I am sitting on my bed waiting for Moa. The three of us had breakfast together and after that Moa disappeared for a bit. She later joined us in our room and we hung out. After having lunch together, she told me she'll be coming to pick me up for our date and with that she went to Su-chan's room with her. I don't really know what she's planned but seeing as this is my first date, I wanted to look nice. So I changed into something just a little bit nicer and put on my red skirt, pairing it with a plain white tee and a pair of black converse.
Soon I hear the bell ring. I thought she had the key-card with her, or maybe this is her trying to make the whole thing seem as real as possible. Cute. Smiling to myself I open the door. There she stands, in her black tee and denim shorts with her white keds, holding a laptop. So I guess it really is going to be a hotel-room date. I chuckle to myself as I let her in.
"What's so funny?" she asks, making herself comfortable on my bed, opening the laptop.
"Oh it's nothing. It's just... this whole thing... what you're doing... it's extremely adorable," I tell her as I settle in next to her.
"Adorable? I was going for romantic. But... that's okay. This is just the beginning."
"There's more?"
"Of course. I'm going to try and give you the whole dating experience as you see in the movies," she says looking through the list of movies and selecting one.
"Ooh... So what are we watching?"
"Ever seen Mimi wo sumaseba?" [a/n. the English title is Whisper of the Heart]
"Oh that? Rau-chan recommended it to me but I still haven't seen it. Is it any good?"
"I haven't seen it either. Su-chan says we should watch it so it must be good."
The movie starts and I get lost in it. This is a gem of a movie. After it's over I turn to her and she is looking at me with a huge grin plastered on her face.
"That was awesome," I tell her.
"Yeah. I did good, right... picking that movie?"
Something about the way she's looking at me- with big round eyes, blatantly fishing for a compliment from me, makes me feel like teasing her.
"I thought it was Su-chan's recommendation?"
"Eh? It was...but... I... But it was me who made the decision to choose it at the end."
"So are you saying the end justifies the means?"
"I guess... I don't know. Come on, stop it. Give me a little credit here," she pouts.
"I'm just kidding," I laugh, "and yes, you did wonderful," I say giving her a peck on the lips.
"Geez. You shouldn't tease me so much," she says as she puts the laptop away and starts getting off the bed.
"But your face when you get flustered is so cute I can't help it." I get off the bed myself.
"Shut your face," she says looking away.
Wait. Is she blushing?
"Are you blushing?!" I try to get her to turn towards me.
"No." Her voice is totally unconvincing.
"You are. You so are." I'm still trying to get her to look at me.
"Stop it, will you? Do you want me to call off the date? And I am not blushing." She's still facing away.
"Eeep... No, don't call it off, please. I'll be good, Miss, I swear. Tell me what you have planned for us next, Miss."
"Now that's more like it," she turns towards me, "And for what comes next, just follow me."
She takes my hand and we walk towards the door. As we reach the door she suddenly takes me by the waist and softly pushes me to the wall on the side. "There's just one thing I've got to do before we continue," she says, immediately pressing her lips to mine. Everytime I feel her lips on mine my body gets ignited. I can't help but pull her closer and it never seems like we're close enough. She always makes me want more of her. I greedily take her lips in mine, as my hands are tangled in her hair. Her hands on my waist are holding me tight and pulling me against her body. She presses into me and I, into her. I feel her hot breath as she opens her mouth and her tongue softly traces my lips. I part my lips and she lets her tongue in. My knees are starting to get weak as she continues to explore. My breaths are becoming ragged but still I cling on to her taste. I can never get enough of her taste. She is intoxicating.
As she starts pulling away, I try to hold on to her. But she moves further away and steps towards the door. Confused, I look at her and I see a smirk playing in the corner of her mouth.
"Revenge, for teasing me." She holds the door open for me. "After you."
The little...!
"You suck," I say as I exit the room.
"Yeah? But you still love me. And you look beautiful."
We enter the elevator and as it goes down, Moa starts to sing Concrete Road, a parody of Country Road they sang in the movie to herself. I join in.
"You know, Country Road is never going to sound the same anymore. I'll never be able to listen to it without hearing this version now," I tell her, laughing.
We get off on the ground floor and she takes me to the hotel cafe. The smell of freshly ground coffee greets us as we enter and take our place at the corner table. We place our orders and we're talking about this and that when a song I recognise starts playing softly. It's Ai wa hana, kimi wa sono tane, the English version.
"Do you recognise this song?" I ask Moa.
"Hmmmnn... it sounds familiar... very familiar... but I can't place it," she says listening to it.
"This is the original version of Ai wa hana."
"Oh."
We listen in silence. Half-way through the song she takes my hand on the table in hers and looks at me with the warmest expression. I can't help but get lost in the warmth of her eyes. She really is like the sun for me. She makes me feel alive. She makes me feel warm. She makes me feel loved. I don't remember how I was before all this started. It's like she has always been with me like this. My body doesn't remember the feeling of being without her. And frankly, I don't ever want to remember.
Just then our drinks arrive, pulling me back to reality. I realise another song has started playing.
"What's it called in English?" Moa asks, taking a sip of her drink.
"Huh? Oh, you mean the song? The title is The Rose, by Amanda McBroom I believe. I know that the Japanese and English lyrics are pretty much one and the same, but the song itself sounds a bit different when you hear it in English, right?"
"Yeah, a bit. But it's still beautiful."
