"Yo, Yukihira! There's a package at the door for you."
Soma was breaking down a whole pheasant in the Polar Star kitchen when Shun Ibusaki called his name. Gloves covered in blood and guts, he hurried from the butcher block and dipped his head through the threshold. He shouted at his enigmatic dorm mate.
"Can you bring it in for me?"
"No," Shun replied, leaving the front door.
"...Okay?"
"You have to sign for it. It's huge."
"Huge?" Soma mentally scratched his head. He was trying to remember if he was expecting a package, let alone a big one. Yes, all his online carts were filled to the brim, but they still sat idly (thanks to Joichiro Yukihira forgetting to provide financially for his son!). "Okay, I'm coming!" He washed his hands.
"He said he's coming," Shun flatly echoed over his shoulder before turning the corner.
"Uh, yeah," the bored delivery driver said. "I heard the entire conversation."
Soma sprinted to the front door to meet the courier.
"Sign here. And here. And here and here and here, too. Okay. Here," the guy said, shoving the package into Soma's hands before taking his leave.
"Okay, bye?!" Soma shouted.
When he finally dragged the box up three flights of stairs and opened the large package in his dorm room, his body automatically crashed onto the bed. He frantically patted his pockets until he found what he was looking for.
The phone rang too many times. Finally, it stopped. "Papa!"
"Soma, my last good living thing!" The gruff, elderly voice of his childhood tickled his eardrum. Aside from his father, Soma's grandfather was his only living relative and last connection to his mother, so he loved him dearly. He chewed his bottom lip in guilt; he should call the old man more.
"Aw jeez, Papa! Don't say that," Soma groaned.
"Why not? It's true!" The elderly man insisted through the phone.
Focusing on why he called, Soma tried his best not to break down. "Mom's...guitar?" His throat felt tight; he rarely talked about her.
That was all he could say. Tears welled in his eyes.
"Argh, good! You got it! And it came in perfect condition, I hope?"
"Y-yes," Soma choked, nodding to the warmhearted man who couldn't see him.
"Good, because for the amount I had to pay for shipping to that godforsaken school of yours, it better not have a scratch!"
"No, it's perfect," Soma chuckled at his mother's cantankerous father, wiping his tears away with the back of his hand. "B-But…why?"
"What'd ya mean, why? It's your mother's guitar, boy!"
"I know that! But why don't you want to keep it? Pops left it to you after the funeral. Don't you still want it?"
"Rah, no! It's no good here. It's cooped up in its case and getting all dusty in my shed. There's no need to keep sentiments everywhere. Plus, I'm old, and who knows how long I have left! " Kazuto belly-laughed.
"Don't joke like that!" Soma frowned. He didn't like teasing death.
"Soma, listen to me. I love having my daughter's most prized possession lying around, but your mother would've slapped me silly if she knew my grumpy, no-talent self had it and not you."
"But, Papa. It's her favorite guitar."
"Soma, listen to me. I miss my little Tamako every damn day, son. It's not good for a parent to bury their child, but even worse for them to die with their child's possessions, with her spirit locked in a box. So hold onto it for me…for both of us, okay? You be a good boy and put it to good use. I love you. And call me more often, ya hear?!"
Soma laughed, sniffling. "You got it, Ojiisan."
-8-
Soma had quite a lot of homework due for Central.
But since it was for Central, he got busy tuning his mother's acoustic guitar well into the sleepy Friday night instead. This scalloped, maple-colored vintage guitar was his mother's best friend and his father's best gift to her. He was raised playing it in the living room just as much as with a knife in his hand in the kitchen.
He'd been strumming a nostalgic melody on his dorm room's floor for two hours, trying to shake off the cobwebs of years away from her, when a light knock tapped on his door.
Soma looked at the time, striking a quarter-to-twelve; it had to be Megumi telling him to quiet down. He got up, delicately placing the instrument atop his mattress, and went to answer it.
He swung the door open. "My bad, Meg- Oh!"
Erina stood before him; her doll face expression was conflicted between peeved and precious. Her foam green nightgown bloomed around her body like a tulip, and her hair flowed like a river down her back. She held his folded jacket.
"Oh Nakiri! Hey! My bad; I thought you were Tadokoro." She was the last person he expected to be at his door.
After their chicken and egg rice bowl moment the other night, he noticed she was avoiding being alone with him. So, he'd been giving her space. He needed time to sort out his feelings, too.
