Yesterday was… enjoyable; it was brief but having someone around felt great. Furina could pat herself on the back for earning Aether's praise for her cooking. While him arriving early caught her off guard, it wasn't a terrible surprise. Sitting across from him while eating was an odd feeling but not one she disliked either. She even got her appetite for cake back with him around and devoured two more cuts after he left.

However, with Aether gone again, the feeling of emptiness crept back into her apartment. She managed to stave off the cold for a while but still couldn't help but sigh at her situation. It didn't feel like the day before yesterday when she at least had something tangible to look forward to; Aether said he could only promise to visit her sometime in the future, not today. Technically, that did not mean he couldn't drop by later but Furina knew better than to get her hopes up. In any case, she continued with the rest of her day after lunch and occupied herself by finishing one of her old novels she never found the time to read.

As for this morning, all she did was read again while eating a bowl of macaroni. "So boring…" she muttered to herself. She didn't mean the book itself but how she occupied her time; it was completely at odds with how she used to spend her time before stepping down as Archon but if she had to choose between how she lived before and now, she'd always choose "now" without question. All she wanted was to put her previous life behind her and live the way she wished without the weight of being Archon keeping her down. She was just Furina now, not Lady Furina or the God of Justice or whatever title she held and she was completely fine with that. It was better for her life to be boring and stale than exhausting and suffocating.

Still, she wished there was someone she could talk to. The Salon Solitaire were absolutely adorable and great and so much more but they ultimately can't talk back to her… maybe cuddling with one of them would hel—

—knock knock

Furina shot up from her sofa faster than her mind actually registered someone was at the door. She went to open it after taking a moment to calm herself. "Hello, Ae— oh, Clorinde."Furina hoped her former subordinate didn't notice her slip. "I thought you were going to visit Saturday."

Clorinde raised an eyebrow which briefly confused her."It is Saturday, Lad— er, Furina."

'…It is?'That couldn't be right. Clorinde last came by Tuesday, the day after Furina spent cooped up in her apartment by herself, and the day after that was when Aether first visited… then yesterday was… Furina's confusion quickly turned into embarrassment. "Oh, it looks like I lost track of time," she laughed, hoping to hide her embarrassment only to prove it to Clorinde. "Come in, come in. Sorry for the mess." It wasn't that messy, not nearly to the extent it was when Clorinde first visited but she hadn't cleaned any of yesterday's dishes yet.

Clorinde didn't see anything wrong, however; if she did, she didn't mention it. "Don't worry about it, Furina." The duelist had a small smile at her former Archon's slobby behaviour. "Did you have someone by?"

"Err… yesterday, I did," Furina nodded after sitting back down on her sofa. "Aether wanted to see how I was doing and stayed for lunch."

"Is that so? And he was here Wednesday too?"

"That's right, although he was only here brief… Wait, how do you know that?" Furina could've sworn Clorinde had more of a grin than a smile for a second. Still, the latter explained Navia mentioned to her that Aether had been going somewhere by himself the last couple of days, leaving his companion with the president of Spina di Rosula. 'Now that she mentioned it, Paimon wasn't with him…' That had completely slipped her mind though she ultimately didn't mind. She wouldn't go as far as to say she hated the flying child but her "drama queen" comment still left a bitter taste in Furina's mouth.

"So?"

"So… what?" What was Clorinde waiting for? Wait, she wasn't asking for gossip, was she?! "A-Aether and I are just friends, there's nothing between us," she tried to say as her face started heating slightly.

However, that wasn't what Clorinde was interested in. "I was asking how it felt to have someone other than me over." She sounded amused at Furina's reaction but was clearly more interested in her feelings.

Furina initially hesitated to answer but spoke up after a second. "It was nice but… strange. I never expected him to come by and check up on me since… At any rate, he promised he would visit again soon," she admitted to Clorinde. "I don't really know why he's so interested in me but I do appreciate his concern."

"Then tell him that the next time you see him. I am sure he'll explain why he is "so interested" in you," Clorinde let out a small chuckle before producing a plastic bag with a small cake box from behind her… somehow… "Here, a gift from a certain someone."She put the bag on Furina's (cheap) coffee table as the latter tried to figure out who she was referring to. "I ran into him before coming here. He unfortunately had to work to do before it left and asked me to pass this to you."

'Is it who I think it is…' Furina thought as Clorinde apologised that she also had work to do and had to leave soon. "It's fine. Thank you for coming today." She said goodbye to her old bodyguard as she left. Now alone again, Furina checked the box to see it was a gift of chocolate eclairs; it had been some time since she last ate any so she'd cherish it… for about 10 minutes before they were all devoured. She then resumed what she was doing earlier— eating macaroni and reading her book while not trying to think how pitiful she looked.

Tomorrow was another day; she only had to get through today…

A/N: I really want to make the chapters longer but at the same time, I keep running into the issue of me going "This is good enough" and end things where they are. I really need to fix that problem in my writing…

In any case, I think going forward a good structure for this fic will be alternating perspectives: this chapter is from Furina's POV while the last was all in Aether's. Chapter 1 was a mix because I had no idea what I was doing. I mean… I still don't know what I'm doing but oh well, you guys should be familiar how I do things from my other Aerina fics.