Shining Light

Chapter 2

“Shoutarou-chan!” Landlady was sweeping the steps when they came back. Shoutarou took a deep breath as he got close, ready to try and explain what had happened and why they had a little girl with them. Hopefully she wouldn’t mind them looking after a child until… well, until Kozuka explained himself.

He hadn’t said anything since Shoutarou got back from talking to Kobayashi. He’d just been walking with his head down and holding Sakura’s hand. She’d done more speaking than he did, and she didn’t seem to have any idea about what was going on.

“Landlady, thank you for passing the message on,” Shoutarou thanked her as they met at the bottom of the steps. She looked from him to Kozuka and Sakura then back to him.
“I’m glad it got sorted, the police called me to apologise. I’m sorry they pulled you in again, Akira.”

Again?

“It’s fine. Happens,” Kozuka replied, sounding only slightly less dejected than Shoutarou had expected him to.

Shoutarou looked at him, narrowing his eyes. Kozuka looked away.

Again, huh?

“I better get my sister to bed. It’s getting pretty late.”
“I can bring you a spare futon up?”
“Ah, please! Be appreciated.”

Landlady nodded, but neither of them made a move for a moment.

“Shoutarou, can you come help me get it?” Landlady turned to Shoutarou and asked. Shoutarou nodded without thinking, and followed her into her apartment, leaving Akira and Sakura on the stairs. He could hear them finally going up to the apartment as he closed the door behind him.

Landlady toed off her shoes before showing him inside, taking him over to the linen closet where she always kept extras of everything anyone might need. She pointed out the children’s futon on one of the higher shelves and went to make tea while he got it.

“Thank you, I’m sure Sakura appreciates it,” Shoutarou attempted to thank her while the kettle still boiled on the stove.
“Shoutarou, can I speak with you for a minute?”

In an instant, Shoutarou was burning hot, his arms tensing around the futon. His legs would barely work with him as he took the few short steps back to the table, sitting down without letting go of the futon.

Had she overheard them? He always tried to keep quiet but Kozuka… but most things they still didn’t do at home. At least, not often. Usually, they’d go to a hotel. But she might have overheard something or maybe she’d just worked it out.

Or did the police say something…

What was he going to say? How could he explain? He didn’t want to fight with Landlady. She’d been so supportive of him through everything. Hopefully she would understand, and things would be fine.

Why did everything have to happen at once?

She poured them each a cup of tea and sat down across from him, holding it between her hands.
“It’s cold this time of year,” she said. Shoutarou nodded.

“The police told me what happened.”
“Yes.”
“Shoutarou,” their gaze finally met, her eyes a little red. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what you’re going through, but…”

Shoutarou hadn’t even touched his cup, scared of the moment when she finally said something.

“Akira is a delicate soul. Something like this…”
“Landlady,” he asked, squirming where he sat. “What did they tell you?”
“Ah, they just said that Akira had been suspected of kidnapping, but…” she trailed off again.

“But that an inspector’s boyfriend came by to clear everything up.”

B-boyfriend…

Kobayashi.

“Sorry, it seems the officer must have been confused. I’m not dating any of the inspectors.”
“Oh?”

Actually, I’m-

“Just a misunderstanding.”

Well, he couldn’t tell her that.

“Shoutarou, if you are-”
“I’m not.”

They fell back into silence, Landlady finally taking a sip of her tea.

“It’s just,” she started again, “an inspector called before you came back. He was asking a lot of questions about who you were living with.”

Kobayashi…

“I told him you were living with a friend. But if there’s anything he should know-”
“No!” Shoutarou cut her off, feeling the hairs all over his body stand on end at the thought of Kobayashi looking into Akira.

He didn’t know what it was that Kozuka was really doing. Even if he had his suspicions, there was every chance it was something it was better the police didn’t know about. It was better that they left him alone as soon as possible.

The sooner he got Kobayashi back out his life, the sooner things could go back to normal for them.

“Well, if you’re sure. Thank you for speaking to me, Shoutarou. If there’s anything else you need to talk about, you know I’m always just downstairs.”
“Right. Thank you.”

He left with the futon, heading up the stairs, trying best to not slip on the snow as it slowly made a new film on the steps. He had to kick the door to get someone to open it for him.

Surprisingly, it was Sakura that did.
“Sakura? Where’s- where’s your big brother?”
“An-chan’s sulking.”

Sulking?

Shoutarou put the futon down and asked Sakura to stay there, before heading to the bedroom.

Kozuka was sulking. He was lying with his ear to the tatami.

“Kozuka?”
“Shou-chan…”

Kozuka rolled over, his eyes red and puffy, snot splattered over his upper lip. A red mark on his bottom lip showed where his snaggletooth had pierced it.

“You’re cheating on me with that cop?”