It was a memory still fresh in Ryuichi's mind. It'd been before he had regained his memories; while he was wandering around the city at night, he came across a beautiful woman. Ryuichi spoke to her as she walked alone, her eyes tinged with melancholy.
"Yo. What's a beautiful woman like you doing; walking glumly all by herself on this fine evening?"
"..."
He was clearly hitting on her, plain and simple. For Ryuichi, a good night was a night where he could meet a beautiful woman and passionately make love to her in bed. So that day, Ryuichi was just looking for a woman who was willing to be his partner.
"If you want, you and I could talk about it in that store over there?"
"…Fufu, sounds good. I think I'll take your offer up and let all my woes out, just for the handsome man who called out to me on this lonely night."
The woman knew that having a "talk" was just a pretext of his, yet despite this, she still nodded in agreement.
Ryuichi brought the woman to his favorite bar, run by a high school student-slash-manager who let him do whatever he wanted.
In addition to having a space out front for customers to eat, the bar also had a private room in the back that was prepared for those purposes, which Ryuichi had used for his trysts many times.
"'Sup, boss. Do me a favor and get the beauty next to me a drink, will ya?"
"You've got another one this time? Hey, you. I suggest you get out of here now. All he wants to do is fuck you up in bed."
"Fufu, thank you for your concern. But today, I thought I'd let his warmth soothe me."
"…Is that so? Then I won't say anything more."
The manager seemed to have sensed something in the woman and decided to let Ryuichi do what he wanted.
Since Ryuichi was a minor, he wasn't legally allowed to drink yet; despite this, he was about to ignore it and have a drink anyway when he noticed that the woman had downed several cups already. When Ryuichi saw her in high spirits, he brought her to the back room.
"Ah… ♪"
Ryuichi took the alluringly mature woman in his arms and carried her. She seemed surprised at first, but immediately, she put her hand on Ryuichi's arm and let out a melancholy sigh.
"It's been years now since my husband has passed away…so sometimes, I have nights like these where I can't help but feel lonely. I have a daughter, though, so when she's home, she eases that loneliness. But today, she's staying with a friend of hers."
"I see. So you got lonely and decided to roam the streets at night."
"I wasn't actually out trying to look for company, though. I was just going to have a quick drink and go home. But then, you found me. ♪"
The woman turned around and kissed Ryuichi on the lips. He was used to kissing, but the sudden kiss from her took him by surprise. However, not content with being outdone by her, Ryuichi firmly began to entwine his tongue with the woman's.
"You're pretty good."
"Yeah, well, I'm pretty confident in my handling of women. Don't worry, I'll make sure you enjoy tonight."
They passionately continued kissing each other, then he pushed her body down on the bed. The woman's body was as attractive as any college-aged woman Ryuichi had ever had relations with, though she was probably in her mid-thirties seeing as she had a daughter of her own.
"I feel so secure in your arms. You're a little rough, forceful even, but my body is telling me that it wants you to ravage it senseless."
"Glad to hear it. Now then… Oh, right. Why don't we exchange our names? I don't mind if you use an alias."
"…Right."
"You might've heard from the manager, but my name is Ryuichi. What about yours?"
"Mine is Sakie."
"I see. Well then, Sakie; let's have our fill of lovemaking tonight."
"Yes. ♪"
"…Ugh."
"A-Awake now, Ryuichi?"
"…Makoto?"
A groan escaped his mouth as Ryuichi opened his eyes. He looked around and saw that he was in his classroom at school, and many students were still inside. It was only natural since they were currently in their brief break in between classes.
"…Did I fall asleep?"
"Yep, and soundly at that. The teacher even gave up on trying to wake you up."
"…Wow. Damn, I messed up."
Though it was unknown whether the same could be said for the previous Ryuichi, the current Ryuichi was, at the very least, properly reflecting on his mistakes. Seeing this, Makoto gave him a startled look which seemed to say, "Holy crap, are you for real?" Knowing what his look meant, Ryuichi annoyedly snorted at him.
