As Infinity Becomes the Present

【Ｃｈａｐｔｅｒ １】

· · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · ·

Reki's POV:

My alarm blared as a groggily tried to slam the stop button. After I graduated high school, I guess I learned to stop using the snooze button.

My apartment was cold, and it hits my bare arms like waves.

I rubbed my eyes and tried to get rid of the blurriness as I slowly got out of bed. What's the plan for today? Oh yeah, work.

The owner of Dope Sketch retired, and left the store to Oka, so now I'm the manager, which is awesome, but it gets pretty boring.

I did my usual morning routine, showering, brushing my teeth, and putting on my uniform. Now, I don't wear a weird blue jumpsuit, but just the t-shirt and a pair of jeans. I kind of gave up the hoodie look when got the manager job, I just thought it looked better.

Alright, lets get going, Reki.

I rush to the kitchen, it would be pretty crappy if my worker got to my own store before me.

I grab a cold coffee from the fridge and rush out the door.

The air is sweet, and smells of old rain from last night. The sun slightly peeks over the palm tree covered ground of Okinawa.

I jump in my car and speed off to work, already tired.

➶➴➷➹

"Morning, Mio," I greet my worker, as she clumsily runs through the door.

" G' Morning! Sorry I was almost late, I over-slept," she sighed and tries to brush her wavy purple hair down.

"You're good, kid. Would you mind re-stoking the orange gloves? They've been selling out really quick for some reason," I lean on the counter as Mio clips her name tag on.

"Yes sir!" She walks over to the 'open-closed' sign and switches it over to 'open.' "Uhm, wait, do you have the box?"

"Oh, uhm, I think. Let me check," I bend down and look under the counter for the box of gloves.

'Bing-bong' The door opens and a customer enters, meh, I'll let Mio get them.

"How's it going!" She greets them.

I'm still digging through the mess of boxes. I'm sure it's under here.

"Uhm, do you guys have snowboards?" I soft voice says from the door. Ok, this joker I gotta see. I suddenly get flash backs from my old friend. First they are happy memories, like teaching him to skate, and him totally obliterating Adam. Then, the not so pleasant memories. 'I'm leaving for Canada, I'm sorry, I can't stay anymore.' I clear my mind of the thoughts and bounce up to see the guy who walked into a skate shop and asked for a snowboard.

"Uh, this is a ska-" I'm cut off.

Standing in front of the door, a tall, blue haired guy with a hair-less face smiles softly, looking exactly like he did in high school, except taller, and with a more mature face and structure.

"L-Langa?!" I can't help but feel the tightness in my chest.

"Hi," He takes his hands out of his pockets and spreads them out, waiting for a hug.

I lunge forward and give him the biggest hug I could give somebody. He is insanely tall. The top of my head barely reaches his chin.

"Oh my god! What- What are you doing here? Why aren't you in Canada?! How have you been?" I know I'm flooding him with questions, but I can't help it. What would you do if you haven't seen your best friend in 5 years?

"Oh, jeez where do I start?" He looks over to the store. "Wow, it hasn't changed a bit."

"I know, well neither have you," I joke, poking at his slightly- stubbly face. "Growing a bread, Snow?"

He rolls his eyes and I can't help but goofy smiling. I still can't believe he is here.

"Wanna catch up with some coffee?" He points a thumbs out the window.

"Mio, do you think you'll be okay for like 30 minutes?" I feel bad for making her watch after the store alone, especially with the kind of guys that walk in here.

"Yeah, I'll be okay, I know where the pepper spray is," She smiles and gives me a reassuring thumbs up.

"Alright, lets go!" I return to my goofy smile and follow my blue-haired friend out the door.

➶➴➷➹

We walk over to a close coffee shop, get our coffee, and sit down.

"So, why did you come back to Okinawa? It must've taken a while," I sip on my iced coffee.

"Well, I had talked with my mom about it for some time, and I thought about her, and you, and everybody else, and I just decided a visit was long over-due," He blows on his hot coffee and takes a sip. "How is Miya? He is what, 18?"

"Yeah, he is good, he is going to collage next month," God I feel old saying that.

"Holy crap, really? I remember leaving when he just became a first year in high school. How are Joe, Cherry, and Shadow?" he swirls his coffee around in his hands. As the rest of his body, his hands are perfect. His fingers are long and slim, making the way he swirls the coffee make them like 10x hotter. Wait, what. No- Reki don't be weird.

I twirl a piece of my hair between two fingers and try to hid the pink blossoming on my face.

"Oh, uhm. Oh, wait I forgot, you don't know. Well Joe and Cherry got married, and they are actually really happy together. They bicker all the time, but you can tell how in love they are. It's so romantic. Speaking of romance, do you have a partner?"

"Oh, uhm..." I can see the red coming into his face. He may have developed more, but his skin is still very fair, and when he blushes, its painfully prominent of his face and ears. "N-No, I'm not seeing somebody right now."

Uh- I don't understand. Why did he blush so much when I said that? Weird.

"So what do you do now? For work I mean."

"Oh, I'm a Japanese teacher. I work nights for adults that want to learn the language. Don't worry, my handwriting isn't as crappy as it used to be," He gives a little smirk and laughs. "Hey, lets get dinner, the whole group. I wanna catch up with them."

"Oh, yeah, I can text them and set it up," I take out my phone and open a big group chat we have. "Oh, shit. I gotta get back to work. We can do Joe's restaurant around 8?"

"Sounds good," He gets up and hugs me unexpectedly one last time. "Later!"

I walk back to the store quickly. When I open the door, Mio is covered in boxes behind the counter.

"Found the gloves..." She groans.

"Jesus girl," I sigh I pick her up.

· · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · ·

[A/N]

Yippie! First chapter done!

This story may not be long, and I'll probably update like once a week, but whatever.

I hope you guys like the story plot, I need to think of more things to add.

Stay sweet,

-Claire <3