Freshmen weren't generally known to lease apartments, but Ray was a special case. A transfer student, in fact, from a university near his hometown. It seemed like the logical solution at the time—close to home so he could commute with the major he wanted to pursue—but that changed rapidly over the course of the first semester.
His first semester in uni wasn't fun—at all, really—which meant that transferring was yet another hassle on his plate of credits to manage.
To top it off, he was moving.
On his own.
For the first time.
It wasn't like he planned it to happen like this, not really, anyway. His first semester at uni was trouble enough for his aunt, so he may or may not have intentionally signed a lease that put the move-in date conveniently over one of Aunt Natalia's business trips.
"You sure you've got everything?" she said, peering skeptically through the windows of Ray's car. He stepped in front of it with a sheepish smile, holding his arms out. The last thing he needed was Aunt Natalia realizing that he didn't pack the twelve hundred sweaters she bought him over every holiday.
"Yup! Got everything," he promised.
She perched her hands on her hips and pursed her lips. "And you'll call me the second you get to San Francisco?"
"Maybe not the exact second—I'll be driving when I get there and all that..."
"Then the second—the very second!—you get to the apartment?" she said, and Ray hummed his ascent. The deal was sealed with a kiss on the forehead before Ray was released to the world as one spritely, independent adult amidst the chaos of California.
Ray galloped to the driver's door and swung inside with one last wave to Aunt Natalia. She waved back, a nervous smile on her face as she watched him pull away from the airport drive-in. She hiked up the handle on her suitcase and gave one last wave to him. He smiled, his throat tight with emotion as he watched her in his rearview mirror standing on the edge of the curb.
The closest thing he had to a mother was Natalia. That much was certain.
"It's okay. You can do this," he told himself, both hands clenched tightly on the steering wheel despite how his hands and arms shook. "You. Are. An. Adult! Time to do adult things! Be eighteen and prosper."
It was difficult to prosper, though, when he was a freshmen outside of the dorms. Dorm life was where everything happened, and he really did want a dorm room for once with a roommate. But after the shitshow that was his first semester... a studio apartment was a good option.
A safe option.
So perhaps it was better that the dorms were full for that semester. The office could call tomorrow, or next week, or next month with an opening and Ray could cancel his lease and swoop right in. He was a people person, dammit, and even if he wanted this one-person apartment to work, he couldn't deny how much he wanted to mingle. Just thinking about it had him vibrating with anticipation, dancing in the driver's seat as he sat in standstill traffic just outside of San Francisco, three hours away from Aunt Natalia.
"And this'll be great," he told himself, firmly, with conviction. "It's not every day a single apartment crops up in San Fran for only fifteen hundred a month! Definitely doable." Sure, it was pricey, but it was nothing when he saw the gorgeous pictures and the virtual walkthrough tour with the realtor. It was a dream come true. Downtown San Francisco, a freshmen in college! For only fifteen hundred a month! He never heard of anything so perfect in his entire life!
It would just make him more desirable, he was sure of it. He'd host all of the parties. Everyone would want to hang out with him. As he waited in traffic, he played the part of cool, calm, collected sophomore boys asking him, "Where should we hang out?" to which he'd reply with a sultry tone, "Your place or mine," and they'd say, "Yours, baby. I'm all yours."
Ray squealed with excitement, drumming his hands on the wheel at a red light. Yes, this would be a semester to remember.
In downtown San Francisco, Ray routed his GPS to the nearest coffee shop from his future apartment. "Oh, excuse me, my current apartment," Ray corrected himself in a haughty tone, fanning his cheeks as he did so. The coffee shop workers would definitely get to know him around here, that much was certain.
Ray twirled out of the driver's side and locked the door behind him—his entire life was in there, anyway. Humming to himself, he looked both ways before bounding across the street and hopping the curb, a skip in his light footsteps.
It wasn't that he needed coffee, by any means, but having something to keep himself occupied was a must. Besides, there was nothing wrong with a little extra energy when it came to unboxing and moving everything in. So he approached the cash register with his sights on a matcha latte, certainly not expecting to turn around and come face-to-face with heaven itself.
Ray startled as he turned towards the end of the counter. There, next in line in that narrow, quaint coffee shop, was the single most beautiful specimen Ray ever did see. There were plenty of beautiful specimens, definitely, and Ray had met quite a handful of them and made a right gay mess of himself, definitely, but this beauty...
"Oh, sorry," Ray said, startled dumb.
"It's whatever," the guy said, and stepped towards the cash register. Ray moved out of the way, awkwardly, still staring at the guy's profile. They met eyes one last time, just long enough for Ray to confirm that yes, they were in fact as dark as his inky-black hair.
