Chapter Text
Making the Craigslist ad had been surprisingly easy. A few pictures of the apartment, a few sentences about the convenience and features of the room available, and interested messages from potential roommates started pouring in.
Getting an extra key from his landlord, however, threw a fairly large wrench in Marik's plans. Apparently he needed a whole week to make a duplicate key, even though Marik knew that the kiosk at the supermarket could make one in minutes. The landlord insisted that Marik wasn’t allowed to make his own copies of the key though, and Marik agreed with a sigh. He supposed he shouldn’t have waited until the weekend before school started to request an extra key to his apartment. He managed to thank the landlord politely before retreating to his room.
With a huff, Marik sat back down at his computer, tapping his fingernails against the black plastic before starting to type. He replied with the same email to everyone that had inquired about the room, asking whether they would be okay with receiving the key to the apartment one week after classes started. As soon as Marik was done, he stood up so forcefully that his chair rolled back and bumped against the sofa, and he headed to the kitchen, resisting the urge to throw something against a wall.
He decided to make baba ghanoush, not because he particularly wanted to eat any, but because he wanted to smash something into a pulp and he might as well get dinner ready while he was at it. After placing his iPhone on the counter where he could see it as he cooked (but have it safely out of the splash zone), Marik fetched an eggplant from the fridge and tossed it in the oven. He set it to roast, and then realized that he’d have to wait at least half an hour before he could actually start pureeing.
He scowled, then decided to make feta salad while the eggplant softened. As he peeled and sliced the cucumbers, his phone occasionally buzzed, screen lighting up as email after email came in. Even though he knew they weren't necessarily responses from the people on Craigslist, it still didn’t help his mood. He chopped the vegetables with more force than what was strictly necessary. Each staccato thump of his blade against the cutting board dissipated a little of the day’s annoyances.
He missed Rashid, or rather, he missed Odion. He wasn't used to being alone, and without Odion's comforting presence by his side, he had been getting angry more often, especially when he had to deal with idiots like the landlord. He knew Odion would have accompanied him to America if he had asked, but he also knew that he was safer with Isis- with Ishizu and so he hadn't asked.
Marik had been hoping a roommate would help keep the apartment from feeling too empty, and the extra income would prevent him from having to tap into any of his overseas accounts. It looked like that wasn't going to happen at this rate, so he tried to calm himself down. There was nothing he could do but grin and bear it.
With a sigh, he stopped his chopping temporarily. After impatiently swiping away the email notifications and turning on the Do Not Disturb mode, he put on iTunes, pointed the speaker towards himself, and then returned to cooking. Soon the melody overpowered the tumultuous thoughts in his mind, and he fell into the rhythm of slicing and dicing and mixing, deciding on the fly to make enough for the week.
After about two hours of industrious cooking and cleaning, Marik had worked up an appetite and was feeling calm enough to deal with all of the notifications on his phone. He rolled up the baba ghanoush and salad in pita bread like a burrito and scrolled through the messages on his phone. As he expected, a stream of Sorry No Longer Interesteds interspersed with marketing emails.
He sighed, feeling the extra disposable income slip away from his grasp. He tugged the email list downwards one last time in the vain hope that refreshing would bring him good news.
A new email did pop up, with Craigslist in the subject line, and Marik recognized the sender as one of the ones he had emailed before. He tapped open the message.
"Waiting a week for the key isn't a problem. The location's good and the price is decent, plus most of the lodging is full by now. Is the room still available? I'm in CS."
Marik's eyebrows lifted up incredulously. A computer science major that was okay with starting school a week later? The nerd must be really desperate to live there, probably because the computer science building was across the street. He snickered, imagining a skinny white kid clutching a laptop to himself.
Well, he probably wasn't going to get any other takers without a key in his hand. He typed back a quick reply.
"Yeah, the room's yours if you want it. The room number is 222, and the apartment's fully furnished, like I said in the ad. Don't forget to bring two month's rent when you move in, I'll let you know as soon as I get the key. I'm in MechE, it'll be cool to room with another STEM major. Are you taking Calculus 1 this semester too?"
Once he sent the message, he locked his phone and set it down. Classes started tomorrow, and he supposed he should probably get a good night's sleep. He had two classes on Monday, but they were both in the afternoon so he could safely hit the gym before class. This decided, he cleared the table and started getting ready for bed.
A few familiar high-pitched chirps later, Marik rolled over in bed and shut off his alarm. He rubbed at an eye and yawned, brushing his bangs out of his face. Peering at the ceiling, he decided that he should probably do his laundry tonight. Another soft huff of breath, and then he climbed out of bed, reaching towards the ceiling and stretching.
He made a face at the bitter post-sleep taste in his mouth and went to brush his teeth. As he entered the hallway, he casually peered into the kitchen before moving towards the bathroom-and then immediately moved back to look properly into the kitchen.
