Chapter 56 The Gift Shop Is Open

“Onions,” Yu-ra's mother said.

She put two in front of Jin and pointed toward the sink.

“Wash first. I'm Eun-ji. You can stop looking as if I'm about to examine your teeth.”

Yu-ra leaned against the kitchen doorway, enjoying herself.

Jin washed his hands.

The knife was sharp. The onions were ordinary. Within half a minute, his eyes were streaming.

Eun-ji passed him a towel without comment.

Yu-ra came up beside him.

“The gravefin?” she murmured.

“Easier.”

“The cliff hounds?”

“Much easier.”

Her shoulder touched his.

He nearly cut the last slice too thick.

“Don't distract the help,” her mother said.

Yu-ra stayed exactly where she was.

At the table, Eun-ji asked about the rescued man from the tunnel.

“Jun,” Jin said. “He's being treated. His friend stayed with him.”

“I watched that part twice.”

Jin looked up.

Yu-ra stopped reaching for the rice.

“The gift shop part was funny,” Eun-ji said. “That wasn't what I wanted to know about.”

“Was there really a shop?”

“I was hoping to charge admission afterward.”

Eun-ji laughed and gave him more food.

Jin found he could breathe a little more easily.

“What do you do?” he asked her.

“Drive a school bus.”

Yu-ra made a small noise.

“Don't ask about the hill.”

“There's a hill?”

“And thirty children who think brakes are a personal insult,” Eun-ji said. “I can handle a Hunter at lunch.”

“He brought milk,” Yu-ra offered.

“Very sensible. We can use it when he tries to impress you again.”

Jin looked at his girlfriend.

She was pink around the ears now too.

“Traitor,” he said softly.

“You ordered the noodles yourself.”

Under the table, her knee touched his.

Neither moved it away.

The author's chapter appears on the NovelPhoenix site, yet this copy was taken without consent; readers support the author at the publication.

Lunch lasted longer than he'd expected. Eun-ji talked about a boy who kept hiding toy dinosaurs in her bus, and Yu-ra argued that one of them belonged on the dashboard.

Jin listened to them interrupt each other.

He'd known her voice on a screen. Her voice calling attacks in the tunnel. The quieter one she used when they were alone.

He hadn't heard this one before.

When Eun-ji went to answer the door for a neighbor, Yu-ra caught him looking.

“What?”

“I like you here.”

“I'm here quite often.”

“I'd like to be here quite often.”

She stopped smiling for a second.

Then she reached across the table and took his hand.

“That would be good.”

In the kitchen afterward, he dried while she washed.

She handed him a bowl, waited for him to set it down, then caught the edge of his shirt.

“You've been very careful all day.”

“Your mother gave me a knife before she gave me lunch.”

“She likes useful people.”

“And you?”

“I like you.”

He swallowed.

She looked up at him, close enough for him to see the tiny drop of water she'd missed beside her cheek.

“I'd like to kiss you,” he said.

“Yes,” she whispered.

He touched her cheek first.

The kiss was softer than anything his nervous imagination had prepared. Her fingers tightened in his shirt. He forgot the towel in his other hand until it fell onto his shoe.

She laughed against his mouth.

He kissed her once more, just long enough to stop feeling that the first one might have been an accident.

It hadn't been.

“Dry towels go on the hook,” Eun-ji called from the hall.

Jin shut his eyes.

Yu-ra put her face against his chest and shook with silent laughter.

Later, outside the building, her phone rang.

The name on the screen was Kwon.

“My manager,” she said, and answered.

Jin stepped away to give her room.

He saw her expression change.

“No. Don't cancel it.”

She listened.

“I know what they'll ask. It's a charity exhibition, not a wedding announcement.”

Another pause.

“Yes. Tell the guild I'm still appearing.”

She ended the call and showed him her screen.

Arin had added an outtake from the coffee advertisement to her portfolio that morning. Someone had put it beside a photograph of Yu-ra at the training hall.

The caption was asking whether the F-rank coffee boy was a paid boyfriend.

Below it, other people were arguing that they simply looked happy.

Jin stared at his old face in the photograph.

“I'm D now.”

“I know.”

“I meant—”

“I know what you meant.”

She put the phone away.

“We can keep things private,” she said. “I'm not going to pretend you're somebody I hired.”

Jin looked at her hand beside his.

He took it.

“Then don't.”

“They'll be there tomorrow,” she said.

“So will I.”

“I'm not asking you to get in a ring with an S-rank.”

“Good. I'd prefer a chair.”

She laughed, but kept looking at him.

“I can't promise they'll be kind.”

“Neither can I.”

“Be a little kind.”

“To you. Always.”

“That wasn't who I was worried about.”

She leaned her head against his arm. Her hand stayed in his all the way home.

At home, Mira was sitting beside a ridiculous pink stuffed dinosaur. Min-jae stood in the doorway looking politely defeated.

“The arcade? After coffee?” Jin asked.

“I won,” Mira said before he could congratulate the wrong person.

Min-jae nodded.

“I need practice.”

Theo inspected the dinosaur and pronounced it their most respectable guest.

Yu-ra laughed.

Then, when the others were occupied, she touched Jin's wrist.

“The sky,” she said. “Theo showed me a photograph.”

He nodded.

“He also said a woman fixed his arm.”

“Selene. She's the Hero there. The one who hired me for the convoy.”

Yu-ra watched his face.

“I'd like to meet her.”

Then she glanced toward the kitchen.

“I want to see it.”

“Tomorrow, before your exhibition?”

She looked toward his kitchen.

“Now. Before I talk myself out of asking.”