Heat flushed to Ray's cheeks as he turned away, clearing his throat. He went down to the end of the counter, passing customers as he went, and peered back at the guy as he was telling the barista, "Just a mocha with a shot, please."
Ray wondered why he was always attracted to Asians. Was that racist of him? Or did it just mean he had a type? Ray put a finger to his chin, suddenly perplexed and morally mortified. Maybe he was racist... This required more internal communication—reflection, if you will. Right. He needed to be more self-aware. He'd do better next time, whatever that meant.
But then he was standing directly next to the guy with the fluffy black hair and dark eyes behind a pair of wireframe glasses, and by God, he was still sweating. Ray plucked at the front of his t-shirt to cool himself down, but that just called attention to himself.
Those dark eyes slid to his direction.
"Sorry," Ray said, barely above a squeak. He dropped his hands to his side.
"By all means, continue," the guy said, and Ray snorted a little. "What?"
Ray giggled again, blushing. "Nothing. It's just—You're really funny."
The guy rose an eyebrow and turned away with a hesitant, "Uh... Thanks?"
"And cute," Ray added, just to spice up his self-loathing.
The guy didn't respond. Instead, they both turned in different directions and Ray put a hand to his hair, eyes wide with horror. WHAT HAVE I DONE?! he screamed internally, but screaming internally wouldn't do the situation any good. It was too late. Far too late.
Ray's name was called.
He lurched forward, and the panic inside of him squeezed out, "Present!" from his worthless mouth like he was in class responding to roll call. The instant he said it, reaching for the tea, he closed his eyes and willed himself to die.
He grabbed the tea and booked it out of there faster than he'd ever booked in his entire life. Running across the sidewalk, he took the first break in traffic to leap to his car, self-deprecating horror leeching through every fiber of his small, gay body. After slamming the tea into the cup holder, slamming the door, Ray slammed his forehead onto the wheel and groaned.
"Great start, Ray, great start," he sighed, straightening up. He took a deep breath, reached for the tea, and drowned his sorrows away with the sweet, sweet taste of overly-processed matcha. It hit the spot that needed to be filled and buried alive.
The apartment was just down the road by two blocks and a posted at the corner of the street. The Design District was populated by low-rise warehouse buildings and, unlike those, the apartment complex Ray would be living in was one of few multistoried brick buildings, all of which seemed to populate that same street corner. There was a row of polished, modern apartment buildings just before it, and Ray marveled at them all—from the grungy warehouses to the arched windows, the blocky apartments, the minimalist architecture.
So this is my neighborhood, he thought, pulling up in front of the brick apartment building with elegant, white-framed windows.
He stepped out of the car, tea in hand, and locked the door behind him. His car wasn't exactly new, and without a fob, the key worked just fine. He gave the hood of his car a light, affectionate pat as he wandered to the main door.
Inside, he found the office closed and a note posted on the door. He squinted at it.
"'Out for lunch... be back at twelve.'" He checked his watch. It was half past one in the afternoon. He checked his email and, sure enough, there was a message left indicating a lock box code where he could get the apartment key.
He added it to his keychain, a smile on his lips. He held it up to the light as he emerged from the building, triumphant and in possession of The Key, the item that gave him access to a new, fantastic life. He gave it a kiss, did a little dance, and popped the trunk open on his car. Now, it was time to move in.
He spent an hour pulling boxes up from his car and testing the results of his work out regimen as he did so. The apartment was sweet, quaint, but large for a single San Francisco apartment. The living area was wide and spacious and blended smoothly into the kitchen. From the foyer, there was a small hallway where a bathroom sat. There, he closed the door, sat a floor length mirror to the side, and stuck a Command hook to the back of the door. He held it still, counting down from thirty until the adhesive stuck.
He was counting down to twenty when he heard the front door open.
Oh, wait, I'm only at twenty-one! he cried internally, but he could see the shadow of footsteps beneath the bathroom door, padding into his apartment, down the hall, and to the living space. He counted relentlessly, his finger pressing so hard into the Command hook that that it shook.
At thirty, he released the hook and swung the door open—careful not to shatter the mirror where it sat, waiting against the wall.
The sound of the door bursting open startled his guest, and startled Ray as well. Not because he was scared, necessarily, but because he was surprised to see a familiar-looking head of black hair around.
And then the intruder whirled around.
Ray yelped when his eyes met those of the beautiful coffee shop guy.
He pointed a finger at the guy and cried, "You—!"
The guy pointed a hesitant finger to himself and said, "Why... Why are you in my apartment?"
