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Izumo realised she had been tapping her foot nervously on the train platform.
Why did she even agree to this? Or maybe she should actually ask herself:
Why had he even proposed this in the first place?
It happened when he was visiting her the last time, at the turn of autumn and winter, when both of them were slowly starting to prepare for their respective end-term exams. Both of them were sitting in silence, her going through her lecture notes, and him writing something related to his thesis on his laptop.
Nobody was saying anything, and they simply enjoyed each other's company in silence. Or that was until Ryuji actually asked her out of the blue:
“What are you doing for the New Year's?”
Izumo furrowed her eyebrows and sent him an irritated look.
“And what am I supposed to do?”
It was now Ryuji's turn to furrow his eyebrows.
“Dunno. Maybe you got invited somewhere.”
Izumo simply shrugged her shoulders and glanced in the direction of her notes again. She didn't give his question that much thought.
“Well, the girls from college mentioned something about some New Year's Eve party, but I'm not sure if I want to go. Paku invited me to visit her and her husband, but I don't feel like third-wheeling, and she probably just wanted to be nice. I'll think about it.”
Ryuji nodded, and, just as Izumo assumed the topic was over, he actually spoke again:
“So you do not have any established plans...?”
Izumo huffed and gave him an annoyed look.
“What's going on with this interrogation?! What does the way I spend New Year's break have to do with anything! Why would you even care? And what are you going to do then yourself?!”
A few years ago, at this point, Ryuji would have already flinched at her reaction, but now he just shrugged and shifted his attention back to his laptop:
“Dunno. Same family stuff, I guess.”
Izumo sighed heavily. Their relationship may have improved considerably over time, but there were still moments like this when she couldn't work him out at all.
And just as she hoped she could finally come back to her notes, she heard:
“So, uhm, well... Why don't you come to Kyoto then?”
Izumo's brow twitched.
“Excuse me?”
Ryuji growled. If she didn't genuinely look so disoriented right now, he would normally be willing to consider that she was doing it on purpose and was making him repeat himself to poke fun at him.
“I asked you, that maybe you could come to Kyoto. It's because you said you don't really have any definite plans in particular. I mean, if you want to come, that is!”
Now, after some time, Izumo had trouble determining why she had not acted more eloquently, why she had not, for example, asked him where he had gotten the idea in the first place. At that moment, however, it was as if her own body acted autonomously since without much thought, she said:
“Ugh, sure?”
“Cool.”
Cool! He had the audacity to simply say ‘cool’ and, unfazed by the whole situation, return to his activities.
And how she was standing on this platform, nervously tapping her foot and glancing at her watch every few seconds. The train was supposed to come in five minutes.
She didn't even really get an opportunity to somehow bale out of the situation, because the second she started thinking about how she could do it, Ryuji said:
“Glad you've agreed, though. Mom is going to be content for sure.”
Oh, splendid. As if it were not enough that he had already managed to put her in an awkward position, he really had to get even his mom involved, didn't he? Now, she actually had to go.
“I'm pretty sure Koneko's going to come as well,” Ryuji continued, only to suddenly throw Izumo a worried look, „I'm not 100% sure about Renzo, though... He's been abroad with his older brother, so he might not come. But if he comes, I'll talk to him.”
Izumo just rolled her eyes.
“Oh yeah, and tell him what?”
“I don't know! To behave or something.”
“We're adults, Ryuji.”
“He didn't change that much, though, no.”
“His presence doesn't bother me. Plus, it's kind of his family home, you know.”
“Well, but if he says something weird to you, make sure to tell me!”
“Okay, my private knight in silver armour.”
Go back a few years, and he would throw a fit about her talking to him like that. Right now, though, he just mumbled under his nose and nonchalantly tried to return to his notes.
And that's how Izumo ended up on this damned train on its way to Kyoto. It was really too late to back out now. Maybe this is why her worries and anxieties came back with redoubled strength.
She's going to Kyoto, and for what? How is Ryuji even going to introduce her to his family?! Like, of course, she was there a few times in the past, but it was always with other exorcists. And how she's going alone. It's objectively weird.
