“…Chihiro strikes again.”
Even after tricking him, Chihiro’s follow-up was impeccable. All Haruto could do was sit there, astonished. Meanwhile, Itsuki was filling Miyako’s inbox up with recommendations for places and restaurants to visit in Hakodate. Okay, great, just get back to work!!! she replied as she looked at the list.
“I’m pretty hungry. Want something light before we check in?”
“Sounds good.”
The food on the Gran Class train car was quite good, using seasonal ingredients and all, but it wasn’t very big—a little lacking for a full lunch. So, after taking the fifteen-minute journey from Shin-Hakodate-Hokuto to Hakodate Station, the two of them headed for a Lucky Pierrot, a chain of unique fast-food restaurants spread out around the city that was supposed to be really popular.
Going inside, they both ordered the Chinese Chicken Burger, supposedly the most popular item on the menu, and they were both digging in after a few minutes. They looked at each other, eyes wide open.
“This is good…”
“Yeah! It is!”
Between the two buns was a juicy, crispy chicken patty drizzled with a sweet-and-spicy dark sauce and topped with lettuce and mayonnaise. It wasn’t teriyaki or American-style, but Chinese youlinji fried chicken, hence the name of the item on the menu. The sourness in the mayo worked incredibly well with the sauce, while the texture of the lettuce added a nice accent. The result: an overwhelming umami flavor across your mouth, instantly wiping away concerns about whether eating a chicken sandwich as your first meal in Hokkaido was really a good idea. It tasted great, it was just the right size, and it was cheap, too. The menu didn’t end with the Chinese Chicken Burger, either; there were regular beef burgers too, as well as curry, rice omelets, and even pizza and pasta for some reason, turning fast-food common sense on its head.
“…I wonder if they could start a franchise near the editorial office,” Miyako seriously suggested when they were done. The one disadvantage of Branch Hill’s location was that there weren’t many good lunch places right nearby, which made the afternoon meal breaks a little samey.
“I want one near my place, too. I guess being in Hokkaido is what lets them offer this kind of quality for the price, but still. If they could provide this in Tokyo, they’d be huge.”
Haruto sounded pretty disappointed as he smiled.
After filling their stomachs, the couple walked toward their hotel. It was four in the afternoon, so there was a line of people waiting to check in at the lobby.
“Hello, we’re checking in under Shirakawa?”
The guy at the front desk checked his computer. “Miyako Shirakawa?”
“Right.”
“Great. So I have you here one night, one twin room for two guests, breakfast included?”
““Huh?!””
Miyako and Haruto both burst out at the same time. The front-desk clerk gave them a puzzled look.
“Does that sound right to you?”
“Umm… When you say one twin room, do you mean it’s two people…in one room?” Haruto asked with some trepidation.
“That’s correct,” the clerk nodded.
“What was Itsuki thinking…?!”
“No, I think this was more Chihiro’s doing,” Haruto said, voice straining. That insane boldness, that drive to take the shortest possible route to her needs, once she decided to take action—it could only be Chihiro. It hardly seemed like the kind of thing you’d expect from a girl who had made her latest romantic advances just a few days ago, but her propensity for changing gears like that was pure Chihiro as well.
“Um, sir…?”
“Um,” the hesitant Haruto said to the concerned clerk, “do you think we could get one more room?”
“I’m sorry, we’re fully booked for the evening.”
“Oh…”
“All right,” interjected Miyako. “That’s fine, then.”
“Huh? Are you sure?” he asked with some surprise.
She blushed a bit. “If there’s nothing open, what can we do about it? Let’s just brace ourselves and do the thing.”
“Oh, uh, okay.”
So the two of them, heartbeats accelerating as they finished checking in, headed for their room. It contained two semi-double beds.
“Wh-which one do you want, Miyako?”
“I’ll take…this one.”
Miyako answered the nervous question just as awkwardly, choosing one of the beds at random and placing her bag on it.
“Okay, uhh, when do you want to go to Mount Hakodate?”
“The sun’s about to set, so it ought to be just about perfect if we took off right now, don’t you think?”
“Great. Let’s get going, then.”
“Yeah, we’d better do that.”
Taking along nothing but the bare necessities like wallets and phones, Haruto and Miyako all but fled the room they had just walked into.
There was a line of people in front of the ropeway up Mount Hakodate, all hoping to take in the night view. The sun had fully set by the time they finally managed to reach the top of the mountain. The peak was, as expected, full of visitors. It was also pretty dark, to the point that they would’ve been separated quickly if they didn’t keep an eye out.
“This way, Miyako.”
Haruto casually took Miyako’s hand as he worked his way through the crowd and toward the far edge of the observation deck offering a view of the whole city.
“Wow, it’s pretty.”
Taking in the famed million-dollar view, Miyako let out a sigh of bliss. There was the city, sandwiched on both sides by the jet-black ocean, its sparkling lights offering sharp contrast like an overturned box of jewelry. You could only find it here in Hakodate, and to make the view even more attractive, the city had added little improvements like orange streetlights and prominent flood lighting for the town’s more historic buildings and churches.
Haruto marveled at how this beautiful sight must be the most romantic thing possible for a couple. Or he tried to. But it was proving difficult. There were just so many people around them; a mixture of Japanese, Chinese, English, and more languages filled the air, and they had to raise their voices more than a little to maintain a conversation. Many of the visitors were taking pictures or selfies, and you were obliged to wait your turn for space by the railing, so it was difficult to settle down somewhere and fully take in the view.