Hot Coffee on Christmas
It was getting late. Very late. The curtains of the Future Gadget Laboratory were half closed, and so the only light came from the small laptop in the back of the room and the dull light from the smartphone screen on the table. A single window remained open, so the occasional gust of cold wind would blow through the lab and cause both current lab mems inside to consider getting up to close it, but never actually bothering to do it. Kurisu had stayed behind at the lab to work on research for the paper she was writing, while Okabe had stayed with her to work on another one of his 'Future Gadgets' very loudly on the other side of the room.
Before either of them had realised it, the last train had been and gone, and as they looked out of the window and saw the heavy rain hammering down from the mid-winter sky, they were out of options. They would have to spend the night at the lab. Together. Alone.
'It's not THAT weird!' Kurisu had thought at the time, 'Now that we've been dating a while, it's perfectly natural for us to spend time together like this. And besides, it's not like I can leave anyway! I can last one night with Rintaro Okabe.'
The late hour, the dull light, and the loud pattering of the rain on the windows of the lab set a peaceful, almost beautiful mood. Or they would have, were the two people in the lab not currently locked in a loud, angry battle of words. She didn't remember how it started, but she knows it started how it always did with the two of them. Playful back and forth, a way of communicating between just the two of them, where witty jabs and petty arguments kept them talking without the fear of awkward silences or dull small talk.
It was in this playful banter that Kurisu found comfort. The familiar safety in the stupid, pointless arguments they had gave her a sense of joy she daren't admit to him out loud, allowing her to be freely expressive to the man who had taken her first kiss without wanting to die of embarrassment at the thought of looking like one of those couples she saw out on the streets of Akihabara that were all over each other. As this argument went on, however, she realised that it wasn't the same as always.
Their voices kept getting louder and louder, their jabs less witty, their argument less playful. Kurisu felt that familiar comfort and ease blown out of her, as if one of the gusts of wind coming in from outside had whisked away her safety with it. It continued without sign of stopping, and she could feel herself shrinking further and further into herself with every word exchanged between them. She wanted it to stop now, she'd had enough. She wanted it to be over. But she knew she couldn't let Okabe have the last word, or she'd never hear the end of it from him. So, with every remark he would make she would rebut, although not with the usual wit or vigour expected of her. She wasn't even meeting his eye anymore. His eyes before had been full of that childlike entertainment they usually held, but she was too scared to look now. Would they look the same as always, or would the eyes looking on her now be full of anger? She couldn't bear the thought.
Okabe turned and yelled something back at her in that loud, high and mighty voice he has in situations like this. Kurisu didn't hear a word of it. She just wanted him to stop yelling at her now, to stop looking at her; and it was this that finally broke her. Avoiding his gaze still, she said nothing and just stood there. She didn't know how long had passed, probably only a few seconds, but to her it felt like an eternity. She felt tears fill her eyes, before the heat of her cheeks hit her and she spun around and sprinted out of the lab into the cold and wet night. As she turned, she could have sworn she saw Okabe's face immediately lose the ever-present foolish confidence it wore and fall into a state of pure panic, but those thoughts were immediately pushed from her mind as she stomped through the pouring rain.
A little while had passed since she had left the lab, and here she sat against the closed shutters of the Akihabara train station, huddled small and crying quietly as the rain fell on her already soaked body. She pulled out her phone to check the time. 11:56pm. She put it back again and just sat there still, mumbling confused nothings to herself as she did so.
"Idiot. Stupid idiot. Why is he always like this? I hate everything about him. His stupid face. His stupid voice." As Kurisu continued by herself, she was interrupted by the sound of splashing and a loud voice that snapped her back to reality.
"Kurisu? Kurisu! There you are! I've been running all over looking for you!" Stood in front of her, hunched over out of breath and completely drenched, was Okabe. She looked away from him and crossed her arms tightly before responding.
"Oh, you have? It took you long enough to find me here." Her words had a little more sting to them than she intended, but she was really in no state to be apologising to HIM right now. It was his fault she was out here in the first place, after all!
