Early in the morning, Sakamo slowly opened his eyes and stared at the smile of pure bliss that Hangaku had, plastered on her face. He gently moved away a curl of her hair from her forehead, to kiss it. She flinched a little, still full asleep and with the same smile.
Sakamo carefully got out of bed and went to the bathroom. He was flushing the toilet when Hangaku suddenly opened the door, still naked, and with a scared look on her face that quickly disappeared when she saw him:
“I… I thought you left without me! I felt the bed cooler, and when I opened my eyes, I wasn’t in my room! For a moment, I… thought something bad happened to you!”
Sakamo hugged her and felt her trembling. She began to sob, and he tried to reassure her:
“I am not going anywhere, Hangaku-chan.”
She slowly nodded and made a slight smile while cleaning her tears:
“Didn’t I deserve the right to be called Mae, after everything we did? Because I wouldn’t mind calling you Ryu.”
“I can do that, Mae. As long as you stop crying.”
“Yeah… Sorry, I got scared. And now I am crying with happiness. I dreamed so many nights about being with you, and now, it feels like a dream. Except for the soreness on my lower half and my nipples. Man, for a guy raised in a Shrine, you sure are a beast in bed! I would never guess!”
Sakamo frowned and tilted his head:
“Complaining, are we? After all the work I went through to be sure you enjoyed it?”
“No! Who said I was complaining? No, nope, never, not me! I am just happily surprised, that’s it. I don’t care if it hurts like this the entire day, it will make me smile every time, by remembering!”
Sakamo slapped her naked butt while going out the door:
“Get ready, breakfast will be ready in no time. You can use the car that’s outside to go to School to avoid the reporters, and I go by foot with Takechi-sama.”
“You are going just like that, without a good morning kiss? Come here this instant, young man, and give your girl a good smooch!”
Sakamo went to her and gave her a quick kiss, leaving before she could grab him. He shouted while going to his room to get dressed:
“No way I am going to let you squeeze those huge boobs against me! You want to tempt me to skip School, but we have too much to do to stay in bed all day!”
Hangaku Mae frowned while lowering the seat of the toiled:
“Damn fool, at least we could celebrate my moving in for a little while longer! I need to teach him to lower the seat, he is way too used to live alone.”
…
After the breakfast where Hangaku Mae tried to steal a kiss from Sakamo at every opportunity, they left the house, and she went straight to the car that was parked outside, waiting for them. Near the main street, Sakamo got out to join Takechi Hito that was waiting for him in front of his restaurant. He saw Hangaku Mae waving at him from the opened window, and he asked:
“That car is different from the one she used yesterday. And why you two came from your street? She gave you a ride?”
“That car was for me, but she is starting to go and come from School like that. A lot of things happened yesterday when I went to meet her parents, and when everything exploded, she came to live with me.”
Takechi Hito grabbed Sakamo’s arms and shook him:
“She what? You two are living together now? Like newly-weds or something? How did that happen? Stop smiling and tell me or I will shake your brains out!”
“Ok, I will tell you, geez! Let’s get going while I explain, okay?”
Along their way to School, Sakamo told Takechi everything that happened, minus his suspicions about Hangaku’s father identity in Azurath. When they were near the front gate of the School, the group of reporters was there, trying to question the students as they entered, with a line of police officers and men in dark blue suits preventing them from harassing the students or invading the School, to search for Hangaku Mae.
Takechi and Sakamo entered, and he asked in a low voice:
“Do you realize how serious your life became? You are too young to be like, already married! Because that’s what it means, you living together with her!”
“And why is that a bad thing? I like her, she likes me, she wasn’t happy in her house, she can be happy with me. I don’t see a problem.”
“I don’t know, I think it’s all too sudden. Do you like her that much? What about her? Because I thought she just wanted to take you to bed and dump you on the first opportunity. She has a reputation for using a guy as a mere servant, you know?”
Sakamo rubbed Takechi’s head, messing his hair:
“You worry too much, Takechi-sama. We are just living together, we didn’t get married or got kids. If things don’t work out between us, no one besides us will suffer. I think everything will be okay, you know? I had a nice breakfast with her this morning, and everything looked just right. Do you know how difficult it is for something like that to happen? To wake up near a girl, see her get dressed, and eat breakfast with her like if it was the most normal thing in the World?”
“Alright, I get it. You do look happy, though. You have a nice smile and your eyes are shining when you talk about her. I just hope she doesn’t toss you away any time soon, I don’t want to be the one picking up your pieces.”
Sakamo signalled with his head to the door of their classroom where Tomiko Hari was excitedly talking with Hangaku Mae:
“It seems your purple goddess is not worried like you. Try to keep your mouth shut, will you? I don’t want the others to find out.”
