Episode 64 — Fireworks

“I’m never doing goldfish scooping again in my life…”

Wiping her fingertips on the paper towel the stall man had given her, Shion muttered it with a sulky air. As if in answer to that sulkiness, she tossed the paper towel into a bin between the stalls and squeezed my hand tight again.

“You’re surprisingly clumsy, aren’t you, Shion.”

I said it with a slight teasing edge — and:

“I am not.”

She bumped her shoulder into mine in protest. In the crowd, that adorable little assault was somewhat hazardous — so I instinctively put my arm around her shoulders.

“There are so many people around — it’s dangerous…”

I delivered that pre-assembled piece of common sense — and then noticed Shion’s body temperature against me through the yukata. We’d had plenty of physical contact before, but the Shion of right now was exceptionally cute, and the festival’s heightened atmosphere added to it — my heartbeat surged in great waves.

“Sorry. Thank you…”

Shion murmured it, and her cheeks were flushed too — and because her hair was pinned up high, I noticed the same colour reaching all the way to her earlobes. My own cheeks burned in response.

A sensation seized me — itching, burning, inside my heart — the pounding of it seeming to spread to the air between us, and I fled from it with a question.

“Well then, Shion — what shall we try next?”

At my suggestion, Shion looked around, and then pointed at a stall a little further ahead.

“What’s a candy apple…?”
“An apple dipped in candy.”

Shion’s simple question received an answer that was no explanation at all. That made two of us — I could imagine the shape of it but had never tasted one either.

Even so, at that answer Shion’s eyes lit up.

“I want to try one…!”
“All right.”

I found myself smiling at that childlike quality of hers, something almost maternal narrowing my eyes. That feeling — of the maternal kind that existed only toward Shion — was, right now, strangely and utterly calming.

Shion, unable to contain her curiosity, began walking forward as if pulling me along. With Shion walking ahead, the exposed white nape of her neck kept catching my eye inescapably, and the surge of heartbeat from earlier threatened to return. I hurried to look away. Even looking away, my thoughts found their way back to Shion — my whole field of vision and my thinking entirely filled by her — and I laughed at myself for it as I let myself be pulled along.

Shion is often childlike in front of me — but today she seemed more buoyant than usual even by that standard. Probably the effect of a first festival — but I found myself hoping that I might be even a small part of the reason, somewhere.

Lost in that mixture of inference and wanting, being pulled forward — we arrived in front of the candy apple stall. There were fewer people queuing than the yakisoba and mini castella stalls, and we could see the display almost immediately.

“It really is an apple…”

Shion turned toward me, telling me with a delighted air. I was seeing the real thing for the first time too — I looked back and forth between the candy apple, larger than I’d expected, and Shion’s apple-red cheeks. Beside the candy apples, strawberry candy and mandarin candy were lined up too — the scene was remarkably colourful. And at the centre of all that colour, naturally, was Shion.

“There are various kinds — which do you want?”
“A candy apple, it’s the biggest.”

Shion murmured it quietly, so I reached into my drawstring bag for my wallet and handed coins to the stall man. The price came out to exactly the change left over from the goldfish scooping, and I breathed a quiet sigh of relief as I received the candy apple and passed it to Shion.

“Sorry — you paid last time too, let me pay—”
“No, it’s fine. We got yukatas prepared for us, and Mum gave me spending money today…”

When I said it:

“Then I’ll gratefully accept — thank you, I’m so happy.”

Shion smiled with a loose, melted sort of grin — and I found myself smiling too, carried along by it.

We couldn’t stay in front of the stall all night, so we moved into the space between stalls. Standing there, Shion reached for the wrapping of the candy apple. But the plastic twisted tight around it resisted, and the candy apple refused to show itself.

After struggling with it, Shion suddenly turned toward me.

“Uta, open it~…”

Again with tearful eyes, she held out the candy apple.

“All right, all right.”

Half-exasperated and yet glad to be needed, I took the candy apple and efficiently unwound the wrapping from the base. In the process my hand touched the sticky surface and got messy — but the wrapping came off successfully.

“There — it’s open.”

I tossed the plastic in the nearby bin and held out the candy apple to Shion. And then:

“Mm.”

Shion didn’t take it — she bit directly into it, right where it was. A sharp crunch rang out right in front of me. I stared at her unexpected move, eyes wide. Shion chewed with perfect composure.

“It was harder than I expected…”
“I’m the one who got a surprise.”
“Hehe. Prank successful. Uta — can you keep feeding me like this?”

Shion said it entirely unabashed, leaning into me and tilting her head. I had no choice but to nod, and held the candy apple out in front of her. Shion held her hair back with one hand and bit into it again. With her small mouth, eating it neatly seemed difficult — the vivid red of the candy had transferred to the corner of her lips. And before me was the candy apple with Shion’s teeth marks in it. The white flesh of the apple — the same colour as Shion’s skin — was just slightly exposed.

For some reason — even though we weren’t holding hands — my heartbeat quickened. Shion brushed back her glittering silver hair and bit into the candy apple, and in her clumsiness added more red to it, and touched the edge of it with her tongue. Each small movement made me feel, for some reason, as though I were seeing something I shouldn’t. And yet I couldn’t look away. While I was wrestling with those wayward thoughts —

Having worked through a good portion of it, Shion suddenly stopped eating. Then she turned to me with that clinging look again.

“I’m tired of eating. Help me, Uta — actually, just have it.”

