#33: Fuzzy Navel / ep.2
“Enjoy both of us — together.”
As if savoring the very idea of watching Mikoto squirm, Shandy narrowed her eyes into a waxing crescent as she said it.
Mikoto could easily guess what “enjoy” was meant to imply. But flustering easily here would be exactly what Shandy wanted. And it wouldn’t let her show any growth — any real reach toward becoming the adult she wanted to be.
As bartender, Mikoto answered in kind, probing right back with words just as loaded.
“My apologies. I’m still very much a beginner in that department. I’d hate to disappoint you both.”
“Wouldn’t being suspiciously skilled right out of the gate be its own kind of disappointing? Makes a girl wonder just how many women you’ve made cry.”
“Perhaps there’ve been nights I made someone cry from being too clumsy.”
“Oh my, quite the clever dodge there.”
“Not to your liking?”
“Fufu. A lovely bit of reaching-up-on-your-toes, very like you. Now, to the main event — let’s see that bartending skill of yours.”
The moment had come to put her hobby — cocktail-making — to the real test.
Given her weak tolerance for alcohol, Mikoto rarely made drinks at home, but the standard recipes and a bartender’s proper motions were all things she’d absorbed here at Antiqua by now.
Not quite the proverb about the temple novice picking up sutras just from proximity, but close enough — Antiqua’s own Mikoto could recite cocktails she’d never formally studied. On knowledge alone, she stood well above an average person by now.
“Coming right up. First, may I take your order, Rinko-san?”
“I’ll have…”
Rinko’s words trailed off into nothing. Understandable enough, given her whole view of love had just been rejected — by Shandy, and, at a remove, by Mikoto too.
Mikoto searched for the right words to offer her.
It had been Mikoto herself who’d pressed the point about Rinko’s failure to consider the other person’s feelings in love. In effect, she’d picked the fight, wounded her, and was now trying to apologize on top of it.
Rather self-serving of her, Mikoto’s own conscience pricked at the thought.
But her resolve was already set. She had no intention of abandoning the stance she’d chosen — responding as an adult — nor any wish to push Rinko away entirely.
“Then tell me what flavor you like. I’d like to know more about you.”
“That’s…”
“You can’t reach someone’s heart while still caught up in some illusion, divorced from reality, can you?”
“…!”
Rinko would have to give up on her own. That was Mikoto’s answer to her confession.
To manage that, Rinko would need to see Mikoto’s real self. Show her the reaching-up-on-tiptoes persona Mikoto herself chose to perform, deliberately, and let her feel that there was no need to protect someone like that. Only then, surely, would she be able to let go.
“Quite the egoist, aren’t you. One might call this kindness forced on someone against their will.”
Reading straight through Mikoto’s own thoughts, Shandy pricked at her gently.
Fair enough. Mikoto was choosing a path several degrees harder than simply refusing the confession outright.
“I’ve already decided. If you want to resent me for it, go ahead.”
All of it, for Rinko’s sake. The only way to lay her feelings to rest without wounding her more than necessary was this.
Becoming, herself, several degrees more of an adult — mending her broken relationship with Rinko not through romance, but through friendship. Even if she couldn’t love her, she could still keep that friendship warm.
Shandy wore a kind, almost maternal smile.
After a stretch of silence, Rinko finally spoke.
“…Then, something sweet. Peach, or apple, something fruity…”
“A peach cocktail, then. And for Shandy-san, a variation on—”
“Meow.”
Shandy did her Mimosa impression.
Apparently she’d already seen straight through what Mikoto was planning to make.
“Caught, it seems.”
Letting out a wry laugh, Mikoto set to work on the cocktail.
She pulled out two slender flute glasses. On the rim of the one meant for Rinko, she brushed a light coat of sugar syrup and pressed sugar granules against it — snow style, for a drink meant to be enjoyed sweet.
Next, ice into the glasses, spun quickly with the bar spoon — pre-chilling, so the glass’s own warmth wouldn’t dull the finished cocktail.
