First Date (Part 1)

October 19th to October 24th – Kimura Kiyomi

The rest of the week turned into a bit of a gauntlet for me. Reiko of course wanted to know what was going on with Suzuki and myself and I on the other hand really didn't want to talk to her about it. Suzuki didn't help much as he pretty much turned back into his stoic self from when we first met and acted like all this didn't have anything to do with him. Why did I like this guy again?

But somehow I managed to make it to Saturday without giving the game away. I swore to myself to tell Reiko everything after it happened. At least if it went well. Whatever that would entail exactly.

Somehow I managed to exchange contact info with Suzuki without Reiko noticing and so we could text each other about the details of our date and that alone felt a lot more stressful than I would ever have imagined. Suzuki seemed somewhat unfazed by everything, but of course I only could read his texts and see him at school where he still kept up his usual demeanor to some degree. Although he sometimes smiled at me conspicuously and my heart really couldn't take it. That made me wonder what I really was hoping for when I met him on Saturday. Did I just want to spend some time with him or did I hope that he would confess to me? Or should I confess to him? The thought alone was terrifying and the images of Suzuki laughing at me and me being left behind rejected and pathetic came back stronger than ever. But ultimately I soothed myself by repeating the mantra that we were just meeting as friends and if nothing happened, nothing happened. How well that would hold up when I actually saw him on Saturday was another question entirely though.

We arranged to meet at the old clock tower, so it really lived up to its reputation as a meeting spot for couples. Which we weren't of course. But it still made me wonder whether Suzuki was aware of the reputation this spot had amongst teenagers and adults alike. When I arrived there 20 minutes early I already could see Suzuki waiting for me. I was surprised and at the same time I wasn't. When he saw me from afar he smiled the same smile he smiled at school when he thought no one could see us and it really did something to me. I wondered whether he was even aware of how he made me feel. When we met at Sophia's house he seemed to respond to my advances in a positive way, including agreeing to this here date, but who knew how serious he was about this. I didn't even know how serious I was about it. 

When we met we greeted each other and after that we just stood there and suddenly I was stricken by the realization that by all common definitions this was a date after all but Suzuki seemed to be somewhat unfazed and somehow that made it easier and harder at the same time to deal with the situation. After a couple of seconds I managed to ask him whether he wanted to go to the place I wanted to show him now. Which I had alluded to at our nightly meeting, but never actually revealed what it was. We started walking in the direction I indicated and of course we walked besides each other. Suddenly the urge to hold his hand grew in me and I didn't know what to do with it. This would definitely be weird, right? We weren't a couple and friends didn't just hold hands, even I knew that much. I knew already how his hands felt through our training and fighting, but this felt like a completely different circumstance and holding his hand now seemed like an impossibility almost. I tried to look at his face and he just looked straight ahead, without any particular expression on his face. 

As he noticed me looking at him, he turned his head though and smiled at me again. I had to look away. But I couldn't help but be happy and smile at the same time. I tried to concentrate on something else to not go crazy right now and tried to visualize the place I wanted to take him to. It was actually a little cafe that I discovered a little while ago and really wanted to go to. In the past I would have asked Reiko for something like this, but for some reason since I knew Suzuki he really seemed like the only one I wanted to ask for things like that. Thinking about this now made me aware again that this was a date and nothing else. Now I started to get nervous. What would happen once we were there? What would I actually talk to him about? What did we even have in common? We talked at school all the time, but there Reiko was always with us and she always had something to talk about and so it was quite easy to keep the flow of the conversation going with Suzuki as well. Finally we arrived at the cafe. I only had seen it on pictures so I was taken by surprise by how it actually looked.

I had taken an interest in it since it looked more like a flower shower than a cafe and was decorated with all sorts of flowers and other plants on the pictures, but seeing it in real life it looked even more beautiful than it had looked in the pictures. Of course I had in mind that Suzukis first name could be written as flowers, but I wasn't sure he would be picking up on that. There we all sorts of flowers, but amongst the ones I recognized were Anemone, Pink Carnations and Daffodils. They all were in full bloom and almost looked somewhat unreal. I must have been quite enamored with the flowers because when I came back to reality I saw Suzuki looking at me somewhat quizzically and I became embarrassed. Him telling me that I looked really cute whilst looking at the flowers didn't help. When he asked whether I wanted to go inside now I quickly agreed and stormed into the cafe somewhat forcefully.