Mix-Up Manor

[Verity Lohlepher]

Verity was standing in the kitchen eating her breakfast. She didn't know whether to be joyous or depressed. Today was the day she was going to look for another place to stay. The landlady of her current apartment had decided to stop leasing it due to unknown reasons and so if she didn't find another housing option, she'd find herself sleeping out on the streets. She knew there was Fairy Hills which was the Fairy Tail dormitory for the girls but for an option, it was quite low in ranking. That was simply because she felt she had more freedom if she didn't stay there. However, if she couldn't find a suitable home, she guessed she would just go there. It wasn't as if it was such a terrible thing for her to do.

After the girl had finished, she exited out of the room and entered the street she lived on. She was currently wearing what she had ran in earlier that morning, just a standard white t-shirt and a pair of shorts, and didn't care whether the real estate agents would judge her. She shoved a hand into her pocket and fished around for a bit before pulling out a piece of white paper. Her landlady, while rude, had kindly written the addresses of the houses that were open that day which was done, she assumed so that she could shove her out of the house quicker. She then gave her instructions to knock before opening the door which shouldn't be locked so that she wouldn't give anyone in there a fright.

Vera saw that there were three addresses on the piece of paper along with the words 'those are the only three I think you'll like'. She highly doubted that was true but decided they would be a good starting point. The first one she went into she crossed off her viable options immediately. While the agent inside had said don't judge the book by its cover, she begged to differ. If she was going to buy or rent a place to stay, she was going to have to like it's appearance. The second one was strange but to her liking. Unfortunately it was way too expensive too. The only one left was the third address.

The sun was already high in the sky by the time she arrived to the just as weird as the second, third option. She was feeling a little peckish but decided she'd just have a quick look around before getting her lunch and deciding what to do next. She double checked that the address was in fact, the right address and seeing that it was, she went to door, which was pretty high up, knocked and tried opening it. That was strange. She peered in between the crack and saw the lock was undone. She tried again but it didn't budge. It appeared the door was jammed.

Giving a quick scan on the general area and seeing no one, she decided that her options were either to knock the door down or leave. The latter option she didn't want and so that left the former. To knock down the door she could either kick it or...well kicking was her only real option. She didn't think she would be strong enough to actually break the door so without another second to waste, she aimed a kick at the door. If it had been aimed at the middle of the door, it probably would have been sufficient enough to swing it open. As it was, she was just aiming at the door in general and so when her foot, protected by a sport shoe, collided with the doorknob, the crunch of gears breaking was heard. Whoops. She hoped she didn't have to pay for that.

She decided that the best thing she could do was just go inside and pretend she didn't know about the broken lock. It should be easy enough to do seeing as her acting skills were great enough for her to land a role that she didn't have to audition for in a play. So she opened the now broken door and looked inside. First thing she noticed was that it seemed to be occupied and not in the show room kind of style. It just was occupied. Maybe the person hadn't moved their stuff out yet. She didn't the landlady would give her the wrong address. The next thing she noticed was the gigantic tree growing through what seemed to be the middle of the house. That was curious. She decided she should investigate the tree more and edged closer to it.

[Tatsuma]

Tatsu rushed back from the bank, in a hurry. He had been away from his apartment for way too long toward the end of the month's lease and he had totally forgotten to make arrangements to have someone else pay for the apartment. It wasn't as though anyone in Fairy Tail actually knew where the place was and he was fine with that. Still he had to get it paid or he wouldn't know where he was living either and it was already ten days late so he was pretty sure there was an eviction notice being written as he ran.
It was difficult to take care of the place when he was gone all the time anyway, and he was going to have to do something about that first and foremost.

He quickly burst into the landlady's office and threw the jewel on the table.
"I have all the money, i know it's late, but I've been out of town!" He said quickly and with his heart higher than he imagined it would if he were facing down some sort of demon or something.
"Mr. Shinju if you can't make the payments on time you won't be able to keep the apartment. I need to be able to get the money reliably." She said, contemplating whether she wanted to kick him out, even though she had already rented the apartment to another Fairy Tail mage.
"I know it won't happen again. I always have the money a month ahead of time and I haven't been late before!" He responded.
"Well I'm putting you on probation, if you damage the apartment or break any rules you're out, but you can stay, just don't let it happen again." She said coolly, completely having forgotten that she had rented it out just a bit earlier.

Satisfies and exhausted, Tatsuma headed up to his apartment, hoping the stuffed wolf he had bought when he met Fayte was still inside. It wasn't like he couldn't have replaced it, but he had grown attached to that one particular fixture and had only the vaguest of thoughts about the fact that she was a dark guild member... at least until he saw that the door was open and there was evidence that entry had been forced.
"I don't know who sent you, but if you're here for me you're gonna end up paying for the do-" He stopped speaking once he saw who was in his apartment. Of all the people in Fairy Tail to find his apartment this was probably the last person he wanted to see breaking into his place... Unless she was here for another kiss, or at least to tell him her name.
"..Door to this apartment... of a friend of mine... hi.. you... what the hell is your name even anyway?"

