Chapter Text
They had been dating for quite a while now. Heck, they were engaged – technically, that is.
Months have passed, and still Takagi had yet to tell her that the band of silver she had been wearing on her finger was not just some random gift. For him, the ring was a promise of love, of a life they could start and share together as one. But for her, it may have been only a harmless piece of jewelry that she'll eventually tuck away in a drawer, forgotten forever.
Letting her know was the least of his concerns at that moment, though. It had been a tough day at work, what with all the developments the Metropolitan Police Department had been having in tracking down one of the biggest narcotics dealers in the country. In fact, they had just found a few millions worth of heroin in a suspected storage house that day while investigating an unrelated case. Professing all his love for Sato was the last thing on his mind.
Takagi idly made his way back to his car, looking very much forward to plopping down on his bed and drifting off to some faraway place. He couldn't wait to get home.
"Hey, Takagi-kun!"
Or maybe he could.
All the tiredness he had been feeling seemed to have vanished at the sound of her voice. He looked up to see Sato's head peering out of one of the building's windows. He could not help but notice that even from afar, she still looked so beautiful.
"Wait up!" she exclaimed before shutting the window and disappearing from sight. He wondered how she always seemed so full of energy even after a long day such as that one. Unlike the rest of them, she was literally a ball of fire. It was amazing, really.
He could hear the clacking of her high heels as she ran down the stairs. After a few moments, she finally reached the parking lot. As she paused to catch her breath, a question popped into Takagi's mind.
"How do you even run in those things?" Takagi asked half-jokingly, pointing at her shoes.
"It's pretty easy if you practice well enough," she simply replied with a matching wink.
"Think you can teach me sometime?"
The second he realized what he had said, he instantly felt the urge to hit himself with a wooden plank. Or anything else that was hard enough to knock him out of consciousness, for that matter. Crap, did I just say that out loud?
Her laughter confirmed his thoughts. A blush crept onto his cheeks as he stared down at the concrete of the parking lot, just as he had always done in times like these. Unknown to him was that she found this knee-jerk response of his extremely adorable. If only he had chosen to keep his gaze straight, then he would have seen that she, too, had put on a slight shade of crimson on her own cheeks.
He was so preoccupied with what he had said that he almost jumped in surprise when she patted his shoulder. "Good job earlier, Takagi-kun!"
Sato figured that a change of topic was needed. The poor guy looked like he was going to pass out!
"T-thanks," he replied, amidst stuttering. "But I didn't do all the work, you know."
"Didn't do all the work? You practically nailed it!" she was quick to disagree. "I never would've even thought of checking behind the closet," she added reassuringly, seeing that he seemed to be unconvinced.
"I saw it in a movie once," he lied, scratching the back of his neck sheepishly.
While he enjoyed being complimented as much as the next person, he was not exactly a fan of being in the spotlight. He was raised to be modest, after all. Sato, however, believed otherwise. He was an amazing guy all around, yet he seemed to have no idea at all. But she also knew that there was no use making a fuss about it.
Sato shrugged. "Whatever you say."
They stood in silence for a moment, making Takagi feel very uncomfortable. His uneasiness intensified when Sato raised a rather questioning eyebrow.
"Are you feeling all right?"
"O-of course I am! Why wouldn't I be, erm, fine?"
"You've been staring at my hand the whole time we’ve been talking," she pointed out, in a tone as awkward as the smile now drawn on his lips.
"Well, I surely wasn't looking at your ring," he blurted out.
Sato sighed as realization dawned on her. "If you want your ring back, you can just tell me, you know," she said pointedly.
"No, no! Keep it, it's yours!" he declined, shaking his head furiously.
This only made her more suspicious. The fierce look in her eyes made Takagi wish for the ability to faint at will once more.
"You're hiding something..." He opened his mouth to offer what he was pretty sure was the weakest of protests, but Sato cut him off before he could. "…and don't you dare deny it, because I have an intuition with these sorts of things. I just know it. Now, tell me, what is it with you and this ring?"
Takagi swallowed hard. Sato was waiting, and it was now or never. "T-that ring. It's, uh, uhm," he began, fumbling in his mind for just the right words. "…you know when two people are deeply, madly, crazily in love with each other? And how if they've been that way for a while, they start to think about the future? That it's about time to, erm, level up, I mean, move on to the next stage, and-"
"Yes," she cut him off for the second time that night.
"What?"
"I said yes. Of course, I'll marry you."
Sato did not give him time to reply. She closed the distance between them, capturing his lips with her own in an unmistakable kiss. Before he completely lost his sense of the world, his mind drifted to his previous attempts at subtly dropping the hint: the wedding magazine he "accidentally" left on her desk, the cheesy romance flick he took, or rather, forced her to see the other week, the conversations about his recently engaged imaginary cousin. It all seemed so silly now.
Maybe she wasn't as dense as he thought she was.