Standing there, in front of his stove, was a stranger, apparently adding spices to a pot.
A person he didn't recognize, just casually cooking, in his kitchen.
He looked around the room for a moment, unsure if it was a dream, but everything was there, and everything was in its place, except that there was a stranger in his kitchen.
They turned and Marik took in iron grey hair and dark tanned skin before his eyes focused on the massive scar marring the left side of their face.
The scar wrinkled slightly as their mouth opened, and Marik's eyes shifted to meet the stranger's. His eyes were as grey as his hair and the stranger said, in a gravelly voice, "Oh hey there, nice to meet you, I'm Bakura, the comp sci student."
Marik could not think of an appropriate response in time, and the stranger continued, "The rent's on the table, don't worry about the key, just get it to me when you can." And then he went back to cooking, like he belonged there.
Marik tried to say something, but there were too many different expressions of outrage trying to leave Marik's mouth at once, and so nothing actually escaped. He tried again, and what managed to leave his mouth was, "The door is locked!"
The stranger glanced back at him, and while it was petty and stupid, Marik felt a little bit gratified that the stranger at least had to look upwards to meet his eyes. The stranger shrugged, as if locked doors were of no consequence.
"Yeah, I emailed you a couple of times to ask if you could open the door for me since I don't have your number, but I guess you were asleep." He stirred again and whatever it was smelled a little bit like ful medames, but the familiarity was unwelcome and Marik scowled.
"Then how did you get in here? The door was locked!"
The stranger, Bakura? he thought, raised his hands in a helpless shrug and a thick gold watch glinted from a surprisingly-slim wrist.
"I had to pick the lock. I knocked and knocked, but you wouldn't open, and it wasn't like I was going to wait outside forever with all of my stuff."
Marik sputtered out an indignant noise, but then he thought, "All of your-" Marik turned and looked around the living room, but he saw no boxes.
The stranger was taste-testing whatever he had in the pot and it occurred to Marik that the kitchenware looked distinctly familiar.
"Are those my pots and pans?"
"Hmm?" Bakura looked up at Marik again, then at the utensil in his hand. "Yeah, you said the apartment was fully furnished, right?"
"You fucking broke into my house and started cooking in my damn kitchen with my pots and pans and food like you own the place-"
"Actually, the food is mine," interjected Bakura, "and also I did bring the rent, so technically I do kind of own part of the place."
Marik swore he saw red at that moment.
"Take the damn money and get the fuck out of my house, I never want to see your goddamn face again!"
The stranger's forehead furrowed, and he had the audacity to look indignant.
"Hey, what the fuck is your problem? I brought two month's rent like you asked, I'm not pestering you about the key even though that would clearly be a deal-breaker because who the fuck is going to miss the first week of classes? Plus, I already moved in and I haven't done shit to you so what the fuck are you screaming at me for?"
Marik vehemently disagreed on the subject of Bakura's lack of wrongdoing, and was about to tell him so when he noticed that Bakura had again claimed to have already moved in.
"That's bullshit, if you moved in already, where's all of your crap?!"
The upward movement of a steel grey eyebrow was more eloquent than words at expressing what Bakura thought of Marik's IQ in that moment.
He enunciated more clearly, "The stuff that I brought... To move in with... Is in the bedroom... That was being rented out... You know... The one YOU put on Craigslist."
Marik had never wanted to shoot someone in the face as much as he did right now. A beat started to throb in his brain, a headache approaching in his mental horizon.
"There is absolutely no fucking way that you could carry boxes past my open bedroom door without waking me, you're a fucking liar!"
Instead of owning up to his error, the stranger simply shrugged at him again and appeared to have lost interest in the conversation, adding more ingredients into the pot that still simmered over the stove.
With a snarl, Marik turned on his heel, stomping down the hallway to his right towards the spare bedroom. There was no way, absolutely no way that someone could have been moving stuff back and forth less than six inches away from his head, there was absolutely no way-
He impatiently shoved the bedroom door open, revealing boxes stacked on boxes stacked on boxes.
"كل خرى," swore Marik, and he gave the nearest box a vicious kick. He pressed the palm of his left hand against his forehead, the oncoming headache pounding more insistently.
"Hey, what the fuck?!"
The stranger was behind him and Marik whirled around in surprise, catching a glimpse of the annoyed expression on Bakura's face before the back of Marik's left hand slammed into the guy's cheek, the one without the scar.
The force of the accidental blow turned the stranger's face from Marik. Marik's eyes, wide with shock, shifted from his offending hand, which still hovered uncertainly in midair, to the silvery hair hiding the stranger's expression.
A low growl of "Hijo de la gran puta!" and Marik understood nothing except the dark-skinned fist that drew back and hurled towards him.
