Confection Oki Kouji x Asano Kura
Sometimes Kura forgets that Oki is popular, and only remembers now when she’s looking at Oki being crowded by a bunch of C-rank girls with chocolates in their hands.
Kura taps the box in her hand nervously. She hasn't had the chance to give it to him, so maybe she's too late. After all, he's already holding a lot of chocolates, and if those girls also give what they hold, the amount of chocolate he has will be able to feed him and the Ikoma squad for two weeks.
As Kura ponders, her fear comes true when Oki suddenly speaks up with a smile.
“Ah, sorry everyone, but I've accepted quite a lot today,” he says, “soo give me the rest next week, okay? Let me finish these first.” He follows with a chuckle.
Oh no. She is too late.
Kura swallows the bitter taste in her mouth and takes a step back. Now the feeling that she's late is confirmed and lined underneath with a massive red pen. But, ah, well… this is her fault. She should've remembered how popular he is and searched for him earlier.
Stuffing the box inside her messenger bag, Kura grits her teeth. So much for valentine.
As soon as the crowd around him disperses, Oki lets out a long sigh as he looks down at how full his hands are. Sure he’s happy receiving each one of them, but he can just imagine Ikoma’s reaction when he brings this much chocolate back to the squad room and asks them to help him eat some. After all, he can't eat too much, and forget the one chocolate he’s looking forward to the most.
The one from Kura—-his fellow sniper, someone he looks up to, and someone he has feelings for.
She’s more of a serious type, but somehow she always does these kinds of celebrations. He doesn't know exactly why, but all that matters is that he knows that sometimes she has her eyes on her and he’ll probably be on the list of people she’ll give chocolates to.
Oki starts to walk to his squad room, smiling to himself.
He just can't wait.
Kura hasn't given him chocolate yet. And it's almost evening.
Oki glances at the reddish-brown-haired girl and sighs. Her hair and jacket sway around as she’s busy getting the next dummies they’re going to shoot at, all while humming a tune from a popular video game that Akari—-her squadmate and childhood friend—-likes. Oki sighs. Their training is almost done, and there’s still no peep about her valentine’s gift.
This afternoon they’re training behind Hayanuma’s building, so Oki thought she’ll wait until they’re alone together to give him chocolate. She really likes planning ahead of time and pulling the strings later to look like she’s not trying hard, but well… it doesn’t seem like anything is happening. Oki even thought that maybe valentine isn’t today and maybe those girls this morning mistake the day too, but remembering how Maori gives giri to the whole squad and the chaos that ensues, he thinks he’s the only one hoping that the day is wrong.
Kura walks towards him, who's currently sitting on a bench located under a tree shade. Hayanuma is surrounded by parks and trees, so the benches behind their building are located as close to the trees so it won’t feel hot in the afternoon. But now it’s already evening, and all the tree shade is helping with is covering his slight frown from the girl he likes.
She eventually stops beside him, and Oki puts back his usual smile, hoping Kura doesn’t catch his expression just now.
“One more round and we’ll be finished for today!” Kura stretches her arms and laughs. “Maintaining a stable training regime sure is tiring sometimes, huh,” she says.
Oki just nods along, still can’t get his mind off the chocolate he’s waiting on.
Suddenly, as if answering Oki’s prayer, Kura claps her hand and smiles. “Ah, I just remembered! I have something to show you.”
Finally?!
He almost jolts up from his seat but holds it back with a smile.
Then, as Kura rummages through her messenger bag for her 'gift’, his mind wanders: what kind of valentine’s gift will she give him? A bunch of confectionaries passes through his mind. Maybe classic chocolate? Or maybe truffle? Candies? Cake? He doesn’t like sweet stuff that much, but if it’s from her, he can eat anything!
His train of thoughts continues. Will she give him pudding? Pies? Chocolate-covered fruits? Or macaron—-
“Here you go.”
Instead of chocolate, she hands him a trigger.
Laughing nervously, Oki looks up at Kura. “Senpai, what's this?”
”...a trigger?” Kura pauses in confusion. “Did you suddenly forget what a trigger is?”
“Uh, no, it's not that…” his words trail off. Oki exhales through his teeth. How can he say that he wants chocolate without saying it directly? He doesn't want to come off as needy, but he wants to receive something from her! He turns his mind around, thinking of a way to nudge her into talking about chocolate.
Maybe… he can talk around it?
Oki inches closer to Kura and starts speaking.
“Actually, senpai, I've been wondering about something~”
Kura, who quickly realizes that he’s closing their distance, stifles a laugh. “About what?”
“About if you remember what day it is today.” He finishes with a smile.
Hearing that question, Kura instinctively pulls her bag closer to her lap. Crap, she curses herself. The memories from this morning flood back again alongside the bitter taste in her mouth. Is Oki toying with her? Does he want to show off how many chocolates he gets that are totally better than what she made?
“Of course,” she exhales, sounding as calm as she can. “Valentine, right?”
Oki raises an eyebrow. So she remembers?
“And um, are ya not giving one to me…? Did I do something?”
