restaurant girl | t. muichiro

chapter 32: i love you.

「

𝐢𝐟 𝐰𝐞 𝐝𝐞𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐭𝐨𝐧𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭, 𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐞 𝐣𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐛𝐞 𝐦𝐲 𝐥𝐨𝐯𝐞.

」

"In the flesh."

After the short silence, Muichiro felt the air rushing out of his lungs at the sheer force of you hugging him tightly. He let out a few dry coughs before letting the shock of feeling your arms wrapped around him hit him. Slowly, he moved his hand to gently pat your back.

He heard you whisper: "I'm sorry."

"It's okay. I would've believed it too."

"It's not okay. I believed Touya over you." You sighed. "I really fucked up, Muichiro."

Yuichiro awkwardly stood to the side, leaning his bodyweight onto the chair behind you and averting his eyes to the floor. He noticed the flashing light in the hallway and deduced that Muichiro found you both because of your broken flashlight.

"You're not taking that job offer." Yuichiro acted quickly to break the silence, watching the way his younger brother looked up at him incredulously. "I'm not gonna stand back and watch you kill yourself just for what you think is the better option. It's stupid that you even asked for time to consider it. When were you going to tell me?"

For now, Muichiro would rather die than let you escape him one last time. "I didn't want to jeopradize our income. I don't want to live from paycheck to paycheck either." As he spoke, he moved to intertwine his hand and fingers with yours before pulling away from the embrace.

"Are you even aware of anything? How many emails we get per day from other agencies begging to sign us to their company?"

"You aren't understanding. Our fate relies on this deal. Our parents don't make nearly enough money to keep that house here on their own--"

"It's pretty clear you aren't understanding either." Yuichiro snapped. "Let me make it clear: you are sixteen. You're not old enough to drive, not old enough to drink, and definitely not old enough to be getting hooked on adderall. Do you know how many people die from overdose and how terrible withdrawal is? You almost died! Any longer and you'd still be in the hospital! Hell, you aren't even capable of eating like a normal person safely right now! What makes you think that you can go making decisions regarding our income or your health?"

"For someone who's lived longer than me, you seemed completely uninformed about anything.Are you forgetting how long we lived in poverty before you grew in the agency? Guess what's going to happen as soon as we get fired."

"We'll find a new one! NextUp is clearly not a good one, anyway!"

You watched the two of them go back and forth quietly, letting yourself nearly disappear in the background as the two bickered. The feeling of the teen model's hand in yours felt comforting, but you couldn't shake the distress you felt at what you'd just witnessed. Perhaps it was the queasiness in your stomach or the adrenaline finally catching up to you that made you begin looping in and out like a derranged person.

Muichiro noticed the gentle swaying of your head, moving to loop your arm over his shoulder and slowly stand up, his other arm around your waist. "Which way did you both enter from?"