“I Want to Go to MouseSea!” ③
Riding the gondola as it drifted slowly along the canal, we soaked in the scenery of this land of dreams.
“Hey, Yui-san. For our next long vacation, I’d love to go to Italy. I want to ride a real gondola in Venice too.”
“Italy, huh. Sounds nice. That’d be fun.”
Watching Yui-san smile filled me with such happiness. The way she tucked her long black hair, stirred loose by the breeze, behind her ear made my heart flutter uncontrollably.
I squeezed her hand, quietly, so no one else would notice.
Catching me at it, Yui-san peered into my eyes and grinned happily.
*
After the roughly twenty-minute gondola loop finished, I pulled out my phone from my pocket right away.
“Alright, Yui-san, let’s go! There’s a wait time, so we should probably line up for the main attraction now. It’ll be lunchtime before long.”
“Oh… y-yeah… right.”
Taking Yui-san’s hand, I strode ahead through the park, checking the map like I knew exactly where I was going.
“It’s about an hour wait, so I figured we could just line up normally without paying for skip-the-line, what do you think? Waiting in line is actually pretty fun too, you know.”
Even while waiting, there’s so much story-driven decoration around that it never really feels boring.
And besides, if it’s with Yui-san, I could wait an hour, two hours, it wouldn’t matter.
“Then let’s just line up normally. No need to rush… ha ha…”
“Great, then let’s go!”
“Y-yeah…”
*
Once we reached the front of the attraction, Yui-san looked up at the tower and swallowed hard.
“It’s… bigger than I expected… huh…”
“It’s tall, but the actual drop happens from that window up there.”
I said it, pointing toward a window high up on the building, and Yui-san’s expression visibly relaxed with relief.
“Really? So it’s not as bad as it looks, maybe?”
“It’s a free-fall type attraction. It goes up and down, so there’s this constant floating sensation the whole time. And the concept for this one is a ‘cursed hotel,’ so it kind of hits close to home, doesn’t it?”
If I remember right, the story for this attraction goes something like: the hotel owner brought back a cursed idol from somewhere, and…
The subsidiary company we used to work for ran hotels, so it felt oddly personal.
“A cursed… hotel, huh… ha ha…”
I laughed along with Yui-san’s strained laugh as we got in line. Being a weekday, the line wasn’t the massive, snaking kind, so it looked like our turn would come up pretty fast.
If we’d come on a weekend, it definitely wouldn’t have been this manageable.
With an ominous soundtrack playing continuously, we shuffled forward, slowly but steadily, through the line.
Passing through a garden lined with eerie statues and into the building, the interior was dim, lit by orange lamps — the atmosphere was almost too on-the-nose.
Chatting about nothing in particular as we moved forward, I noticed Yui-san was gradually saying less and less.
“…Yui-san, are you not good with scary things, by any chance?”
“Huh? Oh, no… it’s not that… exactly…”
Back in university, I remembered watching a horror movie with Yui-san once.
She hadn’t shown the slightest sign of fear that time — if anything, she’d seemed to be enjoying my reactions more than the movie itself.
University Yui-san had been just a little more mischievous, more prone to teasing, than she is now.
Looking up at her, I found her smiling with her face just slightly strained, so I squeezed her hand and smiled back.
“Hehe, it’s fine, don’t worry. It’s not a haunted house or anything. Or is it curses and that kind of thing you’re not great with?”
“No… that’s not it either, but I feel like I’m getting swept up in the atmosphere. I think I’ve fallen completely for Mouse-anything’s scheme…”
“It really builds the tension with all the storytelling, doesn’t it? Even the wait adds to it. I’m getting a little nervous myself, honestly.”
Before long, it was finally our turn.
Stepping into the small stained-glass room where the “cursed idol” was displayed, even knowing what came next, I still felt my heart pick up a little.
Growing anxious, I held tightly onto Yui-san’s arm in the dim light, and somehow her arm felt stiffer than usual.
“…Yui-san?”
I called her name quietly. Her slender shoulders jumped with a start, and she turned to look at me.
“Wh-what?”
She was smiling, but there was something in that smile that looked almost troubled, and something about it felt off.
Wait. Yui-san… could it be that she’s not actually bad with “scary” in general, but…?
Before I could pin down the suspicion forming in my mind, we were finally guided toward the elevator.
Yui-san’s hand, gripping mine, felt tighter than usual.
“Um, Yui-san… are you okay?”
I glanced sideways at her profile. Breathing hard, in and out, she was staring fixedly at a single point.
“………………………”
“…Yui-san? Yui-saaan?”
I waved my hand in front of her face. She snapped back with a start and turned to me.
“Oh, s-sorry, I’m just a little nervous.”
Yui-san, could it be… you’re not good with thrill rides, specifically…?
Just as I opened my mouth to confirm it, the door in front of us suddenly swung open.
Unable to resist the flow of the crowd moving forward, we were pushed straight into the elevator.
Yui-san’s hand, gripping mine tightly, was faintly damp with sweat.
Before I knew it, we were guided to our seats, sitting side by side at the very back.
Following the announcement, I pulled down the safety bar to lock it in place, and Yui-san’s hand, doing the same, was trembling in small, visible tremors.
“Um, Yui-san, are you really okay?”
“I’m… fine……….. I think…”
I think.
That’s when my suspicion finally turned into certainty.
The eyes looking at me were wet with unease, and something in my chest clenched painfully.
I’d messed up. Terribly…!
Only now did it finally hit me. I’d been so swept up in the excitement of our MouseSea date that I’d completely failed to notice Yui-san couldn’t handle thrill rides at all.
