Welcome to Gaia! ::

"Yeah, one moment!" The ghoul in question shouted, hastily putting aside her book and moving the two fruttens that'd been sleeping on her belly before getting up and moving to open the door.

"Hey Mei," she grinned, throwing open the door before pulling her friend into a quick hug. "Come on in!" Stepping back and gesturing for her to enter, she quickly surveyed her room and lamented the fact that she really hadn't had any warning about this visit. She'd at least have tidied up a little if she knew the other ghoul was coming over; as it was the place was a mess of open school books, half-finished assignments and minipets napping everywhere.

"D'you want a cup of tea or something? I've also got some, wait, a second -" she moved to a drawer, rummaging around for a little bit before triumphantly holding up her find; "spookies! Good ones too, not the mass-produced ones, promise. You want any?"

Humming in reply, she started setting up for tea; she'd already had a pot on, but it'd gone so dark it was nearly undrinkable and she wasn't putting Mei through that. "Congrats!" She paused to throw a grin at her friend, "I'd love to see it sometime. We could have a house-warming party!"

Then it was back to putting the tea on, and Leo's reply to the question was a drawn-out groan and the words, "ugh, don't remind me. I like the practical stuff well enough, but all this sitting around and reading about the past really isn't me."

Still, she was making progress. "I'm close to the exam for entering third year, now - just a little bit to go and I'll be ready for it."

"Sure! You know I'll always make time for you," a thumbs up and a smile at her friend, then she deemed the water boiled enough to add a teabag to it. Moving the pot to her little coffee table, she went to grab another mug for her.

"Really fast?" Leo laughed, shaking her head a bit, "Mei, I've been here for five years - really fast passed by a while ago, I think."

Setting the extra cup down on the table, she took a seat while nodding emphatically. "Tell me about it! And what job is ever going to require that of you, seriously? You'd have to be a historian or something."

Weirdly that did make her feel slightly better; it wasn't like she spent long hours thinking about how slow she'd been or anything though. Well... not hours, at least. Some minutes, maybe, mostly when someone younger than her graduated and she was still here, doing the same things she'd done for five years.

Still, that didn't make her school experience a bad one. Sometimes she just got a bit envious of all the creeple who'd moved on with their life.

Caught up in her thoughts, she almost missed Mei's words - almost but not quite. "Really?" She threw her friend an encouraging smile, finally noticing that she seemed a bit.. off. Nervous, maybe? "You know I'll help with anything I can," and she would, in a heartbeat.

Leo nodded as Mei spoke, watching her friend with a kind smile and concerned eyes - whatever this thing was, it was obviously serious. She'd never seen her best friend like this, not in all the time she remembered knowing the jiang shi.

She easily let the other ghoul take her hands, curling her fingers around her and stroking gently with a thumb. And took in the words that were being spoken, a small wrinkle on her forehead. "Me too Mei; you're my best friend in the whole world, you know? I don't have any other friends like you."

Was that it? That seemed rather simple; if all her friend had needed was a little reassurance, she was happy to give it.

She felt slightly puzzled as Mei leaned in and then just before soft lips touched her own, had a moment of pure realization. Then the kiss - because that was definitely a kiss, right? - was over and she blinked rapidly, trying to come to terms with what'd just happened.

Opening her mouth to say something, anything, it occurred to her that she'd just been kissed by her best friend and her mouth shut quickly as all the blood in her body rushed to her face. That was what it felt like, anyway - but that would probably have killed her if that was true, right?

She was stalling.

Consciously she cleared her throat, cheeks still blazing and tried forming some words; "that was... nice?"

Leo jumped up after Mei stood up, startled by the sound of her knee hitting the table and also things were moving really fast and to be quite frank she was still a bit confused -

but then Mei was making excuses to leave and it was quite, quite clear that she had messed up in some way.

Springing into action, she clumsily tumbled after the other ghoul (why did everything in her room suddenly seem to be in her way?) and hastily clasped her arms around her to stop her from getting out the door.

"No!" She said, quite decisively, and then floundered for a moment because she was very close to someone who'd just kissed her and Mei was soft in all the right places but -

- but that was a thought for later. "We need to talk about this. Right now." Arms still clasped around her best friend, she started maneuvering them back towards a seat.