บท 19: Apartment Buddies

After having the most expensive lunch that Hayashi Sakura ever had with her newly-found friend, Yamaguchi Alan, both of them walked out of the restaurant only after Alan paid for their meals through his 'membership card', as what Alan had called it when Sakura asked him earlier.

On the way to the mall's exit, Alan asks out of the blue, "I'll drive you to your house. I have a bike with me and your grocery bag sure is heavy, I must say."

Instinctively, Sakura declined this generous offer. "No. You have done more than enough. I think it's not right to let you carry my bag all the way to my house."

As if looking for something around, Alan said, "Where is your bike then?"

When Sakura doesn't talk, he gives the girl a wide-eyed expression, "You merely walked your way here?"

Slowly, Sakura nods in response while also trying to hide her red-stained face. She swears to herself to buy a bicycle once she gets her pay at the end of this month so that she could avoid embarrassing situations such as this.

"You know, that's it. No more arguments. You're going to get on my bike and I'll drive you to your house. Just tell me where you exactly live so that I'll know where to drop you off."

After being embarrassed, Sakura can't bring herself to argue with this guy any longer. Surrendering herself to his care, she follows him all the way to where he parked his bike. It was a pretty big one, with an extra seat on the back and a large metal basket displayed in the front where Alan placed all their bags.

"Hop in," Alan sheepishly smiles at her as he taps the empty extra seat at the back.

First, she had just lunch with this stranger. And now, she is about to ride on his bike, without even telling if he could be trusted or not. But the way Sakura looks at him, she could probably tell that he is truly harmless.

Shrugging these negative thoughts away, Sakura finally hops into the back seat after Alan was able to unchain his bike from the rails.

Click!

A soft, almost inaudible clicking camera sound suddenly emerges in the scene as someone standing not far from them now has secretly stolen a shot with both Sakura and Alan on the frame. Smiling triumphantly to herself, Watanabe Rin immediately made her leave and viewed the picture she just captured.

"Talk about being a sl*t," she says so to herself while smirking.

***

As Sakura points in the direction of where her rental apartment was, Alan can't help but be confused about it. Finally, he says to Sakura, "Wait a minute, this is the way to my apartment as well."

Astonished, Sakura replies, "What? You can't be serious, right?"

'I mean, a guy who has just paid for their sumptuous meal earlier at the restaurant can't be staying in a cheap apartment such as this!' is what Sakura wanted to say to him but she fought the urge to do so.

"I am being serious here!"

A small yelp instantly escapes Sakura's lips as Alan confirms it for her. How in the world could this be even happening? It's like her world is getting smaller and smaller as time passes by.

By the time they arrive in her apartment, that's when Sakura knows that Alan is, indeed, being serious. He parks his bike and locks it and goes inside along with her.

"So, what exactly room are you?" Sakura can't help but ask. After knowing that Alan lives here, she now gets curious as to what room he is in. And why, of all the apartments in Tokyo he could choose, did he pick this apartment?

"I'm in room 20 upstairs, aligned to your room here downstairs," Alan answers, making Sakura's eyes go to circles. They are now both standing outside Sakura's door as they are having this kind of conversation.

Raising her hands in a reprimanding way, Sakura bellows, "So you are my noisy neighbor upstairs! Boy, you sure like to stomp most of the time!"

Thank God he is not part of that couple who makes those crazy, moaning noises at night, Sakura thought to herself.

Alan was truly embarrassed by this and scraped the back of his neck. "That's actually my little sister, Akira, secretly visiting me here. She could really be a handful sometimes, so I do apologize for that."

That phrase, "Secretly visiting me here", piqued Sakura's interest. Did he perhaps run away from home or something?

"Oh, I see."

Alan leans his head a little and whispers,"But hey, do you have any idea who is that noisy couple right next door to your room?"

Sakura only shrugged, "Nah, I don't have any idea either."

As if on cue, they both laughed at the same time, probably having the same funny thought inside their head about that couple. Once done, Alan looks again at Sakura with a smile plastered on his lips.

"I guess I'll see ya' around then."

"Yeah, I guess."

Waving, Alan starts to walk towards the staircase and Sakura now begins typing her code on her door when the former suddenly stops and turns around once more.

"It was nice meeting you… Hayashi-san."

And just like that, Yamaguchi Alan sprints his way upstairs without waiting for Sakura's response. The latter was frozen to her place, not being able to finish typing her code because of that.

Somewhere inside her brain, she was also glad to know a rare type of person such as Alan…

***

As weekends have finally ended and Monday came without a trace, Sakura finds herself in another awkward situation where her classmates and almost all the girl students of Hirosaki University are giving her a dirty look.

Sighing, she asks herself if what could she have possibly done this time to deserve this kind of treatment.

Once Sakura arrives at their classroom and settles down in her seat, Nakano Yuna approaches her with the cellphone in hand and waved it in front of her. On her screen is where a stolen shot of her and Alan at the bike parking area that was posted by some anonymous person in an underground school site built for the latest and 'juiciest' rumors in Hirosaki University which definitely shocked Sakura. The caption above the mentioned picture says: "Goody-Two-Shoes Hayashi Sakura of Accounting Class 1-A is flirting with Yamaguchi Alan after she flirted with Mori Ken."

Folding her arms around her chest, Yuna says to her…

"Girl, I think you're in deep trouble."