Disclaimer: I do not own Soul Eater.

Open Space
Poisoned Scarlett

"You know, you can always turn on the light in your bedroom." Soul speaks up, watching his meister jump with veiled amusement. She looks over her shoulder, lowering her book as he ambles toward her. He doesn't sit on the couch beside her; rather, he plops down on the floor before her, yawning loudly. "I made sure none of the light bulbs were burned out."

"I know, Soul." Maka smiles, returning to her book. "I didn't feel like sleeping yet, so I came down here for a while. It's nice when it's quiet."

Soul just yawns again but doesn't move from his spot. The Evans family summer villa was big, those had been Maka's thoughts when she arrived along with their friends. Truthfully, Soul hadn't wanted to come. Although the villa would be empty, his parents having gone to another one of his brothers concerts for two weeks, being in a house that's usually inhabited by them was unnerving. He could see bits and pieces of their living here; like how there were fashion magazines on the coffee table, his father's favorite vanilla coffee in the pantry.

It all began with that phone call Maka had unfortunately answered. Then Liz started it when she caught wind of the news and Black Star cemented it with his usually bullheaded decisions. Really, there wasn't much helping it, especially when his meister commented that it sounded like fun. He'd just have to put up with the pangs of nostalgia. But it wasn't as hard as he predicted it'd be; not with all of his friends there to distract him, not with his meister there to pull on his ear when he was spacing out again.

"Hey, Soul?"

Soul grunts when he feels his meister's foot smack into the back of his head. "What?" He grumbles, trying to shake her off. She only plants her second foot, teasingly pushing his head forward while he simmers. "Quit it, Maka! What is it?"

"Are your parents the only ones who live here?"

Soul pauses. "Yeah, why?"

"Really?" Maka hums, gently pushing her legs forward. Soul tips forward as well, but pushes back with his head until they're even again. "This is a lot of space for just two people…"

"Yeah, well, what'd you expect? It's not like they could just give up something like this. It wouldn't look good on the papers," Soul spits, once again pushed forward by her foot. But he gets where she's going with this: take, for example, this living room they're lounging in. It's so spacious, with a long leather white sectional couch and two other couches of the same shade spread out evenly. The flat-screen hangs across from them, forty two inches of space against a humongous pastel wall. The frames that hang off the walls are more decorative than personal, likely chosen out by the indoor decorator his mother hired months ago. The crystal coffee table that tops everything off seems too fragile and beautiful to place even a cup upon it, not that Black Star had any problem placing his feet on it earlier today...

Everything is aestheticly pleasing; more for show than actual living. This entire villa is like a doll house, Soul thinks to himself while his meister turns another page, and the people living inside are no better than that. For a moment, he wonders what that makes them. Intruders?

"Does your brother come visit, too?" Maka asks.

"Wes? Tch, yeah." Soul grunts as he feels Maka's feet slide down to his back. The sole of her foot massages his shoulder, and he decides he doesn't mind this type of contact. At least because he isn't squeamish about this sort of thing, not with her. But she'd probably Maka Chop him to the next town if he tried it on her, he wryly smiles to himself. Shrieking something about smelly feet and all that. She was way too scandalous sometimes. "He's always hanging around here when he isn't busy…"

"He has his own apartment somewhere, right?" Maka wonders, her toes digging into his neck. Soul closes his eyes, lowering his head so she could continue her absent massages. "In California… San Francisco, if I remember correctly?"

"Yeah," Soul sighs when she adds her other foot, rubbing out the knots of stress in his back. He doesn't know how she does it using only her feet but it's a hidden talent he's glad he discovered. It's probably the only reason he sits himself down on the floor before her, just so she could grace him with a literal foot massage on his straining back. Being slouched all cool like that took time and effort, Soul sighs as he feels the stress leave his shoulders with every cycle.

"Do they always leave the villa to you?"

