Roses are Red

Fruit of Their Passions

Recappy From the Last Chappy: "Dad? You mean he committed suicide because of this? Because I didn't get the mark?"

"NO . . .! No, that's not . . . that's not what I meant . . ." She groaned and laid her forehead in her hands whilst resting her elbows on the kotatsu. She was being weak! "Damn it . . .!"

Krystal looked at Zakuro in concern, her breathe caught in her throat. She had never seen her exhibit such behavior before. "Mom . . . What is it? You're starting to scare me . . ."

"All right! All right . . . Yuuta . . . isn't your biological father. Hiashi-sama is. Sixteen years ago, I had an affair, of which you were conceived."

Krystal's irises shrunk in ratio against the whites of her eyes and let her jaw drop. "Wh . . . what?"

Chapter Sixteen: Fruit of Their Passions

It had all started with chocolate-covered strawberries on a lonely December evening. Zakuro's only company started out as a bowl of her favorite passion fruit and many bottles of sake in her kitchen. She had let the sliding doors stay open so she could stare at the sky; it was one of the less cold Winter times, with no rain and no snow . . . She leaned against the counter, yearning for her husband to share the moment with.

Yuuta, however, had not been present at the Hyuuga Estate for over a week. The couple had a fight over something so trivial, she could not remember the main subject of it. He left to clear his head, and although he promised to be back within a week at the most, she missed him terribly. Whatever the argument had been about, she remembered it being her fault, and it had taken a grand total of thirty-six bottles of sake over the week to figure that out (she had a sort of drinking problem back then).

Somewhere around her eighth bottle, when she began considering something harder, Hiashi came into the picture. The two had maintained a somewhat close relationship over the years, even after marrying. Zakuro had a mild childhood crush on him that she never completely got over, which was why she felt her heart beat a little faster as he stood next to her, overlooking the amount she had drunk. She noticed he was a little close, though that may have been from the small space of the counter.

"If you drink much more, you will end up with alcohol poisoning," he warned.

"Hn . . . Maybe then my heart will stop beating so painfully fast . . . When have I been known to not be able to take my liquor, however? Eight bottles and my speech has yet to slur," she replied, turning to him. "Shall I pour you a glass? With your wife pregnant, I'm sure you are in the need of some."

He smiled. "You now me a little too well."

She smiled as well. "That is true. I bet I can out drink you, too, even if we only started counting on this glass." She poured him some. "That is a challenge, in case you were wondering."

Staring at his glass first, he smirked and downed it in one gulp, answering Zakuro's challenge. She downed her's just as quickly before refilling both of their glasses. They raised them, toasting whatever came to mind with each round that came next. Next thing they knew, there was only a single bottle left. Both of them had light head, rosy pink cheeks and were feeling a little loose. Zakuro had not caught on that the shoulder of her kimono had slid down, leaving only her bra to keep her breast covered.

Somehow, in the midst of careless drinking, she had found her way into his lap while he sat on the counter and as she had an arm around his neck, he looped one around her waist. She then silently offered him a chocolate-covered strawberry that he accepted right from her hand. "Hnhnhn . . . You, sir . . . have soft lips," she said drunkenly and ended the compliment with a hiccup; giggles followed. Another strawberry she picked ended up on her own lips after she said, "How soft do you think mine are?"