Weiss knocked on the door to Ruby's apartment, then, she waited.

She couldn't believe she was actually standing in front of Ruby's door. Well, she could, she checked the address six times on the way over, making sure she knew how many turns, how many minutes it would take to drive here.

She fidgeted with her coat. She shifted her feet, heels clicking against the sidewalk, her nice white pants just barely hiding her ankles. Her coat covered a ruffled white blouse that flattered her figure, with long draping sleeves that went to her wrists.

Had she overdressed? She wanted to look nice for her first time at Ruby's place, but she was starting to question if she went overboard.

Ruby's place was in a dingy part of down, with cracks in the sidewalk and leaves filling the nooks and crannies and space beneath the bushes.

Weiss sniffed, holding her arms around her chest, her coat keeping back most of the chill. Despite the run down nature of the place, she couldn't help but feel a flutter of excitement.

This was Ruby's place. With Ruby's living room, Ruby's kitchen, her clothes.

Her bed.

Weiss shivered in anticipation, the warmth in her belly growing, her excitement boiling over.

The door opened, just enough for a head to poke through the crack.

"Weiss! You're here!" Ruby greeted, excited. She gave Weiss a once over. "Wow."

"What?" Weiss asked, folding her arms.

"You're overdressed." Ruby deadpanned.

Weiss felt herself flush. Then, she huffed, crossing her arms, turning her nose up.

"So?" Weiss gestured to herself. "I'm not wearing this for long."

"Not on my watch." Ruby agreed, still keeping the door mostly closed.

"Well?"

"Well what?" Ruby asked.

"Aren't you going to invite me in?" Weiss asked.

"Um. . ." Ruby glanced behind her, then looked to Weiss. "Could you give me like five minutes?" She asked.

"Why?" Weiss asked.

"I didn't have enough time to clean." Ruby admitted quietly.

"So?" Weiss shrugged. How bad could it be? "I told you I don't mind a little mess."

"Define little." Ruby said.

Weiss pursed her lips. Then, without warning, she slammed her palms against the door, attempting to push it open.

"No!" Ruby declared, pushing back on the door.

"Come on Ruby, let me in!" Weiss insisted, pushing harder. Damn it, why did she wear heels?!

"No trespassing!" Ruby yelled, pressing her whole body against the door.

The door clicked shut, and Ruby locked it from the other side.

"Aha!" Ruby declared.

Weiss slapped her hand against the door. She snarled.

"Red! If you lock me out in the cold I won't fuck you for a month!" Weiss called.

"Hey, keep it down!"

Weiss looked to the left. One of the tenants had opened their door, leaning out in a green bathrobe.

"Oh." Weiss blushed. She'd forgotten this wasn't the kitchen. "I'm sorry."

"My apologies." Weiss huffed, brushing her ponytail back.

"All good, just keep it down. No one wants to hear you yell at your girlfriend."

"She's not-" Weiss took a deep breath in. "She is not my girlfriend. She's my - she's my friend."

"Yeah, people usually threaten their friends with chastity." The tenant in the bathrobe rolled their eyes. "Not that I care. My kid's going to bed, please be mindful." Their door shut.

Weiss groaned, pinching her nose. She took a deep breath, then let it out.

"Ruby." Weiss called into the apartment. "Would you please let me in before I catch a cold?"

"Two minutes!" Ruby called from inside.

Weiss put her ear to the door. She could hear rustling, a few bangs, a sliding door open, then shut.

"Ruby, I'm counting to three, and if you don't open up I'm going home and I will text you pictures of me in the laciest lingerie I can find."

". . . I don't see how that's a punishment." Ruby called from inside.

"This is on top of not fucking you for a month." Weiss declared. "One." No answer. "Twoooooo." Still none. Weiss stretched the moment. She didn't know if she could last a month. "Thr-"

Ruby opened the door, dressed in a loose black tank top and black pajama pants, a hoodie tied around her waist. She held a full trash bag in one hand. She gestured inside with the other.

"Come on in." Ruby said, breathing heavily.

Weiss frowned. There was sweat glistening on Ruby's forehead. Weiss glanced down.

"What's in there?" Weiss asked, looking at the trash bag.

"We don't have to talk about that." Ruby said hurriedly. She gestured inside. "I need to throw these out real quick. Go inside, but don't look in the kitchen yet."

Weiss glanced inside the entrance. There were three full garbage bags lined up behind the door. Four bags total. Weiss quirked her lip, then sighed.

"I said I would help." Weiss reminded Ruby.

"You aren't, exactly dressed like you knew what was up." Ruby said, eying Weiss' outfit.

