Not That Kind of Romance (2)
He retreated as she advanced. Benny took one step, Nathan one step back. Eventually Nathan found himself backed against the door, where his hand closed around the knob without thinking. Click. Click. Locked.
The heat that had flooded his head faded in an instant. Nathan felt ice crawl down his spine.
“Go on, then. Try breaking the door down and leaving again.”
It wasn’t encouragement. It was a dare. A threat delivered with overwhelming force, the kind that somehow reminded him of Aspen. She was coming closer. That elf approached with every ordinary step heavy with a terrifying seduction.
But the fear lasted only a moment. What replaced it was a beauty so perfect it defied belief.
The room’s soft lighting caught on the metal plates of her prosthetic limbs hanging everywhere. The reflected glow slid across her smooth skin and the curves beneath. The elven artisan looked as though she were strolling through starlight itself.
Benny peeled Nathan’s fingers from the doorknob one by one. Warmth passed between their fingertips. Her husky sigh brushed across the skin just below his sternum.
“After all the help you gave me these past few days, couldn’t you at least listen before you run off?”
A logic that left no room for argument. She had to bring up the debt.
Nathan, still wrestling with himself, gave a stiff nod. His face felt frozen.
“In case you were worrying about that, I’ll add that I’ve never done this with any other patient. I’ve mustered quite a lot of courage here, you know. Won’t you spare a little thought for my pride?”
Benny lifted his faintly glowing left hand until it was level with her eyes, studying it like some curious artifact. It was only natural. The arm had regrown where nothing had been; of course it was miraculous.
When Nathan had shown them the new limb earlier that day, Benny and the rest of the Graveyard House family had been genuinely shocked.
“I had that kind of daydream. Since you were missing an arm, I thought you might need maintenance like the Nico twins and come by often. Then maybe I could slowly repay what this world had unfairly taken from you. The loss of your arm, the loss of your soul. Just like I healed the wounds of the other Eleim in Graveyard Valley, I thought we might grow closer that way, little by little. But you ran off as if you needed none of it. Straight down a road that could kill you at any moment.”
Benny stroked each knuckle, bending and straightening the joints as though verifying their authenticity.
“And then you came back with a brand-new hand. The Miracle of humanity— isn’t it a little too convenient?”
“You sound almost disappointed it grew back.”
He had tried too hard to sound casual. The curt words slipped out, and Nathan inwardly flailed, unable to stuff them back in his mouth.
Benny narrowed her eyes and let out a soft giggle.
“A little? Still, if I had to choose between having it or not, I’m much happier with it.”
While she continued stroking his hand, Benny suddenly slipped his finger into her mouth. Nathan felt the world collapse.
“There’s a kind of warmth that can only be transmitted from skin to skin, you know.”
Hands clasped behind her back, teeth gently holding the tip of his index finger, she spoke using only her tongue and lips. It really was warm, just as she said. The coolness of the night made the heat stand out even more. And that moist, tickling sensation.
Nathan’s pupils trembled. He could have pulled away at any time. Yet he couldn’t move.
“Hmm. It just tastes like a finger. It was glowing faintly, so I wondered if it had some artificial sweetener mixed in.”
“You said… you said you’d only do it with words.”
“I’ll ask directly. Why are you acting like a married man who just fell into an affair? Weren’t you the one who got dumped?”
A sudden, blunt dose of reality. Strangely, Nathan felt grateful. His heart, which had been hammering like a drum, finally eased a little.
“Who told you that?”
Benny released his finger from her mouth.
“You admitted it faster than I expected. I thought pride might make you deny it. Who else? I heard it from you. During the emergency surgery. You were drenched in sweat, groaning, talking in your sleep. ‘I don’t like it, Aspen. Don’t tell me to go.’ ‘I shouldn’t have turned away back then. I should have asked again whether you ever truly cared for me.’ And so on. Wailing, whining.”
Cursing his own loose tongue, Nathan dropped his head. His face burned red for an entirely different reason than before. Any more blood and it felt like it would burst.
Chuuup. As if demanding his attention, Benny sucked hard on his finger.
Nathan jerked upright like he’d been hit with an electric rod in the Floating Arena. It really felt as if current were racing down his spine. The moist, soft tongue and the strange additional sensation blended together.
Having thoroughly soaked his index finger, Benny returned the hand to him with a satisfied look. Nathan yanked it back and saw her playfully sticking out her tongue. On the pink membrane rested an exquisitely detailed design. Lines formed from several intertwined characters. It resembled a heart. It also looked like a bird spreading its wings.
