Chapter 27

I sat up in bed and checked the time on my phone. It was just about noon. I lay back down. When Miya had first called me to change our White Day plans, I hadn’t been so sure about it, but when I learned he was going to be baking something for me, well, that piqued my interest. Normally you’d let that, like, be a surprise for someone, right? Especially when you were dating. But he’s such a straight shooter, he told me everything, right down to the fact that it was going to be handmade. I’d been drawn to the way he didn’t hide anything since before we started dating. Before he started opening up to me. The way he never kept secrets, even the way he’d let me in on his worries and confusion when I was waiting for his answer—it made me feel all warm inside. Sure, sometimes it was rough not being able to take my eyes off him, but then again, sometimes it was hard to look him in the eyes—like after I’d nearly lost control of myself. I felt like I’d sullied our perfectly nice time together. Even if I just brushed his arm, he understood why I was reaching out. But even knowing, he found he couldn’t bring himself to stop me. It was like that when we bumped into that middle school classmate at the station, or when he cross-dressed at the culture festival. I knew it was silly, but I just wanted to keep him all to myself, even though I knew that threw him off. I thought I’d learned from everything with my sister how much you can hurt someone by letting your feelings take over your actions, but I guess I hadn’t grown much after all. It sucked to be confronted so starkly with my own immaturity. Each time it happened, I would get down on myself; even though I could never quite seem to figure out how to say it, each and every day I cherished Miya more and more. It was frightening to come close to breaking something that meant so much to me. I could still feel it—the tears on my cheeks when I’d thought I’d wrecked everything, only to hear those words: I like you, too. I could still feel it, right there in my heart: the warmth that had blossomed the day he’d screwed up his courage and given me his answer. I remembered how shallow my breathing was, how my fingers felt numb and distant, like they weren’t even mine. I had my hand to my mouth the whole time, so you would have thought my breath would keep my fingers warm, but no. They were cold, until the moment my hand touched his. Every moment had felt like an eternity, until Miya—like he always did—looked me square in the eye. I’d felt joy and kindness radiating through me. The moment we affirmed that we felt the same way about each other and the moment my cold fingers intertwined with his both happened in the same place—at the park near my house. Honestly? Every time I passed that park, I remembered our first kiss. Every time. It’s probably about time for Miya to be getting back, I thought, then wondered what I should do. Should I go meet him? I dithered. He’d said he would come to my house after class, and that I should wait here, but the truth was, I could hardly contain my excitement. I wanted to hang out and wait for him to get here. I wanted to know what it felt like to answer the door when he rang the bell. But at the same time, it was killing me to have all this time on my hands. I’d already finished making my treats for him, so I could lie here until he showed up, for all it mattered. Seriously, what should I do? Miya had said he was going to make me something with flour, butter, sugar, and eggs. Which meant cookies, most likely. I was surprised they were offering some kind of cooking lesson at school. I didn’t remember anything like that when I was there. Well, okay, maybe I missed it. (There were a lot of things I hadn’t noticed.) Or maybe it was one of the new teachers who’d come up with the idea. I’d only just graduated, and it didn’t seem like the school was very different from how I remembered it. Yet…things I knew had changed ever so slightly—into things I didn’t know so well. Was that sad? I hadn’t felt sad when I’d graduated from middle school. I guess I really had fun in high school. And Miya had been there, of course. But I knew that wasn’t all there was to it. Well, for now I might as well clean my room. It wasn’t that messy, but I didn’t have anything else to do. I decided to start with the area around my bed. I picked up the first thing within arm’s reach: the graduation album from the shelf on my sideboard. I’d simply left it there so far, but maybe I should put it away. I’d seen other people open this book, but I hadn’t touched it myself since I’d gotten it. Perhaps I’d take a quick look. I opened to a random page and found myself looking at a list of club profiles. I spotted Hirano in the corner of a picture for the Astronomy Club. Wait… Had he been in that club? That wasn’t how I remembered it. But here he was in