The abrupt demand for assistance — I looked down at the candy apple again. Shion was apparently clumsy at eating too, and the surface was mostly gone, leaving only the white flesh of the apple. There, Shion’s teeth marks were nakedly visible — but I couldn’t ignore Shion’s request.

“You have that side to you sometimes, don’t you…”

I murmured it, disguising something, and took a breath — and placed my own teeth marks over Shion’s.

“Thank you, Uta.”

Shion’s expression softened again. With that movement, the red at the corner of her mouth trembled. That coexistence of childishness and something else again made my body hot, my breathing difficult. If I let my guard down, my gaze kept being pulled straight to that red.

I looked away from my own body temperature and heartbeat, and finished the rest of the candy apple in one go. The taste of the apple that touched my tongue was fresh and sweet.

After that — wanting to clear my head — I suggested to Shion:

“Do you mind if we make a detour? I want to rinse my hands. There’s a small park near here with a tap — and the corner of your mouth has gone red too.”
“Okay.”

After nodding, Shion’s tongue darted out and licked the corner of her lips — and she blinked at the unexpected sweetness. Even that gesture set my heart skipping — and fleeing that fact too, I turned off the main road and headed for the park from memory. Just stepping into the side streets was enough to make the noise recede, as if it had never been. Silence closing in around us.

Walking through the dark guided by the faint light of the streetlamps. Looking up, several stars were illuminating us. The sound of festival music reached us faintly from a distance. Shion caught the hem of my yukata lightly between her fingers and followed behind.

Just the two of us in the whole world — sinking into that sentiment, when — in the midst of our two-person darkness, we emerged abruptly into an open space. The small park that probably only local residents knew existed. A lone tap stood there.

“Shion, go rinse your mouth first.”
“Sure~.”

Even in the dark Shion moved with a light, bouncing step, made her way to the tap, and crouched down. She turned it on and rinsed her mouth carefully, keeping her yukata clear of the water. Then stood up, and — though we were the same height — tilted her head with that upward-glancing look.

“Is it gone?”
“…It’s gone.”

I nodded. It was true — the candy apple stain was gone. Even so, I kept looking at Shion’s lips — and the fact that my eyes went there for reasons nothing to do with candy apple became nakedly apparent.

Something is definitely off today. My body is hot, my heartbeat fast. Is it the festival air getting to me? Or is it exhaustion from going to Shion’s house every day? Or is it that Shion in her yukata is simply too beautiful?

Any number of explanations rose and dissolved. Every one of them traced the outline of the existence called Shion — so my thoughts stayed at boiling point regardless, and all I knew was I needed to cool my head as soon as possible.

Driven by that thought, I moved past Shion toward the tap to rinse off the stickiness — when.

A thunderous sound split the air. Like the summer constellations shattering and scattering in all directions, vivid light illuminated everything around us. It showed no sign of stopping — and looking up toward the sound, flowers of every size bloomed and scattered across the sky. Fireworks dyed the night sky with a violent beauty.

For a moment I was taken by the sight — and then I turned off the tap, shook off my hands, and turned back toward Shion.

Shion flinched at every sound, as if cowering from it. Of course — Shion couldn’t bear loud sounds. I hurried toward her.

“Shion, are you all right?”

My question was drowned out by another burst of fireworks, and — as if hiding herself — Shion threw her arms around my body.

“Uta — !”

Tightly, clinging, the hem of my yukata gripped in her fists. I gently placed my hand over Shion’s trembling one. Shion’s hand carried the same heat as the fireworks. My hand, even slightly damp, was hot too. The colour of the fireworks illuminated our overlapping hands.

“If it’s too much, it’s all right to cover your ears.”

As I offered that, Shion — softly, folding her voice into the spaces between the fireworks —

whispered in a trembling voice:

“You cover them.”
“Wh—”

At that bell-clear voice — something burst. It was certainly not the fireworks.

As if tracing her own words, Shion guided my still-damp hand toward her small ear. In the instant before my palm enclosed it, fireworks flashed — and I could see her earlobe, dyed a deep, vivid red.

That redness called to mind the candy apple’s glossy shine, Shion’s small teeth marks — and all of it was overwritten by the weight of what my hand was touching.

The feeling of Shion’s ear. Water droplets falling. And all of that, dyed through by the scene before me.

Before I knew it, Shion’s face was right before mine. Eyes lit by the fireworks, glittering. Cheeks faintly coloured. And at her lips — looking closely — the faintest trace of candy apple still remained.

Shion whispered softly:

“More — make it only your voice, only your words. Everything else — I don’t need any of it.”

Shion’s voice rang through my head. The sound of the yukatas brushing together. Shion’s breathing, grown faintly unsteady. Heartbeats, perfectly matched in size.

Why is it — with fireworks going off overhead — the only thing I can hear is Shion’s sound. However many flowers burst across the sky, nothing reaches me but the beauty of Shion. The fireworks are out of reach — and yet somehow my ideal of beauty is right before me now. And my damp hand is touching the edge of it.

Shion gently closed her eyes. Again, something burst inside my head. Hot. Hot enough to easily melt a candy apple. Just as naturally as joining hands, just as naturally as deepening an embrace — I wanted to dissolve into Shion further. I wanted to seal the ideal beauty, its texture, more deeply into my memory.

As the fireworks overhead looked down upon us — as if sealing a moment’s beauty, as if reaching for eternity —

lips touched lips.

The place where words become sound — overlapped.