There had to be a reason she was showing it so deliberately.
“…It’s beautiful. What does it mean?”
“A philosophy of life. Hedonic. It means rejecting every constraint. Showing this tattoo is usually a quick way of saying I agree to all the things that would be tedious to explain in words. Those headache-inducing heavenly customs and laws piled up over a thousand years? My desires matter more than that rubbish. I want to live as I please and die before my time. Forget immortality. I’ll stake my life on romance. I will love. I will hate. I will take revenge. Following wherever my soul and heart lead, unbound by the yoke of law. Roughly that.”
“Uh… I like it.”
“Or, well. There’s also a slightly less serious, far dirtier meaning.”
Benny pulled her tongue back in and laughed like a mischievous child.
“It means ‘let’s fuck.’”
The words struck Nathan’s brain like a hammer. He had almost been moved, but the crisis swallowed him again. His hand flew back toward the doorknob. Click, click, click.
“When you said you were going to save Nilly, honestly I wanted to tie you up and keep you here. The reason I didn’t stop you more forcefully was because I’m Hedonic. Your attitude that it’s all right to risk your life for what must be done. Your lingering attachment to someone who was more than a friend but less than a lover. I don’t understand it, but it’s still part of you. As a Hedonic, I respected the Hedonic inside you, Nathan.”
It would have been a lie to say he understood easily. They had lived different lives in different worlds, after all. Instead Benny had chosen respect.
“But after I let you go, I soon realized my mistake. What about my Hedonic? Why should my romance have to yield to yours?”
Click, click, click, click.
Frowning, Benny finally slapped his hand where it gripped the knob. Nathan’s arm curled back like a mimosa leaf.
“The fact that you came back alive wasn’t purely because of your skill, was it? You received a lot of help, and far more luck than anyone could expect. Am I right?”
“…You are.”
“But if something similar happens again, you’ll risk your life again. So next time we might not even get the chance to argue like this. You only live once. There is no next time.”
Benny drew even closer. Her body’s curves and contours pressed against him until they fit together completely.
He thought desperately. Stay sane. She’s a centuries-old elf. In human years she’d be nothing but dust—
A flawless, plush texture brushed against him. It was nothing like Nathan’s skin, toughened by harsh living. Aside from the calluses on his hands from working with machines, Benny’s whole body felt like silk stuffed with cotton. In some ways she seemed younger than him. Dust? What dust. Nathan felt his mind beginning to fracture.
“I’m different from that Aspen girl you were calling for while you burned with fever. Are you afraid of becoming a burden because you don’t know when you’ll die? Ridiculous. When you don’t know when death will come, does that mean you should turn your back on desire? Shouldn’t you love more fiercely, with everything you have? If the world were ending tomorrow, would you fast? Wouldn’t it be more proper for a living being to taste everything they crave?”
Trapped between the door and Benny, Nathan’s face went dark. He couldn’t breathe. He tried not to think about the soft weight against him, or the dizzying scent like fruit soaked in honey.
“I don’t care about your complicated relationship. Even if you pretend nothing happened after tonight, even if you never look at me again, it’s fine. I liked your attitude toward life. So right now I’m going to devour you.”
Benny’s arms slid around his back. The movement wasn’t practiced. She was simply trying to increase the area where their skin touched. Yet it was more than enough to shatter the mind of a seventeen-year-old boy.
“For the hundreds or thousands of years I have left, this is better than spending them wishing I could come back to today. Even if I die tomorrow, the same holds true.”
They were touching. Every inch of them was in contact. It felt like a blood vessel in his brain might have burst. The stimulation was maddening. In the white roar inside his skull, Nathan finally caught hold of a clue.
The inexplicable anxiety and rage that had dogged him ever since he left the arena. He understood at last. It had all been because of himself.
His trembling hand seized Benny’s arm.
“Thank you. You’re right.”
And he pushed her away. Not harshly, but firmly.
Benny’s eyes widened in surprise. Sparks flashed in Nathan’s gaze as he looked down at her. Sweat rolled from his forehead, tracing his hairline and the curve of his nose. The gesture told her how difficult the decision had been.
Along with the sting of rejection, Benny felt a small flicker of satisfaction. If he had pushed her away too easily, her pride would have been wounded.
Nathan was remembering the things he thought he had lost. No—he hadn’t lost any of them. That he had never thought of her seriously? That they should each look after their own lives? If he couldn’t accept such a clumsy farewell, he simply didn’t have to. They were both still alive. Nathan and Aspen both. And as long as they lived, there was always another chance.
