Hi! Welcome to the second chapter of Changing Seasons! I hope people are liking this, or at least know it exists. XD

I'm hoping to try out a new idea every week or so to keep my energy in writing up, so let's hope more comes this way. But I won't forget about the main story. Promise. ;3

Oh, I've also decided that from now on before every chapter, it will sort of explain the "plot" of the AU. To better help, readers understand just what is going on from more than just the chapter title.

And if anybody who reads this can think of an AU! you'd like to see a chapter, please post it as a review and maybe it'll pop up.

So without further a due, here's the next chapter.

Disclaimer: I do not own Young Justice, its characters, or its locations. Those all belong to DC Animation. Probably

*New Neighbors AU!*

(Samantha, a young college student just trying to survive the hectic world on her own starts to struggle with her lack of romance experience when she realizes she's more than a little interested in her new silent neighbor, and the events she goes through to try and get to know him.)

There was an etiquette to this right?

A specific way one was supposed to go about a situation like this? Asking someone out? To figure out if they were into you?

God, she didn't know. Samantha Freya had never been in a relationship before. No boyfriend, definitely no girlfriend, and she'd been more focused on herself most of her life to get her through school. However, the young brunette could already tell that her "moves" she'd made had not only made no sense but that they giving her no indication if her target had any interest in her.

The mystery neighbor, the title she'd coined him with, had only moved in a week and a half ago, taking up one of the older apartments at the end of the hallway of her own home. Quiet, not one to say much, or interact with any of the other tenants, the unknown hunk had come out of nowhere, and just as quickly hid away to only come out when he left the complex.

For work or school most likely from the backpack, he had with him.

When she had first laid eyes on her new neighbor, a boy just her age with dark hair like ebony, muscled figure that a lot of guys would kill for, and eyes so blue she was sure she was drowning in them, Samantha knew that she'd fallen. Really, really hard.

Like on her face, yet she couldn't figure out why.

There was something about him. She wasn't quite sure what it was, but when she first met him one morning, the two colliding in the hallway and helping to pull each other up, something sort of...sparked when she looked him face to face, when their hands touched.

She'd never felt anything like that before. And...she liked it, despite not knowing what the hell she was feeling. It made her feel alive, but as fast as she'd felt it, the feeling was pulled away when her neighbor ran off, muttering a quick apology and leaving her stumped about what had just happened.

Ever since that weird day, Samantha couldn't stop thinking about him. The unknown man she'd run into and lived just a few feet away from. His face kept invading her thoughts when she wasn't noticing it, enough that at some times she would ignore her class lesson and taking notes just to wonder things about him. Like what were his hobbies? Did he go to the same college she did? Did he have any funny quirks?

It came to a point that she decided to do something about it.

She was going to act and try to get to know the mysterious and silent neighbor at the end of the hall, try to get a grip on her emotions, and get back to her schoolwork and herself again. There was no way some guy she'd just bumped into could have such a huge influence on her.

If she just talked to him, everything would surely go back to normal.

So with confidence, vigor, and keeping her emotions in check, Samantha one day headed over to the mystery man's apartment, knocking on the door softly and awaited any answer.

And when she remembered the doorknob rattle and turn, the young woman was reminded of her stomach dropping like rocks in water when it opened.

"Uhh...Hi." Samantha squeaked out, a bit nervous at the lack of confidence she had once had.

Eyebrow raised at the very awkward greeting, the mystery boy looked as Samantha. "Uhh...Hi? Did you need something?"

'Oh, God! I didn't think this far! What do I do?! What do I say!? Think you, idiot! Use that college brain of yours!' Samantha's thoughts screamed to get her to say something to the guy who was staring at her.

"Y-Yeah. I was just wondering if you...had any flour?"

'What did I just ask?' Samantha asked herself mentally, doubling back a bit to wonder if what she'd just let slip out her lips was actually real. 'J-Just go with it! Anything to get out of this obviously terrible conversation.'

