"Miss Sato, I was hoping we could talk about something kind of personal today," Mr. Takahashi said. Sakie was torn between being disbelieving and embarrassed. Which she supposed was improvement, two months ago she could only have been embarrassed. She decided to try the other one out, though a blush crept onto her face all the same.

"Mr. Takahashi, we've been meeting every weekend for the sake of finding out the biological, psychological, and emotional implications of my ability to seduce men with touch. If that isn't personal, I don't know what is," she replied.

He grinned and laughed, "I suppose you're right, but we've only been talking about it in in the abstract. I was hoping to ask you some more about your personal experiences today."

She flushed, "I…I don't use my power on purpose, never have really, you know that."

"Not you using your aphrodisiac affect, more about how this affects your relationships with men in general," he was quick to assure her, leaning forward. She had started to get over her crush, but with him looking at her like that, asking a question about her relationships with men, her face erupted in a blush and she couldn't help flinging her arms out.

"Don't! Ah," she pulled herself together as he pulled back, clearly disappointed, but accepting. "Ah, no, what I mean is…it's embarrassing, so…could you look away while I explain?" she said, squeezing her eyes shut and hands into fists.

"Oh, of course, whatever makes you the most comfortable," he said, turning his chair away from her sitting on the couch. Ms. Sato peeked when she heard the chair move, and opened her eyes to see him staring at a notebook on his desk. Her heart rate returned to normal, or at least to a pace that allowed her to talk normally.

"Thank you. Sorry for being so…strange." She focused on the window and the outside as she organized her thoughts. She had analyzed herself endlessly, but this was the first time she was going to be sharing these particular psychological findings about herself with anyone else, "I know you must have noticed, but especially in the beginning of our association, I didn't know how to act around you. That's because this is the first relationship with a male that I've attempted based on something other than my succubus ability or my abilities as a teacher."

He stiffened, she noticed in the corner of her eye, but like he promised, he kept silent.

"I loved my father growing up, still do, and we had a very touchy relationship. I would randomly pop into his office to give him hugs and he would play with my hair when we were sitting together for a music concert. Of course, that worked against us when my nature started showing at 13."

"He drew away from me, I didn't know why he started dodging my hugs and he never kissed my forehead goodnight. He told me it was part of growing up, but he never looked at me when he said it. He started buying me baggy tracksuits and my usual outfits started disappearing. He encouraged me to start judo lessons, and eager for some sort of connection with him, I threw myself into the sport. Mom tried to figure out what was going on, but he would never say, just feign ignorance.

"Then came a summer day, it was hot so I was only in a tank top and shorts. I walked into my father's office to ask permission for one of my friends to come over, but he had headphones in and was marking up a document for work. I touched the back of his hand to get his attention and he sort of…short circuited. He jerked away, then his eyes went to me and then he was…" she jerked out of her story for a moment to look at her audience, and he was staring determinedly at his notebook. She whispered the end of the sentence, "then he was kissing me."

"I flipped him," she confessed, watching Mr. Takahasi for his reaction, but not seeing anything, "and then I ran. That night, he left. The shame of being attracted to his daughter was too much. Mom finally put together that I was a succubus, and she called the government office to double check the symptoms. Of course, there was no way to control it other than dressing in the ugliest clothing possible and not touching anyone. That's when Mom started to hate me. From then on, all my interactions with men were seeped with this knowledge that they were uncontrollably attracted to me. It was like reading text over a watermarked image, always in the background."

She pulled her knees up to her chest, "It was my fault too, unless they tried to touch me, then I judo flipped them, embarrassed them, and they didn't try it again. But most of the time it was my fault. If they were unfaithful to their wives or girlfriends, that was me, and if their wives and girlfriends felt worthless after that, that was my fault too." She chuckled darkly.

"Those girlfriends made it very clear that I would never attract a boyfriend on my own, that every relationship I had would be solely based on the man's sexual attraction to me and I would never be anything more than a sex toy. As if I didn't know that already. I had one female friend who stood by me through high school, and I threw myself into my studies otherwise. I made it into a great university, but I didn't know what I wanted to do. Then I realized that if I taught kids, I could dress how I needed to and limit my interactions with men to other teachers. High school boys, especially first years, don't generally have enough of a sex drive to become a problem if they bump into me accidentally."

