Hi… Sorry for going AWOL on you guys but to make this short, I'm poor and things have been crazy. That doesn't excuse my lack of updating but I hope this makes up for some of it. As always, thank you for your support and consideration with this story, and if I forgot to address anyone who reviewed, I'm sorry, time has not been kind to me XP Anyhow, this website deleted most of my line break *sigh*…. It's a never ending battle. Well, I'll make do.
Disclaimer: I just… no.
[/Chap4/]
Natsuki glared at the correspondence in her hands as she walked towards her boss' office, 'Three weeks and I still get no respect around here…' She sighed. As soon as she stepped foot inside her workplace some jerk she never bothered to acknowledge shoved Mr. Fujino's mail in her hands and shooed her away. What an ass.
She reached for the doorknob about to turn it until she caught herself and awkwardly knocked instead 'Still haven't gotten used to that.'
"Come in."
"Hi, I have some mail for you." She said as she opened the door.
Her boss smirked, setting down the papers he was working on to look up at her. "Ah, you're on time today I see."
Embarrassed Natsuki blushed lightly and looked down, he was never letting her live her first day down was he? "I've been on time ever since my first day…" she muttered before clearing her throat. "Anyways here, I should get back now."
She started heading for the door until an oddity caught her eye 'Is that—"Sir is that a crossword puzzle?"
She nearly yelped as her boss quickly snatched her up and covered her mouth whispering, panicked, "Shhhh! Be quiet will you, if Maria hears you she'll kill me for not having signed the reports yet!"
She paled, Mrs. Maria, Her boss' secretary and possibly the oldest person on earth. The woman was a menace, in the short weeks the blunette had worked here she had seen the full extent of the panic she held over the office everywhere she went.
Wherever there is slacking, Maria is there.
Her boss let go and she glared, "Then why don't you just sign the damn papers?"
"I wil! Right after I find-" He reached for his puzzle, "a five letter word for 'a stupid person with the mental age of below three years-"
"Idiot!" She snapped.
He frowned, then hummed, "Hey, it fits."
Natsuki was about to say something again until a voice laced with authority overpowered hers, "What is all this ruckus?"
They both snapped to attention turning to find their fear, Maria standing at the door way suspicious and accusing. She looked from Natsuki to her boss, lingering on the latter before mentally saying 'well?' to encourage an answer.
Her boss bravely stepped up to the plate, "Nothing, nothing. Kuga here was just delivering my mail, and I'm just doing what I'm supposed to, signing my papers." He said strongly at first, before fading away near the end like a child, Natsuki stood up.
"Yeah, and I was about to leave so…" She trailed off before walking away scooting pass Maria who merely spared her a side glance and a nod.
"I see." The older woman said carelessly. "Then I'll be waiting to mail the reports in half an hour sir, excuse me for the interruption." She glanced one last time at her boss, content with the fear she saw there. 'Still got it.' She said to herself smiling mentally.
Her boss may find new ways to slack off every day he steps into his office, but she'd be damned if she let him get away with it. Besides, a little bit of tough love never hurt anyone.
[Chap4]
Natsuki heard a chair rolling next to her before an annoying voice followed, "What are you doing?"
Natsuki frowned, "Get out of here Nao."
"I'm bored I don't have any costumers." She practically whined.
"Me neither but you don't see me ruining your day."
Nao smirked, seeing an approaching figure, "That's different, you never have costumers, I'm actually busy at some point of my work day."
"Would you just leave!" Natsuki glared, her stupid red head idiot friend was painfully right. In these past three week she'd had less than a hand full of visits from her only costumer; the business woman from her first day, where they spend a couple of hours looking for the perfect car that apparently didn't exist in her costumer's eyes. 'Why does she have to be so difficult? What was her name again?'
"Alright I'm going! Geez, I didn't know you were so eager to be alone with Takeda." Nao mocked backing away.
"Wait whut—" Natsuki looked around to find a spiky haired man standing right in front of her desk, blushing madly. The blunette turned to find Nao to far away to be dragged back as an excuse to free herself from the pest, cursing her now snickering 'friend' Natsuki mentally vowed painful retribution.
"N- Natsuki-chan" Takeda, having heard what Nao said and taking it to heart felt all the courage he never knew he had piling up into a front of confidence. Or so he thought, unable to see his own hands shaking, the man looked sadly like a boy struggling with his first crush.
"Don't call me that." She crushed some papers subconsciously at the horrible 'chan'. Of all the things he could have said-
"I was w- wondering…" He swallowed seeing her glare and ignoring her rudeness, 'She must be using anger as a front.' He thought, 'Natsuki is so cute when she's shy…' He placed a hand on a stack of papers to pull himself closer and used his most 'charming' voice, "that after work, if you have time, there is this little café I know-" He paused for effect, and right before the scarred man could continue he felt the hand on her desk slip from right under him, knocking the very same stack of papers it was on and half of the things on the blunette's desk.
Takeda froze on the spot, watching as his literal slip caused a mess, and drained a major chunk of his 'manly points' right in front of his co workers nearby and most importantly in front of Natsuki.
"Takeda you idiot, move!" Natsuki snapped, hearing Nao's booming laughter at her side and seeing the buffoon, in front of her staring there like a moron. For his part, Takeda shook off his crumbling pride and began chucking things back on the desk, apologizing every other second.
"I'm really; I'm so sorry Natsuki-chan." He repeated one last time as he placed the last of her items, messily, on her desk.
