Sojiro (about Rui): "...Sometimes he gets attached to pebbles he finds along the road."
It had been a scorchingly hot day, with thick grey clouds threatening to release a downpour of heavy rain at the people in Tokyo. By evening most of them wished for the rain, just as long as they were indoors and could watch the city cool down ever so slowly.
Just as the first raindrops had started falling, Hanazawa Rui got out of bed and left the house. He was aimlessly walking around, his tousled hair soon straightened out by the now heavily falling rain. Rui didn't have a special destination to go to, he had just gone out because the air had smelled like rain and he liked roaming the wet and empty streets. And they were really deserted, apart from one girl, standing in the street, seemingly wanting to open her umbrella. She was holding it in her right hand and looking down at the ground, her longish black hair obstructing her face from being seen. At the sound of Rui walking towards her direction, she looked up, surprised to see someone else out in the rain. Her face was shining with a warm smile, and with two steps, she stood next to him, took his hand and carefully placed the colourful umbrella in it.
"Here. I guess you need it."
And without a further glance backwards, she turned away and walked around the next corner.
"O - Oi! Wait!"
Rui had taken a moment to recover from the surprise, and he ran after her - but the girl was gone. He looked around and realised that he had gone all the way to Tsukushi's street. With a shrug, he opened the umbrella and went to visit her, now that he was already there. He felt like seeing her again anyway, and didn't like arguing with his subconscious about it right now.
"Hanazawa Rui! Eh... you have an umbrella, but you're soaked through and through... I won't even try to understand it."
Tsukushi shooed Rui into her flat and went to get a towel for him. Meanwhile, he looked at the state of her apartment. An open suitcase was lying on the floor, and clothes were spread out all over the place. Without thinking too much about it, Rui lay down in the middle of the floor and placed the umbrella above his head so that it sheltered him and bathed his face in its many colours.
As Tsukushi came back, she clenched her fist and said: "Those things are all wet now, you idiot! I have to leave tomorrow morning, how-"
"So you're really getting married to Tsukasa, huh?" Rui looked at her worried face. She knew that he was still in love with her, but still...
"Hanazawa-san... would you be my best man?"
He got up a bit, bumping into the umbrella in the process, and held out his hands to Tsukushi. He pulled her down and they both lay down beneath the shelter of the strange girl's present, head to head, looking up.
"I do still love you, at least enough to know what makes you happy. So of course I'll be your best man. I've been waiting for you to ask before Tsukasa does."
Tsukushi grinned. "Yeah, I know. Now he's stuck with Nishikado-san and Mimasaka-san."
"Well, Akira would make a good bridesmaid, but I think only virgins can do that job. So, will it be a western-style wedding?"
"I have no idea. Domyoji told me that he'll organise everything, and I should just invite everybody who I want to be there."
"You know that it'll be a bit of a problem to keep calling Tsukasa by his last name, as it will be yours as well."
"Hmph! I'll keep my name, it's good enough!"
Rui started laughing, which made Tsukushi try to get up and kick him, but she as well bumped into the umbrella. She looked at it and remarked "You know... I've never seen you with an umbrella before."
"Well, I got this one as a present, I guess."
"You guess?"
"A girl gave it to me and then just went away."
"Do you know her?"
Rui shook his head. "Never seen her before. I tried to give it back to her, but she seemed to have just vanished, and then I realised that I was in your street, so I decided to drop by."
"And get all my clothes soaked."
"Exactly." Tsukushi tried to hit Rui, but he easily dodged her by using the umbrella as a shield.
"Oh, there's something written on the umbrella!" Tsukushi forgot her goal of killing Rui and tried to decipher the writing.
"It's English! Let me read it!" Tsukushi had been learning English with new vigour these days, now that she was going to spend this summer month in New York, getting married. Slowly, she read:
"Will you come to me on feet of rain
Or will you dance in on the moonlight
Shall I await you on sunshine street
By the light of day? (or when it's vanishing, slowly, surely, beautifully)"
"Oh, that's very pretty, Hanazawa-san. Maybe that girl is in love with you and gave you the umbrella as a present?" Rui took the umbrella and closed it. Outside, the rain had stopped.
"I've never met her before, and she didn't seem to be in love with me." He stood up and turned to go. Tsukushi opened the door for him and added: "But the poem really is something. You should try and find her and bring her to the wedding in New York. Or who knows, maybe Domyoji will still decide that Japan is good enough, that's at least what I'd prefer." "Tell me when I should come and where to as soon as you know it."
"Hanazawa-san...thank you. You know, I felt a bit scared and lonesome before you came. A marriage...although I decided for it, it's still a big thing, and sometimes I feel like something will happen again before Domyoji… before Tsukasa and I meet again. It's so sad, not having him around...but you cheered me up right now. You...always get me up on my feet again."
