Our Last Days as Children

[Zach Kaiser]

For several moments Eld was completely dumbfounded. He tried to think of something to say, but all that came to mind was Etsu alone in her bed, thinking of that night, hands wandering up and down her body...

Finally, he was forced to physically shake his head to clear that image from his mind, and even then it likely wouldn't be gone long. "E-Etsu..." He lowered his voice to what amounted to a loud whisper. "D-Don't get me wrong, I think about that night too, but...this really isn't the place to talk about that kind of thing."

Naturally, he was completely oblivious to the fact that a minute ago he'd shared his views on sex and love without any attempt to lower his voice at all. Though, that was at least more of a general thing.

[Nayt]

Wait, this was a bad place to discuss things like that? Etsu questioned where they were again, and ultimately realized a bit belatedly that they were in a restaurant.

"Oh . . ." she trailed off, "Gomen."

Not that she was too terribly disappointed, because they could just talk about this sort of thing on the way back home. Wait. The way home . . . oh, right, they had to go home at . . . some point or the other . . .

"We should not go home," she said with minimal prompt, "We should go back to the lake."

That was a happy thought. It got her smiling, though her eyes were closed and she looked as if she'd suddenly become very sleepy. She started rubbing her thumb across the back of Eld's hand again, though this time much more lethargic. Suffice it to say, the girl needed no more alcohol for the rest of the night . . .

[Zach Kaiser]

Eld's face scrunched in a sudden effort to process this. He was more than a little confused by the suggestion. It just didn't make any sense right now!

"I don't think that's a good idea...it's still storming out," he pointed out. Even intoxicated a trip to the lake still sounded like a pretty bad idea right now.

"...Why do you want to go to the lake, anyway?" he asked. There were a lot of fish there, sure, but it was a little cold this time of year to be out fishing this late, let alone doing something like swimming which is what he usually thought of when he thought of the lake.

[Nayt]

"I liked being with you at the lake," she replied simply.

She didn't exactly recognize the suggestive qualities of what she was saying just then, but she meant it, anyways. All parts of it, actually. Even the suggestive parts. She'd just admitted to all of that moments ago, anyways. Etsu smiled as she thought about the lake again.

"We should not go home," she said.

This was a great idea to her. She really had no idea where it was going, but she wanted to go there. With Eld, specifically. Because wherever it was going would probably end very well.

"If it is not the lake then we should go somewhere else."

[Zach Kaiser]

Eld nodded distantly, not quite getting the entirety of what she was implying, but thinking it a good suggestion. He gazed outside. "I don't think we'll be going anywhere else for awhile, though..." he lamented. "Not without getting wet, anyway. Unless it's somewhere nearby."

He couldn't immediately call to mind any place like that, so he flagged the waiter down once more. "Excuse me, is there any place..." He trailed off as he noticed the waiter giving him a blank look. "O-Oh, whoops, sorry. Do you know of any places nearby?"

This caused the ponytailed waiter to give him a critical look. These two were definitely drunk. "I...know of a lot of places nearby. What kind of place are you looking for?"

Eld thought about this hard for a few seconds, trying to remember what Etsu said, before replying, "A place we can go to."

Very very drunk. He fought the urge to sigh; fortunately he was pretty good at faking niceties. "Do either of you live nearby by any chance?" When Eld shook his head, he continued. "Then...perhaps you'd like a room for the night? It's looking pretty bad out there." He bit his lip to keep from adding something about them looking in pretty bad shape too.

"Oh...maybe. Should we just spend the night here, Etsu?" he asked, turning back to her.

[Nayt]

When Eld got up, Etsu had to let go of his hand. She instead withdrew her arms to fold them over her side of the table and lean her head upon her arms. She was feeling particularly sleepy, but she really didn't want to go to sleep, no matter how heavy her eyelids were getting.

And she didn't need to try waking herself up, either. It turned out they had a place to go, and Etsu was suddenly very excited to be going there . . . for some reason or the other. It was almost as if the very prospect of going somewhere-- anywhere --had become the greatest possibility in the world to her.

Etsu smiled brightly, "I would like that."

She moved to take Eld's hand again. She did not know where exactly these rooms were, how much they cost, or how hard it was to get there, but she was certain that Eld would get her there safely.

