Photography is annoying.
There, I said it.
The concept is straightforward enough, isn't it? You see something you want to… preserve, you point your camera at it, press a button, and done.
Except, not at all.
Because eyes lie. They constantly adapt to light levels, to the surroundings of the focus, to your [mood], but cameras are machines. They don't do that—or, if they do, they are only doing it according to the basest, most elementary settings.
If you want to capture a good sunset? Prepare to mess [a lot] with the exposure, the camera speed, the white point… Or you're going to end up with a mess where the sun just burns an indistinct spot in the photo while every other color ends up washed out, the end result far, [far] from the vibrant memory you wanted to capture.
There's another thing to take into account, of course: lighting. That seems obvious enough, doesn't it? It's a [photo]graph, an image made of light, but… It isn't. Obvious, I mean. Because the camera takes a single moment, from a single point of view, so it doesn't get the compositing luxury of our eyes. It's almost impossible to see the world as flat, but to see a flat photograph? Not that unusual.
So you need to be aware of it. Of the shadows bringing out the relief of a surface, the rim light delineating a profile from behind, separating it from the background, the sharpness or softness of an intense key light, the weak fill light that you need so that even darkness has [some] light, at least enough to bring out the details in the picture…
You don't need all of that with your eyes. You don't need anything like that to make Shizu be…
[Beautiful].
"Is… Is all of that [necessary?"] my teacher, girlfriend, and, in some ways, competitor, asks.
I look at the colored ring of LEDs surrounding my phone as I fiddle with it on its tripod, the two reflectors around her bed, the blanket covering her shelf of figurines (both to avoid glare from the glass and to preserve my libido),…
And nod.
"Absolutely," I confirm.
She, sitting on the corner of her bed so I can better see the contrast between her pale skin, black hair, and powder blue sheets, buries her face in her hands.
"Iroha… Do you [really] need a porn video of all of us—"
She cuts herself off and looks at me with that weird intensity I'm pretty sure Hachi copied from her.
… Damn it.
"No. Nothing like that. I'm an uncomplicated, horny teenager about to experiment with a hot, older woman. Nothing to analyze in here," I tell her, waving my hands between us, arms fully extended, because I'm apparently unable not to scream with my body language that this is an uncomfortable topic of discussion.
I know them too well. They [thrive] on uncomfortable things.
Also, she stands up.
… She's [really] tall.
"Hey," she says, brushing an errant strand of hair behind my ear as she tries to look at me with only softness and no nerves at all.
It only works because of how [tall she is].
Like… Senpai already makes me feel all sorts of things when he stands in front of me, my face at the height of his chest, his looming body seeming to take up my entire world.
But Shizu…
Black vest and white button-up shirt. Black slacks that look almost satiny. Black hair spread around her, strands thick enough that there are no light leaks between them.
She… Kinda makes me remember all those vampire romance novels that nobody will ever hear about.
[Ever].
"I… I don't want to talk about it," I tell her, looking up into steel gray eyes that are unfairly kind. Relentlessly tender. Intimidatingly…
Genuine, I guess.
Damn the both of them and their infectious fetish.
"Maybe you don't. But I think you, at least, need to relax and unwind for a bit."
I raise an eyebrow that's recently been getting a workout and pointedly look at the bed we should both be getting naked in.
"No," she says, both firmly and prettily blushing the barest trace of pink. "Not as long as you feel like this."
"That sounds like you're withholding sex until I give you what you want," I murmur.
Then I realize she never took away the hand that tucked my hair behind my ear, and that I've been nuzzling it the entire time.
… They are [sneaky].
"I am withholding sex until I'm sure you won't regret it, yes," she says, rolling her eyes.
And taking my hand and pulling me to her living room.
Away from my carefully arranged lighting rig.
… I swear, if this turns into spontaneous, unrecorded sex on her sofa, I'm going to be pissed.
Not literally, I hope. I don't quite get why there are so many doujins with [that].
***
There's a cool can of orange soda in my hand. One of the ones I brought the other day, and that Shizu has arranged a section of her fridge for me to colonize with.
