

"Wanna do dinner sometime? My treat." The shorter man looked as if he didn't know how to react. His mouth opened but then closed and he nodded instead of verbally answering. The grin that took over Yamamoto's face was blinding.

"Great, we can work out the details later. Bye!" He had started running again before he had finished speaking, because as much as he didn't want to leave, his father was about to rip him a new one.

"Where the hell have you been?" Tsuyoshi yelled at his son in favor of a greeting.

"Sorry pops something came up, won't happen again!" Yamamoto apologized as he pulled on his work apron.

"Damn right it won't." His father answered shortly, but the older man's expression softened as he looked at his son. Though flustered from running and thoroughly guilty, the younger man was radiating even more than usual. His father was curious but needed his son to get to work now, and knew that his son would tell him when he saw fit.

The sun was low in the sky as Yamamoto was walking home for the day. His father had worked him to the bone, and since he had also woken up early that morning by the time he got to practice he had been exhausted. Now that practice was finally over all he wanted to do was shower and crawl into his bed and stay there until tomorrow. And then he remembered the cause of his exhaustion and perked back up.

He had said yes, Gokudera had said yes to going to dinner with him! He still couldn't believe it, and if it weren't for how sore and exhausted he was he would swear he was dreaming. When would they get to go? What would they eat? Would they go out? Or maybe eat in since Gokudera had liked his cooking. But most importantly, was this a date?

Because to Yamamoto it was, that was what he intended when he asked. But what if Gokudera hadn't thought of it that way? Maybe he thought they were just going out as friends, or even just acquaintances. Shaking his head Yamamoto put a stop to those thoughts. He would just read the atmosphere and act accordingly, that would probably be the least embarrassing thing to do. He hoped.

And in any case this would be a chance to get to know his neighbor better. To have the time to actually talk without one of them needing to leave right away.

The smell of cigarette smacked him in the face when he opened his door. Scrunching up his nose he headed to his kitchen where he found Gokudera's cigarette from this morning, he most have forgotten it in their rush. It hadn't been completely put out before and had slowly smoldered into a pile of ash on his kitchen table. Sighing Yamamoto swept it into the trash and admired the burn mark on his table. Honestly he was lucky in was plastic and metal and not wood or his apartment might have been gone. He wanted to be angry but just couldn't be, it had been an accident and besides, the burn mark was now a reminder that this morning had happened.

Though he still wished his crush didn't have such a nasty habit.

While taking a shower he tried to plan for their dinner. It was Thursday so maybe they could go tomorrow night or the night after. He wished he had thought to ask for a phone number, he felt weird walking over just to plan out the next time they would hang out. But for now it couldn't be helped. And honestly he did like the thought of getting to see his gorgeous neighbor in person.

After drying off and pulling on a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt he headed over to work out the details of their dinner date. Once stepping outside he realized that the sun had already set and the sky was quickly turning dark. He hoped it wasn't too late to come over. Looking through the window it looked as if all the lights were off, and after his knocking and calling out received no answer he figured his neighbor wasn't home.

Yamamoto wasn't entirely sure what to do. He always randomly saw Gokudera, and even though he wanted this dinner to be as soon as possible he had just said 'sometime' so Gokudera probably didn't feel a rush to contact him. Rubbing the back of his neck Yamamoto sighed as he stared down the door. Maybe they would run into each other in the morning? Or this weekend, though he really didn't want to wait that long. Then with an 'Aha!' Yamamoto raced back into his apartment, found a pencil and paper, and quickly wrote a note explaining that he had missed him tonight and wanted to work out the details of their dinner ASAP. Grabbing some tape as he left his apartment again he strolled back over and stuck the note to his neighbors' door. Satisfied he returned home and finished his nightly routine.

The next morning the note remained untouched, and all day Yamamoto fretted that Gokudera would miss it and his message would go unnoticed. However his fears were unnecessary for when he returned home that night his note was now taped to his door with a phone number scribbled at the bottom. Grinning widely he carefully plucked the note from his door and pulled out his phone as he entered his house, quickly plugging the numbers into his contact list. He quickly sent a text asking when a good day for dinner was and that he would prefer tonight or tomorrow.

It wasn't until he was half asleep in bed that his phone went off, but Yamamoto was instantly awake and reaching for his phone

Obviously can't do tonight, but I guess I'm free tomorrow after 6:30.

Yamamoto grinned at his phone and quickly typed a reply.

Great, see you at 7 then!

A few moments of silence later Yamamoto decided to go back to sleep when his phone went off again. Jumping back up he quickly read the short message.

Yeah

Yamamoto laughed to himself as he settled back down, he could basically see the blush on those pale cheeks.

All the next day Yamamoto was nothing but excited, and it wasn't until it became time to get ready for the night did he start to worry. He had no idea where they were going to eat let alone what kind of date this was. How should he be dressed? Deciding on a nicer casual outfit of jeans and a button-down, he began to pace his room. It was only six and he had way too much time to think about all of the uncertainties of the night, he really needed to think before he acted in the future. Sighing he moved to the living room and turned on the TV to the sports channel, there was nothing to do about his worries now so he might as well let baseball distract him for a while.

When 6:45 came around even baseball could no longer hold his attention so he turned the TV off. Feeling the need to pace but not wanting to he stood and went into the bathroom to brush his teeth again. He didn't know where this nervousness was coming from, he wasn't really the type to get nervous. Gokudera brought out a lot of new things in him.

As he was brushing he heard a quiet knock on his front door. Spitting quickly he called out, "Be right there!" Finishing up and giving himself a quick once over in the mirror and then forced himself to walk not run to his front door, smiling wide before even reaching it.

"Gokudera!" He greeted cheerily. His smile quickly fell upon seeing said man. "What's wrong?"

Gokudera was dressed casually in battered jeans and a red hoodie. His silver hair was down and covering his face slightly, but not enough to cover his troubled expression. His brows were furrowed and he kept worrying his bottom lip, his eyes dark and staring at the floor. They looked up at Yamamoto's question.

"I don't think this is a good idea."