[Verity Lohlepher]

Verity had been about to climb the tree but a person coming from the door alerted her attention. She turned around, about to explain the confusion when she stopped. Her mouth dropped open. What was he doing here? Obviously Tatsuma was just as surprised as she was to see him because his sentence trailed off into asking what her name was. For a moment she just stood there, too confused to comprehend what was going on. Suddenly, memories came rushing back to her and all that was left was a very strong urge to punch him. She decided not to restrain herself.

She unfroze and stomped up to him, sending him a fairly decent death glare at the same time. "Does it matter what my name is?" she growled, stopping just a few centimetres in front of him before aiming a right uppercut punch to his face. She didn't bother whether it landed or not and leaned her face closer to his. "It's not right to kiss people randomly," she hissed before drawing back and stalking back to the tree, fuming. However, once she reached the tree and sat back down, she found her anger left her and she was back to admiring it. "This is a pretty cool tree, isn't it?" she said absentmindedly before turning around to face Tatsuma again. "And my name's Vera, or Verity, I don't mind either," she added, looking back up at the tree before the thought struck her that she wasn't here for studying trees, even if they grew out of apartment floors.

She sighed and got to her feet, casting a look around the apartment before settling her gaze on Tatsuma. She realised that it was kind of strange that he was here. "Hey, what are you doing here?" she asked, her voice sounding friendly for once. She then figured out a plausible reason. "You don't happen to be the former owner right?" It would make sense if he was. "If you're here to move out your things, I can go," she offered. She assumed that was why he was here otherwise her landlady wouldn't have put the apartment address on the white paper she had given her. She looked expectantly at him, waiting for a yes. Vera was assuming that her landlady had simply given her a list of addresses to check out. She didn't realise she had also decided to switch her payments of rent to another apartment of the same price temporarily while she was deciding which apartment to move into next so that she could move her out of the current one immediately.

[Tatsuma]

Tatsuma saw the look in her eye, and thought about the possible implications of her hitting him. Still, he didn't bother to dodge, he only tucked his chin down to minimize damage as she hit him and rubbed his jaw. Her question annoyed him more than the actual hit, and he wanted to say something about her hitting like a little kid, but her demeanor changed to a point that made him think that it would be counter productive. Still, he figured he should break the news about what had actually happened so he could tell her that SHE would be the one leaving.
"No, see what happened was I've been away from town for a little while and unfortunately I had been gone ten days past the due date for my rent payment. Now that I'm back I've already worked things out with the landlady so I'm not actually going anywhere and this apartment isn't up for rent. Sorry about the confusion!" He said, bowing with the apology, a habit he had learned in Hosenka Town. Still, since she was a Fairy Tail guildy, he didn't want to kick her out, even if she had broken his door down. Still he viewed it as a security flaw and she had pointed that pretty obvious fact out with her actions.

"Though you're welcome to stay the night if you want, I'd hate to kick you out on the street. He said, resisting the urge to use her name just to help him memorize it better. Nevertheless he figured that he would probably manage to get it in case he ever had to see her again.
"All of that is of course unless you want to keep punching me.." He added.

[Verity Lohlepher]

Verity listened to Tatsuma explain that he had been late on his rent payment which caused it to go back to being free for lease but that he sorted it out with the landlady and so he was still staying in the apartment. She nodded in understanding while he was talking. Her landlady wouldn't have hesitated to put her apartment back on the market if she had been late with payment - especially since she broke rules constantly. When he bowed she couldn't help but giggle slightly. She never met someone who bowed after an apology. "You're funny," she stated before waving off the apology. "And there's no need to apologise. I'm not apologising for your door after all. Though in my defence, it was meant to be open. I'd be more worried about the landlady. 10 days past would be enough to send mine into a rage," she continued.

She looked around the floor to see if she dropped anything. In one ear, she listened to the spiky haired mage invite her stay and shook her head. "Hey, I'm not homeless just yet...I think," She shrugged her shoulders. With her landlady she could never be sure. "I would have thought too for someone who offered another person to stab them, they'd be more obliged to put up with punches." she continued, raising her head back up to poke her tongue out at him. "Anyways, I'm going now. I need to visit to my landlady again before I really do become homeless," she said before walking out of the door.

True to her word, she visited her landlady's office. It wasn't that far from the apartment and so she made it there in under 5 minutes. "Hi! So all the apartme-," she broke off. She had never seen her landlady so flustered. "Ummm...what's going on?" she asked.

Alerted to her presence the woman looked up. "Verity! I need to tell you something!" she said before continuing while scrabbling around for a piece of paper on the floor. "You know that third apartment on the list I gave you? I switched your rent payments to that one because I needed you to move out and it was the closest in price,"

The blonde eyed her. "What do you mean?"

The woman sighed in frustration. "I mean you are currently living in the third apartment on the list. I took the liberty of sending your belongings there."

"Wait...so you sent my stuff to some apartment AND YOU DIDN'T TELL ME?" she demanded

The woman bit her lip. "Well yes, except there's a complication. The young man who previously rented the apartment out came back and I said he could stay there."

"ARE YOU AN IDIOT? YOU'RE BASICALLY COLLECTING DOUBLE RENT PAYMENT ON THE SAME BUILDING!" Verity yelled.

