Finding Gravity
(Chapter 03)
"Falling in love with her was probably the easiest thing I've ever done in my life. It happened gradually, tenderly, as if some unknown reason lulling me into her to the point where she's molded and imprinted in my own self. But I don't know what her thoughts were nor would she ever told me if I asked." He placed his cup down after sipping the whole content in one gulp, despite it had lost its warmth. "I wasn't in a position to ask her anything. I had too many questions, but the words we exchanged were simply about college matters."
"It was an unrequited love?"
"It's an impossible love. Rejection was the only memento she'd ever left for me."
"Maybe she didn't know how to express her feelings?"
"Or she simply didn't like me enough." Kise had a bitter smile on his face. "I won't lie, alright, I was really irritated by the way she acted and it wasn't a sweet memory. It was the worst, the most heartbroken, but as you can see, a man is a complete fool when it comes to feelings. I persisted, I used every single knowledge I had about women, thinking that she'd eventually give in, when in reality, she's never meant to be mine, not even for a minute."
"What happened to her...?"
"She got involved in an accident when she was on her way to the campus. It was Monday, and the only day where we can share the same class. I waited for her and called her hundredth times, even though they all ended up in mailbox, without knowing a single thing until the obituary was being posted in our campus's general bulletin the next day. I was absent on her burial, but I did pay her a visit. It was the first and the last time, and I brought her a bouquet of withered flowers. If I think about it now, maybe I shouldn't have done that in first place."
"I might have done the same thing if I were you."
"You don't think that's childish, or disrespectful?" Kise shot her a surprised look. His lips cracked into a small smile. "To put it blunt, I think that'd be a great console when it comes to your close ones. Like a situation where you come to their grave and say 'Hey it's me. You know, you're such a bad person to leave like that, especially without saying goodbye. You broke my heart, and you make me angry. Anyway, I still bring you some flowers. The kind that resembles my feelings since you're gone.' Then, you'll cry yourself to sleep for next few weeks and when you finally visit the same grave once again, you'll put a fresh flower bouquet and ask if he/she is having a good time in heaven."
"I don't think it's disrespectful to express your feelings, even if it's directed to a person who's no longer alive. Although you just made it sounded even more tragic than it's supposed to be. Like something you'd find in melodramatic movie about wartime romance or Italian mafia, where they'd condole in elegies and tear-jerking letters or reminiscences."
"That's exactly what I meant. It's more like a mockery to me. A part of me used to wonder that if I make her mad, she'd probably haunt me in my dreams, asking for explanation or even worst, revenge for all disturbances I've done. But we know it'd never happened. Well, I guess that's why people said the first cut hurts the most."
"I'm sorry to hear that..."
"Why'd you feel sorry all of a sudden? You don't have to feel sorry for me nor her. It won't change anything."
"It's a common response, I suppose." She softly replied, slightly avoiding his gaze again. "And if you want to put it that way, holding on to someone who's already dead won't change anything either."
Kise stared at her, amazed at what she just said. No one ever told him so, not even other Generation of Miracles' members nor his respected ex-captain back there in Kaijo. It was a sentence that everyone else always wanted to tell him, but felt bad to.
"It can't be helped." He defended, an uncomfortable pile of feelings stirred at his throat. The lump in his chest swelled even more. "Happiness only lasts briefly while pain could last for a lifetime."
"Happiness and pain alternate, none of them actually lasts for a lifetime."
"What's going on now? Our talk has strayed too far from the main topic." Kise let out an empty chuckle. Both of them weren't surprised it sounded bitter and hostile. "I'd rather listen to your sarcastic remarks instead of your philosophical statement about life."
Haruna licked her lips ponderingly then took a sip of her glass of water. "You're being a coward, Kise-san."
"Don't sass me, Reika..." Kise's eyebrows reflexively contorted into a frown, he was unprepared for such response.
"Oh, pardon me? I thought you want more of my blunt comments? You avoided my statements because they're the bitter truth you don't want to accept. I didn't mean to pity you, Kise-san, I just regretted that you have to go through a past like that. I don't go around calling people a coward for feeling at loss or mourning for their loved ones. I call them cowards because they're too afraid to accept that not all memories should be remembered."
