PS: Hikari's personality is OOC from her anime version during her conversation with Mimi in this chapter.
Chapter 7: Confessions
Yamato stared at his reflection in the bathroom mirror. The glass was a little foggy from the steam that came out of the shower, but he could still see the hickey on his neck. He ran the tips of his fingers over his lips, where the feeling of hers still lingered. Two years and she still had the same effect on him, and he came to the conclusion this wouldn't change no matter how hard he tried to. He let his head fall down and sighed deeply.
He walked out of the bathroom towards the living room, making a trail of water drops from his soaked blond hair on the floor. He found Aiko lying on the couch watching a cartoon on TV.
"What are you watching?"
"Powerpuff Girls."
"Oh." Yamato sat down on the couch. "What's it about?"
"They are girls with super powers who have to save their city from evil people."
"Aren't you too young to watch this?"
"No, I'm not a baby anymore." Aiko looked at him frowning, as if his question was the most stupid thing she's ever heard.
"So you shouldn't have a pacifier anymore."
The girl held it as tight as she could, not at all risking having it being taken away from her. Then she looked at her father and noticed the red stain on his neck. "Daddy, did you get hurt?"
"What?"
Aiko stood up and approached him, placing her tiny hand on his neck. "Your neck is red here. Did you get hurt?"
"No, sunshine." He gave her a smile, but mentally cursed Sora for leaving such a bruise on his skin. "It's just a bite from a bug, it should go away in the next couple of days."
Yamato was completely taken by surprise when she took the pacifier out of her mouth and kissed the spot with the hickey. "What are you doing, Aiko?"
"Mommy used to say a kiss can cure a bruise. You will feel better soon."
"Thanks, sunshine." It was all he managed to say. He was still shocked with the way she just reacted, because it wasn't something she's done before. "Are you hungry?"
Aiko nodded positively after she lied back down in her previous position; the pacifier back in her mouth.
"What do you want to eat?"
"Pizza!"
"You're too little to eat pizza."
"No, I'm not." She folded her arms around her chest, furious.
"Yes, you are. And this conversation ends here." Yamato sighed. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to be angry or yell at you. You can have half of a slice of pizza and that's it. When you get a little you can have more."
"Okay."
"So are we good?" He raised his pinky and stretched his hand in her direction.
Aiko looked at it doubtfully for a while before following him suit and linking her pinky with his. Then she stood up and gave her father a hug. "I'm sorry, daddy."
"You don't have to apologize, sunshine. You didn't do anything wrong."
"So you're not angry at me?"
"How could I ever be angry at you?" He put her down on his lap. "You mean the world to me."
He started tickling her and she laughed so hard she dropped her pacifier on the floor, but didn't mind at all.
.
Mimi was making her way home when she spotted Hikari leaning against the wall near the gate.
"Hikari? What are you doing here?"
"I need to talk to you."
"Is everything okay?"
"Yes, it is. Actually, not really. But I'd rather talk about it in a more private place, if that's okay."
"Sure. Let's go upstairs then."
Hikari paid attention to as many details in Mimi's apartment as she could as the older brunette turned on the lights as she went further in her house.
"Would you like something to drink? I think there's juice in the fridge."
"No, I'm good. Thanks."
"So what do you want to talk to me about?"
"I think you know."
"Oh, right." Mimi pressed her lips together for a moment. "Let's sit down in the living room. I think this will be a rather long conversation."
"So Taichi told you about my offer." Mimi spoke when both women were settled on the couch.
"Yes, he did."
"And I take it that you didn't exactly like it."
"Well, yeah. I'm just worried and don't see how it can be a good thing for him."
"He gets to be a father, isn't that a good thing?"
"To someone he has no romantic relationship with. What if he finds a woman and marries her? How would you explain the situation to her and hope she'd be okay with it?"
"Hikari, this baby will be my child. Taichi won't be a part of his life if he doesn't want to. He can choose what he wants to do. If he finds a woman and wants to marry her, I'm totally okay with that."