The woman appeared to be a bit taken aback by her reasons for anger but she didn't tolerate being yelled at by her clients. "I would like to remind you Miss Lo-,"

"I DON'T NEED A PEP TALK ON HOW TO TALK TO PEOPLE!" the girl interrupted before storming out and slamming the door behind her. She took a few seconds to calm down before walking stiffly back to the apartment. As much as she didn't want to go back, she needed to collect her stuff.

When she got back to the apartment she gave a loud sigh of frustration. Her things weren't there. Maybe there were inside. She saw the door was shut and kicked it open for the second time that day. This time the weary door broke off its hinges. It didn't help that they weren't there as well. Judging that she needed her belongings to move she could hardly leave again. She also didn't want to go back outside and wait. The only suitable thing she could do would be to wait inside. She didn't care if Tatsuma was doing anything or he wanted privacy. He could suck it up. His fault for being late with rent. And so with that thought in mind she went to the curious tree, the only thing that was reasonably good about the situation, and sat on it.

[Tatsuma]

When Verity came back and kicked open his door for the second time that day, he barely batted an eyelash. He had things to think about, but with this girl kicking in doors he was definitely going to have to find a solution.
"Far be it from me to evaluate why you're angry, but I invited you to stay if you wanted, you could have knocked and I would have opened the damn door. However, if you don't start fixing that within the next... right now, I'm going to find out where you used to live, go kick open the door to that place, and hope to everything holy that you rent so your previous landlady can charge you for it." He said calmly as he curled up on the floor next to his giant wolf plush doll he had once purchased.
"Besides if you hadn't heard about me from the guild, I've kind of a made enemies with several dark guilds so if you don't fix that we have no security... actually come to think of it i'll help you. If someone of your build can just kick it down I obviously need to reinforce it." He said as if he knew exactly how to do that. Truthfully he wasn't exactly handy with tools and he was going to have to trial and error the hell out of the door to get it fixed. He had been a bit lax on jobs lately and didn't want to pay any extra expenses if he could avoid it. Still it might be better to ask someone at the guild to fix it... or Fayte since she already knew where he lived anyway.
"How long were you planning on staying here anyway?" He asked.

[Verity Lohlepher]

Verity could get pretty sarcastic when she was mad. Sarcastic and childish. And she was mad. She slid her back down the tree and laid down on the floor with her knees up. She hadn't been comfortable leaning against the tree doing wall sits, or in this case, she could say tree sits. While the girl wasn't paying attention to Tatsuma, she got from his carefully controlled tone of voice that he wasn't happy. She heard something about doors and him kicking them down. She laughed without a shred of humour. "Ahaha. Good luck with that. I think you'll just kick yourself out of your apartment. I'm homeless. Haven't you heard? And there's no more doors for me to kick since they're all open." she said the first thing that came to mind sarcastically before wondering if there was some god out there she could pray to for shutting up people. If she could shut Tatsuma up until she got  her possessions that would be divine and holy in itself.

Like any other person when they weren't in the mood to listen to others, she drowned out her guildmate's voice with her thoughts of undesire. Possibly unlike other people, her thoughts to replace his voice consisted of blah blah blah, who cares? However, Verity had the gifted and talented ability of still listening and so, while she didn't care, she still heard him. Because her brain was also disconnected to her mouth, she made a running commentary while he was speaking. "Yeah, yeah, you're just soooo infamous inside the guild I'm sure we could shut up everyone's mouth with duct tape and the walls would still be talking about it...oh you really think I'm going to fix your door? And you also think it would stop people from ordering assassinations? If someone wanted to break into someone's house, they'd bring a lock pick. Subtlety is key in breaking in...reinforcing doors is kind of hard. What the hell are you going to use?" All of this was said while he was still talking with breaks in between to listen to him. Of course it wasn't her intention for him to hear. She was in the middle of shaping her hand into a camera focus when Tatsuma asked her how long she was planning on staying. "Forever," she replied sarcastically, focusing the image in her hand to be one of the tree meeting the ceiling.

[Tatsuma]

She seemed like she thought he was playing games. This was serious business, then again, most of the time it was serious business. Still he wasn't about to get abusive with her because that was definitely wrong and he wasn't that type of person. No, he had plans, lots of plans which he was sure would likely drive her mad. His last go around with Kotone had also taught him how to do that, but first, he needed to go through the trouble of dealing with her little behavior problem. If she was going to live there she was going to at least not break his stuff... At least what little he had.
"So you're going to break the door to the place you're planning on staying forever? You know what? I'll be right back." He said, leaving the apartment to head down to the landlady. So Verity was more or less homeless now, but she was going to stay with him. That meant she had filled out a lease form, that meant she most likely had put her last address on there, and that of course meant that he could simply go track it down.

As he neared the land lady's office he stopped, sighing heavily and turning back around to go buy the wood for the door, if she was going to act like a kid he was going to have to act like a parent... or at least a role model. She was still hot even if she was childish after all, and as such he would probably be able to put up with more from her. However wrong that was, it was still true, and he had no problems copping to it. Still, other matters remained and he had more to do than think about this. He needed to clean up and fix the damn door. Which meant he would have to order it, and that of course meant that he would need help affixing it... which meant more people coming to his house. Still he could go ask nicely and it might have better results.