Kise's jaw tightened. As he stared into those clear, dark eyes, he felt his heart thumped in both anger and astonishment. Her words had him wrapped around her fingers, as if those plump lips and that ravishing beauty weren't enough to catch him off-guard in first place. Who to blame then? Haruna and her straight-thinking persona, or Kise and his cowardice heart?
"I'm sorry, Reika, but I can't answer to that yet." He cleared his throat and flicked his arm to take a look at his watch. "And it's very late already, you'll be busy tomorrow, right? Come, I'll take you home."
"I can go home on my own. You just have to say it if you want me to leave." She uncovered her lap and placed the napkin at the side of her empty plate. She was about to address the waiter when Kise suddenly held her hand and gently guided it down. Kise then motioned at the waiter to come and handed him his credit card, ignoring Haruna who tried to pry her hand off with deep frown plastered at her forehead.
"Please, don't misunderstand. I don't mean to dismiss you, but I'm at loss of words because of what you said to me just now. I'm not offended, but I can't stand this conversation any longer."
"I know, that's why I was about to make it easier for you."
"No, you think you know but you don't. You're not making it easier for me, you make me feel like I've treated you impolitely. I... I enjoy talking to you, I really do and I told you everything by my own will, but I never thought we'll get this far." He sighed, voice latched with anguish and hesitation. "Look, I'll leave to England next Monday, and I'm not coming back until November. Will you be able to join me for a brunch this Saturday?"
"I'm so sorry, but I have to refuse. I'm very thankful for such wonderful meetings in these last two months, but you're not obliged to give me any answers nor to meet me every time you're in Japan." She said without looking at him straight in the eyes. "I don't want to burden you, so if you don't mind, let's not take things any further than this. Don't think about my questions nor everything I've said anymore, you can think of it as silly things said by a naïve college student."
"In the other words, you don't want to see me anymore? Or do you want me to keep distance with you? Do you know your words can imply that you're now playing hard to get?" Kise's jaw tightened. His knuckles whitened when he fisted them at the table. "Tell me, Reika, which one of them you're currently thinking about?" Kise paused for a while when the waiter returned with Kise's credit card and table receipt.
"Can you at least tell me what actually happened? You asked me questions, you keep raising my curiosity, and when I started to feel comfortable with you, you said you don't want to take things further? Few weeks ago you were a simple teenager with refreshing personality. But tonight, although very beautiful, you become the most complicated woman I've ever met."
"I'm not playing anything."
"Then what?"
Kise stared at her. She stared back for a while before prying her timid gaze off him. Kise felt his throat hitched with amassing awe, and it made him wanted to beat some consciousness out of his own ass for feeling infatuated in such wrong timing.
"Let's talk about it somewhere else."
He stood up after minutes of silence, and without waiting for her answer, guiding her out from the bistro to his car. Haruna sat beside him in silence, mimicking a refined statue, except for the sound of her breathing and sweet scent of her perfume which he occasionally sensed. Apple and cinnamon, with a hint of floral base. It was actually an unsuitable choice for nighttime, bit too redolent perhaps, but somehow, it fitted her perfectly.
That night was a typical view of Tokyo that never ceased to amaze him. Lines of vehicles tidily striping the light-bathed highway in the middle of the city, side-by side with crowds of pedestrian that systematically exchange turns to engulf the wide streets with their anecdotal facades. Kise would have enjoyed that kind of metropolitan bits as well, since it gave an extremely different feelings compare to other cities he had visited, but he was too tense and anxious to feel any sorts of nostalgia at that moment.
Haruna cringed at how cold his figure looked as they pulled off at a vacant park near her apartment. He directed his gaze to the playground near the entrance, clearly avoiding her eyes, as he held the door open for her. Instead of his usual flamboyant and easygoing attitude, he looked domineering, torn, and insecure.
The park was empty. The looming shadows of trees and lampposts occupied half of their visuals as she sat down at the swings not so far from the kid's playground Kise was seeing few minutes ago. He stood a meter away from her, eyes planted solid on the reddish stone pavement under his shoes. Skies above them were bright with stars. The moon beaming shyly through the ethereal movement of misty clouds.