"But you won't be against the idea of having him involved in the baby's life if he wants to."
"No, I wouldn't be." Mimi admitted and Hikari bit her lower lip. "But I won't force anything on him or on Koushiro for that matter. I just want to desperately be a mother."
"Why don't you try finding someone on a dating app?"
"I tried, but it didn't work. Look, I wouldn't be asking him if I wasn't desperate. I'm twenty-nine and getting old to become a mother."
"Well, I don't want you to accept Taichi's help on it. You can turn to Koushiro or any other man if you want."
"What's wrong with it, Hikari?" Mimi nearly screamed with anger. "Is it going to embarrass you?"
"No, of course not. Becoming a parent could never embarrass me."
"Then what is it?"
"I just don't want this to Taichi, okay?" Hikari confessed. "I'd love for him to have a child, but not without love."
"This is something you have to figure out with him, I have nothing to do with it."
"I have, and he didn't listen to me. That's why I came to see you. Maybe you can get to talk him out of it."
"I'm not going to talk him out of anything. He's a grown me and knows where he's stepping into. I've made the whole thing very clear."
"This is not fair to Taichi, Mimi."
"What about me, huh?" Mimi nearly shouted. "Do you think what you're doing is fair to me?"
"I…I…"
"I'm not pointing a gun to his head and forcing him to do this. He decided that on his own. Besides, I'm not going to ask anything from him." She walked to the door and opened it. "Now please, go."
"Alright." Hikari grabbed her purse and walked out of her friend's apartment.
.
Yamato walked out on his balcony after putting Aiko in her bed. The girl fell fast asleep after dinner and he let her stay on the couch for a while before taking her to her room. He looked up at the dark blue sky full of stars before lowering his gaze towards the opposite side of the Tokyo Bay, where Sora's apartment was. The moment when they kissed earlier that day kept overplaying in his mind and he felt like she was never away for two years. It was like none of this had happened, that it was just a dream. Before he knew it, he was wishing she was there next to him that night.
"Damn it, Yamato." He cursed and ruffled his blond hair nervously. "You're a lost cause for still being in love with Sora."
He went back inside to look for his phone to call Takeru. He didn't want to bother his brother with his own personal love problems, but he really needed to talk to someone and Takeru was the best option. Yamato walked into the balcony again as he pressed his phone against his ear.
"Hello?"
"Hey, Takeru."
"Yamato, is everything okay?"
"Yeah." He sighed. "I don't know."
"What happened?" Takeru sounded alarmed.
"Sora."
"Did she run away again?"
"No, she's still here. I think she won't leave this time."
"I see. And you're thinking about giving her another chance, am I right?"
"Yes. Honestly, I think I already have."
"What do you mean?"
"I ran into her at the bay and we spent some time together. I already had a couple of beers and…"
"Yamato, you said you were going to stop drinking."
"I know, I know. I needed to take some of the burden from my shoulders, I guess. Anyway, we were talking and talking and it seemed like the old times, you know? And then she started kissing me right there."
"She kissed you?"
"Yes." Yamato's voice was failing and has a desperate tone. "And I kissed her back. I didn't do anything to stop her."
"Oh Yamato."
"I know. I deserve it. Come on."
"You're still in love with her."
"I didn't mean to." He confessed.
"It was obvious you never got over her."
"What do I do now, Takeru?"
"Well, what do you want to do?"
"Part of me doesn't want to give her another chance because it's still resentful about everything that had happened, but the other one believes she's really changed and is still desperately in love with her. And there's also Kouji and…"
"Who?"
"Oh I haven't told you yet. She was pregnant when she left, but she didn't know."
"Are you saying she had another baby while she was away and it's yours?"
"That's right."
"When did you find out about it?"
"She took me to meet him not too long ago. I think about two or three weeks ago."
"Wow, I didn't see that coming."
"Tell me about it." Yamato sighed. "I don't want to have my heart broken again, Takeru. I don't think I can handle it a second time."
"Go slowly then. Don't dive yourself in like you did the first time. At least not so soon. Make sure she won't turn her back on you and Aiko again."
