COTE: Vignettes archive

Served Cold

A brown haired girl, dressed in a forest green midi dress, was walking in the silent morning, heading to a discrete café. She slipped through the narrow buildings arching their heads to the sky. Each couple steps were followed by a suspicious scan of her surroundings.

The bell chimed at her entrance. Idyllically moving her gaze, still wary, in the serene café, guarded away from the hustle-bustle of the world, the short-haired girl slid against a seat. She let out a silent grunt, bringing the eyes of a boy at her frowning face. Her eyes stared at him with an intensity as if he were a tantalising piece of steak.

"Finally here," he said, placing down a glass of water half finished.

"Yes, I am here," she said, a whispery guttural sound out her throat. "Now you better explain yourself."

Beaded eyes peered at her, sending an involuntary shiver through bare legs. She drew them inwards to her body, warding away the hundred biting ants under her skin.

"Kushida, how does a child feel after stepping back into the cosy warmth of his home after a day of rolling around in the snow matted streets?"

"What the hell does that even matter?' Her words softly roared with bubbling ambers of fury.

"You have a choice?' He asked, propping his chin on his fist. His tilted gaze tramped down uncaringly. "Answer me, we have a lot of time at hand. I do not understand that feeling because I have always lived in Okinawa."

I'll get back at you, you damn bastard. She gritted her teeth, trembling at the feeling of helplessness. But a sliver of glee swam through her mind. Finally something about your past. It's damn time.

She complied reluctantly, swallowing down an urge—the urge to clock that hateful face, and leave him a regretful shell. She had to.

"It should be obvious." She spat the words as if deriding with each syllable. "The feeling," she said with her voice growing softer, "it's the stirring of the body shrinking away from the gusts of wind; quivering of the soft, fragile flesh in a still comfort, away from the sharp and biting needles; it's the singing, dancing jaunty tune huddled on the bed, couch, chair, away from the pale permeating ache in bones; it's, it's...."

"— A sham." The boy broke through the perplexed, strangulated noise. "You do not understand warmth; you steal warmth from people to give to other people. The idea that you, the most stunning girl amidst a rabble of defectives, is a personification of benevolence is your woven illusion. It runs deep; you, too, live in that illusion."

That is... it shouldn't be...

"This is what you called me for? Hah! You're no different; I'm sick, fucking sick of you." Her voice, full of sizzling scorn, was spoken softly. A muscle, throbbing, jumped in her jaw. "That's not all, is it?" Her nails dug into her palm under the Oakwood table; it trembled. "You wouldn't be doing this for weeks otherwise; not so late."

"It's commendable that you pick up things quickly," he said. "Though it's still not up to par."

That gaze burned a scathing inferno in her mind. Inadequate, her? The fucking hubris of his words almost sent her convulsing.

But it wasn't as if she had much choice. Not this time. She has been cornered; she was being cornered all those times she was laughing at the little victories, victories lobbed at her like a bait for a tiny fish. There's nowhere else to go except bend at his—the fucking bastard's—demands. Hook, line, and sinker.

A few light taps on the brought Kushida's gaze back at him. He had an eyebrow arched at her.

"Secrets are truly interesting. Wouldn't you agree? Knowledge, the chunk of a star held in hands of humans—mortal and fallible–dragged us to a far, so far yet not enough, edge." He reclined back in his seat, his knuckles tapping against the wooden bulk of the table.

Impudent. How dare he have an edge against her. Not in this, never. She is unsurpassed in this.

"Don't you agree sharing secrets makes us closer? I could walk in the middle of a packed room, and touch your tender skin without touching, not even needing a look, you would look because I carry a fragment of you no one else knows; it's mine now..."

"Listen to the tape record that is you, and no, I have no need to record this chat—not that you would believe, would you? You grew up so fast, yet so late." He waved his arm in the air. "Mine, mine, mine. Me, me, me. The kindness personified, all this time you only cared about that—yourself."

"So what?!' A fist thundered against the table, just before it was locked in the boy's hand; stillness like death.

"That makes the two of us." His eyes were empty holes, as if someone had dropped the eyeballs out of them.

Her eyes burned. Her teeth flared, bristling. What did he mean? Her eyes widened in mind-numbing shock as she absent-mindedly nodded in agreement.

Create an utter hell for Horikita, huh? She didn't understand one thing about him, and, that terrified her more than it ever had previously.

However, her entirety was excited in equal measure for....

She had been spared, no more than that, even if her hatred for the boy–is he a boy or a monster?--burned, burned with a suicidal writhing and whirring, she could make it work; she has to make it work. No way out when salvation has been dropped in her lap.

Horikita Suzune was holed up inside her room, scribbling away like a foolish wretch on borrowed time. Time was ticking away. The conceited girl didn't realise it yet. None of her misdeeds.

Revenge was a dish best served cold; theirs would prove cold indeed.

The coldest of all.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Words Count: 969

Published: February 09, 2022

A/N: Thanks for reading!