After we finish our drinks we head out. I still have no idea what she has planned for the next activity so I just follow her lead. She takes me through the hotel lobby and towards the main entrance, and holds the door open for me when we reach it. We're going outside? I give her a quizzical look.
"It's okay. I asked K-san. He says it's okay if we only go to the place I told him we'll be going to and nowhere else. Go on, it's nearby," she says as she gently nudges me forward.
Heh. Leave it to Moa to get things done. It's hard to say no to her when she asks for something. We hardly ever find the need to make requests to K-san as he usually takes care of everything necessary for us before we ask. So I'm sure he must have been surprised and totally unprepared, especially when it's Moa who goes to him with a request. It kinda makes me wish I was there to see his reaction.
"We're here," Moa announces.
We're standing in front of the entrance to a park, right next to our hotel. She takes my hand and we go inside. The park is pretty much deserted except for a few old people. It feels nice and cool here. The rays of the afternoon sun stream through the trees here and there. There is a breeze blowing and birds are chirping. It's a picture perfect scene.
"This place is beautiful," I tell Moa.
"Yeah. I've wanted to come here with you from the moment I first saw it as we drove by on our first day."
We walk hand in hand for a while, taking in our surrounding. It's calm and peaceful, and I am with the one person I love the most in the world and she loves me too. This is what heaven must feel like. I can't possible ask for anything more. How can anyone?
"Aahhh...ducks!" Moa suddenly exclaims as she pulls me to the side towards a small pond. There are a few ducks in it.
There's nobody here besides an old couple sitting on the bench overlooking the pond. They smile as they look at Moa getting excited over the ducks, trying to get them to come to her. They see me standing on the side and ask if we were tourists and where we are from. I tell them we're tourists since the truth would take too long to explain. They seem to be a very nice couple, asking me whether I liked the place or not, and a few other small questions. I answer them as best as I can with my limited English. They soon get up to leave and as we say goodbye, they hand me a small packet motioning towards Moa. I take a look inside and I find breadcrumbs, for the ducks I assume. I give the packet to Moa and she happily starts feeding them. I join her for a bit but then decide to take a seat on the bench, and soon she comes and sits beside me.
"Having fun?" I ask her.
"Yeah, they're so cute," she says scrunching up her face.
"Meh, I've seen cuter."
"No way."
"It's true, I have. Right here." I kiss her on the cheek.
"No fair," she whines, and I laugh.
"You know, Yui, I've been thinking," she says after a while, "I want to thank you."
"Thank me for what?"
"For falling in love with me. Thank you."
"Well, the same goes for me too. Thank you for loving me back," I say, feeling a bit dumbfounded.
"No that's not it. You see, I didn't know myself at all. All these years I've known that you're special. I was happiest when I was with you. It was a different feeling from what I felt with my other friends. But I didn't understand it so I just chalked it up to it being because of our close bond due to the amount of time we spend together. If you hadn't fallen in love with me, I might never have realised my own feelings for you. So, thank you for falling in love with me."
I can't reply at once. Her words are making me choke up a little bit due to happiness.
"And I repeat, thank you for loving me back, and thank you for this perfect date," I say as I take her chin. Turning her face towards me I kiss her lips. A short but very sweet kiss.
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As we head back from the park and enter the hotel, we see a worried looking Su-chan in the lobby. She doesn't see us approaching until we are very near. As soon as she sees us she becomes frantic.
"Guys, it's bad. I think K-san knows," she says pulling us to a corner.
"What?" Moa and I chorused.
"He came back a little while ago and called me in his room, and asked me if there was anything going on between you two. I denied knowing anything but he says he needs to talk to you. He's asked me to tell you to go see him when you return."
My hands are shaking as Moa takes them in hers.
"But I don't understand. This morning he gave us permission to go out; he didn't look suspicious or mad or anything," Moa says.
"Wait. Did you say it was going to be just the two of us?" I ask her.
"Yes. Oh. So maybe that made him suspicious? Then this is all m..." Moa starts but Su-chan cuts her off.
"No, that can't be it. He said he's been wondering for a while now."
"Maybe what I did confirmed his suspicion. It's all my fault. I should have been more careful. I'm so sorry, Yui," Moa blurts out, tears in her eyes.
When I see her teary-eyed before me, I just want to protect her. I have to be strong for her, be calm and coherent for her and our sake.
"Hey now," I say as I try to comfort her, "it's not your fault. It's not anybody's fault. This is just how things are turning out. Let's discuss how we're going to deal with this."
"Yes, that's right," Su-chan chimes in. "And for what it's worth, I don't think he was angry. He looked more concerned than angry. So don't jump to any conclusions just yet."
"So what do you want to do? Do you want to deny it, or confess and receive what comes our way?" I ask Moa.
"What if we confess and they try to separate us?"
"They can't do that. Let's see... The worst they can do is fire us or take us to court citing violation of contract, though I don't remember anything like that specifically being in our contract. If they want BABYMETAL to continue, I don't think there's much they can do. I'm sorry for dragging you in our mess," I say, looking at Su-chan.
"I would never want to work with them again if they do something like that to you so don't worry about me," she reassures us.
"See, there's nothing they can do to separate us. So what will it be?" I turn to Moa.
She's silent for a while. Then she looks at me and asks, "What do you want to do?"
"I want whatever you want. As long as I end up with you, I am okay with anything."
She squeezes my hands tightly. "Okay then, let's tell them."
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-The End-