(AN) Ok, so all I really wanted to say was that I deleted the whole 'First Impression' story because... I wrote that story a long time ago, and to be honest I don't really remember what I wanted to try going with having this and that connected. So, this story is officially not a sequel to anything. It's just a story, and enjoy.

"Haaaahhhhh…" Ryo contently sighed as he walked out of the steaming bathroom.

He wore a regular light purple T shirt and a regular pair of grey sweats, but he felt more refreshed than he had in more than a week. With little water droplets dripping from the tips of his pure white hair, he gently used the towel to wipe them off.

There were a lot of things that Ryo disliked, and even more things he hated, but one of the only things he absolutely loved was simply having a long, hot shower.

With all the work he needed to do, he didn't have enough time to simply enjoy the heated water properly. However, he's finished nice and clean with it all, and with a total of four days to spare. It was more than just a little pleasing to know he'd have so much extra time to just sit around in his spacious apartment and lightheartedly think about what next to do with his story, without the nagging to get it done.

He was also pleased to finally be able to stay in his own home instead of having to work in a room half the size of his living room with three random people he didn't know drawing and writing away.

He didn't smile, but he felt so fresh that he could have sworn he saw floating flowers.

Then, he heard the music box melody of 'Lacie' playing in the air. While he does in fact enjoy the song, he suddenly felt snapped out of his happiness knowing full well he set it as his ringtone.

'I swear if it's the damn company again.' He thought bitterly as he walked across the room to see his phone sitting on top of the kitchen bar he knew he'd never use.

With irritation boiling in his stream he just looked down at it expecting to see the word 'Work.' However, to his pleasant surprise, the only word he saw was actually a name.

'Yuki.'

Feeling a slight tug at his lips, Ryo immediately answered the phone and placed it at his ear.

Before he could even try to say 'hello', she, like always, beat him to it.

"Oh, thank god, I was worried you'd be too busy to answer your phone~!"

He felt a nice warmth form in his chest at the simple sound of her voice. It was as loud and abrasive as always, but it gave him a calming sense of familiarity, which was what he needed more than anything right now.

Taking a few strides to relax on the couch, Ryo let out a half hearted sigh. "Aren't you supposed to be busy right now?"

He felt more relaxed when he heard her light laugh through the phone. "Yeah well things ran a lot smoother today than we all thought it would, so I had time to spare. Besides, it's not like you have a good history with properly answering your phone what with you hardly ever having it on you."

"That's because other than work, you're the only one that contacts me."

"Don't forget that bankrupted prince of something trying to get you to wire him money."

"Yeah him too."

Ryo liked this. He missed Yuki, so much. It also annoyed him that the only person he could ever talk to were people at work that only ever talked about his work. It grew more and more mind numbingly boring.

But this, as always, was perfectly natural.

Hearing the sound of Yuki's laughter never failed to make his day. "Well, speaking of, how's work been going? Have any idea when they'll be releasing your next volume? Don't forget that I get a best friends discount~."

"That wasn't a thing in America it's not going to be a thing here."

"Well a girl can dream~! No, but seriously, when's its release date. I want to be waiting in line to get it as soon as it's on sale. Or, you know, have someone do it for me at least. Like you~."

"I'll be busy."

"You don't even know when the release date is do you? As always, you never pay attention to the little things Ryo. One of these days that little habit of yours is going to come right back and bite you in the butt~." Yuki hardly ever took a breath while speaking, but after years of listening to her, Ryo has begun to barely notice it, and just enjoy knowing how he could leave most the talking to her.

"I'm still not waiting in a line."

"Fiiine! I'll just order it online, but I really don't trust overseas delivery. Remember what happened to that special clock that was supposed to have the voice recordings to the main characters to-"

"Yes, yes, it got lost and never made it to you."

"Exactly! Even after those seven times I tried to call them to make sure they had my right address. I really hate trusting that my orders will be flying across god knows where without meeting some kind of horrible doom!"

"It'd be easier if you just let me buy you a copy."

"No! Absolutely not! I'm supporting you and your career in the proper way and giving my own money-earned with my own sweat and tears-to your hard work. What kind of friend could I say I was if I let you donate to yourself without me even giving up a dime."

"You're ridiculous." But he couldn't stop himself from the small smile curling at his lips.

"Say what you will, but I stand by my morals. But, anyways-after getting way off topic-how has work been? Last I heard you were barely turning in your manuscript. How's it been going since then?"

"I turned in my final work."

"Fast and hard working as usual, I would expect nothing less of you. That means you have free time?"

"Pretty much."

