“Ishizaka, I?“
“I have a favour to ask of you,” Ishizaka interrupted. “Let go of the baggage you have because of what happened to me. Do it for him.”
Ishizaka grabbed Kento’s arm and pushed him out in front of Orihara.
“You two haven’t seen each other in a while, right? I’m sure you have lots to talk about. I’ll leave him with you.”
He then glanced at his watch and picked up his bag and suit jacket from the sofa.
“The bullet trains will be running for a while still. I’m going home. I have work tomorrow.”
Orihara stood still for a while after seeing Ishizaka off. After a long stretch of time, Orihara sighed and turned back to Kento. He took off his glasses, rubbed his eyes, and put them back on.
“Kento, what about you?”
“I have the day off tomorrow,” Kento managed to reply gloomily. He hadn’t been able to take part in their conversation at all. Even after all these years, the air between Orihara and Ishizaka still implied that they had a strong bond. Kento felt completely dwarfed.
Orihara approached him, oblivious of his diminished spirits.
“Why don’t you stay the night at my place, then?” He then looked up at Kento with an exclamation of surprise. “You’ve gotten so tall!”
“Uh, yeah,” Kento replied.
Orihara lived in a condominium next to the hospital. He invited Kento inside a simple one-bedroom unit with a living/dining room and kitchen. Kento had planned to say so many things once they were alone, but he was so choked up with emotion he had trouble opening his mouth.
“I thought I’d take you to a nice sushi restaurant since you’ve come all the way to Shimizu, but I thought it might cause a commotion if people recognized you,” Orihara apologized as he ordered off a delivery menu. “I’m sorry. Next time, I’ll try to find a restaurant where we can go without you being found out.”
“You don’t have to worry about that.” Kento inwardly gave a wry smile at Orihara’s overly concerned tendencies. He hasn’t changed at all. He had wondered what he would do if Orihara had changed over the past year.
The apartment was clean but barren-looking. There were no floral-patterned cushions or lace curtains. It looked very much like a man’s apartment.
It doesn’t seem like he has any girls coming over, but….
Kento also kept a sharp eye out as he inspected the bathroom. There was no extra toothbrush as far as he could tell. Good. That means he hasn’t found a new girlfriend. But he was still worried. When Orihara came into the bathroom as he was leaving, he decided to make sure.
“Doctor, are you going out with anyone right now?”
Orihara blushed furiously. “No,” he said.
Good, Kento thought.
Once he got out of his bath, Orihara went to the kitchen and came back with a can of beer. He offered one to Kento, but Kento declined, saying he was still underage.
“Oh, right, you’re still seventeen. You’re so tall, I sometimes forget.”
“Stop treating me like a kid,” Kento protested as he toweled off his freshly-shampooed hair. “I might not be able to drink or smoke yet, but in two weeks I’m turning eighteen. I’ll be able to gamble.”
Orihara smiled slightly before bringing the beer to his lips. He came to sit down beside Kento on the sofa.
“Thank you,” he said. “I can’t thank you enough for… what you did. I wanted to see Ishizaka for so long… but I thought I never could. I thought I had no right to.”
The care he felt for Ishizaka was evident in his voice, which made Kento feel a prick in his chest.
“Were you in love with Mr. Ishizaka?” Orihara snapped his head up at Kento’s slightly sharp tone. He nodded his head almost unnoticeably.
“I could never tell him. I mean, after all, I was the one who…”
Kento hurriedly scooted beside Orihara and put a hand on his shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“It doesn’t matter now,” Orihara said. “But the same doesn’t go for what I did to you. I left without saying a word.” He sighed, taking off his glasses and putting them on the table. “I was… happy when you used to come over to my uncle’s house to visit. Before I knew it, I was looking forward to it.”
Kento’s eyes widened at the unexpected confession. Orihara continued sheepishly.
“About that night… I was so ashamed that I took advantage of your kindness, and… that’s why I said what I did. And if I stayed there, I knew I would end up relying on you, so I put a stop to it.”
He rubbed his fingertips together as he squeezed the words out painfully.
“I always thought I should never have been born.”
“You’re wrong!”
Orihara choked at Kento’s loud outburst.
“Thank you,” he said. “That’s why I left without saying anything to you. And when I got back to the university’s medical office, I signed up for a relocation. I was trying to distance myself. You hated me for it, didn’t you?”
It had been hard to say goodbye a year ago, but Kento shook his head.
“It doesn’t matter now. I was able to see you again. That’s good enough.”
Orihara lifted his face in surprise and stared at Kento. A blush rose in his cheeks as he averted his eyes.
“You’ve become a lot more mature.”
“You think so?”
Kento slid his hand on Orihara’s shoulder and gently held him closer. Orihara twitched, but didn’t resist.
“Doctor…” Kento whispered as he held Orihara close. “You were wrong.”
