Playing with Fire

I didn't have to wait long till she realized it was barely 6:00AM when I received a call from that number; she texted me with the same number she used the night before.

I picked up, leaning back against my chair. "...Akizuki."

I knew exactly why she called, and judging by her tone, she wanted to maintain her untouchable "Ice Queen" persona, but I wasn't going to make it easy for her.

"Good morning, Reina," I answered smoothly. "Don't worry, I'm already brewing up your coffee. No need to remind me."

"It's not that...” There was a sudden pause on the line. “Can you check your bed?"

I glanced at the skirt draped over my desk chair, then back at the screen. I could practically feel the heat radiating from her face through the other line.

​"Check it for what?” A smirk tugging at my lips. "I already smoothed out the sheets. It’s surprisingly spacious now that you aren't occupying three-quarters of it."

There was a sharp, strangled intake of breath on the other end of the line. "Do not play games with me, Scholar Boy. I am currently standing in my dressing room, and I am... I am missing a very specific piece of my uniform... a very essential piece."

I took a slow sip of my lukewarm coffee, watching the gray mist outside the window. "Missing? Everything seems to be in place other than my hoodie and sweatpants. You’ll have to be specific, Reina. I’m just a student; I don't deal in riddles.”

"It’s... it’s charcoal," she stammered, her voice dropping to a mortified whisper. I heard her closet door slam shut. "And wool. And it... it has a silk lining. Kaito, it’s my—it’s the part that goes on the bottom!"

"A table runner?" 

"MY SKIRT!" she finally exploded, her voice cracking with pure, unadulterated embarrassment. "My actual clothes! I am sitting here in your clothes because my dignity is currently on your bed!"

I set my coffee down and picked up the garment, holding it up against the dim morning light filtering through the window. I opened the camera app and snapped a quick, clear photo of the skirt draped over my arm.

"Oh," I said, zipping the photo over to her while we were still on the line. "You mean this?"

The line went dead silent. No breathing. No coat hangers clattering. For three agonizing seconds, she said absolutely nothing.

"Akizuki," she finally breathed, her voice so soft and terrifying I almost dropped the phone. The mortification from earlier was gone, replaced by a low simmering of embarrassment and rage. "If you... if you ever tell another living soul that I spent the last eight hours at your apartment... I will personally ensure that you will NEVER see the light of day AGAIN... Got it?"

I let out a short, quiet laugh. "Yes, Ma'am," I whispered into the phone, the smirk still firmly in place. "Loud and clear."

She immediately hung up after that.

I'm honestly playing with fire here, I thought, staring at the blank screen. But if I play my cards right, I might finally have the upper hand this time.

By the time I got to class, it was almost full. I deliberately arrived a bit later than normal just to make the next thing I'm about to do more effective.

​"Ms. Kujo," I started, my voice clear enough to make the students in the row behind her pause. "You left this at my place last ni—"

​Thwack.

​Before the zipper could even clear the first inch, Reina’s hand slammed down on top of my bag.

"Wh–what do you think you're doing?"

I looked up. The "Ice Queen" was gone. In her place was a girl whose face was a shade of crimson I didn't know the human body could produce.

"I'm returning the ski–"

"Are you c–crazy?! Not here!" She said in an angry whisper, her eyes darting frantically around the room.

​"Not here?" I repeated, my voice dropping to a low, playful hum that only she could catch. I leaned in just enough to see the way her pupils were blown wide with pure, unadulterated mortification. "But Ms. Kujo, you were so... vocal this morn—"

"Listen here, Kaito," she cut me off, her fingers suddenly twisting into the fabric of my uniform tie. "Whatever stunt you're trying to pull off here, it better stop right now.”

​"Your hand is shaking, Reina,” I whispered directly in her ear. “Am I making you nervous?"

"If a single person in this room gets the... the wrong idea, I'll make sure your picture gets on national TV. DO YOU understand?" Her grip on my tie tightened until it was almost a chokehold.

I held her gaze for a beat before offering a faint, mocking salute. "Yes, Ma'am."

"Now go away," she whispered, her head dropping into her hand as she stared at a completely blank tablet screen with the most intense, fake concentration I’d ever seen.

I moved to the seat right next to her, leaning back just as the professor walked in. Even from this distance, I could see her shoulders trembling with the sheer, vibrating heat of her embarrassment.

After the lecture, most of the students were already out of the classroom; there was only one person who seemed to not move, probably to suppress her fury.

I barely had time to swing my bag over my shoulder before a manicured hand clamped onto my wrist like a shackle.

Reina didn't say a word; she just hauled me toward the side exit, her heels clicking against the linoleum.

She dragged me into an empty, dimly lit seminar room and slammed the door with a resounding thud, the lock clicking into place a second later.

"Are you insane?!" she exploded, finally spinning around. "What was that? What was that stunt, Akizuki?"

"I was returning your property, Reina," I said, leaning back against a seminar table and crossing my arms.

"You—you mentioned the apartment! You mentioned... vocals!" she shrieked, though she kept it to a mortified, frantic whisper. She took a predatory step toward me, her finger pointing shakily at my chest. "Do you have any idea how close that was? If I didn't physically stop you, who knows what rumor could've started!"