"Really? They don't have any extra work lying around?"

"...Why?" Ryo suddenly got suspicious of Yuki's intentions.

"Oh, just wondering a little… They called you for something didn't they?"

...He could lie, but he could never seem to get the rest of his body on board with that plan whenever it included Yuki. "They called me earlier and asked if I could assist in helping this one author that is far beyond late turn in his work."

"...Rrryyooooo?"

'Crap.' "I'm not doing it Yuki."

"Ok first of all, I didn't say anything about doing it. But, since we're now on that topic, why not~!" She whined half heartedly.

"Because I don't want to."

"Ok, ok, I get it. You don't want to help some person that you not only have no connections to, but that you also think is most likely just an absolute slacker for not having turned in his work ages ago, even though you can never get through your head that not everyone can write out pages and pages of work as fast as you do. Right?"

"Since you've already explain it, we're done with that."

But, of course, "Oh no we're not! Ryo, honey, darling, my most favorite person in the whole world,"

"How long will this take?"

"I love you, but you're a complete shut in that won't let so much as a fly get into your life."

"I don't like flies."

"So, you really need to get out more. Meet new people. Get some fresh air. Make a coffee date with someone. And for god's sake make someone closer than a freakin assistant!"

"That's what you're for."

"Yes, but Ryo you need to meet new people! You need to make some friends. You need more people in your life."

"You're all I need."

"...Hahhhh."

It was true though. Ever since she persistently broke through his little wall, he's only ever had her. She was his friend, she was his everything. She's the only person that has and will ever understand him more than anyone else. He really truly believed that. Just as much as he believed that ever meeting her was nothing short of an absolute miracle, and that running into more than one miracle is nearly impossible.

He's already learned what lack of a miracle did. He's been learning that since the day he was born.

Ryo listened intently to her, and felt slightly guilty for what he said as he listened to her rare pauses.

"...You really shouldn't be saying stuff like that Ryo. You'll only get me hoping."

He could hear it, the slighter sorrow to her voice, and the stung like a thousand needles in his stomach. He even began to wonder how stupid he was for ever even thinking of saying something like that to her. "Yuki-"

"Now I'm not saying that you'll meet Buddha, Jesus, or even freakin Gandhi in there, but I'm suggesting for you to at least learn to get out there a little more. Consider it a little baby step into being able to be a non socially awkward member of society. You know, like that one book I read said. Baby steps~."

...He realized she was back to her ever babbling self, and just decided to feel a little relieved. "I'm not socially awkward."

"But you get what I mean. You really need to learn how to be more adventures! You never know what you'll run into. Maybe you'll find a puppy, or win the lottery. I don't know! The options are endless! So you're going to get your freshly showered butt-I know you took a shower by now-into some clothes, and go tell them that you'll help what's-his-face finish his work got it?!"

...Knowing full well this was not a battler that he would win, Ryo just sighed lightly-letting his head fall in defeat. "Fine…"

"Alright then! Now, who's the mangaka?"

"Chiharu Yoshikawa."

"...WHAT!" Ryo had already pulled the phone away from his ear in advance, knowing this would happen. "RYO, NOW YOU REALLY HAVE TO GO! I MEAN-I MEAN! YOU DIDN'T TELL ME IT'D BE YOSHIKAWA-SENSEI! YOU'RE REALLY GOING TO MEET HER?!"

"Him."

"I DON'T CARE IF IT'S A FUCKING WHALE, RYO! I LOVE HIS STORIES! I mean I love yours more of course, but I know you already. SO YOU HAVE TO GET ME AN AUTOGRAPH RYO! YOU HAVE TO, PLEASE!"

...Ryo couldn't actually see her puppy eyes, but he knew they were there, and that was enough for him. Sadly.

…..

'I knew this was a horribly annoying idea.'Ryo thought with the utmost bitterness.

He had went off and dressed himself into a pair of black jeans and a plain white shirt, and called the damn editor that had asked if he could assist in the first place-someone named Takasomething-and made his way to the said location.

Finally there, he couldn't help but feel incredibly bored since he was left waiting in a hallway for help. 'I thought they said they were in a hurry so why the hell am I-?'

His continuous bitter rant was cut short when he noticed a small girl go up to him, and -surprise surprise-she was blushing red. "Y-You're Arai-san right?"

To his discomfort, he saw her eyeing both his face and his hair back and forth. "Yes, that's me, so where exactly am I supposed to be going?"

She flinched at the tone of his voice, and he did feel slightly guilty, but he was being forced to do a waste of his own time because his friend-currently overseas-want him to socialize.