As he walked back into his apartment through the doorless doorway, he looked at Verity and sighed.
"Look, either stay here or don't. If you want to stay I will get you a key, but don't break my stuff. You may be pretty, but that's only going to get you so far with me. Why don't you just try being nice. If you can't do that I may be forced to give you another kiss." He said with a chuckle to indicate he was joking.

[Verity Lohlepher]

While to Tatsuma, Verity seemed to think that he was playing games, the girl knew that he wasn't. If she had thought he was playing games with she would flip. She knew he was being serious. She was a very perceptive young lady whether she knew it or not. She heard the psycho ask her whether she was going to break the door of the apartment she was going to stay in forever. She gave a short bark of laughter and was about to respond when he left the apartment. She bet that if the door was still in tact it might have slammed. As it was she was by herself in the apartment. Funny how he trusted her alone in his apartment when she seemed to have a talent in breaking stuff. After he left, she shifted her back into an upright position. She didn't know why but she was feeling particularly crazy today. Maybe it was just her homelessness getting to her. She leaned back on her hands and crossed her legs. She noticed the still silence in the air. She also noticed she was hungry.

The girl pursed her lips. She wondered if there was anything at all that Tatsuma had in his apartment that she could eat. It was a shame she couldn't store food away in her pocket dimension without it becoming all mouldy and rotten. The blonde wondered for a split second whether the psycho would mind if she left his apartment unmanned. She shrugged her shoulders. He couldn't mind. It was a life and death situation. If she didn't get food, she'd starve thus lead to death. Vera pushed herself up from the floor and was about to exit the doorless apartment when she stopped near the entrance. Just to be safe she requipped a transparent window and placed it so all appeared as normal. If someone walked through a few metres in and didn't notice it, they'd knock their head. It wouldn't fall down because the girl had also decided to requip hooks and locks to keep it in place in the wall.  Some people probably  thought it strange for someone to store a bunch of random stuff but honestly, her dimension was practically empty with just her weapons inside. She viewed it as a waste and thus stored everything and anything that could be of use.

She stood back to admire her handiwork. It wasn't a bad job both in reality and in her opinion. The girl then spun around on her heel and walked out, her missions being, to find food. All this happened while Tatsuma was still out. When she came back she had bought her lunch and because she was so nice, food for him to which was...a big fish and a loaf of bread in a paper bag. At least she made an effort. Her lunch consisted of a sandwich that was in a smaller paper bag. She planned on eating it later.

By the time she reached the apartment, he saw him enter it and look where she had been before. He started talking to her as if she was here and wondered if he had been in the heat for too long and therefore started seeing mirages. She also wondered whether she should tell him about the glass window but decided against it. If he was so smart he'd see it and ask her what the hell she'd been thinking. Or something like that. She folded her arms across her chest and leaned against the doorway silently while he was talking. She sniggered slightly at his words.

After he was done talking she walked up behind him and tapped him twice on the back before more or less tossing the paper bag with the big fish inside for him to catch. "Is nice buying someone a fish as an apology for breaking your door?" she asked before moving to lean against the window. "And you know, you say my prettiness won't get very far with you but if I don't act nice, you also say you'll be forced to give me another kiss. I dunno about you but I think that goes far enough. People generally don't kiss people whose personalities they don't like...unless they think they're hot," she said with innocent eyes, looking up at him since he was taller.

[Tatsuma]

Tatsuma stared at the girl bringing him a fish. He hadn't even been looking to see if she was still there since he was purposely trying not to look at her.
"Why would a fis-... how does this-... and you can't use my own look-" He started multiple times to put into words all the things that he wanted to say, but let it all drop.
"I already said being pretty wouldn't get you far enough, and judging by your punch I thought you hated the fact that I kissed you." He said back to her with a smirk. As he spoke he began discharging electricity into the fish, cooking it slowly from the inside out. He had used the tactic before when he was in wild areas that were too populated with predators to justify making a fire. Still, this was not necessarily one of those times and he realized he was more or less showing off, or making her angry... he wasn't sure which. Still he wondered what her angle on all this was. He doubted she was trying to bait him into kissing her again, unless she had something violent planned. The girl was harder to read than most, and between random behaviors of wanton violence, and the innocent look she was using, he found it difficult to ascertain exactly what her intentions were. Given this, he decided to play into it, guessing that he was more accustomed to encounters with women than she was to encounters with men. As such he took a step closer to her and looked into her eyes.
"Though if you want I would be happy to do it again." He said softly as he slowly leaned forward.

He wasn't exactly opposed to following through with his plan, but he would also be happy if it happened to fall in line with his original plan of driving her mad. Either way he figured it wouldn't be so bad and that made the whole thing all the more real. Still he was fully guarded in case she decided to hit him in the groin. He slid his left knee forward, blocking her right leg from being able to make it to his crotch while still keeping the sensuous body language theme. For her left leg he twisted his body so he would have a little more time to react. This placed his shoulder in line with hers, and he used that to lean in more as he whispered into her ear.
"Just say the word." He whispered.

