Cute Flower, Bro

Both of them immediately flushed an intense red that reached their ears. Kousei couldn’t believe what he’d just heard. Marrying a woman he’d only just met? And not just any woman, but the beautiful daughter of the Watanabe family to top it all off? Surely he must have misheard her.

“I… Uh… Wha–”

Kousei’s voice stuck in his throat, as if his speech engine had completely shut down. Maybe it was time for a software update again.

“You heard me perfectly! D-don’t make me repeat it.”

Although Mahiru was accustomed to being direct and always speaking her mind without hesitation, it felt different this time. Her entire face burned with embarrassment, and her legs trembled, threatening to give way beneath her. She could feel her heart thump against her chest with an impossible force. It was the first time in her life she was feeling something like this.

Her face was cast to the side, but Kousei could still detect tears welling up in the corners of her eyes.

“But… We barely know each other. Besides, I’m just an ordinary guy, and you’re the princes–”

The moment he was about to finish his sentence, he came to regret it as he caught her shoulders twitching.

“I’m not a princess! God, you’re so annoying. Just an ordinary guy? Perfect, that’s precisely what I want. Princess here, princess that, I’m so tired of my restricted life in the East. I want to be with people my age, I want to laugh with them, I want to experience what freedom feels like. Is this really so hard to understand?”

Mahiru stopped for a moment to catch her breath. She was jabbering so fast, jumping from one point to another, that Kousei was having trouble keeping up.

His head spun, like someone was trying to drill the laws of physics into his brain. Why did she want to abandon her peaceful and secure lifestyle? It made no sense to him. He would pay to have her life with a guaranteed future, without the risk to fall into insignificance. So why on earth was she so willing to throw it all away?

“You say we barely know each other? Fine, then let’s do this.”

Mahiru pulled out a handkerchief and a pen from her fashionable pouch. After scribbling something on it, she handed it over to Kousei. It was barely legible, but he could make out the words “Café Plaza, 10:00.”

“I think I saw something named like that on my way here earlier, right? My family will stay in a hotel until tomorrow afternoon, then travel back home. So we have a little bit of time to meet and get to know each other. Sounds good?”

“This is… Won’t your parents notice if you hang out with someone like me?”

“Don’t worry about that. As I said, I have to keep my distance from them during our visit in the West, so we’re not even staying at the same hotel. My butler is with me most of the time, but I’ll make sure to ask for his permission to go out. As long as I get back home with him by tomorrow and don’t let anybody know my identity, my father doesn’t care about me.”

Her last words hit Kousei hard. Him and Satoshi shared a strict relationship of mentor and apprentice, but also one of a caring father and loved son. He couldn’t even imagine that Satoshi would ignore him for two full days, not caring what would happen to him.

Was Mahiru…not loved by her father?

Still, he couldn’t risk this. If someone found out that he escorted the Watanabe daughter, both he and his entire family would get into trouble. At the end of the day, the relationship between Mahiru and her father was none of his business, so his answer should have been obvious.

“Sor–”

“I’m begging you, please!”

Mahiru took a small step forward, her fists clenched. She stared into Kousei with every possible emotion glistening in her eyes. Hope, fear, embarrassment, anxiety, all of that was contained in her small tears.

“I know this sounds crazy to you, trust me. I’ll explain everything to you tomorrow if you give me the chance. Please, Kousei, you’re my only hope.”

She was right.

All of this sounded crazy.

Kousei had no idea how they had gone from talking about a blue flower to considering marriage in the span of a few minutes.

But the bare emotions laid out in front of him provided him with the only answer he currently needed.

Perhaps he was crazy as well. Perhaps it would have been easier to reject her and act like none if this had ever happened starting from tomorrow.

And still…

He couldn’t just do that. He knew full well that he couldn’t simply ignore this girl who was crying for help, to him of all people.

Whether he would come to regret it at some point was now entirely out of his control.

I can’t leave her alone…

“Okay,” Kousei somehow managed to say. “I’ll try to make it. Tomorrow, ten in the morning.”

Mahiru’s eyes lit up like all life had just returned to her body, but she could still only produce an isolated gasp.

She was aware she should express her gratitude for him in some way. He had reached out his hand to give her a tiny spark of hope to change her life. All she needed to do was reach for his hand, to voice her gratitude. And yet, the words refused to form, her body frozen in place, as if every part of her was locked in hesitation.

“Alright, I’ll see you tomorrow then, Mahiru. I’m going to head back in.”

Kousei turned his back to Mahiru and made steady steps towards the entrance of the Central Hall. But then it happened.

“Kousei, wait.”

“Huh?”

As he spun around again, he observed that Mahiru’s face was red-hot, perhaps even more than before. Then, his eyes wandered to the object she was holding out to him.

“You said that cornflowers are a symbol of love here, right? Then please take one as a sign of my appreciation… And as proof that we’re really going to marry.”

She ended the sentence in an almost inaudible mumble and had her eyes cast to the ground, her body stiff like a board. Still, she was proud of her small gesture. This blue flower would mark the start of her new life.

“O-oh, thanks. I appreciate it.”

Kousei carefully took the flower from her, brushing against her fingers in the process. They felt soft and warm despite the decreasing temperature, making his heart jump for a single second. Gently placing the flower into the pocket of his jacket without damaging it, he didn’t notice that his lips curled upwards ever so slightly.

As he stepped back into the dining hall and approached Yuuna, his sister let out a teasing whistle.

“Whoa, what a cute flower, bro. Did you make out with a werewolf woman or something?”

“Shut up,” he muttered, tossing an unused handkerchief at her. “Clean your face before someone sees you like this.”

For the rest of the evening, a strange warmth lingered in his chest, spreading through his body in a way he couldn’t quite explain.