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Calm whispers and chatters flutter around in a large hall laden of tables shrouded by pearly white clean sheets and chairs with elaborate engravings alongside the live alluring music sung in French. The walls seem to not only have intricate and luxurious design in the form of sculptures carved into the it, but also wallpapers with golden-themed color palette and motif. Chandeliers hang on from the ceiling, providing not only sources of light, but also adding to the already opulent display of the place where specially-tailored suits and glamorous night gowns are worn while silver cutleries collide with ceramic plates.
Numerous waiters and waitress maneuver their way above the soft maroon red carpet covering the entire floor, catering to the guests and their demands. Some bears with them trays brimming with plates and glasses, while some others carry either a list of a guest's orders or a bill folder made from dyed black leather, yet such difference looks minuscule in the face of their unshakable poise that accompanies their uniform and elegant conduct.
Little chuckles and smiles galore, unfortunately only as a façade. Formalities with a side of passive aggressive remarks are thrown every now and then on the entrepreneurs' tables. Sweet lies spiced with arrogance and disdain penetrate the oblivious lovers' little hearts. Indifference and ignorance chain up the old couples who've fallen out of love, but rather hesitant to touch the issue. Despite all that, the hall still glimmers with genuine glamour – a rather stark anomaly.
Amidst all that, amongst the luxurious tables and all their hypocrisy, sits two men, facing each other, absorbed by their plates and the occasional sneaky glances and grins, yet another display of anomaly in this sea of hypocrisy. One who has his hair dyed blond dons a jet-black unbuttoned suit, showing the dark gray waistcoat and white shirt that’s topped with a bright red ascot wrapped around his neck. His elegance appearance – if one dares to call it so – doesn’t hide his true nature, however, as one of his legs is bouncing restlessly under the table while his face doesn’t even make the slightest attempt to hide his brutally honest judgement of the food before him.
The other one has a rather unkempt dark hair that somehow works in his favor. His appearance doesn’t differ very much from the blond in front of him other than the fact that black and white are the only colors he wears, as everything, including his tailcoat suit and bowtie, is in the same color, save for the white shirt. The stark contrast also extends to the man's poise as he calmly enjoys his dinner with demeanors that of a gentleman.
In spite of all that, both of them seem rather delighted in each other's presence. Glances slowly turn into all-out stares, grins helplessly morphing into wide, beaming smiles. Silence stills between them, yet that doesn’t stop the two men from blatantly showing their obvious love. Again, another anomaly in the middle of the hall's luxurious pool of lies which gains them the envious side eye from the other guests, but they couldn’t care less.
There is nothing in their minds but themselves, indulging at the present moment.
“Enjoying the food, Ryuji?” says the man wearing the tailcoat suit while leaning to his chair's back and swerving a wine glass in his hand.
The blond looks up from his plate and about to respond, but his gaze turns into a confused look before replying back with a question, ignoring the former’s inquiry completely, “Akira, why are you drinking water out of the wine glass?”
Akira chuckles lightly as if a phantom thief after a successful heist and takes a sip out of his water, “I wonder.”
“Drama queen,” says Ryuji before stuffing his mouth with another slice of steak. Akira seems unbothered by it as he takes another sip, now with his pinky up.
“You haven’t answered my inquiry, Dear.”
“Huh?”
“Do you enjoy these scrumptious delicacies?”
“Mmm…,” Ryuji mumbles to himself before swallowing his food, “Sure I do.”
“But you certainly don’t sound like it,” pries Akira, now with a side grin stretched out atop of his smug expression.
“You don’t sound like it. Why do you talk like, uh, what is it? Ancient Englishman?”
“Did you mean English Gentleman?”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever that is,” answer Ryuji, waving his silver knife in indifference to whatever name the thing they’re talking about has, “What are you trying to do, anyway?”
Akira takes yet another pretentious sip from his water in a wine glass to the point of closing his eyes as if he's enjoying the best water in the universe, a gesture that makes Ryuji raises an eyebrow, “Dear, do I wonder what I'm trying to do.”
