Confession

As soon as she enters the bathroom, the dam breaks. She chooses a random stall and closes the door with her hand, not bothering to lock it. Sobs echo through the room, volume elevated by the reverberation on the walls. Somehow, even though Asuka is ashamed of the display she’s making, but she can’t bring herself to care. Even if someone was in the bathroom with her, it would do nothing to quell the hot tears from flowing down her cheeks.

By the time her bawling subsides, her forehead feels hot like a sizzling pan, and the salty tears leave her eyes burning. She heaves a few more dry sobs while opening the tap and splashing her face with cool water. Catching a glimpse of herself in the mirror she sees how red her eyes have become. She turns away from the sight.

She feels a pathetic sense of gratitude that no one has come to the restroom while she was wailing. It was truly a first for her. In the past her public displays would involve violence and rebellion. She shakes her head at these memories. She remembers feeling so cool back then, what had she even been fighting for? Asuka takes a few deep breaths before opening the bathroom door.

“Ah, Asuka-san…!” Standing by the door is Miyuki. Asuka doesn’t even need to use the expression on her face as an indication that she’d heard everything. So much for privacy, she thinks bitterly, but it’s more out of embarrassment than resentment. Asuka turns her face away from the other person. She tried her best to clean herself up before going out again, but the rawness of her outburst hangs over her like a poltergeist.

She’d been dreading meeting Miyuki again, but what she prepared for was seeing her off at the front desk with a pleasant smile, not this. Asuka tries to say something, anything to break the silence, but her crying had not cleared her head enough to aid her with words. Instead, it's the older woman who starts up again, but she seems to have as much trouble as Asuka in finding the right thing to say. After a bit of hand wringing, she says, “would you like to come to the break room?”

Asuka sits in a hard plastic chair, a far cry from the comfort offered by the soft cushions in Terushima’s office. At least there weren’t any armrests to overthink about. Miyuki pours water into a paper cup from a large blue jug and sets it on the table in front of Asuka. She takes her own seat in the other of the four chairs that stands across the table from Asuka.

They sit for a while in silence. Asuka takes small sips of water to keep herself occupied and show appreciation for the gesture. She drinks until there’s nothing left, swallowing one last gulp with an exhale through her nose but keeps the rim of the cup to her mouth, nibbling on the edge absently.

“How are you feeling?” Miyuki inquires gently, nervously thumbing at a beautifully manicured nail on one of her fingers. It seems Miyuki had been waiting for her to finish her drink before deciding to speak. Asuka replaces the empty cup onto the table with a tap. She nods, with a small, withered smile. Her lips felt as dry as her eyes felt tight whenever she blinked them. All that crying must have wrung the moisture out of her like a cloth that had been soaked in a river.

“I’m sorry for…listening in on you, that wasn’t my intention.” She looks down at the table but makes an active effort to keep her gaze trained on Asuka. “It’s just…there are some things I feel I need to share with you.” Asuka raises an eyebrow.

“The truth is, I’d been planning to talk to you when you got back from your meeting. I recognized that you were Tachibana-san’s relative when I scheduled your meeting with Terushima-san the other day. It’s embarrassing to admit this to his younger sister, especially right now, but, ah!” She pops up like she just remembered she left the stove on at home. “Please wait here, I’ll be back!” She holds both of her hands up in a ‘stay’ gesture, slowly inching toward the door and spins around to exit the room.

Asuka stares after her. Was it even okay for her to be in the employee break room without an employee present? Nevertheless, she does as she’s told. She plays with the paper cup for a while, her head in one hand, she pushes the paper cup back and forth with her other finger.

A few moments later, Miyuki hurries back in through the door and doubles over to catch her breath once she confirms Asuka is still there. She stays there panting for air for long enough that Asuka wonders if she should do something. Getting up from the table, she steps around the table to the water machine grabs another paper cup from the stack next to it. When she pushes down on the blue lever, the dispenser spits water and she can feel the cup cooling her hand as it fills. The blue jug on top of the machine gurgles as bubbles float to the top as it is steadily emptied.

