-Amber’s POV-

-The Next Day-

I slowly wake and sit up, only to immediately get blinded by the rising sun streaming through my window.

*Owwww…*

Trying to escape the blinding sunlight, I get up and make my way over to the bathroom. After a quick shower, I fight to make my long, tangled hair look somewhat decent. Feeling a lot fresher, I go out to the living room and spot a blanket burrito laying on top of the couch, moving rhythmically as the girl inside breaths. I’m about to continue to the kitchen when a thought suddenly crosses my mind.

Nova has always been worse than the rest of us when it comes to handling heat, mentioning that her body “runs” really hot. Being burritoed in a blanket like that, she must be really warm.

Worried, I pull back the blanket. I expected a face, but instead a mess of wavy hair spills out, shining a breathtaking silver in the morning sun. Shifting some hair around, I eventually manage to reveal a sleeping face. Disturbed by the light now shining on her face, Nova mumbles and squishes her face back into the fabric around her, triggering a swelling feeling in my chest.

Unable to resist the overwhelming cuteness in front of me, I give in and begin to poke and squish her cheeks, triggering some noises and movement from her.

Eventually satisfied, I go into the kitchen, grab some mix, and begin making waffles. While the waffle iron is cooking, I think about what happened last night and (more importantly) how to ask Nova about it without scaring her back into the blankets. Should I be straight forward? Should I not ask at all and wait for her to talk? Both options seem… awkward.

Once the waffles are done, I place them onto plates and set them on the dining table with a bottle of syrup. Looking over the dividing half-wall and back into the living room, I find that Nova is still asleep. I figured with all the noise I made she would’ve woken up…

“Nova~” I call out to her.

…Nothing.

“Nova, wake up! I made chocolate chip waffles, your favorite!”

I wait for a few seconds... and still get no response. A little concerned at this point, I decide to go and check on her.

-Nova’s POV-

The noise and smell of a waffle iron is enough to get my brain started, but not enough to make me get up and face Amber. As I try to think of a way to avoid dealing with the events of last night, the sound of the iron stops, replaced some footsteps.

“Nova~” Amber puts on a sweet voice, but I refuse to respond.

*I don’t wanna explain anything… Too tired…*

“Nova, wake up! I made chocolate chip waffles, your favorite!”

*…*

I hear her footsteps approach the couch and she places a hand on my side.

“Psst, Nova?”

She shakes me a little. Stirred, my stomach produces a deep rumble.

*I can’t hide anymore… My stomach demands waffles.*

I pretend to wake up and see Amber above me.

“Hey Nova~” she smiles sweetly.

I can feel my cheeks and body heat up, despite already being rather warm.

*She looks so…*

“Huh, that’s a new color. What does that golden pink mean?”

*Wha-, color? Ah! My eyes!*

I quickly bury my face back into the blanket in a desperate attempt to hide my confusing feelings.

Amber retracts her hand “Oh, sorry.”

I curl up tighter, retreating further into the burrito “No, it’s ok…”

“Hey, if you want to, you can tell me if you need me to look away, ok?”

I give a short nod, though I don’t really want to say something like that to her.

Satisfied, Amber smiles and walks back to the kitchen.

I sit up and look over to the table to see she prepared something for us. Even through my sleep clogged nose I can smell waffles. The scent encourages my stomach to file a few more complaints. Complying, I get up from the couch, grunting a little from weirdly sore joints, and walk to the kitchen. A small dining table is nested in the center of the kitchen zone with two chairs are placed on either side of it. As Amber sits in one, I sit in the other.

I finally manage to separate a chunk of the waffle, stab it, and shove it into my mouth. It tastes pretty good, and Amber got the cook time just right.

I hum lightly as I chew “Thank you for the waffles, I’ll make something for you tonight in return.”

Amber gives a small smile “I look forward to it”

I give a slight nod and go back to eating.

A bit of time passes without either of us saying anything, so Amber tries to start another bit of small talk “So, how did you sleep?”

I can tell she’s trying to work her way around to ‘it’.

“Not amazingly…”

“Really? It was hard to get you to wake up.”

“Well, it was rough getting to sleep in that position, but once I was asleep, I stayed that way.”

“Do you always sleep that deeply?”

“Yep! I’ve slept through everything from thunderstorms to fire alarms.”

“…”

“…”

Her expression contorts a bit “That seems dangerous…”

“You- Aren’t the first to say that…”

We silently go back to eating.

Once we finish, Amber and I pick up all of the dirty dishes and carry them over to the sink. As we are cleaning, Amber speaks up.

“So hey… I was wondering. Last night…”

“Oh? OH! That is, um, an ongoing mystery…”

“A… mystery?”

“Well, as far as I can tell by poking around the internet, I am the first person to experience this phenomenon, so there is no precedent or research to go off of.”

“So, if you’re the first person to discover this, what should we call it?”

“I’m not really sure, I’ve never thought about that part.”

“Hooow abooout… ‘The Rainbow Eyes’!”

I do have a few things to say about that, but choose to hold my tongue. Amber looks me directly in the eyes and frowns.

“Ok then… any ideas?” There is a small, but notable hint of sass behind her tone.

“Hmm, we could call it my ‘Optical Mutation’?”

“Ehhhh… that makes it sound bad.”

Nova nods “Fair enough…”

We continue to trade ideas and eventually settle on calling my changing eye color ‘Dynamochromia’. Once we are finished with that, our conversation quickly deviates into idle chatter lands on a subject that reminds me of something.

“Hey, you know what I just remembered?”

“What?”

“I never really figured out what to do from here”

“What do you mean?”

“Like, where do I actually put my stuff? And I can’t sleep on your couch forever. Yesterday I just kinda made a little corner for myself, set up a desk, then was too tired to do or think any further…”

Amber tilts her head “Do you want to do that now?”

“Are you ok with helping me?”

“Of course!”

“Uhm, ok! Just, give me a sec…”

I shimmy my way out of the chair while motioning Amber to stay seated. Excitement growing, I run over to my corner of the apartment and grab some sheets of paper off the top of the desk. As I turn back to the table, I see Amber smiling at me.

Her expression says it all…

-Amber’s POV-

*She’s adorable when she gets like this~*

Nova slowly returns to the table, her white irises now slightly pinker.

I look up at her “Someone embarrassed?”

Nova gives me a cute pout “See, this is why I wear those sunglasses! It’s way too easy for people to read my emotions now!”

I rest my arm on the table and use it to hold up my head.

“I don’t need your eyes changing color to tell how your feeling~”

Nova’s iris’s go completely pink and her face flushes.

*Wait, did I just?*

“…”

“…”

“Anyway, whatcha got there!?” I hurriedly blurt out.

“Right!”

She rushes to place down the papers she’s holding and I begin to look over them.

“Is this a map of my flat?”

“Yep! While I didn’t make any real plans last night, I did decide to draw up a template and some furniture pieces for us to play around with designs and layouts.”

“Okay then, let’s get started.”