Tsukushi took all her courage together and hugged Rui. He didn't say anything, but instead just smiled warmly and then walked away, taking the mysterious umbrella with him.
Rui did see the girl again, just three days after their first short meeting. It was already night, and he was sitting in a coffee shop together with Sojiro and Akira, and they were thinking of fitting wedding presents for Tsukushi and Tsukasa. In general, they all thought that it was surreal that those two were really getting married. In a way it gave them hope that they too might marry a girl they loved some day.
"Well, but I sure as hell don't want to get married before I turn thirty. I mean, where's the fun?"
Akira admitted that Sojiro had a point with that. "But you know, they're all lovey-dovey, and Tsukasa has this virgin policy for himself, so he just has to marry before he..."
Both laughed remarkably dirty. Rui woke up from the laughing and as he looked outside the shop, there she was. He got up hurriedly, almost spilling Sojiro's and Akira's coffee on them in the process, and ran as fast as he could out of the coffee shop. The girl just wanted to cross the street as he grabbed her by the hand and held onto it. The next thing he saw was an elbow coming towards him, and then all was black.
He could hear some voices, and soon recognised them as Akira's, Sojiro's and the girl's. They were talking about him.
"I'm sorry. I didn't recognise him at first, he probably just wanted to give me back the umbrella."
"Umbrella?"
"The one I gave him. Now, thanks for carrying him here to this park, I would've felt really bad letting him lie there."
"Hey, no problem. What's your name? It probably has something to do with 'beautiful', I bet."
Rui decided that this was definitely a good moment to open his eyes. He wanted to see the girl's reaction to Sojiro's blunt compliment. The first thing he saw and felt, though, was black hair falling into his face. He then realised that his head was resting in the girl's lap.
"My name is Ishimi. And that remark was so gross, does it really work with girls?"
Sojiro laughed. "Usually, yes. But you remind me a bit of Makino, so I'm not sure if anything would work with you. Anyway, we'll leave you with Rui, as you were the one who knocked him out. He's a nice one...I think."
"Hey!" Rui and Ishimi cried out in unison. She then looked at him holding his head in pain because he had moved it too much and asked worriedly: "Everything okay?" Sojiro and Akira used that time to get away. They only turned around after enough distance had been put between them and Ishimi so that she couldn't reach them and Akira mouthed the words that both their minds (if it wasn't just one, in reality) thought: "Hey, make the best out of it." The laughter that followed made more than clear what "the best" meant for them.
"Oh, damn. Now I'm stuck."
"Well, sorry for being viciously hit by you."
Ishimi pulled her hair back so that it wouldn't obstruct her vision, and looked down at Rui. "Oh yeah, and who grabbed my hand like some madman? I thought you were going to kidnap me, or worse."
Rui sighed and put his hand on his forehead in order to cool his head off.
"You alright? I didn't hit you that bad, but well, seems like it was bad enough."
"Whose poem is on the umbrella?" Rui didn't think much of coherent conversations, Ishimi decided.
"Poem? Oh, I wrote that when I was in a cheesy mood. It's pretty meaningless."
"No, it's...it has its own glow."
"Was that a compliment?"
"Yes."
Ishimi smiled the same warm smile she had graced Rui with when she had given him the umbrella, then bent down and placed a tender kiss on his forehead.
"Thank you. That's one of the nicest compliments I've heard in a while now."
Rui felt himself turning red, though he didn't know why.
"Ishimi..."
"Hm?"
"Ishimi means "beautiful pebble", in your case?"
"Yep. Poor choice my parents made, but I still like it. It's just as meaningless as my poem, in a way."
Rui grinned. "Oh well, all things have their meaning or purpose sooner or later, I guess."
Ishimi sighed and leaned back, giving him view of the full moon looming above. "You're a very optimistic person. See, I haven't even found a purpose for myself in this world. Well, actually I'm just not sure what to do now that school has ended. "
"What would you like to do? "
"Hmmm...I would make a good English teacher, I guess. But I'll have to study for that, and for studying, I'd have to work, because I'm not that filthy rich. "
"I am. "
"So what? "
Rui knew that hint of pride in Ishimi's voice intimately. It sounded very much like Tsukushi. Therefore, he knew how to make her take the money. "I'll give you the money, and you could pay me back later. "
But she didn't buy it. "I know that eventually, I wouldn't pay anything, and anyways, what are you talking about? You know, we don't know each other at all, and we probably won't ever meet again - "
"Well, I still have to give your umbrella back to you. "
"You can keep it. "
"Then I want to at least invite you into my house for dinner. " Rui got up slowly and sat down next to Ishimi, leaning onto her because he was still feeling a bit dizzy.
"We should've gone to a doctor. "
"I'm fine. "
"No, you're not. Why are you so persistent to express your thanks for some little thing I did? It wasn't anything special, I'm living around the corner and wanted to go about a bit in the rain anyway, and you looked very miserable."
