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The freezing gust of wind should’ve made me shiver, but my body was too numb. I couldn’t tell how long I had been wandering around in the freezing cold or where I was. The heavy snowfall had made me lose track of time and location and my fingers were too cold to be recognized by my phone – not that I could still move them anyway. I tried to look up, to look for a street sign, but to no avail. The snow was too heavy and forced me to look on the ground again.
Though my body was numb from the cold, my mind was not. Thoughts and memories were still running around my head. Thoughts of how happy I had been with him. Thoughts of how much I loved him. Memories of our first date. Memories of the first time he told me he loved me. How much of it had been lies? Everything? Almost two years had gone down the drain when I had found him with her in his bed, covered in sweat and flushed faces. She had her legs wrapped around his hips, sitting in his lap. Her arms had wrapped around his neck, pulling him into a deep kiss. Just like I had so many times.
Right in that moment my mind had gone blank, numb. My heart refused to believe what my eyes saw in front of me. My legs wouldn’t move, I was grown on the ground, staring at them blankly. Only on the edge of my consciousness did I notice them jumping out of the bed and getting dressed. The second he had touched me, pleading to forgive him, my muscles obeyed me again and I turned around and left him. Forever.
“Shit. Are you okay? You’re gonna freeze to death out here!” A voice called, clearly worried.
I snapped out of my daze. Blurred, gray sneakers stood before my feet, shoes tips only inches away from each other. Sometime in my thoughts my feet had stopped walking, so I had just been standing there, staring into the void.
“Trust me, okay? I’ll take you somewhere to warm up, okay? I’m sorry. I promise, I’m not trying to kidnap you, okay?” The person jumped around me like a flushed chicken.
Still not really looking at anything, I lifted my head and glanced at the person in front of me and slowly my focus returned. He seemed to be around my age, black and silver hair was hidden beneath a red beanie. Light blue denim fabric took over my field of vision as he wrapped a scarf around my neck.
“What were you thinking, going out into this snowstorm without a scarf. Now, come. It’s just across the street.”
My vision followed his outstretched arm across the street and my heart skipped a beat. The place he was pointing at, was the restaurant my ex and I had frequently visited. But it looked closed. I turned my head back to the boy.
Faintly I felt a grip on my elbow. “Come on.”
My body was still too cold, too numb to resist. He looked left and right before crossing the street, softly pulling me with him. Completely ignoring the sign saying closed, he pulled the doors and surprisingly, they weren’t locked. He just walked into a closed restaurant. Was this legal? But I was given no more time to wonder about that when the familiar scent of onigiri and tea hit my nose and I froze on the spot. It brought back so many memories of him. Memories of the times he had brushed away some rice from the corner of my mouth with his thumb, memories of the times he had taken a playful bite of my onigiri, claiming my taste in the filling was disgusting.
“Myaa-sam!”
A groan was heard. “Bokuto, I swear to god, I’m closed. You’re not getting free onigiri again–” The other voice stopped itself. “Sit her down. I’ll make some tea.” Another groan. “Not the chair! Take the bench, you idiot! That’s more comfortable.”
“I’m sorry, I have no idea what to do!” I was led to one of the tables and softly pushed onto the leathery seat. “Should we call an ambulance? ‘Cause I was just meant to drop off our order for next week and Meian’s gonna kill me if I come back late.”
“I’m fine.” The words left my lips before my mind realized it. My gaze was fixed on the table’s grain in front of me.
One of the guys sighed. “If by fine you mean just barely warm enough to not be in danger of dying by hypothermia, then yes you are fine.” He sighed again. “Fine, Bokuto. Give me the papers and go, I got this.”
The one who had brought me in, ran off to the door. “I owe you! But don’t forget about Atsumu’s special request!”
“I will make everything as it’s written on this sheet of paper. If that moron of a brother forgot to write down his requests, he can go screw himself!”, the other one yelled after him, but he was already out the door. “Maybe I should start supporting the Adlers instead”, he mumbled, before coming over to my table with a cup of tea in his hands. “Here, I put some sugar in it, because it helps with warming you up, but I’m not sure if it’s too sweet now.”
My pale fingers reached out for the warm cup timidly. “Thank you.” The aroma of green tea filled my nose and helped me relax a bit and find the courage to continue. “I’m sorry for bothering you, I won’t stay for long. I know you’re closed right now.”
Warm fingers brushed the cold back of my hand. “Don’t worry about that, okay? You can stay here for as long as you need. I don’t want you to go out there again too soon.” He cleared his throat. “This is gonna sound weird, but it’s better to take off cold or wet clothes and I have a sweater to spare, if you want it...”
“Thank you.”
The hand vanished from my vision and I faintly recognized him going to the back, before he came back half a minute later with a black sweater in his hands. “For you. I’ll be in the kitchen for a bit. If there’s anything, just call for me, okay? And the bathroom’s–”
“I know.”
