Episode 41: You’ll Catch My Cold, You Know?
Beep beep, beep beep.
“Thirty-seven point five… good, it’s coming down.”
Morning.
I murmured it, looking at the thermometer I’d just pulled from under Yuno’s arm.
Yuno watched me steadily, cheeks flushed. A thin breath leaked from her slightly parted lips.
Last night she’d collapsed with a high fever, and I’d rushed her to a clinic that took evening patients. A seasonal cold, apparently.
After the medicine, the fever had eased somewhat, but every cough still made her wince, clearly miserable.
“Uuh… I’m cold.”
“It might climb again. The fever.”
I said it, pulling the duvet up to her chin, and Yuno gave a small groan.
“Yuno, you must be hungry. Want to eat something?”
“…Mm. I’ll eat.”
I opened the fridge, but there was nothing fit for a sick person.
No choice — I’d make rice porridge.
I’d never made it before, but surely I could manage, relying on some half-remembered version my parents used to make.
I stood at the stove, thawed some frozen rice, tossed it in a pot with a rough guess at the water, set it on the heat.
A generous dash of salt — ah, maybe that was a bit much.
While waiting for the pot to boil, I scrolled through work chat on my phone.
A message from Saeko flagged “urgent” — preparations for tomorrow’s client meeting, apparently the other side was scrambling too.
As I typed a reply, the bubbling of the pot faded into the background.
Glug, glug, glug, glug.
Sizzle——
Hm.
Does something smell burnt?
“Eh!?”
I looked up from my phone, and the rim of the pot had gone brown.
I scrambled to turn off the heat. Too late.
I scraped at the porridge stuck firmly to the bottom.
Sighing, shoulders sagging, I carried it over on a tray regardless.
“Yuno… the porridge is ready.”
I spoke toward the mound of blanket, and slowly, just her eyes emerged.
“Thanks.”
Hazy, melted eyes looked steadily up at me. Maybe from the fever, they seemed a little wet, more alluring than usual.
“Reina, feed me?”
“No. You can eat yourself.”
“I don’t have the strength… please?”
A pale hand slipped out from under the blanket, dangling, swaying slightly.
Asked like that, with eyes wet like an abandoned stray cat’s — there was no way I could refuse.
I pulled a chair over, scooped porridge with the spoon, brought it to Yuno’s lips.
Her lips were pale, drier than usual.
Even so, the way she looked up at me and opened her mouth, small, was unbearably endearing.
Chew, chew, chew.
A swallow. Her brow creased slightly.
“Ngh— cough, cough, cough!”
A short pause, then Yuno coughed.
“Wait, are you alright?”
“I’m fine. Just — it has kind of a unique flavour.”
“Unique… sorry, I messed it up. But that was all the frozen rice we had.”
“No, I’m happy. Give me more?”
Every time I fed her, her eyes narrowed, just slightly.
Every time her pale, faded lips opened around the spoon, my heart gave a small, fluttering pull.
Ah — this is a terrible thing to think right now, but she’s cute.
Before I knew it, I’d pulled her close and pressed a kiss to those chapped lips. After the salt, a faint sweetness.
Once my lips had touched hers, I wanted just a little more, and slipped my tongue through the gap.
Yuno flinched, just for an instant, then relaxed and slowly wound her tongue around mine.
Hot. Maybe from the fever, her breath and body both ran hotter than usual, and my head went a little hazy.
“…You’ll catch my cold, you know?”
When our lips parted, Yuno said it, eyes lowered, the corner of her mouth lifting just slightly.
Her lips were wetter now than before, and her faintly flushed cheeks looked, somehow, alluring.
“That’s fine. If it’s Yuno’s cold.”
What was that.
The moment the words left me, embarrassment crept up, slow.
Saying something like that so easily wasn’t like me at all.
But it was the truth. I want all of Yuno — that feeling had already eaten its way through my entire body.
Yuno laughed, bright, “no, that’s really not fine,” she said. Coughing even as she laughed, which made me laugh too.
“Reina.”
“What.”
“Thank you. I’m happy.”
Her quiet voice, her expression melted soft by the fever — something in the back of my chest pulled tight.
I wrapped Yuno’s warm hand gently in both of mine.
This time, just the two of us — unbearably precious.
I don’t want anyone to take this time away.
I love Yuno. Painfully so.
Whatever past Saeko and Yuno shared, it’s over now.
That’s right. Saeko is the past.
I want to stop digging up that past, stop letting it bother me.
That’s when, faintly, Saeko’s voice echoed at the back of my mind.
— I probably never managed to tell her “I like you.”
I haven’t either.
I don’t want to stay in this ambiguous relationship any longer.
Fear of losing her had kept me from saying it.
But I want to tell her properly. I like her.
I want Yuno to understand — that this is what “liking someone” feels like.
Once Yuno’s cold is better, I’ll tell her properly how I feel.
That’s what I resolved, in my heart.
If only I’d done this sooner, I would later think.
— Not yet knowing that I would come to regret it.