>>2585085Despite the dramatic act in the hallway, Aqua is quick to bury the incident by the time you serve her the curry. She takes her first bite and you are confident you see stars sparkle in her eyes for a second. Coughing a little, she tries to make her excitement not too obvious. “Quite alright, for something prepared by a bachelor” she judges, and it might very well be a slap in the face, considering Aqua’s dining standards. You look at her with raised eyebrows. Was this her idea of getting back at you for exposing her in front of Shion? Since Aqua is unable to withstand your gaze for very long and begins to squirm in her seat like a child caught stealing candy, your theory is very likely to be true.
“M-maybe I’m just a little spoiled by my mom’s curry ah-haha…” she tries to backpedal on her critique – “I see…” you eat a spoonful of the curry yourself. A bit sweet for your liking, but definitely not deserving of the harsh-ish words. “Let’s go visit your mother then. She should teach me her recipe – wouldn’t want you to have to suffer through my sub-par mush, right?”
Aqua almost drops her cutlery. “Wha… what?! Isn’t that a b-bit too s-soon?!” she quickly shovels in two more mouthfuls, now forcing an exaggerated hum of appreciation “M-mhhh! I-it definitely gets better with each bite, now that I think about it!” You cannot help but laugh at her antics and wave her off.
The atmosphere relaxes from there and you continue you usual small talk over the meal. Aqua tells you a bit more about Shion. She seems to be an interesting character, to say the least, and the fire-and-ice dynamic between Aqua and her apparently stretches beyond the relationship on-screen, far into their private life. Aqua claims that the silver-haired witch had been clinging to her since the day they met, so you are naturally inclined to belief it is the exact other way around.
You offer to do the dishes after you are done with eating and Aqua vehemently declines. The compromise has you doing the washing and Aqua handling the drying. When Aqua takes three times longer to dry off the last plate than was necessary, you get the feeling that you are not the only one dreading that the evening might end soon. You shoot her a knowing smile.
“Y-you know… I was thinking of doing a member-only horror movie watch along next week…” she very not-subtly switches topics as the last piece of kitchenware gets put away. “Really? Hmm, shame I’ll be locked out of that… “ you answer while wiping down the sink.
“Y-yeah… that’s why I wanted to-… wait. What do you mean ‘locked out’? You aren’t a member?!” the pink-haired girl yells in disbelief. “Its five hundred Yen, Aqua. Five. Hundred. A month!” You explain matter-of-factly “I can get the full Aqua experience for free, just by searching the sidewalk in front of my local convenience store.” A used kitchen towel comes flying into you face, hiding the smug smirk that had settled there.
“I-idiot!” you manage to free yourself from the rag just in time to see Aqua coming at you with a second towel. After chasing you twice around the dining table, she stumbles, of course, and you have to go catch her, lest she crashes trough the paper door leading to her living room. As you share… hmm well, you guess this is your first hug, technically? You reveal that you lied about not being a member. You also accept the un-posed invitation to watch a horror movie together. “Just as training for the stream…” she mumbles into your shirt, not even trying to break the hold you still have of her.
You are equally amused, impressed and endeared by how much preparation Aqua has put into setting up this evening… all in her own dorky way. Of course, that also means that her act is up, pretty much from the start. Not that you would tell her – your teasing only went so far.
It all starts with the movie she picks. Hours of training in an overrated FPS game might have enabled her to maneuver through the menu at speeds fast enough to make your head spin and veil what was actually going on to your casual-gamer eyes. Too bad the movie she settles on still is the exact same one that had showed in the ‘recently watched’ section, back when the screen was stuck on loading during the boot-up of the streaming service.
