Episode Nineteen: What Exactly Do You Want From Me?
In the dark, black eyes stared steadily down at me. She leaned over me, and the springs of the expensive bed creaked.
Pinned down, held inside the cage of her arms — even like this, I couldn’t look away from her.
The single-diamond necklace swayed in front of my eyes, and I found myself thinking, distantly, how pretty her pale collarbone looked.
“…Kanata.”
Yui-san’s voice, saying my name.
It would be so much easier if I could just give in completely, but the part of me that overthinks everything got in the way.
I really am scared. If I can’t even manage sex with men, this — with a woman — is even more frightening.
Yui-san, you idiot. Why are you doing this? You said you wouldn’t go past kissing. Liar.
I wanted to say it, but somehow the words wouldn’t come. Held under those deep-colored eyes, I go still, like a frog caught in a snake’s gaze.
Her face drew close, and giving up, I closed my eyes. And then her lips touched mine—
*
“Waaah!!!”
I bolted upright, gasping, that morning.
I’d had an outrageous dream. Unsettlingly real, vivid, and pressing a hand to my chest, my heart was still hammering hard.
A faint sweat had broken out across my back, and I shook my head hard, side to side, trying to wake myself properly.
I glanced, without meaning to, at the person beside me. The one directly responsible for that dream was sleeping soundly, breathing evenly.
Pale skin, long lashes. Even asleep, her face was beautiful, and that was infuriating.
I stared at her lips, glossy, not a hint of dryness anywhere.
There’s no question this dream was entirely Yui-san’s fault, for what she’d done to me yesterday.
Why had I let myself go along with it? The way she’d smiled after the kiss, so unbearably gentle and happy, had squeezed something tight in my chest.
I’d braced myself for what might happen next, but Yui-san had, surprisingly, kept her promise of “nothing past kissing” properly.
She hadn’t tried anything further after that — though I had been smoothly talked into sharing a bed with her.
It was a huge king-size bed, so I’d reluctantly agreed, but that was probably the mistake. I’m sure that’s exactly why I had that dream.
No matter how big the bed, sharing it with someone still left me too tense to fall asleep easily.
“…You idiot, Yui-san.”
I muttered it at her peaceful, sleeping face. Just as I was considering yanking the covers off her out of spite, her long lashes fluttered, as if she’d sensed my staring, and her dark eyes blinked open, slow.
“Good morning.”
“…Mornin’… Kanata, you’re up early.”
Still half-asleep, she buried her face into the fluffy down pillow with a small groan.
I’m not usually an early riser either, honestly.
The reason I’d woken up with such a complicated tangle of feelings was entirely, completely Yui-san’s fault.
Meanwhile, this woman, whose hobby is apparently sleeping around, seemed utterly unbothered — waking up beside a woman was clearly nothing new for her, no change in attitude whatsoever.
It stung a little, feeling like I was the only one affected by any of this, but complaining about it would sting even more.
*
I checked the clock — six in the morning. It’d already be bright outside. Yui-san probably still wanted to sleep, but I wanted to enjoy the morning view from this high up, so I sat up, searching for the remote to the electric curtains.
Just then, my vision suddenly tilted, sharp.
Before I even registered that she’d pulled my arm, my whole body had already been dragged back down into the sheets.
My back hit the mattress, and the expensive bed’s springs groaned loudly.
“Th-that startled me…!”
“You don’t have to get up yet. It’s Sunday, let’s take it slow a little longer.”
Lying back down, I turned to face her, studying her.
The neckline of her loungewear showed no sign of the necklace from my dream — good, I thought, relieved, it really had just been a dream.
“…I wasn’t trying to get up, I just wanted to open the curtains.”
“There’s a switch right here, you don’t need to sit up.”
She said it and pushed herself up slightly, reaching over my head.
Her straight black hair, not a single strand out of place even after sleep, brushed softly in front of my eyes. Such beautiful hair — I envied it.