"I didn't mean to imply anything." She said to his back that was hunched rather forlornly. "I didn't pick my words carefully, so I ended up making you misunderstood. I'm really sorry Kise-san, it's just that... I don't want if things become too much too handle."
"What kind of thing is that? Why'd it be too much too handle? There must be a reason why you're suddenly being like this."
She bit her lips. Her heart skipped a beat and it made her throat burned. The world was spinning around her and not a single word of excuse be formed inside her mind even though she wanted nothing but to immediately explain everything to him. Kise was right. What kind of thing is that? Is it Kise's playboy attitude, the complicated conversation they recently engaged into, or else, was it for her curious tendency regarding his personal life?
"Reika, we're getting nowhere if you keep being like this. You're usually fast at making retorts, but now, you're being so silent and it makes me assuming things." He sighed. The broads of his back slowly relaxed; a clear sign that his anger slowly diminished. "You can tell me everything, I promise I won't say anything until you finished."
"I'm sure you remember that two weeks ago, you apologized and gave me a present..."
"Of course I do... go on..." his voice clear and less demanding than before.
"Well, you know, it was something that will surely make any sane women to feel special, no matter how boyish or ignorant they could be." She fiddled with the edge of her dress whilst stealing glances to his direction and, after making sure he still facing the other way, slowly composed herself. "After that, I try to convince myself that it was completely a token of apology and those assumptions won't mean anything since you aren't staying in Japan and we rarely meet. But after today, I realized those intervals are nothing.
"Then, you asked me to drop the honorifics and you told me things that are downright private, those aren't things that usually happen between acquaintance, and all I can think of is how to immediately stop it." Her lips reflexively smiled at the memories of his expression, his chatoyant eyes and the way they twinkled when he met her at the cocktail hours ago.
"I asked you about your past out of curiosity, but it gradually became some kind of way to prevent myself from feeling anything. I used to think that if I know what kind of women you've dated, what kind of memories you had when you were with them, I'd be discouraged. I hoped that I'll find some flaws, or a proof that you're just an arrogant playboy, but after I heard your stories, I somehow felt relieved that you're not as bad as you tried to portray yourself to be."
"Reika―"
"I'm not finished yet." She abruptly snapped, earning a sheepish chuckle and mumble of apologies from the older man.
"The thing is... I'm afraid that I'll eventually developing feelings that I shouldn't feel if I get too involved with you. Even though I had a bad impression to you at first, now I don't want if those times I can spend with you to end so quickly. I enjoy talking to you too, more than you could ever imagine, but on the other hand, I don't want to have a bad ending." She took a breather and closed her eyes tight. When she opened them, he was no longer turning his back against her.
"I don't want to have an unrequited love. I don't want to hope for something which I don't have any chances with."
"I'm not going to reject you... It's mutual."
"No, you will reject me, if not by situations, by your past. You're still holding on to the pain caused by your first love, you said so yourself. I don't have any rights to ask you to return my feelings nor to let go of her, but I can ask you to keep distance with me and that's enough."
"Reika, you don't understand. For now, I might be incapable of loving you the way you want me to, but can't you give me some time? Please, this is very difficult for me as well." He crouched down in front of her, his hand supported by the metal chain on the side of the swing while the other one trailing the dampness on her left cheek. "I was unprepared for this. But I will try, I will do anything you want me to... just, just don't ask me to leave..."
She instinctively touched his hair when he laid his head on her shoulder, her fingers delved in between his soft, golden tresses. "Kise-san―"
The silvery metal clanked when he tightened his grip. "Reika... the way you called me sounded too rigid for a relationship as complicated as this."
"Addressing you like a stranger is the last thing I can do to keep myself contained."
Her response earned another disappointed sigh. His lungs were strangled with sadness that smelt exactly just like her. "Can't I change your mind? Is there really no other way?"
"One of us will get hurt in the end."
"I don't think there's a problem in getting hurt again if I can still be with you."
"I don't want to hurt you."