“I’m out of fresh fruit, so please use the juice in the fridge. For the main ingredient, the Moët & Chandon in the cabinet.”
With Shandy’s permission, Mikoto pulled peach nectar and orange juice from the fridge.
The cocktail’s main ingredient: Moët & Chandon, a lightly sparkling champagne. Which meant the method here wasn’t shake or stir, but build — poured directly into the glass rather than through a shaker or mixing glass.
“How is it, watching Mikoto-san play bartender?”
“…Considering it was your idea to push her into it, not bad.”
“There you have it, Mikoto-san.”
Beside the smiling Shandy, Rinko watched with what looked like genuine interest. It struck Mikoto, faintly amusing, that she herself had probably once watched Shandy this same way.
“Then let me get you both properly drunk together.”
Mikoto moved to finish the drinks. Removing the ice from the pre-chilled glasses, she poured in the nectar and orange juice.
Pale peach in one glass, vivid orange in the other. Into each, careful not to kill the carbonation, she poured the champagne. Filling each glass about halfway, she stirred gently with the spoon before topping them off to the proper level.
A quick taste confirmed it — good work.
Finished. Setting coasters along the counter, she lifted the glasses.
“Thank you for waiting. For Rinko-san, a peach and champagne cocktail — the Bellini. For Shandy-san, its variation, made with orange — the Mimosa.”
Bellini and Mimosa.
Two cocktails sharing the same basic structure — champagne or sparkling wine cut with juice. By strange coincidence, the pairing came to symbolize the two women perfectly: Rinko, who carried the scent of peach, and Shandy, fond of her orange-scented shampoo.
“Shall we toast?”
“…No thank you.”
Watching Shandy’s wry laugh at the rejection out of the corner of her eye, Rinko lifted her Bellini glass instead and studied it closely. Under the shop’s unusually bright lighting tonight, the bubbles rising through the pale peach liquid and the sugared rim both caught the light and sparkled.
“Pretty…”
“That glass runs a twenty-thousand-yen fine if broken.”
“Eek?!”
Rinko recoiled. After a moment’s hesitation, she tilted the Bellini to her lips, tasted it, and let out a small sigh.
“How is it?”
“Delicious. I’ve never had anything like this before…!”
“Fufu. Letting Mikoto-san be pushed into this wasn’t such a bad idea after all, was it?”
With that, Shandy tasted her own Mimosa.
Mikoto braced herself for whatever verdict was coming.
“A little of the carbonation’s gone flat, but it’s a good Mimosa.”
“The Moët & Chandon saved me there. Cheap wine wouldn’t have managed the same.”
Cocktails ran deeper than they seemed.
Simply mixing juice and champagne, and yet the flavor shifted subtly depending on more than just the mixing itself — the glass’s pre-chill, the condition of the base ingredients in storage, temperature, humidity, dilution. Even the temperature difference in the room could shift how the drinker’s own palate perceived it.
What looked like a simple process was, in truth, full of careful, delicate attention. Only a bartender’s genuine devotion and passion for the craft could pull that off.
“Has the winner of the game been decided, then?”
The reward for the winner: the right to “enjoy both of us — together.” Setting aside what exactly that implied, Mikoto asked for the verdict anyway.
Shandy drained her Mimosa at once and set the empty glass down on its coaster.
“Such a delicious drink, and I’ve barely had my fill. I could stand to drink plenty more.”
“Impressive tolerance — I envy that. How about you, Rinko-san?”
Presumably out of rivalry with Shandy, Rinko drained her own Bellini immediately too and set the glass down.
Neither of their faces showed the faintest change of color. Perhaps because it was a light cocktail, only around seven percent alcohol, both remained perfectly composed.
“I’ll have more! Something you’d like next, Kurosu-san. Not too sweet, not too strong, right?”
“Would something on the stronger side be all right?”
“Yeah, I can handle strong drinks fine.”
“Then for me, the same variation, made stronger still. Let’s see if I can guess what you’re making.”
“A quiz, then. Understood.”
Clearing away the two glasses, Mikoto ran back through her memory for a recipe.