the book, so he must have shown up. I thought I remembered he was pretty tight with some of the underclassmen in that club, too. The younger guys always seemed to like him. Including Miya. Hirano himself never really got it—he was always talking about how scary he looked to people or whatever—but it didn’t matter to our juniors. They liked him just the same. I’d thought about joining a club my first year. My sister told me I might as well try something while I was in high school, and I figured she was right. There was definitely a part of me that pushed back, like, I didn’t come to high school just to be in a club! But I hadn’t really done any extracurricular stuff in middle school, and on some level I was eager to make up for lost time. I’d taken a look at the brochure about the various clubs you could join and noticed they had a Cooking Club. I poked my head in once or twice—not even enough to be considered a probationary club member. Mostly it was three guys in the home ec room who shot the breeze while they cooked. It seemed like they were having a lot of fun, but the chatty atmosphere wasn’t really my thing, and I dropped out again without ever talking to them. Needless to say, I didn’t join. So much for my memories of club life. I closed the album and laid it down on the shelf, but it was too big and poked out a little. But it was too tall to fit upright. Maybe if I’d joined the club, I would have experienced other new feelings. Like, I make cakes, but I’m self-taught. Maybe in that Cooking Club, I would have had a chance to learn from a real teacher. Then again, I really didn’t much enjoy talking to people while I baked. I preferred to work in silence. Except with Miya, naturally. Valentine’s Day, now that was fun. It had been great baking together—heck, just having him nearby. It had tickled my heart. The trouble he had in the kitchen was a side of him I hadn’t seen before—and adorable to boot. I couldn’t get enough. I’d found myself wanting to touch those hands working so tirelessly. I’d brushed some flour off his face—and the way he couldn’t quite look at me, mumbling “I’m not very good at this,” was delightful; the feeling of his cheek, the softness of his skin, seemed to linger on my fingertips even now. I’d felt a warm tingle run through my fingers. I had stopped short, almost swallowed by that warmth, and Miya had looked up at me. There was a question in his eyes—like he was asking if there was anything still on his face. I didn’t say anything, though, and a second later Miya appeared to realize what I was thinking and his eyes flitted away. “Uh…” He’d looked back at me, his mind made up, the strength of his gaze piercing me, and I saw his lips form the word, Sasaki. I could only look back at him, wondering if he realized how I was drawn to those eyes, how my heart trembled in my chest. We were baking, so it didn’t go any further than that, but if we hadn’t been— Um. Yeah. Maybe it was time to go. Having too much time to kill led the mind to some weird places. Locking the door to my house made it sink in; there was no one else there. The thought wouldn’t leave me alone as I walked away from the front door. If anything, every step made it more concrete. My sister was at her part-time job, and my mom and dad were both downstairs working in the store. No, no. In the evening, my mom would come back upstairs. I shouldn’t let myself get any naughty ideas. I arrived at the station with that thought firmly in mind—just as Miya was coming through the exit wicket. He wore a bright smile, nothing like the troubled, thoughtful air he’d exuded the last time he came over. I thought I heard him exclaim when he saw me. “I thought I told you to wait at home!” he called as he jogged over. I couldn’t restrain a little laugh, just a puff of air. “What?” Miya said. How could he be so cute? That’s what I was thinking. But I said, “Nothing, just good timing. I finished stuff at home, so I decided to take a little walk and maybe see if you were around.” I kept my thoughts about how adorable he was to myself. He told me he didn’t like hearing that, so I tried to control myself and not say it too often. Although it had slipped out on the day of the graduation ceremony, once. “Sorry,” he said. “I should have told you my ETA.” I stopped him before he could apologize any further (like, “I should have at least texted when I got on the train.”) and started walking toward my house. “It’s cool, man. You did pretty much exactly what you said you would, and anyway, here I am, right? Made your treats all right?” “Yeah, I did! From setup to cleanup, I’ve never had baking go so well! Er, well, maybe I had a bit less trouble when I was working with you…” He looked proud of himself, but there was a shadow behind it. “So what’s that mean, Miya? What’d you do?” Whatever it was, it looked like things had turned