ғᴇᴇʟ ʙᴇᴛᴛᴇʀ {ʙᴇɴ ᴅʀᴏᴡɴᴇᴅ x ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ} !!DISCONTINUED!!

Chpt.20

 "Were you listening to a single thing I said?"

"Not a word."

Silent judgment mixed in with a dash of annoyance noticeably started to rot in the dining room, but the teen was too tired to notice or too tired to care. {Y/N} closed her eyes and took another sip of her battery acid flavored energy drink, the carbonation biting at the inside of her cheek. She couldn't get used to the bitterness of straight black coffee, so a panic attack in a can would have to suffice for the next few hours until the caffeine started to wear off.

And yet, she couldn't decide if her rather active bedtime was due to stress and guilt or if she was just so desperate to control something in her life that {Y/N} was willing to sacrifice sleep achieving that. She could also chop off some of her hair, maybe give herself a different style of bangs. But then again, the commitment of having to wait out a possibly shitty haircut kept her away from the slightly rusted safety scissors. For now, anyway.

"You know, watashi ga anata o araiguma to yonde irukara to itte, anata ga araiguma no yō ni mieru tame ni jama ni naranai yō ni shinakereba naranai to iu imide wa arimasen." Kage adjusted his striped scarf around his neck. She wondered if he ever got hot in all that, or if he even got hot at all.

"No, I don't know..." She mumbled, wishing she could manifest the ability to simply understand everything that came out of that strange man's mouth, not just bits and pieces she picked up from stuff like anime and such.

He scoffed, leaning back in his chair and kicking his feet up, displacing the table toppers and almost knocking over {Y/N}'s drink. "Totemo fukenkōdesu..." He seemed to glare at the black and green can in her hand. "Be careful; that stuff will give you a heart attack, Tanuki-chan."

The teen could only give a small snort, looking down at the almost empty drink. God, if she died by a heart attack after all this time, she'll have one helluva bone to pick with whoever the hell decided to opt-out on all of the cooler ways she'd like to go out. A self-sacrifice kinda thing would be cool; really build her character, yeah? Oh, or maybe like after a huge fight with her love interest, and said lover interest had to live with the fact that their last words to her were like, hella mean? Ooh, or like-

The chair scraping against the polished hardwood floor dragged her out of her thoughts. She shook her head, talking about herself like she was some protagonist in one of those awful fanfics she read when she was still in middle school was helping no one.

"I'll see you later, Tanuki-chan." He called out as he left the dining room. {Y/N} sighed, wondering how long it'd take him to drop the dumb nickname. She was about to stand up and take her leave as well when she quickly realized she'd have to wait a bit longer.

"Jesus Christ, why is it always you?" Every time she saw that iconic white mask, she felt her soul wither away a little more. She would prefer anyone else over this guy. She honestly couldn't place why she didn't like him all that much. Maybe she'd just spent a little bit too much time with him, or there was a deeper reason she didn't want to touch on. Either way, the feeling seemed to be mutual.

"Good, you're ready." He ignored her annoyed remark. "C'mon, we're going on a patrol." Masky tossed her mask over the dining room. She was undoubtedly bothered that he'd gone into her room without permission, even more so upon remembering she'd left it in a less than a great state.

{Y/N} sat there a bit dumbfounded at what he meant by 'a patrol', but as he stood wordlessly in the doorway, she could tell he was planning on letting the experience explain for itself. She reluctantly stood up, taking a final slurp of her drink before tossing it and following behind Masky.