The Glitter and the Truth

(Akane's PoV)

—

And then, I began walking again. Slowly. My hands back in my coat pockets, my shoulders loose, and my expression arranged into a careful, pleasant neutral.

I did not turn my head toward Shin, and I did not, absolutely did not, allow myself to think about the flat of Tsubame Yamamoto's palm resting against his sweater for two full seconds while she looked directly into his face.

I needed some time to 'reset', before I snapped.

Then, Shin fell into step beside me after a half-beat, Sora on my other side.

"Don't walk too close, Shin," I said, my voice landing on the air with the same easy, conversational cadence I had used at the restaurant. "I hate that stench."

There was a small, weighted pause.

Then Shin made a low, quiet sound that was not quite a cough and not quite a laugh, and put approximately four extra centimeters between his shoulder and mine.

"Understood, boss," he said. "I promise that I'll take a shower as soon as I can." He added, clearly joking.

Sora bit down hard on her lower lip. Her shoulders were shaking.

We walked another half-block in that careful new formation before I glanced sideways at Shin's sleeve with the same neutral, pleasant expression.

"Tch. You've got some disgusting glitter left on your sweater." I said, my voice flat.

Shin looked down.

There was, in fact, a small, deliberate patch of gold shimmer stuck to the wool of his shoulder where Tsubame's cheek had rested, and it caught the streetlamp light with an infuriatingly cheerful sparkle.

Shin closed his eyes for a long, patient moment, and then, without a single word, began brushing at it with the flat of his palm as we walked.

After that, Sora finally lost the battle. She let out a small, broken snort of laughter, covering her mouth with her hand as her shoulders shook helplessly. "I'm sorry — I'm sorry — it's just — the way you two are handling this — "

"I'm handling this beautifully," I said flatly. "I'm just being honest. Nothing more." I added.

"You are handling this so beautifully, Akane, it's actually incredible," Sora gasped between her laughs.

"I know," I said, my lips curving into an invisible smirk.

I let another half-block pass in a comfortable, warmer silence, with the earlier tension of the encounter slowly dissolving into the ordinary quiet of the residential street, before I glanced past Shin at Sora with a small, dry curve at the corner of my mouth.

"I'm honestly surprised she never rubbed off on you, senpai-wise. That level of whore energy is usually contagious." I said, my hands still in my pockets.

Sora burst out laughing again, but properly, this time, with the kind of laughter that made her have to stop walking for a full three seconds and press one hand against her stomach.

"W-Well... She's actually a lot more responsible than she looks, I promise," Sora managed once she had recovered, wiping the corner of her eye. "In the drama club she was the one who kept us all on schedule. She just... that's her public mode, I guess. That's how she likes to be perceived."

"How she likes to be perceived," I echoed thoughtfully, tilting my head slightly. "Interesting."

Shin glanced sideways at me, catching something in my tone. "Interesting how?"

I said nothing for a moment. I just kept walking, my hands in my pockets, my eyes on the streetlamp at the far end of the block.

Because underneath the whore jokes and the glitter jokes and the whole carefully performed loose-wolf routine I had been running for the last ten minutes to keep myself from lighting the entire world on fire, my brain was quietly processing everything.

Tsubame had crossed the street too fast.

She had gone for Shin's arm too fast.

She had ignored me too deliberately.

She had brought up the rehearsals with a lilt that had felt more like a message than a comment.

And that final blown kiss, aimed with the precision of a sniper directly at Shin's face... that was not the gesture of a drunk girl saying goodbye to a cute boy she had just met on a street. That was the gesture of a girl who wanted someone to know something. A predator marking its target.

The question was who.

The question was who was watching, and from where, and what Tsubame Yamamoto was getting paid to put on that particular show.

I was not jealous of her.

I had made peace with that the first thirty seconds, once the wire in my chest had recognized that whatever was happening on the pavement was not really about her wanting Shin.

It was about her wanting to look like she wanted Shin. And there was a very specific person in the shadows of my consciousness who benefited from that being witnessed.

I filed the whole thing away in the increasingly crowded drawer inside my head, and I said, mildly:

"Interesting because I don't think she actually cared that much about Shin." 