"So that's why you vanished. You just got into the house. Hahaha - ouch!" His head was pretty fine now, but he decided that laughing was stretching the limits of what it could take too far.
"You're absolutely crazy. I'm not some fata morgana, you know?"
"It very much seemed like that. So, you're living in the same street as Tsukushi."
"Who's that?"
"Oh, I love her. She's getting married to my best friend in a few days, though."
Ishimi helped Rui get up. He was leaning heavily onto her, so she decided that it was better to sit down again for the moment. "That sounds like some shojo manga. And, will you be the knight in shining armour, or is it too late and your best friend is some hunky gorgeous guy who's at the same time awfully sweet towards that girl?"
"Do you know him by any chance?"
"You mean, he's really like that? Woah, she's a lucky girl, two great guys falling for her. She must be really amazing, and I guess beautiful."
"Oh, she's pretty plain. But she managed to change both of us into better persons. And she liked your poem."
"I already like her."
"Then, how about meeting her?" With combined forces, they got up and walked out of the park. They didn't talk until they got as far as to a bicycle stand where Ishimi got her bicycle. She sighed deeply and hung over it. It wasn't easy virtually carrying a tall guy around, even if he looked like he hadn't eaten anything in ages.
"Where do you live, Rui?"
"Come with me to New York."
Ishimi looked up. Her face was practically saying 'question mark'. "You're living in New York?"
"No, I want you to come with me to the wedding of Tsukushi and Tsukasa."
"Oh. No."
"Please."
"I don't know you. I don't know your friends. What do you want from me? It's just too weird."
Rui thought about it. He himself didn't really know why he wanted her to come along. He just wanted to have Ishimi around, maybe to get to know her better?
"I... have no idea myself, actually. I promise that everything'll be okay. You'll like it. Please."
Ishimi didn't know what to do. Rui seemed to be a very nice person, and one didn't get an invitation to New York every day. She could train her English and that would maybe help her getting a stipendium. Actually, nothing was holding her back except for one thing. Almost with triumph in her voice, she said:" I don't have the money to pay a stay in New York. I can't."
Rui grinned mischievously and said: "I need someone to accompany me to the wedding, which would cover the price of flying there and back. Paying your shopping, that's thanks for caring for me now and giving me the umbrella. What else?"
"The hotel. Where are we going to stay?"
"We're staying at Tsukasa's house. But if you really want to pay for that... I'll find something."
"Hey! What's with that grin? Cut that out! It's really not very easy to trust you when you grin like your two friends."
Rui stopped smiling and asked: "Now, will you come with me?"
Ishimi hesitated for a moment, but then decided that she should take this for what it was, a great opportunity. "Okay, I will. And now let's finally get home! Where do you live?"
"Quite far from here. Do you know that district with the huge houses?"
"Oh yes, I forgot that you're filthy rich."
"Exactly. Now, how about we get home by taxi? You can stay at my place, we're leaving first thing tomorrow morning."
"How about my clothes?"
"You could buy them in New York."
Ishimi shook her head. "I'm grateful for you taking me to New York, but I don't want to overdo it. Besides, I'm the choosiest person on Earth when it comes to clothes."
"Okay, then...well, let's stay at your place. That's the only opportunity left."
Ishimi thought about the state of her family's one-room-flat for a moment. It seemed okay, they'd have to share the futon, though. That would be a long, sleepless and awful night...
"Let's go to my place, then."
Ishimi unlocked the door and stumbled onto the futon. She was feeling very numb and light, and her left shoulder was aching from Rui leaning onto it. She closed her eyes and soon after sensed Rui sitting down next to her.
"How's your head? Is it alright now?"
"I'm fine. - Where are your parents?"
"They went back home to Okinawa for the summer holidays. It's pretty nice having the flat all for me for once."
"So you've let me in here although you knew that we would be all alone?"
"You can have one more punch in the face if you feel like it."
Rui leaned over Ishimi and pinned her arms to the floor. She opened her eyes and looked into his. Her first thought had been to kick him somewhere deeper than the face, but looking into his eyes, she forgot. Her head felt like it was floating, and her face was flushed in a deep red. Rui leaned his face even nearer to hers. She closed her eyes, thinking that he would kiss her. He actually did kiss her, but to her confusion, she felt his lips being placed on her forehead. The next thing she heard was him lying down next to her, laughing quietly to himself. Ishimi decided not to damage his brain or whatever was left of it any more than she had done so far.
"You're such an idiot, Rui. How can I trust you now? You might just take me to New York for some 9 ½ weeks scenario."
He turned around to her and looked pensively at some spot in the air. "You know you can trust me, or else you would've hit me... in a sensitive spot. And now, good night."
"Rui?"
"Hm?"
"You said you're filthy rich. How come?"
"My father owns some big companies."
"And what about you? Will you follow that way?"
"I guess."
"Is it... your dream?"
