No strings attached

Pt.10- Dinnner and cocktails

More people arrived at the mansion. It got to the point where the main area was so full of people, they began bumping into one another. Yokozawa watched with a frown. Why were they even walking around to begin with? Couldn't they just chat in one spot and keep it at that?

Idiots. He thought, gritting his teeth when someone bumped into him, almost knocking him down. He steadied himself and glared. "Watch where you're going."

"Oh! I'm so sorry-

"Just get the fuck away from me."

The person who'd walked into him recoiled slightly and made a hasty escape, narrowly squeezing past him and getting lost in the crowd.

Kirishima shook with laughter. "You're so mean." He mused while shaking his head.

"Hm? How so?"

"It was an accident and he even apologized."

"Ok and? I didn't want his apology. It was meaningless to me. Why waste my time? He'd already bumped into me, he should've just kept walking if his destination was so important that he couldn't even be bothered to say excuse me."

"You don't let anyone off the hook do you?"

"No. That's not one of my specialties nor is it on my job description."

The elder was going to comment but the sound of a bell caught their attention, and everyone else's. A butler came out and cleared his throat. "We just finished setting up the room next door for dinner. Please make your way over there and look for the table with your name tag." He instructed, glancing around the room and taking in the amount of people present. "There are quite a lot of you here today. We hadn't expected that. For the rest of you who don't have a reserved table, just find a free seat."

"How did they not expect this many people? Wasn't the owner of this place the one who invited everyone?"

"They probably didn't think that everyone would show up. Most of us here are rivals and competitors." Kirishima explained with a shrug. "Anyways, let's go sit down."

The two walked side-by-side and entered the dining hall. They walked around and glanced at the name tags until they found their table and took a seat. Yokozawa picked up the name tag and began folding it into an airplane. He threw it upwards and grimaced when it got stuck on the chandelier overhead.

Kirishima stared at him.

"S-should I try and get that down?"

"Nah, leave it. You probably wouldn't be able to reach it anyways."

The young man just nodded and glanced around. There were waiters walking around with menus and trays of food in their hands. Did the owner of the mansion really hire an entire team of cooks for this event? That really brought the term spare no expense to a new light.

"Here are your menus gentleman." A butler handed them the menus and pulled out a notepad. "Can I get you started on any drinks? We have water, fountain drinks, and teas. We can even make drinks. Today's special is a cream martini."

"What do you want, Takafumi?"

The gray eyed man scanned through the menu and faltered. There were too many options to choose from. "Oh-uhm. I don't know." He said unsure, setting the menu down and looking a little flushed as both sets of eyes on him grew expectant.

"Take as long as you need." The butler reassured sympathetically.

Kirishima offered the young man a slight smile before averting his attention. "I'll just order for the both of us. He'll take the Midori melon cocktail, the sushi platter and the variety macarons, and I'll have a cold tea and the miso soup."