"No, no. I didn't dress like this because-" Weiss groaned. "Just, lead me inside and offer me a change of clothes!" She said, exasperated.

"Oh." Ruby poked her lip. "Are you sure?"

"I am." Weiss grumbled.

"Cool. Um-" Ruby set the bag down next to the other three. "Come on in." Ruby beckoned.

Weiss walked in behind Ruby, slipping off her shoes in the process. She followed Ruby through a basic living room. The entryway to the kitchen was covered with curtains.

Weiss didn't see anything really dirty about it. The baseboards were dirty, yes, but everything else was either freshly vacuumed, or freshly dusted, or-

There were curtains over the kitchen entryway. Weiss frowned.

"I prioritized the bathroom and bedroom first." Ruby said casually. She reached behind a door and flicked a light on inside. A bathroom with basic black hand towel, soap, some hair care bottles, a brush and toothbrush and toothpaste. All on gleaming white tile and glossy mirrors.

"I'd been picking up a bit more around here, but I hadn't gotten deep yet." Ruby smirked. "With your help though, it'll be a breeze." She said, smacking Weiss' shoulder.

Weiss momentarily relaxed. If the bathroom was this clean, maybe the kitchen wasn't so bad. Maybe it was just cluttered. Or maybe it was a lot of dishes in the sink.

"And this is my room." Ruby said, pushing open her door. "This one I was working on for a while."

Ruby's room was clean, with a made bed and not a speck of trash or dust to be found. Weiss made note of this later. The second she stepped through the door to Ruby's room, she was overwhelmed with everything.

Start with the walls. Scattered with posters, they covered each other up in layer upon layer, like a cultural mosaic squeezed from Ruby's brain and splattered on the walls. The posters Weiss could make out were bands from heavy metal to electro swing. There were famous chefs in one corner, and several pinup girls in the other. They stared back at Weiss, and she looked away, flushing madly.

Her eye caught a powered down computer, with deep black internal components, standing on a table next to a desk stacked with 2 monitors, a keyboard, and what looked like a mouse. Weiss wasn't sure, she'd never seen a mouse with so many buttons and edges.

"There's tank tops in the second drawer." Ruby pointed at the dresser with the candles. "Cargo pants in the fourth."

"Good. Good." Weiss nodded, and stepped inside. She paused, and whirled. "Don't take the trash out without me." She commanded.

"Okay, okay." Ruby held her hands up in surrender. She pointed to a closet door. "I have rain boots just to the bottom left of that door if you wanna slip those on."

"Good." Weiss humphed. "Now leave me."

"Aw, not changing out here?" Ruby pouted.

"I'm not about to show you how to take this off." Weiss gestured. "That's a surprise."

Ruby puffed her cheeks.

"Fiiiiine." She exhaled.

Weiss rolled her eyes, and shut the door.

She was alone in Ruby's room.

Weiss felt her belly fill with butterflies. She wanted to slap them away. It was so childish. A room is a room is a room! She could be in a living room, or a dining room, or a lounge!

But this was Ruby's room.

She took a deep breath, and let it out. Plenty of time to explore that later. Right now, Ruby needed her help, and she was going to give it.

Weiss went to Ruby's dresser and pulled out the appropriate garments. She laid them on Ruby's bed, and unbuttoned her blouse, gently tugging it down her arms and slipping it from her back. She folded the blouse neatly, and did the same with her pants. Her socks were expertly rolled up.

Weiss tugged the strap of her bra. She wore the nice, lacy one for tonight, but it wasn't exactly working clothes. The tank top straps wouldn't cover them either.

Should she forgo the bra?

A thrill shot through Weiss, and she contemplated, her face heating up the more she thought about it.

"Oi, you dead or something?" Ruby asked, knocking at the door.

"Just a second!" Weiss snapped, throwing on the tank top. She'll keep the bra. She quickly pulled on Ruby's shorts, slipped her bare feet into the rain boots, and pulled her ponytail over her shoulder. She opened Ruby's door.

"Ready." Weiss declared. "Let's take the trash out."

Ruby cocked her head.

"What?" Weiss asked.

"You said that like you were a superhero or something." Ruby said, grinning.

Weiss huffed, putting her fists on her waist.

"Are you going to crack jokes, or are you going to focus?" She demanded.

"Now straighten your back and, hold on, there's a cape somewhere-"

Weiss grabbed Ruby by the arm. She marched her over to the five trash bags and pointed.

"You grab two. I grab two, we take to can. Ooh ooh, aw aw?" Weiss asked.

