Work Text:
My Roommates Party Without Me
Working at a bar wasn't normally too bad. He was the cook in the back – him and one or two other people usually. Most of the time, business was simple. People came here for the drinks. The food was just a bonus. But he made great food and everyone in the little bar restaurant could attest to that fact.
Of course this small consolation didn't make working New Year's Eve at a bar downtown any easier.
Needles to say, he was exhausted, very exhausted, as he walked down the street toward his apartment. The streets were littered with drunks still hanging around or wobbling home. Yamcha probably wobbled a bit himself even as he put one foot in front of the other. It was a few hours after dawn. The late shift on New Year's Eve into New Year's Day was the absolute worst.
At least he had some funny stories to remember. He tried to take everything with a laugh. Life was better that way. No matter how many things went wrong or how lonely he felt inside – staying positive kept him going, kept him breathing, kept him meeting each day with a brighter outlook than the last.
Only now he kind of wished the brightness could chill out a little. Blinking his eyes against the morning sun, Yamcha trudged into his apartment complex. The place he couldn't afford on his own, but a decent spot if he had roommates to help cover the bills. Which he did. And he was lucky to have the roommates, the friends, he had. They'd probably be passed out on the living room floor, full on pizza and alcohol and not much else.
Krillin and Goku liked to celebrate away from the crowds. Probably because they'd learned the hard way to keep a drunk Goku away from crowds of unsuspecting people. Loud begging for fights was only part of the problem, too. When Goku actually got a fight… well, the guy was like a drunken martial arts master who didn't know how to hold back on the lesser folks.
And it didn't help matters when Krillin jumped in to escalate the problems Goku started, too.
So, yeah, Goku was only allowed alcohol inside their apartment, and preferably not too much of it, either. Yamcha had experienced one too many cases of pulling his two friends out of a temporary jail cell. One too many cases…
Yamcha paused at the door to his apartment, keys in hand. The smell was off, different, and strong. He didn't normally notice such a thing – Goku was the one with the ridiculous sense of smell – but woman's perfume was kind of one of those strong, unmistakable scents. Did a neighbor get a little frisky last night? There was no way Goku or Krillin had brought in a woman so it couldn't be coming from his place.
When he shrugged it off and finally opened the door, he froze, hand on the knob, eyes staring at the closest human being in the area. And that perfume smell only got stronger as the blond haired clothed-only-in-underwear-and-a-sports-bra woman pulled away from the fridge with a bottle of his beer.
“Uhm...”
The blond smiled at him, shutting the fridge and popping open the can of beer. “You must be the productive roommate.”
And that was it. Nothing more. No introduction. No explanation. The woman simply took a swig of the beer and turned away, walking toward the one nice leather recliner in the living room. Like she owned the place.
“H-hey, wait,” he stuttered, cleared his throat, and followed her out of the kitchenette area, leaning on the small bar-like counter before he tried again. “Starting over. Hi. I'm Yamcha. You're currently in my apartment and I'm not sure who you are, so...”
“Lazuli.”
“What?”
“My name,” the woman said, shifting something around on the recliner before sliding in to sit near the edge. “It's Lazuli.”
He'd probably be able to focus more on the fact that a strange woman was in his apartment if she wasn't so casually sitting in his chair. His chair that he had saved up money to have and claim as his own. His chair that he'd had to work so hard to buy, and so hard to get up the elevator and into the apartment, too.
Now some random woman – in her underwear and with one of his beers no less – was sitting in his chair. In his apartment. New Years Day. One of the worst days of the year of his working career. And he was having to put up with more shit.
So he took a deep breath, let it out slowly, and dropped his keys on the counter in defeat. “All right. You know what? Whatever. I'll deal with all this after I get some sleep.”
“Krillin said you'd say that.”
A few steps. That's all he made it. A few steps. Then his brain focused on her words and he turned to her again. “What?”
“Krillin, the street musician I slept with last night, your roommate?”
“Yeah, I know who he – wait – you slept with him?”
He could hear her take a swig of the beer again, though he couldn't really see her, seeing as he'd moved a few steps toward his room and that meant behind the chair but - “Mmhmm. Nice guy. Good music. Didn't mean to go all the way in one night, but, well, drunk sex happens.”
“Ah hah, right,” Yamcha cleared his throat. “So where's Krillin now?”
An arm reached up above the chair and then pointed down. Oh. Next to her. In the chair. Great. This probably meant they'd had sex in his chair of all things. Yamcha groaned and ran his hands through his hair in quiet frustration. He'd have to give that thing a thorough cleaning before sitting in it again.
His friends were cool usually. They helped pay the bills. But sometimes -
“The other one, muscle man uh...”
“Goku?”
“Right, Goku,” Lazuli went on, pointing with her thumb toward the far corner on the other side of the room. “He's asleep over there somewhere. Conked out pretty early after a couple of beers. Sorry about your lamp. They got a bit rowdy once the alcohol came out.”
Slumping his shoulders, Yamcha sighed. Another thing to repair. Why? Why couldn't his friends ever just party responsibly? Why did it always end in a fight? Even in the apartment. Even indoors. Causing a problem. At least he didn't have to bail them out of a jail cell.
A glance around the room showed him that yes, Goku was slumped in a corner, a blanket covering him for the most part. He seemed mostly dressed. Good on him. Missing just a shirt. Wearing his gi pants otherwise. Who knows what he'd been up to? Well, the fighting obviously. Fighting was in that guy's blood, honestly, with the way Goku went at it all the time.
Oh, there was the broken lamp. A nice lamp. Ruined. Add that to the list of things his friends had broken. Oh, and the window was broken, too. No wonder he could hear the sounds of morning traffic so clearly.
“The window was my fault,” Lazuli said. “I'll cover that one.”
“Thanks,” Yamcha grumbled, not that he really felt thankful. One thing among many. With a sigh, he shook his head, ran a hand through his hair, and headed for his room. “I'll handle this mess when I wake up.”
“All right, then, I'll make sure they don't run away from you. As long as you don't mind if I stick around for a while. I'd love to see what goes down in this place.”
“Sure, fine, do whatever,” he muttered, opening his door and pausing to send one last comment over his shoulder. “If you stick around for too long, you'll have to pay rent.”
“Fair enough.”
He could hear her chuckle even as he walked into his room and closed the door, slumping on his bed the instant he had a chance. Forget changing clothes. He was going to pass out right here. Cover himself in the pillows and forget the world for a few hours. It's not like it was anything new. Well, the chick was a surprise, but, honestly?
Just another day in Apartment 4D.