"Miss Tetsuya," Shimizu greets her at the airport. "I hope you've had a pleasant journey."

"I did," Mahiru says even as she knows that Shimizu doesn't care. But this is the game of titans: or at least, whatever Shimizu hoped to become. Exchanging pleasantries because if they didn't, then their wars would take the world with them.

They don't exchange another word regarding Mahiru's welfare (and she does not ask about Shimizu's). Discussions of business and who Mahiru'll have to meet in New York takes place, but that conversation only last about three hours and Mahiru spends the other seven catching up on paperwork. She gets two hours of sleep when she realizes being annoyed with paperwork isn't the best mood set one should have when meeting with their clients.

Mahiru lands. Pisses off a few board of directors—

"I'm too busy for you right now—"

"You're fired."

—And gets ready for the gala.

She goes dress shopping, Shimizu is starry-eyed at the tailors (what, does Mahiru not pay her enough? She's seen the receipts from designer malls and the brand accessories) when they go in to get Mahiru's dress made.

It's a lovely thing— Midnight blue and gemstones glittering like all the stars in the sea above. Eishi would probably like it, after he blushed about the neckline and the nonexistent back. Then again, he usually liked anything she wore—

Yeah. No.

Maybe she should sit the gala out. Call in sick or something.

The board of directors certainly won't miss her.

She enters the ballroom and immediately declines the first person idiot enough to offer her champagne (one day, if she gets angry enough she's going to file a lawsuit — imagine all the laws she can use, especially the American ones) because by the ever loving Kamii if there was one underage person in the gala then you should make fucking note of it. Mahiru isn't exactly forgettable.

"Mahiru-chan?" That was new.

She turns, and freezes. But the woman in front of her— No, not her mother— takes it as a completely different meaning.

The woman, young, money-hungry and arrogant slips toward Mahiru and elegant hand. "It's good to finally put a face to those names, love." There's a smirk playing on those lips.

Oh, Mahiru wants to laugh. Because if this is what Amami meant—

Mahiru smiles, all teeth and oozing upper-class arrogance and money. "Care to enlighten me on yourself?" There's a lull of amusement in her voice and she injects just the right amount of indifference into it that an angry crease form in the woman's brow. The hand is still held out: perfectly manicured, but the colouring is cheap.

Mahiru doesn't take it. But she gives her a customary sweep and when she returns to the woman's face, she makes it clear that nothing she sees interests her.

She knows who the woman is.

"Nio." The woman smirks. "Your father and I are colleagues."

Oh, Amami was right. Nio and Nao. Her father was obsessed with her mother. Obsessed with the memory of her. This relationship wasn't healthy.

"Colleagues, huh?" Mahiru asks with a sly cock of her head. "Are you the assistant or the intern?"

The crease becomes pronounced and the next thing she hears is a smooth, familiar voice calling her name. "Tetsuya-san?"

She turns and comes face to face with Sakaki Imai just as Nio turns as well.

"Oh, Imai-kun," she purrs and sidles up close. "How many times have I told you to just call me by my name and drop the honorifics—"

"Are you well?" he walks right past her and up to Mahiru. "I haven't heard from you since you yanked all of us to Totsuki, ojou-sama."

And Nio fumes—

But one glare from Mahiru: gold eyes no longer amused pins her in place. It's a warning— The only one Nio is going to get. The Tetsuya name isn't just for anyone and Mahiru was tired of her games. There's a reason why Nao and her father had faced so much controversy when her mother took the name and the only reason why none of the children of her father's lovers ever challenged Mahiru herself for the name.

However, Nio isn't the only reason for her anger.

"Why are you here?" she demands, no longer smiling.

Her father's fingerprint is all over this— He doesn't care about these galas and Sakaki Imai should've never been in contact with Shiro Tetsuya. Should've never known about Nio when not even Mahiru nor Shimizu knew.

Mahiru wasn't stupid.

Sakaki smiles. "Let's dance—"

Mahiru juts out her chin, eye fully open and unsmiling. "Cut the bullshit," she says, loud enough for a few people in their vicinity to turn their head towards the spectacle.

It makes Sakaki panic. And oh, it's such a shame— He'd always been one of Mahiru's favourites. "Don't be like that, Mai—" He tries to take her hand, but sentimentality— His sentimentality at least, won't appeal to her.

So Mahiru continues to watch him with indifferent eyes. "I thought you knew better," she says. "It's a shame—"

"Now, Mai. We shouldn't trouble Imai-kun, should we?" Someone behind them says and it takes everything for Mahiru to seize control of her freezing body.

Her eyes turn cold and there's disappointment in her eyes — it crushes Sakaki because it's the only knife that Mahiru can deliver without being guilty. Better to shove the weight onto someone else, like her father and Amami had on her.

"Father," she says as the atmosphere chills. "What brings you here?"

There's no false pretence of pleasantry. Shiro Tetsuya isn't Azami, he has no patience for these games and Mahiru isn't amused enough to pretend she does.

"I was in New York for business," he says smoothly, apathetically. Mahiru six years ago would've been crushed. Did you not come for me? Come for your daughter? But the Mahiru now doesn't care anymore. "Azami Nakamura said a few of his Totsuki chefs were here, and I thought I would come see."

Mahiru is so angry she can't even cry. Trust him to shove salt in the wound, trust him to twist the knife—

"That's lovely," she says. "Perhaps you should drop by Totsuki in person sometime, then. Joichirou-sensei and I are collaborating at the moment."

Maybe this is what Amami meant. Normal families didn't behave this way. Father didn't blame the deaths of their wives on their now-motherless daughters, and daughters didn't retaliate by teaming up with their late mother's best friend and rumoured first love.

