A house is only as fun as your house mate

Chapter 4: Keith

Damn I had been through some weird stuff these past three days. After meeting Lance again, I suppose my life just took a turn. For better or worse, that was for future me to figure out. I guess my next priority was to find an actual house to live in though. I had checked out multiple apartments and houses within this country but nothing seemed to take to my liking. I loved Japan and wouldn’t want to go anywhere else but it was proving to be difficult staying here in general. My other issue was that, the money that had been spent on supplies over the last year, had taken my cash stack down a great deal. I had to at the very least get a job if I wanted more money to be able to get a bigger or better house than what I could currently afford.  Getting a job was no problem for me. I could deal with one but the issue was, could they deal with me? And can I actually find somewhere that I like to work in. I would speak to Lance but that would be an issue, no way was I planning on asking him for advice. It just never happened no matter how much of me wanted to talk to him about that kind of stuff. It was as he said all those years ago, I am the lone wolf and forever will be. It still surprised me how much I haven’t changed since back then. I had desperately tried to change myself and my personality so that I wasn’t the same person as I was back then. How I had failed. I wanted my hair back, my clothing choices were slowly coming back to me as the more days I spent with Lance pulled me back. The more I hungered for that feeling of comfort in being myself. The past years have been a case of me trying to rid myself of everything that was me.
“Are you okay?” a voice asked. I glanced over from the corners of my eyes and saw Lance, his eyebrows furrowed. “you were spacing out then.”
“I need a job.” I admitted. I didn’t think I could or would be able to let him know that that was on my mind. He simply raised an eyebrow and smirked. “oh?” he continued. I rolled my eyes. Of course he would act stupid at a time like this. He could never take something seriously. “oh I’m sorry that I want to become an actual civilian who can look after themselves.” I cried. His face no longer looked mocking but instead looked perplexed. “Okay, okay, I apologise for being so judgy. Where do you have in mind?” he raised his fingers from the steering wheel giving me the indication that he was defeated, yet kept driving. “i don’t know. I have never had a job before so I don’t know where to start.” Lance laughed then.
“Keithy, keithy, you have a lot to learn my boy.” He started. I could tell this was going to be a long drive home, though we were probably about a minute away from arriving there. “you see, jobs aren’t all that hard. Typically people start off in cafes or stores where they can do part time or even just a nice easy job to get you into the swing of things. You could even work in a pub or restaurant. After all, you are over eighteen so that broadens your horizons within that environment.” I hummed in response, which did not seem to satisfy the friend next me. “aw, c’mon buddy! Give me some slack here, I have never had to deal with a kid before.” A little scowl appeared on my face where it probably shouldn’t have. “i was kidding.” Lance defended, raising his fingers again. “honestly, you could do anything if you really wanted to, you have the smarts to be able to get into a good job. If you could keep your cool easier, I think everyone would be begging to have you.” he explained before smiling at me, yet it looked sad somehow. ‘everyone would be begging to have you’ he had said. The far too familiar pang in my chest came back again. What was it? “what do you do then?” I asked. Lance sighed.
“i teach.” He stated.
“Wait, damn, that’s so cool. How the hell did you become a teacher?” we had pulled up outside of the house now, allowing me to lean over the seat so my face was closer to him. Taken aback, he unplugged his belt and leant back in his seat to avoid my face. “I uh, I guess I just did.”
“Lance, you can’t even write in Japanese. How?” now he smirked this time and raised his chin up to look even more smug than what he originally looked like. “i teach English to younger years in secondary school so when I write and everything, I don’t have to do it in Japanese since they have to get used to the English. I just have to speak occasionally in Japanese that’s all.” My mind was officially blown, I couldn’t believe it. Lance McClain, a teacher? It felt weird to know that fact. He had always been dead good with people though so it made sense for him to be a teacher. “so, where do you teach, I may have driven past it on my way to the hotel?” I asked, genuinely curious.
“Iwatobi high. It’s a fairly big secondary school but it is lovely. I love working there. There are a couple of English speaking teachers there too so it helps that I can communicate with them in my native tongue.” He smiled and seemed to daze off in the thought of the school. “Clavis Irvine is cool. You know what, I bet you would like him.” He continued with a wink my way. I punched his arm in response. “i think I will pass.” I breathed.
“really, all the women and girls are after him?”
“so why aren’t you trying to pursue him?” I teased. He sighed himself.
“Okay, you got me there mullet. I guess he just isn’t my type, he is too pretty for my liking.” Hearing Lance talk about another man in such a dream like way, made me feel slightly jealous. Again, this was just like what happened back then. I was the lovesick idiot pining after a guy who liked someone else. How could that happen again? I was curious and couldn’t resist the temptation of asking. “got your eyes set on someone then?” Lance blushed an amazing shade of crimson at the question.
“w..what?! No, course not, I uh, no, maybe, I don’t know.” He buried his face in his hands before looking back up at me again. “keith?” he asked in his tone that showed the excruciating feeling of distress. “what if I were to tell you that the person I think about was sat right in front of me.” It was my turn to light up in flames. God he was talking about me. “i uh, I guess, I don’t, damn, why won’t my words come out?” I looked up at him hoping for something else to come out of the cute face of his. He chuckled nervously. “ha, uh, it doesn’t matter, let’s just get the shopping inside before the frozen stuff melts entirely.” He didn’t look at me in the eye and dashed out of the car before even checking for traffic. A car drove past, narrowly missing Lance by inches. “lance!” I cried and got out of the car as quick as I could. I wrapped my arms around his waist and held him against me. “i don’t care how mad at me you get but please, don’t lose all rational thought and die because you weren’t thinking.” He melted into my embrace as I sunk my nose into his shoulder. “please.” The last word came out of my mouth muffled but he still heard. “i wasn’t mad at you, just confused and that blocked out the part of brain that makes decisions I guess.” He tapped my arm gently to indicate that I could let go. We stood on the pavement together and he spun around in front of me before declaring, “see, I’m still alive.” He wrapped me in a hug one more time and placed a hand on top of my head to hold it even closer to his chest. “I promise, no matter what, I won’t leave you again.” He whispered. There was something in what he said that made me feel dead happy. He would never leave me. I glanced up and met his gorgeous tan skin and beautiful blue eyes. He looked into my purple ones and we leant closer to the point I could feel his breath on my lips. Feeling anxious of what was going to happen, I jumped away from the Cuban mam, thoughts of what could have happened swimming in my head. I looked back at Lance to confirm that I hadn’t hurt him but he stood there still looking at the spot where I had stood. He scratched the back of his head and smiled. “my bad.” He sighed to me and then came to help out with what I was doing. He grabbed the heavier bag and I, the lighter ones. This wasn’t purposeful, at least I hope he didn’t get the heavy bags on purpose. If he did, that would mean he thought I was weak. I shook it off and just assumed that he just didn’t realise that he had taken them. The door was open in no time, allowing us to walk through quickly and throw all of these onto the table.