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A touch to the door handle tells Fuji that it’s cold outside, and cracking the door open tells her that it’s gotten dark, though the other stores and sign boards outside generate enough light that it’s not really something important to note. Karasuba already put out the closed sign over an hour ago to deter any last-minute patrons who might decide to linger — but the bar is empty. Though the staff usually takes anywhere from ten minutes to an hour to get going, today Kohaku was the first to burst the bubble of small talk in the back, saying something about having to host a meeting for a group project, and one by one the others followed, citing opening shifts tomorrow and the like.
Suo and Fuji close tonight — or, Suo closes tonight, and somehow Fuji had wound up staying behind, too, because she had wanted to mix an old-fashioned and doesn’t feel like making the drink at home, and Suo offered to buy it from her so they wouldn’t short the bar, and Hashibami isn’t a stickler for stragglers as long as the place doesn’t look “like shit” when they open. So Fuji’s still here, though she’s not doing much right now, only checking the weather and the street climate. Across from the bar is some antique store that should have closed down ages ago, because Fuji doesn’t think she’s ever seen anyone exit or enter it, and its neon CLOSED sign never seems to switch off. But it does flicker from time to time. She thinks it’s a nine-second interval, though she’s not sure. If she tries to count it now, she’ll only let cold air in.
“Anything interesting?” Suo calls languidly. She’s moving furniture so she can sweep and mop beneath sofas and chairs and tables — the floor wasn’t really dirty to begin with, but Suo does nothing by halves. Kohaku had asked if she needed help, but Suo waved her off with a smile, telling her to have fun with her group project.
Fuji shakes her head, closing the door behind her. “Not really.” She begins to make her way to the bar, passing by Suo as the latter runs a damp mop beneath one of their tables, right next to the spot that had been plaguing Hashibami since long before either of them even started working here. Last month, Kohaku got down on her hands and knees trying to work it off the floor without damaging the wood, but whatever cleaning solution — or amount of elbow grease — she used had taken the stain with it as well. They’ve been trying to hide it with the furniture, diverting attention to anywhere but the floor, and anywhere but that specific table, but now that Fuji looks again, it really is obvious, especially next to the rich dark brown of everything else in the bar.
Fuji trails her hand along the table’s wood surface as she passes, partly to check for dust, partly to feel the texture, mostly because she knows the movement will catch Suo’s eye when she approaches. Sure enough, Suo stops working the mop long enough to smile, that closed-mouth smile that’s almost too polite to be genuine, if you didn’t know to search for the subtle serene curve beneath her eyes.
“It’s still there?” Fuji says, nodding in the general direction of the spot.
Suo straightens up, semi-leaning on the mop handle as she rolls her neck. She had put her blazer aside, smartly rolling her sleeves up to the elbow. If there were any patrons still here, they would swoon over the display of her lean forearms — it all makes a nice pose, but due to Hashibami’s lately-strict rules on cellphone usage on the clock, Fuji doesn’t have her phone on her. She files it away in her memory instead. “Karasuba-san still hasn’t gotten around to it,” Suo says. “And she won’t let us call a maintenance man, either. Something about her pride?”
Fuji hums. “We should move things around,” she says. “Put the couch over the spot till we can stain it again. Say we’re trying a new floor plan to spice things up.”
“Hm.” Suo fixes her eyes on the couch they had moved together earlier, no doubt considering it. “I’ll ask Hashibami-san tomorrow. We probably should have the floor re-oiled, too, while we’re at it. We ought to make a list.” She laughs, turning to Fuji. “And speaking of making things, don’t you owe me a cocktail?”
Fuji examines her hands, rubbing her fingers together. They had come off clean, no residue either, but she’ll have to wash them anyway. “I guess that’s right,” she says, going over to the bar to part the rose-patterned curtain and reach for a bottle of aged bourbon, which she places on the counter. She washes up with a block of soap, supposedly unscented but with a slight tropical edge when you pay attention, from a brand that Hashibami insists on buying from even though it’s overpriced. Fuji pulls out a mixing glass and spoon, opens one of their cabinets, and digs around for sugar and bitters — she wants to mess around with the recipe one day, but for now she’ll stick to the culinary script.
She pours a bit of both sugar and bitters into the glass, along with a splash of water, and gets to stirring, eyes wandering the familiar layout of the bar. In the corner of Fuji’s vision is Suo, who has finished mopping and gone back to rearranging furniture, and Fuji’s gaze shifts till it lands squarely on the back of the latter’s head. Suo’s earrings shine when they catch the light, and something about that makes Fuji feel almost bad that she’s not doing much to help the bar close, even though she did help with the sofa, and with taking inventory, and with counting the money. She’ll wipe down everything afterward, so it’s not like she’s here doing nothing.
