Masako, Yasuhara and Gene returned at the weekend after Madoka and Lin had departed. Masako and Mai immediately began talking faster than I could be bothered to keep up with about things I did not care for. Gene and Yasuhara, who had not seen each other for three whole weeks, were all over each other. So I retreated to the solitude of my room, where I checked my emails to find that the exam timetables had been delivered. I noted my exams down.

The last few weeks of lectures were always crammed. Lecturers would throw more content at their students after realising they had not taught everything on the exam that they had written. Then there would be three weeks of exams. My exam timetable showed all my exams to have finished in the first two, but I knew that other members of the household would not be so lucky.

My assumption was correct. I found out that evening by text that Mai's timetable had her exams one a day for the last four days of the exam period.

The rest of the semester flew past and we soon found ourselves in the exam period. Like every other exam period, I holed myself up in my room.

On the first day, I set up my desk and organised my revision. I had been working through problem sheets for about two hours when I heard a knock on my door.

"Come in."

But Mai had already entered and plonked herself on my bed.

"Masako just does not shut up!" she moaned. "She sits there and mutters to herself while supposedly revising and it is driving me nuts!"

"So you plan on working in here?" I asked, eyebrow raised.

Mai flushed red, but did not leave.

"Yes."

"Then I expect a cup of tea for the inconvenience."

Mai laughed, put her folders and paper down and jumped up.

"Coming right up."

I smiled as she left and returned to my work. Five minutes later I had a cup of steaming hot tea on my desk and a considerably calmer housemate on my bed. We worked together in silence until lunchtime.

"We should eat," Mai muttered, breaking my concentration.

"If you are hungry, go and eat."

"You should eat too."

"Hmm."

"Oliver."

I could hear the warning in her tone.

"Yes?"

"You are going to come down and eat something."

"Hmm."

Mai stood up and stole the pen from my hand. She then attempted to drag me from my chair. But my chair had wheels and all Mai succeeded in doing was dragging my chair across the floor.

"Are you done?"

"Come on, food," she whined.

I rolled my eyes and stood up.

"Fine."

Mai grinned up at me and then dropped my hand.

"Gene said you were bad at looking after yourself," she mumbled as we headed downstairs.

"Did he now?"

"Yeah, so I said I would look after you if I saw that you weren't eating enough and stuff," she said in an off hand manner. "But I get it, sometimes you just get caught up in stuff and—"

"Forget to lock the bathroom door?" I suggested.

"Oh my! Just let that go! I have not done that since!"

"You mean that you have not been caught," I teased as we entered the kitchen.

Gene and Yasuhara were already cooking their own lunch.

"What are you two lovebirds up to?" Mai asked.

"We could ask you two the same question," Gene retorted.

Mai's cheeks flared red as she squealed, "We were revising!"

"What a vague statement," Yasuhara said. "What do you think they were revising, Gene?"

"Hmm, so many possibilities! I think they were revising the subject of 'Avoiding their feelings' and 'Daydreams about kissing'."

"I left my phone upstairs!" Mai squawked.

She all but ran from the room. I glared at Gene.

"What?" he asked, full of fake innocence. "She likes you!"

"We are friends," I pointed out.

"No, she like likes you," Gene corrected. "It's a recent thing, but she would not be reacting like that if she didn't like like you."

I rolled my eyes.

"No, she does not. We are just friends."

"You just keep telling yourself that."

I began making sandwiches with the intention of making a few too many so I could take the spares back to my room.

"What's in your sandwiches?" Mai's voice asked from beside me.

She had reappeared at some point without me noticing. Her eyes were pointedly staring at the sandwiches so that Gene and Yasuhara had no reason to begin teasing again.

"Hummus and falafel."

"Will you make me one? I'll make us some tea to take back up."

"Okay."

I pulled out two more slices of bread and set to making another sandwich. Gene and Yasuhara were sending amused looks my way, but I ignored them. They had interfered enough in my and Mai's relationship.

Ten minutes later, Mai and I ate out sandwiches in silence in my room. Or rather, I ate, while Mai frowned at her shoes.

"You should eat," I said, echoing her own words back at her.

"What? Oh, yeah, sorry."

She lifted a sandwich to her mouth, but paused mid action. I reached over and flicked her forehead. Mai blinked and pouted at me.

"Ignore Gene and Yasuhara. They're both idiots. Now eat your sandwich before you spill hummus everywhere."

Mai nodded and began to eat. By the end of her first sandwich, she appeared less troubled. I turned on my chair and returned to work. Mai followed suit soon after.

Our afternoon passed as quietly as the morning had. Occasionally one of us would go and make tea. The arrangement worked well. It reminded me of working in my father's study during my A levels. At that time, we both worked in silence in the same room. I could not explain it at the time, but the presence of another being had been comforting.

