The First Goodbye is the Hardeset
12:03 - Polar Star Dorm, Totsuki - Pre-Le Cordon Bleu
"That'sthe last of it." Yukihira grunts as he shoves the last of her tan leather suitcase set – a smallish nightcase – into the back of her trunk. It's only twelve in the afternoon, but she's already exhausted.
A small part of her is begging to stay. But Nakiri Erina does not beg, and least of all to someone like Yukihira Souma. Not even if he has been her boyfriend for a whole twelve months.
"Thanks." She tries for casual indifference, but hears her voice crack anyway.
Earlier in the week, they'd said their goodbyes to the others. With Alice and Ryou en-route to Sweden to start their internship under Chef Magnus Nilssen of Faviken and with Megumi and the Aldinis deployed to Massimo Bottura's Osteria Francescana in Modena, the Polar Star Dorm was already much quieter than usual. Hisako had left not two days ago, Harvard-bound and ready to undertake her Bachelor's.
She hasn't seen Hayama since, but last she'd heard, he'd accepted an apprenticeship in a four-star establishment in Massachusetts.
According to Yukihira, he'd vehemently denied it had anything at all to do with Hisako, nevermind that it would place him exactly 30 minutes away. Everybody saw through the act immediately. Nobody thought to tease him for it. After all, too many of them were suffering the exact same thing. Parting.
Not everybody had the luxury of attaching themselves to their better halves the way Alice did.
She lets out a sigh, suddenly overwhelmed by a sense of incomprehensible loneliness. Yukihira arches a brow at her, and she barely manages a smile as she dumps her satchel into the back seat.
Then, she holds out her arms.
Grinning, he pulls her in, his own arms wrapping themselves about her. She feels his hands on her back, warm, rough, and somewhat tenser than usual. He'd really bulked up in their third year; a direct result of Artisanal Bread 101, she thinks. She lets out a breath, and allows herself, for just that moment, to sink into him.
He smells like clean soap and fresh laundry. Herbs, mint and oregano and basil. Talc, and that godawful cologne she's grown used to over the years. She counts the seconds and etches the memory of his arms, his warmth, and his heartbeat into her mind. This is what home feels like.
"I still don't see why the hell you need to run through two years at Le Cordon Bleu. You've just graduated top of the class at Tootsuki, for gods' sake." There's amusement in his voice. He's always been better with parting. She thinks it's his unfailing optimism. We'll see each other again, he'd said, the first time she'd brought it up. So don't worry so much, Nakiri.
"If I have to head Tootsuki one day, I need to know how the other top establishments are doing it. It was either Le Cordon Bleu or Alma." She lets out a sigh, unwilling to let go just yet. "And you didn't want to come with."
"That's not really my sort of thing, Nakiri." He pulls back a little, and she watches, mesmerised, as his crimson lashes catch in the sunlight. "Anyway, I'll let you know once I've made concrete plans with Chef Shinomiya. If I do."
"Potentially Paris." The words give her far too much hope. And potentially not Paris. She swallows, then pushes away, suddenly resolute. "And we're agreed. Until we're both on solid ground again, we're broken up."
Yukihira has the decency to look a little torn, but they've discussed the subject half to death at this point. He nods, and she has to physically ground herself when his hands find her cheeks, fingers brushing lightly at the sides of her neck. "We're broken up."
He kisses her then, lightly, affectionately. It's nowhere near as fiery as their first, nor as desperate as those stolen in the nights she wakes from nightmares. Today's kiss is sweet and warm, the perfect culmination of their shared past. A break-up kiss. A goodbye kiss. An 'I'll see you again' kiss.
She leans into him. Just a minute longer. "I love you, you idiot."
His chest rumbles with unspoken amusement, and he presses a kiss to her forehead. "And I love you."