She shoved his jacket into his chest. "Sorry to disappoint you, Yukihira," she replied, leaning into her peevishness.
"Aw nah, not a disappointment at all!" he said, genuinely excited by her surprise appearance. "And thanks for bringing this back. Did you pack it with the rest of your stuff?" This disarmed Erina, but she fought to let it show.
"Hisako brought it from the mansion's laundry service," she muttered.
"So, what's up! My bad. Was my strumming disturbing you from your beauty sleep?"
"I was not sleeping, Yukihira. How could I while you spend all night making a nonsensical racket?"
"So…that's a yes?"
"Obviously! Have you no respect for sleeping hours? Mistress Fumio informed me upon my stay that there was an eleven o'clock noise curfew."
"Ah, yeah. The curfew…" Soma noted pensively. "I've never heard of it."
"You lie, Yukihira! Miss Fumio was very clear about it upon my arrival, so I doubt your lowly expectations be any different."
Soma shrugged and pushed his door wide. "Do you…wanna come in?" Erina said nothing. He studied her face, humored by the internal battle of pride and desire dueling within her eyes. He leaned on the doorpost with a knowing grin. Erina crossed her arms with an upturned nose and stepped past him and into his room.
"Hmph. If you insist."
Right then, Soma was glad he decided to clean up before practicing. "I do," he flashed a cat fang.
"What was that discordant noise you were making anyway?" She demanded, standing in the center of his room. He closed his door and grabbed his mother's guitar, motioning for her to sit. She stayed standing in place. He moved back to his practice pillow on the floor.
"I was tuning my guitar. Practicing, dusting off the cobwebs."
"I didn't know you played the guitar." Erina's eyes danced around the sleek wooden curves.
Soma chuckled. "Not since I was a kid. My grandpa sent my mom's guitar to me, so I've been trying to get a feel of the strings again."
"Oh," Erina spoke more softly and sweetly than she had since he opened his door. She approached him as he nestled the giant's entire body into his lap, gingerly wrapping his fingers around its slender neck. Without looking up, he pulled another cushion from under him and placed it at her feet. Erina knelt.
"So, what melody were you playing?"
"Oh, so it wasn't just nonsensical ruckus you heard?" He smirked, and she fumed.
"Never mind, Yukihira! Must you always be such a nuisance?"
He shook his head. "Only to you."
She rolled her eyes and turned away. "You do sound rather nice."
He gushed. That amused him and aroused his desire to share this part of himself with her. He began casually strumming through a series of romantic chords. His fingers loosened as their muscle memories finally awakened. He could still feel his mother's fingers gently adjusting his placement up and down the guitar's neck, like when she corrected how his father taught him the song.
"It's an old American song my dad taught me to play when I was first learning," he said, fingerpicking a string. "But my mother is the reason I play so well. Do you...wanna hear it?" It was a long-shot question, but he liked shooting from half-court.
So, when Erina said nothing, though her eyes spoke her truth, Soma took that as a yes. He adjusted his fingerstyle on the correct strings, placed his pick on his first note, C#m, and took a deep breath.
-8-
There are groupings of organ pipes all over Polar Star dorm, in every room, on every level, that serve as speaking tubes. Depending on where a resident is in the dormitory, each organ pipe connects to its accompanying pipe fixed in any room. The interspersed pipes create a phone network across the large, ancient house so that people could communicate easily without having to deal with the labor of running back and forth. If a pipe flap was open, so were the lines of communication.
No one in the Polar Star Dormitory adhered to the curfew. Instead, around the dorm's expansive grounds, one could almost always find a student up at all hours of the night working on something—a new recipe, pulling an all-nighter, perfecting a cultivation process, and in the case of this Friday night, the only three first-year girls in the dorm—gossiping. Yuki, Ryoko, and Megumi sat in the first-level living room, commiserating on their workload and poring over the latest school drama of the new director's policy changes in a day-old issue of TohSpo. Their weekly tradition was to decompress from their week over a bowl of popcorn, duck fat pâte, and a shared bottle of fermented rice juice.
"Ugh, I'm so worried about Erinacchi. Her father is such a putz," Yuki whined over her beloved new housemate.
"I know, it is so sad what she's being put through. First, her father betrays her grandfather; now, her boyfriend is the one who sanctioned him to do it?" Ryoko shook her head.
"Rumor has it, it's ex-boyfriend now," Yuki corrected, thumbing through the cover story.
