iv. four;

After dropping the proper amount of detergent into the washing machine for Judai's fish-tainted clothes, Asuka starts the washing cycle and exits the small laundry room after she flicks the light off. She meets Judai in the hallway as she heads for her room.

He seems to be awkwardly shifting the collar of the white dress shirt she lent him, thoughtfully frowning at the exposure of his collarbone. "Are you sure Fubuki-san won't mind this?"

She quietly smiles. "He won't. I think he would be flattered instead." She thinks he looks a little dorky clad in it. Her brother is muscular and taller, so she expected the shirt to be somewhat baggy on Judai. Even the black slacks she found for him seem bigger on his waist too.

This makes her wonder if Judai is eating enough these days. The question would be almost nonsensical to think about, given his appetite when he's here eating dinner with her. He's always looked slender like this, but she also remembers the way he used to keep himself locked up in his dorm all the time and avoiding everything (everyone) and that also included isolating himself from the cafeteria for food— Oh. She's worrying again.

Inwardly shaking her head, she reminds herself that he's perfectly healthy now. She makes sure to keep him well-fed, at least for when he's visiting her. Not because she's his babysitter or anything. She just simply cares; cares so much that she usually prepares extra fried shrimp for him on occasions without telling him just so he can eat more because he likes them so much.

"Okay, but did you have to give me these?" Judai whines, gesturing at himself with his open palms to probably indicate the bagginess of her brother's garments.

She laughs a little, inwardly. He remarked about having a growth spurt, but he could barely fit into these clothes that Fubuki rarely wears anymore because her brother said they shrunk for him. (Yep, still not quite a man yet.)

Asuka serenely looks at him. "I don't think you would like the other clothes he left behind here." This is referring to the ridiculous ruffled tops and flashy neckties or bowties and also bright-colored pants. (Idols are creatures of uniqueness, Asuryn, Fubuki told her once in his matter-of-factly voice. She remembered not caring and hanging up the phone.)

Deeming the conversation over, Asuka proceeds to her room for her laptop, leaving the door open so she can bring her laptop to the living room with her charger. She'd normally be content with doing her work in her room, but sometimes it's a bit stuffy to work in there when the air conditioner cools the living room more.

Judai opts to stand at the threshold of her door, still disgruntled as he rolls up the large sleeves to his elbows so that the shirt doesn't feel as big on him. "Why does he even keep these clothes here anyway?"

Unplugging her laptop, she distractedly says, "Because he stays in the guest room sometimes when he visits. He's family, so I let him leave a few things here just in case." Laptop securely cradled after making sure to also take her phone with her, Asuka carefully walks past him out the door to the living room.

"Darn," Judai says disappointedly as he follows her. "I was hoping I could leave some things behind too, so I don't have to wear these next time."

She blinks. Next time?

She really hopes there won't be a next time—she can only handle so much cleaning of fish-tainted clothes and lake water scents in her apartment. (Not to mention, she spent most of yesterday night scouring drawers and dressers just to even find decent substitute clothes for him underneath all of Fubuki's sparkly outfits. She really needs to have a talk with her brother about leaving casual clothes behind.)

Reaching the living room, Asuka places her laptop on the low table and plugs her charger in neatly. Clearing her throat, she adamantly wanted to tell him that it's more of an intimate couples thing for two non-relatives to leave clothing at each other's places so casually and that he doesn't have to do that because she's willing to sacrifice some laundry detergent for him, but she says: "I think there might be a drawer or two empty if you want to do that."

"You mean you're fine with it?" He arches an incredulous eyebrow at her, like he didn't really expect her to agree.

Somewhat offended, she sets her phone next to her laptop and replies defensively, "You drop by a lot lately, so why not?" She will not deny that she's in love with him, but she thinks she knows when to draw a line between responsibility and her feelings when it comes up. If she honestly has extra drawers free, then she thinks he can use them if he needs to.

He averts his eyes. "I thought you would've said no because you don't like it when Fubuki-san teases you."

Thinking that it's oddly considerate of him to point it out, Asuka occupies herself by turning on her laptop. "I don't like that," she easily confirms. "But, I wouldn't be a good hostess if you're not comfortable here." She's dealt with Fubuki all of her life, so it's not like she doesn't have an idea of what he could do if he found out anyway. If. She has developed thick skin due to her brother's teasing anyway.