"For baking. I'm...baking something and I ran out of flour."

Her request was obviously a dumb one, yet the mystery man seemed to oblige, as strangely as it seemed.

"Yeah. I think I've got some. Just wait here." And with that said, mystery man closed his door and disappeared from Samantha's sight. A few seconds later, the door opened up again and revealed mystery man with a sack of flour cradled in his arm. "Did you need all of it?"

"N-No, but I'll return it. Promise." Samantha answered back, her attention back on her neighbor and taking the sack from him.

"It's no trouble." Mystery man spoke. Taking the doorknob by his hand and moving back to close his door, the blue-eyed young man moved his eyes upward to look back at Samantha, before turning his gaze away and starting to close the door. "Bye."

Seeing him shut the door and essentially put a wall back between them, Samantha willed herself to speak. To try again to say something remotely normal. Anything would by fine. She just needed another chance.

"S-Samantha!" She exclaimed loudly, her voice echoing a bit through the hall. Blushing at the sound of her voice echoing a bit through the hall, the brunette moved a hand up to cover her mouth, as if it could stop her from making any more noise.

However, as much as the newest display of awkwardness had been, the mystery man had stopped from closing his door and opened back up a bit to stare back at the girl. While confusion marked his face, an inquisitive look blended with his eyes.

"Samantha?" He parroted back, not sure if he was understanding the word itself.

"My name. Samantha. That's me." She spoke, her voice coming out much quieter than it had been a second ago. "Nice to meet you..."

"Conner." Mystery man replied back, finally revealing his name.

Samantha was pretty sure that throughout his residency, the mystery man, Conner, had never actually spoken to anyone, told them his name. Was she the first to get a response?

"Oh! Well, it's nice to meet you, Conner. I hope you like it here. If you need anything, I'm just down the hall. Room 206." Doing her best to give a cheerful and welcome smile, Samantha turned on her heels and walked off as nonchalantly as she could, flour in hand and never turned back.

Samantha very much so avoided him after that. There was no way she could look him face to face after her bumbling and stuttering. Well, at least not before returning the flour she'd borrowed.

She had told her friends, Artemis and Megan about the issue a few days after during her break from classes, explaining the weird rush of energy, the collision, and the crazy twisting feeling in her chest cavity whenever she got a glimpse of him back at home. And worst of all, the awkward first conversation.

When they both asked for details, anything that would make up for the extremely dumb actions and words she had said to this hunky neighbor of hers, she said something even more stupid.

Blushing, the twenty-two-year-old turned her head down to avoid her friend's gaze. "H-His name is Conner."

Right after answering, Samantha asked her friends what they thought about it all. No holding back. She needed honesty from both of them on this "situation".

She got two very different answers from her friends.

Megan, bless her soul, smiled and told Samantha that she surely had to have fallen in love, the twisty feeling she had felt seeing him having to be love creeping up on her. She commented that the collision reminded her of a story she'd read in her English class, noting it sounded like one of those love novels about people trying to understand love and get to know each other. She'd always been a sucker for those.

Artemis on the other hand, with her usual confidant smirk and the playful look of a lioness ready to hunt in her eyes, simply looked at Samantha, pointing to the confused girl. She knew the look. It was one she got whenever Artemis was ready to tease her or gloat.

Unfortunately, it was the former.

"You useless heterosexual. The thirst is real in you."

Nothing was resolved that Monday.

"I can't keep doing this. He's either going to think I'm a rude neighbor for always borrowing things from him, that I'm a kleptomaniac, or I'm stalking him because I keep coming over every day." Samantha muttered, scolding herself once again at the kitchen table.

Another attempt at talking and getting to know Conner, another day of borrowing something from him, though this time she actually did need it. Salt and pepper it was this time, the condiments necessary to help cook and prepare some pasta and salad she was making for a Friday dinner for one.

However all the preparation, waiting, and delicious smells still wouldn't stop her mind from going back to her embarrassing attempts at talking with Conner.