"You know not to believe those rumors. Either way, I cannot imagine what she's going through."
Megumi hiccuped. "She deserves better." She hiccuped again. Then they heard the muffled sounds of two very distinct voices.
"Megumi, darling, do you want me to get you some-"
"Shhhh!" Yuki fanned her best friend. "I think I hear something coming from the pipes," she said conspiratorially. She rushed over and leaned her head to the only open pipe in the arranged cluster. "Oooh!"
"What, Yuki? It's too late to be spying," Ryoko warned, though she did not hesitate moving to her best friend's side.
"It sounds like Soma…" Yuki cupped her ear to listen closer.
"Well, he has been tinkering with his new guitar all night," Ryoko noted.
"Oop!"
"What?!" The other two girls whisper-yelled.
"It sounds like he's talking to Erina-poo!"
"Again?" The question slipped out as Megumi hiccuped again.
"Apparently! What does that make it? Three nights in a row?" Yuki's face held a suggestive smile. "Wonder what they're talking about at this late hour?"
"We shouldn't…" Ryoko pulled away. "It's rude to encroach on two people's private conversation."
"I agree…" Megumi pressed her hand to her lips to suppress another hiccup.
"Shhh! He just asked her a question, and you two made me miss it!" Then, the clumsy attempts at musical chords on an acoustic guitar began flowing through the pipe. Yuki gasped. "It's kind of a messy start, but…this melody is beautiful," she said solemnly. The two girls squeezed on both her sides to listen along.
Soma's voice came through low, soft, yet steady and clear. This time, all three girls gasped in unison.
"Soma…" Megumi whispered.
"Yukihira…" Ryoko gasped.
"-Can sing?!" Yuki cooed. They looked at each other in disbelief. "And he's good, too! Megumi-cchi, did you know that?!"
Yuki and Ryoko eyeballed the third of their trio.
But all Megumi could do was shake her head, eyes wide as the full moon outside.
-8-
Soma fumbled over the song's first three chords before finding his groove. He was clumsy with his finger arrangement and rusty with the ease at which the song required of the tempo. It had been too long since he had played, or even heard, the song. But there was something almost fateful about the guitar showing up when it did and Erina showing up at his door when she did, which felt synchronistic and made his memory open up. As he slowly strummed the strings, he nearly forgot Erina was kneeling before him, and the melody took him back to his childhood.
And it just felt…right. He exhaled, staring at his nervous digits and pressing the strings. He studied the chords and notes, his tone and pitch, and focused on his muse.
"It started out in springtime
Against the golden skyline
You spoke to me at last."
He tilted his head upward to look at her over his nose, comfortable with his playing. Confidence swirling around the butterflies fluttering in his stomach when their eyes met; he felt his heart burst as he smiled, singing through the next stanza.
"It started out intensely
And within all my senses, I knew…
I'm sure I knew—
The only reason God gave me eyes was to see you."
Soma never dropped his gaze. With every passing word and every changing note, he locked into her heliotrope irises, studying her soft, angelic features. She was mesmerized and seemed to be holding her breath.
"The only reason God gave me ears was to hear your voice
Say, I will al—I will always love you
And when the wind gets cold
I'll wrap my arms around you
His memories flashed back to the transfer exam, the training camp, the chance summer run-ins, the Fall Selection, that night in the woods, and the Moon Festival. Every isolated moment he had with Erina came flooding back at once.
We shared our dreams, endeavors, and many things
We never could tell a soul before
I saw you smile through the tears that fell to the floor
I'm sure I knew
The only reason God gave me hands was to hold you
And he finely tuned the drums of my ears just to hear your voice…"
His voice swelled with fire and passion, and he felt the roar of melodic conviction push through it. The only reason he could imagine he was sent to Tohtsuki was because of her.
"Say, I will al…I will always love you
And when the wind gets cold
I'll build a fire to warm your hands
I'll wrap my arms around you."
His eyes were fixed on her. He didn't know why, but he felt a sudden urge to pour out his soul, the desperate need to let her know this deep-seated secret in his heart. The only reason he was still at Tohtsuki was because of her.
"And I won't let shadows scare you in the stillness of the night
I'll be the cooling voice that tells you everything's alright
And when darkness tries to drag you down, there will be a light
And no wind and no storm and no hatred can hide it
I'll help you find it!"
