"Absolutely, definitely, indubitably NOT!" He slams his hands down beside him on the sofa, a concerned look on his face.
"Woah! He's starting to use words I don't know!" His mother gets up from her chair whilst Haru's father nods slowly.
Haru's father remarks, "Botan definitely takes after his mother."
With a slightly crooked grin on her face, she sits back on the chair. 'Why does she look as if she's won some battle?'
"Well we can't rescind the application for the room now, right dear?" She looks at her husband with a smile.
"Oh yea, of course," he clears his throat, "we can't always redo the past Ryunosuke, what's done is done, you ought to learn this lesson."
For some inexplicable reason, he's now clenching a hand whilst looking as if in deep thought, his face twitches every now and then.
'Did my dad have some kind of tragic superhero backstory...?'
"Wait, why can't you rescind it if you haven't paid yet?"
"Because we already paid for it," they say in unison as if rehearsed, his father remarks again, "it wasn't cheap you know...!"
The words come out of his mouth slowly, 'is it really that painful to say?' Haru stares at his father's dramatic display of emotion, with a bewildered look on his face.
"Then I guess there's nothing we can do..."
Sasaki Haru, accepts his grim fate with even grimmer determination.
'No wonder he's been coming home late recently, guessing he's working overtime to afford it.'
Despite the awkwardness born out of his inner conflict, he resolves on a conclusion.
How could he reject them at this point?
"I used your father's juice fund to pay for it by the way," Haru's father begins to start chant, "oh my juice..."
"Yeah, he had it stored inside a drawer in his desk, found it while I was cleaning and decided to put it to better use."
"I still feel the everlasting sting of financial loss, but it was for Haru...!"
Haru's stares blanked face at them, although the burden on him slightly alleviated, he still felt he was just dreaming.
His parents continued talking about the juice fund as Haru surgically removed himself from the situation, so as to not alert them of his unannounced absence.
As Haru sneaks up the stairs, he hears his mother's muffled voice speaking enthusiastically from the living room.
"Where did you even get that much money? Don't tell me you're in the shady juice business! This obsession has gone too far mister!"
His father's own muffled voice responds, "I'm not! Though I'd be interested in what they've got... But I'm not! It was a bonus from my manager..."
"Why did you just whisper to yourself halfway...?"
Haru returns to his bedroom and flips up the light switch, click, and the room is nice and bright.
Along with the light, he turns on a small portable fan in his room that blows a gentle cool breeze towards his low bed.
Feeling as if something were missing, he leaves and walks into the bathroom next door.
The walls are colored a sickly pale yellow, in accordance with the color of his father's second favorite SonBird juice flavor, lemon.
There is a small square shaped, pale lime colored bathtub installed horizontally against the back wall.
However Haru isn't bothered by the color like his mother is, and checks the time on his phone, '8:34 PM, guess I'll take a short bath.'
As hot water splashes into the tub, Haru locks the door and faces the mirror.
His prior unruly hair has now limped down and settled around his head, the mirror starts to fog up at the corners and Haru grabs the sides of the sink, he leans his face near the mirror's reflective surface.
He squints at his own hazel eyes, slightly covered by separate strands of dark hair, a small red dot appears beside his right eye.
'What the... Is that a pimple?'
After further examinations, he finally decides to ignore the unwelcome intruder and hop into the filled up bath.
A wave of water pours out over the top as he immerses himself in its warmth, shivers crawl up his entire body and leave from his head as Haru lets out a loud relieved sigh.
'Guess I'm being deported from my own home then.'
He felt it was weird how this happened, so he justifies it with, 'oh well, this happens to everyone at some point.' Although that didn't seem quite right.
'Homeland emigration! I like the sound of that, makes it seem as if I actually willingly left instead of being signed out.'
After what felt like fifteen minutes of meditating in the bathtub, he reaches for a towel and wraps it around himself as he climbs out. He wipes down his body before checking his phone, "oh it's nine, guess I was in there longer than I thought."
Suddenly he hears several knocks on the door, his father yells from outside, "Haru!! I haven't bathed yet and you locked the door! I've been calling you for ten minutes, what's going on?!"
In turn Haru yells back, "I'm coming out now!" After wiping himself dry, he leaves the towel on a rack before slipping back on his clothes, he then shuffles to the door.
"I can't believe you choose to take a bath now of all times," his father hurriedly slides between Haru and the door before closing it behind him. He starts to hum the SonBird advertisement music.
Haru quietly returns to his room, where he sits down at his desk and takes out a hairdryer from a compartment under it, he sets the hairdryer on the table as he reaches under the desk to plug in the cable.
After a moment of struggle, he starts to dry his hair, all the while his head was absent of any thoughts, as if he'd left them behind in the bathtub's water.
Soon Haru turns off the hairdryer and unplugs it before returning it to the compartment under his desk.
He appreciates the warmth emanating around his body for a moment, before it all gets blown away by the portable fan as he sits down on his bed.
"Mm..." He sits there staring into the air, feeling like he's forgetting something important.
"Oh well," he shrugs and walks over to the light switch, turning it off and heading to bed for the day.
As he dreams, a familiar environment appears before him, the back of the gymnasium. He thinks to himself, 'what am I doing back here?' Before a girl around his height exits one of the gymnasium's two back doors. 'Oh right, I'm here to meet Saito-san.'
"Good morning Sasaki-kun, did you need something?" Her voice is gentle and sweet, yet her words are all so dismissive to him.
His face begins to heat up.
Haru wakes up in a cold sweat, the fan is off and his door is left slightly ajar, he feels his throat seize up whilst panting.