Chapter 65: Offering a Kiss in the Dark

Chapter 65: Offering a Kiss in the Dark

“What are you drinking?”

They did not choose the private room Asagiri Rin liked to enjoy alone. It was not because she felt Yatsuno Gen was unworthy of entering.

It was simply that she did not think this was something that needed to be hidden. In truth, more than anyone else, she hoped her relationship with him could be normal, but... she had already twisted it herself.

Yatsuno Gen thought for a moment. “A martini, I guess. I tried one last time. The ones you make here are pretty good.”

“You say that as if you often drink cocktails.”

Yatsuno Gen smiled. “I wouldn’t say I’m especially knowledgeable, but I do keep some whisky and base spirits at home, and I occasionally mix a few myself. I think the cocktail that best proves a bartender’s skill is the martini.”

“A thousand martinis have a thousand flavours.”

“You’ve had quite a few too.”

Yatsuno Gen looked at the girl with slight surprise.

Asagiri Rin did not answer that sentence. She only asked, “Wet or dry?”

“Extremely dry.”

Asagiri Rin glanced at the boy, then said to the waiter who had been waiting nearby for a long time, “Two extra-dry martinis. Just rinse the ice with vermouth. And six shots of tequila.”

“Are you using tequila as an appetizer?”

Yatsuno Gen asked strangely.

“If you can’t hold your liquor, don’t drink. No one is forcing you.”

The girl snorted coldly and leaned back against the chair. No matter where she was, no matter what seat she took, she always adopted the most dominant sitting posture. It was as though an invisible crown rested atop her head, and only this posture could keep it steady.

Yatsuno Gen also laughed. “Your goading is very old-fashioned, but sorry, I fall for this kind of thing.”

Was that something worth being proud of? He said it so confidently...

Still, compared to when he had been at the orphanage, he did seem to have changed quite a lot.

The tequila was soon brought to the table. The martinis were still being prepared.

There was no opening line. Perhaps it had already been spoken. Asagiri Rin directly picked up a glass, and Yatsuno Gen picked one up as well.

He looked at the girl.

“Shall we toast?”

“I never toast anyone when drinking.”

She frowned.

Clink.

Then the boy took the initiative and tapped his glass against hers. Yet his control was precise enough that not a single drop spilled. After that, he drank it down in one satisfying gulp.

No struggling or discomfort appeared on his face, only slight enjoyment.

Asagiri Rin froze for a moment, then still frowned and drank hers.

After she finished drinking, Yatsuno Gen’s smiling eyes seemed close enough to touch beneath the dim lights of Paper Airplane. His face seemed like a moon drawing ever closer to the Mid-Autumn Festival, near and bright.

“Every time you tell me you’ve never done something or other... I get this impulse to do it. Or is that actually your way of inviting me?”

“I’ve discovered that you’re not only narcissistic, you also love immersing yourself in your own world and don’t care at all how ridiculous your thoughts are.”

The girl retorted sharply.

Yatsuno Gen smiled without minding.

“Only people who believe in themselves and are in love with themselves can truly enjoy the beauty of this world. At least, that’s what I think.”

It was not brave people who enjoyed the world first, nor gentle people who enjoyed the world first. It was people who loved themselves who could enjoy the world.

Why couldn’t one be narcissistic? Was narcissism shameful? At least Yatsuno Gen felt that if he had a child, compared to that child being self-abased, he would much rather the child be narcissistic.

Some people were precisely because they were extremely unconfident that they tried desperately to deny every expression of confidence. They seemed to think humility had already become a kind of nature, a moral foundation, even an element of character. Was that really the case? It was nothing more than a pass that made it easier to fit into the world.

At its core, it was nothing but a thorough strangulation.

Wearing away personality, erasing individuality, hoping everyone in the world would wear friendly and humble masks, and that everyone would bow to strangers in the street.

Asagiri Rin shook her head and sighed. “I still underestimated the inner strength of people like you. Is your narcissism also why you still haven’t accepted anyone else’s adoption or guardianship?”

The few people who interacted with Yatsuno Gen often all tacitly avoided mentioning too much about his time in the orphanage. Although they also wanted to understand, they felt it might touch some hidden corner of the boy’s heart.