“No, I mean it for real,” says Ryuji, cutting another slice of steak, “What are you trying to do? It’s surprisin' to suddenly eat here, y'know.”
Akira takes another sip out of his fake wine, eyes locked on the man in front of him who's now trying to make a mashed potatoes sandwich with two slices of meat as the bread. It’s true he just told Ryuji a few days ago that they'll have a date somewhere special just before the day of his journey returning to his hometown, but he has never told him the specific place. There are two reasons for him to do so: one, it was for shock factor. He wanted to surprise his lover to a date he could never imagine, and it seems to work well.
However, the second reason is an embarrassing thing that results from the first one: he had not planned this date before he invited Ryuji. His decision to bring Ryuji to a surprise date was an impulsive one that came to his head one afternoon after spending a day together running around the school. The sun was setting and they were tired, but Ryuji, being Ryuji, was smiling wide with his typical grin while the dim and golden sunlight was shining upon him, making Akira's mind went auto-pilot and said 'I'll take you to the most special date of your life'.
It’s even more embarrassing that, even after snapping out of his trance state, he continued on with his impromptu invitation with no plan whatsoever just because he wanted to impress one Ryuji Sakamoto. Of course, the latter happily agreed to empty his agenda on the promised date with yet another happy grin that made Akira's heart melted like a popsicle during the hot weather of summer, something that might sound sweet until the teen realized what kind of disaster he had brought upon himself.
It also didn’t help that he couldn’t find any form of date that he could consider 'special' until the night before his date when he confided in Sojiro about his plan. He was lucky the older man got connections and he only got lectured for 2 hours. It was highly shameful that the former leader of an internationally known group of rebels fell head over heels for a sentient sunshine disguised as his boyfriend. But that didn't matter. Everything had been said and done.
Or so he thought, until one little nosy cat just had to eavesdrop and told the oblivious heiress of Okumura Foods, who came later that night to buy a few bags of coffee for her research, all of his failures. He just sat there while listening to the conversation between the two of them. He had never thought that people talking about him in front of himself would hurt that much. Luckily, he was able to get a rented limousine from Haru just because she is too kind for her own good, albeit her motivation to do so was so that he could impress Ryuji more, something that reminds him just how much of a show-off he is.
But of course, Akira wouldn’t tell Ryuji all of that.
“Well, I am taking you to a pleasant surprise dinner, of course. To treat you, Dear.”
“Stop that,” Ryuji says, shoving his mashed potatoes sandwich in his mouth, “Wou souwnd swupid.”
“Don’t talk while you eat, 'Yuji.”
“Hmmfh!” mumbles Ryuji with a mouthful of delicious steak and mashed potatoes. Akira couldn’t help but have his eyes locked on the blond who looks so happy with his plate. He also notices how sloppy the latter's table manners are, but somehow, it lulls Akira even deeper into a chasm full of the forbidden fruit with Ryuji on top all of that. He has fallen times and times again, being charmed without fail many times by this man who eats so ferociously he doesn’t realize the little speck of gravy on his cheek.
Good heavens, Ryuji is going to be the end of him.
“You sound stupid,” speaks Ryuji, finally after some time of savoring his food, “Speaking like that.”
“Am I, now,” Akira replies jokingly, back to his usual snarky and mischievous self. He puts the glass back on the table and pulls out a white handkerchief from his chest pocket before reaching for Ryuji's cheek, cleaning the speck of gravy on it. The gesture gets Ryuji surprised that he freezes still in his seat, slowly feeling the heat climbing up to his face as Akira takes quite the significant time wiping the blond's cheek before continuing his sentence, “My dearest lover, Ryuji Sakamoto?”
Ryuji can feel the redness on his face alongside the happy smile, both spreading wide after Akira's done with his wiping the gravy off his cheek. He looks away and scratches the back of his head nervously, “Cut it out, man.”
