Episode 108: “The Place Where the Stars Look Beautiful”
Sitting at the counter table by the window, I gazed out through the high-rise windows at the spring sky, dyed amber with the setting sun.
“Kanata, sorry to keep you waiting.”
I turned at the gentle voice to find Yui-san smiling, handing me a warm mug before settling into the chair beside me.
“Thank you.”
I took a sip from the mug. The faint sweetness of the café latte seemed to gently dissolve the tension that had been gripping me until just moments ago.
The Holdings’ head office building has a café space. It seemed to be used for breaks and meetings, the room filled with the pleasant scent of coffee.
Being evening, there were only a handful of people scattered around. The view from up here was so expansive it left something loosening deep in my chest, pleasant and clear.
What a lovely office, I thought.
“You worked here for a year after graduating from university, right, Yui-san?”
“Yeah, I spent a year in the corporate planning department. The division head back then was such a good person, taught me so much with real dedication — I’m grateful for that. So many people helped me get to where I am now, I keep realizing that all over again.”
“You put in so much effort.”
“It’s thanks to you, Kanata. If I’d never met you, I never would have thought to live freely like this. I’m sure I would have married Shinji just because I was told to, had children… and died having lied to myself the whole way through.”
I can’t even imagine a timeline anymore where I never met Yui-san.
Maybe our meeting was a coincidence. But being drawn to each other like this, the way we were — that wasn’t coincidence. Falling in love was fate.
Yui-san took my hand, resting on the counter, and squeezed it gently.
“I’m so glad Dad really understood, in the end. As long as you’re by my side, Kanata, I feel like I can do anything.”
“…From now on, we’ll always be together.”
“…Yeah.”
The amber glow of the sunset reflected in her dark eyes, eyes like a nighttime sea. She looked at me with such tenderness.
Ah, I really do love her. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to how beautiful this woman is.
No matter when, no matter what, she’s had my heart in her grip and never let go. Ever since we first met.
“…Anyway, did you see Shinji’s face? That was pretty funny.”
Yui-san said it, apparently remembering the scene from earlier, struggling to hold back her laughter.
“Yukiya-san really was something, wasn’t he. I wasn’t sure how it would turn out with how stubborn Kitagami-san was being…”
“Seriously. I never even thought about hiring a private investigator.”
According to what Yukiya-san told us afterward, apparently the moment I’d first consulted him, he’d hired a private investigator to stake out Kitagami-san and started steadily gathering evidence.
And that wasn’t even all — he’d apparently dug into Kitagami-san’s father too, as a backup plan in case Kitagami-san refused to back down. It was honestly astonishing.
For Kitagami-san, it must have been a bolt out of the blue, struck from a direction he never saw coming.
“There’s one thing that bothered me — was that photo of the two of us really taken by Kitagami-san himself? On Christmas, going out of his way to… follow us around…”
At that, Yui-san burst out laughing. I nearly got swept up laughing along with her too, and had to fight it back, bumping my shoulder gently against hers in mild reproach.
“Come on, Yui-san. It’s rude to laugh.”
“I mean… it’s just funny when you picture it. It was even snowing that day, and cold too. And don’t you think Yuki-nii was kind of harsh too? Saying it like that… he really went after Shinji’s pride, full force.”
“It was for your sake, Yui-san. For gentle Yukiya-san to go that far…”
“Yeah, but it did feel a little sad for him.”
“Do you actually mean that, Yui-san?”
“Of course. I mean it, from the bottom of my heart.”
Even as she said that, her eyes were laughing. Sad for him — I could tell she didn’t mean it, not even a tiny bit. We caught each other’s eyes and burst out laughing.
I’d been on the receiving end of plenty of pettiness from Kitagami-san myself, and honestly, I felt a small satisfaction in it too.
He’d been a persistent, snake-like man. But having gone through this, I sincerely hope he’ll finally live his own life from here on.
