Uh oh...! // SAIKI K X READER

grapes upon the vine (tv girl reference)

SAIKI POV

Although I don't like her much, I've grown accustomed to the constant drone of thoughts from L/N. Her schedule is burned into the back of my mind always, not even because she thinks too much about it. For example, I can tell when she's going to be hungry within the next hour because she always stands in her kitchen without a goal in mind. I've reached a point where I can toughly tell if she's going to have a good or bad day within the first few minutes of her waking up.

Lately I've found myself caring more about her than I should. Far too many of my thoughts are dedicated to her, I don't like it. I know how easily she gets upset and I spend a lot of time devising plans to make her feel better. I only want that because I'll have to hear her thoughts, by the way, so don't get any ideas.

Oh, right on cue, she's going to be hungry soon. She just did the kitchen thing I mentioned earlier. I get off of my bed and head down to the kitchen to cut some fruit for her. She likes it when I bring the grapes, on account of their "fun and whimsical shape". Unfortunately for her, we don't have any grapes, so an apple will have to do.

"Ku? Are you cutting apples for the neighbor girl again?" my mom calls out to me.

"..Yes." I'm not sure why it shocked me as much as it did, but her saying that made me realize how much time I spend caring for L/N. Clearly I've gone over to cure her hunger often enough for my mother to pick up on the pattern.

"Can you invite her back for dinner?" She calls to me.

"Okay." Seems like Mom is fond of her, despite their first meeting being a wreck.

Thinking back to that first dinner she spent here I physically cringe. My only comfort is that Kusuke didn't try anything sneaky, I wouldn't put it past him to.

Before she leaves the area I remember to ask, "Can you get more grapes?"

"I didn't know you liked those! Okay" She calls back.

I don't like grapes. Well, let me rephrase, I don't care for grapes. I wouldn't go out of my way to eat them unless I was starving.

I grab some other assorted produce for her and close it up in a baggie before heading over. She's in her yard gardening, that's usually how she spends her weekends nowadays. If I remember right she has a part time job as a gardener, which inspired her to start one of her own. I don't see why you'd want to come home from work just to do exactly what you'd to at work, but I'm glad she started this hobby. It's been getting her outside more, which she desperately needed. She used to spend all her time cooped up inside, it couldn't have been good on her already struggling mental health.

Looking at her It's obvious she's been working outside for a while, she's sweaty and covered in dirt. I spot her speaker, which is playing music by an artist she likes called TV Girl. I don't particularly care for them, but I've noticed how excited she gets whenever they're mentioned so I've been trying to learn more. Inspecting her further I notice she's gained a little bit of muscle mass, which suits her well.

"Hey L/N." I call to her, pulling her attention out of her garden and towards me

"Hi Saiki, what's up?" she eyes me up and down and spots the snacks I'm holding "Ohhh thank you so much!"

She gets up and turns off her music "Come on in, I'm going to take a quick shower so I don't stink but after that we can play some games if you want." She smiles at me and opens the door "Ladies first."  I stand there for a second, waiting for the lady to go first before she interrupts me "You're the lady."

"Liar." I say, causing her to stick her tongue out at me as I walk in.

Immediately she goes into the bathroom and gets in the shower, which might prove to be a problem since she didn't grab any clothes to change into. I'd help her, but I think it would be weirder if I looked through her clothes to get her an outfit than it would be to let her realize on her own.

Sitting on her couch, I examine her game collection to see if there's anything multiplayer. No luck. It doesn't matter though, because after a bit I hear the water turn off. Listening to her thoughts, she just now realized she doesn't have fresh clothes.

She walks out of the bathroom in a towel and scurries to her room. Her towel looked really old, would it be weird to get her cleaner towels? Probably, yeah.

After about two minutes she comes back out in some pajama shorts and a strawberry shortcake shirt with her hair pushed to the side of her face.

We end up playing games for a few hours and I extend my mothers invitation to her, which she accepts. She really likes my mom's cooking, apparently. 'Maybe I should start bringing leftovers too? It would probably help lower her grocery costs, I know she's been worrying about those..'

I get snapped out of my thoughts when L/N taps me on the shoulder

"Earth to Saiki? Hellooooooooo?"

"Hm?"

"You were staring off into space, I'm ready to go now" she says it like she's teasing me, even though she isn't.

If you think anything worth note happened at dinner then you're wrong. The only thing of note is that my parents kept giving us odd looks. I'm not sure why, because I was wearing my ring. One mental dialogue is enough for me when she's so close. I'll ask them about it later.