Ray jolted, thrusting his hands to his sides. "This—! This is my apartment! And what are you doing in it?"
The guy held up his key, pointed to it, and said, "I literally walked in. I have a key."
A key? How could there be two! The more Ray thought about it, the more his brain wanted to implode. But before it could overheat, he came to a solid, logical conclusion that had to be the answer.
Ray raised his fist, slapped it onto his outstretched palm, and declared, "You must be from the main office! Only maintenance would have a spare key."
The guy's (beautiful, stunning, distracting) dark eyes narrowed into a dull, flat facade. "Seriously, what the fuck are you doing in my apartment."
Ray's eye twitched. "Well, that rules out the maintenance theory..." he hummed, tapping his key to his chin. He pointed to the front door and said, "Prove that your key works. I might have just left it unlocked, you know!"
Ray led the way to the hallway, and the black-haired guy followed suit. As they marched, Ray said, "I've already moved in all of my boxes so if it comes down to it, I've basically already staked my claim—"
The door behind him shut. He turned just as it locked, and the guy was no where in sight. Ray blinked, rubbed his eyes, and looked either way down the hall. Not a soul in sight.
He squinted at the peep hole on the door, knowing that the coffee shop guy was looking at him through it, muttering to himself, "What a weirdo," before turning and leaving.
The black-haired beauty from the coffee shop could be named as such, but it was quite the mouthful. It made more sense to call him Sora Ikeda, or rather, just Sora because his family was dead to him. The last thing Sora wanted to deal with was people that day, but there he was, in an apartment filled with boxes that didn't belong to him, and a weirdo from the coffee shop banging on the door.
Sounds like they don't have a key after all, Sora thought, hands on his hips. The living space was bland, open, and empty all except for the boxes that person brought in.
And then, Ray remembered to use his key.
The instant Ray burst in, triumphant, Sora cursed and immediately thought to himself, This must be what hell is like.
Unlike Ray, who was here simply because the dorms had no vacancy, Sora was still within commuting distance from his family's house. San Francisco, however, was a vast, colorful city—plenty of neighborhoods to disappear into, if he was lucky. The last thing Sora wanted was for this situation to force him back to his parent's house.
Fat chance, he thought, clenching his fists at his sides.
And, unlike Ray, Sora's family was another matter entirely. He'd rather not get into it, or even drag it into his desperation then and there when the idiot stranger from the coffee shop burst in, key in hand, declaring, "Aha! My key works!"
Sora seethed internally. This was the one and only shot he had at a regular, normal living situation—he didn't want to share any consequences with a roommate. It was a single apartment, dammit! And it was his and his alone.
He stormed to the door, the speed at which he did so startling a squeak out of Ray. On the way to the door, Sora grabbed the kid by the wrist and hauled them out into the corridor and down the stairs. The guy yelped and cried, "Where are we going?! Let go of me!"
"I'm talking to the building managers," Sora said.
However, the instant they reached the first floor of the building, they were faced once again with the locked office doors and the pitch-black room where a secretary was supposed to be. Sora squinted through the windows, skeptical, and tried the handle with a forceful tug. It did nothing.
He pulled out his phone with an annoyed huff. "For fuck's sake..." he groaned, pulling up the contact details of the rental agent he emailed his lease to.
As he waited for his call to be put through, Ray picked at his keyring and worried his lip between his teeth. The call never went through, though.
"Do you have a copy of your lease?" Sora asked, and Ray scrambled for his phone.
They went back up to the apartment as they assembled their materials. Sitting on the empty kitchen floor, Ray handed his phone over to Sora, and Sora did the same, so they could read through the lease agreements they had both received. Sora had read it front to back several times before signing and had even gotten a second pair of eyes on it. He knew it like the back of his hand.
When he reached the signature at the bottom, he squinted at it and said, "'Ray'? Your name's Ray?"
"Oh! I never introduced myself," Ray exclaimed. He put out a hand and said, "Nice to meet you, despite the... weird circumstances. My name's Ray de Lucía."
Sora squinted even further at Ray's hand before taking it and giving it a firm shake. "Sora. And it looks like our leases are the same. Same timeframe, same address, unit number... This is bullshit. I think their main offices are closer to downtown."
"We don't have to do that right now," Ray insisted, waving his hands, but Sora was already taking his phone back to look up the address.
Sora got up, and Ray remained frozen in his place until Sora backtracked and said, "You coming or what? This involves you, too."
"O-Oh! Right, sorry!" Ray yelped, leaping to his feet.