"Did you just-" Ruby shook her head. "Man, you are a donkey."

"It's like you don't want to have any sex." Weiss snarked.

Ruby quirked her mouth, her arms crossing in front of her. She looked away at the floor.

Weiss' brow rose up.

"What?" Ruby asked, catching Weiss' look.

"Ruby."

"What?" Ruby held her palms up. "I'm okay!"

Weiss narrowed her eyes. She looked at the trash bags. She glanced at the curtains covering the kitchen entrance.

"What's behind the curtain?" Weiss asked.

"Pay no attention to what's behind the curtain." Ruby begged in a small voice, her smile faltering.

Weiss started for the curtains.

"No!" Ruby dived, grabbing at Weiss' feet. Weiss tripped over. She pointed her toes and slipped them out of her rain boots, rolling forward.

"What the fuck!" Ruby yelled. "Are you a ninja too?"

Weiss dashed forward, tearing the curtains down.

Before her stood the filthiest fucking kitchen she'd ever seen. A swamp, a toxic miasma of dried sauces and stiff spaghetti. Crumbs in the recesses of tiled countertop gave the space a stormed beach feel. The cupboards and ceiling were vivisected, spilling their open bags of flour and sugar into pillars of disappointment and half measured handfuls. Scrambled egg occupied the same mass grave of a pan as pancakes and bacon, utensils used multiple times with webs of ancient ramen coiled around their tines.

War is hell, and the kitchen before her was Lucifer's lounge.

Weiss turned to her sous chef, mouth closed, eyes wide and strained in shock. She looked around the rest of the apartment, her brain calculating. Extrapolating.

"Look, I know it's bad." Ruby said. "But I promise, I never cut corners in the kitchen. I just, it's been-"

"You're fucking depressed, aren't you." Weiss deadpanned.

"Whaaaaat!?" Ruby said, laughing uncomfortably. "Noooooo. I'm fine, I'm reliable."

"You vastly underestimated how bad the mess was." Weiss concluded.

"No, that's not true. I knew how bad the mess was." Ruby shook her finger fiercely. "What I did was overestimate how quickly I could clean it."

"You gave this five minutes?" Weiss said in disbelief, gesturing to the war crime at her feet.

"It's just a saying." Ruby protested.

"If I asked you how long a steak would take and you said five minutes would it be ready in five fucking minutes?!" Weiss asked, her voice getting slightly shrill.

". . . Yes."

"Then how. In this hell we call Earth. Can you clean this abomination. In five minutes?" Weiss demanded.

Ruby crossed her arms.

"I guess I couldn't." Ruby said, looking away.

Weiss immediately backed off, taking a deep breath. She huffed.

"Ruby, I'm sorry." She said hurriedly. "I didn't mean to-"

"No, no." Ruby held one palm up. She wiped her eyes with the other. "It's fair. This is. . . I don't like confronting this bit."

Weiss frowned. She put her hands behind her back.

"How did it get this bad anyways?" She asked, rocking back on her heels.

"Ugh. . ." Ruby put her hand to her face. "I don't want to talk about it."

"Well you clearly need to." Weiss said, running her hand over her hair. "You don't trust me?" She asked, looking at the floor.

"No, that's not it." Ruby shook her head. "I want you to have a good time, and that's hard if I talk about this." She laughed nervously, rubbing the back of her neck. "But, if I really wanted to, I could've waited for a day. But you didn't want to wait. And I didn't want to wait. I got excited."

Weiss pursed her lips. She crossed her arms and sighed.

"Come on. Let's get the trash out of here. When we get back in, we'll move the dirty dishes into a separate container so we've got room to clean. We'll brush down the counters and get all the crumbs to the floor. I'll sweep. You are mopping. I'll start soaping up the sink and get on dishes. You dry them and put them away. Okay?"

Ruby looked at her kitchen. She looked at the verified snow-haired goddess in front of her, dressed in working clothes, her hair pulled back, arms crossed like she meant business. She almost protested, but the words died in her throat.

"Okay." Ruby relented, shoulders sagging.

"Good." Weiss glanced at the floor of the kitchen. She went and put the rain boots back on, tapping the toes against the carpet. "I'm wearing these back inside." Weiss declared.

"Fine with me." Ruby said, grabbing the trash bags.

Quickly, the pair tossed the trash and came back to the kitchen. There they set to work.

The dishes were moved in semi-ordered stacks to the table, a few towels laid down to keep scraps and scrapes from the surface. The silverware was gathered in a large mixing bowl and filled with water to soften the mosaic of dried sauces and rotten cereal.

