Lily, too much in shock, just stared up at Kaito helplessly like newborn baby. "It...it was you...? That creepy man was you?"

Kaito only nodded while glancing at the corner of the room, away from Lily.

"B-But...h-how did you...how did you manage to..."

Kaito averted his gaze from the corner of the room and back into Lily's eyes. He proceeded to sit down on the side of the bed, next to Lily. "Let me explain. Starting from my childhood, I had a crush on you, Lily. I realized that when I got the book back from the bullies that took the book from you."


"Ha, ha, ha! Taking that book away from that girl was a piece of cake!" The leading bully said.

He was accompanied by two more male bullies. "You said it! You should have seen the look on her face."

"Hey, you!"

"Eh?" The leading bully looked over to his side only to be greeted by a fist in the face.

Kaito was the one who punched the bully. "Give back Lily's book, you punks!"


"As I said before... If I came forward with the book right away... I thought you would think that I was with the bullies and you wouldn't be my friend anymore." Kaito said, looking down at the side of the bed nearest to Lily.

Strangely, Lily found herself scooting closer to Kaito. "Tell me about the pictures, Kaito. How did you know about my secret job and how did you get hat photo?"

Kaito came closer to Lily, never taking his eyes off of her. "You see...during your senior year in high school, on that day, I noticed that you were walking somewhere that you didn't normally go to. I followed you to make sure you were safe. I noticed that you went to a secret modeling agency that operated through illegal means. I thought you were taking that job to pay off your debt. So... I purchased some pictures of you and I demanded that the money would go straight to you. That's how you got enough money to enroll into the university. As for your high school photo, I noticed that you dropped one of the copies on the floor. I picked it up, and kept it to myself. You looked so cute in that picture, Lily."

Lily's face flushed red. She slightly gritted her teeth. "Kaito...if you did like me...why didn't you tell me? Why did you go with Miku?"

Kaito exhaled a huge amount of carbon dioxide while looking down. "Because I'm very, very stupid...and I didn't want to hurt you because of my stupidity."

Lily's eyes started to become teary. She put her right hand on one of Kaito's shoulders. "Th-Then...why? You said you knew about my feelings for you. Why?"

Kaito slowly shook his head before answering. He buried his head into his face. "...Like I said, I'm very stupid. I was a sheep back then. I just dated Miku to follow with the crowd and I was thinking my crush on you would disappear. It never did. The feelings I had for you never faded. I was lying to myself all these years. I tried to get you to forget 'Kaito'. I wanted you to forget the Kaito from before... and fall in love with a new Kaito. One who's not going to lie to himself anymore, one who's not going to be afraid to take a chance, and one who will truly follow his own convictions without being peer pressured."

Kaito fully positioned his whole body on the bed, facing Lily. He scooted very close to her. Kaito put both hands on Lily's shoulders, looking straight into her eyes. "I understand if you're feeling betrayed right now... But...I wanted to let you know...that I've changed. I've changed for you. I've changed myself to be a better person to you, to be a better man. I don't ever want to lose more time with you, Lily. I need you, Lily. I need you at my side. I don't ever want to let you go."

Lily started to sob, feeling the weight of Kaito's warm hands on her shoulders. "You could have just told me... I'm your best friend... You can tell me anything..."

Kaito moved his face closer to Lily, not letting go of her shoulders. "I didn't want you to think I was using you as a rebound. I couldn't afford to make you think I'm using you for my own personal gain. I respect you too much that I'm willing to protect you from my own selfish self. It's not right of me to use you like that..."

Lily couldn't hold herself back anymore. She tackled Kaito, knocking him flat on his back on the bed. She crawled over him, tears dripping down onto his face from her eyes. "Kaito! ...Am I that untrustworthy that you had to resort to using deceptive measures just to communicate your feelings for me?"

Kaito slowly nodded his head "no". "No, Lily. I consider myself untrustworthy. I thought if I told you then and there...you wouldn't believe me."

"Kaito, I love you! I've always loved you!" Lily blurted with another burst of tears falling on Kaito's face. "You didn't have to do all that! I was scared, okay? I was really scared out of my fucking mind when before I knew it was you! I was so relieved that it was you!"

