[Arashi Fanfic] Blue - Chapter 14
"Yuuki-chan! Lunchtime!" Ben called out.
"Yeah, yeah, just give me a minute, I'm almost done." She replied, her eyes glued to the computer screen, fingers flying over the keyboard.
"Last time you said that, we had to wait for half an hour," Tom, the other colleague piped up, half-complaining, half-amused. "We've only got an hour for lunch, kid. Don't work yourself so hard. You're making us look bad."
"Sorry," Yuuki replied, as her fingers continued to type fervently, before giving a final, resolute tap on the key. "There. Done. Now, did someone say something about lunch?"
"Sure did," Ben replied. "Misato-chan mention a Chuuka restaurant nearby. Wanna try it out?"
"Chuuka? As in Chinese?" Yuuki asked. "I thought you didn't like Chinese, Ben-"
"Sounds good. Let's go then." Tom cut her off, before his mate's true intentions could be exposed by Yuuki's verbal diahorrea. Yuuki gave Tom a quizzical look, then immediately understood. She gave Ben a hard pat on the back, "I see I see. Don't worry, mate, we'll help you as much as we can."
Seeing the wink Yuuki gave him, Ben paled. Tom and Yuuki laughed as they pushed Ben out of the office.
Yuuki's laugh faltered when she saw the restaurant Ben was talking about. In fact, she was the one paled this time. Her eyes were round with disbelief, and she was ready to run back to the office.
Keikarou. She was standing in front of Keikarou.
Her stomach lurched.
No fan of Arashi would not know that Keikarou was the restaurant Aiba's family owned and ran. It was where he grew up, and remained where his family lived. She had wanted to visit the restaurant since she became a fan, but the opportunity never came. Yet here she was, with her colleagues, outside the restaurant…
She stood, rooted to the spot, unable to move a muscle.
A week. She was resolved to move on for a week, and the past was already catching up with her. Would she ever be able to shake off all reminders of Aiba? It seemed that was an impossible task.
How life toyed with her.
"You 'right there, Yuuki?" One of the guys spoke, noticing Yuuki's change.
"Eh?" Snapping back to reality, Yuuki answered off-handedly. Composing herself, she replied, "Yeah, I'm fine. Just a bit out of breath, that's all."
She plastered the most genuine and reassuring smile she could manage on her face, and joined Ben and Tom at the door. "Shall we go in?"
Inside, it was bustling, but not too busy. Since it was a weekday, most of the customers were workers from offices nearby, including Misato, the receptionist from their office. Sure enough, Ben sauntered in and made his way to the petite OL, leaving Tom and Yuuki on their own, an awkward position as they waited for someone to show them to a table.
They didn't have to wait long; a tall, middle-aged woman soon greeted them. Aiba's resemblance to her was uncanny: no doubt she was his mother. Yuuki's mind was still in shock at being in Keikarou, thus was completely blank; though Yuuki did engage that the woman seemed to study her momentarily, before her professionalism came back.
Yuuki didn't remember any details about the meal itself. She ordered something, but couldn't remember what; and when her meal arrived, she realised it was mabo tofu. Tears threatened to spill; each bite of her lunch was more painful than the last-and that certainly had nothing to do with the chilli (or lack of it) in the dish. She ate robotically: one spoonful of the tofu, followed by a spoonful of rice; Tom was surprised and curious by the way she ate, though he kept his mouth shut.
As she ate, Yuuki sensed that eyes were on her; not from the customers, but from the owners. Aiba's mother certainly stole looks every now and then, and his father kept his eyes focused on her corner of the restaurant. She had never felt a greater urge to leave a restaurant, in the middle of her meal; Tom was the only reason she stayed.
"Oi, Yuuki! Earth to Yuuki," Tom's voice interrupted the unease. "You alright there?"
Yuuki flashed him a sad smile that said "I'm not but I'd rather not talk about it". The restaurant door opened, and a young man who was almost a younger copy of Aiba, around the same age as Yuuki, came in, and had one foot on the stairs next to the kitchen door. But, instead, he glanced around the dining area of the restaurant, and his eyes widened at the sight of Yuuki. He rushed over to his mother, and said something that made the lady look over in her direction; she pretended not to notice but the women's eyes met, momentarily- Yuuki felt her heart in her throat, not knowing what to expect next.
The older woman made her way over to her table, and flashed her a smile. "How is everything? I hope you're enjoying the food."
"Everything's great, thank you. Absolutely wonderful." Tom replied, with a grin.
"Good, good! I'm glad," she replied. "Um, I hope you don't mind me asking, but you're not from the area, are you?"
"We're from Australia, actually." Tom answered, "but how did you know?"
"Tom, you've got blonde hair and blue eyes. It's not that hard to tell." Yuuki chortled, in English, and flashed a quick apologetic smile at Aiba's mother for her companion's silly question, before her eyes returned to the now empty plate of mabo tofu before her.
"Ah, we get a few foreign visitors every now and then, even though we're so far from the city." She replied, with a gentle smile. "But you don't seem to be tourists…"
"Oh, we're actually here for a training program…"
Yuuki's phone started going off, and she didn't hear any more of the conversation between Tom and Aiba's mother. She hastily placed some bills on the table, mumbled that she was done with the meal and went outside to take the call.
"Moshi moshi, Yuuki desu."
"Ah, Yuuki-san, ojamashimashita." a polite male voice answered. "This is Tanaka, from Tanaka Legal Practitioners. I'm calling about your grandmother's bequest."
