Fate. A predetermined supernatural power. The will of the universe. Fate is order. It writes, and rewrites, gives and takes. It spins vibrant red strings that flow into the world and connect people who are destined to meet, to love, to share a story...
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Heart pounding, I stand outside of Ren's door.
I can't think of a reason for why he would suddenly ask me over like this. Does he need my help with something? It could be that he's hungry, and wants me to cook for him, though that doesn't really seem like something he would go through the trouble to call me here for. Maybe he just wants to spend time with me.
Maybe. But it's too soon for me to get my mind to agree with an idea like that.
I'm unbelievably nervous, and contemplate just turning around and going back home. I could simply message him with an excuse later, for why I couldn't make it. It wouldn't be hard to come up with one, really. After all, I have so many things I need to get done, it's ridiculous that I'm even here.
I step back outside, then pause. I've come all this way, haven't I? If I leave now, I will have whiled away thirty minutes of my day on a pointless walk. But if I get to see Ren...it might be worth it.
I sigh, moving towards the door once more, knowing all too well that there had been no point whatsoever to the internal argument I just had with myself.
If Ren's on the other side of that door, there's no way I could just leave.
I stretch my reluctant fingers towards the calling bell, but before I have a chance to press it, the door is thrown open in my face. "Yo, you came," Ren grins, standing before me in a baggy shirt and sweats, his hand fisted around the knob. My body feels warm at the sight of him, and I reach to undo the top button of my collared-shirt. "Hi. How did you-"
"I saw you come in." I follow his line of sight to the window looking out of his room. "Ah." I suppose leaving had been out of the question this whole time.
"Come on up," he says, motioning for me to enter. "Sorry for intruding," I say politely, while trying dizzyingly hard to shake the image of Ren waiting for me by his window from my head. Sometimes, my brain knows no bounds. Coincidence, I insist to myself. He only happened to glance outside and see me here by chance. He was not waiting for me.
As I follow him across his living room to the stairway, I take a look around his house, letting the sight of the inside of it properly sink in. I had been too preoccupied with taking care of Ren to notice much of anything the last time I was here, but now, when I note the absence of frames on the walls, trinkets on the stands, it strikes me that this place lacks a personality. So clean and minimalistic that it feels more like an office than a home. So this is where Ren lives.
I shift my gaze back to him, and my heart resumes to stir restlessly in my chest. At the time of my previous visit, his head had been too muddled with feverish thoughts for him to pay any attention to me. But now, he keeps glancing back at me every few seconds, as if to ensure I'm still behind him, and it makes the hairs on my neck rise.
There's a faint smile on his face that I'm not sure he's aware of.