As Fuji reaches for the ice tongs and a double old-fashioned cut glass, Suo turns around, tilting her head at an angle so she can gauge the positions of the chairs and whatnot. She catches Fuji’s eyes and grins, and Fuji shifts her gaze again, to the mixing glass. The sugar has dissolved.
Fuji picks out a few cubes from the ice well, dropping them into the glass, and pops open the bottle of bourbon. She pours the whiskey over the concoction and stirs energetically, and when her fingers begin to bite from the chill, she sets the double old-fashioned glass on the counter. She hasn’t made this one in a while — the OTP’s popularity, it seems, has eclipsed that of most other drinks on their menu — but it’s sort of a relief how easily the motions come to her, like the flow of the drink itself, through the strainer she had grabbed without even realizing, into the cut glass.
“Having fun, Fuji?” Suo slides onto a barstool gracefully, folding her hands in front of her as she at first smiles her patron-smile, then remembers that she isn’t entertaining anyone, and lets it shift to a different, less practiced expression. The overlap isn’t exactly slim, but Suo is Suo, and Fuji doesn’t worry about it.
Fuji shrugs and says, “Something like that,” pushing the cocktail across the counter, throwing in a little spin for kicks. In the same movement she grabs a cloth to wipe away the moisture trail that it leaves behind. Her audience hums appreciatively, drink secured in slender hand.
Whether on or off the clock, Fuji likes being behind the stick. Practically speaking, mixing drinks is her favorite part of the job, and at the bar she can lean against the oak countertop and look cool without having to expend too much effort. Tipsy gossip has a way of reaching her ears before anyone else’s, and when it comes to other happenings in the bar — well, the bartender’s got the best seat in the house. And what a view it is. She nods at the dining area. “Looks good. Ready for it to get hectic tomorrow.”
Suo glances at a stray drip trail on the wooden surface of the bar, badly suppressing a grin. “Aside from the bartop.”
“I’ll clean it after this.” To prove this, Fuji saturates the cloth with furniture polish and runs it over the trail, working the polish into the grain, back and forth, without breaking gaze with Suo.
The grin splits into a delighted laugh, one that springs into the air like fresh champagne from an uncorked bottle. “I’ll take your word for it,” Suo says. She rocks her drink side to side in the glass, the ice clinking around haphazardly. “And remind me, what was in this? Bourbon, bitters, white sugar?”
“Mhm. Textbook old-fashioned.” Fuji rests her hip against the counter, taking mental inventory of their shelf stocks, though she already counted everything earlier. “How is it?” she asks, knowing Suo hasn’t yet taken a sip of the drink.
“It’s good.”
Fuji shakes her head, turning to Suo. “Wait till after you try it.”
That same champagne-bubbly laugh. “Fuji, your drinks are always above and beyond the Rose standard,” Suo says, then lifts the glass to her nose and inhales, her dark eyes searching and finding Fuji’s. “It’s a good aroma. Warm, spicy, a hint of vanilla.” She takes a swig and rolls the drink around her mouth for a moment before swallowing, pursing her lips in thought as she places the glass down. Although Suo doesn’t spend as much time working the bar as she does entertaining the guests, she still knows the craft, and Fuji does care about her input. She watches Suo’s expression attentively, waiting for that serene curve.
And Suo smiles. “Well-balanced, as it should be. Not too sweet, not too bitter. I knew it would be good.” There’s a mark on the glass where her mouth was, a smudge of tinted lip balm.
“Did you?”
“I did.”
They stay there in something that would be close to silence, if not for the thrum of the ice machine in the back. Fuji very slowly runs her cloth back and forth over a meter of the bar in front of them like it’s doing anything more than killing time. Suo hums, a prince’s intonation of uncertainty.
“I didn’t need help with closing,” she says at last. Her sleeves are still rolled up. When she twists the ring on her finger, the muscles of her forearm shift delicately beneath her skin.
“Good to know, because I didn’t do much.”
Usually Suo would reassure her that it’s okay, the help was appreciated regardless, but clearly she has more pressing issues on her mind, because she continues, a bit hesitant, “And I doubt you only stayed to make an old-fashioned. So I guess you had something to say to me?”