In the corner of my eye, I saw him disappear behind the counter into the kitchen and I took the time to look around. My ex and I had come here frequently, often at least every other week, but since I had found him cheating on me, I hadn’t been here once. The furniture and decorations were the same. The left wall was still made of the same old, natural stones, the black leather of the booths complimenting the cozy aura. The right wall was still the same glass front as the front side, the same booths aligned along it. And in the middle were still smaller iron tables and chairs scattered around. But while this hadn’t changes, the atmosphere had. Something was different. It felt cold, as if the coziness had left. If it was because the lights were off and radiated an atmosphere of being closed, or because all the warm and happy feelings I felt here had been a lie, I didn’t know.
Slowly the numbness left my limbs and the cold of my clothes crept up my skin. With a sigh, I took off my jacket and pulled my own sweater over my head. The fabric of the black sweater was warm and soft and smelled like the green tea in front of me. I was just pulling it over my head when I heard footsteps.
“Hey, do you have someone to take you ho...me?”
I ran my fingers through my hair in hopes of fixing the mess on my head a little, before looking at him for the first time that day. It took me a second to recognize him as the guy I had often seen behind the counter, because his typical cap was missing and didn’t hide his gray hair. He had never served my ex and me, but he brought up the food up to the counter so the server could bring it to the appropriate table. The deadpan expression on his face worried me. “I’m bothering you, aren’t I? I’m sorry, I’ll leave–”
Hurt flashed over his features as he pleaded, “No! Please! It’s alright, you’re not bothering me.” His face turned red. “I just didn’t expect you to change here.” He cleared his throat before continuing, “When I said you can stay as long as you want, I meant it. I just asked because I don’t want you to go out there into the snowstorm alone.”
“Thank you, uhm...”
“Osamu, but just Samu’s fine too.” When he smiled at me, I managed to put at least a small smile on my lips too. A beeping coming from the kitchen attracted our attention. “I’ll be right back.” With that he disappeared into the kitchen again and I took a sip from my tea which was lukewarm by now.
A few minutes later, Osamu returned with a bunch of onigiris on a plate in his hand and placed them in front of me. “Is your tea cold? Do you want another one?”
I was about to decline, but he had already gone behind the counter again, so I grabbed one of the onigiri and nibbled on the rice. Its taste reminded me of the countless times I had bitten into it while smiling at my ex.
“I’ll try to not take this personally”, Osamu said with a chuckle, when he placed two more cups on the table and took a seat across from me. “I mean, I know it’s a weird combination for a filling, but I figured you might like it. If not, I’ll gladly eat them all by myself.”
To say I was confused would be an understatement. His wording made me think something was up. “A weird combination?”
The cheeky grin he placed on his lips only confused me more. “I won’t tell you what it is, you gotta taste for yourself. Now stop nibbling on the rice and get to the filling.”
He would stand by his word, that much I could tell, so I did as he told me and took a heartfelt bite of the onigiri. My eyes widened in surprise when the familiar taste of salmon and squid touched my tongue. It was exactly the special combination I had ordered whenever I had come here. It wasn’t specifically listed on the menu, but the individual fillings had been and the first time I figured it didn’t hurt to ask. “How did you...?”
“I’ll take the risk of standing there like a creep, but you know, when you open a restaurant and on the first day someone orders something that’s not on the menu, you get curious. Especially if it’s an odd combination. So, when I brought it to the counter, I waited to see who had ordered such an abomination.” He laughed. “In my whole life, I had never been so nervous for feedback but you looked happy when you bit into it. And then you came back. Regularly.”
I choked on a grain of rice. “I’m sorry, I offended you and your art of cooking.”
He smiled at me warmly. “You didn’t. To be honest, it’s one of my favorite memories and I always looked forward to making you another one. I missed it, actually.”
My heart clenched at his sad expression. “It wasn’t your food. The reason I didn’t return one day.” My grip on the cup tightened, thinking about the reason I had stayed away. “It’s just... I used to come here with my that guy, because we dated, but we broke up a few months ago and I couldn’t stand to get confronted with all the happy memories I made here with him, when I learned he lied to me. Every smile of his, every touch of him, I would question if all of it was a lie. I would question what he was thinking when sitting here with me. Were his thought filled with her saying his name, while I looked at him, dreaming of moving in with him?” Tears burned behind my eyes and I shut my eyelids to keep them from falling down my cheeks, but one escaped and rolled down. “It’s been a few months and I think it’s getting better, but for some reason today was a particular bad day.”
“And then comes that damn owl with frosted tips and brings you right here, twisting the knife in the wound.” Soft fingers brushed over my cheek, wiping the single tear away. “I’ll spit in his tea the next time.”
A laugh bubbled up my throat. “Owl with frosted tips? That’s a good one.”
My heart raced at the loving gaze he threw me and his thumb still lingering over my cheek. “I like it.”
“What?”
“Your laugh.” Heat shot up my face and I was sure I was visibly flustered. “You said, you avoided this place because of the associations with that ex, but would you be willing to add some others with someone else, so you remember the emotions come from the person you’re with and not the place you’re at? No pressure of course, I get if it’s too early, the wound still too fresh.”
I raised a questioning eyebrow. “Are you asking me out?”
He shrugged with a cheeky grin. “Maybe. If your answer is a yes, then I am asking you out. If your answer is no, then I was asking for that owl with frosted tips.”