hello, hello

The doorbell rings.

Touko gets up, brushing her messy brown hair away from her face and hastily tying it up with a rubber band as she hurries out of the living room, slipping on a rather embarrassing pair of fluffy, pink slipper as she does so.

"Coming!" she calls, as the doorbell rings twice, thrice.

Her slipper-clad feet slide across the smooth wooden floors, gliding as she nears the mahogany door with its elegant brass knocker and, of course, the doorbell, which the stranger outside is taking full advantage of.

It rings once, another time, and then three rings in rapid succession.

"Fuck you, I'm said I'm coming!" she shouts as she finally reaches the door, pulls it open, and prepares to give the impertinent deliveryman or whoever it is outside a piece of her mind.

Her breath hitches as she takes in the sight of her visitor.

Green hair, considerably shorter and well-combed, frames a smooth, angular white face; aquiline, his features could be called. His jaw is scruffy with a five o'clock shadow, his eyes an intent, piercing emerald flecked with bits of gold. He's wearing a white dress shirt and loose black pants, though neither of them can hide the leonine bulge of well-defined muscles just underneath the surface. There is a strange, Rubik's Cube-like contraption attached to his belt.

And he is holding a bouquet of white roses in his hand.

"Hello, Touko," the stranger says, smiling that oh-so familiar smile. "It's been a while, hasn't it?"

Without a word, she leaps into the man's arms, embracing him firmly and planting her lips on his. He drops the bouquet, startled at first, but quickly leans into the kiss, their bodies fitting perfectly together, as they were meant to be. She breathes in his scent, the smell of cologne and leaves and something that smells like mint and green tea, and she breaks away only long enough to say, "N."

He grins. "I've missed you, too."