Like the whole relationship between the two of them in general, she almost wanted to say.
Before she got an opportunity to try to relax on the train, her phone buzzed.
‘You're on the train already?’
Great. Oh God, what did she get herself into.
When she managed to get off the train after a few hours, the first thing she did was to nervously look around her.
It didn't take long for her to spot him in the crowd, looking around as nervously as she was. He hasn't noticed her yet.
She slowly started walking towards him, begrudgingly dragging her feet, and then their eyes met.
A smile momentarily dawned on his face.
Izumo also involuntarily smiled gently, despite the lump in her throat, and waved gently at him.
After a while, they finally managed to break through the crowd swarming around the platform.
“H-Hey—” Izumo began, but she didn't finish. Before she had a chance to say anything else, she felt Ryuji's strong arms tightening around her.
The girl felt herself momentarily turn all red.
They were in the public!
Ryuji must have realised their awkward position as well, because he momentarily let go of her and nonchalantly tried to ignore what he had just done.
“You have actually come.”
“It would be difficult for me not to come, as you have already involved your entire family in the matter.”
“Can I help you with your suitcase?”
Izumo rolled her eyes.
“Thank you, gentleman, but I think I'm capable enough.”
Ryuji just groaned under his nose and put his hands in his pocket. “Wasn't saying you weren't.”
He led her to a taxi, which puzzled her at first, although it probably made sense, given that this time it was just the two of them, not an entire group as during the previous times she was there.
This resulted in an additional issue, though, as they ended up arguing over who should pay for the taxi. Ryuji, of course, argued that he would pay as Izumo was his guest after all, while the girl insisted that as she was about to spend two nights at his house, and the least she could do was to pay for the taxi.
The confused taxi driver, too polite to tell them that he really didn't care who pays as long as they pay at all, and whether they could just go on with their day as he had other people to pick up, suggested they pay half each, which they did.
When they finally arrived, Torako Suguro was already waiting for the two, and she greeted Izumo with a radiant smile.
“Kamiki-san, right? It's so nice of you to come! Ryuji, why didn't you help her with her suitcase! Come on, make yourself comfortable! We're slowly finishing all the preparations in the kitchen.”
Izumo immediately pulled a gift from her bag and handed it to the hostess.
“I hope it's not a problem for me to be here, I'm guessing the Inn can be extremely busy over the holiday period...”
“Ah, thank you, dear, well, of course it is not a problem! Ryuji was delighted that you were coming, he didn't talk about anything else—”
“Mom.”
Izumo giggled. She was, of course, aware that Ryuji's mom was probably just teasing her son, but she would nevertheless be lying if she said that she wasn't curious at all about what exactly the boy was saying to his mom.
“And who's that wonderful young lady over there! Oh right! My saviour back from the Impure King incident!”
Everyone looked in the direction from which the voice came, and everyone's eyes met no other but Tatsuma Suguro himself, covered with some white powder, probably from rice flour.
Izumo felt herself blushing.
“Oh, it's not like that, it was my friend who mainly saved you sir, I only helped a little—”
Ryuji, on the other hand, groaned.
“Stop scaring her, dad. And what are you actually doing?”
“I’m helping out in the kitchen, obviously.”
“Maybe we can help too?”
Now all eyes turned again towards Izumo.
“I just thought—”
“Huh, well, it's not a bad idea.” Ryuji said with a smile.
Torako waved her hand.
“Ah, it's nothing, we'll manage, besides, why would we send a guest to work in the kitchen—”
Tatsuma slapped both his son and his guest on their backs with far more force than was necessary, making both Izumo and Ryuji open their eyes wide in shock.
“Oh, come on Torako, you can see that the kids are all fired up to work!”
“Well then.”
And so, Izumo and Ryuji ended up being delegated to prepare mochi cakes together with The Highest Priest.
As father and son were engaging in familial banter, Izumo carefully took a look around the kitchen.
She had already forgotten how preparing food for a temple + Inn combo is such a large undertaking.