It was all for naught, however, because the moment Ray parked his car in front of the office in question, Sora looked out with a sigh and left the passenger door open as he went to investigate the locked front door and the dark, empty windows. Ray leant against his steering wheel and wondered how it was possible for him to be in this situation. Just half an hour ago he was hanging a mirror on the back of the bathroom door and now?
Now he was on a wild goose chase with the hot guy from the café.
"This could either be good or bad luck..." he sighed, pressing his cheek to his forearms as he watched Sora pace the sidewalk, phone to his ear, a furious expression on his face like he was two seconds away from kicking Ray's precious car into the Bay.
"This is hopeless," Sora huffed, dropping back into the car. He slammed the door and Ray immediately winced.
"Careful—my car is fragile," Ray said, only to receive a withering glare in reply. Ray turned away with a mumbled, "Sorry."
Sora slapped the hardcopy of his lease onto the dashboard and put his hands over his face. Ray refrained from apologizing again—clearly, apologizing didn't improve the situation. Ray looked away, biting his lip. He didn't know what to say in situations like this, but now it made him wonder if he was even ready to be an adult. Was being an adult a scam, just like their leases? No, it was all just a misunderstanding.
Then... Was being an adult just a slew of misunderstandings?
Ray put a hand to his tense, throbbing forehead. His head hurt.
When Sora spoke again, it was from out of left field and startled Ray all over again. "Okay. Next place—take a right at the next stop sign."
Ray was too terrified of making the wrong move, so he complied with Sora's directions. They wound up on a side of San Francisco Ray had never been to, and unfortunately, he had been too scatter-brained to pay any attention. By the time he realized this, they were far from the apartment and Ray began to process the fact that he was in a car, alone, with a complete stranger.
Ray's eyes widened, horrified, after parking the car. Sora unlocked the passenger door and moved to step out, only to stop when Ray asked, "You aren't... gonna murder me, are you?"
"The fuck?" Sora said with a scoff. "Get out of the car, you idiot. I'm gonna need your lease here too."
_____
A tall man in black leather and combat boots pulled a cigarette from between his lips and blew the smoke to the wind. It distinctly felt like they were engaging in a drug deal up at the highest peak of San Francisco, overlooking the city from a measly little park occupied only by tourists.
Ray crossed his arms against the breeze, his phone in the hands of this stranger Sora dubbed Ambrose Elton.
Ambrose read through Ray's lease before handing his phone back. He stuck the cigarette back to the corner of his mouth as he went on to examine the hardcopy Sora retrieved from the movie truck rental he was using.
Ambrose flipped page after page before sighing and handing it back. He leant his hip against the railing. The man clearly had no fear of death because that had to be a surefire way to die if the railing didn't hold out. Ray's heart skipped.
"Sounds to me like you two were scammed. Not the fault of either of you, but I imagine you've both already made your security deposits and first month's rent. No way in hell you're getting them back now."
"What?" Ray cried, horrified. That was already $1,800 down the drain he wouldn't get back!
"You've got to be shitting me," Sora groaned, hands over his face. He took the lease back and slapped it to his side, furious. "Who gets to live there?"
Ambrose put a hand in his pocket and shrugged. "Whoever can scrape up the three grand for rent this month gets the apartment."
"Three thousand?!" Ray and Sora cried, horrified. All of the blood in Ray's body drained from his system and sent him staggering, woozy. He put his hands to his head and moaned, "It said rent was only fifteen hundred..."
"Yeah, well, ya aren't getting a single bedroom apartment in the Design District for under three thousand. Sora—you showed me pictures of it, right?"
It took a second for Sora to reply. Ray glanced at him and found Sora staring into space as he cleared his throat. "R-Right."
"It looked like there were two bedrooms. In any case, it's cheap for a two bedroom apartment, that's for sure. But again, rent's three thousand. If you can manage that, then fuck it. The place is yours."
Ambrose pushed off of the railing and asked if they needed anything else. When Sora shook his head, Ambrose gave a soft wave and dismissed himself with that voice of his that sounded like a nature documentary narrator.
Ray waved after him, saying, "Nice meeting you..." in a dejected tone. His hand slumped to his side.
"Well, that settles it," Sora said. Ray looked up at him. "The place is mine."
Ray's amygdala started on fire and in the split second panic between fight or flight, Ray settled on fight. "What? No way! You can afford paying three thousand for rent a month?"
Sora's eye twitched and he sneered as he said, "No, but I'll figure it out. Don't you have family around here?"
"Uh, yeah, three hours away. A-And it's complicated!" Ray insisted. He didn't have anyone in San Francisco aside from people his aunt worked with. Not exactly the sort of people Ray would go to begging to house him for a semester. "And I have classes starting soon, so I need to live here. The semester starts tomorrow."
