DRAWN (17 page)

“Come now,
senpai!”

          And then it’s suddenly there, and my body starts to shake, again and again, at the beauty of it.

“Morning,
senpai
.” Yuki’s voice is scratchy with sleep when I wake up
the
morning after – my second one, too, never mind if it’s fake since we still haven’t had sex.

          “Morning,” I croak out. Times like this, I want to shield my eyes. This hair-tousled look of Yuki, with his bedroom voice and his golden skin glowing against the white sheets, makes me hot and weak, and I just want to---

          Yuki’s baby blues gleam.

          I close my eyes shut before his godly powers give me a blasted nosebleed.

          “
Senpai
?”

          “Yeah?”

          “Why do you come so easily?”

          Trust Yuki to come up with
shite
like that for a morning-after conversation. It’s weird, really. Most of the
shoujo manga
I’ve read don’t cover morning-after scenes much. Is it because sex to them – to Yuki – is as common as, I don’t know, eating fresh
sashimi
?

          “I’m not answering,” I mumble, face flaming in a very familiar way now, even with my eyes still welded shut by sheer embarrassment.

          “
Senpai---
”

          I try fighting fire with fire. “Well, you tell me why you don’t care that you never get to…” My so-called fire dies a tiny flame when I can’t make myself say the most important words.

          “Have an orgasm like you do?” Yuki’s innocent smile is tangible, torturing me even though I can’t see it.

          “Yes,
that
.”

          “But I do.”

          My eyes fly open. “You do?” I totally did not know that. How could I
not
have felt that?

          Yuki nods, eyes gleaming even more brightly. “Before we go to bed---”

          The words have my toes curling.

          “---I have a shower then I think of you and I---”

          “I get it!” I think I’m going to have a blasted nosebleed, after all.

          “But I’m not yet finished,
senpai
. So as I think of you, I---”

          “You DO NOT have to explain.”

          “But I promised I’d help you,
senpai
.” Yuki pauses then looks at me calculatingly. “Or maybe, you want me to show---”

          I jump out of the bed, never mind if it means he’d see me in his shirt and my underwear, which I’ve been hoping won’t have to happen again. I’m very conscious about my bum. It’s not just as tight as Yuki’s is.

          “I’ll take a shower first,” I say, already padding away because I don’t want to give him more time to tease me.

          Yuki’s swimming when I get out of the bath, my hair dripping on my denim jumper shorts, which I’ve paired with a striped racer-back top underneath. I grab my phone and quickly take photos, knowing that we don’t have much time left for me to sketch him.

          The phone rings, making Yuki look up and catching me with my iPhone zoomed on him.

          “
Senpai,”
he growls.

          “Do I answer the phone?” I ask, trying to pretend his baby blues aren’t shooting daggers.

          “Yes, and stop taking photos.” He lifts himself off the pool, which of course makes the muscles in his arms more defined.

          I just have to take another photo.

          “
Senpai
!”

          “Just one more!” I press the camera icon on the screen one last time before dashing for the phone. It’s probably reception, confirming our checkout. Yuki says we have to leave right after lunch.

          “Hello?”

          Crackling noise makes the other person’s voice hard to hear.

          “Hello?”

          Heavy indecipherable sounds come out from the other end just before the crackling noise disappears. “Angel, can you hear me now?”

          Bloody, bloody, bloody, bloody, bloody-

          “Angel?”

          “
Dad
.”

          “Surprised?”

         
Gobsmacked
is the word I’d actually use if I’m British, but yes,
surprised
will do, too. Or shocked. Or shite-eating, pee-in-your-pants scared. And let’s not forget guilty – heart-thumping, chest-squeezing, conscience-flaming guilty.

          I clear my throat. “Totally. Are you back home?”

          “No, but hopefully I’ll be back soon. I just have a few more seminars left. Your father’s a pretty popular guy here.”

          “You always are, Dad.”

          “How’s things there with Lace?”

          For a moment, I’m absolutely speechless, my mind unable to grasp the fact that Kelly actually
lied
to my dad for me.

          “Angel?”

          “It’s…okay.” I feel like I’m floating as I say the words and it’s not me who’s lying to my dad. I can almost hear my dad speaking in my mind. He once told me about how most serial killers say they can’t remember doing what they did as a defense mechanism of sorts.

It’s
distancing
yourself from the situation even if you feel like shite inside, like what I’m bloody well doing now.

          “What have you guys done so far?”

          I wait for the usual uncontrollable urge to tell the truth to take my heart in a death grip. Nothing happens.

          “Angel?”

          “I’m s-sorry. I didn’t hear you.” I swallow. “How are things there, Dad?” My voice breaks in the end. I’ve just stupidly remembered how Uganda’s still a war zone and now I’m starting to drown in the guilt. All the time I’ve been busy doing…stuff…my dad’s out there, fighting for his life.

          Well, okay, I know he spends most of his time cooped inside lecture halls, but for all I know, the whole country may be booby trapped and Jason’s going to explode in pieces if he just makes the smallest misstep.

          “Hey.” Jason’s concern travels down the phone lines like a kind of warmth that’s strangely suffocating, most likely because I feel like I don’t deserve it.

          “I’m okay, angel. No need to worry about me. I’ll be home before you know it.”

