Epilogue 1

Epilogue: Katenai Aite Chapter 1

February 10, 2023suzurantranslations

The epilogue (or extras) chapters are all from Mukai’s point of view! So we get a nice glimpse into his thoughts and what he thought of Chihiro from the beginning. Hehe. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) Hope you enjoy!!

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On the smooth, piano-black body of the coffee maker, an indication of the coffee being ready popped up. It made a soft electrical sound, and along with a mellow fragrance, coffee poured into the cup.

“This is fine, right? As expected, office-use capsule style coffee cups are convenient, but there really aren’t many companies that make chic coffee machines for capsules, huh?”

Isaki patted the machine proudly.

The assortment of a classical logo and simple form was indeed Isaki’s taste.

“The portions aren’t bad either.”

“Hmm…”

Mukai grabbed the coffee cup after the machine finished filling it up and leaned against the low cabinet by the window. He had just come back from a meeting and his suit jacket felt constricting.

It seemed that Isaki’s clients had also just left as there were three empty cups on the table.

“So, how was it?”

“They decided to work with us.”

It was the end of May, and the sunlight that was shining through the blinds was that of early summer. Mukai had preferred to drink water instead of hot coffee, but the sharp acidity of the black coffee was unexpectedly good.

“Ah, as expected.”

“When they brought up the topic of sitting down with the legal department again to sign the contract, I took the opportunity to mention that I also wanted to submit a contract business reform plan.”

“Ha ha”

“The rest will be handed over to Honma. I want to take a little bit of a longer break this summer.”

At Mukai’s announcement that was oozing dissatisfaction, Isaki ducked his head.

“Yes, yes, sorry for making you work during Golden Week.”

“Thanks to you, I couldn’t meet up with Chihiro at all.” Thankful that there was no one else there with them, Mukai freely mentioned his lover’s name and grumbled.

Just by saying the name Chihiro, his heart overflowed with happiness.

His boyfriend of one-month worked at a manufacturing company, and when it came to holidays, the whole company adhered to the calendar. As for Mukai’s industry, the event season was their busy period. On top of which, he had another project piled up, and so even though they just started dating, he hadn’t been able to meet up with Chihiro as much as he had wanted to.

“Now, now~ It’s not like you guys are at the age where you can ask ‘Which is more important, me or work?’ are you?”

“But I want to see him.” Mukai cut off Isaki’s teasing tone with his real intentions.

“Aah, I see,” Isaki replied flatly. “My my.”

“I miraculously snatched up my ideal type, even though it was absolutely impossible and almost gave up. It makes sense that it would make me restless, no?”

After speaking in a manner that deliberately exposed some of his flaws and pressed for an answer, Isaki just smiled wryly. Mukai took off his jacket and draped it over the back of the chair that was beside him.

Honestly, he hadn’t even dreamed of being able to date Chihiro.

He got to know Chihiro as a colleague, and at first, he was fond of Chihiro’s shallow pride and his slapdash ways of trying to achieve maximum results with minimum effort. Chihiro himself probably thought that he was acting calculating, but Mukai was able to see through all of that. His cuteness, his sulky attitude, his petulance, all of it was perfect to make him cry in one of Mukai’s daydreams.

Mukai himself thought it was unfortunate, but his type was a straight beauty who took no notice of him. Being able to win over that kind of person was as enjoyable as hunting.

In regards to Chihiro, without a doubt it was the same feeling at first.

Chihiro’s shock when he noticed that he was liked, his occasional feeling around as if testing to see if it was really true, all of that was cute. And his conceited and selfish behavior was like that of a playful cat- it was irresistibly adorable.

Mukai wanted to make him his lover and spoil him to his heart’s content. He wanted to see Chihiro bewildered at being the one that was held but at the same time losing himself in the pleasure. As he was watching Chihiro with such wicked thoughts, he was reminded of how considerate he was to his clients and how he treated the female employees fairly. And while Chihiro was full of himself over being favored, Mukai drew a line to keep a balance between them.

He purely thought to himself that this was nice, but by the time he noticed, he was already in too deep. He was so preoccupied with Chihiro, he made an unthinkable mistake in his work and hated himself for it.

To become so serious about a straight guy was pointless.

Even if he were to treat it as if it was a game, the other party would instantly come to his senses and run away. He knew that all too well because of past experiences. Even though he decided to resign as an opportunity for him to forget, in the end, he was too lovely and Mukai ended up treating him badly, and on the contrary, caused Mukai to never be able to forget him.

━━ “I’ll apologize to you, Mukai.”

Mukai had wanted to tear down that arrogance that Chihiro had so naturally acquired while living a life with no setbacks, but instead, it was himself that was knocked down by that strength of his.

No matter how much Mukai yearned for him, he would never be able to reach him and never be able to forget him either.

And when he was laughing at himself, thinking that this was his well-deserved punishment, he found himself working together with Chihiro once more.

When he was approached by Hata for the job, he had thought to turn his offer down, but he wasn’t able to fight the temptation of being able to see Chihiro again, and he couldn’t reject the offer.

He was shocked at his own lingering attachment for a man that he would never be able to have.