A small click, and light poured in through the gap as the electric curtains slid open.
Not wanting her to notice how the sudden closeness had startled me, I turned my back to her.
The view through the floor-to-ceiling glass pulled a small sigh of wonder out of me. A gorgeously clear sky.
“Whoa… bright.”
I ignored Yui-san’s grumbling behind me. The sunlight stung faintly at the back of my eyes, but the view from this high up felt like floating in the sky itself — wonderful.
A mischievous pale arm slid into the gap between me and the pillow, wrapping around me tightly from behind.
Warmth spread across my back, and I closed my eyes at how good it felt.
Waking up with someone beside me — maybe this was the first time that had ever happened. I hadn’t known waking up next to someone could feel this comfortable.
“…What time’s checkout?”
“Whenever, but let’s eat breakfast before we head back.”
“At the restaurant?”
“No, we can order room service. Though right now, I still want to sleep a little more…”
They’ll even bring breakfast up to the room. A hotel with this much service is really something.
Yui-san hugged me tight, like a body pillow. We should be using the same shampoo and body wash, and yet Yui-san always smells wonderful, somehow.
Unlike her, clearly desperate for more sleep, I was already wide awake, and with nothing else to do, I took the left hand wrapped around me from behind and idly laced my fingers through hers, playing.
I traced along her middle finger, then her ring finger, brushing over her nails. Perfectly smooth, well-kept nails — proof she still hasn’t given up on her usual playing around with women.
Not that I think she ever intends to stop, really.
For someone with a face that looks like she has zero interest in that sort of thing, she spends an awful lot of time, behind that composed expression, thinking only about girls. It genuinely irritated me.
“Kanata.”
“What?”
“…Are you teasing me on purpose?”
Her voice, sleepy, came from behind me, and the fingers I’d been playing with caught my hand, gentle but firm.
“…That’s really hard to read as anything but an invitation…”
I knew this was the finger she used to love women with, but I hadn’t been touching it with any intention of inviting her.
But if that’s how Yui-san reads it—
“Hmm… so other girls have invited you like this before, then.”
Her fingertip twitched, just slightly. Ah — direct hit. Knowing that other people, people like Yui-san who can fall for women, apparently feel real desire over this long finger of hers left something complicated churning inside me.
“…Who knows. Forgot already.”
Deflecting again, so easily, the second things got close.
For all her loose talk, Yui-san’s never once actually pushed me down seriously.
Even knowing I’m weak to being pushed, she’s never once driven it all the way through — always, in the end, leaving me an escape route.
Backing off that easily, every single time, made it hard to believe she actually wanted me that much at all.
Is that because I’m frigid? Or is it simply that I hold no sexual appeal at all?
Unlike with a man, touching my body wouldn’t do anything for Yui-san’s own pleasure — so of course she wouldn’t want to sleep with someone who couldn’t feel good doing it either, I suppose.
If I ever seriously begged her the way other girls apparently do — sleep with me — what would Yui-san actually do?
Would she, gentle as she is, actually respond? Or would she just laugh it off smoothly, the way she always does?
Lately, without the courage to actually test it, this is all I seem to think about.
*
Room service breakfast was fantastic, and across the table, her eyes watching me were just as gentle as always.
“…What exactly do you want from me, Yui-san?”
I said it, half-accusing, over coffee after breakfast, and Yui-san laughed.
“Nothing in particular. I just like you.”
Said so easily, so lightly, that I sighed.
“Honestly, Yui-san, you’re just…”
“What?”
“…Nothing.”
Kind, considerate, almost goddess-like on the surface — and yet the more I learn about her, the more she starts to look like a devil.
The problem is exactly that she doesn’t want anything from me at all — why can’t she see that?
Yui-san surely expects nothing from me.
Not one single thing in return, for anything she does for me.
She probably still doesn’t realize —
that I’m already stuck here, feet tangled in some bottomless swamp, unable to take even a single step away.