ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ɴɪɴᴇ

୨⎯ Vacillating Words of a Soul ⎯୧

"You're telling you are Y/n? The Akashi Y/n back in highschool?" Rindou further expounds out of shock and confusion. I then slap him aggressively, pointing out, "Don't you mention my surname! I have thrown it away a long time ago already."

"That fucking hurt!" He yelled. Rindou then shifts his gaze to the background and speaks with a lowered and displeased tone, "I had a feeling you were familiar. So it is you, Y/n. Who would have thought we would meet again after all these years..."

"I tried forgetting about you. Hah! Of course you would easily forget about what you did to me."

Rindou places his eyes back at mine, now with a cautious face. He sighs deeply and explains, "You know I'm bad at remembering stuff. Didn't I mention that to you before?" I slap him once more. "Don't you dare talk to me as if we're still on good terms! You-! Tch." I drop the conversation and remain still, avoiding eye contact with him.

"Before anything else, will you get off of me? I'm getting sweaty over here. Like you said, it is hot." Rindou says with a piercing glare. I roll my eyes at him before going back to my proper seat. He then grabs my jaw with force and says with an irritated grin, "Roll your eyes at me one more time and you'll get a taste of your own medicine, woman."

Again, I pull away his grip and fix my hair. "Just drive. Here's the location."

"Now, you're making me your personal driver?" Rindou says, frustration rises through his head. I look at him one last time and repeat what I said with a firm tone, "I said drive. Don't make me commit illegal acts, Haitani."

I see Rindou faintly smirking at me as he speaks in that same arrogant manner, "Well, if you say so. Just don't start begging for me to stop when I go faster than you can handle."

About seven minutes of him driving on the road, I begin to feel like I'm gonna get knocked out any second now. I can't fall asleep right in this car... together with him. He's a-My eyelids begin to sink deeper and deeper-perverted guy.

"Y/n. Y/n."

I feel a subtle nudge on my head. As I can't make out the face quite clearly with my sleepy vision, I utter, "...Huh?"

I quickly straighten my back to see that I am back at my mansion... still inside a car though. Scattering my vision, I take note of the man beside me waking me up from my snooze. "Ugh."

"'Ugh'? ...Hey, I brought you to your place. Can you get out of my car already?" Rindou says with an unexpected caring tone in his voice. I'm not quite sure what to do right now. All I'm certain of is this headache I'm feeling that feels like someone is drilling inside my skull.

"I..." My hand impulsively held the side of my head as a sharp stab passed right through my brain. Rindou says a side comment, "That's what you get for drinking a lot. I honestly didn't expect you to be a drunkard. Or are you having some kind of problem?"

I whisper to myself, "Yeah. You're obviously the problem."

"Did you say something?" Rindou questions as he tries to assist me in going out of the car. As stubborn as I am, I reject most of his help. "I'm totally fine! I don't need you." I exclaim since I am getting annoyed with the entirety of his presence.

He keeps following me from behind while I keep telling him to go away until the worst thing that could happen actually occurred. My manager sees me and him. She approaches me, walking with a quick pace, and interrogates me as if I did something wrong, "Y/n, who the fuck is this?"

"Haitani Rindou..." I exhale an upset sigh.

"After you didn't answer me properly yesterday, how dare you bring-! Wait, did you say Haitani Rindou?" Mari sees me nodding my head. "You're joking, dear!" She laughs loudly.

I reply, crossing my arms, "I didn't believe it myself as well when I first knew it was actually him up in that ring. Acting all high and mighty against his opponent..."

Mari completely ignores me now and switches her attention to the guy behind me. "Hey, can you be a model? Or even better! An actor. Are you interested?"

"In you? No." Rindou says.

Mari breaks out laughing again. "You're truly amusing! You could honestly be a star!"

He grins, "I already am."

I chime in, "A star that doesn't even light up, that is."

"You're such a good match for Y/n here!" Mari says with confidence as she pulls me closer to her. She then gasps, continuing her sentence, "I just remembered something! He might actually be the one for you! What do you say, my beloved Y/n?"

Without a doubt, I decline, "No, Mari. I have hated this guy all my life! Not in a million years will I ever make a project with him. We can't even guarantee if he has what it takes to be an actor!"

"Say, what's your current occupation?" Mari asks him before replying to me. "Hmm?" Rindou hums softly. "I'm currently a drummer of a rock band but I fall in and out so right now I'm just taking my time enjoying life."