"Wouldn't teaching elementary or middle school have been better for you then?" Mr. Takahashi asked, speaking for the first time since she began. He was looking at her, but she didn't mind so much now that her story was out.

"It would be," she said with a small smile, "but high school days last longer and succubi have the most difficult time in high school. I only became interested in the other demis after you introduced me to them, but I've always been interested in helping out succubi."

"You're amazing," he said, startling her into a blush. "Most succubi either retreat from civilization or turn themselves into objects for sex because they don't see another option, or that's what Ugaki told me. You chose the hardest path possible, why?"

"It wasn't too difficult, I did have one male friend that, while our relationship was because of my succubus nature, it wasn't sexual," Ms. Sato said, fidgeting with the end of her ponytail.

"Ugaki?" Mr. Takahashi guessed, and Ms. Sato nodded.

"He found me at my school bus stop, he had had some complaints from mothers of other students about me, but when he met me he knew I was doing my best to not attract attention and I was trying to not be defined by my nature. We never touched, but he was willing to support me emotionally where my father wasn't. We would meet up in cafes a couple of times a year and catch up on each other's lives. His wife adores me and they came to my high school and university graduations, proud of me in the place of my parents."

Her eyes glazed over, watching fond memories. And Mr. Takahashi couldn't help but smile at her. Such a dreamer, and so resilient. No wonder Ugaki wanted him to watch over Miss Sato more than the others, he really was like her father.

"I still don't understand why you chose such a difficult life, but I'm glad for it," he said, pulling her from her thoughts.

She blushed and averted her eyes, trying not to let his words effect her, or at least not show it, "Uh, I guess because despite everything, I'm a romantic. One day I hope to have a real relationship with a man who sees me for who I am, and wants to just spend time with me. I want to go on picnics and read and talk about books together. I want someone to spend my quiet time with where we can just…exist. I know that that probably isn't going to happen, because if I truly let down my guard, their thoughts would turn immediately to sex. Sex will be a part of it of course, but my dream of quiet moments is difficult when I have to be aware of every single touch. And there will always be doubt on both sides about whether the attraction is real or my aphrodisiac affect. Despite that, I keep hoping that that will happen, and that small chance goes to no chance if I live as a monk in the mountains. And I'm not really suited to the party animal life, too much of an introvert. Of course, I have a little more faith in myself now, thanks to you."

Now it was his turn to blush, but she wasn't watching, so he took a second to control himself and ask, "What have I done?"

She turned and laughed then, and it was pretty, at the same time that it was loud and forceful, "What have you done?" she laughed. "This is my first successful friendship with a man. In the beginning I wasn't sure what to do, which is why I would occasionally test you with my succubus effects to figure out where you stood. I just didn't understand how a relationship worked that didn't put your attraction to my body as a significant factor. Once I realized that attraction wasn't why you wanted to talk to me, that you were much more interested in what I could teach you about demis around my succubus effect, I could act much more naturally. It was your insistence on acting like I didn't affect you that made me interested in dating you in the first place."

"Wait what?" he asked, mouth dropping open.

"Oh, erm," she said, her laughter leaving and the awkward returning. It was clear she wished she hadn't said that, "Er, like I said, I didn't understand a relationship with a male that didn't factor in attraction. When you didn't seem attracted to me, I replaced it with my own, but only for a little while! Then I figured out you simply respected me and didn't want to make me feel uncomfortable around you, and it would have been against your will if I used my succubus effect on you, so I stopped. Relationships for you are built on more than physical attraction and I've gone and ruined that by making you feel uncomfortable around me, and now I'm just running off at the mouth, and this is so embarrassing!" she curled up into a ball, pressing her head into her knees so that only her reddening roots were available to be seen. Though she continued talking about how much she messed up.

