Chapter 2

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I carefully opened the door knob as I felt millions of painstaking piercing pinches going at my stomach.

Here goes nothing…

Once the door had fully been nudged open, I slowly trotted to my boss' desk where he sat signing some papers.

"Ahem." I quietly interrupted.

"Oh! Iwate-san!"

"Yes?"

"Right, well I hope you're up for –"

Shit. Shit. Shit.

"…your new position on the creative artists team!"

"I understand Sir, I'll get packing right away." I turned around and then stop. "HUH?!" I said a bit too loud.

"Iwate-san, I think you misunderstood me. I just promoted you as a magazine artist."

I felt my mouth drop down as Fuji-sama started chuckling.

"Um – well er…Thank you!"

"Are you not thrilled?"

"NO! No, no, no. I'm quite happy!"

Yes. VERY happy.

--

I left Fuji-sama's office with new thoughts of a bigger pay check.

"Yes! I'll be able to buy a bigger apartment! Oh no…I still have to pay back obaa-san." I whispered to myself.

As I walked back into the elevator to the 3rd floor, I realized something.

"Why would he promote me…especially since he has never seen any of my work?"

I mean, I am grateful that I got a promotion; it's just that I had always helped Suzumiya with her work in the shadows since she was part of the team and was a friend of mine. I had asked her never to tell anyone because I was afraid that if the company found out about whom the designer really was Suzumiya would be fired. I didn't really want to knock-out someone nice to be able to gain a fatter pay check…ugh…Now this is reminding me of my father…but seriously, who knew other that Suzumiya?

I walked out of the elevator to my cubicle.

Hmm…it couldn't have been Kyon or Sanada…maybe – "OUFF!", "Sorry!" I apologized after bumping into something hard. I looked up to see who I had accidentally run into.

"Uh Tezuka-sama…gomen, I wasn't paying attention to where I was going."

"That's fine. Happy with the promotion?"

"Uh…yeah."

"That's good."

"Yep."

"Now you won't have to complain about your job."

I nodded my head as he left.

WAIT…HOLD ON! How did he know about the promotion?

By then the elevator door had closed and he disappeared.

He's Fuji-sama's business friend…maybe Fuji told Tezuka…unless Tezuka saw me with Suzumiya and told Fuji! Nah, he's not the guy who's interested in what we busy bee workers do.

I continued walking until I reached my desk and plopped down.

"Ah…" I closed my eyes imagining the new wonders that would come with my new job.

"Oh my GOD! AKANE!"

I immediately opened my eyes and stood up to be greeted by Kyon-san. He suddenly decided to hug me out of the blue…

"Argh…you're killing me – can't breathe!"

"Oh sorry."

"That's okay."

"So I heard that you were promoted to be an artist designer by Tezuka-san! He must have seen and admired your skills!"

"…what?!"

Scratch the 'he's innocent' thought and replace it with: 'who the hell is this man?'

"That's what I overheard in the cafeteria."

"Oh…"

"Well, I'm going to miss you!"

Right. Don't tell me that I should be missing you because I will never. Especially since I always ended up with the tedious odd end jobs that you decided to give me.

He handed me a couple of boxes. "Need help packing?"

"nope, I'm fine."

He's definitely after my pay check…

I took the cardboard boxes and started to fill them with my office junk. After sometime I glanced at my watch: 1 PM. No wonder I felt like eating a cow. I stopped packing and headed to where I would find food.

--

"Mmm. Green salad…lots and lots…" I quietly said to myself as I ate my lunch. Considering that truthfully, I am a size 6, I decided to go on a diet. Which would consist of not eating: meat, fattening products (cream, cakes, butter), and eating: vegetables, fruits, whole wheat bread, light soups and so on. Really, I felt like a healthy whore. After all, I successfully kept this diet for about a month now. My goal was to get down to a size 5, and considering that I was neither fat or obese by nutritionist standards, it shouldn't be a hard thing to achieve.

"Akane…"

I stopped eating as soon as I realized who was talking to me.

"Keigo…what are you doing here?" I raised my eyebrow, fully knowing that it was in fact a weird day. Promotion and now Keigo…seriously, I'd have a laughing fit if he suddenly told me he actually loved me. We've gone out on 'dates' before…well more like set-up dates and he usually sees me at my dads house which is very rare. Other than that, our relationship as always stayed as…haters – the very opposite of lovers.

"I have an important letter for you from your father."

"Oh?"

"You know how he is…"

"Yeah," I snatched the letter from his hand and began to read it.

Dear Akane,

I haven't seen you in a while, so I took the liberty of planning a pre-wedding party in your honour. It is in 8 weeks from now. If you don't show up, I will not hesistate to send Fujioka-san away.

Your father.

"Are you kidding?" I looked up to read Keigo's facial expression.

"Either way, it doesn't matter to me if you show up or not; as long as I'm gaining something out of this."

Unbelievable.

"Ah Atobe-san."

"Fuji-san."

I looked up once more to see the two men face to face.

"Ohisashiburi-desu." Fuji quietly said.

Atobe nodded and with that, left.

"I'm sorry; I didn't mean to drive him away."

"It's quite alright."

"Well I cam here to just tell you that I cannot attend your promotion dinner."

"Huh?"

"Tezuka-san will be in my place instead."

"HUH?!"

Fuji-san chuckled, "you do know that I always treat newly promoted staff to dinner as a token of my appreciations of hard work accomplished."

"Oh right…" I nodded.

--

The rest of the day went by…normally…considering the turn of events I encountered today.

I sighed and took out my keys to the apartment complex.

Stairs or elevator?

Stairs right? After all, I am trying to lose weight.

--

"Oh my God…" I groaned. "This is such a horrible way of exercising." I had one more set of stairs until I would reach the 7th floor.

Struggling the rest of the way, I finally managed to reach my apartment.

"Ah…home at last!"

I switched on the lights and rushed to my bedroom, changed into my pyjamas and rushed back to the couch and turned on the television to watch my favourite dramas.

"Yuki! I cannot bear to live without you!"

"Hoshi! I – I love you!"

I couldn't help but clasp my hands together and shed a little tear. Today's romance stories seemed so foreign to me. Love…is something very abstract…there are many ways of expressing it – yet it would seem I had never gotten the experience of tasting it. I used to imagine that I would find a sweet prince charming and live happily ever after, but in the end I was tied up with an arrogant prince charming who intended to make my life miserable. That was reality and yes, I had to accept it…at least for now.

Grugggleb…

"Time to eat!"

I got up, opened the fridge across the room and took out yesterday's leftover miso soup and tempura vegetables.

I stopped for a second. "Tomorrow…I'm eating dinner with – TEZUKA-SAN?!"

Argh, someone else who I would like to avoid for the moment. I really didn't want to deal with someone very mysterious any time soon.

Great. Just great…

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Author's Note: Sorry for the….prolonged update. I was really busy with school and other things. I plan to update slow, but anyways, thank you to those who read and enjoy this story.