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The others left, leaving only Hokuto, Mai, another guy and me. I didn’t know the other guy’s name but he seemed fun too. He only wore a t-shirt and jeans. I thought he’d freeze in the cold night but he didn’t seem to even notice it.
We went into the foyer of the karaoke place, which was way too brightly lit for my liking. Loud, tinny pop music pumped over the speakers.
Hokuto did the talking while I checked out the basket of tambourines on a shelf near the counter.
“Let’s tambourine,” said Mai, standing beside me bouncing on her toes.
I grinned and then we high fived.
The four of us took a tiny elevator out to the 11th floor. Wow, that other guy could cut back on the aftershave a bit. The musky smell overwhelmed me in such a small space.
We went into a room with vinyl seats down two sides. There was a massive screen for the karaoke and some high-quality looking microphones.
A tablet type thing and a bunch of laminated menus sat on the heavy coffee table while disco lights reflected colors on the walls.
The place smelled of stale smoke and booze and maybe a little bit of vomit but I could ignore that. A private room just for the four of us? That seemed a helluva lot less embarrassing than singing in a bar.
“So, what’s with the free drinks? I asked.
Hokuto picked up an old-fashioned phone handset hanging on the wall. “What do you want?”
“We phone for drinks? You’re shitting me?”
He just grinned. “Beers all round?”
Sounded good to me. The other guy had put an old ‘90s song on. I knew it, I just couldn’t place who sang it. I picked up a microphone and joined him while Mai banged her tambourine not even bothering to keep time with the music.
The other guy had a good voice but he postured so much while he sang, I wasn’t sure if it was meant to be a joke or his usual style.
Before the song finished, someone turned up with a tray of drinks. This was the life, beer in one hand, microphone in the other. Only, I gave up my microphone to Mai when her song came on. Then Hokuto handed me the tablet thing so I could put on songs of my own.
A few songs in and somehow, we ended up having a drinking contest. Empty glasses littered the table and we’d gone onto drinking harder stuff. Those drinks had to be watered down, though, because they didn’t hit me at all. I was still as sober as I’d started. I mean, the words on the karaoke screen were getting harder to read and everything had a warm, fuzzy edge but I could handle that.
I won the drinking game. Or lost. I wasn’t sure of the rules but I got handed a shot glass that I scoffed down. It tasted sweet and syrupy.
The others all cheered me on.
“Mori, you’re so cool,” Hokuto said. “Fun Mori.”
I gave him the thumbs up and he shot me back a smile that zinged my heart.
Then I got up to go to the bathroom. I stumbled on the way out the door but righted myself. Mai laughed and I laughed back. It had been pretty funny.
When I returned, Hokuto was singing a Japanese song. Obviously, I didn’t know the song but he had an amazing voice. I curled into the corner of the bench, tempted to have a little snooze. Then Mai squeezed past me and knocked my phone off the table.
I jolted awake.
“Sorry,” I said, not sure why I apologized.
She handed me my phone and my glass.
“Drink more. It will keep you awake,” she said with a laugh.
The room seemed a bit spinny and the smell of that booze did weird things to my belly, not to mention all the sugar in the mixer. But I drank it down. I had more singing to do.
Then the phone rang.
“Our time’s up,” Hokuto said.
Four hours already? That’d gone too fast. I still had a heap of songs I wanted to sing.
“We should extend,” Mai said. “Two more hours.”
“Three hours,” the other guy said.
Hokuto looked at me. Hell yeah, I’d extend. More drinking. More singing.
Then I checked my phone. Was that the time? When had it got so late? Well, so early? I had to be at Yuki’s at 8am. That gave me two hours.
But I was having fun. Yuki was no fun and I’d just be sitting doing nothing when I got there. I could drink for two more hours then sleep it off when I got to her place. All this responsibility stuff didn’t suit me at all.
“Two hours,” I said. “Then I’ve got to go.”
Hokuto sat down, putting his arm around me.
“But you’re on holidays, right?” he said, his breath fluttering the hair near my ear. “You can stay out as late as you like. You don’t have to work.”
I sighed. “I have to meet someone.”
Hokuto moved his hand up to caress my head. The way his fingers moved through my hair felt so good.
“Text them and say you’ll meet later,” he said.
I looked at my dud phone. “I don’t even have a SIM card,” I told him. “I’m like a non-person since I came to Japan.”
“You don’t have a SIM,” Mai said. “We will get one when we go shopping.”
“Is that okay?” I asked. “You won’t feel like you’re babysitting me?”
Mai laughed. “It’s no trouble.”