She recognised some family members (mainly from the Shima family – there was no sign of the presence of the youngest son, though). From what she understood, there were also some people from the Inn staff.
“Oh,” Ryuji glanced at his watch, “Konekomaru should be arriving soon.”
“Well done,” interjected Torako, “take our guest and wait for him together. We'll take it from here, it's practically all ready anyway.”
Izumo was immensely happy to hear that Miwa-kun would in fact show up. They may never have been exceptionally close, but the boy had always been extremely nice and friendly to her. She liked him a lot.
Ryuji took Izumo to his room and showed her the manga he recently decided to pick up due to the influence of his college classmates, even though he was never a big of manga reader himself.
After some time, a familiar voice pulled them out of their conversation:
“There you are, guys! Welcome, Kamiki-san!”
“Nice to see you after all this time, Miwa-kun!”
It only took a moment for Izumo and Koneko to start talking to each other with an enthusiasm worthy of long-lost friends, which made Ryuji roll his eyes.
‘Thanks for forgetting I'm also in this room, guys.’
“Oh, that's right,” Konekomaru finally turned towards Ryuji, “Renzo mentioned to you if he's coming eventually?”
Ryuji shrugged his shoulders.
“The last time I spoke to him, he mentioned that he still was not sure.”
“And he said the same to me.”
“Well,” Izumo interjected into their conversation, „let me excuse you for now so I can get dressed for the evening.”
The room where everyone gathered for the New Year's Eve celebration was exceptionally lively that night.
Everyone was chatting merrily around the table while the New Year's Eve music show had just started on the TV, which was playing in the background.
It seemed that nothing could disturb this idyll until suddenly, a joyful shout rang out across the room:
“IZUMOOO-CHAAAN~”
So the young Shima has arrived after all.
Ryuji groaned, Konekomaru sighed, and Izumo merely shrugged her shoulders.
‘So Ryuji may have been right that he hasn't changed that much.’
Before Renzo could approach them, however, he was stopped on the way by Kinzo, so he could beat the shit out of his brother.
‘Well, some things definitely don't change at all.’
“So, Izumo-chan~” Renzo addressed her, while sitting down (obviously) next to her. “You really did come. It was Bon who invited you, and you actually came!”
Izumo raised her eyebrow and noticed Ryuji was slightly twitching on her other side.
“I guess?”
“So, is it true that Bon has kept visiting you for some time? That's—”
“Okay, enough of this topic.”
If stares could kill, Renzo would probably be lying dead by now, but pretty unconcerned by this fact, he sent Ryuji a wry smirk in response.
“No need to get so defensive, Bon—”
“HOW ABOUT A GAME OF CARDS!”
All gazes now turned towards the stressed out Konekomaru.
“I'll go to my room to get it.”
If one wasn't going to count the strange competitiveness between Ryuji and Renzo over a seemingly completely innocent game of cards, Renzo's 'flirtatious' remarks towards Izumo, which seemed to irritate Ryuji even more than her, and Kinzo getting too drunk, the rest of the night passed relatively calmly.
It was actually quite nice to sit like that with the boys, when all of them were finally fully legal adults, and to drink a little while talking, and laughing, and playing some stupid card games.
‘Wow,’ Izumo thought to herself, ‘I've really made it to another year in my life.’
The next morning she was woken up by Ryuji's gentle knock on the door of her room.
“We're going to have breakfast in about half an hour, and then we're going to the shrine.” Ryuji told her through the closed door. “You're coming with us, right?”
To the surprise of no one, the Fushimi Inari Shrine was packed to the roof.
At one point, Izumo felt someone slightly pulling her sleeve, and when she took a look to check who that was, it turned out to be Ryuji.
‘He just doesn't want to lose me in the crowd,’ she told herself.
Well, it wasn't a completely baseless theory, given that they had almost lost Konekomaru. The poor boy had admittedly grown a bit since his high school days, but it still wasn't difficult to lose him in such a big crowd.
The preparations for the New Year's dinner had already begun when they returned later in the afternoon.
Suddenly, Ryuji's phone buzzed.
