Chapter Text
In Tokyo, a city known for its culture and cuisine, restaurants were everywhere. It was a city where you could have convenience store ramen for lunch and then a 15 course omakase tasting menu for dinner. Some restaurants lasted mere months while others went on to become Tokyo staples, tourist traps or something special. This restaurant was one of the few that became special.
Nanami Kento had always dreamed of creating something special. Not a legacy but something that would bring him happiness or merely contentment for the rest of his days. It was why he left his stable job in finance to go to culinary school. It was why he blew almost all his life savings on opening his restaurant. And it was why he met you.
Before you, Nanami would've said that he didn't believe in fate. That his decision to upend his life and financial stability were carefully calculated risks that paid off. He worked hard in finance. He worked even harder in the kitchen. But he didn't work to meet you. You weren't a risk. You were something entirely else. And even after four years of working together, he could never quite describe you. Nor could he quite describe the feelings that bloomed in his chest whenever you looked at him as you burst into the kitchen holding out an order ticket. Or when you playfully shoved him as you locked up together and your body brushed against his for a moment.
Was it respect? Maybe it was admiration? Or affection? It certainly wasn't lust. That's not to say that he hadn't thought about what your lips would feel like on his but lust wouldn't linger like the thoughts of you did. And since he'd been feeling this way for quite some time, he was certain that it was something more.
And with steely resolution, he made up his mind to do…absolutely nothing.
"Wait." Suguru said incredulously, "You're not going to make a move?"
Nanami nodded.
"So to be clear, you just told all of us that you've had the hots for her since she started working here and you're not going to pursue it." Satoru matched Suguru's incredulity, his eyebrows shooting up to meet his hairline.
Sighing as he continued chopping vegetables, Nanami spoke, "It's not like I don't want to-"
Gojo cut across, "Either you want to or you don't, Nanamin."
"What's the worst that could happen?" chimed in Shoko.
Nanami dropped the knife with a clatter, "It's not so simple. For one, I'm her boss."
"You two are basically best friends."
"I'm older than her."
"By three years, not thirty."
"I don't want to make her work environment uncomfortable if she's not interested."
"Everyone can tell that she likes you back."
Nanami shut his eyes in frustration and took a breath before facing his incredibly pushy friends, "I get that you all want to help but let's be serious. She's intelligent, outgoing and beautiful. She's the life of this restaurant. And I'd rather have her here as an employee than lose the spirit of this place. So asking her out is entirely out of the question. It's better this way."
"How is it better when you're agonizing everyday over your unrequited love for her?" Satoru overemphasized the word with a cheeky grin at Nanami.
This was one of those moments where he regretted coming to his friends, with his problems, though friend was often a strong choice of term for his relationship with Satoru. Nanami had always moved slowly. He was careful and restrained, believing it better to take his time than rush into decisions. Which is an excellent trait unless one is surrounded by outgoing irrational idiots which he was. While he had been friends with Gojo, Geto and Shoko since their teenage years, in all that time, they never seemed to understand that Nanami was incapable of laying his heart on the line recklessly.
While they'd spent college having flings, getting drunk and partying, Nanami spent his days in the library studying with a long term girlfriend. When he'd made the decision to go to culinary school, it was the closest he'd ever come to a rash decision until he decided to open the restaurant. He didn't dive in, he dipped his toes in the water first. The only person who ever truly understood him was Haibara and he wasn't here now so he was stuck telling his relationship issues to the overgrown manchild known as Gojo.
Nanami knew he should've been grateful for the help they were trying to provide but couldn't find it within himself to be. Of course he didn't want to push aside his feelings for you. He wanted nothing more than to draw you into his arms and confess to you that you'd lived in his heart since the first month you started working here and that if he had to live one more day without being yours, he'd combust. But it was necessary that he didn't.
You were more than a waitress. You held the place together. You resolved arguments, treated burns and cuts, mentored the younger workers, knew how to calm even the most irrational of customers. You'd be the first one in and the last one out if you needed to be. You'd come in from your nights off detailing your wild escapades. Compared to you, Nanami was boring stoic beige while you lived in full color and he couldn't imagine forcing you to be with someone like him.
Shaking off his thoughts, Nanami resumed cutting, "I'm fine with things how they are right now." The steady thud of the knife hitting the cutting board a soothing melody to his irritation.
Suguru came to stand next to Nanami, slinging an arm across his shoulders, "We just want you to be happy Kento."