Patience and endurance matter sometimes, but this is the only life he gets. There’s no need to sacrifice yourself for someone else’s sake forever.
I hope he gets to know, someday, the joy of living close beside the person he loves most.
“I’m sure someone wonderful will come along for Shinji too, eventually.”
“…Yeah. Life is long, after all.”
*
I’d always felt like I’d been born into a free era.
I’d gone through life without ever really having the chance to truly understand just how many people in this society live carrying “difficulty in living.”
I thought I understood that unspoken suffering, but really, I hadn’t understood it at all, not until I experienced it myself.
But we’re free now.
Unbound by anything, just to fulfill the simple wish of living with the person we love — that’s what it took to get us here.
Gazing at the sunset, we held onto each other’s hands, tightly, endlessly — as if savoring our happiness.
Soon after that, the double bed from Yui-san’s room, along with the single bed I’d used back in my school days, were both hauled away, replaced by the king-size bed I’d always wanted.
“Hey, Yui-san! I’m so glad we went with the big bed, right!?”
I dove headlong into the wide, spacious mattress.
Since it’s something we use every day, I’d wanted to be particular about the bedding when choosing the mattress.
I couldn’t have been happier, but Yui-san, looking down at me, had her lips pursed into a pout, clearly a little dissatisfied.
“…Isn’t this maybe a little too big?”
“Bigger is better, isn’t it? You can spread out and use the space.”
“I don’t want to spread out and use the space! I want to sleep curled up next to you, Kanata…”
Back when we were picking out the bed at the furniture store, Yui-san had grumbled the whole time about wanting a smaller one, but I ignored all of it and picked this one on my own.
“Come on, Yui-san, don’t say that, just try sleeping in it with me. Here, come on.”
I waved her over, and Yui-san, still radiating dissatisfaction, climbed slowly onto the bed anyway.
Like I’d been waiting for exactly this, I threw my arms around her and nuzzled into her chest. She smelled so good, that scent I love so much.
I found myself thinking, just for a moment, how nice it would be if this new bed picked up Yui-san’s scent soon too… but then I realized — from now on, we’ll sleep together every single night, so there’s no need to worry about that at all. She herself is always going to be right here.
“…See, cuddled up like this, isn’t it not so different from before?”
“Hmm, I guess that’s true…? But Kanata, what if you roll over and end up far away?”
“Then you’ll just have to hug me tight every time that happens.”
“…If it happens too many times, I’m swapping this for a single, just so you know.”
“A single!? No way, not after we finally got the big bed!”
Well, technically Yui-san was the one who bought it, but let’s set that aside.
“I mean, I sleep so much better when we’re pressed together.”
“That’s true for me too, but…”
*
From then on, weaving trips in between our busy work schedules, the two of us made frequent visits to interior shops, gradually filling the house with new furniture.
The living room curtains changed from charcoal gray to ivory, and a houseplant found its way into the corner of the room.
We even splurged on a new dining table, though at Yui-san’s request, the one thing we kept without replacing was the black leather sofa in the living room.
That sofa is the place where the two of us have spent the most time together in this house. It’s packed with more memories than either of us could count, and replacing it felt like too much to give up.
So I was in full agreement on that one too.
Yui-san’s room became our shared bedroom, and in its place, the room I used to use would become Yui-san’s home office.
Once our relationship was accepted, Yui-san wasted no time bringing over the belongings she’d kept at her work apartment, since she no longer needed the place.
Fortunately, given how little she tends to own, everything fit into just a few boxes, which for now sit stacked in my old room.
Before long, I gave up my own apartment too, went through a decisive round of decluttering, and moved out with only what I truly needed.
Clothes crammed tight into a suitcase, a few cardboard boxes, and Orca-kun, Seal-kun, and Whale Shark-kun all moved in along with me.
The day I finally got to have “a night I never had to go home from” ever again.
The moment I stepped into the living room, Yui-san wrapped me in a tight, tight hug without a word.