"Then… I'll bring extra stuff next time to leave behind," he carefully replies, which makes her wonder if he ever leaves stuff behind with Johan or Jim when he's staying with them because that traveling bag of his can't possibly hold that much with Pharaoh and his duel disk occupying it. She nods and starts logging in to check her email. A slight pause, then comes a confused: "I thought you were on vacation?"

Asuka clicks on a recent, unread email. "I am, but the teachers all decided to keep in touch so we can exchange lesson plans for the next school year and other school things that would bore you to sleep." She starts typing a response email to a coworker.

"I should take offense to this, but it's also very true," Judai gravely sighs, feigning resignation. She smiles quietly in response, because he'd rather play along than make an indignant comment about how school always bored him to sleep.

As she composes her email response, Asuka can hear his footsteps receding. She sends her email with an attachment of a document file containing her lesson plans for the first month of the new upcoming school year—she'd also asked for some feedback on it in case it needs to be tweaked.

Judai's footsteps come back and she sees him with his deck in hand when she turns around. He's probably going to go through his deck, so she diligently starts to go through more unread emails and opens up one of her colleagues' typed lesson plan for her to browse through.

She had received two more lesson plans from two other teachers, for peer reviewing, so Asuka quietly reads the schedules for the next hour and does her best to offer comments and constructive criticism in her responses. She doesn't teach the same subject as some of them so she couldn't offer too much about the planned assignments and projects, but she had been able to provide feedback for other things such as page count of how many pages to read from assigned texts and also about the span of time to assign homework at a decent pace without causing too much stress on students. She always cared for small details: things that could make students' lives a bit easier without alternating the curriculum.

When she sends the last email, she stretches and glances at the clock at the corner of her laptop screen. The emails may be finished now, but Asuka feels like she'd get more soon. Wearied, she exhales audibly and sags her shoulders.

"Are you done?"

She looks behind her to see Judai idly sitting on the couch, strategically placing his cards all over the cushions. Maybe he'd been playing by himself, she thinks. She would've liked to join him for a duel or two, but the emails and amount of squinting at small words has her haggard.

"For now, I am." She feels a yawn coming up.

Politely covering her mouth, her eyes are half-lidded and she feels a lethargic drowsiness as her head slightly droops. Still on the floor at her low table, Asuka scoots back and leans her back against the couch behind her. Some people say naps aren't good to take during the day, but it's not like she has sleeping problems either since she gets enough hours of sleep every night. A small nap once won't hurt, she figures.

She forgets when it happens, but her eyes close and she goes to sleep.

.

.

Blearily blinking upward at the ceiling, Asuka painstakingly sits up and notes that she is on the couch with a blanket over her.

Oh, she belatedly realizes, this is the blanket from my bedroom. The blanket from her bed is a gentle sky-blue, and that's the same color as the bundle on her lap. She doesn't own another blanket of the same color. Asuka knows that Judai was the one who set her here. No one else could've.

Combing her hair with her fingers, she momentarily blinks at her laptop still on her low table, which is still opened to her email inbox, seemingly untouched. She wonders if he had taken a peek at her screen while she slept, but quickly dismisses the idea because Judai's more than likely to be confused at all of the things she had exchanged via email earlier than find anything worthy to embarrass her over. He avoids things if it'll give him a headache.

I slept for an hour? She stares at the clock of her laptop, feeling blankly dazed.

She only has one new email from her colleagues about an hour ago, so Asuka decides it can wait for a bit longer as she folds up her blanket and goes to her kitchen to prepare a cup of coffee. When she reaches the kitchen, she stares at Judai at the dining table, once again scattering his cards atop the surface.

She asks, a little bemusedly, "You're still going through your deck?" Asuka immediately strides to the counter where her coffee machine is.

"Well, I couldn't really watch TV while you were asleep," he replies casually. She watches him place Neo-Spacian Air Hummingbird's card in a pile.

You could've lowered the volume, she thinks offhandedly while grinding up the coffee beans. "So you spent the past hour… doing what exactly?"

"Talking with Yubel and Winged Kuriboh, and rearranging my cards—" Judai uses his fingers to count them down, placing his cards on the table momentarily. "—going over strategies, wondering why Sho wears glasses when his glasses don't even cover his eyes, wondering if Edo even likes colors because all he wears is gray, wondering how Manjoume styles his hair every morning like how he always has it, wondering how Kenzan's dinosaur DNA works, thinking about how SAL the Monkey is doing, and trying to figure out where Pharaoh is hiding."

