“That’s called admiration.” 

Kanada Maiiri glared from the corner of her eyes at the new hire who had just rambled to her about his sentimentality. Gorohara Bunta, for his part, attempted to keep his composure in the face of such a rebuke. Though he tried, she could tell from his eyes that her response had not only been undesirable to him, but completely unexpected. Perhaps, she considered, he had been expecting outright rejection. As he had followed her onto the street, he would not be spared by such a thing. Behind them, in the bar, their coworkers laughed drunkenly in celebration of some promotion of some manager on their floor. 

Maiiri had just gone out for a smoke. 

“No, admiration is like, I want to be like them! Like that, right?” 

Maiiri tugged on the cigarette while staring across the street at a neon sign. The building across had a number of businesses inside of it. A lender, salon, bar, cafe, but the sign was apart from those bland plastic displays backlit by boring lightboxes. The neon sign was in the shape of the character ‘ro’. No indication to the nature of the business, and not even a notice of what floor one could find it on. A mystery, then. 

“Okay, so, you think you’re in love with me. Let’s say it’s not admiration—but of course it is just that. A hypothetical; I am in your apartment, sitting on the couch and drinking a beer. It’s just us in the apartment and it’s getting quite late. What would your course of actions be in that scenario?” 

She did not look at him directly; one eye peeked at him between puffs. 

Bunta crossed his arms for a moment before pulling one hand up to scratch his chin. He pretended to be quite in thought for a few moments while dozens of pedestrians passed them by. One, a girl of about twenty from Maiiri’s estimation, tried to avoid a few men and had to squeeze between them and Bunta. He pressed himself against the lightpost he had been leaning against until she passed. His eyes followed her before they came back to Maiiri, who was smiling at her own prediction. Though he tried to meet her half-gaze, he could not maintain eye contact. Already his thoughts had reached the fated conclusion. Helped along by the young woman or not, his answer was clear to Maiiri without needing to be told. She took a long drag on her cigarette, pulling it to its last breath, and exhaled a cloud of smoke into the cold Fukuoka night. 

“That’s called Lust.” 

“N-no! I wasn’t thinking a-a-anything like that, Kanada-san!” 

He waved his hands stupidly in his own defense, but his stutter betrayed him. 

“Gorohara, do you know why I smoke?” The man was stunned by the question. “I smoke because it’s a good way to give your hands something to do while you think. When people say they smoke to relieve stress I think that’s it. You get to stand in one spot and do absolutely nothing at all. I like that.” 

Bunta was silent. His head drooped and his shoulders were near falling off at his own shame. It would have been kinder to reject him outright. She should have done so earlier in the week when she noticed his constant staring. Why she had not she could not discern at that moment. Maybe she pitied him. Either way, to have followed her from that annoying party and to have brought along his own selfish desires to her special time away, that was a sin. Crime met punishment. Total subjugation. He probably was in love with her, she had no way of knowing and she knew that much. It was funnier, and more spiteful, to break him down to the components of that emotion than to face it head on. To justify it by even saying it was real. Bunta was younger than her by eight years. He had only graduated college the year before. When she had been the type to waste time on pointless sentimentality he was probably still in Junior High. She had no hate in her body for what had become of her, it was just exhausting to keep putting up with people treating like she should be miserable. 

To take pride in misery seemed repulsive. 

“Kanada-san!” 

Bunta declared himself stoutly as he stood straight. He had been building himself up to this moment so, Maiiri sighed, she faced him directly. She did not return his stern expression, and her eyes still darted to the signs in order to decipher the strange character. Still, as long as he felt she was paying attention, then what was to follow may have stuck. 

“I love you! Please go out with me!” 

The crowd did not even turn their eyes to eavesdrop. Each figure moved by, shuffling between coats and bags. Somewhere, in that moment, a car honked at something. The echo bounced off the windows of the buildings and carried the sound to them. The crowd inside seemed to laugh at the car, erupting into their celebration the following second. Maiiri realized she had more to drink than she had thought, because she had to stifle a mean chuckle. The near-smile still crossed her lips, drawing no joy from her suitor. He must have wanted her to smile at his declaration differently. Maybe she could have, even as soon as three years prior. Then he would have been only twenty-one. Too young and foolish to waste time on. 

Maiiri pulled out another cigarette and lit it in her lips. It filled her throat with the sweet taste of nicotine which had welcomed her into the night minutes before. She slid the lighter into her pocket and found the hideaway to be quite warm. She kept her hand there and slid her other into another pocket. The cigarette tucked into her lips, she spoke from the corner of her mouth. 

“No.” 

Bunta’s eyes grew damp. His face crumpled together in creases of mourning, growing red and shameful. He must have been aware of the state he was in. He turned away and walked down the street, disappearing into the crowds. Alone at last, Maiiri faced her sign. A man in a blue sports coat walked into the front door of that building. At least some of the places were open, maybe the bar was quiet. Perhaps she could find what “ro” really was. With those lingering thoughts overwriting any concern for the new hire, Maiiri inhaled her cigarette yet again.