I had four exams. I finished all of them with plenty of time to spare and no doubts about any of my answers. Yet even after I had finished my own exams, Mai continued to work in my room. I relinquished my desk for her use while I read on my bed.

I noticed several things about Mai during this time. She did not deal with stress well. Or rather, she had periods of time where she dealt with it very well, followed by a few hours where she fell to pieces. Everytime she began to fall apart, I made her tea, which seemed to calm her a little.

Where previously we had shared cooking duties, I took over, much to Gene's amusement. He, like me, had finished his exams by this point. While he was assisting Yasuhara with his final exam in the same way I was catering to Mai, Gene still found time to tease.

For the most part, I ignored him. But sometimes I feared that his words were upsetting Mai. Stress caused her upset at a lot of minor things, such as dropping her pen or being unable to do her shoelace up on the first attempt.

The night before Mai's first exam, I took her dinner up only to find her crying onto my desk. Crying Mai was bad. It was hard to read when someone was crying two metres away from you.

I placed the plate of food down next to her.

"What is wrong?"

"I can't do it."

She hiccoughed herself into silence and looked up at me. Her eyes had puffed up.

"I just… I keep looking at it all… I just can't do it!"

Her breath quickened.

"I just…"

Panic attack.

I flicked her on the forehead to gain her attention.

"Mai, listen to me. Breathe in slowly. Mai, listen. Breathe in to the count. In, two, three, four. And hold it, two, three, four, five, six, seven. "And out, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight."

I repeated this several times until she had calmed down.

"I'm sorry," she sobbed.

"You had a panic attack. It is not abnormal given the level of stress."

"These exams don't even matter, I just have to pass them to get into next year," she whimpered. "But I'm so worried about failing them! And then I've got to find somewhere to live for the summer! And…"

Any further words that came out of her mouth were lost to sobbing.

"I will get you some tissue."

I headed to the bathroom and retrieved a toilet roll, when something of Mai's words hit a cord. She had to find somewhere to live? I presumed she would have free reign of this house, as neither she nor Masako had indicated that they would be moving out.

I questioned her upon reentry to my room.

"What did you mean about finding somewhere to live?" I asked as I passed over the toilet roll.

"I emailed Luella to check it would be okay and she said I couldn't… And I don't have parents to go back to! I said I'd pay more but she said I couldn't!"

Her sobs renewed. I could not understand it. Why would my mother refuse?

"I have nothing to do for the next week," I told Mai. "I will find you somewhere to live for the summer."

"Really?"

I gave her a deadpan stare.

"Thank you Oliver!"

"Eat your food before it gets cold."

Mai blew her nose and picked up the fork. Meanwhile, I grabbed my laptop to write a strongly worded email to my mother.

"How… How did you know what to do?" Mai asked a few minutes later.

I did not look up as I continued to type.

"Gene and I used to get them."

"Why? Or is it too—"

"We were orphans too once," I explained. "Born in America. Our mother died and our father abandoned us. We both suffered from nightmares and late onset PTSD. Luella is a psychologist, she referred us for treatment. But anxiety is part of it."

"Oh, I'm sorry."

"Why?"

"Well that's horrible!"

"Our birth parents were not good parents. Luella and Martin, for all their faults, are preferable."

"I'm glad you're happy with them," she said, smiling.

"Me too."

Mai's first exam went absolutely fine, but she had no time to relax. She dove straight into revision for the next exam. This routine continued until the day before her last exam.

We had already eaten our evening meal. I was reading and Mai was due to have her daily breakdown.

As if on cue, Mai spun around to face me.

"Yes?" I prompted.

"I like you," she blurted. "Like, really like like you."

I had not expected that.

"You… Like me?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"You deal with all my crap and don't complain," she said.

"I see."

"Look, I didn't ask for a response or for you to go out with me or whatever," Mai muttered. She sounded almost angry. "I am just informing you of how I feel. I have a headache and an exam tomorrow and I don't care about anything any more."

And with that, she spun back around on the chair to face the desk to furiously scribble away again.

Ignoring her odd behaviour, I recognised a few problems within her statement that I could fix. I got up and headed to the kitchen to make tea. While the kettle boiled, I located some paracetamol and poured a small glass of water.

I took the tea, water and painkillers up to my room and placed them next to Mai. She muttered a quiet 'thanks' as I sat down on my bed. I refreshed my emails, but nothing from my mother yet. I could not fathom her reasons for refusing Mai.

Nor could I fathom Mai's confession.

Gene had been 'like liked' me. Or was it just a response to the stress because I had been kind?

Author's note: So this is now drawing to a close! Finaly chapter out tomorrow! Thank you all for your kind reviews!

Please review :)