"Ren called earlier," she said, and not because it was relevant, but because she was the kind of person who said things when they occurred to her rather than managing the timing.
"How was he?" Mike said.
"Tired," she said. "It was late there... but still... he always picks up anyway."
"That’s considerate of him."
"It is," she said.
She looked at the floor for a mont. "We talked about coming ho for winter break."
"Whether I should go back or he should co here." A pause. "He said co back..."
"He also wanted to see the apartnt."
"Not you," Mike said.
"He said first," she said. "Then the apartnt."
She almost smiled. "In that order."
"That’s the right order," Mike said.
She looked up at him. "Do you think so?"
"The person and then the place," he said. "Yes... that’s the right order."
She held his look for a mont. There was sothing in her expression that was not quite the look she wore when she was processing sothing analytically.
It was slightly different from that. Softer at the edges, and not entirely comfortable with being softer.
She noticed the sweatshirt at roughly this point.
She glanced down at the tag resting outside the collar. Then she looked back up at him.
"You knew," she said.
"For about three minutes," Mike said.
She pressed her lips together. "And you didn’t say anything..."
"You were already managing enough," he said.
She stared at him. She seed to be deciding whether this was thoughtful or deeply annoying and was having difficulty choosing.
"Go inside," she said finally. "Fix the sweatshirt..."
"Go to sleep."
"Those were going to be my suggestions as well," Mike said.
She didn’t move from the doorfra. He didn’t move from where he was standing.
The hallway was quiet around them. Again.
"Why are you still here....?" she said, but she said it differently from the last ti she had said it, without the edge, more like soone asking a question they actually wanted the answer to. "You’re waiting for sothing...?"
Mike looked at her for a mont.
"I’m deciding," he said.
"Deciding what."
"Whether I’ve said everything I ca out here to say," he said.
She looked at him, and the warmth in her face had not gone down. "Have you...?"
"Not entirely," he said.
She waited. He had the patience that she had identified early and catalogued as one of the more difficult things about him, the patience that was not passive, that was instead the very deliberate absence of rushing, and she was standing in her doorway at three in the morning on the receiving end of it, and she was not, if she was being accurate with herself, trying particularly hard to end the conversation.
"Haruka," he said.
"Hm?" she said.
"Go to sleep," he said. "You have a long week ahead."
She looked at him for another mont. Sothing in her expression shifted, a small precise movent that she did not entirely control and that Mike noted with the attention he gave to things that would be relevant later.
"You are," she said, "a genuinely strange man."
"You have said this before," Mike said.
"I’ll probably say it again," she said.
"Probably," he said.
She straightened from the doorfra, slowly. She did not imdiately close the door.
She stood in the opening with one hand on the edge of it, looking at him with the expression that she had when she was deciding sothing and had arrived at the decision but had not yet acted on it.
"Goodnight, Mike," she said.
"Goodnight," he said.
She closed the door, but Mike’s hand was already on the fra.
"You’re looking forward to sothing, huh," he said.
Haruka turned around.
The expression on her face was not the embarrassed version from thirty seconds ago. It was sothing considerably less patient than that.
"Move your hand," she said.
"I’ll explain why I’m here first."
"I know why you’re here," she said. "You ca to make sure I was alright and then you stayed to enjoy yourself."
"Explanation complete, so please... move your hand away."
"Haruka."
"I haven’t slept," she said, and she said it with the particular flatness of soone who had been sitting on a specific complaint for a while and had finally found the right mont to put it down. "I was awake because of you!"
"You and Petricia and your extrely thin wall and your complete disregard for the fact that soone on the other side of it is trying to sleep."
Mike said nothing.
"Do you know what it’s like," she said, "to be on the phone with your boyfriend and then have to explain what you’re hearing through the wall? Again? After the last ti?"
"And then after that to not be able to sleep because every ti you close your eyes—" She stopped.
She pressed her mouth closed. She had clearly reached the end of the sentence and realized where it was going and decided not to take it there.
"Because every ti you close your eyes," Mike said.
"Don’t," she said.
"I wasn’t going to say anything."
"You were absolutely going to say sothing." She pointed at his face. "That expression is the expression of soone who is absolutely going to say sothing."
Mike stepped inside.
She moved back automatically, which she imdiately seed to regret, because moving back was the opposite of the direction she had been intending to go.
"What are you doing...?" she said.
"You haven’t slept," he said. "You’re worked up."
"Standing in a doorway arguing isn’t going to fix that."
"And you coming into my apartnt will."
"Probably not," he said. "But at least we can stop having this conversation in a hallway."
She looked at him standing in the middle of her apartnt, jacket still on, entirely unbothered by the fact that it was past three in the morning and he had just walked into her space without being invited, and the most frustrating part of it was that she had moved back when he stepped forward, which was not the behavior of soone who actually wanted him to leave.
She was aware of this. She was fairly certain he was also aware of this.
"Sit down," he said.
"This is my apartnt," she said. "I’ll decide when I sit down..."
"Then stand," he said. "But stop being angry for a minute."
"I’m not angry," she said.
Then she siad, "But... uhm... yes... I’m a little angry."
"I know," he said. "You’re also tired."
"Those are different problems."
She looked at him. The sharp edge of the anger was already doing what anger did when it ran out of fuel, which was beco sothing quieter and more honest.
"I couldn’t sleep," she said again, but this ti it ca out differently, and it was less complaint, more just a fact. "It’s been a long week and I couldn’t sleep and then I really couldn’t sleep and now it’s three in the morning and I’m standing here sweating and my sweatshirt is inside out and you’re in my apartnt."
"I know," Mike said.
"That’s all you have to say."
"What would you like to say?"
She looked at the ceiling for a mont.
"I don’t know," she said. "Sothing that makes this less ridiculous."
"It’s not ridiculous," he said. "It’s three in the morning and you’re exhausted and you’ve been awake longer than you should have been for reasons that are at least partly my fault."
He looked at her. "That’s not ridiculous, but... that’s just a bad night."
She stood there for a mont. The tension in her shoulders had gone down slightly in the way that tension went down when soone said the accurate thing without trying to fix anything with it.
"Partly your fault," she said.
"I’ll take the partial," he said.
She almost laughed. Not quite, but close enough that the corner of her mouth moved.
"Go to sleep, Haruka," he said.
He said it the way he said things when he ant them simply and without anything else attached to them. "The week will be the sa length whether you’re rested for it or not."
She looked at him for a mont.
"You should go back," she said, and it was not urgently, but just noting it.
"I know," he said.
He did not imdiately move, and she did not imdiately ask him to, and the room was quiet between them in the specific way that a room is quiet at three in the morning when two people are in it and both of them are aware of the fact.
Then he turned and walked to the door.
"Mike," she said.
He stopped.
She was quiet for a second, and then she said, "Close the door properly this ti."
"I will," he said.
Mike walked back to her so that he could caresses her shoulder. "Maybe... after you’ve got sothing you deserve?"
"H-Huh...?"
"What are you... talking about...?"
"Oh, co on now... Don’t play fucking dumb with !"
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