“If I might die tomorrow, I should love like someone who will die tomorrow. No, I must. Thank you. Thanks to you, my thoughts are clearer. I know what I have to do now.”
There was a better path than regretting that he hadn’t held onto Aspen. He understood it at last.
The two of them walked slowly away from the door. Only when enough distance opened between them did their bodies separate. Sweat dripped from the knight’s face. His breathing was ragged between his awkward smile. Self-control stretched to its limit.
Yet Nathan held on through sheer stubborn will.
“So… I’m sorry. I can’t.”
Benny stared blankly at his expression for a moment, then stepped back with a faint smile.
Nathan thought she had accepted the refusal. Yes, back off like that. Just a little more. I’m barely holding on.
As if she had read the thought, Benny retreated another few steps. A pang of guilt hit him—guilt for the resolve she had gathered, for the longing she would carry for the next several hundred years. It had been arrogant complacency.
“Yeah, don’t make me laugh.”
That expression hadn’t meant acceptance. After studying her carefully, Nathan finally understood. That hungry smile meant Benny’s patience had finally snapped.
As he swallowed hard and tried to step back again, Benny grabbed his collar in an iron grip.
“That face you just made… you looked so fucking horny.”
Their lips collided. Benny hurled her full weight forward, toppling Nathan. The lavender scent of her pink hair flooded his nose.
…If it was your first time, you could have at least said something.
There had been a little awkwardness at the start for a reason too embarrassing to revisit. Nathan had tried to apologize. But Benny showed no sign of minding.
Is that important? Did you dislike it?
The seductive elf narrowed her eyes, studied his face, and smiled. A smile brimming with victory and satisfaction. Then she buried her face in the blanket like a caterpillar and mumbled.
It’s fine as long as it felt good.
I liked it so much I thought I’d lose my mind too.
With those words that shook Nathan’s brain once more, Benny irresponsibly slipped off into dreamland, leaving only him behind in reality.
Two hours later, Nathan lay beside her, eyes bloodshot and wide open. His expression looked as if his soul had been shattered. His gaze was fixed on the ceiling. The bed, soaked in sweat, was slowly turning cold. The lingering heat from their bodies made the chill feel even sharper.
…Let’s not just lie here staring.
It had already happened. So before he came to his senses, maybe one more time…
No. That’s not it.
Nathan mentally readjusted his grip on the pen. It had already happened. Just as Benny said, he would neither regret nor agonize. What he needed to do now was sleep. Close his eyes and fall asleep properly, like her.
But his eyes refused to close. A persistent tickling, nagging sensation kept bothering him. Nathan frowned. What exactly was causing it? Excitement? Torment? Regret? Aspen?
The realization arrived slowly. This discomfort wasn’t only from inner turmoil. Nathan turned his head toward the side of the bed.
Amid the cozy scene of romantic lamplight and dancing mobile shadows, an incongruous pitch-black silhouette stood there. A man was looking down at him.
“You’ve got quite the luck.”
Cold water doused his hazy mind. Nathan started to bolt upright, then stopped himself. The man’s form was too deeply shrouded in darkness to make out clearly. He couldn’t be sure of the intruder’s armament. Nathan decided to keep only his body tense, ready to shatter the bones of any careless opponent the instant an opening appeared.
What he could see clearly was the man’s strangely awkward expression. The corners of his eyes twitched as though he truly hadn’t expected this.
“We are as bewildered as you are. The whole eastern Heavens has been turned upside down searching for you, yet here you are, comfortably enjoying a pleasant night. Your composure is excessive. You even killed a member of the royal family. Have you no worry at all about what will happen if that suspicion becomes known? This… isn’t it a little wrong? Are your nerves made of steel?”
Breaking in uninvited and then demanding common sense from others. A bleak wind brushed across Nathan’s skin. Only then did he realize he was wearing nothing. Fortunately he was tightly wrapped in the blanket, but so was Benny. Once he thought of that, the man’s presence became dozens of times more unbearable. Unconsciously Nathan pulled the blanket higher, up to his shoulders.
“Who are you?”
“We would be disappointed if you don’t remember. We have met before. In that abandoned building.”
The man who sighed tilted his head toward the bed. An elf’s characteristically youthful face. Chaotic lines drawn in white and black paint across his features. Nathan flinched. Aside from the long ears, the man looked almost identical to the abyss sorcerers of the Lower World.
“Ulukabo. Ulukabo of the rotting limbs.”