Akira grips the fabric of his pants ever so tightly, trying to keep his composure despite how intense his desire to have Ryuji in his arms is. If Persona-users could have a Palace, his would just simply be a small gym with Ryuji’s face manifesting itself in every single means possible while his Shadow self would just stand in the middle of it all as if he's been charmed by a Marin Karin, stumbling about aimlessly with his Treasure – a laminated photo of Ryuji's smile – fully exposed. He also acknowledges how hyperbolic that hypothetical situation is, but if anything were to describe how he feels seeing Ryuji's red face and wide bright smile, nothing could hit the home better than that.
Taking a deep breath to regain control of himself, Akira gives his lover a satisfied grin and leans on his chair, “Alright, then.” It’s not like I could hold up the act after that, anyway.
“Um, by the way," Ryuji starts as he tries his best to get back on his lane with another topic after Akira derailed him flawlessly, “Won’t you really answer me?”
“Hm?”
“Y’know, about wearing suits and eating out here?”
“You don’t like it?”
“Nono!” refutes Ryuji straight away, “I like it here. I mean, the meat's fantastic. It’s just surprisin' that you told me we're eating out but using suits and… being here.”
“Ah,” responds Akira using what seems to be the only appropriate response to Ryuji's inquiry. He adjusts his seat a bit before pushing up his glasses in an attempt to hide his effort to think up a quick and on-the-spot answer a la a phantom thief. At least he could fend off Ryuji's curiosity if his answer is satisfactory. He shall never know about his disgraceful fall, “That. Yeah, of course. It’s just that… I thought it'd be nice.”
“Nice?”
“Yeah.”
“Whaddya mean?”
God, Ryuji's unintentionally so sharp sometimes, “I mean, it gets boring quick with curry every time we eat out, right?”
“I don’t mind if you’re the chef, though.”
“Well, I do.”
Ryuji chuckles and carries the conversation on with a teasing tone, “So, this is also an excuse to skip your shift, too?”
“That’s–!” an immediate response flies out of Akira's mouth, but gets cut off as immediately. He would never skip his shift intentionally, and implying otherwise feels like a challenge to his integrity as the unpaid part-timer of LeBlanc Café whose dedication is unmatched by no one, but as luck would have it, realization sets in quicker than what his mouth could spit out, saving him from himself, “Th-that’s right!”
Ryuji's teasing tone continues as another chuckle comes out before his next attack that he carries out with a side grin and a raised eyebrow, “That’s not like you to skip your shift.”
“That’s–“ Think, Akira, think! “–because I don’t want to lose my time with you.”
Silence follows.
It wasn’t something that Akira's brain had processed carefully. It was a pure spur-of-the-moment string of words that he blurted out without any second thought. It didn’t even register at first until Ryuji just stares at him with mouth wide agape with his next bite of meat falling off the fork. It was at that moment that three things fly by him at once like a sudden wave of tsunami, slapping him back to reality.
First, he said that with a rather uncannily calm and serious tone, something that he somehow managed under the immense pressure to hide his foolish impulse to impress Ryuji. Next up, the words that he uttered were of great significance as tomorrow, he'll go back to his hometown, far away from Tokyo. Lastly, it must be utterly shocking for the poor blond to hear what seems to be a serious response from him after such a teasing attempt at prying for his secrets.
Combine all three, and Akira gets himself Ryuji reddened as if his face is a boiled crab, just like before. The only difference now is that there is no smile to accompany it, but rather shock that’s etched into his eyes. His fork stops midway as well before slowly falling off his grip onto his plate, sending another wave of surprise that fortunately frees the blond from his frozen state, albeit with an audible gasp, something that Ryuji poorly handles with putting both of his hands on his mouth after it.
“…S-sorry,” Ryuji apologizes after a few seconds more of silence with a muffled voice.
“It’s… it’s fine,” Akira tries to reassure Ryuji despite being shocked himself. He's lost his powers, but he just knows that this moment is comparable to that of being shocked by a Ziodyne.
