Chapter 20: The Hollow Space

POV: Kaito Minami

The office lights glared too brightly today.

Even the view — endless glass and skyline — looked sterile. Perfectly symmetrical. Perfectly dull.

Sato stood by the table, reviewing a set of revised contracts for the Shinoda merger. His tone was precise as ever. “The Kitmera Group has requested a direct review of their logistics plan. I’ll confirm your attendance for the oversight meeting at noon.”

“Kurosawa,” I repeated. “They’re still with the Shinoda subsidiary, aren’t they?”

“Yes,” he said, glancing at his notes. “They’ve been expanding their holdings aggressively. The chairman considers their partnership... useful.”

Useful. That word again. Everything was either useful or not. Efficient or expendable.

People. Companies. Even silence.

I leaned back in my chair, staring at the documents without reading them. “Send me the summary later.”

“Of course, sir.”

When he left, the sound of the door sliding shut filled the room like punctuation.

Silence followed — the kind that used to comfort me.

Now it just felt wrong.

No quiet movement in the corner of the room.

No faint scent of soap and citrus.

No soft, deliberate rhythm of someone existing quietly within my space.

Tanabe-san came in briefly to replace the flowers. “The agency called earlier,” she said gently. “Fujimoto-san was reassigned for the day. The Kurosawa estate required additional staff.”

The Kurosawa Group.

Something in my chest tightened before I could stop it.

“Reassigned,” I echoed, though the word felt too clinical. “Was that a request or an order?”

“The company asked,” she replied. “It’s only temporary. She’ll return tomorrow.”

“Mm.” I nodded once, a non-answer, and turned back toward the window.

The Kurosawas were known for excess.

Lavish, careless. They treated their wealth like theater — grand, visible, and without restraint.

The thought of her there — in those polished halls, surrounded by the kind of men who wore charm like a weapon — sat wrong in my stomach.

It shouldn’t have mattered.

She wasn’t mine. She wasn’t anyone’s.

Just another employee from a contracted service. Replaceable, temporary.

And yet, I couldn’t help but picture her in that space — the way she’d shrink slightly under a stranger’s stare, how she’d keep her voice steady anyway, still polite, still professional. She didn’t belong in their world any more than she belonged in mine.

Maybe that was why her presence made this place bearable.

---

Sato returned around noon with more reports.

I tried to listen. I really did. But his words blurred into noise — percentages, projections, deadlines — until he paused mid-sentence, studying me carefully.

“Is something wrong, Minami-san?”

“No.”

The lie was smooth, habitual.

He nodded slowly. “Should I postpone the meeting?”

“That won’t be necessary.”

He hesitated, then said, “You’ve seemed... preoccupied, lately.”

I looked up from the tablet, meeting his gaze just long enough to make him regret the question.

“I’m managing,” I said.

That seemed to satisfy him. He left a few minutes later, the door closing with a quiet click.

---

The rest of the day passed in fragments.

Meetings. Calls. More performance than substance.

Every sentence rehearsed, every gesture controlled.

But beneath it all, I felt it — the faint irritation I couldn’t name. A quiet, burning awareness that somewhere, she was moving through another space that wasn’t this one.

That someone else might notice the same stillness I had.

That someone else might see her the way I did — steady, resilient, quietly radiant.

Ridiculous.

I knew better than to let sentiment distort judgment.

And yet, when I looked up from my desk that evening, the city lights blinking far below, I realized I hadn’t touched a single file in over an hour.

---

Tanabe-san passed by on her way out. “Would you like dinner prepared tonight, Minami-san?”

“No,” I said quietly. Then, after a pause, “She’ll be back tomorrow, correct?”

She smiled faintly. “Hopefully.”

When she left, I was alone again — the hum of the city pressing against the glass, the silence filling every inch of the penthouse.

It was strange how absence could take up so much space.

Stranger still, how it could feel like jealousy when it had no right to.

I turned off the lights, letting the city swallow the room in gray.

Somewhere out there, under the same sky, Hana Fujimoto was working — unaware that her absence had unmade the rhythm of my day.

And I hated how much I noticed.