So they basically adopted the attitude of waiting for the day he wanted to speak about it himself. They believed this was the best way to respect him.

I know who you are now. As for your past, tell me when you want to.

But Asagiri Rin was different. During that period, there had been no one else, only them. So she could speak without restraint. Even if she stabbed into his pain, so what? It was not as if she had done fewer bad things while playing the villainess.

Why did thinking of it make her feel an inexplicable little thrill?

Yatsuno Gen shook his head. “That isn’t why. It’s simply because I think I don’t need it. Some things, if you don’t have them at the beginning, you don’t need them later either.”

“For example, familial affection?”

“You could say that.”

Asagiri Rin fell slightly silent. She picked up the next glass of tequila.

This time, she did not learn from the lesson of Yatsuno Gen taking the initiative to clink glasses. Instead, after lifting it, she paused in that position. Clearly, she was waiting for something.

She was a lost child, waiting for a bus to take her home.

She was also a child who had forgotten happiness, standing on the hill of childhood with her arms spread wide, waiting for a gust of wind to blow all the dandelions into her arms, just like the one that man, who would never appear, had personally given to her.

Clink.

The glasses collided crisply. The song playing in Paper Airplane was Don’t Look Back in Anger, a classic by Oasis, a band known as the Little Penicillin.

Every time Asagiri Rin heard the line about her knowing it was too late and walking on by, she could not help being moved.

The gradually rising aftertaste of alcohol became a faint peachy flush on her neck. She thought, perhaps drunken words were all nonsense, and no one took them seriously. That was why so many people carried such thoughts as they spoke their true feelings and acted wantonly.

After this glass was finished, the two extra-dry martinis were brought to the table.

The waiter naturally had a vague idea of what kind of identity this girl, who occasionally appeared in the most hidden and forbidden private room of this bar, might have. So he came quietly and left quickly, not daring to disturb them in the slightest.

He did not even have time to admire Yatsuno Gen’s face a little longer.

The moment she set down the empty glass, the girl immediately picked up the martini.

“Cheers.”

For the first time, she took the initiative to say that word.

Yatsuno Gen paused. “You want to drink this right after finishing that? It’s very strong.”

Asagiri Rin shook her head. “A martini should be drunk in three mouthfuls while it’s still cold. Do you understand alcohol or not?”

“Fine.”

You could not persuade someone who wanted to get drunk, and he was too lazy to talk about health issues. If the price of living to one hundred or one hundred and twenty was swallowing all the bitterness in your heart silently by yourself, without even a channel to vent it, then it was merely a century-long imprisonment.

One mouthful was already large.

The flavour of vermouth struck the mouth.

It was worth savouring carefully.

Looking again at Asagiri Rin, her sitting posture had already softened. At this moment, she was quietly watching Yatsuno Gen. She still seemed very calm, but she was already clearly different from her usual self.

How should he put it? Asagiri Rin like this, with her cheeks slightly flushed beneath the dim light, made one want to reach out, part her black hair, hold her face, and kiss her.

They looked very natural, but in truth, they did not have so much to say to each other. Or perhaps there was an invisible barrier, making Asagiri Rin feel she had to speak, yet leaving her unable to say anything.

So they listened to music and drank, one mouthful after another.

Looking at him, real yet distant, right in front of her, she really wanted to ask whether he truly hated her.

She also really wanted to say that at first, she had indeed wanted him to hate her, but now she was sad because of it.

But in the end, she said nothing and asked nothing. It seemed they could only be like this, unrelated to each other’s pain and itch.

Was that so?

Although they did not drink especially fast, in less than an hour, the martinis and all six shots of tequila were finished.

Asagiri Rin’s vision had already begun to blur. It seemed similar to how much she usually drank, yet the alcohol hit her faster than on any other night.

She tried hard to pretend she was normal and looked over.

“What should we drink next?”

“That’s already quite a lot. We still have class tomorrow. Don’t get that drunk.”

“I’m not that drunk. I have a very good tolerance.”

She said it unconvinced.