Holding her back as she nuzzled affectionately into my neck, I felt her tears trailing down and touching my skin.
The moment I noticed, my own tears started falling too, naturally.
It had been a long, painful, difficult road. Days spent walking through darkness with no end in sight, relying on nothing but a single small light to guide the way.
— But I made it home. To this house.
Without wiping the tears trailing down her cheeks, Yui-san smiled at me.
“…Welcome home, Kanata.”
“…I’m home, Yui-san.”
We said “I’m home” and “welcome home” to each other, savoring the words — words we’d surely go on repeating tens of thousands of times from here on.
A certain, undeniable happiness filled this new living room of ours.
*
And then, the months slipped by, faster than we could keep track—
*
Having fulfilled her promise to deliver results within three years, Yui-san’s official resignation as president was finalized, and she returned to Holdings’ corporate planning department.
Watching her smile at her grand farewell party, arms full of a huge bouquet and countless gifts, I felt so genuinely proud of her.
Having reconciled with their father, Yukiya-san’s company was apparently now under consideration for joining the Group as a subsidiary.
Though when it came to inheriting the company himself, Yukiya-san still showed no interest in that — his stance remained firmly one of “fully supporting Yui-san,” nothing more.
The three of them made time for family dinners together now and then, and their relationship seemed to be in a genuinely good place.
As for Kitagami-san, his pride thoroughly shattered, he seemed to have finally let go of everything entirely. He put himself forward as head of a newly established overseas business division and left Japan.
He’s apparently living an energetic life now, traveling frequently across various countries, centered mainly around Asia.
*
And as for me — I ended up transferring to Holdings around the same time as Yui-san, and by some strange twist of fate, was assigned to the very “secretary’s office” that Kitagami-san had once tried to offer me. I’ve been living a hectic, busy stretch of days ever since.
But it’s all so that, someday, I can support Yui-san when she becomes president. I’d gladly take on the hardship, if it means that.
It’s not like before, where we could always be together, constantly.
Even so, coming home each day to a life where Yui-san is there waiting brings such a deep calm to my heart.
Whenever we find the time, we go on dates every chance we get, and the corkboard in the living room is now packed edge to edge with photos of the two of us.
With both of our jobs having changed, we’ve been too busy to find room for a proper long stretch of leave, and the promised trip kept slipping through our fingers as the seasons flew by — before I knew it, winter was already approaching.
*
“It’s gotten pretty cold already, huh.”
Looking out the car window on the drive home, I gazed at the darkness outside, the sun long since set.
“Yeah. It really felt like it went by in an instant.”
“Oh, right, Kanata, did the long leave request get approved yet?”
At that, I turned to Yui-san, remembering something.
“Oh, wait, did you pull some strings for that, Yui-san? I applied for ten whole days off and it got approved without a single question asked, and I thought that was strange.”
“Actually, I told Dad ahead of time that I wanted time off to travel with you.”
“Of course you did, Yui-san. Always so thorough.”
“It ended up taking way longer than we meant it to, but we can finally take that trip now. I’m really looking forward to it.”
“Me too. So, where are we going, exactly? You mentioned before there was somewhere you wanted to go together.”
Back when we’d promised to take a trip once everything was settled, Yui-san had said, rather unusually for her, that there was “somewhere she wanted to go.”
Yui-san’s always the one giving in to what I want, so when she says something like this once in a while, it makes me so happy.
“…Kanata, do you remember? We made a promise a long time ago, to go there together.”
“A long time ago? Back in school?”
“Yeah. In school, on Christmas.”
It hit me all at once. That winter of our first year of university, that one single Christmas night we’d spent together.
That promise we’d made so casually, watching the planetarium show.
“…Somewhere with a beautiful view of the stars. Let’s go there together.”
There’s no way I could have forgotten. I’d held onto it too, all this time, all along.
Someday… I’d genuinely dreamed, from the bottom of my heart, of the day that promise would finally come true.