Reach Out Your Hand, Beyond That Is. (Nightcord At 25:00 fanfic)

[Chapter 6 - "Mock Exams"]

A day passes, it is now a Sunday morning.
"Yoisaki-san! I'll look forward to working with you again." A familiar face arrives from the main door of Kanade's house.
    It's Kanade's housekeeper, Honami Mochizuki, hired by Kanade's grandmother in order to help Kanade in terms of cooking, cleaning during the weekend.
     It's all because since Kanade's father is currently hospitalised for the time being, her grandmother worries about how Kanade would treat herself alone at her house. So she hired a housekeeper despite Kanade not liking the idea for a stranger to come to their house every weekend.
     It took a while to get used to, but.. Kanade has grown onto it and likes Honami showing up from time to time.
     She is also aware that Honami is an underclassmen with Mafuyu at her school, so maybe she could...?

Honami enters the kitchen, which is clearly the first room that the main door leads to, and then looks around.
     "It's a lot more cleaner than last time I arrived, that's nice to see." She looks happy from the thought of Kanade doing a little work while she was gone.
     "Ah.. yes, I cleaned the place up for a change, took my mind off of things." Kanade replies hastily, as if she practiced this line a few minutes before.
    Since yesterday, while Mafuyu was scouring around the internet for various calculus examples on Kanade's monitors, Kanade took the leisure to clean up her own house since she's got another person staying. For the time being.
    She may be naturally drained, but she still has morals for herself when it comes to others staying at her place.
Plus, she informed Mafuyu that Honami would be arriving on Sunday. So the first thing they did before her arrival, Kanade sent Mafuyu to the Sekai with her sleeping bag.
Honami wouldn't be running into her upperclassmen today.
"Anyway, Yoisaki-san.. I brought some ingredients for today's meal. Do you like beef stew?"
"Mhm, that will be nice. Do you need some help?"
"Oh! You don't have to.. really. I've got everything handled."
"You can start with your song composing while I cook, I know that you always have your mind on that all the time."
To be fair, Kanade does get to songwriting while Honami housekeeps the place. So she's not wrong into thinking today wouldn't be any different.
But to Kanade, she got a plan. In order to kind of help Mafuyu in a way for her mock exam coming up tomorrow.
Kanade shakes her head lightly, humming a small noise showing that she insists while doing so.
"I'd like to help. This time."
"Just tell me what to do and I'll try my best." Kanade gives a look of determination.
Honami, just can't say no to that look.. so she follows through.
"Ahaha, okay. I can't really say no to that, so.."
"Here, you can start by rinsing the vegetables with water, it's over there in the paper bag."
And they get to work.

At the Sekai, Ena wanders around the place as her somewhat morning stroll.
    Currently, her mom and brother are asleep so she decided to use this small frame of time to walk around the place and lose calories from last time's afterparty.
    She walks over to Miku, who's been sitting on the small staircase area where they meet up as usual.
     "Miku.." she says with a yawn.
     "Shhh.." Miku replies.
     To this, Ena got a bit confused from that reaction. She tilts her head to the side to notice Mafuyu sleeping inside a sleeping bag while lying her head down on Miku's lap.
     "Mafuyu.. Did Kanade bring her here?"
     "Yes, it's because her housekeeper was arriving today."
      Ena remembers quite a bit that Kanade mentioned someone arriving to their house for house keeping work. Now that Mafuyu kind of became roommates, there would be an issue or some kind of awkward situation that were to happen if she was still there.
      Glad that this solves the issue though.
     "That's nice, anyway I'll catch you later Miku." Ena waves to her.
     "Mm, see you soon."

Back at Kanade's place, Kanade finished her share of the cooking help since Honami politely asked her to stop here and just let her watch for now.
    During this small timeframe though, while Kanade waits for Honami to finish her cooking, they usually use this moment to catch up and do small talk.
     "Ehm, Mochizuki-san?"
     "Hm? Yes?"
     Kanade stutters for a bit, wondering deeply on how Honami would even react to this upcoming question.
     But since it was for the sake of her friend Mafuyu, she had to press on.
     "This would sound rather weird.. but."
     "Do you have any spare books you could lend to me from your school?"
     From this question, Kanade has no idea about the school's regulations and guidelines regarding lending books to others who aren't students. So Kanade thought that she was shooting pretty much and arrow into the dark.
     "What for?" Honami asks with curiosity.
     "Oh.. uhh.. it's for.."
    After a few seconds of fake stuttering, she mumbles an answer.
"I.. wanted to study more.. during the summer break before next year arrives."
That's probably not going to work, Kanade's head starts doubting.
Honami takes a while to respond, making it seem so that it's definitely not going to work.
"Hmm.. it's wonderful that you're taking the initiative with your studies, Yoisaki-san."
"But, how long do you need the books for?"
"How long does Mafuyu need the books for.." Kanade makes a guess.
"Eh, I just want to take a quick read just today. If that's okay with Mochizuki..."
"Mm! Yeah, I think I can see if I could lend."
"I do like seeing the thought of you taking studies seriously."
"What books do you need?"
It worked somehow, Kanade is relieved for a moment that she managed to help somehow.
"Oh.. I need the books about..."
And she explains the topics that Mafuyu needs for her mock exams but disguised as if Kanade needs it for her studies.