Mr. Takahashi, on his part, suddenly had reanalyze every interaction he had had with Miss Sato, and several things became clearer. He stopped listening to her rambling and was trying to figure out how to factor a succubus's attraction to someone else. Compared to their aphrodisiac effect on others, he had always considered the attraction on the succubus side of the relationship to be minimal or non-existant. Of course that was flawed reasoning, and apparently he now knew what an inexperienced succubus with an attraction to someone looked like. He wondered if they could control the intensity of their effect according to how much they liked the person, like a baseline that increased with their will, or if the attention was what actually changed the situation like it was in normal relationships. This was fascinating.

"and part of it is Ugaki's fault anyway!" that part cut through his thoughts for some reason.

"How is it Ugaki's fault?" he asked. This was the first time he had ever heard her blame someone else for her effect. She was still bright red, matching her track suit.

"Well, er, he's the one that encouraged me to use my aphrodisiac effect on you after he knew I was attracted to you, in the beginning," she admitted.

"What?" he said again, this was a lot more information than he bargained for. She didn't look like she was going to say anything else so he prodded, "I thought that it was his job to stop succubi from using their effects on people."

She looked up, blush fading, "No, I thought you understood. No one can stop a succubus's effect, that infringes on the succubus's agency and liberty, not to mention it's impossible without complete incarceration. Ugaki's job is more about the government interacting with a succubus than stopping the succubus from using her powers to control people. People are on their own for that one. As long as a succubus isn't trying to control the government, they can do what they want. Unless she has a conscience, of course. Ugaki worries about me settling down with a family, knowing what a romantic I am. Plus, he thinks that any guy I decide to seduce would be extremely lucky, even if it was against his will. I disagree with him of course, and figured that out halfway though our first talk like this." She flushed bright red and ducked her head again. He could practically see her thoughts, and "kill me now" seemed to be the most common one.

He wanted to write everything down to think about later, because his thoughts were much too jumbled right now. It didn't help that her aphrodisiac effect was working around her glasses and track suit, or maybe it was just him remembering her in her tank top and sans glasses during that first meeting. Ms. Sato certainly goes zero to one hundred quick.

"I'm sorry," she said, pulling herself even tighter into a ball. There was also the fact that he had wanted to comfort her through her whole story. Between her father and her touch starvation, he felt his heart break. He had wanted to reach out and give her a hug like he had done with the other demis when they needed the comfort no one else would give them, but of course, Miss Sato had already spelled out all the problems with doing that.

"Hey, don't apologize," he said, trying to figure out the words that he needed. "I'm not offended and I enjoy your friendship Ms. Sato."

She peaked through her knees, meaning he was at least on the right track. Strangely he felt the need for Hikari to jump in and demand the correct sort of apology from him. Hikari wanted everybody to be happy, so she created circumstances to fix situations that normally needed time and distance, then when she put all the effort into fixing the situation, everyone just agreed that it was fixed, even if it shouldn't have been. Too bad he was a responsible adult who had to handle this relationship, with another responsible adult, on his own.

"I'm glad I've been able to help you, even if I didn't know I was doing it," he continued, "you've really helped me to understand the challenges facing succubi, and…I promise I won't make it awkward if you're willing to continue to have these weekend talks."

There, that sounded responsible and adult like, and it was true to boot. Miss Sato took a deep breath, then exhaled, before smiling at him.

"I'd really appreciate that, Mr. Takahashi," she said, smiling sincerely. His hormones kicked in again, like they did at least once a week during his meeting with his coworker, mostly calling him the biggest idiot in the entire world. He could have had a succubus girlfriend if he had made a move, said anything that mentioned he was attracted to her brain and personality as much as he was to her. Her smile, even under the glasses and baggy clothes and pony tail, was one of the most gorgeous things he had ever seen.

He told that part of himself to shut up, and focused on the happy feelings he got from making someone who always felt rejected or objectified feel safe in their own skin. The friend zone was just fine.

A/N: So here it is. The first non-M-rated story in this fandom. Not going to lie, this was me figuring out how a relationship with a succubus like Sakie would even work, so there will be a lot of fluff. This will come to three parts at the moment, and I hope you enjoy and help me to fill out this page with lots of glorious stories.

Peace and Love,

thecagedsong