“What?” Orihara said in a startled way, looking up in his arms.
“You said I would forget about you, but I never stopped loving you.”
Orihara was looking up at him with a slightly troubled expression. Kento hooked a finger under his chin.
“Will you accept me now?”
When their lips overlapped, Orihara still did not resist.
Orihara walked ahead as he led Kento to the bedroom.
“Doctor, are you sure?” Kento asked while he took Orihara’s pajamas off. “I don’t want you to say that it’s a mistake again.”
Orihara flushed and shook his head. Once they were naked and on top of each other, Orihara’s body seemed so fragile in comparison to his own body, which had grown a lot over their time apart. Kento hesitated for a moment. I have to make sure it doesn’t hurt.
He lay down on his side facing Orihara so he wouldn’t put any weight on the other man.
“Hold onto me,” he said, as he wound Orihara’s arms around his neck. He held the man close as they both lay on their sides, and lifted one of Orihara’s legs so that he was straddling Kento’s leg, and entered him that way. Orihara gasped a little from the tight squeeze, but eventually loosened up as he grew accustomed.
It had been a year since their last time in bed, but for Kento, the feeling of being inside Orihara was exactly as he’d remembered it. He hasn’t changed at all. He’s warm, soft, and gentle. Orihara filled him with so much pleasure, so much happiness.
“Doctor, I love you… I’ve always loved you,” he whispered to the man who desperately clung to him. Orihara’s face was buried in Kento’s neck, but he nodded in response.
Kento let go of the leg he was hoisting up and reached down to Orihara’s lower regions and stroked him. Ragged breaths burst at his ear, just as they had that night. The breaths turned to sweet moans and were sucked into his own feverish heat.
As their intimacy reached its peak, the man’s slender arms tightened around Kento’s neck.
“Doctor…”
Orihara let out a short cry as his soft body bucked. Kento held him tightly. After climaxing, Orihara’s strength left his body and he was no longer able to hold onto Kento. Kento laid Orihara down on the sheets and decided to make love to him face-to-face this time.
“I can see you better like this,” he whispered. “Doctor, you’re beautiful.”
Orihara hid his face from embarrassment.
“No, don’t do that. Show me your face,” Kento said, gently prying his hands away. “I missed you. I wanted to see your face. You were all I was thinking about.”
As he slowly and reluctantly detached his body from Orihara’s, Kento gently took him back into his arms. He brushed up the man’s damp hair and kissed his sweating forehead.
“Doctor, did you sleep with me as a way to say thanks?” he asked.
“No, I didn’t,” Orihara said, looking up at Kento with reddened cheeks.
“Oh. Good.” Relieved, Kento buried his face in Orihara’s hair. “Did you see me on TV?”
Orihara nodded silently. After a pause, he began to speak in a low voice.
“I was… happy that you debuted. I watched as much of you as I could… though I was busy with work and I couldn’t always. But I recorded the shows so I could watch them later.”
“Really? So did you watch that episode of Music Map?”
Orihara nodded.
“Did you get the message that I love you?”
Orihara blushed again, but nodded and continued to speak.
“I was filled with so much happiness to see you singing and dancing again.”
Kento ran his fingers through Orihara’s soft hair. “Does that mean I was the one to bring you happiness?”
“Yes.”
It was everything Kento had wished for. Satisfied, he buried his face in Orihara’s hair again. He decided to take a leap of faith with his next question.
“Hey, Doctor, do you love me?” he asked.
There was a brief silence, after which came his answer in a dubious voice.
“I think so.”
“Honest. That’s just like you, Doctor,” Kento chuckled as he stole Orihara’s lips again. ‘I think so’ was enough. His biggest wish had already come true ? to bring happiness to the person he loved most. Now, they had all the time in the world to spend together. He would take his time to make the man fall in love with him.
Kento sighed in contentment as he released Orihara from their kiss. He felt like his whole body had been filled to the brim with something hot and sweet. He laid a finger on Orihara’s chin and turned his face towards him, and gazed at his beloved’s face.
“There’s a song I wrote ? will you listen to it together with me? I thought of you when I was writing the lyrics.”
Orihara slowly opened his eyes and tilted his head. “You wrote a song?”
“Yeah. I wrote the lyrics to one of the songs in our first album. I’m kind of like Paul or John, don’t you think?”
Kento crawled out of bed and went to grab his backpack. He pulled out a Chronos CD and showed it to him.
“See? It’s this song ? ‘Sand Glass’.”
“Did you really write the lyrics?”
Orihara looked astonished, which made Kento feel a little proud. He sat down on the bed and cupped Orihara’s face with his hands.
“Yeah. I wrote it with all my love,” he whispered, as he bent forward to kiss him.
I wrote it to send it to you.
All My Loving_Yaoi Novel Page 12