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Naoto // Before Us [ 2 ]

I'm eating lunch with my friends at the cafe near our University. We were just talking about random stuff at school when my eyes caught a guy with black hair and have a serious facial expression, alone.

He's busy reading a book which is new to me because, when I look around, all I can see are students tapping on their phones.

"Hey, y/n, what are you looking at?" Audrey, my friend said.

"Not what. more on who," Akari said as she peeked from Audrey's shoulder, which sparked Audrey's curiosity to look back.

"Is that Tachibana, Naoto?" Audrey asked.

"Yeah! I heard he's top on our department." Akari added.

"He's cute, I kinda dig his mysterious aura but he's always alone and too focused on his studies, bet he doesn't have time for a girlfriend," Akari said as she rested her chin to her palm.

"It's rare to see a man that's serious on his studies. Most college students are crazy over partying." I said.

"Ohhhh," Akari and Audrey said in chorus.

"What?"

"You like him," Audrey said.

"Let's- let's just eat!" I said, almost stuttering. I glanced at him one more time before my eyes went back to my friends.

★ ☾ ★ ☾ ★

Days passed and I kept on thinking about him. I'm curious to know him and I don't understand why.

I walk my way to my favorite cafe to meet my friends. I halt when I see him sitting on the bench of our university garden. He's holding of what I think is a case file.

"Is that Prof Kimura's assignment?" I whisper to myself. Me and my nosy ass walked over there. I saw him looking at the crime scene photos.

"You can see at this photo." I lean forward to point the picture. "There are tiny blood splatters on the wall and the body that they found was facing the door. If the victim's neck got slashed near the wall, then the suspect might be left-handed. he/she/they were facing the victim while the victim was facing the front door. There's no sign of forced entry so, I think the victim knows the suspect. My theory about this case is that the victim expected the suspect to go to her house, she opened the door, talked first, got in an argument then boom."

Tachibana looked back at me with a weird expression. I was leaning from his back, near his ears and cheeks, Looking at the files. I realized what I did so I took a step back.

"I-I'm sorry," I let out a faint laugh. "I'm not a creep or something. We're actually in the same department and I'm your classmate in Prof Kimura's class. Though I got the set B of the case file for our assignment."

"Oh. I see." He closed the folder and stood up. "Thanks for your unsolicited opinion." Ouch! He's kinda tactless, eh?

He started to walk away, Me being me, don't want to waste such a rare encounter so, I ran towards him and walked beside him.

"I'm l/n y/n! You're Tachibana, Naoto, right?"

"Yeah."

"You know, you're kinda popular. You aced our midterms and our prof likes you. I really love solving crimes! at first, I wanted to be a crime/suspense author but I changed my mind so, I enrolled at this university."

He suddenly stops walking. "What do you want?" His head faces me. He doesn't have any expression so, I can't read him.

"I just want to be your friend," I said and extended my hands for a handshake.