When he goes to bed and gets comfortable in the dark, he tries to imagine being in the position that he put so many others in, overcome and vulnerable. …But he grows tired of that and envisions you in the same scenario that he had anticipated for him and Tsuzuki after the poker game (in the few blissful seconds before the shining white knights of cock-block arrived). He’s certain that he can’t win you in a hand of cards, but unmitigated passion, in his opinion, looks better on you. He wants to see what those tattoos look like when they’re polished with afterglow. The thought makes his skin tingle, and needless to say he stays awake, building upon it with more images.
Muraki spends most of the following day at the clinic, then dinner at Seventh Heaven and a walk around the village plaza. He doesn’t talk to anyone, but he watches the human traffic with a detached look in his eyes. It doesn’t occur to him to look for you so soon—not just yet. Though he considers going up to the roof again, there was no strategy in that, or in knocking on your front door (but he could, and the fact that you live above him makes his fantasies a little more interesting). He needs to plan.
On the seventeenth he wrestles with the idea of staying in his apartment all day and doing just that. Furthermore, the window was open and a cold draft was coming into the room—that weighs against getting out of bed entirely. But emptiness turns his stomach inside out.
It was one of those rare occasions where he feels like cooking for himself. He gets dressed (making sure that he is equipped with all his armor, so to speak), and leaves the apartment.
One long walk later (punctuated by bumping into someone in the plaza, in which case he bows and apologizes to them), Muraki is at the grocery store. He picks up a shopping basket and makes a casual beeline to the dairy section. There, basking under the fluorescent lights between the sticks of butter and cylinders of biscuit dough were the eggs. After considering the selection for a moment, he reaches into the back for a plain beige carton hiding behind the pastel pinks and blues, and opens it to make sure none of the eggs were broken. It’s the first item to go into his basket.
But while he’s there, he decides to pick up a few more things and pivots around on his heel to stroll through the aisles of various goods, picking up edamame, strawberries, a bag of coffee beans and filters.]
The day of 15th after the roof to up to 17th
Muraki spends most of the following day at the clinic, then dinner at Seventh Heaven and a walk around the village plaza. He doesn’t talk to anyone, but he watches the human traffic with a detached look in his eyes. It doesn’t occur to him to look for you so soon—not just yet. Though he considers going up to the roof again, there was no strategy in that, or in knocking on your front door (but he could, and the fact that you live above him makes his fantasies a little more interesting). He needs to plan.
On the seventeenth he wrestles with the idea of staying in his apartment all day and doing just that. Furthermore, the window was open and a cold draft was coming into the room—that weighs against getting out of bed entirely. But emptiness turns his stomach inside out.
It was one of those rare occasions where he feels like cooking for himself. He gets dressed (making sure that he is equipped with all his armor, so to speak), and leaves the apartment.
One long walk later (punctuated by bumping into someone in the plaza, in which case he bows and apologizes to them), Muraki is at the grocery store. He picks up a shopping basket and makes a casual beeline to the dairy section. There, basking under the fluorescent lights between the sticks of butter and cylinders of biscuit dough were the eggs. After considering the selection for a moment, he reaches into the back for a plain beige carton hiding behind the pastel pinks and blues, and opens it to make sure none of the eggs were broken. It’s the first item to go into his basket.
But while he’s there, he decides to pick up a few more things and pivots around on his heel to stroll through the aisles of various goods, picking up edamame, strawberries, a bag of coffee beans and filters.]