Aya didn’t know when she had fallen asleep when she rose from her bed with her curls all around her. She yawned, swinging her legs over the bed and landing her feet softly on the floor. She stood, nearly walking into her bedside table, before once again realizing she no longer lived in an apartment the size of a storage cupboard anymore.

  Brown eyes blinked open at the sight of the door leading to the bathroom connected to Mars’s room. She guessed the other girl was already done using it as she stepped in the water heater beeped, letting her know it had refiled for a hot shower if she needed it.

  Under the hot water, Aya washed her hair and thought, trying to remember what she recalled before she had fallen asleep so suddenly. It was only after a moment that she finally realized.

  “Daichi!” Her realization almost made her trip, she gripped the shower glass in time to stop herself from taking a nasty tumble. “That’s right, Daichi’s in Mericross. I can say thank you for everything, but how would I even contact him?”

  Her shower ended with a walk towards the kitchen, where Mars was in the middle of reading their smart fridge’s list of suggested missing groceries.

  “Mars.”

  “Oh, hey Aya.” Mars said, turning away from the list of bacon, eggs, cheese, and bread she was about to take note of for errands later.

  “How would I find someone in this city if I wanted to?” Aya asked, the urgency in her voice made Mars lift a brow, it must have been important if that was the first thing Aya was coming to her about.

  Whomever the curly haired brunette wanted to find must have been pretty important to her, was more family popping out of the woodwork or something?

  “Usually, they’d give you a phone number, but you could always search them up online if you have their full name. You got a name?” Mars folded her arms after she spoke, waiting for Aya to answer.

  “A full name and his grandmother’s name.”

  “Whoa, this isn’t illegal, is it? I do not want the cops being called.” Mars smirked, knowing that even if it was, she was willing to help the other girl.

  Aya giggled.

  “Nothing like that.” Aya said, taking a seat at the island table that the apartment had provided them. “Remember that friend I was telling you about? The one that moved to Mericross?”

  Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

  “Daichi, right?”

  “That’s the one. It would be nice to have a friendly face that could show us around.” Aya said, nodding furiously, Mars could tell she was excited at the prospect of seeing her former neighbour. “I can’t wait to tell him all the things that’ve happened since we said goodbye.”

  “It doesn’t hurt to look him up, from what you’ve told me, he knows his way around the net.” Mars said already getting out the ingredients for Aya to help her with breakfast.

  “You’re right.”

  ----------

  The blinking cursor stared back at Aya as it waited for her to type something into BooBoo’s search engine.

  “Let’s try, Daichi Lutz.” She said typing it in and finding a minimal amount of results, if he had an online resume, she would be at least able to find something there, right?

  A few seconds of waiting, she was met with a site used to collect online resumes. Plenty of which she recognized during her own time in the job market.

  There were a lot of popular ones too. Clicking carefully, she looked through the profiles to see that Daichi had indeed been active on some of them, updating his profile to say he lived in Mericross and now Axen.

  “I would probably do the same if I cared.” Aya said with a laugh.

  [Warning

  We at Picked-clean are not responsible for any responses from the individual being contacted by this information, we urge you to double check and only send serious inquires to the individual of your interest.

  Picked-clean is not responsible for any legal issues that might occur.]

  Aya rolled her eyes at the disclaimer, these companies were the ones putting these profiles up, but all of a sudden, everything became at the user’s risk.

  The phone number popped up, allowing Aya to dial. As she did, she wondered why her uncle simply didn’t use one of these sites to find her there were more than a few of them but as she checked further, her profiles had been scrubbed clean due to years of inactivity.

  ‘Ah right.’ she huffed. Profiles that didn’t pay for premium features were given less priority, which incentivized people to use them less.

  The phone rang, and rang and rang.

  Aya tapped her foot patiently against the floor as she waited for Daichi to pick up, but there wasn’t any answer.

  “Hopefully, he calls back.” She said, lowering the phone from her ear, mostly she hoped it was the right phone number, he might have changed it when he moved. Aya shook her head. No.

  If the address on the resume was updated, then the phone would be too.

  ----------

  “Any luck?” Mars asked as she worked on something on her tablet in the large living room they shared now.

  “I found a resume and a phone number, which I tried but he didn’t pick up.” Aya said with a huff. Mars snickered and placed her tablet on the couch to give Aya her full attention.

  “Well, it’s noon on a weekday, Aya. Considering the average person is probably at work, he might be busy.” Mars said as if talking to a child. It was easy to forget that most of the world ran on a 9-5 schedule when you were employed unconventionally.

  Aya’s face reddened with embarrassment.

  Of course, Daichi would be at work, that’s why he had a resume up anyway.

  “You’re right, I hope he sees it when he gets home or something. Hey, what have you been up to anyway? You’ve been busy on your tablet.” Aya said, launching herself unto the couch, much to Mars’s displeasure.

  “Silly girl, what if you fell off?” Mars said, smacking Aya’s arm.

  “Awww, are you worried about me?” Aya teased. Mars smirked.

  “I’m trying to get to know the city better through maps, we should probably take Lisa up on those free bus passes for the month.” the dark haired girl replied, but Aya knew there was something else up.

  As a competitive gamer, Mars often went to local tournaments to practice her skills. Aya reasoned it must have been tough on her to move so abruptly when she had just settled in, but there was no way she would have allowed E.C. to get that close.

  Arlo’s attitude, especially. Aya cringed at the thought of the white haired man laying a hand on Mars.

  “You look like an angry puppy.” Mars remarked at Aya’s pouting face. The brunette often wore her expressions on her face, allowing anyone to read them if she thought too hard.

  “Eh? Mars, are you saying I’m cute?” Aya giggled, pressing her cheeks together to make fish lips.

  “I call you cute, don’t I?” Mars retorted.

  They would get through it together.