"It's fine, just let me work now…" She managed through gritted teeth, seething inside at Nao's never ending amusement at her expense. "And I said not to call me-"
"We'll talk about that café latter, then. I- I'll see you around." He bowed- wait, bowed? Why would he- "Um, bye."
He left quickly not daring to look her in the face, belittling himself mentally at his non-smoothness, and leaving an annoyed Natsuki behind, left eye twitching.
[Chap4]
"Nao you Bitch!" Natsuki seethed, "What the hell's wrong with you! You know I hate that idiot!"
"You should have seen her face Mai- Hahahahah! The mutt was right about to smack him!"
"I was not." She said indignantly, hating that her friends still treated her like a child, "I told him nicely to leave me alone." She turned to Nao, "But you on the other hand-"
"Alright, eat your lunch, I made it myself." Mai pointed to said lunches proudly, honestly, these two, "I visit you both for the first time and you're already fighting."
"Looks great!" Nao smiled, ready to dig in, until she felt a hard kick in the shin from directly across and under the table. "Oww, what the hell!"
"Wow, Mai, this is really good." Natsuki said innocently and smiling.
Mai scoffed, "Of course it's good, who do you think you're talking to!"
Both girls ignored Nao grumbling and forcefully eating her own food with a pout. Mai came right during lunch time, happily dragging her friends to the break room, not caring about their usual tense atmosphere. As a roommate Mai was more than used to their squabbles and dumb competitions, and since it happened so often the busty woman started to ignore them altogether. It made her life easier.
They all got quiet as the eating began, Mai thinking about the next lunch she'd prepare for her friends during her future visits, Nao still snickering over the whole Takeda thing and Natsuki-
Well, Natsuki was failing miserably at keeping her mind blank. She took a gulp of her drink before going back to worried again, she had to find her costumer a car soon, or else she would ask for someone else, a better salesman. Like Takeda. She groaned.
"Natsuki, you ok?" Mai glanced at her.
"Yeah, right. It's been three weeks and I still haven't sold a thing, Mai, of course I'm just peachy."
Her friends stared at her.
"Did you just say peachy?"
"Would you just focus." She said with a small glare.
"Relax, mutt, it's the first month. No one expects you to be the new Takeda." Nao said offhandedly. "You'll get it eventually."
Natsuki took another bite of her lunch, "You just had to mention him didn't you?"
"Nao's right Natsuki, just concentrate on getting used to the office."
The words Nao and right together sounded so awfully wrong that Natsuki decided to ignore them, "And if I don't get it?"
"Natsuki," Mai said comfortingly, placing a hand on her shoulder, "Eat lunch and relax instead, there's plenty of time to think about the rest."
Nao nodded, and with one last squeeze of her shoulder Mai let go. Natsuki was quiet for a moment trying to get back into her old train of thought, trying to figure out how to become better, but surprisingly enough she found it hard to make clear thoughts again. She looked at her friends who were already busy eating again, then concentrated on Mai.
"So Mai, how are you and your stupid boyfriend doing?"
[Chap4]
Natsuki walked towards the exit to the closest trash can with all of their containers and wrappers, she dumped them out and scowled at her lazy friends who had been talking with each other for the past fifteen minutes nonstop.
Apparently she had pissed Mai off with their last conversation and now her friend was promptly ignoring her. 'Tch, s'not my fault Tate's an inconsiderate moron.'
Natsuki looked up and caught a figure of a person stepping into the building; she looked at the clock in the break room. Shizuru…
Every day at about the same time Shizuru would come in for her internship. Not that Natsuki even noticed or anything…
Besides, during the last three weeks Shizuru had been considerably distant, 'But then again,' she thought slowly, 'it's not like we were close to begin with.' Which was true, all they've done is put up with each other while also avoiding- well, that's not true. Natsuki's the only one whose been ignoring Shizuru, Every day the brunette still walked by her small cubicle and every time would Natsuki look away.
And what's even more surprising was that her boss hasn't asked for anymore favors from her. Not that she wanted him to!
As the figure walked closer Natsuki confirmed that it was indeed the brunette, the girl was looking through her cell phone like usual and had a Styrofoam cup of… coffee? Shizuru drinks coffee?
That won't do at all.
Natsuki chanced a glance back at her animated friends, yup, they certainly wouldn't miss her. She walked out towards Shizuru, catching the girl off guard, "Aren't you a little too young for addictions?"
Shizuru looked up from her phone, eyes showing brief surprise before calming down again, "Ara, Natsuki came to see me? This is surprising."
"Not really, I was just walking by." She looked away.
"Ah." Shizuru nodded, "As for your question, this is for my father, he asked me to pick it up on my way over."
"So you're texting him right now?" The question left her lips before she knew it.
Shizuru looked at her for a few seconds before answering, "No, I'm texting my teacher, I seem to have misplaced some questions for her upcoming test."
Natsuki stared, "If they're for a test then why do you have them?"
"I am her student aide, and since I have already passed her class before I help her with things like these." Shizuru answered smoothly. "But she'll definitely need these before the end of the day, I'll have to go back." She held up s few sheets of papers with notes and questions.
Natsuki didn't say anything and they both stood there in silence again until Shizuru's mobile went off, "That's her, excuse me."
Natsuki stood still as Shizuru walked a few paces away but still within hearing distance, she watched in complete silence as Shizuru's face lit up and noticed a small teasing tone when the young girl addressed her teacher personally.
Shizuru smiled, "Hello Tomoe."
[/Chap4/]
Dun, dun, DUN! Aww there you have it, so lemme know what happening. I pulled an all-nighter for you guy, I hope you're happy DX