“Like if I babble about everything! My mouth is a tomb!”
When they got near the two girls, Tomiko Hari smiled at Sakamo and hugged him, taking that chance to whisper:
“Thanks, she really needed to get away from that house! If I didn’t have a boyfriend, I would kiss you right now! Take good care of her, will you?”
Sakamo touched his forehead with hers and spoke with a low voice:
“I will at least try.”
They entered the classroom and greeted their classmates, that shouted Sakamo’s name and made a deep bow. Sakamo frowned, wondering why they were doing that until they all shouted:
“Greetings, Sakamo-sensei! Your humble students greet you!”
He looked to where a laugh was coming and saw Yoshinobu Tokuga laughing his lungs out, while the small menace, Shintaro Nakaoka, was looking at him with a frown. Sakamo shook his head and asked:
“This was your doing, right, Yoshinobu-san? Shame on you! Come here so that I can knock your head!”
Before Sakamo could catch the laughing boy, the School alarm sounded, and the Principal’s voice was heard from the loudspeakers all over School:
“This is a drill! Go to the meeting point outside! Follow your class representatives and your Teachers! I repeat, this is a drill!”
Sakamo joined the others in a line after Hojo Masako and followed her to the exit. Along the corridor, other lines joined them, and they all went to the meeting point, in the playing field at the back of the School. Hangaku Mae approached Sakamo’s and asked in a low voice:
“I am going to the recording studio after School, and the rest of the week as well. You are going to your part-time, right?”
“Yes. We can have dinner in Takechi-sama restaurant, and go home afterwards. We can watch a movie or do something else, but I may need to do some work before going to sleep.”
“Can I be near you while you work? I won’t distract you.”
Sakamo slowly nodded:
“You can read a book in my office if you want, but you can’t see what I am working on. It’s too secret and may give you problems if someone sees you in there because I am always in a video call or a meeting.”
Hangaku nodded with a big smile and gave him a quick kiss, going to her place again.
…
Life was peaceful for the new couple. No one messed with Hangaku Mae in School, not even the obsessive and narcissist Tashiro Saito. Not after the last warning he got.
Sakamo’s driver messaged him two days after the incident in the Hangaku’s manor, saying that a car brought a bunch of clothes for Hangaku Mae that her mother sent, and he opened the door for the delivering guys by using the spare key Sakamo gave him, and the boxes were in the living room for Hangaku to see. Sakamo asked if he could take care of buying a new closet, similar to the one he had in his room but a lot bigger because Hangaku would need more room to use, something that the driver agreed upon immediately.
During their breaks after classes, when Sakamo and Hangaku crossed paths with the three jealous girls, Sadakichi Chiba, Nakano Takeko, and Goya Kino, they averted their look or even walked to a different corridor, every single time.
In the middle of the week, Oki Koma came to see Sakamo Ryu in his classroom and called him to talk with her in the corridor. She made a deep bow as soon as he joined her:
“Sakamo-kun, I apologize for what I said and for taking lightly of your faith and beliefs. I hope you can forgive me and attend my next class.”
Sakamo returned the bow:
“I accept your apologies. Can I go to the gym with my pendant? Because I can’t take it off.”
“That’s another thing that I wanted to talk to you about. There is a reason why necklaces or any kind of jewellery are not allowed during gymnastics, it’s for safety reasons, nothing else. The School could be accounted for if you got hurt because you were wearing that necklace with your pendant, and me as well. I can keep your necklace with me during class if you don’t want to put it in your locker, and I will return it to you by the end of the class.”
“I am sorry, but I can’t do that. No one besides me can touch my pendant. You can be a really nice person, but your soul can also have some darkness that would taint my pure pendant. I can’t risk it. I won’t be attending your classes, but I will make sure that my classmates will. Like that, you won’t lose your students, only me.”
“But I want you to come! I could make a special training plan for you! You have an amazing physic, I am sure you would do well in a professional team! Perhaps even represent our country in the next Olympics! I could be your coach!”
Sakamo’s eyes narrowed, and he spoke in a serious, slow tone:
“For someone like me, raised in a Shrine where I was taught to live a simple life and to not attract too much attention upon myself, doing something like that would be shameful. I am sorry to destroy your dream of training me, but that won’t happen.”
“But… it’s not shameful to represent our country in the Olympics, it’s a great honour!”
“I know it is, but I still won’t do it. Me, appearing in front of the cameras, public watching me, my name being recognized everywhere I went? Sorry, I can’t do that. It goes against everything I believe.”
Oki Koma nodded with a sad face:
“I understand. I had to try, though. Well, talk with your classmates then, because I prepared a fun activity in the afternoon, for my amazing new students.”
Sakamo bowed again, and went to his classroom, leaving behind a very sad teacher.
…