Stormy Summer

A Calm Morning

Waking up the next morning, I was confused.

When I turned my head to the side, looking toward Rose, who seemed to be sleeping, and, slowly, I realized where we were.

I let out a sigh before sitting up and searching for my phone.

It's Monday, at 8 AM.

I opened the message that popped up on my screen and smiled at the Selfie Kuro sent me of him, Bokuto, and two other kids, that I didn't recognize.

One of them, the smaller one of the two, had orange hair, while the other one had black hair, his scowl contrasting the big grin on the smaller one's face.

"Who's that?" Rose asked sleepily as she placed her chin on my shoulder from behind me.

"I don't know," I replied before sending a picture I took of Rose Chalie and Anna when we arrived yesterday as a quick reply to Kuro.

"He looks kinda cute, though," Rose mumbled as she scooted back to her futon, probably intending on going back to sleep, so I quickly moved after her, and placed her pills next to her head, "Take these before going back to sleep," I muttered before getting up and going downstairs.

I figured now that I'm awake, I might as well take a look around. The last time I was here, I was still a kid.

Everything felt so familiar and different at the same time. Everything seemed bigger when I was a kid. But Kuro's parents changed a few things, too, I was quick to realize upon entering the day before.

The furniture was slightly different, too. Naturally, the electric devices were new. The old ones were most likely either broken or a safety hazard for little Kuro to walk around.

I let out a sigh when I opened the backdoor, putting on my shoes before walking outside, grabbing the keys on my way. I haven't been here in ages.

I went past the volleyball net that my grandparents set up for us kids to play, and toward the shed that was placed toward the end of the backyard. In there, everything seemed a little more organized than I remembered, but I was still quick to find what I was looking for. I took a quick look around the shed before pulling out my phone, and snapping a picture of what I found, quickly sending it to Kuro with the caption, 'Look what I found!'

It was an old Volleyball that Kuro, Ken and I signed when we were kids, pretending to be famous. Though, if I remember correctly, Ken was kind of forced to sign his name as well.

Kuro.

Kenma.

Natsu.

"Summer?" I jumped as I was forcefully snapped out of my memories, and started flailing to stop the volleyball from dropping to the ground, before turning around to face Rose.

"Gee... You scared the shit out of me!" I took in deep breaths to calm myself down as Rose walked toward me, further inside the shed, "What are you doing out here?" I fumbled with the ball in my hands, slightly embarrassed that someone would see this.

"'I could ask you the same thing," she huffed as she held out her hands, silently asking me to let her take a closer look at the ball, "What's that?"

"That's..." I trailed off, searching for the right way to put it while I handed the ball to her, "Well, Kuro-chan and I thought it'd be cool to..." Rose turned the ball over and looked at the children's handwriting of our names, before raising her eyebrows at me, and I averted my eyes in embarrassment.

"To pretend to be famous?" I could hear the smile in her voice and cleared my throat before nodding and changing the topic, "Are Anna and Charlie up, yet?"

Rose threw the ball back to me before going outside the shed again, motioning for me to follow her.

Outside the shed, I saw Anna and Charlie sitting on the bench just next to the backdoor, reading.

"Didn't you say there is a lake somewhere near this place?" Rose asked seemingly out of nowhere as she sat down between Charlie and Anna, careful not to sit too close to Charlie.

I nodded, walking closer, leaning against the wall next to Anna, "There's a lake somewhere around here... But I don't actually remember how far it is," I scratched the back of my head, "or where exactly it is, for that matter... We'd have to look it up and use Google Maps or something," I concluded, sliding down to a crouching position, holding the ball in front of my crouching form.

"I think I found it!" Charlie exclaimed after a while of searching on her phone, "it should be in that direction," Charlie pointed somewhere behind the shed, looking uncertain, "I don't know for certain though," she handed her phone to Rose and I leaned in closer to see something as well.

"We probably shouldn't jump in the lake, but it's a good place to take pictures and to just relax," I spoke up as Rose scrolled around, looking at the area of the lake and the way we would need to go to get there.

Rose nodded absently, "What happened to you don't actually remember anything?" she mumbled as she seemingly tried to memorize the way, while also figuring out which way we would need to go, to begin with.

"I said I don't remember the way there. I do remember that, as a kid, I had a lot of fun there," I defended myself, "and that it was always somewhat quiet there."

Of course, that might have changed during the time I haven't been there, but I still have the memory of how it used to be.

"Alright," Rose handed the phone back to Charlie after she figured out how to save that route for later, "Let's have breakfast, first," she was met with all of our approval.