DISCLAIMER: Guess who owns Sailor moon!! Not meeeeeeeeee! :D Naoko Takeuchi owns SM and i am just making a fan fic. durr

CHAPTER 1: Mess.

Bright streaks of morning sunshine began filtering between open slats of dusty, white blinds. It was dark in the young mans apartment and aside from the morning sun shining through, one could hardly tell that the morning had come. Mamoru rolled groggily to the other side of the bed as he slowly opened one eye to stare at the time on his clock. It was 8'oclock. He rolled onto his back as he contemplated more sleep, seeing as it was Sunday and he had neither work nor class. He lay there on his back, staring at the ceiling as his brain was having a huge debate on whether or not to get up, or to stay in bed just a few more minutes. It was the growl of his stomach that made his decision as he slowly sat up and rubbed the sleep out of his tired, puffy eyes.

Tired and puffy, as they always seemed to be now a days. He was finding it harder and harder to get any sleep as of recent and he really couldn't quite place it. His mind would always be racing right before bed and his only assumption was his school work. Midterms were upon him and he was heavy with various projects and reports…not to mention the studying.

"That's it.", He said to himself "I'll be back to normal once midterms are over." He stood and gazed downward at the floor for his slippers. He moved a dirty shirt out of the way, but…nothing. He kicked a pile of clothes out of his way, found his lost calculator, but no slippers. He kicked another small pile out of his way and shook his head.

"I'll also get my cleaning back to normal too once midterms are over", He said, bending over to check under his bed, managing to find one slipper. Question now was: where was it's mate? Two piles of clothes and a moved couch later, he found it and proceeded to drag his tired body to the kitchen.

He reached the kitchen and slumped his shoulders depressingly upon seeing the small pile of dishes he had left sitting in the sink from last nights dinner date. He sighed as he ran fingers through his dark black hair, turning away from the mess as to not worry about it. He'd get to it later, like he seemed to do with all his other chores recently. Dragging his feet over to the counter to grab things for making morning coffee and toast, he saw his cell phone lying next to the toaster and noticed the red light had been blinking.

He picked it up, looked at the screen and rolled his eyes. "…Yuriko…"

He put two slices of bread into the toaster and pulled the lever, all the while… staring at his phone, wondering whether to listen to the voicemail message or ignore it. He gave in and placed the phone to his ear.

"Hi…Mamoru…It's me, Yuriko…as if you couldn't tell already" The voice laughed "Last nights dinner was wonderful, it really was. You are a great cook Mamoru. Everything was so tasty, I mean that." There was a long pause "Mamoru…I…" Another pause "I do like you, a lot but…I've been getting this feeling lately that it is all one sided. You just don't seem interested anymore. I don't know if you ever really did seem interested to begin with. You stare off into space a lot, you never pay attention, you just don't seem…well…here" Short pause "I'm sorry Mamoru, but…I just don't think it's going to work out. Your mind is completely somewhere else and…I don't think…a girlfriend is in your future. I've got to go. My brother is going to be picking me up in a few minutes so we can go visit my mother, but feel free to call me."

The message ended and Mamoru flipped his phone closed. He wasn't at all bothered by it, nor did he feel any remorse. "It was only the third date anyway" he thought to himself. That was the fourth girl in the last 6 months. He would get a hook up through a friend, or meet someone new on campus…but no one could ever seem to hold his interest and his mind would always wander elsewhere. Again, as usual he would tell people "School has just been very stressful lately, some hard classes and all that"

Maybe that was the reason he had been in this weird funk as of late. He did have quite a work load which was probably what made him more withdrawn than usual, and that glowing shine he wore about had faded into something lackluster. There was no denying it. He wasn't himself.

"We'll see what happens when midterms are over." He reached over and grabbed the toast from the toaster, before pouring himself a cup of coffee.

He sat down at the table, toast and jam in hand as he opened the paper. The front page had yet another story of some mysterious death caused by, as witnesses put it, monsters and weird people in weird costumes. It had been happening a lot recently with claims of three mysterious soldiers coming to save the day, or almost as in the case of the current paper.

"I guess those mysterious senshi are kind of cute. They do have short skirts." Mamoru raised an eyebrow as he sipped his coffee. Other than the front page, there was really nothing interesting in the news anymore, at least not to him anyway. He used to remember a time when reading the paper was enjoyment. Flipping through the pages, he would read near every article that came by because he could never get enough reading in his day. Fresh newsprint would fill his nostrils until every last inch of the paper had been read. Now days it was a miracle if he even got past the front page. He'd stare at the page for a while before getting lost in his own thoughts, realization of how much time had gone by not crossing his mind.

He was doing it again, just staring. It wasn't until a knock at the door that he snapped back into reality, looked down, and realized jam had spilt on his shirt. He sighed as he grabbed a napkin from the holder and walked up to open the door.

"Yo!" A familiar face waved, though it took Mamoru a few seconds before he realized its familiarity. He just stood at the door way, a blank look on his face…almost confused as his face tried a few seconds to put the name to a face.

"You, going to let me in…or are we going to stand here until the book store closes?"