"Sometimes," Soul says, sleepily. "Wes said something about me getting out of Death City for a bit during vacation. Not like it matters." His eyes open again and he straightens his back, Maka's legs slipping and resting on his shoulders instead. He leans back against the couch, her tense legs relaxing and hanging down his shoulders. "Deathscythe's don't get days off. I'm waiting for Lord Death to call us up on some insane mission again…"

"There hasn't been much activity since the Kishin was destroyed," Maka optimistically says. "Maybe we'll be able to stay until Monday after all!"

"Don't get your hopes up, Maka." Soul snorts, dropping his head back. He closes his eyes when he feels her fingers reach for his long fringes, combing through his hair like they always did nowadays. He tries not to think too much into these intimate actions. He doesn't want to ruin this attention he recieves from her so quickly. "There's always something going on out there."

"You're so negative," Maka sighs, and smiles and places her hands over his eyes. She catches his grunt of warning but she only lets her hands slowly slide down to his cheeks and further down to his strong jaw. She allows her fingers to inconspicuously admire his jaw line before her hands slide back up to his hair. His eyes open right after, darting up to her. But he can't see her: she's leaned back, allowing her fingers to fidget with his silver locks of hair again. "Papa said Lord Death would try to give us as much free time as possible…. after all that's happened, we deserve it. Most missions are going to second or third years, so we'll be off for a while if all goes as planned."

"Nothin' ever goes as planned," Soul mumbles, groaning when she pulls his hair warningly. "Maka! Ouch! That hurts!"

"Then stop saying stupid things and relax." Maka huffs, going back to her soothing ministrations. Soul growls softly in his throat but obeys, closing his eyes once more. Maka notices his hair was too soft. He was always using her shampoo, Maka grumbles. That's why she was always going out to buy more – he was too lazy to reach up into the shower basket and get his own bottle, instead using hers, which sits on the bathtubs edge. That's why his hair was too soft; untangled as it glides between her fingers like fine woven silk.

His face was also smooth of any blemishes. That she blames on the exercise, sweating out all the impurities from all the junk food he consumes during the day. But he needed to shave, Maka thinks, a hand sliding down to rub his cheek. It was scratchy.

"I already shaved," Soul says before she can comment.

"No, you didn't." Maka frowns, rubbing his cheek more furiously. "I can feel it under my hand, Soul. You didn't shave today."

"It's not my fault it grows back so quickly." He sneers, cracking an eye open. His eyes dart to her legs, which still dangle from his shoulders, and a sly grin stretches his face. His hand reaches up to cup her calf, sliding the hand down to her ankle and lifting her leg up a bit. "You need to shave, too."

"I do not!" Maka fires back, wiggling her leg from his grasp. His other hand comes up and slides up to her thigh, stilling her as he repeats the action and dares to move higher up her thigh. His fingers dig into her skin as they rub her leg, marveling the silk skin and hard muscle none too subtly.

"Or not." He says, lightly impressed. He rubs her right leg, then her left as if weighing his options. "Maybe it was just your right one…"

"They both feel the same, you liar!" Maka snaps, batting away the creeping flush on her cheeks with anger. "I shaved both of them today!"

"Hmm, not well by the looks of it." He smirks, sucking a breath when her leg suddenly wraps around his neck. He struggles, literally choked by the massive power her toned legs held. "Okay—okay, you did! Maka, I can't breathe—!"

"Hmph!" Maka huffs, loosening up her strangle. Soul gasps in air, sending her a withering look. "That's what I thought you said."

"Jeez, you're so violent." He wheezes, rubbing his neck. "That's not cute in a girl—OW!"

"No one asked for your opinion!" Maka grinds out, dropping her legs from his shoulders completely. Soul holds the bump on his head while she makes to stand, fed up with his attitude. It's about time she went to sleep, anyway: she'd have to wake up early to make breakfast with Tsubaki. "I'm going to bed. Night, Soul."