“Well, I really did want to make one.” Fuji swipes her cloth over that same meter of wood. It’s not easy to get Suo alone, to monopolize the prince’s time. Suo makes it seem easy, though, the way she looks at a person, like she’s been waiting to talk one-on-one with them forever. When Suo looks at her like this it’s hard to believe that Tokiwa hasn’t stepped it up already. It’s worse than she’d thought. Fuji pauses. “How is it going with Tokiwa-kun?” she asks.
Suo hums again, takes another sip. “It appears that I’ve reached a standstill,” she muses, more to her glass than to Fuji. “On that subject, how is Asagi-kun?”
“Good.” Asagi is usually good. Almost disconcertingly so — Fuji’s always bracing for the whole thing to reach a peak, stop, and then begin its downhill plunge, but in the meantime, Asagi’s good. Fuji was just thinking maybe she’ll invite him to her place tomorrow, not even to do anything, just to hang out.
Suo laughs, then, but this one is closer to the one she uses with the patrons, or when she’s trying to play off a struck nerve. “Did you ask just so you could brag?”
“Is it bragging?” Fuji asks, because she really isn’t sure herself. Her feelings toward Asagi skew less romantic than, say, Hagi’s obvious infatuation with Kohaku, but she likes spending time with him, and she likes messing with him. But that’s just the way it is. “I don’t know. I thought maybe you’d ask for tips.”
“Whatever you have with Asagi-kun is an anomaly,” Suo says, a little wonderingly, a bit enviously, looking up through her lashes. “I don’t think any of your usual advice would do much good when it comes to Tokiwa-kun.” She considers the rest of her cocktail, then downs it till all that’s left is the ice.
She does have a point. Even the date, from what Fuji can tell, hadn’t been particularly eventful, though trying to get Suo to talk about it directly is a dead end. And Tokiwa is generally pleasant and enjoyable to be around, but really, he doesn’t know anything. For every one of Suo’s advances, he takes a half-step forward, looks around like a frightened rabbit, and takes two steps back. At this rate, Fuji could — wouldn’t, but could — snatch him up in a heartbeat and he wouldn’t even realize till he was wound around her finger. Suo wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. The claim has been staked in word, but not in deed, so really it hasn’t been settled at all. And Fuji would — couldn’t, but would — tell Suo to give up, look elsewhere, but even she understands that Tokiwa is one of few that sees Suo as simply Suo. Of course, she is charming Suo, handsome Suo, but those are different from a prince who can only be worshiped from afar. A classmate, a friend, someone on the same level. Only Suo. In that sense, someone like Tokiwa isn’t easy to find.
With that single drip trail cleaned, the bar doesn’t need any more polishing — probably, like the floors, it didn’t need much to begin with, but it’s better to be safe than sorry — so Fuji sets the cloth aside for now and wonders if she can obliquely use this scenario for a doujin. Maybe not the ladykiller in love trope that’s all over Suo’s situation, because it’s trite and uninteresting, relies too much on obliviousness as a plot device, and is not particularly sexy. But maybe the fact that they’re here after work hours, or Suo’s slim fingers curved around her old-fashioned cut glass, or the lights striking her wine-dark eyes at an angle that turns them scarlet.
“What about practice?” Fuji says absently, feeling curious. It’s a basic instinct, like the urge to lick a bleeding wound, just to see what happens next.
“Hm?” Suo says. The air conditioning is down, the music is off, and the hum of their ice machine is not loud enough to warrant the tilt of her head, faux-innocent the same way she plays when she’s trying to coax a shy confession out of a patron.
Of course, Fuji isn’t shy. “What about practice?” Fuji repeats. She leans over the counter and flicks her fingernail against the side of Suo’s glass, which rings dully as Suo’s grip tightens. “I don’t have any tips about Tokiwa-kun, but once you get further, you’ll want to know about this and that.”
“This and that,” Suo echoes.
“You’ve always struck me as inexperienced,” Fuji explains.
Suo laughs, but slides her glass at Fuji with enough force to send it careening over the edge till it strikes tile and shatters. Fuji catches it before that can happen, sets it off to the side. “Do I?” she says amiably. “Don’t you think there’s a reason I’m the top host here?” This is how Fuji knows she’s hit a bullseye, because they never bring up the bar rankings, even when Hashibami is talking business statistics.
Fuji doesn’t say that when it comes to a princely character type, a lack of experience is more pro than con — after all, an ideal isn’t something that is reached so much as something that simply exists. She also doesn’t say that no one with experience, or with the confidence to draw upon it, would be struggling for attention from someone like Tokiwa. Instead she only hums, walking around the bar to Suo’s side. Again, as she approaches, she slides her hand over the counter, leaning against the structure for support as she settles onto a barstool, facing Suo. “I don’t know,” she says again. “But you could prove me wrong.”