Shiro gives her a stony glance that she's always feared— Despite the fact that he's no longer towering over her and instead, finally eye-level with her. And he walks away— He turns around and walks away, wounding an arm around Nio's shoulders, who looks like she wants to throw it in Mahiru's face— Who just cocks her head and shrugs in a show of utter indifference.

There's a dull throbbing behind her temples and Mahiru dumps her champagne into the nearest plant before hailing down someone with a tray and depositing the empty glass.

She needs to get out— Honestly screw the gala, screw her father—

Mahiru slams into someone. The two of them crumple against the wall and she looks up oh well, look at her luck.

"Sorry," Eishi says just as Mahiru tries to slip out from his side he recognizes her. "Oh, Mahiru!" he says and begins apologizing profusely. "Uh," he finally stops. "You... Do you want to dance?"

Mahiru is looking for the exit. "Stick to cooking," and she takes off.

But there's a hand that wounds firmly around her wrist two steps later. And Mahiru, out of reflex tries to shake it off.

"Mahiru, are you okay?—"

"Let go," she demands, eyes wild. And trembling— Was she trembling? "Let me go!"

Mahiru's chest heave and— Were those tears sliding down her cheeks?

"I'm worried," Eishi says, gently, but his grip on her wrist still firm.

Reaching up, she pushes away. "Or maybe you shouldn't be." He seems like he wants to protest, but his grip hardens on her wrist. "Stop acting, Eishi." Mahiru gestures with an arm.

He looks away. "I always did think you'd leave like this."

Mahiru's lips part. Her brows furrow and in the dark corner of the ballroom, she finally lets her anger run free. "You know why I left. You knew, somewhere inside of you, that one day, someday, I would leave. And you chose to do nothing. You knowing it has nothing to do with it. It changes nothing."

"It has to do with everything, Mahiru!" Violet eyes flash, hand outstretched. He towers over her when he's at his most passionate. "Do you know why you were going to leave? It was because the food was never good enough for you, I was trying to find a way to make you stay, and with Azami Nakiri at the helm, I could have!"

"No, you were doing it for yourself!" The anger and grief come pouring out. "You were trying to make me stay, but have you ever thought about what was here, what had been? Have you ever thought about how I felt instead of just assuming, just predicting?"

He's gone silent.

"We were incompatible not because cooking wasn't good enough for me," she says, footsteps nearly drowning out her voice. "It was because cooking had been too much for you and I had never tried to compare."

Everything you touch, you ruin.

"Is it..." He breaks off, head to the side. "Is it so hard to accept that I love you just as much as I love cooking? Why does it always have to be a choice? Why do you always have to make people choose?"

"Because that how you make it out to be!" Mahiru says as the gates of her battered heart opens. "You made me choose! You made me choose between what I wanted and what you thought I wanted. And I did! I made the only choice that I could live with. Are you trying to ask me to compromise for you? If you are, then you should've thought about it before you made that decision. I love you, Eishi Tsukasa! Mahiru Tetsuya loves you! I could've done the exact same thing you made Azami Nakiri do for you." They pause. "But I can't. Because you've never once told me what you've wanted. Wanted from me."

"Would you have listened?" he asks lowly, delicately.

Mahiru shakes her head. "You don't know what I would've done. You say you love me? Well," she says, voice shaking. "You sure as hell don't trust me, not enough to confide in or depend on."

It feels freeing to say those words— To say those sentences locked in her throats because she was afraid of what they'd do to Eishi, delicate and brittle bones, the air trapped inside his throat and the wonderland nestled amidst violet irises. Mahiru was afraid of losing him.

"I didn't mean for this, you know," he admits as he leans against the wall, looking as if his string been cut, the feathers pulled from his wings. "None of this."

"You should've said something," she says in return. And they both know that neither of them are blaming each other, but as Eishi pulls her into his arms, there's a whisper of apology in the curve of his lips as they touch. Mahiru rests her head against the crook of his neck and closes her eyes.

x

"Well, isn't this nostalgic?"

They're sitting against the door of the freezer, Eishi's double-breast white jacket. On the other side of her, Eishi ducks his head— But not before she sees the dash of red at his cheekbones. "Shut up."

"Make me."

"On second thought, Eishi, don't you dare."

They had their first kiss in the freezer.

Now, there are dried tear tracks down her face. Mahiru sighs and wraps the jacket around her more firmly. There's no scent to this— Nothing particular, only a clean-soapy sort of trace that anyone ever wore it.

"This isn't healthy, Mahiru," he says gently.

Her words catch in her throat. All of the carefully curated vocabulary, all of the speeches memorized, the prose inscribed into the back of her eyelids.

"...I know," she says finally. And she braces her hands against her knees. "I don't know what to do."

Eishi looks away for a moment, distant and thoughtful before he finally turns back to her. Carefully, he says, "I think you should see a therapist. You need someone to talk to. And if you don't want to talk to one, maybe you should talk to... Her."

Nao. Nao, who can't be swayed by her father's money. Nao, who can't judge her even if she tried.

"Okay," she agrees softly. Then she raises her head. "You should talk to someone too."

He raises an eyebrow. "Who? About what?"

"Joichirou Saiba—"

"Why? He doesn't even specialize in French cuisine—"

Mahiru sighs and shuts him up with a glare. "I know what you want to do," she says. "But... Your ambitions... Are wide and unfocused. I know you loathe to admit that there's someone better than you. But Joichirou... Even if, he who he is has a lot of knowledge you'd benefit from."

"Fine." He turns away, petulantly sticking his chin out.

Wow, this is the person Mahiru fell in love with.

Mahiru sighs and holds out of her pinky. "Swear."

She has to wait for a few minutes before he finally turns around with a "don't hit me please."

"What do you mean don't hit me?!"