"Such a stubborn girl." His amber eyes flickered at her, they were ablaze between the nightshades. The surface of his orbs sheen with tears, and it looked like he can break anytime soon. "Meet me again then. This Saturday. Let's meet for the last time and make proper goodbye just like how an acquaintance should."
"So you can have another past to hold on to? I wonder how you'll describe me in the future."
"You're still sassing me till the end, huh?" He sadly chuckled while fondly staring at her.
"Do you have a better way?"
"I don't want to hold on to you, because that will give me a reason to let go, but I'd keep you somewhere in my heart, in a place that only reserved for me to see. So even if I fall in love with someone else, you will forever be my secret, my gravity."
"If that's so, I think there's no need for us to meet this Saturday." She swallowed the growing lump inside her throat to prevent her tears from falling. "You've secured a place for me in your life as a secret only for you to take out and remember, why not let that be the last of our conversation, Kise-san?"
"Why don't you want to see me anymore after today? I only asked for one meeting."
"I know. But my feelings will waver and what happened tonight will have no meaning if we see each other the next day. I don't want us to say goodbye as acquaintances."
"I should make the most of tonight, then." He bitterly acknowledged as his eyes traveled down to their intertwined fingers. Her hand was so small compare to his. Slender and long, with translucent shades of pink, and there were small scars scattered at the inner lining of her thumb, index, and middle finger. He wondered what kind of pastime activity had caused that. How did she treat and hide them so far? Did she hurt badly?
Suddenly, there were so many things he wanted to know about her. He had been telling her his story in their short encounters, but he never heard any of hers. Never did it crossed his mind that he would hold her hand and had such heartbroken conversation at the park in the middle of the night. He wished he could bring her to travel with him. He wished that their encounter could be stalled, even if it's just for a moment or two, instead of experiencing everything in one go as their first and last time. Ah, what an irony. Kise would never thought he'd eventually have a sentiment to such smallest of details.
"What kind of memento should I leave for you?"
He gave her a sad smile, his thumbs drawing circles on her pale wrists. "I should have bought a ring and propose to you right here, right now."
"We're straying away from the topic, Kise-san." She replied, a lone trail of tear wetted the slope of her cheek.
Kise took a deep breath as he leaned closer and pressed his forehead against hers.
"Is it okay if I kiss you?"
Timidly, like a butterfly around a newly bloomed petal, she released her hands from his grip and wrapped them around his neck before responding to his question. He welcomed her attempt by nibbling at her bottom lips, tenderly playing with the virgin flesh before slowly savoring the inside of her mouth. Her lips tasted as sweet and as plump as they seemed.
Apple, cinnamon, floral, and salt. Those tastes were the ones her lips allowed and he greedily took them in―as much as he could. The air grew warmer, and even before he realized it, she broke the contact. Her breathing was hot and ragged against his chin, her sweet scent mingled with his, it was somehow felt like she just left a piece of her inside him. A piece that would last for a lifetime, just like what he promised he'd made her be.
When he finally arrived in front of her apartment building, the cracks of his already broken heart crushed into smaller bits of stinging pain. He couldn't bring himself to stare when she thanked him and bade him goodbye, but he couldn't allow her to pass by from his view just like that, thus he held her hand when she was about to open the door.
"It's not tomorrow yet." She glanced at the digital clock displayed at the small screen of his music player which pointed at 11.52 PM. It soon turned into 11.53 in a blink of an eye. "Just a little bit longer..."
So she stayed.
They sat in silence, counting through each breathing, each whiff of air, and each beat of heart they skipped. It was an unhurried moment. As if time was being kind and allowed their last seven-minutes to be less fleeting than before, to gradually convey all kinds of unspeakable emotions that ran through their pained souls. Their counting stops a minute before the numbers shifted to 12.00 AM, right after the soft roll of his name escaped her lips.
"You don't have to say anything anymore." He shut his eyes and clenched the steering wheel harder to stop himself from pulling her into his arms. The look in his eyes were hazier than before; their rays of gold became dull and obscure. His calm breathing faltered and his voice was merely a whisper swallowed by the sound of door being closed.
"Goodbye, Reika."
