Chapter Forty: Late Night Phone Call:
December 20th, 2010.
10:58 p.m.
Kyosuke stared
at his phone. Things should be better, right? Still, he didn’t feel right. He
and April still worked together. They did talk to each other. But…
I love her.
Kyosuke pulled
up his messages. He tapped for the composer.
Hey there. I’m sorry to bother you this late, but can we talk? I really like
you.
He deleted the
last line before hitting send. Kyosuke didn’t expect much out of tonight. Maybe
she would respond days later. Kyosuke put down his phone and went to bed.
Moments later,
his phone rang.
Kyosuke reached
around for his cell.
“Hello?” he
asked, half-asleep.
“Kyosuke?” a
woman’s voice asked. “It’s me, April. I just got your text. What do you want to
talk about?”
“Text?” Kyosuke
narrowed his eyes, confused.
“Yeah. You
wanted to talk to me about something. What is it?”
It donned on him
what April was talking about. Kyosuke sat up like a bullet. “Uh…”
“Are you okay?”
“Uh, well…”
Kyosuke didn’t expect a quick response. Now, he struggled to speak. He rubbed
the back of his head.
“Uh… Well… I
like you. Really like you.”
“Kyosuke…”
“No, listen! I
am terrible at this. I… I… I suck at confessions. I do like you. I really do.”
The other line
was silent. The Japanese shinigami’s stomach dropped. He shut his eyes, waiting
for her to hang up.
“Okay…” she
said. Kyosuke opened his eyes.
“That all?” he
asked.
“I don’t know
what to say to that.”
Kyosuke frowned.
“Don’t you like me?” Another pause on the other line.
“Well… I don’t
like you.”
“Huh?”
“Oh, bugger.
You’re doing it again!”
“Doing what?”
April screamed
on the other line. “Damn it! Why do you always mess with my head like this?”
Kyosuke had a
blank look on his face. “I don’t know what you are talking about.”
“Never mind.”
“So… What does
that mean for us?”
“Us?”
“Yeah.” The
whole time he expected her to hang up on him. Probably would’ve been easier.
This… This…
“Look,” Kyosuke
said. “I apologize for calling you so late. Forget I said anything.”
“Kyosuke.”
“What?”
“I’m coming over
by your place.”
“Wait, what?”
“I will be there
in ten minutes.”
“April… -san?”
Kyosuke lowered his phone as the other line beeped.
“What did I just
do?” he asked himself. “I don’t feel so good…” He looked out in the darkness of
his room.
Too late now…