[Zach Kaiser]

It was a plan then. A good plan. Perhaps even a great plan? Only time would tell. "Yeah, I think we'll get a room," he told the waiter.

"Alright, well I have your check here and..." He looked them over once more; no, even very basic math was not going to happen with either of these two right now. "You know what? I'll put it on your room bill, you can pay for both in the morning." He wasn't even going to ask, and risk getting a nonsensical reply. Or worse, have them insist on paying now.

Eld nodded. "Okay. Now I just need to get our bags." He turned to start going towards them, but the waiter stepped in the way.

"I'll get your bags for you," he offered, realizing that getting them up the stairs was already a risky prospect and having either of them carrying anything was only going to compound the problem. Somehow, he gathered them all up himself, though it was high uncomfortable and involved one of the lighter bags handles being around his neck.

A few minutes later there were at a room on the second floor; it didn't go as bad as he'd feared, though it'd been difficult to tell the man at the desk he needed a room key with a bag handle between his teeth.

"And here you are. If you need anything else, uh, there should be someone downstairs all night. Just try not to fall down the stairs." Having piled the bags in the corner of the room, the waiter-turned-bellhop quickly left.

Which left Eld and Etsu alone in a Cizokian style room, though rather than the futons that were common in Cizok it did offer a pair of beds instead...

[Nayt]

Elated to have somewhere to go, Etsu got up out of her chair . . . and found herself suspiciously unable to stand. She was standing, yes, but the world was doing a few spins in the process, and though this should have been worrisome for her, she couldn't help but find it particularly hilarious. Was this all the doing of sake and ahi tuna? If so, she was most definitely going to have to do this again someday. And with Eld, particularly. And alone again. And maybe it would be a date or something. Maybe it currently was.

Why not? Etsu had all but forgotten the reason why she and Eld never got together after their time at the lake, or why she never just sneaked into his room when she was feeling particularly lonely.

Nevertheless, Etsu wasn't going to be doing any walking on her own, so she edged closer to Eld, keeping a hand on the table to keep herself balanced as she did, until she was able to reach out to him, whereupon she reached out to him, touched his side, and kept going until she'd wrapped her arms around his chest and was holding onto him merrily. She walked like that, too, though not exactly hugging him the whole time. She had one arm around his waist and he had one arm around her shoulders, and every time she stumbled over his or her own feet, she caught herself on him, half hugged him, pressed her face to her chest, and laughed about it.

Climbing stairs was hard, though. She had to really concentrate on that one. Eyes on the steps. One foot in front of the other. It was a task she'd never thought to be so hard, but after great difficulty and a lot of leaning on Eld, she managed it. Somehow.

At the door, it came time to bid their waiter farewell-- wait, they had a waiter? She'd almost completely forgotten about him. But he was being nice enough to carry . . . all of their bags? Wow, that was impressive! Etsu concluded that this guy was very dexterous and deserved a pleasant goodbye.

"Arigatou~ gozai~masu, Kyuuji-ku~n," Etsu said to the waiter, still blissful in her intoxication, enough that she could show some level of affection for just about everything around her (though infinitely more for Eld). She bid him goodbye with an enthusiastic, though notably lethargic wave.

And with that, standing in the doorway with Eld, she paused to look over the room as best she could--which really wasn't all that good. What was there, one bed? That was fine. She was perfectly okay with one bed. It wasn't like she was sleepy, anyways! And with that in mind, she started edging closer, but only by a couple of steps. With Eld and Etsu clinging to each other as they were, walking was a matter of singularity for them. All it took was one person to start heading in one direction and the other would start towards it, too, as if they'd happened upon the very same idea, and were equally as adamant in getting there.

[Zach Kaiser]

Eld nodded mute thanks to the waiter as he left; he was the one doing most of the supporting, as Etsu could barely walk, so it was taking a great majority of his focus to keep them both standing. Either the storm outside was really bad, or he perhaps had a little too much to drink, because he was fairly certain most staircases did not wobble as you went up them.

Having the same idea as Etsu, he started towards the bed, but this caused them to tug in two different directions, so he relented. He was about to point out her mistake to her when he noticed she was, in fact, heading towards the bed.

How odd. He'd been certain the bed was on the other side of the room. His mind must have been playing tricks on him due to the sake. With a mental shrug, he let her guide him over to the bed.

