Tangerine ~ Bullet Train

8 - The dangerous job

'Hi mom,' Yuina said when she stood in the hallway, picking up her phone. 'Yuina,' she heard her mother say, 'are you on the train?' Yuina could hear a slight concern on the other side of the line, why that was she didn't know. Surely her mother wouldn't be worried about her? Maybe everything changed now that her father was in the hospital. Maybe her mother finally realised she cared for Yuina and wanted to see her safe.

'Yes,' Yuina replied, to which her mother sighed with relief. 'Good,' she said. 'Hiroto is still unconscious. His boss called. He will be visiting your father at noon tomorrow. It's important that when he comes, he sees we're both by his bedside.' Why she still felt a knot forming in her stomach Yuina didn't know. She thought she had already given up on her parents, but it looked like she still had some hope. Now that hope was again being crushed. Her mother only cared for appearances. She wanted to look strong as a family with them supporting Yuina's injured father. That was all.

'We all don't have a direct ticket to Kyoto, mom,' Yuina replied, 'because they had already been sold. At some point we need to get off the bullet train and take another public transportation or wait for another train. We'll only arrive in Kyoto after sunrise. I won't be home until at least eight o'clock.'

'So?' her mother asked, missing the point here. 'So,' Yuina said whilst getting slightly annoyed, 'if we need to be at the hospital just before noon, we need to leave around eleven. There's no chance I'll get some sleep these coming few hours.'

'So?' her mother asked again, still not seeing where she was headed with those words. 'You'll be home on time.'

'Yes, but I also have to get some sleep if I want to function properly.'

'One night of little sleep won't do much harm,' her mother replied. 'Besides, it will look even better if his boss arrives and sees you with those dark circles surrounding your eyes. That will look very sympathetic.'

Yuina felt like she was being punched in the stomach. Her mother absolutely didn't care for her, maybe not even for her father. She thought about her getting more and more distance between herself and her aunt's loving family, because she had to go back home as soon as possible. She would even have to transfer to another transportation service, because at some point the end of the line up until Kyoto was already sold out. Why did she bother? Why did she continue to live like this?

The door to her wagon opened and she saw Tangerine standing in the doorway. He looked uncertain, but he stepped into the hallway anyway, the door automatically closing behind him. Yuina didn't know what to do or feel anymore; it was all too much at once.

'I will hang up now,' Yuina said, to which her mother tried to stop her from doing that. 'Yuina–' she said, but her daughter cut her off. 'I will be there on time,' she said with a dull voice, to which she hung up the phone. She stared at her mother's name on the screen for a few seconds before putting away her phone.

She felt absolutely gutted and frustrated because of the words of her mother. She felt like she didn't deserve it at all. She had to go to such lengths to get home on time, just to put up a show for some boss, so that their parents would look more desirable. How Yuina felt didn't matter to her mother.

'I don't understand,' she heard Tangerine say when he walked up to her and stood still right in front of her, looking at her. She wasn't ready to look back at him just yet. 'I thought you said you would spend two weeks at your aunt's place after that festival. How come you're back on this train? It just has been a few days.'

Yuina couldn't detect which intonation Tangerine used, but for some reason she wanted to find out. She knew the only thing she could do to achieve that, was to look at him. But when she did, she wished she hadn't. Now she felt both gutted and weirdly confused at the same time. His eyes were still mesmerizing whilst they ran searchingly across her face. He tried to understand why she was here, but he couldn't find an explanation.

She didn't know how else to say it but bluntly. 'My father has been in a serious car accident and is currently still unconscious, so I have to get home as soon as possible.' When she blurted out the words, Tangerine's eyes would soften. It looked like he sympathized with her. 'I'm sorry,' he said. It looked like he meant it. Yuina didn't want him to comfort her with the thought of her parents, because that wasn't really on her mind. Strangely enough he seemed to understand that. 'I'm sorry you had to cut your trip at your aunt's place short.'

How she would react Yuina didn't know. She already thought Tangerine strangely understood her the first time they met, but now he seemed to be doing just that again. Every other person would assume she was being sad because of her father being in the hospital, but he seemed to notice she was more concerned with spending less time with her lovely family. It surely couldn't be so that he remembered her outburst about her parents the last time they met, could it? But that was the case. He remembered everything about their odd meeting, from her first smile when he had spoken up to those creeps to her soft, glowing eyes when he told her he thought she was a wonderful person. Although Yuina only saw him once before, it felt like he really knew her.

'So that lovely bloke you're traveling with is Lemon, no?' she tried to say light-heartedly, but Tangerine could hear the slight annoyance in her voice. It caused him to grin on impulse. 'Yeahhh,' he replied whilst stretching the word out, 'my brother, a real pain in the ass.' From the way he said it Yuina could detect his brother would often annoy him, but there was also a slightly brotherly loving undertone in Tangerine's voice. It was clear to see he cared for his brother a lot, though he tried to hide it. 'Are you... doing the job?' Yuina asked. The atmosphere became tense immediately. Tangerine looked around though knowing they were the only ones in this hallway. 'Yes,' he still replied with a soft voice. 'The dangerous job,' she said in the same voice, to which Tangerine nodded.

He didn't know how to proceed from there on. He still heard the words of his brother running through his mind. He knew Lemon was right; they didn't need anyone snooping around in their schemes. They didn't need someone to be sitting in their four-seater, where they would be hearing of their mission. But he noticed that he didn't want her around for different reasons. Firstly, he wanted her to be safe. How could she be when she were to be involved in their mission? But he also didn't want her to look at him in a different light when she would find out about his area of expertise. To be hired as a swindler, threatener, harmer and assassin that was. He didn't want to see the look on her face if she knew he was all of those things. That's why he didn't want her to be involved.

'Look,' he said, his face suddenly harsh, his eyes no longer soft, 'let's just say that you would do better to keep your distance from us on this train, alright?' She absolutely understood the seriousness of this situation. 'You don't want me to sit with you,' she said, to which he didn't know how to react. It would be safer for her to not be sitting with them, but fuck, how he wanted her to so badly. He couldn't bring himself to lie and possibly hurt her, not even to save her skin. That's why he needed her to know that was not quite it. 'It would be better for you if you didn't,' he therefore explained. He said nothing more, but Yuina understood he thereby meant that it was not the case that he didn't want her to.

There it was again, the strange realisation that she felt connected to him. He could've just told her that he simply didn't like her to be in his space, but he didn't. He explicitly said it would be better for her. But what did he know? What did anyone know about what would be best for Yuina? She didn't even know herself.

'Just please,' Tangerine told her, 'please go sit with your friends and don't come looking for us again, okay?' She didn't strike him as the type who would plead ever, so the fact that he did meant it surely would be really serious. But she didn't want to. She couldn't. This was the man who made her laugh. This was the man who made her sad by leaving. This was the man who made her feel something. She couldn't help herself; she had to be stupid and ask him.

'Could it be so that we would ever meet outside of this train?'

He wished she didn't ask him that question so that he would be spared from feeling miserable. He wanted to so badly, but he couldn't. It wouldn't be safe for her. Still, he felt something other than misery also. A warm feeling began to flow through his body. She asked him with hopeful intentions, as if she'd hoped the answer to be "yes". Did she felt the same way about him, too? He couldn't get involved in wanting to find an answer to that question, yet he already was. He forced himself to put some distance between them.

'Please,' he said again whilst facing away, 'leave us be.'

She watched him go back into the wagon and kept standing there alone.