Fragments of Desire | Jo Togame

CHAPTER TEN

TO BE honest, you didn't remember how nervous and excited you felt for any big events such as these. You never submerged yourself into these types of things and the last time you did attend one of the traditional festivals, it was with Kazuyuki when his family brought you along. You were still fairly young and could remember the few stall games that were obviously rigged and a luminous vision of seeing the fireworks.

You were too young to remember everything as clear as day, but when you recall watching them on a hill sitting beside your childhood friend, you remember the feeling of surrealism.

Now that you were a late teenager, you were now attending a festival for the very first time in years.

You got up and took a quick shower before getting dressed and heading downstairs to eat breakfast. You decided to pack your bag with water, food, a power-bank for your phone, the decorations and signs you had, extra money that your parents gave you, and the kimono your Mother had bought you.

You ended up leaving the house earlier than you expected, not sure if it was because you could already see the townsfolk of Bofurin set up stalls and clearing up the main road or the fact that Togame was expecting you. A slight part of you felt your nerves go up at the beautiful decorations in your hometown. But this year, you were spending the festival Shishitoren. And you had no clue how things worked over there.

Kazuyuki was bummed out when he found out you were going to the Shishitoren region instead of Bofurin where him and his friends would be coming to the festival. You tried cheering him up that if your sales (or when you ran out of film) were all gone when the festival was still rolling around, you'd return back to your hometown and try to find him among the crowd.

Soon enough, you got to the designated area Togame had texted you the address. You weren't expecting any mansion or huge building, but from where the google maps brought you to, you stood in front of a rugged two-level floor apartment. You gulped looking at the ominous structure.

The place was fairly small due to there only being one long balcony and 6 sections of doors with three rooms on each floor. Togame had briefly explained that he was on the second floor, room 6.

You stood in front of his door, afraid to knock. These types of apartments were known to have a generally cheap rent with the downside of thin walls, an extremely small kitchen set and bed all in one room, and the smallest bathroom you could every think of. You wondered how on earth him and his family lived in such a tight space. Not that you were judgemental at his living conditions.

Hesitantly, you knocked on the door three times as you began waiting for an answer. It didn't take long for the moment of silence to be washed away quickly to the sounds of ruffling and then footsteps approaching the front door from the other side.

"Coming." You heard Togame's voice call out loudly. His tone sounded croaky and sore—as if he had just woken up.

Soon after, the door swung open to a messy haired Togame with grey sweatpants hanging loosely on his hips as his naked torso stared back at you.

His eyes were obviously tired, small eye bags around his green ones staring back at you with barely any energy.

"...Did you just wake up?" You tried not looking any further down in hopes you wouldn't fold at his defined abs.

He raised a brow almost surprised at how you didn't falter yet, making his lips curl into a smirk.

"And what if I did?"

You rolled your eyes unimpressed and sighing out loud. At the same time, he raised his long arm to grip at the top of the door frame leaning down on you to look at you better as the other was shoved into his pocket.