Adjusting the ingredients slightly would satisfy Shandy’s request for a variation cocktail easily enough. But that alone would make it too simple to guess.
A bartender’s job includes entertaining the guests. Setting a little quiz was part of that job too.
Closing her eyes, an idea struck her.
This time, Mikoto pulled out two inverted-triangle cocktail glasses.
“Those glasses run fifty thousand yen for the pair.”
Mikoto’s fingers twitched. Terrifying, to think she’d been pressing her lips to something like that without a second thought this whole time. Rinko seemed to be thinking the exact same thing, and asked Shandy directly.
“Hey, why’s it so expensive?”
“The earlier glasses were Swarovski. These are Baccarat.”
“…You’re just showing off with expensive glassware, aren’t you.”
“Put plainly, yes, exactly that. A professional bartender’s job isn’t just making a good cocktail — it’s the beautiful interior, the fine glassware, the clever turn of phrase, all of it in service of making the time spent with a cocktail feel special.”
The bartender’s own face, the one Shandy — usually so full of playful smiles — only occasionally let show through. Those amber eyes, earnestly focused on her work, were beautiful enough to draw you in no matter how many times you’d seen them.
It had been exactly this serious side that first captured Mikoto’s heart. Remembering it now, something warm settled in her chest.
“You’re just deceiving people, showing them a dream. Basking in something luxurious, without actually gaining anything real.”
“Yes. A small, one-night-only dream. A lovely stretch of time you can savor in exchange for money. The same thing you did in your own side work, Rinko-san.”
“I…”
Rinko’s words trailed off, and she fell silent after that.
Rinko’s own side work — sex work catering to women — was, likewise, offering a one-night dream in exchange for money.
“…You think I’m filthy, don’t you? Someone who’ll open her legs for anyone?”
“Fufu. However should I answer that? What do you think, Mikoto-san?”
Pre-chilling the cocktail glasses, stirring the spirits in the mixing glass, Mikoto answered without much thought at all.
“I don’t really think anything of it, one way or another.”
“…Really?”
“Any woman who got to spend a night with someone like you, Rinko-san, would count herself lucky.”
“Then, um, I…”
“Oh? Didn’t you already quit that job?”
“I did, but…!”
Shandy’s eyes glinted, as if she’d just spotted fresh ammunition. Choosing not to hear Rinko’s rather direct advance, Mikoto continued finishing the cocktail in the mixing glass.
The second drink Mikoto was making used bourbon and vermouth. A cocktail the color of a sunset, deep amber-brown, with a vivid red maraschino cherry sunk inside — the Manhattan.
Its paired variation had already been decided.
“Mikoto-san, I’ve already figured it out.”
“There’s really no beating you… How would you like it made? Shaken or stirred?”
“Stirred not shaken, please.”
Shandy delivered the request in fluent English — the exact reverse of a certain spy’s iconic order. Her answer was exactly as she’d predicted: gin and vermouth, stirred, with a pale-green stuffed olive sunk inside — the Martini.
Manhattan and Martini aren’t often treated as true variations of one another, but the mixing ratios and the finished look — the pinned cherry paired against the olive — mirror each other closely enough.
And the real reason Mikoto had chosen this pair was—
“Thank you for waiting. For Rinko-san, the Queen. For Shandy-san, the King.”
—their nicknames.
The queen of cocktails: the Manhattan.
The king of cocktails: the Martini.
“Oh my, quite the clever touch. Using the nicknames as your variation, is it?”
“To add — Shandy-san’s King runs somewhat stronger in proof. Rinko-san’s Queen falls between medium-dry and dry. Made exactly to order.”
“I’ll have some…!”
Once again, Rinko didn’t bother with a toast for her second drink either.
The pause before Rinko’s verdict felt agonizing. A medium-dry Manhattan wasn’t a guaranteed hit for someone who preferred sweet drinks. Mikoto silently hoped the sweetness soaked into that stubborn maraschino cherry would come through.
“Kurosu-san, this is amazing. This one’s good too.”
“Might I have a taste?”
