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Izayoi stared blankly. Had she… had she misheard him? She’d known for at least a year now that these “business dinners” were a pretense for something… decidedly not professional. But this? This was sudden.
At first it was every month – after she turned him down at the conference in Osaka, he started leaving messages at her office line asking her to dinner to discuss an “opportunity available at Taisho Biomedical”.
She cursed herself at first – she should have just pretended to have forgotten her card case in her hotel room, accepted his card with an apology, and never called him back to formally decline his offer. She was in a good place where she was; she was the youngest director of clinical studies at the University of Tokyo hospital system, and the first woman at that. She had no plans to leave, much less to move to for-profit pharmaceuticals.
But she had called him back, and then he kept calling. She agreed to start meeting him for dinners at her assistant’s encouragement – Tomoko was the closest thing to a friend she had in the office and she couldn’t stop commenting on how charming and how eligible the Taisho CEO was and how it seemed like he may be interested in Izayoi for more than just a job based on how frequently he’d been calling.
Plus, Izayoi’s own mother’s words from the past New Year kept echoing in her mind: “Nobody wants Christmas cake on the 26th, dear, and at this point you’re well into January.” Izayoi had quickly lost her appetite for osechi.
Tomoko did have a point, though – Touga was charming. And smart. And Izayoi did enjoy talking to him quite a bit, though she’d never tell him that. Plus, she could probably get his input on some employee issues – she hadn’t had any formal management training, and it couldn’t hurt to have some outside perspective since she had quite an uphill battle ahead of her, being both younger than most of her reports and a woman.
So she agreed to the first dinner. And then the second. And a third, and before she knew it, they had a standing “business dinner” every week at the same Italian restaurant halfway between the hospital and the Taisho head office.
They’d fallen into a routine. He’d arrive first, but Izayoi wouldn’t be too far behind him. She’d greet him with “I’m declining your job offer,” and Touga would reply with “That’s a shame.” They ordered the same thing every time and would quickly settle into conversation, at first exclusively business-related, then decidedly less business-related as time went on.
And if she wasn’t paged by the office, they’d stay there until the owner kicked them out. He’d walk her to the station and wave goodbye as she boarded her train home.
It was nice. It was enjoyable. It fulfilled her need for social contact outside of work. And before she realized it, a year and a half had passed and Tomoko was making cracks about when Izayoi could expect an engagement ring.
“Don’t be inappropriate,” Izayoi had brushed her friend off, but the truth was, she didn’t know what to make of this relationship. She was actively declining any dating opportunities (not that many came along at this point; she was well into her thirties and men seemed to find her… intimidating), and as far as she could tell, Touga wasn’t seeing anyone either.
Whatever they had was nice enough. As a foreign colleague of hers often said, “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” right?
Which brought her to now.
“Wait… what?” Izayoi was pretty sure she wasn’t processing language correctly anymore. Was she having a medical event? Her mother had told her she really shouldn’t be working such a stressful job… the absolute last thing Izayoi wanted to experience in her final moments was the universe proving her mother right.
Why was Touga laughing? She was, quite possibly, dying and he was sitting there laughing?
“I said that I’d like to discuss a partnership opportunity with you.” He was struggling to keep a straight face.
Oh.
“This… is not a business partnership, is it?” She wasn’t really asking.
Why did it feel like time had stopped?
“Not a business partnership. I want to spend the rest of my life with you, no matter how short or long that is,” he replied.
“But you realize… I won’t do the housewife thing.”
“I realize,” he nodded.
“And this means that we will never, ever accept any of Taisho’s trial partnership requests, right? I refuse to invite even a hint of a conflict of interest inquiry,” she continued, realizing that he probably had not thought this through very thoroughly.
“It’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make,” he laughed.
“Well if you’re fine with only getting to work with Keio instead of more prestigious hospitals,” she began slyly, unable to stop her smile (or the dig at his alma mater), “I suppose I find this proposal favorable.”
“Well then,” he replied, beaming, “it sounds like we have a deal.”
Izayoi couldn’t help but giggle as she shook the hand he’d extended. She wasn’t exactly sure what she was getting herself into, but she couldn’t wait to find out.