I'm pretty sure that's about… a fifth of a marriage? How many portions am I up to in total?
Because I think we're already past the hundred percent with Hachi…
"If you don't want to talk, maybe I should?" she says, sitting in front of me, on the other side of her white kitchen counter, the gray tiles of the wall behind her blurring the sharp edges of her black hair.
"Oh, sure, because you are obviously feeling nervous and—you are. Of course you are." One day, I'll have an uncomplicated, non-stressful, [routine] sexual encounter.
It'll likely be years from now…
"Iroha… Yes, I am," she says before sighing and dragging a clawed hand through her hair. "I never even considered… [being] with a student, and now I am in a relationship with three of them, two current and one former. On top of that… You are [you]. And I know you would be perfectly capable of faking wanting to be with me sexually just so I would be with you emotionally."
Damn it.
I did [not] want to talk about this.
"I am, aren't I?" I tell her with a nonchalant shrug that makes her snort before answering my cheeky grin with a suffering one of her own.
"I don't know how he does it," she says, that soft, maddeningly wistful smile on her lips making it perfectly clear who 'he' is. "He just looks at you, and you… understand. One another. Perfectly."
"It's his fault," I automatically answer.
"I think we should get three shirts with that written on them," she agrees with a solemn nod.
"Five. Yui and Yukino would agree."
She snorts. I giggle.
And we laugh.
My right hand's on the counter, hers on top of it, clutching me protectively, and so I feel her laughter vibrate across my arm and up to my chest.
She [is] beautiful.
Intimidatingly so.
"It's… It's his fault because…" I try to barrel past the stab of insecurity. Maybe I manage. "Because he made me like this. I was… not happy. Not really. But I was [content]. And then he had to dangle his ideals in front of me, made me see how little being content actually matters, because it's better to struggle and hurt for something that really… that is worth it."
I'm not looking at her. At the wise eyes so often filled with comical overreaction, at the twist of her lips that makes her smile become something to while away the hours on, at the tilt of her head as she considers me with gentleness and care.
At Shizu.
But…
I look at my hand.
And I can't help but see long fingers carefully massaging between thin bones, reaching up to my wrist and down almost to my fingertips.
She's…
A part of me hates her.
She's too perfect. Too good a person. Too noble, caring.
And so, she's a reminder that… other people could've been like her. And weren't.
"You are worth it, Iroha," she says, her voice a caress on my ear, a low murmur that makes my heart race and my eyes close.
"You are my girlfriend. You are obligated to say things like that."
She snickers at that, caught by surprise.
And her hand grasps mine.
"I am."
She lets the silence stretch, the warmth of her touch seeping into me until I can't stand it anymore, and I look up at her.
At wise eyes, gentle lips.
Except not.
Because she's nervous, and she's biting her lip, trying to keep her smile steady as her eyes look from mine to our linked hands.
"I [am] your girlfriend, Iroha. And that means that… yes, I am contractually required to tell you the good things about yourself you refuse to believe." She tries to calm down as she speaks, a ghost of the composed Shizu in my mind settling over her, but…
Her fingers don't stop moving. And they are gentle, comforting, [thrilling.]
But they also don't stop moving.
I know a nervous tic when I see it. Thanks for the training, Mom.
So I turn my hand up, palm to palm, and grasp her.
"You are worth it, Shizu," I say, refusing to look away from steel eyes that don't have any right to be this open, this vulnerable.
"We aren't talking about me—"
"No. We are talking about us."
There's a flash of panic in those eyes of hers, and I remember all those times she lost her cool for the silliest of reasons, all those times she got flustered, embarrassed, frantic,…
She's… She's a human. A person.
I'm not sure Hachi understands that.
I almost didn't.
"I…" I swallow what I was going to say before I even realize what it was. I need to think this through. "I know it comes naturally to you, to be relied on. To be wise and caring. But… But that's not what a relationship is. You need to let yourself be cared for as well—"
"Iroha, you have done more than enough for me. You… I don't even know if I would be with Hachi if you hadn't pulled us together, and you helped with Haruno in a way I'll never be able to pay you back for—"
"Then don't! It's not about—it's not about [debts]. It's not about give and take! It isn't supposed to be!"