"Man, you've really changed, haven't you? I mean, you're so smart that the teachers never say anything, and even if you have a bad attitude in class, you'd manage to get away with it if you got good scores on tests."
"Same goes for you, doesn't it?"
"Yeah, but I don't fall asleep in class!"
"…Tch."
He certainly had a point. Makoto had never fallen asleep during class before; he was also secretive in picking up women, so he wasn't in particularly bad waters.
"…Man, what a nostalgic dream."
It was a memory of a passionate night with a beautiful woman he came across a while ago while strolling outside at night; a widow who'd called herself Sakie. Ryuichi hadn't seen her since then, but a woman as beautiful as her surely must've remarried and built a happy family by now.
"…Ah, now I remember. Sakie's the woman who resembles Shizuna."
Both Shizuna and Sakie had returned delighted expressions when he'd embraced them, and their mannerisms had closely resembled each others'. Now that he thought about it, their appearances were also quite similar… Don't tell me they're actually mother and daughter? However, he discarded the thought and laughed it off, thinking, "Nah, there's no way."
"You slept very soundly, didn't you, Shishido-kun?"
"Yeah… Fuaaaah… Ah?"
"What? Why're you staring at me with your mouth wide open?"
It was because he had suddenly found Shizuna right next to him as if it was a matter of course. Unless he was still half-asleep, he could've sworn Shizuna hadn't been beside him while he was talking to Makoto. That meant that she had somehow made it to Ryuichi's side while he was unaware… He shifted his chair away slightly to put some distance between them.
"…I know I'm in the wrong for approaching you without warning, but do you have to act that scared of me?"
"I'm not scared or anything. I just thought you were creepy."
"That's even worse!"
Her loud voice rattled his sleepy mind, making Ryuichi furrow his eyebrows.
"Seriously, what happened between you two? Why're you suddenly so close to each other?"
"I suppose you could say a lot of things happened between him and I."
"And what are those 'things', hmm?"
"Shut up, you. Keep your nose out of this."
Ryuichi made a shooing gesture with his hand while Makoto laughed as he left the two. Makoto was truly a sucker for anything interesting happening around him, which made him particularly curious about Ryuichi's changes, much to Ryuichi's dismay. Ryuichi was also wary of the girl standing next to him, because he never knew when she might let something spill from her mouth.
"So? Need anything from me?"
"…No, I didn't have any particular business. I just wanted to talk to you. Is that not allowed?"
"…No, it's fine."
It would've been easy for Ryuichi to turn her down for being a hassle, but he didn't want to make her sad, and he also didn't want to be seen as rude by everybody. Perhaps regaining his memories had made him a tad bit more timid than before, or perhaps he'd just had a change of heart.
"Are you worried about rumors popping up?"
"Surely you wouldn't want them either, would'ja?"
"Hmm, well, we don't really mind… Right, girls?"
With that, Shizuna turned her attention to her friends. The girls, whom he had only talked briefly with a while ago on his way back from the restroom, waved their hands energetically when Ryuichi's eyes turned to them. Apparently, their encounter that day had produced positive results.
"...?"
Suddenly, Ryuichi felt a gaze and turned his head to see Sohei, Shizuna's childhood friend, staring at him. When their gazes met, he quickly looked away, but it seemed the fact that Ryuichi was talking to Shizuna like this was weighing on his mind.
"…Ah, is it Sohei-kun?"
"Yeah. He doesn't seem too happy to see you talking to somebody like me."
"…I wonder why. All I'm doing is having a normal, regular conversation with you."
Ryuichi knew why. It was because there were a handful of people who knew how she was before and couldn't accept this new reality.
But in any case, he secretly glanced at Shizuna's face without her noticing. In the manga, she would always be smiling when she looked at Sohei. Yet, the look on Shizuna's face when she was looking at Sohei now seemed to be a mixture of resignation and disappointment.
"…Oh, right. Shishido-kun."
"Yeah?"
"Can we exchange contact information?"
And so, Shizuna grew yet another step closer to Ryuichi.