Wow, I didn’t want to be overly sentimental or anything but a lump rose in my throat. Mai was so awesome. In the past few days, I’d forgotten what it was like to have someone want to hang out with me.
“Tell me more about your friends you’re meeting,” Hokuto asked.
I might’ve been a bit fuzzy headed and I might’ve been totally blissed out by the way he massaged my head but there was something in his questioning that seemed a little over keen. I moved back a little. I couldn’t exactly tell him about Yuki and Shun. And there was no way I’d tell him about a little man in a box who spoke to me.
“They’re just people who I hang out with,” I said. “It’s complicated.”
“They can’t be very good friends or they’d help you get your phone sorted out,” he said.
He reached down to where I held my phone in my hand, his fingers lightly tracing mine.
They weren’t my friends at all but I wasn’t going to tell Hokuto that. I wanted to change the subject but, more than that, I really wanted him to kiss me.
“You have such beautiful fair skin,” he said.
I almost snorted. All my life I’d been mocked about my lily whiteness. No matter what I did, I never tanned. He put his arm next to mine, comparing. That did nothing to convince me that my fair skin was anything good. The warmth of his skin tone made my color look almost blue in comparison. But, more importantly, he had the sexiest forearms I’d ever seen.
Then I looked into his eyes, those beautiful brown eyes framed with thick lashes. There’s no way I could refuse those eyes. I’d stay and drink with him. I’d still get to Yuki’s on time, if I ran.
I grabbed one of the drinks off the table. I wasn’t even sure which one was mine. Mai had stopped singing and had slumped in the corner, not far from sleep but the other guy belted out a power ballad.
“Of course, we could always go somewhere quieter,” Hokuto whispered in my ear.
I wasn’t sure about that. I mean, there was a whole part of me who wanted to go somewhere quieter. A holiday fling with a hot guy wasn’t something I’d say no to, but I hardly knew this guy.
“Maybe we should just hang out here for a while.”
But Hokuto took my hand and coaxed me from the room. Surely we couldn’t just leave like that, though.
Instead of leaving though, he took us out to a landing on the fire stairs. That landing was mighty small and the two of us had to huddle together.
I’d expected it to be dark outside but the cold morning hit us. That wouldn’t be flattering. I bowed my head, not wanting him to look at me in the harsh light.
He lifted my chin.
“You’re so pretty,” he said, running his finger along my jawline. “Can we meet some other time, just the two of us?”
Hell yeah we could. I nodded. He didn’t break eye contact with me and that eye contact had my belly flip flopping all over the place. His breath brushed my skin as his face moved closer.
My heart thudded as he put his arm around my waist.
This would be my first international kiss and it’d be with one of the hottest guys I’d ever met. Could things get any better?
As his lips brushed against mine, something touched my head. I tried to brush it away without breaking the kiss. We hadn’t even got to the tongue bit yet and his lips were the sweetest thing I’d ever tasted.
I grabbed something from my hair and had to break away for a minute. A black feather.
Feathers. What the hell?
“What’s that?” Hokuto asked.
“Nothing,” I said throwing it to the ground.
The crows cawed as though calling me a liar. Those damn crows could leave me alone.
Then I remembered my promise. That’d I’d listen to them if they warned me of danger, but was this a real danger or were those crows just cock blocking? How dangerous could one kiss be?
I bet they were just nagging me because they wanted me to go back home, like the horrible voice of my conscience.
I smiled at Hokuto, encouraging him to kiss me properly. Those crows could nag someone else. I’d make it back to Yuki’s, no problem. But I had time to fool around a bit first.
Hokuto ran his finger over my bottom lip. I could barely stand looking at him. He flooded me with emotion.
Then, just as he moved in to kiss me, the crows scooped. The cloud of black surrounded us.
“Get out of here, you damn crows,” I screamed. “Leave me alone.”
I tried to swat them away.
“Don’t worry about the crows,” I said. “I’ll get rid of them.”
The swatting didn’t work so I jumped up, swinging my arms in the air. That didn’t stop the crows though. They cawed and swooped. That was not normal. Hokuto stared at me like this was my fault. I’d get nowhere with crows attacking us.
“Go away,” I screamed again. “Let the hot guy kiss me.”
Then I realized I’d said that out loud, which probably wasn’t the best idea. I really did want him to kiss me but blurting it out seemed wrong.
The sky cleared. The crows flew off to wherever crows go to when they aren’t bugging me.
I turned back to Hokuto but he’d gone. Swell. Just swell. Those horrible crows had scared him off.