A Pale White Nape
"No, it's just... I feel like I'm watching a live-action romance drama right in front of my eyes."
"Exactly, Ueda! You acted so indifferent this morning, but this is pure youth!"
The teasing remarks from Kenji and Suzuki, typical of high school boys, flew across the table.
Staring intently at the menu, I suddenly gasped as a shiver of embarrassment ran down my spine.
...Huh?
Is... is that so?
Is that how we look to other people right now?
At first, I hadn't thought much of it when Shun offered to read the menu for me.
But hearing Suzuki and the others say that suddenly brought reality crashing back in.
Slide—
...O-Our shoulders are touching!
And since when did we get this close?!
Through our changed casual clothes, Shun's shoulder brushed against mine, teasingly close.
That faint friction vividly transmitted the high body temperature characteristic of a teenage boy.
This posture, sitting side-by-side and peering into the menu together.
Even though we were clearly sitting on the same bench, our eye levels were completely different.
Thump! Thump!
H-He's a whole head taller than me.
Is this what they call a heart-fluttering height difference?
Gulp. I swallowed hard without realizing it.
What if Shun suddenly hugged me from behind right now?
My entire body would easily fit right into his broad chest.
If he wrapped my waist with those toned forearms I saw during cleaning duty, I wouldn't even be able to resist.
And on top of that...
His hands are so huge...
Shun's hand, holding the corner of the menu alongside mine, came into view.
In stark contrast to my pale, slender fingers...
His hand was rugged, with thick knuckles and prominent veins.
Even though he was supposed to be a high schooler of the same age, his hands felt strangely adult...
"I-I'm sorry, Raon-yang! I tripped... Are you hurt anywhere...?!"
"..."
"That incident" from barely an hour ago automatically replayed in my head.
Those large, rough hands...
Squeezing my breast...
Ugh...! D-Don't think about it!
Thump-thump! Thump-thump!
I could feel the blood rushing straight to my face.
My ears burned so hot I felt like I was going to explode any second.
"You guys," Shun chimed in from beside me, his voice sounding slightly exasperated as he scolded Kenji and Suzuki. "It's fine if you're teasing me, but when there's a girl around, at least show some respect for personal space."
His low, nonchalant tone felt like a bucket of cold water being poured over my head.
...What? Was I the only one who cared?
I sneaked a glance at Shun's profile.
He was flipping through the menu with a completely stoic, unbothered expression.
Un-believable!
My heart drops every time our shoulders touch, my chest thumps at the difference in our hand sizes, and my head is spinning just thinking about that perverted accident from earlier...
And this guy is totally fine even while pressed right up against me?
Even with me, a prefecture-wide SSS-class beauty who could easily be the center of an idol group, right next to him?
It's not fair that I'm the only one embarrassed!
An inexplicable wave of stubbornness and frustration welled up inside me.
I stealthily tilted my head up a bit to examine Shun's face more closely.
And then...
...Huh?
Contrary to his stoic expression...
His ear, peeking out from beneath his dark hair, was flushed as red as a cherry tomato.
Oho? What's this, what's this?
He's totally conscious of me!
I barely managed to suppress the laugh bubbling up inside me.
He was acting like a cool guy on the outside, but on the inside, he was completely panicking!
In that instant, my mischievous streak flared up.
Isn't it human nature to want to tease someone even more when you see them getting embarrassed?
"Um, Ueda-kun. Is the Milanese Doria... this one?"
Equipping my softest, most demure tone.
I leaned my right shoulder, which was already pressed against him, just a tiny bit closer to Shun.
"Ah, you want to get the Doria, Raon-yang?"
The exact split second Shun's gaze naturally turned toward me.
Rustle—
I lightly swept back the jet-black hair draping over my right cheek with my fingers, tucking it gently behind my ear.
Since I couldn't break my pure and fragile concept...
I made sure it looked entirely like an unconscious habit while looking at the menu.
Yet, I angled it so that the nape of my neck was blatantly visible from Shun's perspective!
H-How's that?!
My pale, slender neck filling his entire field of vision.
The faint, sweet scent of shampoo wafting over as my hair shifted.
This was my ultimate finishing move, mobilizing sight, smell, and sound all at once!
Take that!
Can you still stay calm after this?!
"...?!"
It was super effective.
Shun's breath hitched visibly with a sharp gasp.
"Uh, huh? Ah...? I-I mean... the, the Doria? The Doria is..."
His pupils shook wildly.
Flushed bright red not just on his ears but all the way down his neck, Shun began to stammer and babble like a completely broken robot.
Nice! You saw it!
It was the exact moment I was about to cheer internally and flash a victorious smile.
Shun, who was frantically looking around to avoid my gaze...
And I, who had raised my head to gauge his reaction...
Met each other's eyes, dead-on, in midair.