Gojo and Shoko chimed in with various statements of agreement and for a second Nanami felt almost guilty for thinking that they didn't understand him. But those thoughts were broken the second that the wide double doors to the kitchen swung open and you burst in wrestling with your scarf. The world faded to you and only.
Your dark curly hair was dusted with a light layer of snow from the biting winter outside and the tip of your nose was red. He immediately knew that you'd forgotten your hat again. But as you bounded up to him, chestnut eyes sparkling in the kitchen fluorescents, he didn't have the heart to scold you. And as unethical as it sounds, if you got a teensy sick, he would have an excuse to make your favorite soup for you.
"Kento, thank goodness you're here. I need your help" You let out breathlessly.
Despite the mild temperature in the kitchen, Nanami found himself warming inside. You needed his help. It was one of his favorite things to hear from you. Not because he wanted you to be dependent on him but simply because he wanted to do anything he could to make your day easier. He wanted you to have the easiest life imaginable and he wanted to be the one to make it happen for you.
He, of course, didn't say this. Instead, he wordlessly set down his knife and briskly washed his hands in a nearby sink. As he drew close to you and he began to deftly untie the scarf you'd somehow managed to knot too tightly around your neck, you smiled up at him and his world stopped. To say you had the most beautiful smile he'd ever seen would be an understatement. You were just radiant when you smiled. And at moments like this when your smile was for him and only him, it was everything. He didn't smile much but he smiled back at you with a warmth that he reserved for you and only you.
When the scarf fell loose around your shoulders, he whispered, "There you go." Giggling, you flung your arms around him, squeezing hard and fast, "Thank youuu Kento, you're a lifesaver."
He waved away your praise, "Yeah yeah just stop trying to choke yourself to death. I can't lose my favorite waitress."
You feigned offense, "That's all I am to you huh? A waitress?"
"A damn good waitress."
He lived for these little moments of banter with you. And when you looked at him, your rosy lips contorting into a perfect pout, it melted his heart and made him want to kiss it off your face.
"Well this damn good waitress is off to get ready for opening so I'll see you around Kento." And with that you skipped out of the kitchen, waving goodbye at him.
Nanami stared at you as you left, eyes filled with wonder. You'd been with him for no more than two minutes and yet that time had been the best time of his entire day. God you were really something.
"She's gone, you can stop giving her goo goo eyes now." Satoru's voice broke him out of his reverie and he flushed red.
"I wasn't giving her goo goo eyes Gojo."
"Rightttttt" chimed in Shoko, "You were just staring at her wistfully with a heart full of yearning."
"I-I wasn't yearning." He protested weakly. It was hard to deny. It was incredibly obvious. He was yearning. Pining. Longing. Whatever verb you used, he was doing it. And he never wanted to stop.
Satoru strode up and sat on one of the prep tables near to him, a smirk playing on his lips. This was not good. Satoru often reminded Nanami of Loki: handsome but devilish and mischievous. And whenever he started smirking, it often meant he was cooking up what was most likely a ridiculous and harebrained scheme that would result in disaster.
"I have a proposal, Nanamin." Satoru asked, his voice sickly sweet like the kikufuku he enjoys so much.
Proposal? Nanami couldn't say he wasn't intrigued but he also couldn't say that he was excited.
"Go on."
"It's December 12th. Which means after today there's 12 days before Christmas and when the restaurant closes for the holidays right?"
Nanami nods.
"Well the rest is easy, you get the twelve days of Christmas to ask her out. If by Christmas Eve, you've mustered up the courage to tell her how you feel, then I'll stop annoying you for three months." Gojo says, that lazy smirk still on his face.
"And if I don't?"
"You'll gets me sweets every week for three months."
Three months free of Gojo's incessant annoyances sounded like heaven but was it worth laying his heart on the line. You didn't know it but you had the power to ruin him. And if you did, you would still have his affection after. It was a risk. The biggest one he'd ever taken in his life.
"Were you even worth it?" He thought briefly before dismissing the notion entirely. If he'd only found you beautiful, he may have entertained the notion. But you…you were something so all encompassing that you possessed all of him with a single look. You weren't just beautiful. You were charming and charismatic, sensitive and empathetic, thoughtful and kind. You were everything.
And everything is definitely worth it.
So steeling himself for what would be the biggest risk he'd ever take, Kento looked Satoru square in the eye, "I'll do it."