[Nayt]

Left alone to their devices, Etsu guided them ahead. She really had no idea where she was going, only that there was a bed here and it seemed to be the only thing worth note. Really, it was the only thing she could continue to see when the world was spinning, and it hadn't exactly stopped yet. It started spinning when she got up out of her seat at dinner and it showed absolutely no signs of letting up.

Etsu practically crashed into the bed. Eld was walking and if he didn't stop, neither would she. This resulted in Etsu hitting the bed with her knees, letting out a yelp, and grabbing onto Eld by his shirt for dear life. Not like it was going to do her any good . . .

[Zach Kaiser]

Indeed, Eld wasn't quite aware enough to stop, and when Etsu took a dive and grabbed his shirt, she invariably pulled him down with her. Eld resisted for a moment, but coordination did not come easy just at the moment, and so he was invariably pulled down with her.

Belatedly he managed to throw his arms out, which was the only thing that stopped their foreheads from clonking together in what would have probably been a very painful experience. What did happen, though, was that he suddenly found himself with his face inches from Etsu's.

"Oh," he said softly in surprise. For some reason, his face suddenly felt hot, and his mouth particularly dry.

[Nayt]

And indeed, though she tried to stop it, Etsu wound up crashing down upon the bed much earlier than she hoped for. What was she hoping for? Probably an opportunity to sit down or at least jump on the bed a little. For some reason or the other, that came off to her as an amazing idea. But laying down wasn't a terrible idea, either. It was just that she wasn't tired! No amount of heavy-eye-syndrome could convince her of this. Or how heavy her whole body was. Actually, laying down felt amazing because of that.

Why hadn't she thought of that before? She should've just tried to lay down when she first got . . . . wait . . .

It took her that long to realize where Eld was, hovering over her--and her realization seemed to come at about the same time as Eld's, too.

Etsu stared up at him. This close to his face, she felt her mind blank out with each passing second. She was intoxicated and couldn't see straight, but this close, she could see every detail on Eld's face. She could see every hair in his eyebrows, every contour and imperfection on his skin, the shape of his nose, the color in his eyes--and she really investigated it all, too. It felt like it was the first time she was able to see Eld's face this close--or, at the very least, the first time she was able to appreciate it.

Time passed and her mind began to work again. It wasn't long before something came up, a question that slid through out of absolutely nowhere. It was a silly question, a poorly placed one, and one she shouldn't have even entertained, but she didn't mind the idea. In fact, she felt a little bit hopeful about it.

"Tsukimono-kun?" she asked, prompted only by their proximity and the lengthy silence that persisted between them, "Do you want to kiss me?"

[Zach Kaiser]

While lethargy certainly played into his inability to move, there was more to it than that. It was as if he was expecting something to happen if he just stayed where he was, but for the life of him he couldn't think of what. All he could do was look her in the eye, with his gaze occasionally lowering to her lips, which looked very soft and were still very red from the photo session earlier.

When she asked him a question, it finally clicked. Yes, that was exactly what he'd been waiting for. "H-Hai," he responded reflexively. That was definitely high on his wants, especially now that she'd voiced the idea.

[Nayt]

Etsu searched Eld's face as he thought it over. It took no time at all for him to put his thoughts to words, and she couldn't help but smile a little.

"You may kiss me," she said.

And she was sincere about it, too. In fact, even if she'd said nothing and Eld leaned down to kiss her, she'd have been perfectly okay with that.

"I will not stop you."

Because she wanted him to. That's all it came down to. When that question popped up in her mind, it should have been evident to her why. Or, rather, that it wasn't even a question at all. This was just like when they were at the lake, when Eld pinned her down and she leaned up to kiss him. It was a great kiss, something she thought about whenever she was alone at night--and then the other things, too. Naturally, she just replayed the events in her mind every now and then. It was nice to reminisce.

[Zach Kaiser]

Eld's mind was pleasantly abuzz. Very few thoughts of the future or past penetrated the veil the currently hung around his mind; all he could think of was the present, and at the present he had no reason not to. In fact, it sounded like the best thing he'd heard all night.

So having been granted permission (and in fact forgetting why he'd need permission entirely), he let himself close those last few inches without hesitation, and pressed his lips to hers.