"Yeah, night." Soul smiles back, watching her go through lidded eyes. He slumps back on the couch, gazing ahead absently for another half hour. His family really did have a lot of space. It's almost gone to waste, considering how much room is still leftover. The entire house feels empty, Soul determines. Although it's clear that people live in it, now more so with so many spending a few days over so they could hang by the beach, it still holds that dollhouse effect.

Soul picks himself off the floor, heading back down the hall to the stairwell. He takes each step slowly, not a plank creaking with his weight. It stays silent, the plush carpet beneath his toes warm. He turns down another hall, heading for the door that's his room for the next few days, when he notices light coming from beneath Maka's door. He pauses, sure he heard her say she would be hitting the hay. Maka usually fell asleep quite quickly although she awoke at the slightest noise. Deciding he'd have nothing to lose, Soul opens her door slightly and peeks in, rolling his eyes and letting himself in entirely.

That idiot. She fell asleep with her nose buried in a book, why is he so surprised? Soul feels a small smile climb to his face as he nears her, taking the book from beneath her chin and placing her bookmark in it before setting it on her nightstand. The last time he doggy-paged a book, he'd gotten an earful from her. He grabs the duvet, tugging it from beneath her and wrapping it around her as she stirs but doesn't awaken. She can be a heavy sleeper when she's tired; Soul knows only too well.

Even this guest room, Soul thinks absently, letting his eyes roam the room, is too big for a single person. It's huge, with a queen sized bed nestled snugly in the middle. The closet has two sliding doors, of which double as mirrors and allow him to see himself standing beside Maka's bed. The window to the front of him is tall, cracked open to allow a swift summer breeze to blow through. The carpets cream colored; the nightstand is marble black. There's an ebony black wardrobe pushed against the wall, a long vanity beside it. The tall mirror there is rather dusty from disuse. Maka has her own bathroom here, something she'd joyously said she was grateful for as he took so long during the mornings.

"What're you doin', Soul?" Maka yawns, rolling herself further into a cocoon. She struggles with the duvet that has her enveloped like a burrito before she gives up, rolling on her back and looking up at Soul sleepily. "You okay?"

"Just thinking," he murmurs.

"About?"

"This house." There was a time when he would fight to keep his thoughts to himself. He's learned to stop that. If he tried, Maka would somehow wrench the information from him. She was clever that way. "It feels…fake. Like a dollhouse."

"Your parents are really wealthy. I'm not surprised they bought a summer house." Maka states, deliberately. "A lot of wealthy families do, especially when they have children."

At this, Soul snorts derisively. "Cut the bull, Maka. You know as well as I do that the only reason they let me spend the summer here with you guys is 'cause Wes called and you answered the damn phone…"

"For the last time, I said I was sorry!"

"Yeah, yeah, I know…" He broods. "Just don't do it next time. Anything that isn't local, leave to me. Deal?"

Maka rolls her eyes. "Whatever you say, Soul."

He looks at the clock and grins. "It's gonna' be three. You're not gonna' wake up tomorrow." Although he can easily wake up, groggy and ill-tempered, it took the power of heaven and hell combined to drag Maka out of bed if she did not get enough hours of sleep. He'd learned that one day they stayed up until two in the morning watching movies on a school night. Although they ended up going to school anyway, they had missed the first four periods of the day and Maka still passed out on the couch the instant they reached home.

"Don't remind me... are you sure we can use your father's coffee? Didn't he say something about that?" Maka fights a little more to release herself from the prison that is her blanket while Soul slouches toward the door. He laughs a little at the sight but covers it up with a cough when she looks up warningly.

"Pretty sure he wouldn't mind if we buy another can for him before we leave," he replies, cheerfully. Maka presses her lips together, not liking the idea but not about to deny herself a cup of hot coffee in the morning. "Just don't tell anyone about it. Patty can chug a gallon of coffee once she gets started..." Both shudder at the thought. "Night, Maka."

"Good night, Soul." Maka beams back, watching the door until it completely closes and his footsteps fade. She shifts onto her back, snuggling deeper in her blankets, and closes her eyes once more to prepare herself for the next day of fun.