[Verity Lohlepher]

Verity had no intention whatsoever - her head was mostly empty in conversation for the most part. She just blurted out whatever that came to mind without regard for the consequences. She did remember one particular day where she decided she would be less inclined to be impulsive but that was just her issue of thinking strength came from being able to say whatever she wanted. She didn’t think she believed that anymore but she still rather liked saying whatever. So very simply, there would be the answer to Tatsuma’s question of what her motive was.

She giggled slightly when he started to speak. He was funny when he was flustered. She watched him curiously when he dropped everything and started on how he thought she had hated the fact that he had kissed her. At that point she nodded cheerfully. “Indeed I did hate it!” she affirmed. The psycho was right when he guessed he was more used to encounters with women then she was with men but she probably wouldn’t have the reaction he expected. Verity wasn’t that dumb. She did realise when someone was trying to play games with her. She didn’t like that a lot. However, what she did like was when she was right. There were only a fair few moments and this was one of them. As such, the sensuality of his body movements was lost on her. She was too excited with her revelation of being correct.

She swivelled her head to face him and hovered centimetres from his face for a moment. “Guess what?” she whispered, a smirk sliding on her face “Point proven,” she finished, her blue eyes sparkling. She didn’t hang around long in that position afterwards because no matter how oblivious she could have been, she was still slightly uncomfortable by the closeness. She turned around and ran a hand along the cool glass behind before plopping down on the floor once she found a suitable spot. “So, how come your fish is fried already?” she asked as per normal, pulling out her sandwich and taking a bite out of it. This time she didn’t bother about how beautiful talking and eating at the same time might look. He didn’t deserve her manners.

[Tatsuma]

Tatsu smiled, indeed a point had been proven. Though she it wasn't exactly her victory. He had been trying to get into her head, trying to figure out the types of things that made her uncomfortable, and the fact that she had backed down and changed the subject was a sign of a line of things he could use to get to her. Still, that was something he would save for another time. In the interim she had asked him a question.
"It's my lightning. I pretty much just flash fry it. I learned to do it when I was hunting and couldn't afford to start a fire... I still like it better with spices, but my kitchen... well let's just say it leaves something to be desired." He said, gesturing to his kitchen area that had exactly one plate, one cup, and nothing in the ways of cookware, although there was a range. For all his reading and studying he had never so much as touched a cookbook. He just knew he liked the way other people cooked fish.
"I'm honestly not here much. There's too much adventure to be had out there, but it is nice to have a place to call home even if I'm only here alone." He said as he moved in the direction of his earlier gesture only to create space. There was something special about Verity, something he couldn't put his finger on about her personality had almost caused him to over share how he felt, and that was a grenade from which he didn't want to pull the pin.
"I can cook yours too if you want." He said.

[Verity Lohlepher]

Verity sighed wistfully, finding she wished that she had left the window in its position, as she watched him gesture to the kitchen. She wondered if he even knew about its existence beforehand. If she had left it there, he would have hit his hand and hit it hard. She took a bite of her sandwich and munched continuously while he talked. He was like an electric stove. Or a primitive animal she mused. In a way they both hadn’t interacted much with society although her reason was because she had been plain anti-social rather than because she was living in the wilderness. She guessed he had never directly said ‘I lived in the wilderness,’ but it was easy to assume from his speech and social grace – or lack thereof.

She didn’t follow his gesture to look at the kitchen; there was really no point, and wondered at the back of her mind when her possessions were coming. Instead, she fixed her gaze on him while he talked. It didn’t bother her that it could be taken as creepy. “That’s a complete waste of money,” she commented cheerfully. “I take it you use lightning magic?” It was an indirect question asking him what magic she used. It was only fair since he knew what magic she used. She was about to take another bite of her sandwich when a thought occurred to her. She pointed eagerly to the bread. “Hey! Can you toast bread?” She wasn’t intending on asking him to toast a piece of bread for her to eat.

The blonde almost choked on her sandwich when he suggested cooking hers. Her what? Her sandwich? She made a face. “Ew no. I like my sandwich the way it is,” Talking about her sandwich, she was practically done with it. And if he thought she was eating a fish, he would reaffirm her belief that he was delusional. She only bought a fish for him.

[Tatsuma]

She asked if he could toast bread then said she didn't want her sandwich cooked? First how could she not like cooked sandwiches? It made the meat taste sweeter, and it created an opportunity for seasoning to work it's way into the meat, although he hadn't been paying attention to how much of the sandwich she had eaten he was sad to hear she didn't like cooked sandwiches. Still... it wasn't exactly like he could cook the sandwich himself and make it much more than warm meat and toast so it didn't really matter all that much.
"Yes I use lightning magic, and yes I can toast bread... but more importantly how can you not like cooked sandwiches?!?" He asked in surprise. Plus on top of that she seemed to have a temper problem and that was going to get on his nerves fairly quickly. He walked to his fridge and grabbed a bottle of coffee milk from it as he looked past her back at the door.
"Can you please fix that door or something. Seriously, I have enemies and if we're both going to live here we MIGHT want a little bit of privacy." He suggested as he set out to clean up the splintered pieces of the door. Unfortunately, given the damage, he was probably going to have to go talk to the land lady about replacing the door so that the key would still fit.