“HAAAAAPY NEW YEAR!!!” rang out a voice from the phone.
Ryuji sighed.
“Happy New Year, Master. I hope you had at least one decent meal on this occasion.”
“Yes, mom, I even got out of bed. And you? Are you in Kyoto? Has your foxy girlfriend arrived?”
“MASTER!”
Izumo, Renzo and Koneko stood a little off to the side, trying to pretend they weren't eavesdropping. However, Lighting had a loud enough voice for them not needing any special effort.
‘He told Lighting about me coming?’ Izumo was genuinely surprised.
The dinner went on in a happy atmosphere as much as the evening of New Year's Eve. Izumo was seated together with Ryuji and his parents and the happy family banter between the three of them filled Izumo with some feeling of warmth to which she couldn't really put a name on.
However, practically immediately after finishing cleaning up after dinner, Ryuji disappeared somewhere. Izumo looked for him for some time until she finally found him sitting outside.
“I've been looking for you.”
“Huh, yeah, I just wanted to grab some fresh air.”
“Can I join?”
Ryuji's face did not hide his surprise, but he pointed with his hand to the space next to him.
“Sure.”
Izumo sat down next to him on the terrace steps and, after fighting a battle with herself for a while, finally pulled herself together and said:
“I wanted to thank you.”
“Huh?”
“Don't pretend to be surprised. For inviting me, I mean.”
“Is'sa nothing.”
“You know damn well it is not a ‘nothing’.”
Ryuji sighed heavily, all while nervously staring at the ground, for some reason unable to look at her at all.
“I already told you. There's always a bunch of people here anyway. Besides, mom was happy. So—”
“And what about you?”
“Huh?”
“Were you happy I came?”
Ryuji felt himself turning red.
“You’re too smart to ask stupid questions.”
“It's not a stupid question”
“I literally invited you myself, goddammit!”
This time it was Izumo's turn to pretend the ground beneath her feet was the most interesting thing in the universe.
“You may have guessed that already, but I have never had a holiday like this. Apart from the one time we were here for the wedding of Juzo and Mamushi. You know, when I was a child, my mother never really prepared anything. Once I grew up, I always spent all the holiday breaks at the dormitory. That's why being here means so much to me. Thank you, Ryuji.”
Izumo's words really evoked something in Ryuji. He would have been the happiest to tell her that, after all, ‘she's already part of this family anyway’, but he was aware that it might sound strange, so he just said instead:
“Just know that you are always invited here.”
Izumo nodded slightly, and Ryuji could've sworn she was blushing as well, but as it was already dark outside, he couldn't say for sure.
“Are you certain you really want to go tomorrow already? No one is kicking you out, you could easily stay a few more days.”
Izumo shook her head.
“Thank you, but I don't want to overstay my welcome, plus I need to study for the exams after the break.”
Ryuji nodded. After all, back in the day, they were always competing with each other for the position of the best student in the class, so he couldn't blame her for wanting to prepare well for the exams.
Besides, he himself had things to do.
“But...” Izumo continued after a moment, “After the exams... I guess you will visit me, right...?
“The last time you saw me at your doorstep, you said you didn't recall yourself opening up a hotel.”
Izumo groaned.
“You know damn well that I was just playing with you!”
After a while, they both burst out laughing and, until the chill of the night had really set in, they spent some more time together outside, simply enjoying each other's presence.
The next morning the journey to the train station they spent in silence.
It was not an awkward moment per se. It was a mixture of just being comfortable to sit with each other in silence, and sadness of realisation it would take some time until they see each other again – but that second part they still couldn't admit to each other out loud.
“So…” Ryuji started when they finally reached the platform, “I also want to thank you for actually coming.”
Izumo just nodded. It seemed as if her mind was somewhere else.
As the train approached the station and was already visible from a distance, Izumo finally decided to let go of her inhibitions.
This time, she was the one who initiated the hug between them.
Before Ryuji could react, however, Izumo simply quickly whispered, “Thank you, Ryuji,” grabbed her suitcase, and ran towards the train.
Ryuji smiled as he watched the train pulling away from the station.