Chapter 216: Not Asleep Yet?

“Bzz—”

The black unregistered mobile phone in his hand suddenly vibrated faintly in the dark, silent restroom.

Kaoru Hoshitani’s breathing stopped completely in that instant.

He was like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, every muscle in his body snapping taut.

The faint cold light of the screen lit up, casting itself across his face, which was covered in an unnatural flush from arousal that had yet to fade, mixed with extreme shame.

The moment he saw the new message notification pop up on the screen, Kaoru Hoshitani’s body went rigid, and his heartbeat unexpectedly skipped half a beat.

Just when he was about to go mad from the emptiness twisted into him by Rika Kawasaki, hiding in the restroom like a pervert gasping in despair, this vibration without any warning easily shattered the dead silence of the darkness.

A powerful shame surged up like a tide, and Kaoru Hoshitani bit down hard on his lip, almost drawing blood from his lower lip.

His fingertips dug sharply into his palm, forcibly suppressing the humiliating shivers running through his body, and with trembling fingers, he slid open the unread message.

However, the content displayed on the screen was like a basin of warm water at just the right temperature, instantly extinguishing the terrifying conspiracy theories in his mind.

Sender: [Chika].

[Good work today.]

[If you can’t sleep, you don’t have to force yourself. You just changed environments in Hokkaido, so your body and mind will be more tense than you’d expect.]

[No need to reply. Just wanted to remind you, if you have a headache or stomachache tomorrow, the old pharmacy opens at nine in the morning.]

Kaoru Hoshitani stared fixedly at that line, “your body and mind will be more tense than you’d expect.”

So cunning, so desirable.

So desirable, so enviable.

Everything that had happened to his body—that body which had been thoroughly ruined, those shameless reactions in front of Aina Onee-san—

Should have been his alone, a dirty secret, a torment he alone should bear.

“I didn’t! I don’t want it anymore! There’s nothing wrong with me!”

—It’s not because I’m broken.

It’s not because I’m disgusting.

Miss Chika said it’s just because I changed environments and my body is too tense!

He really wanted… really wanted to believe that answer.

Kaoru Hoshitani leaned back against the cold tiles of the restroom, clutching his head, his face red with shame, no longer daring to look at those few lines on the screen.

His mind kept thinking:

She understands me…

She actually understands me…

How could anyone understand me like this?

For so long, Kaoru Hoshitani had never been treated this way.

Almost everyone who approached him carried a strong possessiveness or a condescending protectiveness, but Chika didn’t.

He had verified this himself.

He used to think he was already completely ruined, that he would always run into people like Rika Kawasaki who treated him roughly.

But those who said they loved him only gave him a gentleness that made him feel even more worthless.

So over time, Kaoru Hoshitani complied.

If I’m rotten, then let me be rotten.

…

No, why?

Why was this person able to comfort him so precisely?

Could she have some special fetish?

That can’t be right!

But…

But she went against her own sister for his sake, to save him.

Could that be fake?

R-right?

She really does care about him, doesn’t she?

No no, thinking like this definitely isn’t right.

But, looking at the words she sent.

Oh, it seems right.

Ugh, is it right or not!

Kaoru Hoshitani didn’t quite dare to speak. Outside, Saita Aina turned over in bed and made a small sound, and he immediately pressed the screen dark, his whole body freezing in place, not even daring to breathe too loudly.

He sat there dazed, and even after about ten minutes he hadn’t left.

He felt like he was thinking, but when he asked himself what the answer was, he couldn’t even figure out the question.

A few seconds later, he couldn’t resist lighting up the screen again.

Turn it off, turn it on again.

Even though his conscience ached, he still wanted to look one more time.

That faint glow flickered on and off across his face.

No, Kaoru Hoshitani, what are you doing?

Aina Onee-san is right in the bedroom, just on the other side of the wall…

And you’re hiding in the restroom, craving a message from another woman?

But—

Chika is his friend, not anyone special to Kaoru Hoshitani.

I’m sorry, I’m sorry.

But I can’t do anything right now either, can I?

Even though he really did feel somewhat guilty, he could only sit here and wait dully.

So, I’m really sorry, this is too strange—

He had to look one more time.

After struggling back and forth more times than he could count, Kaoru Hoshitani opened the text input box.

He didn’t dare type even one extra character, afraid of leaking his trembling emotions.

He only typed four short words:

[I’m fine.]

Click, send.

The instant the message was sent, Kaoru Hoshitani, as if scalded, abruptly flipped the phone face-down on the sink.

Time, in this moment, seemed stretched into infinity.

The exhaust fan wasn’t on in the restroom, and it was so quiet that even the occasional drip from the pipes sounded like a drum.

One minute passed, two minutes passed, and the phone made no movement.

From that small seaside town all the way to today, Kaoru Hoshitani had never imagined that one day he would be next door to a sleeping Aina Onee-san, waiting for another woman’s reply.

Kaoru Hoshitani, who had always followed the rules, of course knew clearly—this was wrong.

He of course also knew he shouldn’t continue.

But there was no way for him to control it.

He had no choice but to wait for that message.

Just when the burning anxiety was about to drive him mad.

“Bzz—”

The phone lying face-down on the sink let out a faint vibration.

Kaoru Hoshitani shuddered all over, snatching up the phone and flipping it over. On the screen, two new messages lay quietly.

[Yeah, that’s good.]

[You’ve already worked very hard.]

Looking at those seven short words on the screen, Kaoru Hoshitani didn’t react immediately.

He just stood there blankly, even his breathing stopped.

Rationality screamed in his mind: Miss Chika has no idea what happened in the bedroom tonight.

