"Suki! Go and buy some eggs from the convenience store for me." her mother called out loudly from the kitchen.

The girl opened her eyes, blinking away the remaining sleep. It was just the beginning of summer. The season to be lazy all you want. For her, it was rather boring, just sitting at home, munching on snacks without doing anything because of the summer break.

Tanaka Natsuki. Her name, Natsuki, literally means 'summer child', but to the irony of life, she wasn't really fond of the heat summer has.

"Yes, Mom!" she stood up unwillingly, heading towards the door.

"Don't forget to close the door, we don't want Kei to run out on the streets now." her mom reminded her to be careful. The last time she forgot to close the door, her dog, Kei, went out in the rain and had to be bathed again.

"Okay," she yelled through the closed door as she stepped outside the house.

The birds chirping in the background while the main attraction to her ears was the sound of the ocean waves coming from near her house as well as the rustling of tree leaves when the warm breeze blew past the trees. The sun was shining above her head as the scorching heat was burning her skin but it was bearable.

She threw a hat on her head to stay protected from direct sun rays and made her way to the store. She could see the beautiful shadow patterns made by tree leaves under her feet; one thing she loved to watch in summer.

The streets were almost empty with one or two vehicles passing by now and then, other than that it was a peaceful early summer afternoon. Natsuki walked on the hot pavement road, gazing at the ocean waves that captured her attention as they repeatedly hit the big rocks scattered across the shore making a satisfying sound.

"Oh, Suki-chan! Going to the market?" the aunt from her neighbourhood yelled out, peeking her head from the window of her house which faced the street. She must have spotted Natsuki walking alone on the road.

"Good afternoon, Aunt Kimura. Yes, I'm going to buy some eggs. See ya." Natsuki waved her hand at her, continuing to walk down the street.

•~•~•

She stepped inside the convenience store as the cool air-conditioned air welcomed her, saving her from the heat.

"Good afternoon." she cheerfully greeted the person who was standing at the cash counter when she entered and the bells jingled at her arrival. The cashier greeted her back with the same enthusiasm.

She quickly went to the aisle which had eggs and picked out a pack of 6 eggs, now going to the cashier.

"It'd be 200 yen." the cashier informed as she rummaged through her pocket for her wallet.

But seemed like she forgot to bring it with her.

"Is there a problem?" the cashier asked her.

"Uh, I think I forgot my wallet," she said with a troubled look on her face, more like frustrated.

"I'll go back and get it." she mumbled and started to step back but a hand stopped her.

"Let me help." when she heard a voice, she looked up to meet a pair of dark brown eyes.

The voice belonged to a boy probably the same age as her but he didn't look Japanese. Was he a foreigner? But he was speaking Japanese...?

She was now confused about how to react, so the boy spoke up again. "Don't worry, take this for now." he gestured towards his hand which had the money, assuming-ly 200 yen.

She actually didn't want to go all the way back to her house and then listen to her mom's nagging for forgetting her wallet and come back again, on top of that, the sun was really burning up, therefor she accepted the help from this kind stranger.

"Thank you so much. I'll make sure to repay you." she quickly bowed in gratefulness as the stranger smiled and handed her the money. She took it from him, paying for the eggs.

When she was finally done with the payment, she turned around to properly thank the guy again but, to her surprise, he was already gone. She wanted to ask for his contact information so she could pay him back but he was nowhere to be found.

She sighed, having no other option, she left the store, walking back towards her house.

•~•~•

"Huh? What's all this stuff here?" she mumbled as soon as she turned the corner of her neighbourhood. Her house was at the end of the street. While walking down the road she found some boxes laid out on the side of the road.

"Maybe someone's moving in." she thought to herself, peeking at the boxes when a cute-looking furry friend, a dog to be precise, barked at her from a distance which made her turn around.

At first, she thought it was a cute puppy just like Kei, but soon she realised this one wasn't wriggling its tail and looked kind of unhappy for some reason? It was slowly edging towards her, still barking. Now she was rethinking everything.

What if it bites her? Just a thought and she quickly turned around, mentally making a plan which somewhat went something like this...

'My house is just at the end of the street which is barely 50 steps apart right now. If I start running just now, I can make it before it catches up to me if it decides to chase me, can't I? Let's do this.'

She mentally took a note to never look back once starting to run.

The birds were still chirping peacefully and the ocean was still alive, the wind was still blowing with the sun heating it but the only thing that didn't sit straight with all these was the loud beating heart of Natsuki as she leapt over her house with hope.

She barely took two big steps when she stumbled on her feet and onto a person who just happened to come out of the house she was standing in front of just now before the furry friend decided to show up.

Thankfully the person was strong enough to hold her steady but her clumsy movements made her trip on nothing which resulted in her totally strangling the person down to the ground with a thud and crack.

Wait, a crack?

"Holy heavens! My eggs!" she spoke up rather loudly, forgetting that she was resting literally on top of someone and also that the words she just said sounded funny in some way.

"Your eggs?" she heard a laugh coming from the person she was resting on and that was it! She realised where she was and quickly stood up, brushing off the dust from her clothes as she did so.

"What do you mean by 'your eggs'?" she stood up straight with embarrassment clearly visible on her face.

"You said it yourself, didn't you?" the voice sounded familiar, making her eyes go wide. The person she stumbled with was none other than the kind stranger who had helped her just now in the convenience store.

"You?" she exclaimed upon realising.

The guy just stood there with a playful expression before saying, "Yes, me." he grinned what looked like a box-type smile. She thought it was cute.

Cute? She blinked her eyes to clear her head.

"Aren't you forgetting something?" the guy said, sighing as he dusted his pants off.

"My bad!" Natsuki said which didn't sound so genuine for some reason.

"Not a pleasant way to apologise, but, okay," he smiled again but this time the smile made her blood boil because of how arrogant he looked. He was so gentle at the convenience store just now, how can a person change so much?

Never judge a book by its cover. Maybe don't judge it by the first chapter, too. Who knows what's in stock for you in the upcoming ones?

She was contemplating how to apologise without sounding rude again when the puppy ran past her and jumped onto that guy's hands as he picked it up lovingly.

"His name is Yeontan by the way," he said, patting the puppy on the head and Yeontan started to wiggle his tail. "Oh, my name is Kim Taehyung. I forgot to mention before. We are just moving in. Nice to meet you...?" the greetings came out as a question when he saw the utter surprise on her face.

She suddenly felt really embarrassed. Firstly, she forgot to bring her wallet and he helped her- not to mention she hadn't paid him back yet -then she got scared of a dog who was probably harmless and stumbled with the person who helped her as well as, is moving into the neighbourhood so they're basically neighbours now.

What a way to have the first meeting! Go Natsuki go! The voice in her head spoke up as the embarrassment bottled up inside slowly resurfaced.

"Nice to meet you as well." she bowed for a solid 2 seconds before taking off towards her house like a flash of light.

"Oh!" that's all that came out of Taehyung's mouth after she was gone.

This was just a first meeting. No one knew what was going to happen in future.

Because;

The summer break had just started.

■□■□

Thank you for reading. PLEASE interact and comment.. that helps me a lot. Not only does it make my day but also gives me motivation, and inspiration to write more and better. I hope you support this story. Don't let it flop please, I really wanted to write something like this for a long time. I've tried my best. Hope you like it.