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59.61% Transition and Restart / Chapter 271: Chapter six, 2017, spring break: 8

Kapitel 271: Chapter six, 2017, spring break: 8

Ryu allowed Mars to turn into April before he made his mind up. He missed Ai-chan, but not as much as he had feared, and that made him a little disgusted with himself. If he was this callous, then he needed someone to watch over him, and who better suited than Kuri, with her lifelong experience from life?

"Are you still sure about this?" he asked her. They sat in the same café as when she had dropped the bomb three days earlier.

"No, she said. I'm anything but sure, but I'm running out of time."

"So, what do we do, and why me?"

"Look, I'll be absolutely honest with you. I see you as a boy, an honest, decent and good boy, but a boy still."

Ryu nodded. He already knew that. "So why me?" he repeated.

"Because you have everything that would make you grow up into a good and decent man. Because your have your name, and because in my world your looks could make the idiots I'm working with believe we're really a couple."

He listened to her reasons, almost a short speech.

"I'll take the good and decent parts," he said and grinned. "My looks are only a tool. They don't define who I am."

Kuri grimaced. "They do, to a much greater degree than you can understand yet." She tuned that grimace into a smile, as beatifically gorgeous as always. "People react to you because of how you look, and you can't avoid being coloured by those reactions."

Ryu didn't really understand, but he had no reasons not to believe her, even if she was biased because of her line of work. Instead he nodded pretence that he had understood.

"Ulf could explain better than I do. He was always better at explaining." Her smile turned into one of longing and sadness. "He should have explained better."

She was miles away. Ryu read in her eyes how she followed him in her mind wherever he had gone with his bike. Probably shared the road with him on the bike he had given her as a present.

Then his eyes fell on her left hand. A ring glittered on it, a large brilliant catching the lights in the café.

She must have seen him looking at it. "Is it time for me to take it off?"

'Huh?' "Sorry, I didn't mean..."

"Is this the last day I wear the ring?" she interrupted. "Are you my boyfriend or not?"

So it was finally time to voice his decision. "Yes, provided you really are my girlfriend."

With a bitter smile she put her right hand over his. "Then we're dating." She couldn't prevent tears from welling up in her eyes, but none dropped as she pulled the ring off her finger. "I'll save this. It's a memory. I'll have memories."

'I wonder what happens next.' Ryu pulled her hand over the table and cradled it in his own. She hadn't worn the ring long enough for it to make a mark on her finger. 'Memories only. Not even a lingering mark to prove you two were together.'

He had gained a girlfriend. He had lost a friend in doing so, because he doubted Urufu would accept the sudden turn of events. He hadn't even have time to lose his love. Ai-chan still ached in his heart. 'I guess it makes us one of a kind. Boyfriend and girlfriend still in love with another.'

At least he considered Kuri one of his best friends. At least that, even if they were a couple now. Something they could start from. Something they could share.

'Can I learn to love you again?' He didn't know.

"You're silent," Kuri said. She hadn't pulled back her hand. It still lay in his hand, long, slender and cool to his touch. A beautiful hand, just like the rest of her was beautiful.

"Just thinking."

The smile he received carried some happiness in it. "And he already begins. Thinking. Don't you dare to copy him!"

'Huh? Oh, yes, Urufu always try to think things through.' Ryu hadn't thought of it that way. Did Urufu over-think everything?

"Yes he does," Kuri said. She had this way of almost reading people's mind. A long time ago it had scared him a little, but not any more.

"Should we invite your bodyguard to our table," Ryu said instead.

"Oh, so you noticed?"

He had. Ryu always knew of the people around him. "He's very discreet," Ryu said in an attempt to make an excuse for Kuri's bodyguard. He really wasn't, all that discreet that was. Ryu had seen him throw them worried glances for most of their lunch.

Kuri waived him to their table and he took a seat.

"Wakayama Ryu," Ryu offered.

"Pleased to meet you. I'm afraid my profession prevents me from disclosing my name," the man said.

"I guess," Ryu said. "Well, Kuri, now what?" he asked and turned his attention to her. "Do we make some kind of grand announcement, or do we just let it filter out through the rumour mill?

"I got myself a tactician this time. Filter out."

"I need to know, are Ai-chan and Urufu taboo subjects when we speak from now on?"

"Gods no! Why would I do something like that to us two? You know, and I know."

He nodded. "But if things change?"

"If things… Oh, I see. Just tell me if your feelings change, will you."

'But you won't, because your feelings won't. OK, I can live with that.' "I will," he said. 'Poor Ai-chan. When she gets to know about this.' But maybe it was better this way. If she got angry enough with him she'd move on faster. "You do the same," he added to remind her it wasn't very polite implying he was the only one who could have a change of heart.

