hat night after working, Killua tucked his hair into a baseball cap and waited at the back door of the club for his Uber to swing around and fetch him. Beside him, Kurapika just remembered his earrings and stood alongside him, plucking them off with one too many sighs.

"What," Killua huffed.

"Nothing."

"What are you waiting for then?"

"Oh, just for you to ask for a ride," Kurapika said.

Killua rolled his eyes. "I'm not asking for a ride when I've already ordered an Uber."

"Just let me drive you to your apartment."

"So you can know where I live? No thank you," Killua said, but more accurately, he didn't want Kurapika to find out what his apartment number was. His flat had a window on the street and Kurapika would no doubt wait for him to turn on his light. In doing so, it inadvertantly gave Kurapika permission to hunt his apartment down via sneaking in through the locked front door behind another tenant.

It wasn't that Kurapika knowing about his roommate situation bothered him—it certainly wasn't that. It was simply a matter of knowing that Kurapika was in the market for an apartment of his own, and there was only so much Killua knew he could deal with. Kurapika's unresolved sexual tension with the club owner was one of them, and Killua hoped he'd sort it out after living with the guy. Maybe being roommates would stamp out Kurapika's horniness for the guy.

I'm glad I don't have to worry about that, Killua thought with a slight grimace, thinking about his own roommate. Sure, Gon was cute, but...

"I don't see why I can't bum at your place once in a while," Kurapika sighed once again, dramatic and annoyed.

"I've—literally only been moved in for three days."

"Three days I coulda been bumming at yours."

Killua rolled his eyes. His mind was spiraling around Freecss, though, and his need to scream about it mounted with each passing minute of the day. An entire two-and-a-half days had gone by in silence, and it was all he could do to keep from ripping his hair out from the immense, unfathomable frustration of having been duped on his first lease ever.

"You... can't bum at mine," Killua huffed, brow tense. He pinched the bridge of his nose. "Because... I..."

His phone pinged—his driver was here.

Oh, thank God, he thought, mortified. There was no way for Kurapika to know where he lived (unless Kurapika stalked him), and so there was no way that Kurapika would appear unannounced and out his employment status to Freecss. He imagined a scenario in which Kurapika showed up, unannounced, and Gon was forced to hide in the bedroom while Kurapika yodeled in the kitchen about a client of theirs, and Killua would have to sit there knowing that Gon was listening to every fucking word—

No, stop thinking about it, Killua thought, stuffing his phone into his pocket.

"Well, I'm leaving," he declared.

"Wait, no, what were you gonna say, you whore," Kurapika demanded, trying to grab Killua by the jacket. Killua wrestled out of Kurapika's grasp, slamming his shoulder into the door and heaving it open. He took off at a half-sprint as Kurapika followed him out. The only thing Kurapika was waiting for in there was Killua, anyway.

Kurapika harrassed him all the way to the Uber out on the street, who looked alarmed as Killua swung open the door, being fully attacked and kicked by Kurapika. He asked his driver for his name, and when the two matched up, Killua slid in with a sigh and went to close the door.

Kurapika's face got smushed in the door, and with his cheeks pushed in, Kurapika seethed, "I'm your best friend—I deserve to know where you live—"

"The fuck? Those two things have no correlation whatsoever," Killua insisted, giving the door another tug. Kurapika cursed, voice muffled from his squished cheeks.

Killua pushed the door out, just enough for Kurapika to yank his face free, before slamming the door once and for all. He flipped Kurapika off through the window, and Kurapika stuck his tongue out, rubbing feeling back into his cheeks with his two gloved hands.

Whatever the case, Killua decided that he needed to prepare for the day that Kurapika would inevitably follow him home. He opened up the notes on his phone and started typing away.

And, when he came home, he copied those notes onto a piece of note paper, which he then brought to the kitchen where Gon was opening the mostly-empty fridge. Killua reached in front of them, grabbed one of those stupid magnets that looked like cat butts, and pinned the paper to the fridge with it.

He gave it a little smack as Gon stared at it, and then stared at him. "Apartment rules," Killua said.