Slowly processing the list, Asuka deadpans, "How productive. That's a lot of thinking."

She tinkers away with her coffee, and thinks it's strange for him to actually think about this stuff. To anyone else, the things he said he thought about would've been passed off as something very Judai-like and it would be dropped quickly as something common and that'd be the end of it. Because he's random, so he must think about random things. Cause and effect. But Asuka knows that eccentricity of his somewhat faded with time—it's not completely gone, probably a bit buried, but he's a bit more thoughtful nowadays. Those fishing trips to the lake sort of already prove her point, with how calm he appears whenever he sits there on the grass and simply waits and it would feel like the world paused for a moment until he catches a fish.

Or maybe she's just being too introspective about this.

But then again, she's always been a bit attentive to Judai. Because he's simply that different.

"I know. I hardly used my brain this much," he seriously nods, going back to his cards and setting Neo-Spacian Flare Scarab next to Air Hummingbird. The sight is a little funny to her because he's still clad in her brother's large clothes, yet he looks so focused.

"Anything else happened while I was sleeping?" she asks, scouring for her mug in a cupboard above.

"I think your phone went off a while ago." He continues shuffling his cards, taking out the H - Heated Heart spell card and starting a new card pile of spell cards on the table. "It was a text—" Judai abruptly looks up and reassures her with a nervous I-did-nothing-wrong smile because he knows she can be protective of her things, "—which I saw on your lock screen! I didn't touch it!"

"Okay," Asuka simply accepts, sipping her coffee after blowing at it.

Raising an eyebrow, he asks with caution, "You're not mad?"

"Why would I be?" She twirls her coffee in her mug idly before taking another sip and letting the rim of her cup shield her face. "I trust you," Asuka says with a shrug, sincere. She thinks she trusts him too much sometimes. (Is that good?) By now, she thinks it's okay if he sometimes sees her things. The only other person to have that privilege currently is Fubuki.

"...I'm touched," he humbly smiles.

Asuka sips her coffee again and smiles warmly. If he ever looks at her stuff nowadays, she can tell he does it for a reason. Maybe it's from curiosity or maybe it's because he has her well-being in mind, but she knows that his intentions are good and it makes her feel appreciative that he's looking out for her. Even if he sometimes teases her about things, he would never harm.

It's a peaceful silence, until he absently glances at her and snickers.

"What?" she inquires, feeling a little embarrassed and self-conscious as she looks over her shoulder. She sees nothing that would be worthy of a laugh.

Judai holds his cards with one hand and uses the other to gesture at his head. "Winged Kuriboh is sitting on your head." He looks a little cheeky, and she huffs.

Asuka sulks, "I wouldn't know that." Setting her mug in the sink, she turns on the sink and rinses the coffee remnants.

She has seen Winged Kuriboh before whenever Judai summons it in his duels. The little creature always floated with him loyally when they had been in the other dimension, although she had been much more preoccupied by other things than watching the little spirit float around. If she recalled right, Johan and Manjoume also have a similar companion? (Well, she's seen the Ojama Brothers before and she wouldn't really classify them with Winged Kuriboh or Johan's Crystal Beasts.)

For most of their time at Duel Academia, she never really knew about Judai's ability to talk with spirits. He hardly ever mentioned them in front of her and she didn't think anything of it. That had been before they'd spent most of their time trying to survive in the Dark World from the not-so-nicer duel spirits. She would still really like to meet spirits one day like him, just not the murderous and homicidal ones. All she ever met were those when they were still in that world. Maybe seeing something like a Cyber Petit Angel floating around would've been a better sight for her; a better experience.

A quiet silence, then he asks: "Would you like to?" Finished with cleaning, Asuka curiously regards him with skeptical eyes, wiping the mug with a towel. He's grinning up at her, disregarding his cards. "To see Winged Kuriboh, I mean."

She shifts, piqued, giving into her curiosity. "Sure?"

He goes through his deck, finding Winged Kuriboh's card and holding it up. Judai brightly beams at her, closing his eyes and reopening them—then Asuka sees orange and green colors. She still needs to get used to it, seeing him with those eyes. They're different, but the same on him. Like looking at a coin. She can't really describe it.

