Chapter 2 - Part one

2.

“Are you really sure?” In the last two days I had already asked my brother this question around 100 times already. “Nao! Get yourself together. It will work out.” I noticed that he was a little annoyed by me by now. But how couldn’t I ask? He dragged me in front of this club, where Mia told me she met Kento, and he expected me to go inside, sparsely dressed in the dress which I had bought two days ago, putting on a little show, so that Kento will see me. Everything else wasn’t clear yet. My brother didn’t want to tell me more, which was the reason why I kept asking if he was sure.

“Yuichi! Why can’t we forget about this whole thing? Nothing happened!” Again I stepped in front of him and tried to find out what was making him bothered. When he answered you could see the rage in his eyes. I went a few steps back because he scared me.

“It’s easy: You can’t treat a girl like that. And not my little sister of all people. But if I saw that scene with my own eyes, if the girl wasn’t you, I would still try to find a way to get back at him. But the person he tried to mess with is you and that’s what’s making me go crazy with rage and he’ll have to pay.” He had a smirk on his face which frightened me even more and made me agree to his plan.

“Okay, Yu, I’ll do it. Tell me again what I have to do.”

“So, you’ll go inside now and lean on the bar, just behave as conceited as Mia. Then just wait until he comes and talks to you. Everything else you’ll see.”

While he explained what I had to do, I thought about how he knows how Mia behaves. It seemed fishy, but when I thought more about it, it wasn’t. Mia has always seen something special in my brother, so I shouldn’t be surprised about the way she behaves towards him, like with every other guy she thinks of as interesting.

I walked towards the entrance, but I felt uneasy while I did.

“Ach Nao”, Yuichi called after me, “It could be that other guys will talk to you too. But don’t be scared, just behave like you always do. You know” he winked, “like you always do with me.”

I had to laugh. “You really think I should behave like a snob, with a mischievous grin on my lips and pretend I am interested in all the guys who come talking to me? Super plan, dear brother. Later.”

I turned around. His last words took away the uneasy feeling, just a little bit of fear remained, another part of me was looking forward to get back at Kento. Not just cause of me, but because of Mia too. It couldn’t be that my friend always gets tricked by those idiots. And why do those idiots fall in love with other girls even though they have girlfriends? I really couldn’t understand it.

The plan in this club required quite an effort of me, but with the thought of Mia I hoped I would be strong enough to endure it. I went into the club and on the direct way to the bar. There I sat down and waited. It didn’t take long for someone to come and talk to me. “Hey Nao.” I took my time before I turned around to face him, because I was scared to see Kento this fast again. I breathed in deeply and then I noticed that it wasn’t his voice at all.

I turned around and looked at the guy who sat down beside me. He winked. I wondered how he knew my name. He saw that I was stunned, he smiled. An extremely beautiful smile. My breath caught. The guy who sat down was looking drop-dead handsome. And not at all unfamiliar. He put on a sulking expression. “You don’t even recognize your brothers’ best friend from childhood. He asked me for a favour, but didn’t tell me what it’s about. Just that I have to be here and talk to you.”

“Shosuke? Is it really you?” I stared at the guy across from me, open-mouthed.

He laughed. “You seriously remember me. Does that mean I left a really good impression behind?”

What I could remember was that he always was conceited. His self-confidence wasn’t missing. After my brother left he was the only one I trusted and told everything, but after 2 years he also went away. Back then he got a scholarship on an elite Middle School, inclusive the dorm. From what I heard he even went to High School there. There were times we crossed paths, but the last time was over 5 years ago and he changed a lot since then. A lot taller, and his facial features were much more pronounced. He was really handsome, almost like my brother. The only difference should have been that I couldn’t see his face as well as Yu’s, because of the 5cm that he was taller than my brother. And in this bar it was dark. But from what I saw I could already tell that he was extremely good looking.

“Yeah right.” I smiled, but just until I remembered why we were even sitting there. I breathed in deeply. “How much did my brother tell you?” I asked. I didn’t want everyone to know about it.

“Not a lot, like I already said. Just that I should come here, sit beside you and amuse you. But I have the feeling that you can tell me why I have to do that. Not that I mind sitting beside you for a whole evening.” He winked again.

I had to swallow. Not because of his wink, even though every other girl would have been breathless, more like that I didn’t know how much I should tell him, because I thought of all the events that happened as embarrassing. “Please Nao!” he grouched, “I know that we didn’t see each other for long but I am still the guy from the past who you told everything to.”

That was true. But that was seven years ago, before he just went away. Maybe not just, because it was about his school education, but I still was a little mad at him for not showing up more often, even if his school was far away. He saw my hesitation and reached out with his hand to my shoulder, so that I could get myself together.

“So, the summary of the events should be enough: the boyfriend of my best friend showed me in an extremely obvious way that he wasn’t really interested in her, but more like in someone else, if you understand. And this thing about him obviously being interested is the crucial fact for Yuichi and the reason why both of us are sitting here right now. I don’t know more myself, just that this prick will be here too.” I gritted my teeth.

Shosuke looked at me surprised. “Are you serious? Nao made a scandal. That didn’t happen in a while.” He pretended to hold his grinning. I stared back at him with feigned indignation, because I noticed that he felt the same wrath as my brother, but I didn’t want to anger him more. So I tried to distract him, by talking about the scandals he mentioned.

“That’s not true. I never made one!”

“What about the time, when we last saw each other, five years ago, when two guys in the middle of the city on the summer festival fought for your attention by buying you the same souvenir? If I didn’t meddle, the whole neighbourhood would have been spectators of it and you would have walked around with a deeply red coloured face for more than two days like I heard you did.”

I blushed. It surprised me that he still remembers that. I did. On that day we wanted to have an amusing trip to the festival with my best friend from back then and 2 guys in the class. But it was ruined the moment when we found out that the guys weren’t even a little bit interested in Akiko, who invited both of them, but in me. Shosuke meddled with that fight by buying that souvenir and giving it to me with a really broad grin on his face. Consequently my classmates were hostile to him and when they saw the broad grin on my face they looked at me with a really cold stare and disappeared. After that they never talked a word with me again, and furthermore that was the day Akiko was my best friend for the last time, and the day I last saw Shosuke. But the red plush heart was still on my window.