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It was a school night and Chiyuki was laying across the large mattress Yukito keeps as his, naturally, excessive sleeping area as she slowly and tiredly worked on an essay on her History of Cinema class. While she is a fairly dedicated student and has some intellectual interest in the theoretical subjects of her course, she does think her time is better spent developing the mountain of scripts on her email folders rather than a six-page analysis of Last Year in Marienbad, which has hardly any lines at all.
It is a romance movie, but also black and white, and a French art movie. It sometimes feels like the consubstantiation of every Achilles heel she has as a screenwriter and she hates it. Why could it not be White Zombie? She is a great Horror author!
Her boyfriend took pity on her and tried to help. He was kind enough to procure her a DVD copy of it, as no streaming service carried it, and probably never will carry it. Also, he has let her watch it on his larger TV, for the details, and even saw it with her, regaling her with some of the comments his father had made when they watched it together many years prior.
She ate it up and thanked him profusely for the kindly given help, but she still struggled. Because she hates it with a passion. It felt like she had been working for ages, especially since her boyfriend had been in the shower for God knows how long.
Should Chiyuki be worried? Well, she could knock on the door, but considering how rowdy he had been halfway through the movie, he might ask her to join him, and she does not know whether she has the fortitude to say no. She really should focus on what she was doing, in any case, so she is going to trust that he did not slip on the shower and cracked his skull, at least for five more minutes.
Well, maybe she should call for Yukito, after all. His phone was sitting beside her on his nightstand, and it has not stopped ringing for a while now. She was going to just leave it alone, to preserve his privacy, but what if it is an emergency? What if it is his mother, or maybe Irene, needing to talk to him immediately? They do not call very often, so it would be advisable to at least check who it was.
Steeling herself into her decision, the screenwriter peeked over to see incoming messages from his manager. It seems that he has some news.
Call me
Those vultures at the TV station are hounding me
DO NOT TALK TO THEM!!!
I worked too hard on your schedule. Don’t accept any work without talking to me first!
Where are you?
You better be following your diet to the letter
I don’t care how tasty the fries of Ms. Ueda’s are. You can have three, not one more!
God, do I have to do everything myself?
The poor man seems to be running haggard, as his colleague had a “stomach-ache” and is on leave again. This time, however, Professor Asagi could not prescind of her services, regardless of the insistent pleads of the man and her boyfriend’s. There are too many scripts to proof-read for her to concentrate herself on his schedule and his career the way she would like.
Something on his phone caught her attention. Behind all the text messages, peeking through the fury of the man’s, there was an image of Chiyuki, one she did not know existed. Considering the long and dark dress, the expensive and tasteful jewellery borrowed from Irene’s and the makeup on point, courtesy of Kazuma’s, she wagers the picture was taken at the premiere of Mr. Makino’s movie.
This, however, she does not recognize the photo from anything that the journalists had taken that evening. It was a completely candid shot, with terrible composition and a little shaken, as if it was taken on a whim. In fact, she looked rather tired, it was likely taken much later, at their personal after-party. She was laughing, and she can see a sleeve that probably belongs to Kazuma and a shadow of Haruki’s.
The woman never saw the wallpaper of her boyfriend’s cell phone. Not that Yukito is a very secretive man, and, for reasons of the job she did for him, she had all his social media passwords, but she preferred to respect his privacy and let him tell her whatever he wanted her to know. Exactly because she has this level of access to his life and intimacy is that she should honour the trust given to her and not abuse it out of sheer curiosity.
Chiyuki has explained her point of view to him many times, to assure him and herself that she is conscientious of the weird position their relationship is in and that she would take every step in her power to account for that. He has slightly mocked her earnestness, which he is wont to do, but she knows that he appreciates it.
At that exact moment, as she has his phone on hand, Yukito opened his ensuite bathroom door, startling her. She dropped his phone and quickly backed away.
He chuckled. “I saw that, baby. Are you snooping around?”
The woman froze with an embarrassed smile, trying to come up with an excuse.
“I’m sorry, it’s just that it was ringing and I...” She innocently mumbled, trailing off as her nerve disappears.
“How naughty! And after you promised you wouldn’t do it, too…” The actor laments, placing a hand on his bare chest.
She huffs and changes the subject. “Yeah, by the way, am I your lock screen?”
Soon enough, Yukito was the one wearing the embarrassed smile.
“You weren’t supposed to see that.” He mumbled, pouting.
The black-haired man scratched the back of his head and gingerly reached for his phone. Chiyuki handed it to him with a flare, while she contently looked at her adorable boyfriend.
“Well, I did and I think it’s sweet.” She smiled at him “But what other pictures have you taken in secret? Are they any good?”
He smirked, deviant. “Oh, yeah, there’s one of you poking your nose that cracks me up every time.”
“What?! I don’t poke my nose!” The woman shrieked.
“You sure do.”
Chiyuki frowned deeply. “Let me see this thing!”
“You’ll see it, alright. After I post it to all my social media.” Yukito responds, easy-going.
“You wouldn’t dare.” She threatens, cute as an angry puppy. “Yukito! Delete it right now! Yukito!”