[Verity Lohlepher]

The girl stared at Tatsuma as if he was going mental. He thought she didn't like toasted bread? Tears would have pricked her eyes had she been more sad. Food, food was life. Food was the key to peace, war and everything else. Without food, everyone would be dead...literally. Toasted bread WAS food. Toasted bread WAS delicious. It was just...the freshness of her sandwich  was too beautiful to give up. The taste blended so well. The greenness of lettuce with the juicy tenderness of herbal flavoured chicken. The lemon juice squeezed ever so gently on the top of that providing a slightly tangy sensation for the mouth. And holding it all together was that soft, mouth watering bread that toasting it would never do the freshness of the meal justice. She couldn't put all of these emotions into words. It was simply too hard. Instead she tried to convey all her thoughts and opinions into that stare that screamed 'YOU BELONG IN A MENTAL HOSPITAL'. No wonder she called him psycho. He just didn't get food. She sighed sadly and continued to enjoy her delectable meal.

Verity further increased her stare into full on 'BEWARE!! GONE CASE!!' mode when he appeared to think they were going to live together. There was no magic, no force, no war in the world that could stop her from thinking he was a complete lunatic by now. At the rate this was going she might even call him one in the face!

...

That wasn't a bad idea. Why hadn't she in the first place? She made a face. She wasn't sure. At all. She decided to 'help' him with the door though.

"Hey Looney!" she barked (there it was) as he started cleaning "If a door is required, I have tons," she said, nodding her head affirmatively. "What kind of door would you like?"

Without waiting for his response she decided to further 'help' by sweeping up splinters on the floor with a normal broomstick. She was doing it very proficiently, very thoroughly and also very carelessly. To anybody in the near vicinity of that broom it was probably like trying to dodge a dangerous and heavy grandfather's clock pendulum. If there was one thing Vera knew, it was that broomsticks were lethal weapons.

[Tatsuma]

After standing up to dodge the shards of wood flying this way and that, he grabbed the bit with the lock and pulled the rest of the wood off. After a loud sigh, and while still in the crouch position he held it up.
"I need a door that has this lock in it so my key works, I'd also love to have a door that you can't break down, possibly even one that's magic resistant. You wouldn't happen to have that on hand would you?" He said as he stood, ignoring the fact that she had called him looney. He slowly started eating his fish and trying to figure out exactly what he deal was. After discovering that he was stumped, he chose to go ahead and address the looney comment from a moment ago.
"Also I'm not looney, I'm eccentric, the difference being I have my wits, other people just don't understand my thought process." He said as he moved to sit down on the couch. His body sunk into the one piece of furniture he had aside from his desk and accompanying chair. He didn't really care to hear Vera's answer.

His head had begun to throb. Between her inability to listen, her destruction of his stuff, and her flighty sense of personality, she had successfully managed to do what no amount of dark guilds in the world could possibly have done... She had forced him to simply not care anymore.
"Listen if you're staying here do whatever, touch up the place, don't touch up the place, throw a party, make a guest registry, buy a farm, or even feel free to strip naked and run around.... especially that last one... maybe bring a friend. The point being, don't break anything else. I'm not exactly rich by any definition of the word and am not looking forward to the land lady's reaction when I inevitably have to go tell her the door is boned." He said, expecting her to not actually heed the first word of his statement.

[Verity Lohlepher]

Verity shook her head sadly. He didn't get the point. In fact, he missed it by several continents. She didn't think his thinking process was 'looney', gods forbid did he think she didn't get his thought processing? She didn't even listen to it! How on earth could she do that? She didn't bother elaborating though, instead deciding to give him an art gallery of door choices. "Well I've got this door that looks about that size. No magical properties though. There's this other door that's looks about that size and also has no magical properties." She said slowly, sucking the insides of her mouth in thought. She browsed through her limited collection. "You know...if you ever need a broken window, be sure to tell me, I've got one the exact size of the ones in Fairy Hills,"

She looked up at him, eyes wide when he said she could do whatever the heck she pleased if she stayed here. A big grin spread on her face. "YES! I DEMAND FREELOADING RIGHTS AND FREEDOM OF EVERYTHING AND ANYTHING IN RETURN FOR NO BREAKING THINGS! AND IF I DO, I'LL PAY!" She said this with a fiery passion before jumping right up and tackling him in a tight hug. "You know, you're not that bad for a psycho person!" She said happily before moving back to her previous position and picking up the broom she had dropped. "Oh and as per our new deal, I'll get you a door!" It wasn't that hard a task if one knew how to pick the right places to prod. She bet she could get it free of charge. First she'd go blackmail the Landlady, this time her blackmail would be legitimate and then she'd go talk to that handy boy/man who had helped Kensie and her fix the window she had broken.

[Tatsuma]

Tatsuma thought of this carefully and shook his head as if he had somehow figured this would come into play. He hadn't of course, but it didn't entirely bother him, it wasn't like he expected her to be as forthcoming and reliable with rent since she didn't seem like the hardworking type when it came to picking up jobs.
"Hmmm, deal, you're in charge of food though. I would say cleaning, but that seems dangerous." He said as if agreeing. Still, he wondered how she was going to get a door for him, obviously he needed to work on fortifications for the place anyway, but he hadn't exactly gotten any major advances in currency or connection to just go out and buy... what would he buy?