Shin frowned slightly at that. "What do you mean?"

I glanced up at him. Smiled a small, dry smile. Kept walking.

"I'll tell you later, ghost boy. For now— " I lifted my chin toward the apartment building rising at the end of the block, its warm windows glowing softly against the dark sky " —let's get our cute idol home before someone else decides to have opinions about her."

Sora, still catching her breath from the earlier laughter, glanced at me with a soft, warm look that I pretended not to see.

Then, we walked the last stretch of the block in companionable quiet, our three shadows stretching long behind us on the pavement, the taste of spaghetti alla Nerano still faintly on my tongue and the sound of Sora's real laughter still tucked somewhere behind my ribs where the cold parts of me could not reach it.

At the entrance of her building, Sora turned to face us under the small light above the doorway.

She hesitated for a second, her fingers curling around the strap of her bag, and then she stepped forward and wrapped her arms around me in a small, careful hug.

For some reason, I didn't refuse her touch. I let her hug me.

I even, after a small, awkward pause, lifted one hand and rested it lightly against her back.

A little pat pat to say 'I care about you, too'.

"Thank you," she whispered against my shoulder. "For everything. For tonight. For the food. For — for the walk."

"Go inside, sweet idol," I murmured back. "Lock the door and text me when you're in. Otherwise I'll stay here on guard all night long."

She nodded against my shoulder, released me, gave Shin a small, warm smile, and disappeared through the glass door of her building.

Through the lobby window, I watched her cross to the elevator and step inside before I let out a slow, quiet breath.

And then, it was just me and Shin, standing under the streetlamp in front of her building, the residential quiet of the ward settling around us like a soft, dark blanket.

Shin turned to look at me, but I did not look back at him.

I stared at the elevator numbers on the display above Sora's lobby door, watching them climb steadily upward — three, four, five — until they stopped on her floor, and I imagined her walking down the corridor, sliding her key into her lock, and her closing the door behind her with a soft, safe click.

Then, without turning my head, I spoke.

"Take me home, ghost boy."

Shin's shoulders shifted slightly beside me, the small, quiet movement of someone listening carefully.

"Yours?" he asked.

"No. Yours. I don't think that going to my home would be a good idea," I said.

"Understood," He replied, without asking any further questions.

There was a small, warm pause. Then I felt his hand find mine in the space between us, his fingers threading through mine with a slow, unhurried certainty, his palm warm against the cold skin of my knuckles.

This time, I let him take it. 

In the end, I couldn't stay without his touch for too long. Even if I was angry, my body still needed him like air. 

'Tch— I hate love.' I thought.

I did not turn my face to look at him. I just kept my eyes on the elevator display above Sora's lobby door — still steady on her floor, still safe — and let my fingers tighten a fraction around his.

Because tonight had been full of of things I could not yet name, and there was only one place in the world where the cold parts of me knew, with an unshakable, animal certainty, that they could rest.

His bed. His sheets. His shoulder. His breathing in the dark.

And a girl named Tsubame Yamamoto, and the flat of her palm resting for two full seconds against the wool of his sweater, could go and get in line behind the long, quiet list of things I was not going to think about until morning.

Then, the elevator display flickered off, and my phone rang. 

I pulled it out from my pocket and saw a message from Sora saying, "Hey, I'm home now. I'm completely safe. You can go now. Thanks for everything, we'll meet at school, friends!" 

After reading that message, I smiled, and I finally turned to Shin.

"You're a very kind person, Akane," he said with a smile.

"I'm not... it's all your fault for making me like this," I said, gently punching his chest.

Shin chuckled and then pulled me closer to him, into a tight hug, with my head gently resting on his chest.

He kissed the top of my head, and in that moment I finally realized I was literally starving for it. I wanted more. 

"...You're still not forgiven, Ishikawa." I said, slowly pulling back, because I could still smell that disgusting gyaru scent on him.

"I just wanted to hug you, Akane. Nothing more," he said.

My heart skipped a beat, even though he said something normal.

"Tch— I expect two hours of cuddles, Ishikawa. Otherwise I'll kill you." I teased.

"Okay, two hours." He replied, giggling.

And then, I turned, tugged gently at Shin's hand, and started walking us home.