          I sniff. “Just come back home safe.”

          “I always will, angel. I have to put the phone down now. I’ve got a talk in ten minutes. You and Lace take care, okay?”

          “Love you, Dad.”

          “Love you, angel.”

          Putting the phone down, I turn around slowly and find Yuki just a step away from me.

          “I’m sorry you had to lie to your dad,
senpai
,” he says quietly.

          I don’t like seeing him sad because of me so I say, “It’s no big deal.” But it is, and I lied again. If I’m not careful, this is going to be a very hard habit to break.

          Yuki glances at the clock, which tells us we’ve just a few minutes before it reaches eleven.

          “We can start packing now.”

          So we do.

The silence between us is awkward but I can’t think of any way to change it.

          As I snap my suitcase shut, Yuki says from the doorway, “
Senpai
?”

          “Yeah?”

          “Would you like to meet my father today?”

“
Sei ga hikui ne…”
Yuki’s dad, Akito Himura, is saying in not so many words that I’m a midget.

Well, okay, he just said I was on the short side but same bloody banana, right?

          Yuki only smiles.

          “
Amari kirei ja nai ne…”
Now, he’s saying I look like shite – oh, okay, he just said I wasn’t that pretty.

          “
Atama ga warui deshou ka?”

         
That does it!

          “I’m sorry that I’m not a giant, sorry I’m not a beauty queen, but I’m definitely not dumb!”

          Yuki and his dad look at each other for a second before doubling over in laughter.

          Oh, for the bloody love of…really? This is just a matter of like-father-like-son bonding?

          Akito-san grins and pulls me close for a hug. “Please call me
Akito-san,
Kat-
chan,
and please do forgive an old man’s not so funny way of introducing himself.”

          It’s impossible to stay mad at Akito-san, not with his twinkling eyes and sunshine-y aura. Yuki’s a fake angel, but Akito-san’s the real deal.

          “Forgiven,
Akito-san
,” I say, grinning back.

          As we head toward the boarding section for our flight back to Palm Beach, Yuki and his father speak with each other in hushed tones, walking a little ahead of me. I don’t mind, not when it gives me time to properly observe Akito.

I really want to know what he did to make Sascha fall in love with him. He’s got to be five inches shorter, ten years older, and we won’t even talk about how many kilos he has on his wife.

          Maybe, Sascha loves the brainy type. Apparently, Akito is some kind of imported genius Wall Street worships and he was paid, like, millions of dollars to move an ocean away and work in the States. Godliness must be genetic, I guess.

          The bond between Sascha and Akito will probably be a puzzle to me forever, but one thing I’m certain of is how happy Yuki is with his dad. He’s not bubbling with joy –
gods don’t get bubbly,
after all – but the happy aura surrounding the two is almost tangible. With Akito-san, Yuki is almost…human. The only time I see him so relaxed, so
happy,
is when he’s trying to find new ways to make me blush to death.

          The three of us board the plane around two, and inside I find myself sandwiched between the Himuras, at Akito’s insistence. He seems sincerely impressed when I tell him about my work as a
mangaka
and I am honestly, completely
bowled over
at how much he knows about the
manga
industry. He cites circulation figures for different
shoujo manga
like they’re just sums of basic arithmetic formulas and he quotes summaries for upcoming releases like they’re nursery rhymes.

          And he thinks I draw like
Shinjo Mayu!

          I love this guy, I really do.

          Akito’s phone starts ringing the moment we come out of the plane. It’s Sascha, and she wants us to meet for an early dinner.

          “I will be very happy if you join us, Kat-chan.”

          I still have to pinch myself whenever I hear Akito-san call me that. For a
mangaka
living outside Japan, it’s like hearing the angels sing. I feel like I’ve become 2% more Japanese than I used to be.

          “Okay, Akito-san,” I answer happily. I’m totally adding a new character inspired by Akito-san to my
manga
even if I have to rewrite it from scratch. He’s just too sweet for words.

          Sascha’s chosen a French bistro I’ve been hearing raves about, never mind if I’m not even sure how to pronounce its name. It’s just minutes away from the airport and we get there in good time. The maître d greets Yuki and Akito by their first names, which totally impresses me.

          Based on the looks we’re inviting, I’m guessing that being given one of the center tables in the area is some kind of privilege. Personally, I feel it just makes me stick out more in my denims.

          Yuki bends toward me when Akito-san excuses himself from the table. “How do you find my father,
senpai
?”

          I grin. “You really have to ask?”

Yuki leans back against his chair, as if he’s relieved by my answer. “I’m glad.”

Even with his eyes closed, Yuki looks strangely tired. “Are you okay? You didn’t talk too much during the flight.”

“I just like listening to you two talk. It’s relaxing. You two have a lot in common.”

          It doesn’t sound much of a compliment the way Yuki says it. I start to question him again when I feel a feather-light touch on my knee.

          “
Yuki
!”

          His fingers literally walk on my skin, leaving behind another path of fiery sensation on my bare legs.

          “I’m back,” Akito-san says as he takes the seat across me.

          I snap in an upright sitting position even as Yuki’s fingers stop at the edge of my jumper, driving me crazy with the way he keeps tracing invisible lines on my skin.