Yatsuno Gen smiled and nodded, already standing up on his own initiative. “I know, but I don’t want to drink that much.”

“Then that means you admit defeat.”

At this moment, she seemed very serious, a strangely childish seriousness, yet precisely because it was childish, it seemed cute.

Standing beside her, Yatsuno Gen nodded.

“Mm, I lost.”

His smile was gentle, just like the boy in her memories. It was as though when he smiled, sunlight would scatter the dark clouds and rainwater would become a hot spring.

She hated this boy’s gentleness, because gentleness was a hypocritical quality, something that could be used on anyone. It could not be privately owned, yet made people want to monopolize it.

“Hmph. I’ll let you off this time.”

She stood up, but her steps staggered. Her body was far less clear-headed than her consciousness, or perhaps... neither was very clear-headed.

But Yatsuno Gen, quick-eyed and quick-handed, seemed to have anticipated this in advance. Very naturally and easily, he held her slender arm and steadied her balance.

The instant she felt that reassuring strength and warmth, she turned her head.

The boy was close enough to touch.

His face was even better-looking than before, and his eyes were still as impossible to see through. And... the veins appearing on his neck, his prominent Adam’s apple.

Everything was dizzying, as though it belonged only to the hallucinations that came after drunkenness.

Even his scent made her feel attached, but this did not belong to her.

“Let, let go. I’ll walk by myself...”

“I’ll take you to the car.”

Yatsuno Gen did not let go. In fact, Morita Kaoru, not far away, had already seen this scene.

She came over as well and glanced at Yatsuno Gen, who was supporting the girl who seemed already unclear-headed.

“Should I support Miss instead?”

Yatsuno Gen merely gave her a very clear-headed smile.

“Don’t worry about me, and don’t worry about her.”

“...”

For some reason, he was clearly only a high school student, even an orphan from an orphanage by background. Yet his gentle gaze seemed to possess a power that naturally convinced others.

As if all she needed to do was listen to him.

She still turned around and went to get the car.

Yatsuno Gen brought Asagiri Rin into the back seat of the car, but he did not get in himself. He said to Morita Kaoru in front, “Just take her home. I can go back by myself.”

Morita Kaoru did not hesitate and nodded.

“All right.”

Just as Yatsuno Gen was about to leave,

Suddenly, the car window rolled down.

First, a pair of fair and delicate hands climbed onto the edge of the window, then the girl with her hair in disarray struggled to poke her head out.

Her chin rested on the back of her hand, and a few strands of hair swayed across her face.

She was dazed and unclear, her eyes misty.

“Hey, Yatsuno Gen.”

“Mm?”

Yatsuno Gen stopped walking and looked over.

She pursed her lips. “Come here. I’ll tell you a secret.”

A secret? Did drinking turn you back into a child?

But the boy still walked over, lowered his head to look at her, drew closer to her face, and offered his ear.

“Go ahead.”

The girl’s voice was very soft, but very clear. The entire street was noisy and lively, but Yatsuno Gen could automatically block it out.

“I actually don’t hate that period of time. Really.”

She had forgotten the original purpose of their reunion.

Yatsuno Gen laughed.

“Mm, I know.”

Asagiri Rin then seemed a little downcast again, even aggrieved.

“When I left... when I left, I said I wanted them to bring you too... but no one listened. No one listened.”

She seemed to become once more that little girl who needed to rely on him, the little girl searching for airplanes outside the orphanage.

“...”

An indescribable emotion, like a river he thought had long since dried up and stopped flowing, one day turned into a tsunami and rushed toward him.

That faint sob in her voice was a torrential rain.

Yatsuno Gen raised his head and looked at her face.

“Asagiri Rin.”

“How bold of you. You dare call me by my full name?”

The girl’s cheeks were red, and her eyes were red too. Even the most evil demon should show mercy before such a face.

“You’re so cute.”

“Mm?”

She raised her head in confusion, and no one knew whether she had heard clearly.

But.

The boy reached out and cupped her face, fulfilling the wish he had held not long ago.

In the dark night, some people danced, some people sang, and some people offered kisses.

Amid the dim, noisy, chaotic intoxication filling the street, he kissed her.