Rain

Inukai hung his umbrella up as they came in. This girl. Today was the second time he had run into her. The first time was in an alley with a bunch of creeps. She didn’t even seem to notice she was in trouble. Today he ran into her on his way home. In the rain. She was smiling and happy. But it was freezing outside she might get sick. She wasn’t hard to convince to come home with him. He worried that someone else could’ve convinced her instead. His hand gripped his wrist as he stepped back to let her in. Her hair was soaking wet, shimmering in different colours as the light ran across it. Her clothes were in no better shape. A once poofy skirt was flat against her thighs and thigh highs were now semi see through. A sharp fang bit the inside of his mouth as he watched her take off her shoes. The bottoms were worn…did she live on the streets? She smelled too nice for that. Ah weird thoughts. But it was true! She smelt sweet like candy. Almost intoxicating. But it wasn’t a perfume it was a natural scent. Not too strong just barely there. Weird thoughts… Inukai held a hand out to her to lead her down the hall. Thankfully no one was home. Except for Rui of course. But he never left his room. 

“Wow! Your house is so big!” Pan pan chirped walking ahead to explore but Inu kept his hand on hers. Inu smiled a little. Her curiousity and enthusiasm was so contagious. She turned back, curly tail swishing back and forth discarding droplets on the floor. Inu shrugged stopping in front of his bed room door to let her in, “my room is right here. It’s not really my house it’s shared between a lot of us. But no one is really here right now- um.” The unicorn like ashuri pranced into his room, stooping down on occasion to pick things up and put them in different places. Weird. He wasn’t going to complain. He didn’t like cleaning his room so if she wanted to she was free to. He slowly shut the door before moving to his closet looking for clothes that would fit her. “You should change your clothes. I don’t want you to get sick.” He started to turn around holding a few options for her. 

Oh.

His mouth was left half open as he watched her undress. She wasn’t wearing a bra or anything- Inukai quickly spun back around staring at the floor. There was. A naked girl. In his room. A girl. He just met. Yesterday. Is this her paying him back?? Seems a bit off. She hadn’t been flirty or anything just… nice. Inu kept his eyes shut as he put the clothes on the bed, “here you can see what you like.” His ears tilted back and forth as she hummed. She was so cute…Inukai cleared his throat as he started to turn back around hearing a lack of movement. 

He shouldn’t be surprised. She was only wearing his jacket. Which was thankfully half zipped and way too big on her. Golden eyes stuck to her purple pink ones. No roaming just don’t look down. Holy shit. There was. A pretty much naked girl in his room. And he didn’t warn Rui before hand. This was like breaking bro code. Pan Pan however smiled running up and hugging him. Inukai took a deep breath feeling her skin pressing up against him. Her lack of boundaries was really showing. 

“Thank you! You’re so sweet. Everyone in the city has been so nice to me so far!” The girl cuddled into him refusing to let go. Inu gently pat the back of her head slowly moving her to the bed before grabbing a brush off of his bedside table. 

“You’re welcome.” He hoped the flustered tone was creeping out too much. He wanted to seem cool but it was hard to do that when well… Inukai tossed those thoughts aside moving back towards her and carefully taking clumps of her hair in his hands. This would take a bit to brush out, “some people haven’t been nice to you. Like yesterday… where are you from again?”

“The woods! But I think they were being nice. They offered to help me find fun things in the city and…” Pan Pan paused hushing as things seemed to click for a moment, “Mama always said I need to be careful because I’m pretty. And somehow that makes me a target for stuff. She was really worried about me going out on my own but I promised I would be ok.” Pan Pan smiled looking over to him, “And now I’ve found you again! It must be fate. I was meant to run into you! Because you’re nice and I trust you.”

Inukai felt himself blushing again. She was so sweet. He looked back to her hair finding it hard to keep eye contact with her, “I’ll take care of you. As long as you’re around me I’ll make sure no one bothers you….your hair is pretty.” He smiled parting it for her again before quickly standing back up again to create space. Pan Pan didn’t even seem to notice how embarrassed he was, far too entranced by the things in his room. It took hours of questions and answers for Pan Pan to go through everything and for Inukai to struggle to explain what he could. He supposed it made sense if she grew up in the woods technology wasn’t her strong point. In fact she didn’t even have a phone. Yet she mentioned she needed to be home before the sun went down. The storm had other thoughts. As the sun got closer to setting it picked up. No way was she going home in that. 

Pan Pan stood quietly at the window, ears ducked flat against her head. She hoped her mom would be ok without her. Of course the forest was filled with Yokari. Surely they would be ok. She took a deep breath unsure of where she should go next. Inu was nice but surely he wouldn’t be ok with her spending the night. He has been rather quiet, sitting at his desk with one of his pillows in his lap as he kept an eye on her. He seemed half awake. Yet smiled when Pan looked over to him. 

“I- really should get going.” The shiri said playing with a braid that Inukai had done for her. Inukai seemed to wake up at that. He shook his head looking outside.

“Look. I know you want to get back to your mom but you’ll get lost or hurt out in that. It’s fine you can sleep here.” Inukai said tossing the pillow on the floor and pulling out extra sheets and blankets from his closet, “I’ll sleep on the floor and you can have the bed.” 

Pan Pan frowned putting her hands together, “oh no I’d rather take the floor than you. It’s your bed-”

“I-I actually like sleeping on the floor! I do it all the time!” Inukai smiled setting up a makeshift bed. “I am a kemori after all” His hand shifted to a paw doing a small wave at her before shifting back. “Take the bed it’s fine.” 

Pan Pan was going to protest more before lightning struck and a loud boom quickly followed. The power crackled off an upset noise coming from another room. She shook in her spot before slowly making her way onto the bed. Scary. It was scary out here without her mama. She sniffed hiding under the covers. It smelt a lot like Inukai. Warm. Citrusy. She shifted holding his jacket tightly around her as thunder continued to crackle outside.

Inukai slowly laid down after watching her for a bit. His ears tilted back and forth. She was crying… He felt bad. He wished he had a car to drive her home but all he had was a motorcycle and he wasn’t about to drive her home on that. He closed his eyes. He couldn’t sleep. Not with her crying in the background. It broke his heart seeing someone so happy…he sighed rolling over to stare at the ceiling. His eyes slowly closed as he got used to the noise. Tired…. she made him tired…

He woke up at a sudden weight on top of him. A quiet whimpering in his ears as thunder crackled outside again. It took him a bit to process what was happening. Pan Pan had moved to the floor. Was she scared of thunder? It struck again. A bright flash of light filled the room illuminating her shaking figure. Inukai carefully shifted, being as careful as possible to not touch her from under the blanket. He managed to free the hand she was on top of and grab the blanket on top of his bed, pulling it down to cover the two of the up. It was pitch black under the blanket but it didn’t muffle the sound well. What else could he do for her- too bad his headphones were too far away… it didn’t matter as Pan Pan moved herself to tuck her head into Inukai’s shoulder, hands coming up to cover her eyes. Inu slowly nervously moved his hands to cover her ears and muffle the sounds for her as best he could. A few minutes passed. More strikes of lightning. But she didn’t move anymore. Inukai sighed internally, finding a comfortable way to muffle the noise for her and sleep at her side. 

To think this all happened because he didn’t want a cute girl to get caught in the rain…