The “hard work” she mentioned must only mean his effort to escape Tokyo, his effort to adapt to life in the northern country. It was just an ordinary polite remark.

But…

Yeah…

Tonight, I really did work very hard.

Working hard to hold Aina Onee-san tight, working hard to pretend he was feeling something, working hard to hide his panic the moment his body was filled, forcing himself to let out fake gasps…

He gave it everything he had, just to keep Saita Aina from discovering he was broken, just to maintain that perfect “home.”

And now, those seven words on the screen glowed quietly.

No probing into why he wasn’t asleep in the middle of the night, no demand that he must be a “normal person,” just drifting down lightly through hundreds of kilometers of night sky.

Kaoru Hoshitani’s body suddenly lost all strength.

He slid slowly down the cold tiled wall, crouching half on the ground, clutching his knees tightly.

“But I already worked so hard…”

When the voice squeezed out of his throat, it carried an unstoppable, fragmented tremor.

“I just wanted to be a normal person… I just wanted to make Aina Onee-san happy… Why, is it so hard?”

In this dead silent darkness, no one would answer him. No one would crouch down beside him, hugging him in the same posture. And no one would say to him—”Then, I’ll stay here.”

Kaoru Hoshitani could only crouch there alone, holding his knees, burying his face deep into his arms.

A long time later, his emotions finally gradually settled.

The heat in his body, unexpectedly, had been miraculously released for the most part during that desperate crying fit.

He supported himself on the edge of the sink, trying to stand up. But because he had crouched too long, his legs went weak, and he stumbled before barely steadying himself.

He turned on the faucet, adjusted the water to the smallest stream, and splashed ice-cold tap water over and over onto his tear-streaked face.

He looked at the reflection in the mirror—red-rimmed eyes, yet with a trace of morbid dependence in his gaze—he knew he shouldn’t do this. This was the first step of betrayal.

But he had no choice.

He dried his face, took a deep breath, clutched the black phone tightly in his hand, and gently opened the restroom door.

Outside, the living room was pitch black. Kaoru Hoshitani, like a thief, stepped barefoot on the wooden floor, walking step by step toward the master bedroom.

“Creeeak—”

The bedroom door was pushed open a crack.

Just as Kaoru Hoshitani stepped into the room, about to head toward the bed.

In the darkness, the blankets on the bed suddenly let out a rustling sound of fabric friction.

“Akane…?”

Saita Aina’s hoarse voice, thick with sleep and half-awake, rang out without warning in the silent bedroom.

Every hair on Kaoru Hoshitani’s body stood on end in that instant! His heart violently contracted into a ball, as if someone had gripped it hard.

Almost out of a instinctive survival response, his right hand flashed behind his back like lightning, hiding the black phone deep into the loose hem of his pajamas.

“A-Aina Onee-san…” Kaoru Hoshitani’s voice trembled uncontrollably from extreme terror.

Saita Aina turned over in the darkness, didn’t open her eyes, only reached out a hand and fumbled around on the empty bed beside her.

“Where did you go…?” Her voice was very soft, carrying a trace of tired murmuring, “Are you feeling unwell?”

Kaoru Hoshitani pressed the phone hard against his lower back, forcibly swallowing a mouthful of saliva that had gathered from nervousness, trying to make his voice sound steady:

“N-no, I’m not unwell… I was just a bit thirsty, couldn’t sleep… went to the kitchen to drink some water.”

“I see…”

Saita Aina mumbled. She fumbled and leaned out, grabbing Kaoru Hoshitani’s left hand that hung at his side.

The moment she touched Kaoru Hoshitani’s fingers, a trace of instinctive distress entered Saita Aina’s drowsy voice:

“Why are they so cold… Hurry back under the covers.”

She applied a little force, pulling the stiff Kaoru Hoshitani toward the edge of the bed.

Kaoru Hoshitani let himself lie down on the edge of the bed. As soon as he lay down, Saita Aina, carrying her own warm scent, leaned over like a vine, naturally pulling him into her embrace.

Her cheek pressed against Kaoru Hoshitani’s back, and her breathing soon became long and even again.

Saita Aina had fallen asleep.

She thought her Akane had only briefly lost sleep because of the pressure of running away.

She thought that just by hugging him, she could disperse all the coldness in the boy’s heart.

But Kaoru Hoshitani, held tightly in her arms, was now stiff as a corpse.

He listened to Saita Aina’s loving, steady breathing behind him, felt the body warmth she passed to him—what surged in his heart was no longer the warmth of being saved, but an extreme guilt that cut like slow slicing, carving flesh and crushing bone!

Saita Aina didn’t know.

She knew nothing.

She thought she only needed to hug Akane to protect his world.

—And it was precisely this innocent-to-the-point-of-cruel trust that made Kaoru Hoshitani feel he was beyond redemption.

In the endless darkness.

Kaoru Hoshitani opened his bloodshot eyes, staring emptily at the ceiling.

Carefully, he pulled out the hand hidden inside his pajamas.

Rationality screamed frantically, telling him he should put this phone back on the coffee table in the living room, should completely cut off this dangerous source.

But his fingers defied all rationality.

Little by little, he fumbled around, and finally—

He shoved the unregistered phone completely under his side of the pillow, pushing it into the deepest crack of the mattress.

—

He knew he shouldn’t do this. He knew that from this moment on, he was no longer “Kaoru Hoshitani without secrets.”

But that cold black phone, right now, was hidden somewhere he could reach with a single touch.

Like a dirty secret that absolutely must not be discovered.

And like an abyss he had already come to depend on completely.

As if—

This was fine too, right?