The counter-top appliances were moved next. The microwave made its way to a chair, the toaster was emptied of crumbs, and the blender was shifted to the top of the fridge.

The counters cleared, the pair worked on brushing all the crumbs and stray salt to the floor. They used towels to wipe up streaks of butter and sticky jam.

Weiss got to sweeping, gathering all the stray bits of Ruby's sorrow into a dustpan, tossing the amalgamation of gray crap into a trash bag.

Ruby came around the corner with a house mop and bucket. She swiped the floor with the mop head, picking up the fine silt and dust on the tile.

Weiss frowned. She glanced at the floor, the curtain that covered the kitchen all bunched up.

"What were you planning?" She asked.

"What?" Ruby paused in her mopping.

"Were you just gonna clean this and leave me outside, waiting until you were done?" Weiss asked, gesturing to the kitchen.

"I don't know." Ruby said. She finished mopping and dumped the water down the sink. She filled it with fresh soapy water and tossed in a sponge. She handed one to Weiss, nodding her head to the counter.

Weiss got to work, sudsing the counter down, cleaning the recesses of dirt and grease, the splatters on the back wall and around the outlet.

When she finished drying the counters, she joined Ruby at the sink. Ruby had already started the dishes, stacking them in a drying rack to the right of the sink. Weiss got a fresh towel and began drying them off, stacking them up on the clean counter tops.

When all the dishes were clean, Ruby directed Weiss where they belonged. As the last glass and plate were put away, Weiss involuntarily sighed with relief.

The kitchen was whole.

Bone-tired, Weiss pulled herself to the living room couch, planting her face into the recess of the cushions.

Ruby laid down on the floor in front of the couch, arm over her forehead, staring up at the ceiling.

"How did you get everything else done so fast?" Weiss mumbled into the couch.

"It's easy to throw shit away." Ruby said. "If you have the right motivation. And vacuums do most of the work."

"Unlike in kitchens." Weiss groaned.

"Vacuums don't do shit in most kitchens." Ruby pursed her lips. "'Cept in sous vide."

"I need a shower after that." Weiss said, pushing herself up from the couch.

"Oooh, maybe we could take one together." Ruby suggested, a ray of excitement bubbling up in her.

"No." Weiss said, swinging her feet to touch the floor, next to Ruby's head.

"Aw." Ruby pouted. "Why not?"

"Because." Weiss sighed.

Ruby caressed Weiss' ankle, her lips flat, eyes boring into Weiss.

"You have nothing to be ashamed of." Ruby said.

"Says you." Weiss snapped. "You don't want to be a downer, right? Neither do I. So let me take a shower and we can get to what we came here for." She rubbed her eyes, bleary from the days work.

"You still want to fuck me?" Ruby asked. "Aw, I thought I'd scare you off."

"You are trying really hard." Weiss said, putting her hands on her forehead, sighing.

Ruby frowned. She looked at Weiss, at the sheen of sweat on her shoulders and the beaten down air that surrounded her.

"I actually don't want to, tonight." Ruby admitted quietly. She looked away from Weiss. "I was just kinda hoping we'd. . . Sleep together."

"Sleep together. In the same bed?" Weiss asked.

"Yeah." Ruby pressed her fingertips together.

"And you couldn't just ask?" Weiss said, exasperated. "Are you trying to dangle another carrot for me?"

"Nooooooo." Ruby denied.

Weiss rubbed her eyes. She looked at Ruby, flushing and embarrassed, squirming under her gaze.

"I figured I'd head home after." Weiss said softly.

"Because you want to?" Ruby asked, meeting Weiss' eyes.

"No. It scares me. You scare me." Weiss admitted.

Ruby cocked her head. She pushed herself from the floor, eyes locked with Weiss'. She twisted her head sideways and, without breaking eye contact, rested her arms and cheek on Weiss' thigh.

"Don't give me that look." Weiss said, smirking.

"What look?" Ruby asked earnestly.

"Like a kicked puppy." Weiss answered.

"So you're scared of puppies?" Ruby asked.

"No. I love puppies." Weiss said. She swallowed. "Why are you putting me on the spot like this?"

"Because I think we want the same thing." Ruby said softly.

"What's that?" Weiss asked.

"To belong." Ruby said, her voice breaking.

Weiss was quiet, the soles of her feet tingling. She leaned back, looking away from Ruby.

"I'm going to take a shower." Weiss said.

"And after?" Ruby asked.

"I'll tell you when I get out." Weiss said.

Ruby held her hand out, like she wanted to say something. Then, she let it fall to her waist.

"Okay. I'll get you a towel." Ruby relented.