That Blonde Guy

Chapter 27

TOKYO, 2018

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"She has become Mikey's girlfriend!"

Naoto almost jumped when the unconscious body of Takemichi suddenly shot up and uttered those words.

"She has become Mikey's girlfriend!"

"Hey, calm down," he said, walking to the guy who was now sitting on the edge of the bed. He tapped his shoulder. "You just woke up. Calm down."

Takemichi was trying to collect himself together as he sat there on the table, in front of Naoto. He just came back from 2006. His whole body felt weakened and his stomach was aching from hunger. Naoto was watching him devour the heap of food on the table in front of him, and he was so hungry that he finished everything in less than five minutes.

"How long was I out?" The lad asked, wiping his mouth with the sleeve of his shirt.

The detective glanced at the calender first before answering. "Six days."

"That's roughly a week."

"Yeah. Pretty long."

The two immediately proceeded on updating each other about what's been happening in their respective times. Takemichi spoke first, telling the younger the new information he gained from the past.

"She has become Mikey's girlfriend," he said for the third time. "Nika Ogawa."

Naoto's brows pulled together. "Six days ago you told me you never saw the two of them interact--and she's his girlfriend now?"

"W-Wait, I know, even I was confused! Everyone thought there was nothing going on between them, but then Mikey suddenly went and announced that Nika was his girl during Toman's general meeting. There was something going on all along. I just--just didn't know."

Naoto paused for a moment, looking at the picture of Nika Ogawa's corpse pinned on the cork board. He sighed. "Now that the relationship between them has been confirmed, we can now say that the reason why she's in Manjiro Sano's penthouse during the explosion was because she's his lover."

"What I don't understand is why Mikey had to hide her presence from us if she's his lover?" Takemichi asked, confused. "I mean, everytime Toman would have a gathering in this timeline, she was never there. On Draken and Emma's engagement party, on Peh-yan's wedding--she was never there. Mikey never mentioned her name. Nobody even thought that Mikey's in a relationship with someone, he was always keeping himself busy with businesses and various affairs of Toman."

"Their relationship was kept secret."

"But why?"

Naoto shrugged his shoulder. He had no idea. Takemichi heaved a deep sigh, frustrated. Just why were there so many things he didn't know?

"What about other information about Nika Ogawa?" Naoto asked.

"I tried asking Baji about her. They're pretty close, so I thought he might have known something. I asked him if 'Nika Ogawa' is her real name."

"What? What did he say?"

"He just looked at me like I was some creep. I.. I was embarassed."

"Stupid. Of course he would frown at you, what kind of question is that? You're being too obvious."

"I couldn't think of anything to ask, I was self-conscious the whole time and it was awkward. I mean, it was Baji--he's always been so cool and intimidating." He cleared his throat, looking away from Naoto. In a lower voice, he added, "Baji is something else, you don't understand."