Chapter 27: I Think I’m in Love

The girl’s eyes widened in surprise, and the smile on my face slowly froze because this time, I hadn’t said those words in my head.

The soft music playing inside the bakery, the hiss of the coffee machine, and the conversations around us suddenly seemed to fade into the distance. She held her fork above her plate while I replayed the last few seconds in my mind, as though doing so might somehow turn back time.

Why did I always lose control of my mouth whenever everything was going well?

"What did you just call me?" she asked.

The surprise in her voice wasn’t mocking, but that didn’t make the hole I was about to fall into any shallower. Maybe I could deny what she had heard and claim she had misunderstood the lyrics of the music playing in the bakery.

Unfortunately, the music didn’t have any lyrics.

I cleared my throat and tried to look as calm as possible.

"You asked if I was listening, so I said yes."

"I’m asking about what you said after that."

"I don’t remember saying anything after that."

"You said ’my angel.’"

I lowered my gaze to my coffee as my face grew warmer. Jumping into the bitter drink and drowning in it seemed like the most dignified escape available to me.

"It was a slip of the tongue," I said at last. "It happens."

A small smile appeared at the corner of her lips as she continued studying me.

"You said something similar before."

My head snapped up.

"When?"

"Yesterday, when you were lying on the ground near the exercise bars. You looked up at me and whispered, ’An angel.’"

The embarrassing scene replayed in my mind. After twenty push-ups, I had been lying flat on my back, and when I saw her face up close for the first time, I had been too exhausted to stop myself from saying the first thing that crossed my mind.

I had hoped she had forgotten.

In fact, I had convinced myself that she had.

"You still remember that?"

"It was a little difficult to forget." Her smile widened as she set her fork on the edge of her plate. "First, you stared at me strangely. Then you collapsed after a single pull-up and called me an angel while looking into my face."

It sounded even worse when she described it.

"I also did twenty push-ups," I muttered.

"I’m still not sure the last few counted as push-ups."

"We’re not having that argument again."

She covered her lips with one hand and laughed softly. Unlike the laughter she had let out after slapping my ass, this one sounded gentler, perhaps even a little shy.

I tried to come up with a reasonable explanation that might save me, but I had no choice other than to stand behind what I had said. When I first saw her, I genuinely thought she looked like an angel, and I hadn’t called her anything else in my mind since then.

"Fine." I leaned back in my chair. "When I first saw you, I thought you looked like an angel, so sometimes I accidentally call you that. There’s nothing strange about it."

"Do you often call people angels?"

"No."

My answer came far too quickly for me to think about it.

When she raised one eyebrow, I tried to correct myself.

"I mean, it isn’t a habit. If I called every girl I met an angel, I’d be an extremely strange person."

"So you only call me that."

I looked away for a moment.

"It sounds stranger when you put it like that."

"But it’s true, isn’t it?"

She leaned forward slightly and looked into my eyes with a curious expression, waiting for an answer. The morning sun streamed through the window and lit the edges of her blonde hair, making it seem pointless to question why I had given her that nickname in the first place.

"Yes," I finally admitted. "I only call you that."

Neither of us spoke for the next few seconds. A faint blush appeared on her cheeks while my heart began pounding as though our morning run had exhausted it more than my legs.

At last, she lowered her gaze to the cheesecake in front of her and picked up her fork again.

"Then I don’t mind."

After saying that, she cut another small piece from her dessert as though nothing had happened.

I couldn’t return to normal as easily as she could.

She doesn’t mind?

Did that mean I could keep calling her my angel?

Maybe she liked the nickname. The color in her cheeks might even mean she liked it more than a little. Of course, this could all have been the product of my overactive imagination, but I was determined to think positively today.

As I reached for my coffee, a sharp ringtone rose from the phone on the table. The moment she looked at the screen, the sweet smile on her face vanished and was replaced by the expression of someone greeting an approaching headache.

I hadn’t seen the name on the screen, but the way she briefly closed her eyes and took a deep breath made it easy to guess who was calling.