She knew that though her approaches could be written down in a "Worst Dating Tips" handbook, her interactions with the silent boy were getting better in the three weeks he'd been at the apartment complex.

Rather than mismatched talking about nonsense like sports, how his hair looked good, or worst of all the weather, Samantha every now and then got a couple of replies back. Some were quick and to the point and others went on a bit longer to continue a conversation topic they could both relate to. It even went so well that at one point Conner chuckled at really bad jokes she made.

And they were bad. Like terrible pun book bad.

Yet, he chuckled. She'd heard people groan at her bad jokes before that she loved so much, but hearing Conner himself get a laugh at her very bad taste in humor had made her feel like she could walk on air. It had been the highlight of her Wednesday, as sad as that sounded.

Taking the salt and pepper shakers she had borrowed from her neighbor, Samantha began to season the boiling noodles, making sure she didn't take too much and let them rest in her hand. For a moment, not very sure why, she looked at them, her eyes lingering on the utensils. And a very sad and desperate thought crossed her mind.

These were Conners', so that meant he'd touched them. Used them himself...

'Artemis was right. I really am a useless heterosexual.' Samantha thought, slamming the shakers hard on the table as if to knock the strange thoughts that had bubbled up in her mind and began stirring at the boiling pasta noodles. 'I may be making some progress with Conner the way I'm going, but it's far too slow. By the time I actually get anywhere to really knowing him, he may already have a girlfriend. Or just see me as a neighbor.'

But she couldn't just force herself to get all suave and make it very obvious she was into him. As much as she'd grown over the years into the mature and competent woman she was today, Samantha couldn't change the person she was.

The shy, awkward, and inexperienced woman she still was. If there was some switch that could just be flipped to get her to turn her into a sexy, confident knockout to get his attention, she'd have flipped it days ago.

"Does he even feel the same way I do? This could all be one-sided." Samantha told herself, frowning at her own comment.

There was no way she wanted that. All this tiptoeing around and terrible conversations a child could do better. But...that was life. If he didn't feel the same, she couldn't hold that against him.

"Why does life have to be so hard?" She muttered sadly, fixing up the salad bowl to finish the greens to perfection.

A hard knock made the brunette drew her attention away from her thoughts and prep work, turning her head over her shoulder to look at her apartment door. She wasn't expecting any packages today and the mail had already been collected. It was already getting dark out, the clock on her stove reading 8:00.

"Who could it be this late?" Washing her hands in the sink and wiping them dry while heading to the door, the brunette grabbed the doorknob and twisted it, pulling lightly to open the door to see who was there.

Standing on the other side, wearing a long sleeved black shirt that clung to his body and showed off his toned body and dark jeans along with brown boots stood the very man she'd been thinking about.

"C-Conner?" Samantha spoke, surprise evident in her voice and surely her face.

This was a first, to say the least. Ever since she'd met Conner and spoken with him, never once had she seen him go to someone else's apartment, all except the landlord. Every time they talked, it had been her that came over to his home.

What was he doing here so late?

"D-Did you want your salt and pepper back?" She asked, realizing that could have been the reason. "I've must have taken them longer than I needed and-"

"No, that's not why I came," Conner responded, a bit quieter than he usually spoke.

"That's...not why you came?" Samantha asked. "Did you want to borrow something from me now?" She joked, chuckling a little and rubbing her neck that felt like it was sweating up a storm. It was high time the roles were switched and she gave something to the taller neighbor to take from her. He deserved it for being so kind and considerate for her weird requests.

"I," Conner stopped talking, his words halted as he closed his mouth. Rather than say anything, he only let his eyes stare at the smaller woman standing on the other side of the threshold. His eyes scrunched a bit for a moment and lowered the floor like he was trying to figure out something in his head. Seconds later when his features finally relaxed, Conner looked back up and it felt like a fire had lit up in his eyes.