After pondering the potential ability to make the place safer.. and the likely futility of it all, he finally decided to accept her currently stated agreement and take the opportunity for a little break.
"Okay you fix the door, I'm going to go take a shower, possibly go relax in the hot tub, and hopefully get rid of this headache without having to go out and waste the money on getting a massage." He stated, somewhat upbeat about getting to give himself a mini spa experience.

[Verity Lohlepher]

The girl shrugged her shoulders when the blonde told her she'd be in charge of food. "Sure, as long as you're in charge of cooking it," she replied. She probably intercepted him speaking halfway. On second thought, she did. It was a good thing she did though. Otherwise she would have heard his comment on how her cleaning could be dangerous. She was proud of her cleaning ability. She'd taken care of herself ever since she was twelve. Sure she had help from their caretaker but it was only for a little while before it was just up to her and her sister. And then her sister had left to join Fairy Tail so her fifteen year old self could have chose to become even more independent. She didn't rise to that challenge though. And then that happened. She had to become fully independent - even if she didn't want to. So really, she had a full years experience of living by herself. Now she was going to have a roommate. It was a welcome change.

Vera nodded to the boy telling her to go fix the door and was about to exit when a thought occurred to her. "...Hey...don't you think you'd want a little privacy if you're going to have a shower? At the moment, anyone can come inside accidentally," She turned around, facing him with a curious tilt. Honestly she didn't care, she knew he was there so she wouldn't intentionally go and look. She wasn't perverted after all.

[Tatsuma]

Tatsuma could have laughed when Verity mentioned him being in charge of the cooking.
"That's adorable. Seriously, I pointed to my kitchen earlier and if you run your finger over the stove, you will find a layer of dust. I don't cook, that's why you're in charge of the food." He said, shaking his head like it should have been obvious. As far as gathering ingredients he could do that on his own and save tons on the grocery bill. Then she mentioned something about him wanting privacy. She really must not have known him at all... which was fair since this was really the first time they had done any serious conversation.
"Well I'm not really that worried about someone seeing me naked, it would probably be more of a distraction for them than it would for me, but if you insist what were you thinking." He shared. He neglected to make the comment about her joining him, partially because he was trying to be somewhat respectful, partially because he was doing this to get some time by himself, but mostly because he wanted her to fix the door and it seemed like such comments might detract from her willingness to do so. As such he was all ears, paying attention to whatever it was she had managed to come up with.

[Verity Lohlepher]

She made a face when Tatsuma suggested that her thinking he could be in charge of the cooking was adorable. She didn't think it was. She was about to counter his statement with a jive about his apparent wilderness training thus he should know how to cook lest he not be good at it, when the thought occurred to her that if she did the cooking as well, she was practically the cook. That was unfair. When he accepted her freeloading deal she had really meant freeloading. As in not doing anything. He had brought it upon himself when he had suggested so. The girl grumbled. Well at least she wasn't the maid. Maybe if she could prove she couldn't cook, he would stop her from burning his house done. But then she'd effectively be burning down her free house too. She sighed. She couldn't have the winning deal at everything.

She nodded her head in acceptance. His reasoning sounded logical enough. She couldn't tell what she'd do if she wanted to have a shower and her door was knocked down...actually, she did. She would go without one. The girl hated showers. If anything she'd be jumping for joy at having a valid excuse on skipping out on having one. Showers were pointless. Baths were pointless. Having to clean yourself in general was pointless. The next day you were going to get dirty again so why bother? Collect the dirt and then wash it all over. That was her reasoning.

Vera guessed her soon-to-be roommate-once-her-stuff-arrived-plus-she-fixed-the-door thought she had some ulterior motive in asking him about the door. To her it was a perfectly normal question. Was it not one? And didn't she already give him a reason why she asked? She knitted her eyebrows together in slight confusion. "Ummm exactly what I said? That anyone can come inside accidentally?" she replied in a mystified tone. She decided to wait for his response before leaving. Mainly because she was confused as to why he asked her what she was thinking.

[Tatsuma]

Tatsuma could have face palmed, but he was honestly too drained to do so.
"I thought you meant you had some solution to the problem, I know someone can walk in, that's why you're on door fixing duty." He said as he shook his head, turning to go into the bathroom to start his shower. After shutting the rice paper door to the shower room he simply hopped in and turned the water on... and then hopped out, realizing that the water was way too cold when it first came on. Obviously whom ever made showers were liars! The knob on the wall had a range of temperature settings but every time he had used the shower he found there were only two positions, standing in the water enjoying oneself and jumping back out of the water whilst desperately trying to adjust the setting to the aforementioned enjoyable level. And the people who made showers also made toasters too because he had discovered only two settings for those as well, uncooked and burnt to a crisp. With everything people had these days it didn't make sense for there not to be some sort of temperature/heating regulator, and obviously he was going to have to take these devices apart later to try to figure out how they worked. Whatever the case may have been, he was definitely not happy.