"..."
"..."
It felt as if time had stopped.
The ambient noise of the family restaurant faded into a muffled, distant hum.
A distance so close our noses could almost touch.
Shun's dark eyes, filled with embarrassment, shyness, and an unconcealed, fresh flutter of excitement, captured me entirely.
The moment my pure and delicate face was reflected in those straight, intense eyes of a man...
Thump-thump-thump-thump! Thump-thump-thump-thump!
I was the one who started the prank.
I was the one who attacked.
But when I actually received that hot gaze head-on, my desire to tease him evaporated without a trace, like spring snow melting away.
Only the sound of my heart beating frantically inside my chest rang deafeningly in my ears.
Huh...?
Whoosh—
This time, my own face flushed so hot it felt like it would explode.
With all my composure completely shattered, I hurriedly buried my face deep into the menu.
O-Oh no...!
This is way, way more embarrassing than I thought...!!
"Um, Ueda-kun. Is the Milanese Doria... this one?"
Raon, who was pressed close against him, asked in a soft voice.
At her call, Shun turned his head without thinking.
"Ah, you want to get the Doria, Raon-yang?"
The moment he lowered his gaze while answering.
A single scene was imprinted onto Shun's retina in slow motion.
Rustle—
Raon, who had been peering seriously at the menu, unconsciously swept her falling, ebony hair with her hand and tucked it behind her ear.
As a result, the curtain of her hair parted...
And her pale white neck was defenselessly exposed.
"..."
Shun's breath hitched.
Raon's neck was—just as pale white as he had imagined.
And, even more than he had imagined—it was incredibly slender.
A texture so smooth not even a single peach fuzz could be seen. Skin as fair as a princess raised in a castle who had never once stepped into the sunlight.
A dizzying curve that swept down from beneath her ear along her slender neckline, leading into the collarbone inside her casual blouse.
The subtle scent of shampoo that wafted over as her hair shifted paralyzed his sense of smell, and the stimulating beauty revealed before him completely dominated his vision.
Was a human neck... always a body part that could look this beautiful?
Such a stupid thought flashed through his mind for an instant.
Why vampires in subcultures like manga and movies always buried their lips so greedily in girls' necks as if possessed to suck their blood...
He felt like he could understand that impure, irrational sentiment just a tiny bit now.
After all, if someone shoved something so flawlessly dazzling and defenseless right in front of your face, anyone would instinctively have their gaze stolen away.
No, wait. Stop. My eyes, my brain.
An alarm.
Shun's reason belatedly rang its emergency sirens frantically.
He had to look away immediately.
He had already committed an irreversible, catastrophic accident by touching her breast on the narrow floor of his room barely an hour ago.
But if he got caught staring intently at a girl's neck like this in the middle of a family restaurant?
That would solidify him as an undeniable pervert beyond any shadow of a doubt.
I can't get caught. Absolutely, definitely not...!
Shun's reason understood this perfectly.
Thus, it relentlessly issued commands to his brain and eyes to turn his gaze away.
However...
Shun's eyes and brain were, in a sense, completely transparent.
They willingly traded their host's social standing for their own desires.
What could he do?
In the end, those traitors were also components that made up the human being known as "Ueda Shun."
Please, please listen to me! We're seriously screwed if this keeps up!!
No, you bastards—!!
It was useless. He had absolutely no control.
Shun felt a dizzying vertigo rush over him like an incoming tide.
His gaze was glued so tightly it was as if it had been stuck with superglue.
Sensing a group project with no hope of passing, Shun's soul began packing its bags to run away again.
Only his poor mouth, which hadn't joined the union strike, kept working.
But sadly, the mouth is a collaborative organ that absolutely requires the assistance of the brain.
"Uh, huh? Ah...? I-I mean... the, the Doria? The Doria is..."
Deprived of the brain's support, Shun's mouth spewed out words under extreme tension that were worse than verbal diarrhea.
Sensing his strange behavior, Raon tilted her head from the menu and turned toward Shun.
Ah.
In that split second, their gazes locked in midair.
"...?"
Her eyes widened slightly in confusion, as if asking what was wrong.
A mysterious color blending purple and blue, like twilight dusk captured inside a glass marble.
Meeting Raon's pure, clear eyes head-on, he felt an illusion as if his very soul was about to be sucked in.
Thump, thump, thump.
Shun's heart hammered so wildly it felt like it would shatter his ribs.
How many seconds of suffocating silence had passed?
"...!!"
Raon's pupils, which had been staring blankly into his, shook violently.
It seemed she had belatedly realized that her action of tucking her hair back had completely exposed her neck, and exactly where Shun's gaze had been directed.
Whoosh—
Raon's cheeks,
and her neck, which had been so pale white just a moment ago,
flushed a deep, brilliant red—like a ripe, juicy cherry.