"R-Right this way."

With that he just followed after the tiny girl that-hopefully-has lost interest in him.

…...

"H-Here it is." She said with her head hung low, and, before Ryo could make up for the rudeness from earlier by thanking her, she dashed away down the hall.

He just sighed and looked at the door exhaustively.

Rubbing the back of his neck he just opened it.

He only took a look at the mess the three people he managed to look at were before trying to speak.

"Hello-."

Then, all of a sudden, there was a figure in front of him. To, very little surprise, he saw it was actually his editor-who look fair enough like crap.

"I'm sorry for having to ask for your help, Arai-sensei, but you're the only other person that was available right now."

Ryo felt uncomfortable at the slight bow, but just nodded along. "It's fine, I did have free time." 'Besides you're not the one that nagged at me to go off and meet people.'

"Thank you, please sit right over."

Ryo just went along and took the first seat that he saw and didn't even bother looking at any of the other people-who the majority seemed to be taking a long moment to properly stare at him-and looked back up to the editor whose name he couldn't bother to remember. "Now what do I do?"

Immediately the editor handed him a piece of paper that was already divided up into panels. "In this one you can just go ahead and draw out an aquarium setting. You can ask Yoshikawa-sensei for approval when you're done. Is that right, sensei?"

Ryo followed his editor's eyes and saw some scrawny looking man that had large rolled under his eyes. 'So that's Chiharu Yoshikawa.' Ryo thought, remembering what Yuki nagged him about.

The man just blinked up dazed out, Ryo couldn't even tell if he actually heard what he was asked. He met Ryo's eyes and just nervously said, "Y-Yeah, that's fine." before going back to whatever he was scribbling. However, after only half a second, he looked back up at Ryo with slightly widened eyes. Well, to be more specific, he was staring at Ryo's hair.

Realizing how many eyes were on him, he was growing very impatient. He opened his mouth to say only god knows what-.

"Get back to work, you can all gawk at him once we're done."

Ryo blinked at the sound of the voice, and looked over to see it was some brunette man scribbling off as fast as he could. Feeling like he was missing something, he just watched as the girls that were already staring, and Chiharu just get back to their work-all looking slightly embarrassed.

Ryo shot the man that spoke up a quick glance that was not returned, and shrugged it off, going off to work.

….

"We're done!" Nearly everyone seemed to yell at once exhaustively.

And, before Ryo could even make a peep, the three editors in the room-his, some brunette that reeked of newbie, and a tall man with a resting bitch face-began carefully scrambling up the pages, and they gave their thanks, a bow, before running all at once out the door.

Ryo was left to blink blankly as everyone fell either forward or backward, tired. Everyone seemed to even forget Ryo was there until he let out a half hearted sigh.

All the girls turned their eyes to him immediately, and, all of them having slight blushes, said, "Thank you very much" in union. A girl with messily curly brown hair even said, "You really saved us there, Arai-Sensei!"

"Ok." Was all Ryo could really say. It wasn't much of hard work to him.

"R-Really!" Then, quite bored, Ryo met eyes with the actual author. The amount of gratitude that was in them made Ryo slightly bothered. "You saved us a lot! I-I'm really sorry you had to come in to help."

"I already told my editor that I had a free schedule, so something like this was fine." 'Not really fine so much as doable.' He muttered in his head.

However, Chiharu's nervous smile wouldn't falter. "But it still feels like so much! I-If there's something I can do then-"

"An autograph."

The sudden request seemed to take him off guard slightly. "'A-Autograph?'

"A friend of mine wanted one."

Finally, the gears seemed to be turning in his head. "O-Oh! O-Of course! Just um. Hold on." He began looking around through the loose and cut papers everywhere before pulling out a sole survivor-minus the slight tear in the corner. "This'll do! Um… D-Do they want a their name on it or...?"

"Her name's Yuki."

"O-Ok…" Then he-with a slightly shaky hand-began to write out his signature, and a little note.

While waiting the few seconds Ryo followed the feeling of being watched, and saw all three of the girls were still staring curiously at him. That is until they saw him notice them, and they all began looking in any other direction.

"Done! Um, Ryo-san."

Ryo finally looked back over at the man as he held out the slice of paper. To which, Ryo wordlessly reached over and took it.

"Thank you for being a fan Yuuki-san, please keep reading!"

It slightly bugged Ryo that he spelled her name a little wrong, and that his signature was pretty messy-probably due to the exhaustion-but he knew Yuki would oddly love it more because of that. Something about the rarity and one in a million nonsense she said when she got a limited edition manga copy were one of the words was misspelled.