With a yelp, he skittered backwards, only for a box to catch his left calf and send him tumbling back. Bakura’s arm sliced through empty air as Marik’s right leg swung upwards. Pain exploded from his toes as Marik’s foot happened to crash into Bakura’s knee. Both of them howled and scampered back, away from each other.
Marik scooted backwards over the box he had landed on, when he ran out of box and fell back onto the floor. Only the quick curl of his body preventing his head from slamming against the floorboards. There was a loud thud as Bakura also managed to trip backwards, the home invader falling on his ass and accidentally knocking his head against the doorframe with a thump. “Mierda!”
Marik knew he should be getting back onto his feet, but once his head was resting on the floor, the position was not uncomfortable, and he rested a moment. A huff of breath from near the door and Marik tensed, ready to kick despite the throbbing pain in his toes, but the stranger only spoke from what sounded like the same position on the floor beside the doorframe.
"What was that for?"
Marik felt his blood start to heat up again at the question.
Punctuating each word with the smack of his palm against cardboard, Marik shouted, "You! Broke! Into! My! House!"
The stranger started to argue when there was a sharp beep. Puzzled, Marik looked around for a second before sound began to blare, lights flashing again. Sitting up, his wide eyes meet Bakura's as the smell of burnt food reached them at the same time.
“SHIT!” they yelled simultaneously, then they scrambled to their feet, ignoring their forming bruises. Bakura was closer to the door and he raced ahead down the hallway, Marik in hot pursuit. A slight curl of smoke wafted overhead and the stranger skidded to a stop, Marik running into him and then shoving him aside as he sprinted into the kitchen.
Sure enough, the pot the stranger had been stirring was now on fire, smoke billowing into the air as tongues of flame threatened to lick at the wooden cabinets above. The blaring of the smoke detector made the headache that had been lurking at the back of his mind take center stage. Marik bared his teeth as he grabbed the pot lid and slammed it over the fire, climbing onto the kitchen counter and hitting the mute button on the smoke detector.
Thankfully, the infernal alarm fell silent, though his head still hurt like hell and his eyes now itched from the smoke. Hopping down from the counter, Marik turned to check the stove. The idiot had turned the heat up all the way, and Marik shut it off. He checked the pot, touching the lid handle experimentally to see if it was hot. Finding that it wasn’t, he removed the lid and saw that the fire had died out, though the inside of the pot was charred black and released a cloud of thick smoke.
Marik slammed the lid on again, waving some of the smoke away from his face, then he exited the kitchen to properly beat the shit out of the short stranger. All he had to do was make it to his bedroom and-
Wide grey eyes peered at him from the hall entryway. Only Bakura’s much-too-pale face, white-rimmed eyes, messy grey hair and a white-knuckled hand gripping the doorway were visible, the rest hidden from Marik’s view.
Marik scowled at him. “You’re lucky that the fire didn’t spread to the cabinets, asshole, you would have set the whole place on fire.”
The stranger’s eyes grew impossibly wider, then he turned and disappeared. Marik frowned, moving to look down the hall, and when he saw only the open bedroom door at the end of the hall he gave chase, cursing under his breath. When he burst into the bedroom, Marik looked around wildly for the stranger, but didn’t see him anywhere, only the boxes he had brought with him. A loud honking of a car in the street and Marik rushed to the window to see Bakura a block away, a brown and grey blur as he sprinted away.
Glowering, Marik checked the window and found it unlocked. He locked it with a little more force than strictly necessary. Good riddance. He knew that the son of a bitch could probably break in again, but his headache demanded aspirin, his body demanded a really hot shower, and his stomach demanded breakfast.
Marik returned to the still-smoky kitchen to down some aspirin. He would have opened the window, but he didn’t want any vermin crawling in, so he turned on the ventilator above the stove. Back in the living room, he looked at the front door. It was locked, but that was apparently no deterrent, so he pushed the sofa in front of the door to prevent any more unwanted visitations. Once that was done, he jogged to the bathroom, brushed his teeth, ate cereal straight from the box while watching his barricaded front door, then retreated to the shower.
He would have liked to take his time and let the heated water soothe away the stress of the morning, but he was still jumpy at the thought that the stranger, Bakura, could be back at any moment. Once he had his clothes back on, he returned to the spare bedroom to survey all of the boxes the stranger had left behind. Marik supposed that he could call the cops to have them take it away as evidence or whatever, but he didn’t want his name on any police reports and honestly he didn’t want to deal with this right now at all.
Grabbing his bookbag, cell phone, and wallet, he was about to head out for his first class when he realized that he’d have to move the couch if he wanted to leave or get back in. With a snarl, he returned to his bedroom to cram as many of his valuables into his backpack as he could fit before moving the couch and going to class. The way this was going, his first semester of college was going to be shit.