I’m such an idiot. Why didn’t I ask beforehand?
I should have known — if I said I wanted to ride something, there’s no way Yui-san would ever say no, no matter how much she personally hated it.
“Yui-san, I’m so sorry, I never realized you weren’t okay with thrill rides…”
“I-I’m fine, really, fine…”
Far more worried about Yui-san’s state than anything the ride itself was doing, I couldn’t help gripping her hand tightly.
There was no escaping it now. No turning back. All that was left was to climb to the top, and drop.
Everything went pitch black, and Yui-san’s figure disappeared from view entirely. All I had to hold onto was the hand gripping mine.
Worried sick about Yui-san, none of the ride’s staging registered in my mind at all.
The elevator climbed higher and higher.
“K-Kanata…!”
“Yui-san…! It’s okay, I’m — I’m right here beside you…!”
Hearing her voice on the verge of tears made me want to cry too.
Please, please let there be fewer drops than usual this time.
We gripped each other’s hands tightly.
Inside the elevator bound for who-knows-where, pitch black, all I could feel was the warmth and strength of Yui-san’s hand beside me.
Guilt and regret crushed down on me. This wasn’t how this was supposed to go—!
The climb began to level off.
Reaching the top, everything suddenly lit up, light pouring in through the window all at once.
The moment the view outside came into sight—
With a floating, weightless sensation, our bodies plunged straight down, all at once.
My whole body lurched upward, a churning, unsettling feeling like my insides were being pushed up through me, and I instinctively tensed.
But before I could even make a sound myself—
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!”
Mixed in with the other passengers’ screams, Yui-san’s full-throated shriek rang out through the elevator.
“Owowowowow, Yui-san, my hand, it’s going to break! It hurts~!!!”
Squeezed with tremendous force, the bones in my hand ground together painfully.
Every time the elevator dropped again, Yui-san screamed louder than anyone else on board, and every single time, she crushed my hand even harder, until I was screaming too — for an entirely different reason.
*
“Haah…! Haah…, i-is it over…?”
Once the attraction came to a stop, Yui-san, eyes brimming with tears and trembling all over, looked at me with ragged breath.
My hand still ached from how hard she’d been gripping it, but overwhelmed with guilt, I found myself gently stroking her cheek instead.
“Yui-san… a-are you okay?”
“Y-yeah… somehow…”
Her hands were still shaking, so my chest tightened and I threw my arms around her without thinking.
“I’m so sorry, Yui-san…! That was scary, wasn’t it…!”
Watching her, still trembling with fear, made tears well up in my own eyes too.
Before long, the other passengers began filing out, so I hurried to unbuckle Yui-san’s restraint and, supporting her unsteady hand, helped her out of the attraction.
Buying tea from a vending machine and returning to a bench, Yui-san looked away from me, clearly embarrassed.
“Yui-san? What’s wrong? Do you feel sick?”
I sat down close beside her and gently rubbed circles on her back with my palm.
I twisted the cap off the bottle and handed it to her, and her tear-glossed eyes finally met mine.
“Thank you… I’m sorry, Kanata… I really thought I’d be fine… I showed you a pretty uncool side of me there.”
Watching Yui-san slump, dejected, I shook my head firmly, side to side.
“No, I’m the one who should apologize, for not checking with you first. You pushed through it anyway because I was so excited, didn’t you…! Let’s ride something more peaceful next.”
“But Kanata, will you actually enjoy that…?”
Hearing her say it so weakly made my heart squeeze.
Why is Yui-san so unfairly kind? Watching her try so hard to give me everything I want, so earnestly devoted — if there weren’t people around, I’d have thrown myself straight into her arms right then.
“Of course I’ll enjoy it, as long as it’s with you, Yui-san…! Come on, let’s rest a little, then go talk to the turtle at that attraction nearby. After a relaxed meal at a restaurant, we can ride the boat… and watch the show tonight.”
I put the headband, which had come off, back on Yui-san’s head.
Squeezing her hand tightly, Yui-san smiled back at me, looking relieved.
Having thoroughly savored MouseSea, night fell, and as we gazed out at the sea reflecting the orange glow of the streetlights, I pressed myself close against Yui-san.
Surrounded by the crowd gathered to watch the show, we held hands firmly, waiting for it to begin.
“Today was so much fun. I want to come back again. Should we do Land next time?”
“…Even if I can’t handle the thrill rides?”
Yui-san asked it with a rueful smile, and I laughed and nodded too.
“Of course. The whole point is making memories together with you, Yui-san. You don’t need to push yourself.”
“…I wanted to look cool in front of you, honestly. Sorry for squeezing your hand so hard.”
“No, it’s fine. Thank you for trying so hard for my sake. That feeling alone made me happier than anything.”
An announcement signaled the show was about to start, and we leaned into each other, watching the sea. Narrowing our eyes against the exciting music and the lights dancing across the water, we kept holding hands, on and on.
“Hey, Yui-san.”
“Yeah?”
“…I love you.”
I whispered it quietly into her ear, pressing my lips lightly to her cheek. Everyone was surely too absorbed in the show to notice.
Yui-san looked briefly startled, and then her face melted into a smile, genuinely, deeply happy.
*
Getting to see that smile, lit up by the glow of the show — that might have been the single best part of the whole day.
There’d been a mishap or two along the way, but it turned out to be a deeply satisfying MouseSea date after all.
I really never want to put Yui-san through something that scary again for my sake… but the sight of her trembling in fear was also unbearably cute, and that particular thought, I decided, would stay a secret from Yui-san — for now.
— MouseSea Arc, End —