She feels something on her head, and she widens her eyes for a moment.

"Kuri, kuri?" something chirps above her head, making her blink.

Asuka warily lifts up the weight off her head and cradles it, observing. Winged Kuriboh waves at her rather happily, idly flapping its wings. Melting a little at the adorable sight, she musters a soft endearing smile. "Hello there, Winged Kuriboh," she greets cordially, patting its head.

It pleasantly rubs its face against her cheek affectionately. "Kuri!" She feels a little smothered, but doesn't mind. It's sort of like having a pet if she had to compare it to anything.

Judai finds amusement in this, apparently. "It likes you!"

"It's really cute," replies Asuka offhandedly, softly stroking its head in her arms. "I didn't think you'd actually show me it."

"I normally don't do this," he admits, looking away briefly. His eyes are back to brown. "At most, I summon Neos whenever I'm in a serious pinch." Serious pinch? He had never summoned Neos before in front of her, so she wonders about what he does when he's away because she would think most of the things that happened to them were pretty life-threatening already.

"But…?" Asuka coaxes, because it seems like it's important that he shouldn't use his powers often with the way he brought up Neos. Winged Kuriboh lazily dozes in her arms in the midst of her petting.

Shrugging, he leans back into his chair and drums his fingers on the table. "But it seemed like you really wanted to see Winged Kuriboh, so I made an exception this time."

Why? she wants to ask. She doesn't think she's that special—doesn't want to be too hopeful, because he's nice like that to a lot of people. "How many people do we know that can see spirits naturally?" She sets Winged Kuriboh on the table.

Judai blinks, and Winged Kuriboh vanishes in light. She knows Kuriboh is still there, listening half-asleep. A contemplative answer: "Johan and Manjoume. I think Edo can see them too. Three."

She hums softly, feeling a little left out. Maybe her bond with her cards isn't as strong as she had thought. But regardless, she still loves her cards very much and she is proud of how far she's gotten with them. She doesn't need to have anything else as validation for her if she knows that she's put all of her heart into her deck. To take her mind off it, Asuka decides to go back to the living room to check her phone for the text message Judai informed her of.

He stares at her thoughtfully for a second before he clumsily stumbles out of his chair and hurriedly follows her. "Are there any Duel Monsters from your deck that you really want to see? Like Winged Kuriboh?"

That's an odd question to bring out of the blue. Stopping, she contemplates, "Maybe Cyber Tutu? I'm attached to her."

Asuka begins to kneel at the low table to check her phone. It's a text message from the group chat her teacher colleagues made—they want to meet up and celebrate because all the final grades have been submitted, and this means they can finally enjoy their summer. (Asuka thinks maybe she shouldn't tell them that she had already submitted her final grades weeks ago when finals had been over. She tends to be too meticulous and often finishes her work faster than most people, and it admittedly makes some envious of her work ethic. This exchange of lesson plans isn't mandatory, but she personally thinks the networking is good for her.)

She types an agreement to the text invitation, knowing that Judai won't mind if she stepped out for a few hours tomorrow.

Judai stands near her. "Can I borrow Cyber Tutu's card?"

Eyebrow arched, she tilts her head. "What for?" He's never been through her deck before and now he wants to borrow her favorite card?

Looking suspiciously chipper, he hums a cheeky: "A surprise for tomorrow!"

He's up to something. That can't be good. When she thought to herself that his eccentricity has probably been buried, not totally gone, this is what she means: jokes and teases are his specialty with her, but there is also something meaningful in the way he does it that makes her wonder why he does it at all. Even if that includes coming up with plans. It makes her wonder why she puts up with this since he's not exactly the brightest when it comes to plans, because she doesn't see why Cyber Tutu's card has anything to do with anything at all, to be honest.

But it's Judai, so maybe it's better if she just plays along. Yeah, that seems safe. Maybe. Probably.

"I'll go get her..." Only a simple shake of her head is offered. Asuka makes sure to sigh in front of him before she stands up and goes to her room for her deck. (He smiles wider at her reaction, not bothered at all.)

When she comes back, he is still smiling and he begins to perk at the card in her hand when he looks over. "Thanks!" chirps Judai, taking Cyber Tutu. "What are you doing tomorrow, by the way?"