out well, so it couldn’t have been anything too awful. “Some of the ingredients… I sort of put in more than the recipe said. Just by instinct.” I couldn’t help laughing at his grim tone. I know, I know, it was a serious thing for him. “Instinct, huh?” “I know! Or anyway, I learned. Careful measuring is the lifeblood of baking.” He was being cute with all his might! “Kuresawa and the other guys were with you, right?” I said. Miya had said Kuresawa was the one who urged him to go to the event. I figured he wouldn’t have any trouble making something that his girlfriend would enjoy. If they were making cookies, he’d probably chosen some adorable shape. So what about Miya? “Yeah, Kuresawa and Tashiro were both there. They seemed pretty good at it, so I asked them to help me with stuff that I didn’t understand from the teacher’s demonstration. There was another guy helping out, too—when I was having some trouble, he came over and gave me some advice. That’s how I managed to pull this off!” He sounded like he’d genuinely enjoyed himself. I wished there had been cooking lessons when I was there. I would have happily gone with him. “So you had fun?” “I did!” I already knew the answer to my question—I just wanted to see him smile. “Oh, hey,” I said. “I finished reading those two manga you lent me.” “What did you think?” Miya’s eyes sparkled. It would have been easy enough just to say, “Sure, they were fine.” But I knew Miya was eager to hear what I thought, so I tried to be a little more articulate than that. Talking with him was the first time I’d ever described my response to a book I’d read in detail to anyone, so it was like discovering a new part of myself. “The one that was a sequel to the last thing you lent me, you know how the main character gets more and more lured in by the guy who’s a great cook? And then the protagonist decides he’s leaned too much on this guy and sort of tries to take a step back? Like, trying to get away with just going to fast food joints and stuff? I felt bad for the other guy. Like, why not go get burgers with him? But he ends up sitting there eating by himself.” Yikes. I was talking about it like I was describing myself. Guess that’s what I got for reading something with a theme that hit so close to home. The series was a lighthearted comedy for the most part, so the sudden twist where the guy was sitting at the table by himself was all the more poignant. I felt like it would be only natural to try to take a guy like that home with you, even if you had to prod him a bit. “Huh! I’m not much of a chef, so I always sympathized a lot more with the uke…” “But you baked today, right, Miya? So now you know how the other guy feels!” My eyes wandered to the paper bag he was holding, and he looked a bit shy. “Yeah… I guess so…” Arrrgh! If we weren’t at the train station right now… We chatted as we walked and got back to my house in what felt like no time at all. We went in the back door of the shop and up the stairs. The shop was on the first floor of the building, while the second floor was our living space. The front hall was just at the top of the stairs. “I had this same thought last time… Going upstairs without poking our heads in at the shop feels like we’re sneaking in,” said Miya. Somehow that made me nervous. I couldn’t say it out loud, not even as a joke. “It’s just us here today anyway,” I said, but I regretted the words as soon as they were out of my mouth. There was no need to mention that. I beat myself up about it as I opened the front door. Why would I say that right now? He would think I was, you know, expecting something to happen. I stole a glance at Miya, hoping I was just overthinking things and that I could let go of the slight sourness in my stomach. Instead, I almost clapped a hand over my mouth in amazement: He was bright red. I felt my heart skip a beat. I thought I could hear my own pulse. There was the ka-chak of the door closing. Each moment was ingraining itself into my brain, like it was happening in slow motion. When I saw my own hand clasp his, it was like I was watching from some other place. My fingers touched his, but they seemed far away. I felt like our hands would meld together from the warmth of his fingers; I was in my own little world—everything simplified and elevated. “Sasaki?” There was a touch of panic in his voice. His Adam’s apple bobbed dramatically, but he didn’t say anything else. I hadn’t locked the door. We hadn’t even taken off our shoes. And yet, it felt like things were already starting. I couldn’t help hoping. I slid my fingers along his hand, tucking them just inside his left sleeve. The skin on the inside of his wrist was thin and smooth, and I could feel his pulse pounding. I wanted to lose myself in the sensation of it. “Wait… Just a little longer…” His voice was hardly more substantial than his breath.