"It's the dream my father started dreaming. He wants me to dream it on, and I don't feel all that bad about it. But something is missing."
"Ah, I bet it's Tsukushi."
"I think..." Rui hesitated, then continued after a while. "...that the love I felt towards her changed into friendship again. I think ..."
Rui looked at Ishimi, only to find her sleeping.
"Haven't I found the most beautiful pebble of all?" he whispered quietly into a strand of her hair, and soon after he fell asleep as well.
"Rui, you brought your girlfriend along! Did she hit you into taking her with you?" Despite his words, Akira winked in an almost conspiratory fashion at Ishimi. Then she was introduced to everybody else who would be attending Tsukushi's and Tsukasa's wedding. Sojiro took over the introduction.
"Okay, people, that's Rui's new girlfriend."
"I'm not."
"Her name is Ishimi. Say hello to Rui's girlfriend, everyone."
"You are indeed looking for a fight. I am not his - "
"But wouldn't it be much more fun?"
"No."
"Oh, alright. She's not his girlfriend, she's his mistr - " Sojiro was then chased by Ishimi all around the group until both were worn out.
"You're persistent. How about this: you're just a friend of his."
"That's much better."
And then she was introduced to Kazuya, Sakurako, Shigeru, Makiko and Yuki, all of them friends of the soon-to-be married couple. Ishimi felt a bit out of place in the beginning, but soon was told all the details of the "T 'n T" love story, as Sakurako called it. With that, they got to other topics and by the time they were already approaching New York, Ishimi felt very comfortable with the whole group. The only thing that made her worry was that Rui was sitting all alone in his seat, barely talking and sleeping half of the time. As they were starting landing and everyone hurried back to his or her seat, Ishimi who was sitting next to Rui asked him whether he was all right. He nodded, but still she started examining his head as far as she could reach it.
"I told you I'm fine. You weren't that violent."
"But you're acting all weird today."
Rui took the hand that had been searching his head and placed it in front of his mouth. "I'm usually not the talkative kind, you know? So... you don't have to worry."
"Will you still talk with me like you did yesterday?"
Ever so softly, Rui planted a kiss on Ishimi's fingers. "Yes. As long as you're around."
She shivered involuntarily and took her hand out of his. Her chest felt all tight, and she found it hard to breathe. She couldn't decipher what Rui was feeling, and it made her uneasy. And even worse, she couldn't guess what her own feelings were like. Now she wasn't all that sure if going to New York with Rui had been such a good idea. But strangely enough, she knew that if she had stayed behind, she would have missed something important. All those thoughts vanished, though, as she saw New York from the air for the first time.
"Amazing."
Everybody felt pretty drained from the flight, and so most weren't paying that much attention to the city around them as they got into the cars that were waiting in front of the airport. Ishimi shared a car together with Kazuya, Yuki and Sojiro. She felt immensely tired, but Kazuya, who was sitting next to her, kept her awake with his annoying voice announcing the sights and asking her various questions. He had bought himself an American newspaper at the airport and now was making Ishimi translate most of the articles, as his English was in a very lamentable state.
"What does this meeeean?"
" 'Japanese business tycoons operating in New York invite to celebrate their success' - are you going there, Kazuya?"
"My family is not that rich, but I was still invited by Tsukasa. You know, his mother would have become suspicious if all of us would have come to New York without some special occasion demanding that. She did give that year to them, but she would never let them marry."
Sojiro took over the explanation. "And so we're just visiting this party, and without that old lady knowing, they'll marry in absolute secrecy."
Ishimi shook her head. "That's ridiculous. How can his mother do that?"
"Oh, she can. All of us have fiancées somewhere who would help business if we would marry them. There's bound to be some drama sooner or later, if we choose to rebel against our parents' decisions. Actually it's very surprising that Tsukasa and Tsukushi made it so far. I won't believe that they will be able to stay together until I've seen them being married with my own eyes."
Yuki protested. "I always knew that they would make it. Tsukushi is strong enough to face anything, you know."
Ishimi decided that it would be the best thing to change the topic a bit, as Kazuya's eyes had become all watery at the mention of Tsukushi and Tsukasa marrying. "Now, who will be the best man?"
Sojiro sniffed and appeared, for all intents and purposes, like a broken man. "Both wanted Rui as the best man. Nobody likes me. Oh." He coughed and reverted back into normal Sojiro mode. "Well, Tsukushi asked Rui first, so Tsukasa asked Akira and myself."
"Then who will be the bridesmaids, now that you two can't?"
"Kazuya. He's the only virgin in here, well, maybe except from you."
Kazuya turned blazingly red and was silent for the first time since Tokyo. Ishimi grinned at him and said "Hey, who cares? And I guess noone would try and fit you into a dress - that's more something that Sojiro would look good in."
"Well, I look good in everything." The car stopped and Sojiro got out first, stretching his arms. The others followed him out of the car and stood in awe before the big house.