"I'm sure everyone was so deep into their review that no one even heard a thi–"

"You," she breathed, her voice a low, vibrating hum of pure lethality. "You are a dead man walking, Kaito Akizuki."

"That's a bit dramatic, don't you think?"

"Dramatic?" She stepped into my personal space, her finger actually making contact with my chest now. "Do you have any idea what the 'vocal' comment implies in a room full of students with overactive imaginations?"

"That we were having a very spirited debate?" I suggested, tilting my head. "Or perhaps you were thinking of something scandalous? I didn't know the ice queen has that side to he—"

"Stop it!" Her hand dropped from my chest, clenching into a fist at her side as she struggled to find a retort that didn't involve physical assault.

I held up my hands in mock surrender. “Alright, alright, I’ll stop... for now that is.”

“Your phone... give it to me...”

“My phone? Why, Miss Kujo? Are you going to call my parents?"

“Do NOT ‘Miss Kujo’ me!” she said, her voice still cracking. She took a few steps forward, closing the distance. “The photo you took, the one you sent me earlier this morning, I want it GONE.”

“You mean this photo?" showing her the exact photo of her skirt draped over my arm. “I don’t know about that, Reina. I was thinking this would be a perfect contact picture for you.”

“Give it to me! ” she said, lunging at me with full force. Though I was faster, lifting up the phone high above my head, she still forced her way, her body pressing on mine as she stood on her tiptoes.

“I saved it in cloud storage, y’know,” I laughed as she tried to jump to reach the phone.

“I will—I will hack your entire life!” she panted, her face inches from mine.

Suddenly her foot caught on the edge of a chair, causing her to lose balance, and she instinctively grabbed my tie.

We crashed into the wooden desk. My back was against the heavy wooden table, and Reina was flushed against me, her hands bunched in my shirt and her face buried in the crook of my neck.

The room was deathly quiet, save for the sound of our synchronized, ragged breathing. "Reina," I whispered, the teasing edge in my voice finally faltering. "Is this another lapse in judgment?"

She didn't move for a long beat. I could feel the heat radiating from her skin, a literal fever of embarrassment and... something else. She slowly looked up, her eyes wide, the fierce "investor" look completely replaced by a girl who looked like she’d just realized she’d overplayed her hand.

"I hate you," she breathed, her voice trembling as she reached into my open bag and snatched the charcoal skirt. "I hate your apartment. I hate your coffee."

She let out a frustrated, shaky huff and shoved herself away, smoothing her skirt with trembling hands. She didn't look at me as she straightened her blazer, but her ears were still a brilliant, glowing pink.

"Delete it, Kaito," she muttered, heading for the door without looking back. "Or the next 'study session' will be held in a courtroom."

As the door slammed shut, I looked down at my phone. I didn't delete it. I just moved it to a hidden folder labeled Collateral.

Right as I locked the screen, a call came through. It was Haruna, loudly reminding me that my shift started in twenty minutes. Grabbing my things, I pushed the morning's chaos to the back of my mind and rushed out toward the konbini.

I met Haruna outside the konbini 5 minutes before the clock-in time.

“Hey Kaito, welcome back!” she cheerfully called out, setting down a stack of plastic crates. “Did you rest well, or did you waste that day off?"

“Eight full hours of REM sleep, thanks to you, Haruna.”

“That’s wonderful; I can already notice the difference in energy you have today. Well then, let’s get this shift started, shall we?”

The shift was going well; I was fully awake, not stumbling over my greetings with customers, and I was actually helping Haruna get things done in the store.

But that energy only lasted until the final hour of my shift, the exhaustion finally finding its way deep into my system; every time the door chimed, the sound pierced through my skull like a needle, and the cold air from the refrigerator was suddenly colder than usual.

I powered through the rest of my shift, and just as I was walking out of the konbini, Haruna stopped me. "Good job on today’s shift, Kaito! Now you better properly rest again, okay?"

"Yeah, I will do. Anyways, I’m heading out. See you tomorrow, Haruna.”

I stepped out into the crisp night, my head slightly hurting even more now. A few dry coughs escaped me as I walked toward my apartment, but I shook my head, burying my face deeper into my collar. It’s just standard exhaustion, I reasoned with myself. A good night's sleep, and I’ll be fine tomorrow.

I didn't even bother with making dinner. I climbed the stairs to my third-floor walk-up, kicked off my shoes, and collapsed onto the futon, still in my school clothes.

As I lay there in the dark, the silence of the room allowed the morning's chaos with Reina to replay in high-definition. For the first time, the "Lethal Heiress" hadn't looked like an academic rival. She’d just been an ordinary girl, panicked, flushed, and possessed of a temper that could probably melt the polar ice caps.

I fumbled for my phone, the screen's brightness searing my eyes as I checked for notifications. Nothing. Not even a single, scathing reminder to delete the photo of her skirt.

She's properly mad, isn’t she?

I let out a heavy, ragged sigh. Somewhere across the city, she was probably planning for my future suffering. She was likely calculating exactly how to make my life worse than it already was, and in the quiet of the fever-dream dark, I realized I’d probably earned every bit of it.