“I don’t think I have anything to prove to you,” Suo says, spinning in her seat so they’re squared up to each other properly. Fuji’s legs are long, so their knees knock before she adjusts their positioning, but Suo doesn’t seem to pay it any mind; her eyes, scarlet in the light, are unblinkingly fixed on Fuji’s.
“You don’t,” Fuji says. Deliberately she looks off to the stained-glass rose on the door, as if waiting for someone to walk in, and Suo follows her gaze even though there is nothing. She can be so easy sometimes. Again some base instinct rises, the same way Asagi makes her feel. She clears her throat. “But it’s not like I’d mind practicing, either.”
Suo’s knee bumps Fuji’s. “For Asagi-kun?”
“Something like that.”
Without the cut glass near, Suo has resorted to messing with the bar itself, her ring lightly clacking against the wood. She says evenly, “Well, what sort of practice, specifically, were you thinking about?”
“Kissing.” It’s a commonplace doujin trope. Sort of contrived, but Fuji doesn’t care about how the plot itself comes about so much as she cares about the execution of it. If it’s hot, or if it plays into a larger narrative, that’s all fine. She tilts her head, trying to gauge whether Suo’s lowered eyes, oil-black lashes against fair skin, signify embarrassment or disgust, and adds, “You don’t have to if you don’t want to.”
“No, it’s fine,” Suo says, in a tone that’s measured even for her, shifting in her seat. In her lap, her fists clench, but she looks up and meets Fuji’s eyes. “We can do that.”
They’d once had a customer after Fuji’s own BL-loving heart, who’d had the two of them stay near each other almost the entire evening, rarely without at least one point of contact — Suo’s arm thrown over Fuji’s shoulder, Fuji’s hand under the table laying pseudo-covertly on Suo’s thigh. So the proximity isn’t unfamiliar. They had gotten a lot of tips that night, but then the mixer happened, and Suo didn’t want to play like that anymore. But now with no eyes on them, Suo’s knees are between the vee of Fuji's thighs, and Fuji leans in. She slides a hand along Suo’s shoulder, laying it against the back of her warm neck. Suo’s perfume, or maybe it’s cologne, is darkly floral and a little smoky, like the aftereffects of a rose being burnt alongside incense. When their lips meet, it seems to envelop her.
Fuji thought the competitive streak would kick in, but Suo’s lips are soft and her kissing is hesitant, like she’s never done this or even thought of doing this. Fuji’s no real love guru, but she had a high school boyfriend, and she’s had a lot of doujinshi, and these are enough. She knows how to kiss. Suo clearly had neither of these, because she does not.
It’s brief. Fuji doesn’t want to overstay her already-limited welcome. When they part, she says, “There. Practice.”
But Suo stands and pulls Fuji up with her, her thin arms so much stronger than they look, and kisses her again, a little harder this time. Fuji takes a step back, caught off-guard, but she experimentally flicks her tongue out when their lips meet, surprised when Suo opens up without much fanfare. Here’s what Fuji had been expecting. They shift positions, Suo’s back pressed to the side of the bar. Even though Suo isn’t necessarily a good kisser, it’s not unpleasant. She tastes like bourbon and spice, a little sweet from the cocktail.
Tokiwa-kun won’t do this to you, Fuji thinks. Suo probably knows it, too, but her hands still move to cup Fuji’s face, like that would somehow improve her technique for another kissing partner in the near future. The motion has a clumsy earnestness more charming than any suave line she’s ever uttered. No one else knows this side of her, because right now she isn’t the prince of their bar, she’s only Suo. And the one who got to her first is Fuji. The back of her neck is warm against Fuji’s palm. Something about this fact is endlessly satisfying.
Fuji draws back, listening to Suo’s shallow breathing, the attempts to smooth it out that don’t quite succeed. Her eyes are dark and wide and lovely, and her mouth, parted but unspeaking, somehow looks redder now. She’s still holding Fuji’s face. A part of Fuji wants to lean in again and press her mouth to Suo’s neck, to find out if the perfume, its scent still heavy between them, smells any different directly on the skin, right above the pulse point, but she feels a bit winded, and Suo’s palms are refreshingly cool on her cheeks, so she only settles into the contact. This strikes her as something Asagi might do with her, and then she remembers there was a narrative involved with this whole thing, as negligible as it may be.
