All for Love (Fin)

II

“I’m sorry…” he whispered in my ear as he held me in his arms.  His body felt warm pressed to mine, in spite of the stabbing chill from the hotel room’s air conditioner.  Maybe his chest was drenched with my tears, but he just held on to me… held on to make me feel that maybe we could stay like this forever.

 I slowly shook my head.  “Don’t be…” I whispered between the sobs.  I don’t want him to feel guilty.  This is what I wanted, too.  I wanted to give myself to him, to show him that he is the only one who would always have my everything, to make him feel the things that I can’t say, to assure him that I belong to him, to erase his doubts.

 For how long we laid like that, I don’t know.  What I know is that in spite of the guilt and the pain that I feel, and in spite of the uncontrollable tears and the shame of my boldness, I am really happy.

 “Don’t worry,” I heard him say, his voice hoarse with the cold.  “I’ll protect you.”

 He planted a soft kiss on my forehead.

 “Aishiteru,” one of us must have said.  I’m not sure, though.

+++

 “Inoo-chan, have you heard?” Yaotome-kun suddenly whispered as I was packing my bag and preparing to go home.  In reality, I am a little annoyed at him.  He’s so loud and fidgety and I don’t think I could ever be friends with people like that.

 I frowned a bit, not at him, though.  “What?”

 “I heard somewhere there’s a new group to debut,” he said, with matching hand gestures.

 I nodded.  “Ya-Ya-Yah’s debuting?”

 He shrugged.  “I don’t know.  I heard it would be the permanent group of Hey! Say! 7…”

 “Seven?” I asked.  “They’ve just been launched like a few months ago, right?”

 Yaotome’s eyes widened.  He shook his head.  “Yeah.  They’re debuting even before us.”  He laughed, but I know it was half-hearted.

 I let out a sigh.  There was no surprise actually.  Many of our sempais never debuted.

 Then, he tapped my shoulder.  “Don’t you wish you’ll be part of the new group?”

 I smiled to myself.  Of course, I want to debut.  All this time, I’ve been doing my best to debut.

 I was about to answer him when his phone rang.  He excused himself and left me wondering… wishing… that I would be part of that group.

 Maybe I can.

+++

 I shoved my phone under my pillow.  Kei hasn’t e-mailed me for weeks now.  He wouldn’t even answer my calls.  At school, I felt like he was ignoring me.