Damn it.
[Damn it!]
She's on my side of the counter, hugging me to her chest, still holding my hand, our fingers laced as I feel her heart beating through them.
"Don't tell him I cried. Please," I ask her, my face buried against her chest in a way far from what I imagined I would be doing by this time.
She doesn't say anything, just… holds me.
And I let her.
***
The sofa. The damn sofa.
I'll have this thing dry cleaned if it's the last thing I do.
"Better?" she asks, her voice carried by a heated gust of breath going through my tresses from behind my head.
Her arms are around my waist, and I'm leaning back on her chest, the stiff fabric of her vest making the whole prospect far less enticing than it should be, and—
And I'm really not in the mood to be thinking about her breasts, am I?
"Not really," I answer, my voice that strangled thing I hate, the barely there sound that comes out when I don't have the strength or foresight to be loud and obnoxious and make people [look at me—]
"This all has gone too fast," she says, lifting a hand to caress my hair and soften the blow of rejection.
"It has," I agree. Because there's no point in arguing otherwise. Not when it's so plain to see.
She kisses the top of my head, and I shamefully close my eyes, relishing in the intimate contact that will soon end.
"Remember the day Hachi asked me out on a date?" she asks, and barely waits for me to quietly nod before continuing. "You called, and I don't even know what you wanted to say, because I just got [frantic]. I started freaking out at you, and you decided that you'd come over and make sure I was as ready for the impromptu date as I could get in a few hours."
She chuckles.
I remember the harried woman opening her apartment door and pulling me right in before I could even take off my shoes, and it's hard not to smile at the memory.
"You did my hair, my makeup, helped me make a good ensemble out of the things I had in here that I had never thought to wear together... You made me feel… [beautiful]. Stunning, even."
"You are—"
"And then, when it came time for my date with Haruno… I couldn't think to wear anything other than what you had chosen for me."
"I—"
"Iroha, listen," she says, cutting me off for the second time so I get the hint. So I don't try and stop the inevitable. "This has been… a whirlwind. A mess. Pure chaos."
"It's Hachi," I weakly interject. And she chuckles.
"Yes. But it's also you. Because I wasn't ready for that. I wasn't ready for a young woman to make me feel attractive. Desired. The last one had been Haruno, and… you know how that went."
I am still. Frozen.
And really grateful I am facing away from wise eyes and tender smiles.
"I… Hachiman was right, you know? That night, after Haruno… defeated me, when he said I was planning on setting him up with you? That's what I wanted to do. I wanted to be happy for a while, despite my best judgment, and then have him be with the one girl I knew he wouldn't throw away. I saw how he looked at you, Iroha. I saw how he loved you.
"I… I have trouble seeing it. When people look at me.
"So I didn't see it in your eyes. I didn't see it when you came here, asking to be… taught. About love, and intimacy, and sex. I didn't see it when you came to help me get ready for a date with the man you love. I didn't see it when you [smiled] and jumped up between Hachi and me, kissing us both. I didn't see it when you dragged me to plan how to make an intervention for our little martyr. I… I have enough trouble believing Hachiman and Haruno feel for me what they constantly say they do.
"You… You don't say it. You show it."
Her arms tighten around me, her lips press against my hair, and my eyelids close tightly enough some moisture is squeezed between them.
"I… I tell him. I do," I try to protest.
"No. You answer him. You answer what he says and does, but… but when it's up to you? You'll prepare and rehearse a little speech solely for the sake of seeing his eyes widen as he strives not to lose control. You'll buy a costume just to act out a fantasy of love and devotion. You'll help his other girlfriends be better prepared for him. And you'll help me help him. That's what you do, Iroha."
"I… I am not that… not that… I am not what you think I am."
Delicate fingers glide down my jaw and to my chin, and Shizu tilts my head up and at an angle so I meet her eyes once again.
The wise eyes that are so tremulous and insecure.
"You are. And… And it's taken me too long to understand. And I'm sorry."
"Don't. You don't have to feel sorry for me—"
"No. I'm sorry for me."
I blink up at her, trying to understand the implication.