"Oh" Mamoru shook his head "Motoki. Sorry. Still trying to wake myself up. Yeah, come on in…if you don't mind mess that is"

"Pfft, With Rika gone in Africa, I bet my place is messier than your-" Motoki walked in and hung his coat on the rack "I, uh, I stand correct." Motoki counted "I have ONE less clothes pile than you do" He laughed and sat himself down at the table.

Mamoru walked over to the kitchen with his mug and offered his guest some breakfast, to which he declined stating he had eaten on the way. Mamoru shrugged and placed his coffee cup in the sink along with all the other dirty ones that had piled from the previous night. It made Mamoru's thoughts wander again, and as if reading his mind…Motoki chimed up.

"So, what did you serve up Yuriko last night?" Motoki leaned back as he flipped through the pages of Mamoru's newspaper.

"Some Italian dish I pulled off the internet. Nothing big."

"What do you mean nothing big? I saw those piles of dishes in the sink when I walked in" Motoki winked

"Some of those dishes are days old. I'll wash them later."

"When you going to see her again?"

"I'm not" Mamoru walked to the refrigerator to put away the butter and jam.

"Oh, that's ni- WHAT!"

"I'm not going to see her again"

"But…oh…geeze..Mamoru!" Motoki's voice was dripping with disappointment.

"She left me a message. Do you want to hear it?"

"She left you a message? What's up with you man!"

"Do you want to hear the message or not?"

"Fine, toss me your phone" Motoki threw his arms in the air and caught the phone. He placed the phone to his hear and listened to the message left. His expression went from pure joy to down right disappointment. He sighed in frustration as it seemed he had lost all hope in aiding his friend in love. Maybe he would try again come summer vacation.

"I don't understand you Mamoru. You two seemed so compatible!"

"She's too serious."

"She's too this, she's too that. No one is perfect Mamoru. What is it going to take for you to stop holding such high standards? Even Rika has got her flaws…though I do my best not to point them out for my own sanity." Motoki laughed as he threw a paper airplane in the air he had made out of the morning paper. It flew across the room before landing behind the couch. "Wasn't a good paper anyway" Motoki said lazily.

Motoki's eyes moved about the room in search of any semblance of clean but found none. His mind began to question if the real reason Yuriko ended things was the upkeep of Mamoru's apartment. Any woman would be appalled at the mess left about, but with the disinterest Mamoru was showing in his life, it wasn't like he was about to bend over backwards and clean his apartment for some girl.

"You sure she didn't leave because of this…mess?" Motoki questioned to Mamoru

"No. In fact, she liked it. It seemed to be the only common ground we shared. We're both very messy, in fact, her apartment is worse than mine."

"Maybe that's why all those other girls left. They took one look at this filth and decided they didn't want to be with a pig" Motoki laughed as he made his imitation of swine. "Oink! Oink! Ha, ha. Either that, or they saw the dirty…you know and thought 'ewww, dirty pervert!" Motoki snickered

"Hey! I didn't ASK for those magazines! Shota gave me those and I haven't gotten around to throwing them out yet!" Mamoru huffed as he filled the coffee pot with soapy water and left it on the counter to sit.

"Oh, lighten up! It was just a joke" Motoki chucked as he threw a wadded up page of the paper and it bounced off Mamoru's head.

The paper rolled by the sink and all Mamoru could do was stare at it wide eyed and confused as a gust of déjà vu filled his brain and came knocking at the door. He kicked the paper with his foot and he could just see some forgotten memory stuck in a bubble but the moment he tried to think about it, it would burst.

"Everything ok? You look confused"

"I…errr…naw. Just got the weirdest déjà vu when you threw that paper at me, like it's happened before and it was significant"

"You mean, like THIS!" Motoki wadded up another page and hit his friend square in the face and laughed

"Ow! Not like that! You know what I mean! That hurt!" Mamoru rubbed his eye. He glanced down at the wad of paper, only to see his half eaten toast stuck inside.

"WTF! Who throws toast! Don't throw toast in my apartment!"

"It's already messy enough"

"Yes, but not with food! I don't want to attract mice and roaches!"

"Alright, alright. Now, get dressed. I want to hit the book store before lunch"

"Then Crown Café for lunch?"

"What is WITH you and that Café! We ALWAYS eat there! And why, when we go, do we ALWAYS have to sit at the corner booth!"

"I don't know. I am just…well…drawn to it. The foods good, reasonably priced and I like booths because I can bring my school work and sprawl out I guess." Mamoru shrugged, not fully understanding why he always chose that café. In all honesty, the food wasn't that great.

"Lets eat somewhere else today. I hear there is a burger joint that just opened up about a block from the book store."

"Alright. I'll be back. Help yourself to some 'help clean the apartment' cookies"

"HA. You wish! Only if it's with that Hot red senshi. She seems feisty." Motoki glanced down at a picture of 3 senshi on the front page "HEY! Didn't there used to be a blue one? What ever happened to her?" Motoki yelled out at Mamoru

"Short haired one?" Mamoru's muffled voice came from the bedroom as he tried to find the neck hole in his shirt.

"Yeah"

I don't know. Maybe she quit the force. Beats me. I don't really care to much. They protect the city somewhat, and as long as no weirdoes come and attack me, I am good" Mamoru walked out of the bathroom in midst of putting on his pants. He shuffled his feet around piles of clothes looking for his coat, and upon finding it, he headed for the door.

"Ready Freddy?"

"Lets go!"