Just when I was about to published this and iz upset about no reviews... There goes me updates! C:

Smile9316: My saviourrrrrrrrrrrrr! Thanks for reviewing~ You healed me broken heart lol. Wazzit confusing? /goes back to previous chappy to look/ Oh! The last words... You should watch 'Konoha no Sekai Jijou' to kinda understand it :3

"It seems that there was a murder that happened near the national park. The victim is according to the police, the head of an underground business. His goods are scattered everywhere and the police believes that some of it are missing..."

Suzume had stopped walking when she heard the voice reporting about the news in the TV. Shizuo turned to walk back to her, confusingly looked at the TV. He then figured Suzume just stopped to listen to the news.

"I bet it's the flea who created the mess." Shizuo scoffed before Suzume hesitantly agreed before walking on.

Izaya had been wondering who did this while he stood at the shadows, quietly observing the police trying to gather evidence. They had been at this case for hours and it seemed to him nothing had progressed. He snickered at the uselessness of the police for a moment.

"It's going to be interesting!~" Izaya sang as he walked away from the scene. Before he could completely leave, he saw another figure hiding in the shadows as well. Shizu-chan?, he thought, then denied it. Shizuo was not one to hide around. He was one straightforward person. Izaya took another better look at the figure. It was wearing a loose dark-coloured hoodie. There was a vaguely seen black rose with green stalk that was casually placed in the pocket. With a closer look, Izaya finally figured what the whole thing was made out of.

It was made of straws.

"Black Straw?" It was the new colour gang's work then, Izaya deduced. The rumour must be true that they had professionals in the gang. Izaya had done some good research about the colour gang. It originated not from Tokyo but from Osaka. The members in it had been knowing each others longer than the colour gangs' history, which only meant it just picked up the term colour gang when it came to Ikebukuro. When it was just a powerful group back then, the members had used dogtags to show their identities, but it became black coloured straws when it came to Ikebukuro.

Izaya grinned to himself, wondering about the people in the gang. It wasn't a large group like Dollars, every member were carefully picked and they were not recognisable unless others were also the same gang members. In return, no one outside the ring had known who the members were, much less the head of the whole group.

He wondered what was the requirements to get into the gang, since he was rather sure the secrets in there must be a lot. He was getting a bit too over his head, so he frown and looked back at the spot where the hooded figure was, it was no longer there. Perhaps went back to report to the leader?

Speaking of which he had not visited Hamako ever since he left her in her shop the week before last. He wanted to give her some personal space for the time, but probably no one thought he was capable to give others personal space. All that information hunting and stuff, but he was and he just did. He didn't mind what everyone thought, except for Amano, but that's the past now. Now, there isn't a soul that he can actually talk to about his feelings anymore. Maybe Shinra but he was stuck in his world of Celty.

He peered through the glass panel on the door. Hamako was on her headphones and rocking herself on the sofa while reading a book. Most of her face was inside the book, so Izaya couldn't see her clearly. Her headphones however, was clearly having the prints of skulls. Maybe she had liked rebellious stuff, Izaya told himself.

"Mako-chaaan!~ I miss you!~ I haven't seen you for~e~ver~!" Izaya once again helped himself into the shop. Hamako immediately dropped her book and stood up in surprise. To Izaya's surprise, she wore a white framed glasses that was neatly perched on her nose bridge. She immediately took her glasses off and placed it on the coffee table, face as red as tomatoes. It seemed that she remembered Izaya hugging her that time.

Izaya of course took every chance to tease her.

"Oh dear, Mako-chan the tomato fairy remembered a hug from me!~" Izaya's grin grown to a full one. She's rather cute, he thought then paused, cute? Maybe he regards all of his human as cute. Not just her, but only maybe.

"I-Izaya, what do you have here? I-I meant! W-Why are you h-here?!" Hamako picked up her book from the cold floor and put it carefully on the table. She checked it for any creases on its pages, as a distraction for not looking at Izaya. Looking at his handsome face would just make her face get worse. She had just said him handsome!

Hamako embarrassedly covered her face with both of her hands. Izaya looked at her, as he smirked, he probably had a grasp what she was thinking. After all, he had come across a lot of teenagers that fell for his looks. He slowly pried Hamako's hands away from her burning face and whispered in her ears.

"What's Mako-chan thinking?" Hamako, as a normal reaction, tried to flail her arms to escape. She did escape successfully but her arms contacted Izaya's face. Izaya backed away from the aggressive hands and dramatically fall onto the sofa.

"Ow! Ow! Ow! Mako-chan had ruin my face!" Izaya whined in a high pitched. If Hamako wasn't the one who was in fault, she would probably be laughing Izaya right now. She kept apologizing and asked if he needed ice pack or something. Izaya pretended to need one and she ran off to her pantry fridge.

Izaya continued to lie down on the sofa, it was until then he saw the ceiling of the shop. It actually had glowing stars and moon stuck on it. He thought only children did that and he figured Hamako was childish enough anyways. If the shop was dark enough, it would be like looking at the night sky since she painted the ceiling blue.

"H-Here's the i-ice!"

Izaya took the ice pack anyways and gingerly placed in on his face. Hamako finally laughed softly. It was too funny for her, imagine an ice pack on someone's face anyways. Izaya turned to her and looked at her somewhat accusingly and she stopped her laughter, but she was still smiling.

She then went back to the pantry and opened the fridge again. She took a slice of cake and went back to the sofa. Izaya was still lying on her sofa like it was his bed. She chewed the small pieces of the cake while she looked at Izaya. She told herself that he was actually rather attractive but his smirks and habits just puts most people off the dinner plates. Izaya abruptly sat up, dumped the ice pack at Hamako while smiling as if it was natural to throw it. He took off from her shop, claiming he needed to go home.

"Bye bye Mako-chan!~" Izaya walked off like he had never received a smack to the face by Hamako's arms. Before he could step out of the shop though, he spotted a white rose with black stalk made from straws sitting on the florist counter.

Straw Rose?