"I'm sorry I… I am sorry I thought you cared for me… [less]. That you—"
"I love him. I loved him for months."
"I know. That's why it was so easy to think you didn't love me."
She smiles. And kisses my forehead.
And I turn around, pinning her to the sofa, one arm on each side of gorgeous, wide, vulnerable eyes.
And I kiss her.
Not hungrily. Not… not in a fit of passion, or lust, or hormones. Just…
I lean down, my lips barely brushing hers as my eyes slowly close, as my arms relax and my chest presses down on hers, her whole body warm and soft beneath me, my bare legs brushing the fabric of her pants up as I try to find the best way to lie on top of this tall woman that isn't pulling away from me.
Then I lean back, barely, still in reach of tender lips with maddeningly beautiful smiles, and look at her.
"I love you. Not… Not since months ago. Not since I saw you walk into a classroom, and I started wondering if I may actually like girls. Not since I first pondered how it would be to climb up your body, and—damn it... What I mean to say is that this is new. That I thought you were an amazing person long before you dragged me to that room full of weirdoes so somebody would take care of my electoral problems. That I already thought you were beautiful long before I kissed your bare breasts. That I had already touched myself to you before I filmed your first time with Hachi. That I… That I loved kissing you, and being called your girlfriend, and being a part of something full of love, and affection, and caring, and…"
I bury my face in her chest, yet again, to my shame, without any kind of desire for something more even as her hands come up to caress my back through my shirt, deft fingers once more playing with me in a maddeningly soothing manner.
"I love you," I whisper against her chest. "Not like I love him. Not like I loved Hayato. But like I love you. And I'm sorry if I didn't say it—"
"That's not what I've tried to tell you, Iroha," she says, yet again embracing me, pulling me against her until I can only breathe air that smells like a wise woman who should stop smoking. "I'm telling you that you've already told me. That it was me who didn't understand what you were saying."
I lie there, on top of her. Breathing.
Being held.
I'm not used to it.
"Then… You aren't…" I try to say without quite knowing how, why, or what.
"I love you too," she says, her words yet again a warm ghost across my hair.
"You… You do?"
"Iroha… I… I'm risking a lot, being with Hachi and you. Do you really think I am the kind of woman who would—"
"No! That's not what I mean—I… I thought you were letting me down. Gently."
She freezes.
"What?" Her voice is tremulous and, if my accelerated lessons on easily flustered sexy older women are right, on the verge of panic.
Which, strangely enough, calms me down quite a bit.
So I lean back and meet wide, steel eyes that are, yet again, far too yielding.
"You [know] I have attachment issues. What did you think I was seeing this whole thing as?"
She pales.
"Oh gods, I'm so sorry! It's not—that's not at all what I meant! I just wanted to take things slow until we were more comfortable with one another—"
"If you don't think I'm attractive enough—" I start to say. Leadingly.
And far more at ease than I've been since I stepped through her door.
"What?! No, no, no! You're [exasperatingly] sensual! Even if you didn't have hypnotic eyes, legs that I want to run my fingers over, perky breasts with pink nipples that I want to lick around and around, and an ass I would kill to have, you—the way you [move]? Oh gods, Iroha, you could give me an aneurysm just with how you walk when you know Hachi's staring at your butt! I've seen cats take [notes!] I—you're laughing at me."
I am.
"Not at all. I am sobbing in relief," I tell her, fluttering my eyelashes and pretending to wipe away a tear with a finger that, conveniently enough, lies at the end of an arm that's, right now, brushing over her left breast.
And now she's looking at me with the non-verbal equivalent of a deadpan.
Which, yet again, calms me a whole lot.
"Right. Now that you've managed to make me confess my shameful, lustful thoughts… do you want to cuddle?" she asks, verbalizing the deadpan.
"Is that code for—"
"It is code for, 'I don't have the emotional strength to have my first time with you after how draining that was, and I still think we need to have a few more talks, but I still want to feel close to you and hold you until you need to leave.'"
"You may want to come up with codes less packed with meaning," I tell her with the kind of grin he would say is foxy.
And… Well, I'm not about to contradict him.
