Torn apart | S. Manjirou

38

"You know how media works, they always assume wrong things," Mikey sighed, looks like he's totally done with the popularity.

"Oh," I switched my gaze to the stage, "Seems like it's our time to shine!" Manjirou nodded and grabbed me by my hand, leading to the platform.

His touch made me feel different kinds of emotions. Such a minor contact had already brought me a grand wave of butterflies to the stomach. I wonder if he still likes me, as Y/n..

Mikey passed me the microphone. "Hello everyone! My name is Aruna Lesa, i'm the president of 'Mona Navina', which you might know. As you've heard from the mayor, our opponents are leading on the world business market. At this rate we might even get pushed off of it. That's why me and Sano Manjirou, Bonten's boss, agreed to make an alliance." I exhaled, gaining a lot of cheers and applause. I transmitted the mic to my partner.

"Uh.. Aruna already said everything, but i'm just gonna add, that i'm glad to attend this event and most of all glad to become allies with miss Lesa," he turned to me, making his voice sound a bit.. seductive? That made me flustered, and i covered my heated up cheeks with my hand, on which he chuckled. Stop teasing me in front of everyone.

Seems like correspondents took our speech as a chance to annoy with their stupid questions. However, me and Mikey had to answer all of them, if we didn't want our reputation to get ruined.

"Aruna, we saw you come with a partner by your side. Could it possibly mean anything?" One man shouted.

Mikey glanced at me. "Just a misunderstanding. The organizers of the banquet notified us to bring a new companion. That's it." I replied, holding back from cursing the hell out of him.

"Mister Sano, you're close to 30, yet you're still single. Do you have anyone or you prefer to hide it?" The woman asked, openly flirting with him.

I tried to not laugh from the way she presented that question. "I would rather not answer this, thank you." He blurted out, making the crowd slightly cheer up. Don't get your hopes up.

"Mrs Lesa, why did you name your company 'Mona Navina'? Is there some meaning behind it?" A young man screamed, causing the audience to shut up.

I immediately looked at Manjirou. "Yes, there is a reason. If you translate each word, you will see the meaning. The combination itself is connected to someone dearly to me." Mikey, on the other hand, looked totally clueless. I'll wait till you realize it's about us, you dumb kid.

Before they could start asking us more questions, Manjirou winked at me again, taking away from the staging. It seemed like we were careless teenagers running away from cops. We looked at each other's eyes, reading pure joy in both pairs. Me and him genuinely laughed the stress out, approaching his gloomy dog.

"Your speech was amazing, babe," Hanma whispered to me, hugging from behind. Mikey's expression changed, as he glared at him.

"Stop. fucking. calling. me. that!" I whisper shouted at him, because this simple pet-name brought me unnecessary memories.

We formed a little 'friend' group of 4 people: me, Mikey, Hanma and Mitsukiri. Yuka's face wasn't ugly enough, had to change it.

"Hey, Mikey," I called him out, still looking at her, biting my lower lip. "You have totally charming eyes."

He raised his eyebrow in surprise, slightly smirking at me. "Is that so? Because yours are completely alluring." Then he rubbed the back of his neck,

"As if i've seen them a lot of times before."

Hanma choked on his wine. "Right, that would be such a nonsense! It's not like you've encountered with Aruna before."

My eyes widened, i poked his back with my finger and shook my head, signaling to stop throwing random shit.