"Yeah."
"So I have a nephew huh?" Takeru glanced at Hikari, who looked at him with her eyebrows raised, silently asking him about it.
"Yes, you do." Yamato could barely hold his smile at the thought of having another child. "You know how much I wanted a big family."
"I think that was always quite clear. You pretty much told it to everyone you know. What is he like?"
"Well, he has red eyes like Sora does, but everything else is me. I guess you can say he's a mini me."
"I bet he's cute."
"He is. Don't worry, you'll get to meet him soon."
"I better." Takeru laughed on the other side. "Call her, Yamato."
"What?"
"I don't need to be seeing you to know that you want to. Just… be careful, okay?"
"I will. Thanks, Takeru."
"Anytime. Let me know how it goes later."
"Of course. Bye."
.
"So it turns out we have a nephew?" Hikari asked after Takeru ended the call and placed his phone over the counter.
"Yamato recently found out Sora was expecting another child when she left for Paris. She introduced them not too long ago."
"Wow, how crazy is this? I didn't see it coming at all."
"Me neither. I'm still surprised."
"Do you think they will work things out now?"
"I'm tasting my own medicine here, but I hope they do." He sat beside her. "My brother is still head over heels for her."
"Well, he never stopped being in the first place."
"You have a point."
"What about us though?" Hikari leaned over and lightly bit his earlobe. "When are we going to conceive our second one?"
"I need to check my agenda." He slowly turned to hear. "But I'm pretty sure I have some free time now."
"That's good to know." She advanced in his direction and he found himself pinned underneath her on their sofa.
.
The moonlight reflected on the glass filled with wine Mimi was holding. She had lost track of how long she had been leaning against the wall in her balcony staring at the movement of the city below. Her conversation with Hikari kept overplaying in her mind and she was beginning to think everything was just a bad idea. In the end, she knew she had no right to put neither Taichi nor Koushiro into this situation just because she was desperate to have a child.
But most of all, she was disappointed with the way Hikari approached her to talk about it. She totally understood Hikari being against the idea, it was her brother after all. But Mimi was surprised with the way she reacted, especially considering they were friends since they were teenagers. So she expected a little bit more understanding from her friend.
Mimi was so spaced out she barely processed there was someone knocking on her door until a dancing tune echoed in her living room. She walked back inside and stared at the screen of her phone. She thought it could be only a coincidence and automatically assumed Taichi was the person standing on the other side of her door, not at all realizing she was only wearing a gray T-shirt from college.
"Hey."
"Taichi, what are you doing here?"
"I was in the neighborhood and thought I'd stop by for a while."
"Oh."
"Is it a bad timing?"
"No, not at all." Mimi stepped aside for him to walk in and drank a little more of her wine. "Please, don't mind the mess. I didn't have time to clean my apartment. And by time I mean energy."
"I can completely relate to that." Taichi gave an warm laugh. "I promise I'll overlook it, but it doesn't seem messy at all."
"Thanks." She smiled.
"That's a pretty good wine." He grabbed the green bottle and stared at the label. "And pretty expensive too."
"Yeah." Mimi stood beside him. "I thought I could spoil myself after a day like today."
"Did something bad happen?"
"Not really." She shrugged and avoided making eye contact with him, afraid he would be able to catch everything just by staring into her eyes. "It's just been an exhausting day at work."
"I see. Those are the worst."
"Yeah. Would you like some wine? I drank more than half of a bottle already, but there's definitely enough to share, I suppose."
"Sure." He replied, following her to the kitchen and watching her grab another fancy glass in her cupboard. "So you decided to have a relaxing night on your own."
"Pretty much." Mimi looked down at where his eyes fell and blushed quite heavily. "And you can tell I suck at being a host."
"Well, I showed up unannounced, so…"
"So it is your fault then." She teased. "Have you ever enjoyed a good wine watching the view from the balcony?"
"Not that I remember of."
"Then tonight is the night." She grabbed the bottle and walked out, closely followed by him.