But Soma hadn't even realized until he began singing that he had these deep feelings buried in his soul for Erina…until he started playing the song that his father sang to his mother on her guitar on the day he committed his life to cooking solely for her on the night he proposed to her. Erina's eyes pooled with emotion, pulling his heart closer with every breath he took. His voice softened and slowed. His fingers plucked to match its tempo.
"And I will al—I will always love you
And when the wind gets cold
I'll build a fire to warm your hands
I'll wrap my arms around you…"
Since the final night of the Moon Festival, the only reason he'd secretly resolved to fight against Central was because of her.
He gently tapped the guitar case to indicate he was done. Suddenly, a wave of vulnerability washed over him.
"So, yeah, that's the song I was working on..." he said shyly.
They sat in silence, the final note left in the room, locked in place, staring at each other in a way they never had before. Tears rolled down Erina's face. She leaned forward and stalked toward him, her chest swaying with each crawling step.
She took the guitar out of his hand and sat it beside them. His eyes darted around her actions. "Did it sound-"
Erina gently cupped his face and looked him in the eyes.
"Can I kiss you?" she whispered.
Her seductive question sent chills rippling through him. His heart double-tapped as she made deep eye contact with him. Her eyes moved from his eyes to his lips, lingering for a heartbeat before returning to his eyes.
Soma knew she was waiting for him to answer, but his tongue felt like lead in his mouth. He stared at her, stunned, and nodded.
Immediately, her plump and balmy lips planted on his. Soma's eyes widened at her touch and shut, realizing this new reality, though he did not know what it meant.
Erina Nakiri is kissing me!
She pressed into his mouth, parting his lips with her sacred tongue. Soma wrapped his arms around her waist as she cupped his face. They shared a delicate kiss, as quiet as the atmosphere around them, as confessional as the song he had just sung—his first.
Soma leaned back on the floor as Erina climbed on top of him, both deeply engrossed in the sensation of each other's taste. His eyes flew open. As it was his first kiss, the rebel in him dared peek at his fantasy coming alive. The rumble in his belly told him this moment was real, but his head was swimming in disbelief.
Then, a thought crashed into a wall in his mind. He didn't want to; it was not even on the list of things he wanted to do, but Soma pulled away. He had to. Erina's eyelids fluttered open in confusion. He hoped if she had kissed him in a state of delirium, she wouldn't come to her senses.
But he had to ask.
"Wait. Aren't you still with Eishi Tsukasa?" He hadn't been brave enough to ask her outright after the last time she shut him down after their lecture. "I mean, he's still your boyfriend, right?"
"Ex," Erina corrected.
Soma's lungs did jumping jacks in his chest. He brushed a strand of hair out his face, slid her off him, and stood up, leaving her on the floor at his feet. Erina's face dropped in humiliation...
Until she saw his trademark grin spreading across his face.
He held out his hand, and his heart fluttered as he waited for her to accept his invitation. She eyed it, hesitated, and then seized it. He pulled her up and led her to his bed.
-8-
Three nosy first-year girlfriends stood in the dark on the first floor as a springy single-sized mattress creaked two final notes from an open pipe on the third.
Yuki squeaked into her fists.
Ryoko fanned herself.
Megumi could only gulp the air seizing her lungs—her hiccups gone at last.
a/n: broke soma (shakes head), baroque soma (nods head)...but seriously, when this chapter came to me, i was listening to the original acoustic by JP Cooper and reminiscing on what that felt like to hear it for the first time 11yrs ago. the nostalgia and romance colored my imagination & all i could think was that our favorite couple's love confessions through this moment would be epic. if you disagree, boohoo for you! something i like tinkering with in romance is initiation. i think to subvert familiar romance tropes, especially when working with any canon material, you have to trust your characters to be brave in the moments that matter most to take action that's out of character but also shines a truer light onto who they are/want to be. vulnerability breaks the mold in life and romance, so while it would truly be in soma's nature to move in for a first kiss first, how much more satisfying is it to see erina step up like the lover-girl-yearner she is and make the first move? she's a mf boss who knows what she wants in life, why not in love?
p.s.: as always, i love reading your comments, so pls leave a review, follow, favorite, and share with someone in the fandom you think would enjoy reading it, too! like my writing? then check out my shonen 'n spirituality substack [link in profile!]
-You're Welcome!-
8.20withlove
-i don't own the rights to Shokugeki no Sōma, wahwahwaaaah
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