"It's amazing." Both Yuki and Ishimi said those words at the same time. They smiled at each other.
"That's poor people for you, Kazuya. Kazuya?"
Kazuya was gaping at the house. "Amazing."
Sojiro kneaded his forehead in frustration. "I should have known." He went over to Ishimi and Yuki and put his arms around their shoulders.
"Now back to this very interesting conversation we had just now. Yuki couldn't be a bridesmaid. What about you, Ishimi? Was Rui the lucky man last night, by any chance?"
Yuki was absolutely disgusted by his words. She freed herself from him and said "You're so gross. Ishimi, you better come with me and Kazuya to the house. The other car will be here in a minute".
Ishimi watched the two walk away, and then looked pensively at Sojiro. He smiled genuinely at her and when he started talking, his voice was even, all traces of flirtatiousness gone.
"I don't mean it the way that Yuki believes I meant it. I just... I heard Rui talking to you on the plane. He just broke his average per year of words spoken. And it seems he even talked more to you last night after we left you there in the park. The only person he talks that much to is Makino. Now, he's in love with her, or at least was. To you, he talks even more."
"From the amount spoken, you assume that Rui's in love with me?"
"Yes, but not just that. He seems more like a living person now, not just a potted plant, at least when he's around you. I might actually go so far and call him a man."
"That's absolute nonsense, Sojiro."
"It's not, and I'll prove it to you."
"I will prove to you that he's not in love with me, not one bit."
Sojiro whispered into her ear. "Oh yeah? And why would he take you with him to New York, just after meeting you? One doesn't take friends along to the other end of the world after just meeting them, but lovers you wouldn't want to miss."
Ishimi smiled at Sojiro and shook her head.
"That's a very romantic outview on life. I wouldn't have thought that of you."
"You'll see that I'm right, Ishimi. You'll see."
He let go of her as the others stood by them.
"Oh, we just decided to become good friends." Ishimi agreed to that, then went over to Rui. She didn't feel like talking, but instead just looked up into his eyes. All thoughts vanished from her head, and the only thing she felt was a slight shiver running down her spine, and her chest aching strangely again. He stepped nearer and then they walked up to the house.
When they entered, two people stood by the entrance.
"Oi, Rui! Who's that girl?"
Rui didn't seem to want to answer, so Ishimi decided to speak for herself.
"My name is Ishimi. I... uh... gave him my umbrella, and he asked me to come with him to New York. Eh."
"Then you've written that poem?" Makino didn't look plain to Ishimi, she seemed to be nervous and happy at the same time, and that made her very beautiful.
"Poems are crap. They are too complicated." Domyoji was more direct, it seemed. Makino kicked him.
Ishimi decided to like her.
Everyone except for Ishimi got into his or her room to get a bit of sleep after the exhausting flight. She preferred to explore the huge house more thoroughly instead. It had the eerie feel of an almost abandoned hotel, as she didn't see anyone in the rooms and hallways except for one or two maids who were preparing the house for the party that had been announced in the newspapers. This was where it would be held, as the Domyoji family had arranged it in order to present Tsukasa to the business world and to show off their success.
After about thirty minutes of wandering around from splendid rooms to even more gorgeous rooms, Ishimi decided that the whole thing wouldn't get any more interesting and was just about to turn around and go back as she saw Tsukushi coming out of one of one of the rooms.
"Oh, Ishimi, do you know the way back to our corridor? I always get lost in these huge houses. Who needs that much space anyway?"
"Well, my sense of orientation isn't really the best, but if the maids I've seen haven't moved from their places, we could ask them."
Tsukushi walked up to the other, taller girl, and together, they tried to find the maids that Ishimi had seen before. But as it could be expected from human beings, they had moved and couldn't be seen anywhere. The girls then tried to find their way back by themselves, but soon gave up and rested in a bedroom complete with TV, bathroom and a most probably authentic da Vinci sketch hanging from the wall.
"We'll die here... it's impossible to find a way out." Ishimi, having said that, let herself fall on the bed. It was a bit harder than she had expected it to be, but she could as well fall asleep on the floor. She couldn't get more tired and exhausted now, but Tsukushi obviously didn't feel tired at all as she kept pacing up and down in the room, and Ishimi didn't want to leave her all alone by falling asleep, so she tried to strike up a conversation.
"Did you go sightseeing in New York already?"
"This is already my second time here, so I know a little bit of it all, but I haven't been really sightseeing yet."
"Oh yes, you were already here, that time. I forgot."
"Who told you about it?"
"Ah, your friends told me everything. Was that bad?"
Tsukushi shook her head. "No, it's okay. After all, you're Rui's girlfriend, so you should know, and I don't think he would ever tell anyone such a lengthy story. Although I heard that he does talk quite a bit with you."
"Sojiro told you that, right?"
"Yes."