"I came by to ask...if you wanted to go get dinner with me?" Conner finally asked, his voice relaxing with each word like weights were being lifted off his shoulders.

Eyes widening at the question, Samantha couldn't help but just stare. She heard that right, right? Did her cute neighbor, the guy she's been awkwardly trying to ask out, ask her out?!

"Dinner?" Samantha repeated, the word sounding foreign on her lips despite speaking plain English. "Like...a date?"

His sculpted face growing a bit red from the question posed, Conner, scratched the back of his head, the other hand in one of his pants pockets. For such a silent stern looking man, he really had this boyish charm that showed when he looked nervous.

"Y-Yeah," Conner responded. "You've...been the only person besides the landlord who's talked to me or been nice since I've moved here. Even with the way I barely talk or put any emotion out there, you still came by at least once a day. You talked with me, borrowed something, and came back to talk again or make a bad joke." Conner explained, a thankful smile growing at each thing he listed off. "As weird as it was for you to ask me for things, I sort of started to like it. Every time I heard a knock at my door I was kind of hoping,"

"Hoping?" Samantha asked, her voice coming out in a soft whisper as she repeated Conner's words.

"Hoping it was you." Conner finished, a blush now fully taking over his cheeks.

"I...I didn't think I had that much of an effect on you. I thought everything I talked to you about was pretty stupid, to be honest." Samantha replied hesitantly, trying oh so hard to drive away the case of dry mouth she was getting, along with the warmth that was taking over her own face.

Smiling more at the comment, Conner sheepishly shrugged his shoulders. "I thought it was pretty funny the way you made jokes. You being pretty just added to it. I wanted to go out with you so we could...get to know each other more than just from casual chat in a hallway? If that's okay?" He asked a smile that could only be described as charming pointed in Samantha's direction.

'H-He thinks I'm pretty!' Samantha's thoughts cried with joy, the young woman almost jumping for joy at the compliment. 'I really want to go but...'

Standing up straight and thankful that she had a hand on her doorknob to keep her from falling to the ground from jelly legs, Samantha smiled to the hopeful suitor. "I'd love to. You don't know how much I'd like to...but I can't."

Hearing her response, the smile on Conner's face slowly dimmed out, and a frown replaced it. "Oh. Do you have a boyfriend?" He asked, worry lacing into his voice.

"What? N-No, no nothing like that." Samantha quickly spoke, shaking her head to signal there was nothing of the sort going on. "I'm single, don't worry. It's just...I'm making dinner tonight and I can't leave with where I'm at now."

"Oh," Conner spoke, a sigh of relief escaping his lips. A smile returning to his features, the taller man nodded to Samantha. "Got it. I'll...come by again another time then. We could talk about it more?"

"We could," Samantha said, yet an idea lingered in the back of her mind. She still wasn't an expert on how dating went or whatever next step was supposed to go after this stage, but all that mattered was what her heart was telling her. "Do you...want to come in instead?"

"Into your apartment?" Conner asked, a bit surprised by the idea.

"Yeah. I'm pretty sure having a home cooked meal isn't one of the 'first date' things to do in this type of situation, but I don't care and I made a lot. You can join me and we can get to know each other over some pasta and salad. I wouldn't want to make a young man like you walk all the way back home alone this late at night." She joked, giggling a little at the poor joke and gave a playful wink.

Chuckling along with her playfully, Conner, with a shine in his eyes, smiled and nodded. "Yeah, walking those twelve steps would be killer on me. And it would be nice to have dinner with beautiful company."

Blushing at the flattery of her neighbor, Samantha opened her apartment door wider and motioned Conner to walk inside, her face beaming with happiness and an indescribable feeling in her chest.

"Welcome neighbor." Samantha joked. With that said and Conner taking a few steps into the warm welcome, Samantha closed the door behind them and the two began a long night of chatting, laughter, and relaxing in each other's company.

Perhaps Samantha wasn't as bad at romance as she thought she was.