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"Twenty-three forty five and ten seconds, twelve seconds..."
"Can't you just-"
"Fifteen seconds..."
"-put the countdown on hold until-"
"Nineteen seconds..."
"-it's ten seconds to go, like everyone else does?" Heavily, Aoko dropped the duvet down on the couch, letting the bundle fall from her arms with a sigh.
Saguru didn't look up from his watch. He was squinting at it, struggling to see the hands moving in the dim light; the only illumination came from the city buzzing outside the window he was facing, where seemingly everyone was awake, waiting for the clock to strike midnight. "I," he said, "Don't do what everyone else does."
"I see how it is." Aoko crawled onto the couch and curled up beneath the blanket, sealing the edges of it under her, locking him out. "You'd rather look at your watch than at your-" The word died on her tongue, and she wildly cast about for a replacement. "-...Aoko."
The silence hung for moments; seconds that Saguru must have been counting with the littlest hand. Tick, tick. She could hear it with the heartbeat pounding in her ears. Idiot, idiot, idiot...
"My Aoko?" Still infuriatingly distracted, he at least had the decency to raise an eyebrow and glance in her direction for what must have been a split-second at best. "Never."
Aoko pretended to huff, looking out of the window instead. Fireworks had been going off intermittently for hours, but none from Beika Park, which this room of Saguru's house, luckily, happened to face. Those fireworks were a burst of colour at exactly midnight, and everyone else's paled in comparison.
They were the same ones Aoko had watched since she was a child, though before now she had always been in the park, with Kaito and her father, cold hands wrapped in wool gloves, every year fretting while Kaito juggled sparklers like it was nothing.
"Twenty-three forty-six and five seconds."
When she reached for her phone, her hand bumped against the untouched, glass bottle of pear cider on the side table. (Delivered, along with a knowing look, by Saguru's housekeeper, and she could only assume that Saguru had had the same rush of parent-in-law-enforcement fear that she had, as his drink was just as neglected).
No notifications, and Aoko sighed again.
"-and eleven seconds." A pause. "He hasn't called?"
She could tell from the sound of his voice that he was just as disappointed as she was.
Not that she'd say that.
This was their night.
And that was fine.
"It's too late, he won't get through now," she said. It was only fair; cell phone companies could only deal with so much traffic on what must have been the busiest few minutes of the year. She burrowed deeper into her nest of duvet. "He's not coming."
"Then I suppose I'd better work on being better company, hadn't I?" With her eyes covered, Aoko couldn't place the sound of rustling and the shift of leather-on-leather until something was placed down on the other side table with a clunk, and the next thing, she was being elbowed gently in the side. The watch's minute ticking sounds weren't audible any longer. "Budge up."
"I'm too cozy," she said into the duvet. "I can't move."
He elbowed her again. "You can."
Aoko shook her head; a gesture lost with it beneath the covers. "Nope, it's no use. I'll have to live here."
Saguru clicked his tongue. "While I freeze to death on the outside."
"The cider would warm you up." Aoko peeked out just in time to see Saguru's shoulders tremble slightly with laughter, and she giggled, too. If there were any two less likely underage drinkers in the world, she would have loved to have seen them.
"That's an awful survival tactic," he said, his voice coming not quite even, and the smile not quite gone from his face, though he was clearly trying. "I think it's been proven that body heat is much better for-"
"Okay, okay!" With a flourish, Aoko threw half of the duvet over his lap, covering him and freeing herself in one move. She grinned at him, and he smiled, hesitantly, back. "But only because I want you to live long enough to see the fireworks," she added. "Obviously."
"Right," Saguru agreed with a nod, shifting closer; close enough that their sides were pressed together, and Aoko didn't even think to move away. "Of course."
At twenty-three fifty-six and two seconds, the fireworks started with a bang and squeal that startled Aoko so much that she ended up elbowing Saguru hard in the gut.
That was the thing about cuddling, really; with that sort of proximity, any sudden movements came with the chance that someone might get a black eye.
"Oof," he said. It was enough to have her fussing, twisting around with her hands palm up in front of her, tension in her fingers and no idea what to do with them. And then, "They're early?" he added, perking up a little. She apologised, face heating up, and sunk back into the position they'd been in before, relieved when he once again put his arm around her shoulders (a move that had been surprisingly smooth the first time, no fake-stretching necessary). Outside, where the sky had been black and clear just a moment ago, smoke was fading not too far away.
So there went the 'romantic first kiss at midnight' idea. The 'literal fireworks going off in the background' idea.
Maybe it was just as well, Aoko thought, glad Saguru couldn't see her frown. Injuring him during a kiss would have been twice as bad.
She settled down, fisting her hands in the duvet and bringing it up half-over her face, willing her body to be less awkward. Cuddling Saguru wasn't supposed to be awkward; she'd never imagined it being, and it was all her. He was taller than she was used to, and broader in the shoulders. His hands were warmer, and she liked that.
She liked everything, except...
Except that once again there was a quietness falling that no amount of their talking could fill, not really. There were gaps in conversations, moments of silence that felt so distinctly wrong and empty that Aoko wondered, sometimes, if Saguru, too, got the feeling that they were both waiting for someone else to speak.
Eight screaming rockets went up in quick succession. Stark orange lines, one by one shattering into an explosion of blue or white, vivid colour that began to fizzle just as the next appeared. She didn't have to think any more; they were mesmerising. Not as much as they were up close, but being indoors and warm and able to appreciate the beauty without a crowd of hundreds struggling to do the same thing...
...but not until midnight...
Saguru had picked up his watch again, as though he actually needed to double-check.
She said it for him, mumbling into the duvet. "...They're not coming from the park."