Intrigued, Asuka replies, "I was going to meet up with some colleagues for a get-together. They wanted to celebrate the school year ending."

He nods understandingly. "That's good because you need a social life, Asuka. Seriously." He points Cyber Tutu's card at her teasingly. "You're always cooped up in here!"

"Well, I live here." He makes it seem like it's a crime for her to stay at home, the place she's paid for to live in.

Judai wags her card at her face again to help make some point. "You live in this neighborhood, but I bet you never went out to see it for yourself, hm?"

Quietly, she rolls her eyes and starts to sit down on the floor at the low table where her laptop is still at. She has seen some of the neighborhood before. She has to since she routinely walks to the school that she works at. But aside from the usual block or two, she never really explored the other places nearby since that would require her to take different routes. It's faster and more efficient, so she rather prefers sticking with the ones that she is most comfortable with.

"Your silence means yes," Judai annoyingly singsongs at her. "Hermit."

"Busybody," she casually retorts at him, checking the one new email she received earlier during her nap. Her other colleague who teaches about Duel Monster card types asked for some advice about rearranging their syllabus, so Asuka starts opening the sent file to read through it.

Indignantly, Judai pouts and complains, "Hey, I'm a busybody because I care!" She startlingly jumps a bit at the statement, blinking. "We can't have you staying inside 24/7."

She wonders when he started to be this considerate to her because the irony is almost deafening, in her opinion.

An eyebrow raised, a somber nostalgia fills her chest. She gives a halfhearted mutter: "You didn't have a problem with staying inside 24/7 back then either." Back when they all came back to this dimension. Back when he avoided everyone.

She sees him sigh, then he murmurs a clipped: "I know. That's why I don't want to see a repeat of it in others." His voice is lower and more sad, and he is looking away. It makes her thoughtful about what he could be thinking because he never really talked about those days. She almost wants to take back what she said, but he needs to remember that there had been similar situations before and that they're treading near it now. She actually doesn't know why she brought it up right here and now years later, but maybe a part of her is still a bit sour that he felt like shutting everyone—not just her—out of his world and basically drowned himself in angst. "Especially since you seem to have everything planned out for yourself, y'know?"

Unlike me quietly echoes in this silence, given the context. He never really said he had anything planned out for his future except to travel. He seems genuinely content with his life right now, even if she doesn't exactly approve. Wandering seems to be his thing. She respects that he makes his own decisions in life. (Not to mention, she'd like to assume that Yubel is there to help him when she can't. He'll be okay.)

For her, Asuka's always had some sort of road to follow, not really that straightforward, but they were still roads to take and that turned out pretty well for her. Not exactly wayward to a point where being lost is the only thing she could feel, but not exactly too specific either. All she needed was a push and some gentle guidance. But Judai, he didn't really have that for himself. She should cut him some slack, all things considered.

Asuka clears her throat comfortingly while Judai awkwardly stands.

"I appreciate the sentiment," she starts softly, looking back in fond nostalgia. "But if you didn't notice, I have been going outside more. I came along with you when you went fishing, and I enjoyed it." Her fingers pause from typing, and she beams at him from the floor. "Sometimes, I think it's just a matter of finding the right company. So…" She smiles sincerely and says a heartfelt, "Thank you for that," because he really did let her into his world a little more again from their second visit to the lake together and it's nice. It lets her see a bit more beyond this hero image of his, beyond everyone else's image of him. Lets her see him.

Judai jumps from her words, and she wonders if it's because she thanked him. "Well, er— You're welcome?" He looks a bit flustered, and it's an odd sight because she hardly sees him embarrassed before. He rubs the back of his hair, pondering something, before nodding at her. "Call me when dinner's ready," he distractedly says, going back to the kitchen to fetch his deck, and then she watches him walk down the hallway to his room. She hears a gentle click of his door when it closes.

Tilting her head at his behavior, Asuka shrugs to herself before resuming her email response.

Maybe he's tired? It couldn't be that fun sitting at the dining table while she slept for an hour. Couldn't be that fun to think about things like Manjoume's hair routine or Sho's glasses or that SAL monkey. Sometimes, she wishes she can see spirits just so she can ask Yubel what goes through in Judai's head.

Oh well. She just hopes that Cyber Tutu will come back to her in the same mint condition she was in when Asuka gave her card to him.