I chime in once again, "That's why you were looking for women left and right."

My manager places her hand by her chin, twisting inside her train of thoughts. "I think we can make this happen. Yes, that's right! The company will take in whoever they can find just for you to have a perfect match for this project."

"I completely disagree with this reckless idea. Don't you see how angry I am with this person?!"

"This is your only way to gain more fame which means you'll have more money!" Mari continues to encourage me into grabbing this opportunity.

Rindou adds with a laidback gesture on his stance, "Do you just care about money? I can give you as many as you want."

I wave my hand at him and argue, "There you go again with your arrogant head. Besides, they're probably fake." We're going nowhere with the current direction of the conversation. Not even Mari can save me. She looks really determined just to boost my career.

He scoffs, saying, "You must be forgetting something crucial, Y/n."

"You must be too." I clench my hidden fist as I compose myself. "Look. I didn't drag you here so why don't you take your leave already? I don't need anything from you, Haitani."

"What happened to calling me Rinnie? I was sure you liked calling me that a lot." He asks in a teasing manner. My anger keeps building up that I want to give up talking to this guy. "Stop bringing up the past. I don't need you. End of story!"

"Maybe right now you don't." He turns to face the front door. Before he leaves, Rindou smirks at me and says, "I'll have my phone open just to hear you begging for me to come to your aid. I'll be waiting. Goodbye, boo~"

"Don't even think about it, you piece of-! Ahh!!" I shout at him, watching him exit my mansion with such a relaxed manner as his hands occupy the insides of his pants pockets.

My manager then comes up to me and pats my back. "Now, now, dear. Calm your head down. You must be extremely exhausted. I didn't mean to push you that far a while ago."

I exhale a deep breath and pans my view to her direction. Guilt paints my face as I soon realize how much my bottled anger has spilled. "I do get where you are coming from, Mari. The head of the production team might take this chance as well if he were to be introduced."

"I see you've got some history with that hottie. Now that I think about it, you did mention something like about your high school crush?" What?! Since when?? "Oh, but you were drunk at that time so I didn't think much of it and laughed it off."

I clear my throat and attempt to stir the conversation in a different angle, asking, "Did you know him from somewhere? I kinda got a hint that you were familiar with his name."

"You see, I read an article about two months ago about a suspected accomplice for a particular crime committed with that exact name, 'Haitani Rindou'. It said something about further investigating his case. Well I haven't really seen an update so I think everything is cool now."

"Mari..." I utter out of shock. "After reading an article like that, you would still want me to work with him..? Are you trying to kill me?!"

My manager carefully emphasizes her stand, "My beloved Y/n, you can be silly sometimes, hmm? My point here is I would take any chance we can get to support you! You can trust me, no? If all things go south, do nothing and I'll take care of it. Got it?"

I slowly lean my head towards Mari. "What am I without you? I have learned the basics because of you. I shouldn't neglect your actions since everything you have done for me turned out to be a great success. Thank you, Mari."

She places her hand on top of my head and rubs it gently. Her gaze softens and says in a comforting tone, "You are the only one who truly ignited the fire inside of me to be of service to someone. It has grown me into a person with a bigger mission to fulfill. You don't need to thank me, dear."

"Hmm?" Rindou picks up his buzzing phone. On the other end, someone begins to shout into his ear, "Where the hell did you disappear this time?!"

"Will you please stop busting my eardrums from time to time? Your bass guitar sucks, Hajime!" Rindou says in an irritated tone.

Hajime raises his voice at him, "Shut the hell up and get your ass back in the studio! Our main vocalist is tired of keeping his hopes up only for you to not show up. He keeps speaking in a sulking tone, 'Our drummer sure is taking his time.', 'Our drummer is the best one we have. We can't ever replace him.' Do you get the message now, Rindou?!"

Rindou simply chuckles before hanging up the phone call. "Geez, I wish she could have missed me this much."

Not even a minute passes by, another call lights up his phone once more. "Ran? What's up?" He switches the phone to his other ear to clearly hear his brother's voice from the unreachable end. What his brother says to him colors his mind blank.

"Sanzu's gone missing without a trace. Everyone in Bonten can't contact him as of the moment. You know what this means, right? ...He's most likely plotting something sinister and twisted. Be careful, Rindou."

♥ ᴛᴏ ʙᴇ ᴄᴏɴᴛɪɴᴜᴇᴅ...