So I half turn until I'm lying on my side. Still on top of her, but with my back to the sofa as my face falls on the same cushion she's resting on. And, conveniently enough, on top of that dark hair that feels far softer than any upholstery as I lean forward to timidly kiss her cheek.
She runs her fingers down my arm as she mutters something about cheeky, inscrutable younger girls being the end of her, and I giggle. Then she blushes, and I laugh.
Then… we lie there. I don't know how long, just that it's enough for my eyes to dry, my heart to slow down, and the knot in my gut to untangle as soft touches make me aware of her being there. Around me. For me.
She said she loves me.
And… She doesn't lie. Not to others.
So… I'm not entirely reassured. I'm still afraid she'll come to her senses and leave me outside of what she'll build with Hachi and Haruno, but… But I trust her enough not to let those fears be bigger than they need to be. I trust her enough to believe that, when she says she understands me, that she knows how I… how I show I… how I show I care?
That she does.
That… That what I do… matters. That I reach her. Them.
I remember Hachi's letter to Haruno's mother. His speech about why I set up the prom. Why I did the whole thing. Why I wanted them to help.
I haven't told him. How much it mattered to me that he saw through me. That he understood.
Shizu... also does.
I could love her just because of that.
"Iroha…" she asks before trailing off, her fingers running through my hair, parting it over and over in different ways that only have in common soothing touches like cool water flowing over my scalp.
"Yes?" I say, almost drowsily despite my mind still reeling, still running in circles.
"I'm almost afraid to ask, but… did you have one?"
"One what?"
"A… you know. One of those. A speech," she says with what I'm pretty sure is a blushing tone of voice.
Synesthesia would be cool to have.
But… Well, I'm pretty sure I can make do with regular senses for what comes now.
"Shizu, are you asking me if I want to have my first time with a girl be with you? If I want the same woman who taught me about sex to take my hand and guide me through this experience? If I want to feel our naked bodies touch, our skin gliding on top of one another as the heat between our legs grows, as hungry kisses go from gentle to needful, as tenderness mingles with raw desire? Are you asking me if I want to feel your fingers gently prod at my sex, trace the edges of my faded areolas before taking my nipples and pinching them with barely enough strength to make me bite my lip as I look at you with pitiful need? Are you asking me if I'm sure I want to experience my first time with a woman be with you, the beautiful, caring, sensual girlfriend I still can't believe is in front of me? I'm sorry, but that's impossible! Because I don't want a first time: I want a lifetime."
Shizu blinks at me, her head turned aside over the cushion.
Then she goes perfectly still, blushes, rapidly blinks, and, overall, makes a very good impression of someone about to have a stroke.
"So... you still want to cuddle?" I tell her with a slow, lazy lowering of my lashes before I lick my lips.
And she [whines.]
Heh. Still got it.
==================
This work is a repost of my second oldest fic on QQ (https://forum.questionablequesting.com/threads/all-right-fine-ill-take-you-oregairu.15676/), where it can be found up to date except for the latest two chapters that are currently only available on on Patreon (https://www.patreon.com/Agrippa?fan_landing=true)—as an added perk, both those sites have italicized and bolded text. I'll be posting the chapters here twice weekly, on Wednesday and Friday, until we're caught up. Unless something drastic happens, it will be updated at a daily rate until it catches up to the currently written 84 chapters (or my brain is consumed by the overwhelming amounts of snark, whichever happens first).
Speaking of Italics, this story's original format relied on conveying Brain-chan's intrusions into Hachiman's inner monologue through the use of italics. I'm using square brackets ([]) to portray that same effect, but the work is more than 300k words at the moment, so I have to resort to the use of macros to make that light edit and the process may not be perfect. My apologies in advance
Also, I'd like to thank my credited supporters on Patreon: aj0413, Niklarus, Tinkerware, Varosch, and Xalgeon. If you feel like maybe giving me a hand and help me keep writing snarky, maladjusted teenagers and their cake buffets, consider joining them or buying one of my books on https://www.amazon.com/stores/Terry-Lavere/author/B0BL7LSX2S. Thank you for reading!