Kuri gave him a peculiar look in return. One filled with a little amusement. "If that happens you'll be the first to know." A mischievous grin followed the words.


Kapitel 272: Chapter six, 2017, spring break: 9

The last Sunday of their spring break Yukio was supposed to meet Ryu, who wanted to tell him something strange that happened.

The last Sunday of their spring break Yukio sat together with Kyoko, listening to a Sato-sensei livid with rage.

Two older men he had never seen before listened to her yelling, together with Principal Nakagawa; former Principal Nakagawa. He was retired now.

From time to time Principal Nakagawa spiced Sato-sensei's yelling with a few choice curses of his own. They were both very much in agreement.

As for Yukio, he stared at the display in bewilderment, and by his side Kyoko sat looking scared. As scared as he was himself.

A minute earlier her father had stormed out of the room screaming obscenities that would have had him expelled had he been a student at Himekaizen. Yukio agreed with all of them, every single curse accentuated exactly what he felt.

"… don't care what you think you fucking whore-sons! They're getting an escort, and that's final!"

"Please Sato-san..."

"Please Lieutenant Colonel Sato! Shut the hell up and do as you're ordered! They gave me this rank just because I'd outrank you."

Kyoko covered her ears.

"Ma'am!" Both men came to attention.

"It's just the..." one of them tried.

"Just the what?"

"The arms. Why an armed escort?"

Sato-sensei stared at the man with thunder in her eyes. "Because they were assaulted by a gun-toting maniac, one who shot and killed a police! Were you two born morons, or did you need some special education to lower your intelligence that way?"

Yukio noted how Principal Nakagawa grinned wildly at the assessment. One of them looked at him for help.

"No no," he said. "I wouldn't use her language, but none of you two fill the requirements to be accepted to Himekaizen."

Which was just about the same as using Sato-sensei's language.

One of the men reddened and tried to rise, only to be dragged back down by his colleague.

"Ma'am, we need solid evidence first."

"Are you trying to tell me Kareyoshi managed to hide even one of the tracks leading back to him? Her bloody father fucking managed to dig him up!" Sato-sensei pointed at Kyoko who still sat with her hands over he ears.

'Her father' hadn't, not really. After he started making questions Yukio made a digital excursion of his own, and with Kyoko's father watching over his back the screen soon filled with an intricate net of information all pointing back at their English teacher. Now Yukio understood what Urufu meant when he said Kareyoshi needed a dictionary to find the meaning of the word discreet, and that he'd still fail understanding it.

"Ma'am, is that armed escort an order?" The protests had gone out of his voice.

"Finally! Yes, with that murderer taking the helm I'm not risking anything."

And so it was decided. As soon as they could muster the men, Yukio and Kyoko would go to school and leave school with an armed bodyguard. Yukio wasn't so certain the reason was their safety, more likely that Sato-sensei wanted Kareyoshi to know that the other side knew about everything he had done.

'Looks like a fun second year,' Yukio thought glumly. Well, as long as he had Kyoko he could face anything.

They left the nondescript building that had served as Kyoko's private hospital a couple of months earlier. The surgical facility was still inside, somewhere. He didn't have a lot of good memories from the place and tried his best at forgetting.

"Urufu, heard anything?" Sato-sensei asked when she drove them home.

Yukio shook his head. He guessed Kyoko did the same from the back seat. He didn't have Urufu's technical skills when it came to digging up a presence on the net. His skills lay in his understanding of dozens of communities, and the contacts he made on them. While some of his otaku contacts were bat shit crazy they were still very good at sniffing out stuff online.

"Sorry, Sato-sensei," Yukio said in case she hadn't understood his gesture. "He's gone, but he can take care of himself."

She looked at him when they stopped at a red-light. "You trust him that much?"

"We both do," Kyoko said. "You know, this is the first time I've seen him hurt. He just needs some time to think things over."

'Think things over. Yeah, man, that's what you usually do.' But it was a fine mess Urufu put himself into this time. 'I just hope you're right, Kyoko.'

Sato-sensei must have seen his hesitation. "But you're still worried, aren't you?"

"Yes, yes we are. I wonder where he is."

When Sato-sensei didn't say anything, Yukio took his phone and sent Ryu a message. Maybe they could still meet, even if it meant being a little late.

By the time they reached Kyoko's home Ryu still hadn't answered. He still hadn't when Yukio unlocked his own door. That was reason enough to call him, but now Ryu's phone was out of service, just like Urufu's.

Well, they'd meet tomorrow. If it wasn't important enough for Ryu to keep his phone on, Yukio guessed whatever it was Ryu wanted to talk about could wait another day.

Yukio announced his arrival, but the flat was dark. His mother was probably out shopping. With the flat for himself he drew a bath and prepared to wait for her. At least he had someone to wait for.

'Urufu, damn it! What the hell are you doing? Where are you?'


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