"Hey! I had a lot of ground to cover and-" Okabe immediately took to defend himself before stopping and stretching out his right arm "Hey, have you been crying?" Kurisu instinctively wiped her face with her wet sleeve.
"No! And besides even if I had been, you wouldn't be able to tell with all this rain!" Okabe simply carried on looking right at her and shook his head a little.
"I think I would, Kurisu, considering how red your eyes are"
"My eyes are not red! Shut up you idiot, did you run all the way out here in the rain just to make fun of me? Is that it?" Kurisu turned her head away from him and remained silent for a moment, before peeking back and seeing that Okabe was still looking at her, now with a soft smile on his face.
"Here, take this. I didn't just spend my time running around after you, you know." As he said this he reached out with his right arm, which was holding what appeared to be a paper cup with a plastic lid on top.
"What? Why? Where did you get this at this hour?" Kurisu gingerly reached out to Okabe's outstretched hand and grabbed the paper cup that was in it before carefully lifting the lid off the top and feeling the hot steam slam into her face at once.
"Well there's this place not too far from the lab that's almost always open, so I thought that since you were out in the rain in the middle of the night in the winter, you would…appreciate a cup of warm coffee." It was Okabe's turn to look away this time, and as he did Kurisu had to suppress a smile. 'This was exactly like him she thought, 'He can be a really nice guy sometimes, but most of it never makes it out through that thick skull of his' And she continued to try and not smile as she took sips of the thankfully still hot coffee whilst trying to protect it from the rain that was still falling heavily. She noticed Okabe check his phone before quickly looking away again and thrusting his other arm forward this time.
"It's after midnight now so here you go! I didn't get time to wrap it but still, I got you this. Merry Christmas!" He blurted this out as quickly and awkwardly as he possibly could, but still Kurisu leaned forward and grabbed the plastic bag. She pulled the contents out and found herself holding a plush toy of a white cat-like animal with a large V-shaped mouth and blushed cheeks. Kurisu recognised it immediately and turned a bright shade of red.
"W-what even is this? I've never seen this before in my life!" Okabe just laughed at her, causing her to go an even brighter red.
"You really are bad at hiding the Channeler in you, aren't you? I saw it as I passed the computer while you were browsing Channel a while ago and so I got one for you." Hearing this, Kurisu remained red as she curled into herself again, squeezing the plush tightly between her legs and her chest. She thought about the present she had gotten for him, still wrapped neatly on the bed of her hotel room
"Stupid idiot Okabe…" She said into the plush, causing Okabe to once again fall into a state of panic.
"Don't like it? It wasn't that expensive, I can always go back and get it swapped for something you like better! Or If you want, I could-" He was cut off when Kurisu quickly stood up and wrapped her arms around him in a strong hug. The feelings all came back to her in that moment. The joy in her mind, the comfort in her heart, the little tingle she'd feel in the pit of her stomach that only appeared when she was with him. They all came flooding back, and as she felt incapable of thanking him with words, this would have to be the next best thing.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!" In her flush of emotions, she had completely forgotten about the scalding hot cut of coffee that was in her hand. WAS being the important part, as she now realised it was instead all over the back of Okabe's lab coat, and it was him who had just let out that bloodcurdling scream.
Kurisu had once again gone a bright red, however this time she wasn't embarrassed. As she watched Okabe flail around until he managed to get his dripping wet lab coat off and drop it on the ground with a wet plop, she hunched over laughing harder than she had in a long time. Okabe was staring at her in frustration and confusion, which when Kurisu noticed this, made her laugh even harder.
"What's so funny about this? That stain will never come out! Not to mention I go to all the effort of finding you, buying you coffee, and giving you an amazing Christmas present and this is how you repay me? Betrayed! By my own assistant!" She completely ignored Okabe's eccentric rant and readied herself again as the laughter died down until all that could be heard was Okabe's frustrated sighs and the thumping of rain on the street around them.
"Maybe he's not such a useless idiot after all" she muttered to herself, before gesturing to Okabe. He turned to her and once again displayed a face of confusion as Kurisu looked right at him with the most genuine and sincere smile she had ever worn.
"Merry Christmas, Okabe."