Killua walked off to the bathroom. He could still feel the mascara on his lashes from work, so he reached for a cotton ball and doused it with makeup remover. He set to work rubbing it off, his eyes on his reflection through the mirror.

Meanwhile, Gon plucked the rules right off of the fridge and studied them with a furrowed brow, and annoyance sinking like acid into his gut. He blamed the Taurus in him for being a stubborn fool, thinking he and Killua could just "co-exist", whatever that meant, without having to question each other. Rationally, he knew apartment rules made sense.

But irrationally, however...

"'One: No food-sharing,'" Gon started, slowly. He looked at the pudding cup in his hand and dejectedly returned it to the fridge. "'Two: Killua reserves primary bathroom access after midnight...'" Gon glanced at the clock. It was nearly one in the morning. "'Make sure you're finished with the bathroom before then. Three: Clean what you contributed to—this includes cleaning the bathroom by turn, cleaning your own dishes, and cleaning the kitchen after cooking. Four: Don't go into each others' rooms.'"

Gon's brain was stuck on the no-food-sharing rule. He wandered over to the bathroom where Killua's cheeks were smeared black. He was quick to shut the door before Gon could peer in, and through the crack, Gon said, "I think it'd be useful to share, like... foods we both eat but don't need much of."

"Such as...?"

"I don't know. Butter? Spices? Eggs and milk?"

Killua splashed water over his face and considered this. He supposed he didn't want to start completely from scratch... and it'd just take up more room in the cabinets and fridge if they both had milk cartons, egg cartons, butter, and spices as duplicates.

"Okay, fine," Killua said, smearing mascara from his cheeks. He spat water out into the sink and reached for one of his black hand towels, which he found rumpled on top of the shelving unit above the toilet. He often folded it up.

He opened the bathroom door, and Gon startled. He held the towel up, and Gon startled again. "Don't use this towel, or any of the other black ones."

"O-Okay, I won't," Gon said. "We could use one of my towels as a handtowel or something—"

"No. I mean, you can, I'm just particular about what I share," Killua said, and mentally followed up with, Mostly because I don't even know where my hands have been, especially after work.

"Okay, that's fine with me," Gon said, wide, doe eyes flitting between Killua's. Killua looked away, jaw tight, and threw the cotton swab into the bin. "Could I add something to the list?"

"Sure."

"No shoes outside of the foyer?"

Killua paused. He looked down at his feet, realizing then just how shit he was with unlacing his combat boots. When he looked up, Gon offered a weak, apologetic smile and said, "Sorry. Just—something I grew up with."

Killua left the restroom and went to the foyer where he sat on the steps that led down to the door. He started unlacing his boots and, meanwhile, Gon went back to the kitchen, thinking to himself, I JUST MADE HIM SO MAD DIDN'T I? I SHOULDN'T HAVE SAID ANYTHING.

Gon came to the apartment with few items, but one of them happened to be a kettle for tea. And, since he couldn't eat the pudding cup, he set the water boiling and stood waiting for it as Killua returned to the living space, shoes in one hand as he headed for his bedroom.

Gon crossed his arms, tension easing from his shoulders. They did it. They got over the Rules Talk.

That peace only lasted for a few seconds before Killua paused at his bedroom door, turned, and said, "Oh, also—"

Gon glanced at him. Killua leant out of his door, hip cocked, and said, "No boys allowed, got it?"

No boys? Gon thought. Why boys specifically?

Gon put a hand to his heated cheek, wondering, Do I really exude that much gay energy? He was almost flattered, until he realized that Killua was back in his room ignoring the fact that he was essentially policing Gon's nonexistent lovelife.

"That—! But—!" Gon started, indignant.

"If anyone comes over, they're gonna know we've got a roommate, even if one of us isn't home," Killua explained, stepping back into the room. He grabbed the rules from Gon's hand and pinned them back onto the fridge. He punctuated it with a simple, "And no girls, either."

The instant Killua turned away, Gon's jaw dropped. He clamped it shut, mouth twisted into a line as thin as his patience. Once Killua disappeared into the bathroom again, Gon took to his room, fists clenched at his sides, the kettle still boiling behind him.