Ryuji puts down both of his hands and turns his head away, trying to calm himself with deep breathers. His fingers are tucked away below the table, but they’re fiddling anxiously to the beat of his heart that believes he's on a track competition right now. Not only that, now both of his legs are also bouncing up and down because of what he just heard from Akira. This situation isn’t what he intended. He didn’t intend for Akira to answer seriously like that. He was just going to tease Akira while subtly pressing for an answer to his question. He didn’t expect it to backfire like this.
He also didn’t press Akira for nothing. It was surprising. Everything here is surprising, and Ryuji means it. This whole time, besides enjoying the delicious food, he has also been thinking about the reason why Akira decides to do all of this. The moment he came with a literal limousine in front of his apartment, he was confounded beyond words. He did not expect Akira to go that far just for a surprise date, given that they’re just teenagers, and he's been trying to look for any reason that would shed light on why Akira would afford this expensive dinner, but to no avail. He simply knows there’s something unusual behind it, but he can’t put his fingers on it.
Everything gets even more complicated when it's added with the fact that Ryuji has bought something to give to him since not only does he need to spot the perfect moment to give it to him in a perfect manner, he also feels the need to find out why Akira keeps avoiding the his question.
He takes another deep breath and steals a quick glance at Akira across the table. He also seems to be shaken up by what he's just done and his reaction just now. It’s not often that he sees Akira visibly trying to regain his calm and joking composure.
Geez, screw it!
There’s something that he needs to do now. He can press Akira later.
Searching out his suit's pocket, Ryuji pulls out a small navy-colored box and holds it under the table. He steals one more quick glance at Akira to reconfirm his move. His ex-leader still seems to be a bit dazed, something that happens when things go horribly wrong in his plans. It usually spells out disaster, but for now, it’s a golden opportunity for Ryuji.
Time for an All-Out Attack!
“Uh, uhm… 'Kira?” asks Ryuji timidly. He was sure he felt confident when he thought of All-Out Attacking Akira, but somehow, all that confidence has evaporated now.
“Oh, yes?” answers Akira, seemingly still a bit out of himself.
Even so, there is no turning back now.
“I…,” Ryuji starts, the words just on the tip of his tongue, but it feels incredibly difficult to just let them roll out. Another huge dose of oxygen enters his lungs and he turns his face back to Akira, red and all. His partner is starting to regain his poise, making Ryuji's heart skips a beat, but he should continue, now or never, “I also… don’t wanna lose my time with you.”
It seems that despite losing his Persona, Ryuji stills possesses his electric attacks in other forms as proven by how Akira is sent to another shocked state by what he just confessed, albeit only a little bit. It was a strategically-timed attack on his part, nonetheless, and Ryuji feels a bit glad, but also more nervous as Akira's wide eyes also send a wave of emotions his way.
Even so, his attack continues.
“Th-that’s why–” Ryuji pulls out one of his hands from under the table and grips Akira's tightly after. He's getting desperate. This attack must be done as soon as possible, any minute more and he'll embarrassingly fall in front of the only man he wants to impress. It’s time to bring out the big guns, he must survive, “That’s why I–“ Ryuji pulls out the little box he brings out earlier and shoves it in Akira's hand, “–want you to have this!”
Ryuji push Akira's hand back to him and turns his face away again. His hands are now the ones that are gripping his pants tightly while slightly trembling. Both of them are sweating as if he's in a sauna made in the middle of a volcano crater. Every single kind of thought is passing by his mind right now, even ones that don’t make any sense at all, but they’re all so incoherent that Ryuji can’t even begin to comprehend them. He can only feel how his heart skips ten beats. He can only feel the heat on all his face. He can only feel anxiety rising, worrying if he has done something poorly or if his gift isn’t that impressive. He feels like waiting for a change of heart after stealing a Treasure, but multiplied by ten and all dropped on him at once. He closes his eyes and tenses his muscles as if an astronaut bracing for–
“Ryuji, you don’t have to!”