“No way! Not sharing!”
“Boo.”
Pouting, lips pursed in open displeasure, Shandy pressed her own lips to her Martini instead.
Waiting on Shandy’s verdict felt far longer than waiting on Rinko’s had. She was a professional, after all. And Mikoto had already been warned, back on her visit to see Mimosa, just how demanding a Martini could be to get right.
The same recipe as the Imperial Hotel’s. Fifty-one milliliters of gin, nine of dry vermouth — could she really have reproduced a difference of a single milliliter, one that was hard enough to measure precisely with a jigger to begin with?
“…How is it, Shandy-san?”
“Sweet critique or dry? Which would you prefer?”
“Not too sweet, not too dry, please.”
Shandy answered with a simple “very well,” and her expression softened.
“The spirits are mixed thoroughly. The glass was properly pre-chilled too, so as a short drink meant to be enjoyed quickly, this passes.”
“So, a pass, then?”
“No. I can’t hand Antiqua over to you just yet.”
With that, Shandy’s expression shifted back into her earnest bartender’s face.
“Too much dilution. You stirred too long, letting the ice melt more than necessary, which dulled the gin’s sharpness. The ratio’s probably off too — a few milliliters too much vermouth. And on top of that, oil from the olive. Did you properly drain it first?”
“I hadn’t thought to…”
“Too much oil turns this into an entirely different cocktail — a Dirty Martini. Do be careful next time?”
“…Yes.”
She’d half expected it, but the critique still landed hard. However kind Shandy usually was, when it came to cocktails, she allowed no room for slack. Proof of the real pride she took in her work.
“I— I think it’s delicious! So it’s fine, Kurosu-san!”
“Thank you for the support…”
For all she’d said, Mikoto’s shoulders sagged anyway.
Getting even a sound of approval out of Shandy was never going to be simple.
“I never said it was bad. Mikoto-san’s very first Martini has its own charm too, as it is.”
“Hey. Let me have a taste too?”
“I’ll let you drink it if you kiss me. Mouth to mouth.”
“Absolutely not!”
“Oh, how disappointing.”
Watching Shandy and Rinko each tip back their own glasses, none of the earlier hostility remained between them. Some wary tension still lingered, sure, but nothing close to the open hostility from before.
“Maybe this is the power of alcohol too.”
The thought slipped out unbidden. Both Rinko and Shandy turned toward her with a puzzled look — Rinko especially, with no sign of picking up on Mikoto’s own feelings at all.
Mikoto remembered something Shandy had said once.
—A drink shared in a prickly mood never tastes good. Shall we make peace, Rinko-san?—
True enough — she’d been tense and conflicted at the very start, but that unease had settled by now. Even the sharp, unfiltered back-and-forth between Shandy and Rinko, despite the friction underneath, felt oddly comfortable in its own way.
“Ah…”
Mikoto wondered, suddenly.
Maybe Shandy had proposed this whole evening at Antiqua from the very start, precisely to keep the three-way relationship between them from souring any further.
“Is something the matter?”
“…No, nothing at all. Fufu.”
Pressing Shandy on it directly probably wouldn’t get her an answer anyway. Or perhaps, being the shy type she was, she’d just smile and say “I only wanted a drink,” and leave it at that.
A bartender who thought of everything, down to the smallest detail. That was exactly who Shandy was.
“That reminds me, Shandy-san, Rinko-san. I’d like to serve one more round, if you’re both still up for it.”
“Planning to drink us both under the table and take us home, are you?”
“Yes. I intend to enjoy the two of you together. Rinko-san?”
“Totally fine. I’ll take as many of your drinks as you’ll give me, Kurosu-san!”
Mikoto studied both their faces. Neither showed the faintest flush, but something in their expressions had softened, just slightly.
One thing, at least, was certain — both of them were genuinely enjoying this time spent with a cocktail in hand.
“Then, allow me to make a masterpiece meant to get you both drunk — peach and orange together.”
At Mikoto’s declaration, only Shandy laughed, as if she’d already caught on to something.