"Your father?"

She nodded reluctantly.

Before answering, she straightened in her chair. Then she accepted the call and tried to sound as natural as possible.

"Good morning, Dad."

I couldn’t make out the deep voice coming from the phone, but I could hear the man asking several questions in quick succession. She stared at her cheesecake and began turning the handle of her fork between her fingers.

"Yes, I finished my run. I’m at the bakery beside the park right now."

When her father asked something else, her gaze shifted toward me.

"I’m not alone," she said. "I’m sitting with a girl friend I just met."

My heart gave a single hard thump.

Girl friend.

I knew perfectly well what she meant. She had only introduced me as a female friend she had recently met, but my mind had already chosen the interpretation it preferred and started celebrating.

My angel had introduced me to her father as her girlfriend.

I wasn’t going to let technical details ruin that beautiful fact.

The man on the phone asked another question. She opened her mouth to answer, then abruptly stopped as a strange expression appeared on her face.

Covering the phone’s microphone with her palm, she leaned toward me.

"What was your name again?"

---

I stared at her in silence for several seconds.

"You never asked for my name."

She pursed her lips.

"You never asked for mine either."

She was right.

We had met twice since yesterday, gone running together, done pull-ups, and were now sitting in a bakery. Somehow, even though I had gone as far as calling her an angel to her face, asking for her name had slipped off my list of things to do.

My ability to communicate with other people was in an even worse state than I had thought.

"Noctis," I said.

A brief flash of surprise crossed her eyes.

"Noctis? Is that your real name?"

"As real as my hair color."

After a small nod, she removed her hand from the phone’s microphone.

"Her name is Noctis. Yes, it’s a little unusual, but that’s her name!"

Her father apparently wasn’t satisfied with that information because he asked several more questions. When she looked at me and failed to find the answers on my face, she sighed and leaned back in her chair.

"She’s the same age as me. She’ll be starting university soon, and she studies music."

She listened in silence for several more seconds.

"No, I didn’t ask which university she’s going to. Dad, I only met her this morning."

I thought we had met yesterday morning, but correcting her would only make the conversation longer, so I stayed quiet.

When the man’s voice grew louder, her brows drew together.

"Fine, I’ll be home in half an hour. I’m already nearby, and I’ll walk back. You don’t need to come and get me."

Without waiting for his response, she ended the call and placed her phone on the table. Her shoulders dropped as she let out a long, weary breath.

"See? It isn’t even past breakfast, and the interrogation has already started."

"At least he worries about you."

"I know, but sometimes he forgets the difference between worrying and conducting an investigation." She ate the last piece of cheesecake and placed her fork on the empty plate. "I wouldn’t be surprised if he called my mother and asked her to investigate who Noctis is."

I smiled slightly as I sipped my coffee.

"He probably won’t be too suspicious since you introduced me as your girlfriend."

She tilted her head.

"What else was I supposed to call you?"

"No, I liked the way you put it. You can keep doing that."

When she understood what I meant a few seconds later, the color returned to her cheeks. Instead of answering, she began stacking her empty plates, but she couldn’t completely hide the small smile at the corner of her lips.

After enjoying that minor victory, I looked at the phone on the table.

"You know my name now, but I still don’t know yours."

"That’s true."

She nodded calmly but made no effort to introduce herself.

I stared at her for several seconds, waiting for an answer.

"Well? Aren’t you going to tell me?"

She rested one elbow on the table and placed her chin in her palm. The mischievous glint I had seen when she approached me near the pull-up bar returned to her blue eyes.

"You’ve already given me a name."

"Angel isn’t a real name."

"It’s enough for now."

"That’s unfair. I told you my name."

"I didn’t ask. My father did."

I gritted my teeth slightly as I stared at her. The person sitting across from me had an inborn talent for using her innocent expression to irritate people.

"What do I have to do to learn your name?"

She looked toward the ceiling as though she were genuinely considering it. When her eyes returned to me a few seconds later, her smile widened.