"Will someone miss him on that party? I'd very much like to strangle him. Rui is not my boyfriend, and it's absolutely normal to talk with friends. Argh, I wish I could kick Sojiro down some cliff!"
"Oh, I'll help you doing that. But, you know, I really thought that you're Rui's girlfriend."
"I'm not. Why do you all think that? We're friends!"
Tsukushi started laughing. "You're just as dense as I am sometimes." She tried to continue speaking, but just found Ishimi's frowning face too funny. After a while she managed to cool down a bit, though, and tried to make the other girl see what was pretty obvious to her.
"I only saw you two together for a very short while, but... Rui's different around you, you know? He's almost outgoing and talkative. And he seems to be smiling more often when you're around."
"Maybe I'm just a funny person. Look, I know how it looks like that I came here with Rui without actually knowing him that well. I just had the definite feeling that I could trust him, that's why I still went with him. Whatever his reasons for inviting me were, I won't question them right now. Basically, I'm planning on running around like a headless chicken and not falling in love again right now. Rui does make my head spin a bit, but I guess he does that to every girl. I really don't want to think about it further. Please. I just want to improve my English as much as possible while I'm here and have a nice time."
Tsukushi wanted to ask various questions (falling in love AGAIN?), but Ishimi's last sentence got all her attention.
"How good is your English?"
"It's okay, I guess. You want me to practice with you? Rui told me that you want to improve."
Tsukushi's eyes widened with delight.
"That would be so nice!"
"Then tell me what you've been learning recently..."
"Don't tell me you're actually jealous! Hell, of all rooms you had to choose my mother's! Thank God I found you before she did."
"Of course I'm not jealous, you idiot! Why would I be? You're just carrying her around, after all." Tsukushi was furious.
"Sssshh, you'll wake her up."
Ishimi just guessed that she was still sleeping. Her body felt like it was floating, and Tsukushi and Tsukasa were talking some weird stuff, so this must be some kind of dream.
"Do you remember how you carried me like that? You were really mad at me that time."
"And you were really drunk that time." Ishimi had the distant feeling that Domyoji was smiling at Tsukushi. She wondered how she could know, with her eyes closed, but somehow, in this weird weird dream, she knew. As much as she knew that when Domyoji stood still, it wasn't because they had brought Ishimi back to her room, but because they wanted to kiss. It was a highly embarrassing moment for her, waiting for them to finally get it done while being crammed in between them. This felt far too real to be a dream - or a nightmare.
"Oi! What are you two doing?" Immense relief flooded through Ishimi as she heard Rui's voice.
"I'll take her. I don't think she wants to witness your intimate moments so closely."
"Exactly!" was what Ishimi wanted to cry out, but she opted on playing Sleeping Beauty for a while longer. She felt how she was being lifted up by Rui. His scent and his warmth felt already very familiar to her, but still her face turned red when she felt his heart beating fast right next to her ear. He walked up to a door and opened it, presumably to her room, when Tsukushi and Tsukasa whispered a conspiratory "jealous guy" to each other. If it was Rui or someone else who was jealous, Ishimi didn't have time to find out as the door was closed. Rui placed her on the bed. Nothing happened for a while, but Ishimi couldn't sleep.
"Jealous? ...Huh. It's true, isn't it?"
She felt him leaning nearer to her face, and this time he finally managed to get it right and kiss her on the mouth. Her eyes popped open.
"You're done pretending that you're asleep?"
Ishimi now wasn't really sure whether she was awake now, as she felt Rui kissing her neck with an expertise that bordered on the extraordinary. She tried pushing him away, but he pinned her arms down and just continued with his thorough exploration. She tried to form a sentence, but at first only succeeded in breathing heavily. But when she felt his mouth touching the upper part of her breast, she panicked.
"No!" All the kicking did her no good, as she couldn't free herself. Rui then simply let her go, because he didn't want her panicking more. She stumbled away from him and fell from the bed, face forward, hitting her nose hard. When Rui tried to help her up, she pushed him away, but he was adamant.
"Stop fussing. Your nose needs some ice on it or else it'll swell and you'll look like Rudolf the Reindeer on high voltage." He took a handkerchief and put some ice from the little fridge he had next to his bed in it. Then he shoved it quite rudely, as Ishimi thought, onto her nose and made her lie down in bed again. He piled up loads of pillows below her head in order to lift it a little bit in case she got a nosebleed. Then he sat down next to her.
"How about saying you're sorry for jumping me?" Ishimi's voice didn't quite have the effect that she had wanted it to have. Instead of being reproaching and hurt, she only brought out something that could compare to some large animal having flu and not being able to breathe through the nose. Rui stopped short of laughing. This was maybe not the best moment for it. Instead he tried to answer her as truthfully as he could.
"I think I'm in love with you. And I think you love me too."
"Well, that's no reason for - umm... what did you just say?"
"You heard me, honey."