Kura's laugh is bitter. “You didn't want any, right?”
“Eh?”
Oki's heart sinks into his stomach. What is she saying?
The girl averts her eyes and lets out a long sigh. “It's just… this morning, I heard you talk to the C-ranks about how you're not accepting anymore, and I maybe kinda feel bummed because I actually wanna give one to you, but, eh, my chocolate is not as good—–”
“No no no! You got it all wrong, senpai!” Oki cuts Kura off and grabs her right hand. “I turned them down because I want one from ya!”
Before Kura could answer, Oki pulls her closer, and scents of lemon and hints of lavender she had never felt coming from him before envelop her.
“I’ve been waiting for your chocolate, senpai, for a long time. I know you’re not that into making chocolates and stuff, but I remembered ya said ya likes to give everything when it comes to making something for those you’re interested in,” says Oki, “so I’m just wondering if maybe… ya will give one to me?”
With the last word Oki says, Kura snaps back to her senses and pushes him away in embarrassment. “N-not if you get that close!”
Oki snickers, letting Kura back off but still not letting go of her hand. “Senpai, yer turning red~”
Kura just mumbles an angry response while grabbing the box from inside her bag and plopping it on Oki’s empty hand. The box is wrapped in light blue paper, with clear plastic on the top part. From there, Oki can see that inside the box is a plastic divider with different confectionaries, from chocolates, truffles, macaron, candies, and even some decorated small cakes with a doodle of his face on them.
“It's honmei. All of it,” says Kura, “I don’t know what you like so I make everything I can think of.”
“Honmei? Really?!” Oki’s eyes light up. He expects to get something more special since he knows his feeling is not entirely one-sided, but homemade? This is exceeding his expectations!
“Aah, I never thought someone like ya could make homemade confectionaries like these, senpai!”
“What do you mean by that?”
“Nothing~” he hums happily. “I’m just really really really reaaaally happy you decided to give me something for valentine.”
“Is that so,” says Kura. She averts her eyes. Aah, she wants to scream out of happiness and embarrassment now, but she needs to appear calm in front of the person she’s interested in. So she takes a few deep breaths and tries to move away from the black-haired boy.
But when she thinks she can compose herself just well, Oki pulls on Kura’s hand and forces her to get up close to his face. He puts the box of confectionaries in between them, before tilting his head a bit and leaning in—-placing a kiss on the box, right across where Kura’s lips are.
Their eyes meet, and Kura can feel herself melting away when Oki’s azure eyes glint.
“Thank you very much, senpai,” he grins, then murmurs near Kura’s ear. “I like ya.”
Kura's hands go limp. She wants to push him away so he doesn’t hear her heartbeat, but maybe now is too late. Her heartbeat already spikes so hard she wonders if someday it’ll ever go this high again.
“A-ah, yes. Of course.” Her mind is buzzing with white noise. The answers she has just spouted out are the result of her fried mind trying to work despite everything. She has never been good at something like this, and all Kura can do is avert her eyes from the bright light in front of her. “Mm, yeah, happy valentine, Kouji-kun.”
Oki snickers. “Senpai, that’s not an answer~”
The girl realized that words that were coming out of Oki’s mouth can be considered as a… question, as a proposal, and she fakes a few coughs. “I need to think about it first,” Kura mumbles, “give me two months.”
“Eeh~? Isn’t that too long?”
“Well, it’s because I can’t think straight when you’re that close!” Kura sputters and tries to put up an annoyed face, but fails.
“Is that so?” says Oki. “So maybe if I get closer you can think more clearly~?”
“What—-”
Oki lets go of Kura’s right hand, and quickly wraps his arm around her waist, earning a yelp from her. Kura’s face goes from a shade of pink to burning red. “Wait! T-time out! Time out!”
But Oki doesn’t heed Kura’s words and closes their distance even more, making Kura let out a small whimper, trying to hold back her voice. He laughs at Kura’s response and plants his face on the crook of her neck. Aah, he’s glad she’s still thinking of him.
He smiled. Kura can’t see it, but he’s as embarrassed as her right now, and it’s better if she doesn’t see his uncool side right now.
Oki glances at the box of confectionaries in his hand. How can such a box bring him so much joy? He may never know.
From inside the Hayanuma building, Akari glares at the two of them with disdain in his eyes.
“Aah, do they think people can’t see them from the kitchen?” Akari mumbles, scooping a strawberry ice cream into his mouth. “Well, Kura is as dense as a rock so maybe not. But Oki-kun? Man, that guy…”
He sighs and puts the rest of the ice cream on his bread before putting them on top of each other. He focuses his gaze on Kura who’s still trying to escape from Oki’s embrace with a red face.
Way to ruin valentine, best friend. Akari huffs. Way to ruin his lonely, lonely valentine.
“Whatever,” he says through gritted teeth, “I’ll just go back to playing Cupid Parasite.”
As he walks away from the kitchen and the two lovebirds, Akari bitterly mumbles about how Kura will just have to pay by buying him a few takoyaki tomorrow.