"I’ll tell you if you do 40 pull-ups."

"Are you kidding me?!"

"No. I’m completely serious."

"I can only do 6 pull-ups!"

"The sixth one doesn’t count because you didn’t finish it."

"Because someone slapped my ass!"

An elderly woman sitting at a nearby table heard me and turned to stare at us in surprise. I immediately closed my mouth and lowered my gaze to my coffee.

The girl, meanwhile, had covered her lips to hold back her laughter.

"All right," she said once she had gotten herself under control. "If you can do 40 proper pull-ups within a week, I’ll tell you my name."

"Promise you won’t distract me this time."

"I promise I won’t touch your ass."

She laughed again as she said it, making me question how reliable that promise really was. Still, with White Snake and a few more increases to my stats, doing 40 pull-ups wasn’t impossible.

Considering the reward, I was ready to train until I killed myself.

After checking her phone, she pushed her chair back slightly.

"I need to go. If my father says half an hour, he’ll start watching the road from the balcony at the twenty-five-minute mark."

I finished the rest of my coffee in one gulp and stood up as well. The bitterness made my throat tighten, but I put in a tremendous effort not to let my expression change.

I was about to take out my wallet when she headed toward the register.

"I’m paying," she said.

"You don’t have to. I can pay for what I ate."

"I invited you. Besides, this was an apology meal for making you fall."

"Making me fall is a very innocent way of describing what happened."

"Did you get hurt?"

"My pride hurt more than my back."

She handed her card to the cashier, then turned toward me with a sweet smile.

"Then I chose the right treatment. Cake is good for wounded pride."

Since I couldn’t think of a proper response, I slipped my wallet back into my pocket. At least letting her pay for this date gave me the perfect excuse to pay for the next one.

By the time we left the bakery, most of the morning chill had disappeared, and the sun had risen completely above the apartment buildings. More people had gathered in the park, while the sounds of passing cars began filling the street.

She took a few steps toward her home before stopping.

"Can I have your phone?"

My heart sped up again as I took it out of my pocket and handed it over without asking any questions. She entered her number into my contacts, then called herself so my number would appear on her phone.

When she handed my phone back, I looked at the name of the new contact.

[Angel]

I raised my eyebrows.

"Seriously?"

"You haven’t earned my real name yet."

"I’m already starting to regret agreeing to 40 pull-ups."

"Will you be here at the same time tomorrow morning?"

She tried to make the question sound casual, but there was a hint of worry in her eyes as she waited for my answer.

"Of course I’ll be here."

Once again, my answer came out far too quickly and eagerly. I cleared my throat, shoved my hands into the pockets of my tracksuit, and tried to look calmer.

"It’s already part of my workout schedule."

She pretended to believe that lie and nodded.

"Then I’ll see you tomorrow, Noctis."

Hearing my name in her voice for the first time felt far better than I had expected. I placed a relaxed smile on my face to hide the warmth spreading through me.

"See you tomorrow, my angel."

This time, I knew exactly what I was saying.

Her cheeks turned slightly red, but instead of objecting, she turned and started walking home. After a few meters, she glanced back over her shoulder and raised one hand in a final wave.

I waved back and watched until she disappeared around the corner between the apartment buildings.

When I took out my phone and looked at her name in my contacts again, I no longer had any reason to hide my smile.

I had gotten her number.

We were meeting again tomorrow, and she had been the one to suggest it. Even after I openly called her my angel, she hadn’t run away. Instead, she had personally saved the nickname into my phone.

There was no possible way for today to get any better.

Just as I was about to put my phone away, it vibrated. A new message appeared on the screen.

[Angel: By the way, I liked it when you called me that.]

I read the message three times.

To make sure I wasn’t seeing things, I raised the screen brightness and read it again. The words didn’t change, and a few seconds later, a second message arrived.

[Angel: But that doesn’t mean you’re getting out of those 40 pull-ups.]

I pressed the phone against my chest as the smile on my face slipped completely out of my control.

"God... I think I’m in love."