Accidentally filling it up too much, she carefully but quickly goes over to Miyuki, whose breathing has subsided while she waited for Asuka. “Thank you very much…” she gratefully takes large gulps, finishing her drink in one go.

Soon they are seated again at the small, round table, this time Miyuki sits in the chair next to Asuka’s right side, following the direction Asuka had walked her to. 

“I’m sorry for the trouble, I have asthma, so I don’t run often,” she laughs at herself, playing with the long, curled side bangs that rested on her flushed cheeks. Asuka shakes her head, “it’s no problem.” What could’ve been so important that she would take such a risk running like that?

Wondering if it would be okay to ask, she notices that Miyuki pulls out something from under the table. A small package. It was wrapped in a brown paper the same color as cardboard, and sealed with a shiny gold sticker in the shape of an oval.

“This is something I received from your brother, Tachibana Kyo-kun.” Asuka’s eyes widened. “Or actually, to be truthful, it’s something I picked up after it fell out of his bag.” She had an awkward smile on her face as she explained.

According to Miyuki, Kyo had dropped the package on his way out for deliveries that day. Miyuki had been watching him from the front desk and ran over to return it to him, but he had already disappeared by the time she made it outside. She searched for a while but running too much triggered her asthma and she decided she would keep it for him until he returned. But that ended up being the last time she ever saw him.

She was cradling the package delicately in her hands. “Until now I’ve just kept it in the locker I use in the changing room. It didn’t feel right to bring it home. When I saw you today, I was sure,” she gently slides the item toward Asuka, “that you should be the on to have it.” Nothing could have prepared Asuka for this. She already has the documents from Terushima in her bag, but now a mysterious package has made its way to her. And it was something he never got the chance to give to its recipient.

Asuka accepts the package and examines its details; it’s slightly rounded, and about 11 centimeters tall. Judging by its weight she might assume it’s a small candle. Shaking it reveals nothing, as no rattling sound can be heard. She doesn’t want to open it just yet, deciding to wait for a private moment would be better for her nerves.

Her musing is interrupted by Miyuki. “For a while I’ve been worried it might be a perishable item, but it hasn’t leaked or rotten from what I’ve seen.” “Yes, it seems that way,” Asuka answers subtly. Miyuki starts fiddling with her empty cup, repeatedly folding it flat with her hands. She looks as though she wants to say something to Asuka and moves her mouth like a fish gasping for oxygen.

“Asuka-san,” she strains, her words are held back by doubt, but she pushes forward with conviction. “I know it isn’t appropriate for me to bring something like this up to you. But the truth is…”

Miyuki squeezes her eyes and bites her lip in a way that makes Asuka more curious than anxious. “I…I had a crush on Kyo-kun….”

Asuka’s mouth falls at the same time as her eyebrows lift into her hair. Miyuki’s face is fully pink after revealing her affection for her brother. “I don’t mean to make this about me,” she blusters, “it’s just….” Miyuki trails off and clasps her hands together, rests her lips on her knuckles, “it feels like I haven’t been able to move on after learning about what happened to him.”

Asuka feels like she should be upset, but instead, a sense of understanding forms. There are so many things left unsaid between her and Kyo that fill her with regret every time they come to mind. She never even apologized for the incident that got her expelled. He’d worked so hard to get her through school, only for one foolish action to ruin everything. The shame had been too great at the time, it still is, but now she wishes every day for one last chance to atone. Now that she thinks about it, three months isn’t all that long ago when it comes to losing someone.

She didn’t know what to say in response to Miyuki’s confession. She felt like she could say anything, so she chose the thing that had been pressing at her since that morning. “Miyuki-san, what was Kyo like when he was at work?” Miyuki is caught off guard, but she smiles softly. She really was very pretty; Asuka couldn’t help but notice.