Fuji grabs Suo by the wrists to gently lower her hands. The heat that rises to her own face is almost instantaneous, but she ignores it and says, “It’s going to have to be you.” She releases Suo, takes two steps backward, crosses her arms. “Because Tokiwa-kun’s not just dense, he’s stupid.”
Suo’s breath falters, her hands gripping the counter as she leans against it, but she manages to laugh. Her ears are flushed. “You think I don’t know that?”
“I know you know,” Fuji says emphatically, going back around to retrieve her cleaning cloth and furniture polish, not looking at Suo. “I’m going to finish the wipe-down. Can you take the dishes and the ice well?”
Suo hums an assent. “Yes, ma’am.”
After Fuji’s gotten her equipment, she quickly begins wiping down the tables and chairs, ignoring the hiss of the sink as Suo starts up the hot water for the few stray dishes and the ice-burning. Fuji’s part won’t take long, given that the furniture really isn’t dirty, and since the adrenaline rush is making her move at a quicker rate than her usual relaxed slow-is-smooth-is-fast pace. Suo’s perfume lingers in her nose, stronger even than the lemon-scented polish she’s using.
Someone had once asked if she ever envies other doujinshi artists’ popularity, and she’d said no, never, which is true, because Fuji doesn’t worry about that sort of thing. Fuji has never envied Suo, but — maybe she’s been jealous of her, or for her. To most, Suo is someone to admire, someone to wonder at, to worship. The prince type is an easy one to love. But the way Fuji sees it, Suo isn’t a prince so much as a familiar set of brisk footsteps somewhere in the vicinity of the bar, a laughing curve to eyes dark as wine, a low voice that could be comfort or threat in equal measure if you let it. A coworker. A friend. Only Suo. Like leaving her spot in a convention queue to someone who arrived late, and who doesn’t seem to realize how long everyone else has been waiting, she’ll soon be ceding that place of understanding to Tokiwa. It isn’t even that she wants the goods that badly, but a part of her goes — I was here first. In her mouth, the lingering cocktail-sweet flavor turns a little sour.
Fuji thinks, circling to the last table she has to clean, that they’re not in the genre for this sort of thing.
“Thank you for staying to help,” Suo’s voice says from behind. Fuji startles, a little.
“It’s fine,” she says automatically. She turns to face Suo, wondering when Suo will make her next move. Even with this to spur her, her pace tends toward the patient and calculated — until it doesn’t, in which case it’s erratic, so it’s hard to say. Maybe Fuji really should snatch Tokiwa up. “I told you, I really did want to make an old-fashioned.”
Suo laughs brightly. Draped over her arms is Fuji’s coat, which the former offers with the same flair as if it were to a guest. “I’ve got it from here, Fuji. I’ll put everything away.” She nods at Fuji’s cleaning supplies. “So don’t worry about those and just go home.” She has put her blazer back on, over her shoulders in that impractical way only Suo can wear well, though the sleeves are still pushed up.
“You sure?” Fuji asks, but she has already set the cleaning supplies down, reaching out to take her neatly-folded coat from Suo. When she pulls it on, it smells faintly of Suo’s perfume.
Suo’s face is as pale as ever, but her ears are still a bit flushed, and there’s a subtle pink blooming on the back of her hands as she absently rolls her sleeves back down to the wrists. A vague, residual feeling of satisfaction washes over Fuji. “I’m sure,” she says. “I do appreciate it, though, really.”
Fuji hums and shrugs, turning on her heel to start toward the front door. “It wasn’t a problem,” she says into the air, knowing that Suo is following a step and a half behind, their shoes clicking against the floor in lockstep. Fuji doesn’t touch any of the furniture now, and only stops once they reach the front. The stained-glass rose reminds her of Suo’s eyes in the light.
The door handle is cold when she turns it, and the air is colder still, but the night breeze feels good on her face. “You work the closing shift tomorrow, Suo?” Fuji asks, even though she already looked at the schedule they have in the back and knows which days Suo’s on.
“I do,” Suo says. In the chill of the outside air, the pink in her skin is already beginning to subside.
The antique store’s CLOSED sign blinks. Fuji stares, holding the door open, counting up to nine, still smelling smoky rose. Briefly, she glances sideways at Suo, considering, thinking again, This really isn’t the genre. She’ll have to invite Asagi to her place tomorrow. “I’ll see you then,” Fuji says, letting the door close.
The neon red light flickers and catches her eye, before she can see what smile Suo is using.