"Hai…"
"The shares she has bequeathed to you are currently in trust, and Mrs Lee has named our firm to act as the protector. We'll need to ask you to come in as there are some technical details and procedures to follow. The trustee has asked to meet at his office, Friday next week. Is that a convenient time?"
"Next week? It should be fine." Yuuki answered. But there was something wrong. A trustee? "I'm sorry, Mr Tanaka, I was under the impression that the shares were trusted to your firm…"
"Ah, no, Yuuki-san. We're merely the protectors of the trust, as per your grandmother's will. The shares were trusted to someone else, it seems. Under the terms, we would approve and carry out the transfer once you indicated an intention to control the shares. I'm happy to go over the details when we meet on Friday."
"Sure, that'll be fine." She replied. "If you don't mind me asking, whom did she appoint as the trustee?"
"A J. Kitagawa, I believe…" Tanaka said, as he shuffled papers on his desk. "Ah yes, to Johnny Kitagawa."
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She thought that it would be a simple affair. That once she had signed the papers, she could just sell the shares to some trader and be done. But it seemed Grandma had other ideas: settling the shares in trust, appointing Johnny Kitagawa himself as the trustee, while her lawyers merely acted as protectors. Signing the shares over to her would not be easy now, and she would have to meet Johnny Kitagawa: something she wanted to avoid at all costs. Aiba probably hasn't told his boss about their relationship-well, what previously existed, anyway-but she was sure that Johnny probably knew, through his own channels and means. Yuuki dreaded the unavoidable meeting: she was scared and nervous, yet she knew it had to be done.
But the dread of meeting Johnny was nothing compared with the fear of running into Aiba. From being the person she most wanted to see, he had become the person she most dreaded. She didn't know whether to ignore him, to scream and yell at him, or just pretend nothing has happened. She was equally lost with regards to what to expect, which was probably the aspect which scared her the most. Knowing that Hikari was back, having seen her leaving his apartment, she could only hope that Aiba knew what he was doing. And if Hikari was the one he loved, then…
"Wow. Never thought I'd see this kind of scenery in Japan." Tom's voice interrupted Yuuki's thoughts. "Hey, Yuuki, have a look at what's outside!"
It was the weekend, and their colleagues at the Chiba office suggested a road trip to show Tom, Ben and Yuuki some of the sights outside Tokyo. Hiroki, their section chief, offered the services of his new seven-seater, which meant that most of the staff who were single, including Ben's Misato-chan, could accompany them.
As her colleagues murmured words of admiration and sighs of amazement, Yuuki merely gazed around. She remembered the place well-how could she not? This was where she spent her last Christmas.
With Aiba.
Aiba and Yuuki had been out since morning, just driving around aimlessly, enjoying each others company. They stumbled upon this stretch of nature sometime in the afternoon, and stayed to watch the sun set behind the hills. She wore a long skirt that day, a floaty, gypsy sort; it was something she bought on a whim, and put on because it was Christmas, and Christmas demanded something different.
The sky began to change colour, the clear azure blue gradually darkening, as the sun changed from a blinding yellow to a mellow orange. Aiba and Yuuki stood, side by side, as a breeze picked up, and her long skirt, and her hair fluttered in the wind. The sun walked towards the depths of the mountains, slowly becoming a ball of red, the sky dyed a mix of pink, purple and orange. Everything else turned dark, except for the few twinkling lights, reflected in the sky by the emerging galaxies. But the beauty was short-lived; the realisation triggered a thought in Yuuki.
"Ne," she whispered, in a voice barely audible to herself. "Will love come to an end someday?"
Her eyes, focused straight ahead, didn't see the turn of Aiba's head. He made no answer; he merely brushed his fingertips against hers, grasped her hand and squeezed it tightly. The contact surprised Yuuki: she turned her gaze to their now-entwined hands, before lifting her head, and their eyes met.
He smiled, a gentle, reassuring smile, a smile that wiped her mind clean of any doubts, any insecurities. Then, and there, Yuuki truly believed that they would be together, forever; that nothing could ever stand in their way. That nothing would ever happen to the feelings they shared. That nothing could ever be between them, and force them apart.
How wrong she was. Not even one year since she last stood on the hill, with such confidence and assurance in her relationship, all her beliefs at that time were proven otherwise.
In retrospect, the time she spent with Aiba as a couple seemed too perfect to be real. They never fought, never had a single argument, not even one disagreement over where and what to eat. Perhaps that was the source of her insecurity: everything seemed too good to be true.
And that scared her- a lot.
She was so sure that she loved him; but a nagging voice in her head always doubted if he loved her equally. After all, Aiba was in love with Hikari when they met- she was there at his weakest moments. She was afraid of the relationship ending, if Hikari changed her mind. Subconsciously, Yuuki didn't want to be the rebound girl; she selfishly wanted to be more. She wanted him to feel for her what she felt for him. She wanted-and was ready for-a lifetime together: a lifetime of laughter, tears, disagreements over the little things, teasing and everything else. She didn't want perfection: she just wanted love.
But, it seems, even that was too much to ask for.
As the wind whipped her short fringe across her forehead, her eyes stung as tears gathered: tears of sadness, of loss, of emptiness… no matter how hard she tried, it was impossible to run from the past, to run from Johnnys…to run from Aiba. Everything she did merely took her back to where she was before; there was no way for her life to return to what it was before she met the guys. Her life had changed the moment she talked to Tomo-kun in that glass-walled cafeteria at Meiji; and she was well past the point of no return.
She was powerless; her life was beyond her own control. The only thing she could hope for was Johnny's understanding … and support. Perhaps that would be her last and only saving grace.
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