–an impact.
As if reflex, Ryuji opens his eyes and tries to process what he just heard. He knows very well it’s a common expression expressing gratitude whenever someone receives a gift and he also knows that it’s Akira's voice, in a happy tone to boot. That also means that Akira has opened his gift that he gave like a teenage girl confessing to her popular and handsome senior.
Concluding from the facts, his attack was successful and Akira is impressed.
With that information clicking in his mind, Ryuji slowly tilts his head to face Akira once again, and there he captures a sight he has never imagined he would ever see.
Akira, with a slight shade of pink on his face, is captivated by what seems to be a wristwatch with black leather strap on the outer side, but light brown on the inner side. The case of the clock is glistening silver with white background serving as the place where the hands tick. A wide happy smile, yet another rare sight from Akira, is carved onto his otherwise stoic face. Ryuji could swear he feels like falling in love all over again.
“Well, d'ya like it?”
“Are you kidding? I love it!”
“Oh, man, I’m glad,” Ryuji chuckles a bit as if there’s a ton of weight lifted from his shoulders while also showing how proud he is of his gift, “Although I did get nervous givin' it to you.”
“Why’s that?”
“Well, y'know how things turned out with that stupid maid thing we did back then? I was all excited and stuff about it, 'till the maid really came and I got real scared.” Ryuji sighs, maybe he's just a bark-and-no-bite man when it comes to romantic stuff, “And, uh, that wasn’t very impressive of me.”
“But you didn’t back out of this one this time,” Akira says, closely examining the obviously expensive wristwatch Ryuji got for him, “And 'impressive'? You wanted to impress me?”
“I mean, duh, it’s your last day here and all. You've impressed me enough times already,” answers Ryuji. His hand subconsciously holds a silver bangle hanging from his wrist. It was given to him by Akira on his birthday, something that he really wanted, but unable to afford.
Akira notices what Ryuji has just done with his silver bangle and suddenly a rush of memories come in. The memory of working many part-time jobs to get enough money to buy it. The memory of running away from the Reaper when he was looking for things to sell in Mementos. The memory of Caroline and Justine looking at him with disapproving and disappointed looks as he was audibly calculating the cost of using the Persona Compendium. All of that was to buy his crush at the time a very expensive silver bangle. A faint, proud smile makes its home on Akira's face.
“Many times?”
“Of course! From day one, remember?”
“That’s what you told me when you confessed.”
“Well, you did steal my heart.”
Akira pauses a bit. He seems a bit surprised, but a little chuckle quickly follows to hide it, “Oh, man.”
“Something’s wrong?”
“No,” Akira shakes his head, “Nono. Just… I'm glad. I'm glad you were able to make it tonight, what with all my sudden messages. I'm just glad I could spend my last night here in Tokyo with you, 'Yuji.”
“Same here, man.”
“Now, then,” Akira rolls up his left sleeve a bit and starts to put his new watch on while Ryuji just observes with a wide, eye-to-eye smile on his face. The curly-haired man looks at his new watch like he's looking for the time, “We’ve got some time left. Let’s finish up and then have some more fun before we head back home.”
“Understood, leader,” Ryuji gives off a smirk and starts eating with a gusto. Akira tilts his head a bit and holds it with his hand, eyes totally focused on Ryuji trying his best to finish his steak.
One day, he'll probably let Ryuji know just how deep he falls in love for him to the point he made an impromptu date at an expensive restaurant with a limousine as their vehicle. He'll maybe also tell him just how his smile makes him go crazy and does all sorts of things that he has never thought he could. Perhaps he'll also tell him how deep he will yearn for his presence when he gets lonely in his hometown far away from Tokyo and how this big city has become identical with him. Yellow, bright, loud, active, and most importantly, it is a home for him now.
One day, he'll tell him just how impressed he is at his brightness.
But for now, he'll let the magic lives on.