Sora rolled his eyes, hands in his pockets. "Well, I'm not living with another person."
"It—It wouldn't be forever!" Ray insisted. Sora eyed him dully, unconvinced, as Ray surged on. "Just until we find a new place! And we'd splint the rent and be paying the fifteen hundred we agreed on."
Sora clenched his fists at his sides. Rationally, he knew Ray knew nothing about him. There was no reason for this idiot stranger to even consider how terrible a decision it was to live with Sora. "You don't know what you're saying," he hissed.
"I'll be a great roommate!" Ray insisted. "Just two guys being dudes! We can play video games and watch sports and whatever else dudes do—"
"That's not the issue," Sora snapped, and Ray immediately shut his mouth.
Sora paced away, and Ray's brain turned frantic for an answer. He couldn't afford to pay three thousand a month! He was already asking so much of his aunt, and this would just be pushing the limit of her generosity. Ray wanted to be his own person, dammit! and the first step to doing that was living on his own. He'd prove to his aunt that he was a young, capable adult. He wouldn't go crying to her over this.
Sora started to turn back. Ray scrambled for something to do, and in an instant, he summoned tears to his eyes and whispered with exaggerated dejection, "I-I can't afford the three thousand..."
Sora hesitated, frozen at the sight of tears bubbling along Ray's lower lashes. He looked away, cursing under his breath. Ray glanced up at him before putting his hands to his cheeks, looking down, "I can't g-go back home..." he moaned, miserably. "I have no one h-here..."
Ray let out a weak, gasping sob. He paused, glancing up at Sora, who was intentionally not looking at Ray, arms crossed over his chest, brow tense and forehead wrinkled with distress. Sora started to look at him, so Ray covered his face, fake sobbing.
"Fuck—Fine, just—just stop crying, alright?" Sora hissed, waving a hand at Ray.
Ray stopped instantly. "Really? You'll be my roommate?"
"Jesus, you really sprung back from the grave there, huh?"
Ray gasped with excitement, wiping tears from his face as he said, "You won't regret this, I promise! I've never had a roommate but I'll try my best!"
Sora was already regretting it, but it was too late. Soon, he was back at the apartment where his rental truck sat on the curb of their hill. Ray's pathetic car beeped when he locked it and turned his keys to the foyer entrance. They propped the door open and started the ascent with Sora's boxes to their flat.
Ray pulled a box from the top of the stack in the back of the truck. Sora's heart nearly gave out at the sight of it, and every horror story imaginable flitted across his mind—the box, ripping open at the seams. The box, tipping backwards and spilling all of its contents onto the pavement. Ray, curious and intrusive enough to open it himself.
Sora snatched it from Ray. "I-I'll take this one. I don't need your help, you know."
"I don't mind, really," Ray said with a ignorant smile and went to take the next box. Sora scowled at him and started towards the door, clutching the box to his chest and wishing this day would just be over already. Maybe he was asleep and this was all just a horrible, dreadful nightmare.
He climbed the steps and unlocked their flat with his own set of keys. Looking at the keys made him sick. With a sigh, he pushed inside and wandered into the open living space as Ray's foot caught the closing door and nudged it open.
"Sorry—I sort of claimed the right room. But I can take the left one, too, if you'd like!" Ray said. Sora could see boxes stacked in the right room through the crack in the door.
"Which, uh... which has a larger closet?" Sora asked.
"I don't know," Ray said, so they went to investigate. Sora kept the box clutched to his chest as the two of them examined the rooms. Sure enough, one did seem to be an office space, as it had no closet to speak of. It just so happened to be the room Ray picked.
Ray scratched absently at his hair and said, "Well, not surprised. I don't have that many clothes, so I didn't think to check."
"Left room for me it is," Sora said.
"You start unpacking! I can take care of the boxes!" Ray said, and before Sora could argue, Ray was already bounding through the living area and disappearing into the foyer. The front door shut shortly after.
Sora wandered into the second bedroom. The closet was spacious, and Sora had to believe this was the one good thing out of all of the bullshit of that day. He shelved the box and, gently, tore the tape from the top. Its contents weren't meant to be folded up like that, so he set to work hanging them in the corner behind the open closet door.
Layers of lace and shiny, sheer fabrics occupied the box, each one more elaborate than the last. Sora flattened them out as he extracted them, and when Ray came back in, oblivious, Sora hid the lingerie behind the door and ordered his makeshift moving guy to leave the boxes just inside the door.
a/n: I promise not all of the chapters are gonna be this long, but I hope ya liked it :) I'll be posting every Sunday and Thursday.
Thoughts on Ray?
Thoughts of Sora?