Once he got the shower adjusted to a positive setting he went ahead and stripped down, hopping in the shower and just standing underneath the water, he still moved back and forth on his heels as he stood there since he didn't like to not be in motion at least a little bit, but he was starting to see the value of it when it came to situations like this. Too much motion kind of ruined the water hitting all the good spots on his back and shoulders.
"And now we play the waiting game." He said to himself, referring to the point at which the hot water started running out and the shower stopped being enjoyable.

[Verity Lohlepher]

Verity stared at him, still confused before the message sunk in. Oh. That made more sense. "You could have suggested that it was about the door! What am I supposed to think?" she grumbled. Unfortunately before she could actually tell him her plan he had already disappeared off into space...well the shower more likely. The girl shrugged before exiting out the empty arch where the door once was. Her plan was simple. Ask the landlady nicely for a door. The psycho lived fairly close to the landlady and so within a few minutes she arrived even when walking. Unlike her previous entrance, Vera was cool, dignified and calm. At least she thought so. In reality, she barged in without knocking and strode straight towards her landlady before slamming her hand on the lady's desk much to the horror of some. Simply put she was neither dignified, cool nor calm, instead she had most likely interrupted an important meeting in the loudest way possible.

The visitors looked at her not blinking and swiveled their heads around to look at the landlady. "Ms Winters, who is this young lady?" The landlady smiled through gritted teeth. "Give me a second. I'll be back soon," She got stiffly out from her chair and pulled Vera to the outside. "I apologise for the mishap, okay? Now don't go interrupting my business!" she hissed. The blonde stared at her. For a second she was about to tell her what she honestly thought. However, she refrained. Instead she quirked her eyebrows up. "Really? You apologise?" she tried to ask smoothly. The landlady seemed to know what her game was. "What do you want?" she grumbled. Verity was shocked. How had she read her so fast? "Don't look surprised, usually when you blunder in you and attempt to lie your intentions, you want something. Do you want a replacement window?" she spat the last words out with venom.

Vera was pleased she didn't have to elaborate so simply shook her head with a smile. "No, this time I need a door! And someone to fix it in place! The door should fit Tatsuma's front door," The other woman looked at her unimpressed. "So you broke another person's property. Geez you're talented," she said dryly but giving her a phone number to follow. "Call that and I'll handle the rest,"

Soon enough the blonde was waiting outside for the door to arrive with the handy man...or handy boy. When the door arrived it appeared they thought the person most suitable for the job was some trainee apprentice. She stood up about to say some instructions when the trainee moved straight past her and into the house. "Now where is this broken door?" She looked at him deadpan. Even she wasn't that stupid. She followed after him more slowly. She was about to turn a corner when she heard a high pitch scream coming from some room. She sighed. What did that boy do? She entered the room to where the scream was locate-okayyy. Great. Verity immediately averted her eyes.

[Tatsuma]

At first when the guy came through the door Tatsu thought... well..that it was a guy. Then, after seeing that someone was in the shower and the guy screamed like a girl. Confused as to what was going on he stepped out only to see Verity follow in shortly after the guy. His first thought was "Threesome?" although once he realized for sure that the other person was in fact a guy he was very much against that concept... plus it was Verity, she didn't seem very oriented toward sexcapades with one person let alone two.

With a shrug he wrapped the towel around himself and looked at Verity, ignoring the screaming man/woman.
"Okay... why is there a strange guy hanging out in our apartment with me in the shower screaming like he's a five year old princess who just saw a spider?" He asked her, fully prepared to further torment the girl... and friend, by removing the towel. He reserved this for only the most extremely dumb answers because he didn't want to hear the guy screaming again. This was not exactly how he had wanted his shower to end either.
"And please tell me it's not that you were trying to prove a point." He said with his eyes closed as he massaged the bridge of his nose.

[Verity Lohlepher]

Verity continued looking at the ceiling like it was the most interesting thing in the world. She could feel her cheeks beginning to burn. Meanwhile, the boy had fainted. This rendered any initial thought of Tatsuma's to be useless. Unless, of course, he had a thing for unconscious people. She heard him ask why there was a strange guy in their apartment. She was about to respond when something he said struck her the wrong way. Her eyes flashed with annoyance and she snapped her head back.

"Exactly how would this be proving a point..." The blonde trailed off her sentence, her tone becoming less annoyed at the end.

The first thing she noticed was that he'd be really heavy. Not the standard heavy but the really really heavy heavy kind. Basically he wasn't lacking in the abs or muscle department. The second thing she noticed was that she was staring. Normally she didn't care but this time it was kind of different. She turned her gaze to the floor, aware she was getting more red in the cheeks.

"Anyways...fixing...door...you said......I'm incapable.....things.....handy man....fix the door....fishy landlady," Half of the words she said were mumbled incoherently before she dashed back out as quickly as humanely possible. She concluded that the handy boy, whatever his name was, had probably fainted either because he got too embarrassed...or...that or maybe he just couldn't take it. Anyways, she was out now. Vera almost felt tempted to fan her face. She was feeling pretty uncomfortable. If she lived there, she really hoped she wouldn't have another encounter like that again.

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