"Wow. That's surreal. You calling me honey."
"Are you avoiding the topic?"
"I'm trying hard to, yes."
Rui reached out and stroked Ishimi's hair. She flinched a bit, but let it happen.
"Rui, you're honestly the nicest guy I've ever met. But you just plain scared me when you were suddenly all over me, you were so different."
"I'm sorry. It's just hard for me to think clearly in your presence."
"And... I want to go back to Tokyo right away, if it's possible."
Rui stiffened visibly and stood up. Ishimi closed her eyes and tried to hold back the tears as his precious warmth left her and as he unlocked the room and called a servant in order to get everything arranged.
Ishimi left right away without telling anyone except for Tsukushi and Tsukasa, whom she congratulated on their wedding that would be the next day. She refused to tell them what the real reason for her leaving was. After all, she herself didn't know why she was leaving either. She only realised that when she was already back for two days, working hard on a poem, her late present for the couple's wedding. Before that, she had felt quite numb, not being able to think clearly and just looking for a job all day long. She had found one eventually, it was just handing out flyers, but the pay was surprisingly decent, at least good enough to make her think about buying herself a nice new umbrella.
The poem didn't want to come to her that evening. After all, she wasn't a poet, but an English teacher to-be. All that stuck in her mind was why she had left. She had simply wanted to think about Rui's confession in silence. And he had really scared her by kissing her, though she had to admit that she had enjoyed it. Her feminist side was constantly blaming her for this. But it couldn't tell her what to do about Rui. Ishimi wasn't someone who had never fallen in love. She also had had sex before, the boy she had broken up with not too long ago had been her second boyfriend and her first lover. But she still couldn't decipher her feelings for Rui. It was like some curse had been placed upon her, one that made her insecure and unsure like some middle school girl suffering the first pangs of a middle school love. It was almost infuriating. And she didn't want to be tempted by Rui into confessing to him or even sleeping with him without knowing for sure. That wouldn't be fair, so she was actually quite happy to have left New York right away. Or so her brain told her. Her body and her heart felt quite miserable without him, and it made her think only of sad poems. In the end, she still came up with a happy poem, one that, as always, didn't have much in common with Tsukushi and Tsukasa. She still liked it, in a way.
'Fill my heart with magic
With the pulsing laughter of butterfly wings beating
With green blades playing the song of the sun,
the most beautiful violins
With red cherries,
dangling from your ears -
which one to eat?
Fill my heart with you.'
And endlessly tired, she fell asleep. Only once, in the early hours of the morning, she woke up again with a start.
"God, I'm so silly! I'm thinking about him all the time and want to kiss him no matter what! Of course I'm in love with him!"
And then, with a broad smile on her lips, she went back to sleep.
Then again, confessing was a wholly different subject. Rui was standing in front of her place five days later, squinting against the sun burning down on Tokyo with unwavering vehemence. Ishimi saw him standing there and hurried out. She wanted to go to the bookshop nearby anyway, and she was very happy that she was more or less dressed up.
"How was New York?"
Rui got a photo album out of his bag.
"That's why I came. Let's go eat some ice cream, and you can look at the photos."
"Tsukushi looks so beautiful here, don't you think so?" Ishimi wished she would have been there as she looked at a photo with Tsukushi in a very refined and beautiful western-style wedding gown and Tsukasa standing next to her, grinning like mad. This made her smile broadly as well.
"You have a kind smile, you know?"
Ishimi shifted around in her seat at the ice salon, avoiding to look at Rui.
I love you, you know?
But she didn't dare to say it out loud. What the hell was wrong with her? It shouldn't be so difficult.
"Uh... and how about Domyoji's mother? What did she say?"
"She actually attended the wedding. But noone was allowed to take pictures of her. There's only one showing her, far in the background. It's this one."
"She's smiling!"
"No, you're imagining things. It's nice enough that she turned up and didn't slaughter everyone."
"I'm telling you, that's a smile!"
"No it's not!"
"It is! There, she even has wrinkles around her mouth!"
"That woman never ever smiled in her whole life! It would probably hurt her face if she tried."
"Come on, give her some credit. I'm sure she loves her family."
Rui shrugged. "Well, it could be. But coming to the wedding was the least she could do, after giving Tsukushi a free ride to hell."
Silence settled in. Ishimi didn't know what to say any more, because her mind was now completely blocked by the one thought of finally confessing her love to Rui. Everything around her reminded her of this. Couples kissing were in the streets as they went for a walk, there seemed to be only Shojo Manga in the bookshop they went to, and when they sat down on the grass beside the river, she had the certain feeling that she had turned absolutely mad. Rays of light seemed to blink little "I love you"'s at her when they were reflected in the river. She tried not to look at the water and to think of some proper sentences.
The water is so beautiful. Oh, yes, by the way, I love you! - That's really bad...
I could hug him? Lean on him? Would that already be a confession? Not really.