She tells Asuka about different times she remembers of Kyo and how helpful he was. A moment that particularly stood out was one time during a drinking party after work. Miyuki was being harassed by one of her drunk colleagues, unable to stand up for herself, Kyo stepped in and redirected him by challenging him to a drinking contest. Kyo lost, but when Miyuki asked if he was okay

“As long as you’re not uncomfortable anymore,” she could barely understand his slurred speech, but it struck her heart, nonetheless. “I guess I fell for that side of him before I knew it,” she concluded, blushing with her hand to her face. She had a dreamy far off look in her eyes as she relieved the moment.

Asuka smiles too. It warms Asuka heart to know how much of a positive influence Kyo left in the world.

“It’s kind of embarrassing, though,” Miyuki says, sobering up from her reminiscence. “For a while I thought that the package was meant for me,” she admits, blocking her lips with a curled index finger.

Asuka tilts her head, “why is that?”

“Well, there’s a name written on the bottom of the gift, and it was just one character off, so I got confused because of the messy packaging. It’s a good thing I didn’t open it, I suppose!”

A name? Asuka tilts the object over towards the fluorescent lights. On the bottom of the package is something that jolts her senses. “みさき” is written in black marker, the bumpy texture of the paper it was printed on makes it a bit difficult to read, so it’s no wonder Miyuki had been confused, but Asuka is all but certain. This was a present Kyo had intended to give to Misaki.

“One time I actually planned to tell Kyo-kun by confessing to him on Valentine’s Day, but I got scared seeing him reject chocolate from other people.” Kyo had always been popular with girls. When Asuka was younger and he was in high school, he always came home with at least one paper bag full of sweets from the girls (and apparently a boy or two) outside of his class. 

Miyuki goes on to say that she wasn’t able to give them to him because she figured he already had a lover. Misaki immediately comes to mind for Asuka, remembering what he written about her in his diary entries. The clues and timing matched perfectly.

“Thank you for taking the time to talk to me during my break,” Miyuki says as she walks Asuka to the front entrance. “I feel much lighter now that I’ve shared all of that….”

Asuka shakes her head, “no I really enjoyed it, actually.” Slowly it dawns on Asuka that this talk with Miyuki about Kyo did not have the same devastating effect as it did when Terushima mentioned him. Which is ironic to her because the only thing Terushima really mentioned regarding Kyo was that “he was a pleasure to have in the workplace.” Maybe she was all cried out by the time they started? The is sadness still there, but it’s slightly less powerful.   

“Wait, Asuka-chan one more thing.” Miyuki stops by a desk filled with documents to be filled out by customers and plucks a business card from her blue vest. Using one of the pens at the document station, she writes a seven-digit number with incredibly skillful handwriting. Asuka had never been very good at making her own letters look nice, so she was easily impressed.

“Please, if you ever need anything, you can call me at this number.” Miyuki passes the card to her with two hands, like when she gave her the visitors pass earlier that day. In the past when someone offered help to Asuka, it would make her feel worse somehow. Taking the paper with her own two hands Asuka can feel herself smiling genuinely.

“Thank you, Miyuki-san, really.”

Miyuki and Asuka waved goodbye to each other. Just as Asuka is about to cross the street to get to the train station so she can ride back home, a lightbulb pops up in her mind. She dashes back into the building to see Miyuki returning to her post. “Miyuki-san!” Miyuki turns to Asuka’s voice with a swish of her ponytail.

“I have an important question to ask. I’ve been trying to finish up something for Kyo, but I need to know where he used to make his deliveries. Do you know?” Miyuki looks into Asuka’s dilated eyes and deflates, giving in to her desperation. She takes Asuka aside and whispers her next words. “The truth is, it’s against company policy to reveal that kind of thing to non-employees, but for you….” Miyuki shuffles uncomfortably before speaking up again, “I’m embarrassed to admit this, but, when I was first developing a crush on Kyo-kun I ended up taking a peek at his delivery schedule.” Miyuki insists that it was just out of curiosity but still couldn’t help feeling like she was being a creep. Asuka is thankful for her curiosity  

Miyuki puts a finger by her face as if to jog her memory. “If I remember correctly the last district Kyo-kun would have been making regular deliveries to was….”