Ryo just folded up the paper and tucked it away in his pocket without taking another glance at anyone else. "Thank you very much." Then, he began to get up to finally leave the room for good. "I'll be taking my lea-"

"Arai-sensei."

Ryo paused, feeling quite annoyed, and looked back over at the brunette that had earlier told everyone to get back to work. The pair of reddish brown eyes looked at him looking somewhat bothered.

"I actually had something I wanted to talk to you about."

Ryo's eyes slightly narrowed. He spent the time he needed to here, and he wanted to go back home. He wanted to take another long shower, laze around, and watch some shojos if he could. He didn't feel like spending another unneeded amount of time here.

"I'm a little busy." It was a lie, but-

"But you said you had a lot of free time."

'Damn.' "I had something after this."

"Then why would you go somewhere where you wouldn't know how long until you were done?"

'Cheeky bastard.' Ryo growled in his head.

He was about to snap at the brunette, but knew that Yuki would get mad if she found out instead of socializing he got into a fight. Then, he got mad at himself for practically being in the palm of her hands. Either way he just gave in and sat back down-now very annoyed.

"Fine, what?"

"...We can talk after everyone leaves."

'Arrogant prick!'

Ryo couldn't even pay attention to whatever on earth Chiharu was telling the brunette-while looking something between worried and baffled. He couldn't even bother dealing with the female assistances that were still eyeing him.

All Ryo could bring himself to do was be very annoyed at him situation, and wish he didn't pick up that phone call.

…..

Finally, everyone had left other than the two of them, and Ryo could stop wondering why he didn't just get up and leave.

He looked up at the brunette-that for some reason decided to stand right over him-but all he did was stare down at him as though he were either waiting for something, or trying to figure something out.

Though… Ryo did feel like he was forgetting something when he looked at the guy… 'Oh well.'

"Well, everyone's gone now, so what is it?" 'So that I can leave already.'

But the guy just stared at him some more, to both Ryo's annoyance and discomfort. He even slightly leaned back, away from the stare.

Then, the guy just let out a small breath of air. "Do you really not remember me?"

"...Huh?"

"We met at a bar."

Ryo tried to think, but can only run into blanks. "...Did I sleep with you?"

To this, the brunette even looked slightly disgusted. "No."

"Then you're going to have to more specific." Ryo leaned back on the chair-slightly comfortable-and leaned his cheek on the palm of his hand.

"You kissed me." He slightly muttered it, and there was a very weak tint of pink on his cheeks, but he also looked fairly annoyed by it.

'...And?' "If I kept track of every person I kissed I wouldn't have room for anything else." He wasn't exactly proud of it, but it was true.

Then, the brunette's eyes slightly widened by that, but there didn't look to be that much surprise in them. "My names Yuu, and I stopped some guy dressed as an office worker from taking you off somewhere."

Now the wheels were really trying to turn in Ryo's head. 'A bar, a business guy, saved the day, Yuu… Oh.' "Ooh. You were the guy with the love triangle problem right?"

Yuu looked fairly bothered by the mention of that. "That's really what you remember me by?"

"Well you did talk an awful lot about it."

"You asked me to."

"I did?" 'Why would I care about something like that?'

"It wasn't that long ago."

"Well, my brain doesn't bother to remember bar meeting."

"...Hahhhh, whatever. There's a reason I wanted to talk to you."

"Do you want to sleep with me?"

Once again, he looked appalled by that idea. "No."

"Just asking." 'That's usually the reason people want to talk to me.'

"How often do you sleep with people?" Yuu muttered it to himself, but Ryo could still hear him loud and clear.

"What did you want to talk about then?"

"You left your beanie at the bar."

. . . This caught Ryo's attention. "What?"

"Your beanie, you left it there."

Ryo's eyes widened at that. He even leaned a little more forward. "Do you have it?!" His tone shifted from indifferent to concerned.

In reply, Yuu blinked at him, looking quite surprised. "It's at my house."

"Where do you live?!" Ryo immediately got up, and thought over what he needed to take, and then remembered he didn't bring anything with him.

"I can just bring it tomorrow-."

Ryo cut of Yuu quickly. "I'm not waiting until tomorrow!" Then she paused for a moment, and realized-as he looked at a surprised Yuu-that he was yelling. He tried to sigh, and calm himself down, but he still felt antsy. "Where do you live?"

...There was a pause before Yuu just sighed. "Just follow me I'll show you." And with that, Yuu walked out, and Ryo did as he was told.