Rui, my heart beats only for you... yuck, that makes me feel sick.
Rui, in the meanwhile, wasn't that bothered by the silence itself - he was used to that - but he had hoped that Ishimi was in love with him as well and would tell him so. After some time, he lost all traces of patience and decided to take the initiative himself. He wanted to know the truth now, and besides, Ishimi's presence once again made him shiver with the startlingly strong wish to at least kiss her. And so, he simply took Ishimi by surprise and kissed her. She couldn't have thought of a better moment to confess, but when he looked at her after he slightly unwillingly ended the kiss, it stuck in her throat. And the words still didn't come when he got up and his shadow fell on her, and when he climbed up from the riverside to the street, his face a very icy and intimidating mask. Only when Ishimi's anger flared up, she found the courage to speak. She stumbled after him and shouted at his retreating figure:" I love you, you idiot! But you can't wait one bit for me, can't you? I was never ever in my life so nervous because I love you so much, and you run off all huffy and puffy and so very much insulted! Idiot, idiot, idiot!" Rui had meanwhile turned around and looked at the crying and red-faced Ishimi. He walked up towards her and wanted to hug her and kiss her and touch those beautiful tears on her beautiful face. She turned around and wanted to run away, but he reached for her hand and held her back. Ishimi slapped him as hard as he could in the face, and Rui let go off her hand so that she could run away. He didn't try to catch up with her, one angry mark on his cheek was enough. And besides, he now knew that she loved him too, so everything would be alright eventually. Hopefully.
Ishimi was still puffy-eyed when she finally got into her street, so it was quite a bit of bad luck when she saw Tsukushi waving and calling for her from in front of her apartment.
"Come over, come over!"
She had wanted to give Tsukushi her wedding present, anyway, so she went up to her. Sojiro and Akira just got out of Sojiro's car at that moment.
"How did the date go? Oh - not very well, it seems. You look pretty bad." Akira patted Ishimi on the head. She was glad that she had cried all her tears out by now, or else she would've started wailing again.
"That wasn't a date."
"It was one. Rui even refused to help Tsukushi moving out because he wanted to meet you instead. That means, you've lost our bet." For Sojiro, everything was clear. For Tsukasa obviously as well, because when he stepped out of Tsukushi's apartment and saw Ishimi standing there, he said: "Oi, you! Rui's woman! You can help as well!"
Tsukushi kneaded the bridge of her nose in frustration.
"Why did I marry that guy?"
"Because he's always telling the truth." Sojiro stated matter-of-factly.
"Because you love him?" Ishimi pointed out the obvious.
"You have the rest of your life to find it out." And Akira made Tsukushi realise how happy she was.
It didn't take long for Tsukushi to move out of her old flat. Susumu had already moved to their parents into a slightly bigger apartment (which was a compromise between Tsukasa's ideas of a huge house and Tsukushi's stubborn insisting on staying where they were), and she would move to a flat near them, sharing it with Tsukasa who would come from New York by every time he could snatch some free moments away from work. When they had packed the rest of her belongings into some bags, Ishimi remembered her wedding present. She took a piece of paper out of her bag and handed it to Tsukasa.
"That's my wedding present."
He read the poem diligently. And smiled at Ishimi in such a nice way that she understood that it had been a good present. Tsukushi was very delighted about the poem and hugged the other girl as a way of Thank You. Then they left for their new home. The housewarming party would be the next day, and "Rui's woman" was invited as well.
"What shall we do? Ishimi, you want to tag along for some... drinking? Partying? Picking up girls?"
Akira nudged Sojiro and pointed behind Ishimi's back, towards her own flat.
"I think she'll go for picking up a certain boy instead."
"Oh no. Don't tell me he's standing there."
"You can find out for yourself." Sojiro turned her around and pushed her a bit, sending her stumbling towards Rui. Then he raised his voice so that Rui could hear as well what he said next.
"And make the best out of it!"
Ishimi didn't quite realise that they left afterwards. She went up to Rui and silently looked at the sky where the sun was slowly setting and making the summer heat a little more agreeable and the sky a little more beautiful.
After some time, she came to a conclusion and stepped directly in front of him. She looked up at his handsome face, and the eyes that were looking at her with a mixture of sadness, worry and even insecurity. He obviously didn't know what to say, so she made the first step and hugged him. Who needed words anyway? But when Rui circled his arms around her waist and whispered into her ear, she started to cry... because she did need those words after all, and it made her happy to the point of crying to hear them.
"Hey... don't cry. What's wrong?" Rui tenderly kissed away her tears, but that only made Ishimi cry even harder.
"Oh God, I'm sorry. I'm usually not a crybaby... uwah! I... I dunno, I just can't stop." She laughed through her tears and looked up at him.
"You won't get mad if I kiss you now?"
"No, I won't."
And indeed she didn't get mad at all.
THE END