Lily felt her arms becoming unsteady. A moment later, they gave out but Kaito caught her and slowly embraced Lily with her on top of him. She sobbed softly while being on top of Kaito. Kaito held her tight. He held her so tight in his arms, as if trying to squeeze the remaining tears out of her. Lily basked in the warmth of his embrace. Lily didn't know what she was feeling right now. She felt...a mixture of happiness and agony.

Kaito whispered into Lily's ear. "I'm sorry, Lily. I'm so sorry. From now on, things will be different between us. I'm not going to lose any more precious time I could be spending with you. I want to help you and I am obsessed with you. Yes...I'm that in love with you that I developed an obsession. Can I ask what you think of that?"

Lily didn't even have to take a moment to think about it. "...I'm happy. Happy that the man I love is obsessed with me. I'm just happy...but..."

"Yes?"

Lily slapped Kaito right across his face, clean and elegantly. "Don't you ever pull this kind of shit on me again, you hear me?"

Kaito smiled at Lily, not even taking any time to feel the spot where Lily slapped him. "Of course, Lily. I never meant to hurt you and I never will."


Ten minutes later, Lily was sitting on Kaito's lap while being wrapped around Kaito's embrace from behind. She felt his warmth enveloping around her as she read through the pages of her old autobiography book of her idol Yuri Masuda. It filled her with nostalgia just reading through the pages like she used to every day, whenever she got a chance as a kid. "I really never thought I'd see this book again. It was a gift from my late mother...and it's all I got left of her after she died. I'm really happy that you got it back to me after all these years, Kaito..."

Kaito nodded as he gently squeezed her body in his arms, trying to warm her even further. "You don't even got to worry about a thing, Lily. At your mother's funeral, I made a promise to her as she was being buried. I promised that I would protect her only daughter. I promised that I'd do anything to keep her safe and happy."

"Geez..." Lily reached behind her and pinched Kaito's nose affectionately. "You sound like one of those fairy tale knights in shining armor. Did I ever tell you how much I hate fairy tales?"

Kaito chuckled, taking a sniff of Lily's hair. It smelled just like her favorite shampoo flavor, lemon. "Don't worry. I'm aware of that. I'll try not to sound like this too often."

Lily made a playful scoff as she tapped both sides of Kaito's face even further with her index fingers. "It's from all those video games you used to play. If you keep talking like that, I might even start doing it too. And it'll be all your fault."

"Oh yeah?" Kaito started tickling Lily's stomach. Out of reflex, she elbowed Kaito's stomach, which made him reel back. "Ow! Ha, ha, ha!"

"I see you're playing dirty now." Lily said in an insidious voice as she turned around and started to tickle him back.

Suddenly, the door opened. They halted their activity, turning around to see IA and Gumi at the door, leering at them, with their eyes bloodshot.

Gumi was the first to speak. "We could hear you from over in our room. We heard every word and if you two are going to flirt, can you at least wait until the morning?"

Lily blushed, embarrassed for waking up her two friends. "Oh, uh, sorry... Hee...hee..."

IA made a soft giggle. "I take it that the planned worked, Kaito?"

Kaito nodded toward IA, smiling at her. "Well, obviously!"

Lily quirked both her eyebrows at that. "Wait, what? Kaito? They were in on this, too?"

"Yeah." Kaito sat up on the bed. "I called in a few favors from them. It took about two weeks to set all this up. I was lucky that IA was so good at crafting cards."

IA gave out a nervous giggle as Lily sneered at her.

"I was also thankful that Gumi was able to give me your Skype account name, Lily."

Lily's eye twitched as she forced a crooked smile. "So that's what he meant by a birdie telling him."

IA became nervous again, this time to Lily's look of smoldering anger. "Uh...maybe we should leave these two alone now. Congratulations for landing Lily again, Kaito!"

Gumi giggled as she followed IA on the way out and closed their door behind them.

Lily then turned around to Kaito and gave him a demonic look.

Kaito laughed nervously. "Look, I forgot to tell you about that, okay? Please?"

Lily only answered by making a monotonous and dull expression then pinching Kaito's cheeks as hard as she could.

"Kaito, you idiotic son of a bitch!"


The conclusion will come soon...