And there was one more shocking thing. Upon their reunion, Chihiro had become such a capable person that even he had wanted to hire him as his marketing manager. He had known that Chihiro had a lot of potential, but he lacked ambition and drive for his work.

He couldn’t help but wonder if there was some reason that prompted Chihiro to change his view of his work. And before he was aware, he found himself once again thinking of nothing else but Chihiro.

Once their work relationship ended, they wouldn’t meet anymore. As he was fumbling around, searching for a way to continue having a link or connection with Chihiro, he was scolded by Isaki to get a hold of himself.

“Your ulterior motives are clear to him, aren’t they? Having a gay guy always sticking to him, it would be a real nuisance to him.”

That was true. He didn’t want to make Chihiro uncomfortable in any way.

Just when he decided to once and for all put all his effort into forgetting about him and settle his feelings, an unbelievable thing happened.

“I like you, Mukai-san.” ━━ When Chihiro confessed to him, he truly thought it was all a dream and was disappointed. There was no way something like that would happen. It was way too convenient.

He had daydreamed of a situation where he desperately begged Chihiro and managed to get him to date him. Even that was unthinkable, and he struggled to give up in order to not burden Chihiro with his feelings.

“It’s a miracle, truly.” Mukai savored his happiness. “Every time I get a call from Chihiro, I have to double check that this isn’t a dream.

“Well, Minami-san really is your ideal type, huh.” Since they had known each other since their school days, Isaki was really familiar with Mukai’s preferences. “An aloof beauty, but adorable when he laughs.”

“That’s right, exactly that.”

As he was reminded of Chihiro’s face, his lewd figure immediately occupied his head. Suddenly taken over by worldly desires, Mukai put his hand on his forehead. Isaki laughed out loud at him.

Pinning down a straight guy and making them realize they’ve taken on the role of being held by another, that was Mukai’s favorite situation. Mukai felt thrilling excitement watching them cry, overwhelmed by pleasure they never knew before.

And yet, it wasn’t to that extent with Chihiro. If anything, he was full of anxiousness, wondering whether Chihiro was disgusted or not. He even thought it would be fine if they didn’t have penetrative sex. But, from the beginning, Chihiro didn’t put up much resistance and accepted it all, and in no time at all, he was used to it. Afterwards, when he had asked him if he hated it, oddly enough, Chihiro replied with a ‘Why would I?’

When Chihiro had embarrassingly said, ‘Doing it with the person I like, there’s no way I would hate it,’ Mukai had felt even more defeated.

There was no way he would ever win against Chihiro.

The single phrase of ‘person I like’ that was said casually, Mukai repeated it over and over in his mind without getting tired of it. Chihiro probably never even dreamed that Mukai would be savoring this happiness so much.

“Oh by the way, Kimura-san asked me how’ve you been these days.” Isaki said as if just remembering.

Kimura was the bartender at the gay bar he had been going to since his university days. It was a small and cozy bar, but the clientele were pleasant and he could always drink comfortably there. In his university days, he would go to various bars in hopes of flashy events and encounters. But he was past the age where he’d get conceited from his popularity, and these years, he thought the best kind of place was one like Kimura’s, where the faces of the customers were familiar and you could drink peacefully.

“Ever since you’ve been devoted to Minami-san, you haven’t gone there at all. Everyone’s immensely curious about it, you know. They told me to tell you to bring your boyfriend along. But bringing Minami-san to a gay bar, that’s kind of absurd, huh.”

“Yeah…”

Chihiro was straight.

Right now, they were living in their own world, enjoying the honeymoon stage of becoming lovers and paying attention to nothing else. If he introduced Chihiro to the gay community, there was a high possibility that he would feel uncomfortable in that kind of atmosphere. Mukai didn’t want to take that kind of risk.

“You finally caught the beautiful butterfly in your net, but you don’t want to scare it off, right?”

“That’s exactly it.”

Isaki had also dated a lot of bisexual and straight men, so he understood that much.

“Most importantly, since I don’t know how long it’ll last, I guess there’s no reason to introduce him to that world.”

Straight men will eventually choose women. That is the way of the world.

After finally putting into words the reality he was trying not to think about, Isaki shrugged his shoulders.

“Well, it can’t be helped.”

“I’m just trying to make it last as long as possible.”

He tried to make it seem like a joke, but it was really what he thought. And, if at any time, it seemed like Chihiro wanted to break up, he made up his mind to immediately withdraw. He definitely wouldn’t try to stop him or bother him in any way.

Even if it’s a short time, I want to remain a good memory for him, ━━ that was too embarrassing to say out loud, but that was really how he felt.

“Whyyy do we always fall for troublesome people I wonder~” Isaki drank his coffee and mumbled dejectedly.

“You must be feeling bad.”

“Why?”

Isaki pouted as if asking, ‘What are you saying I did?’ The nails on the hand that was holding the cup were beautifully polished, shining as if they were manicured. His long eyelashes, charming lips, no matter when you look, he was a beautiful man. He was capable at work and his personality was not bad.

It really is a waste, Mukai thought to himself. Isaki’s rotten relationship with his lover who was married.

“Perhaps, we did something bad in our past lives.”

“Maybe.”

They both laughed bitterly at their hopelessness for always being drawn to straight guys.

Mukai’s fate was sealed when he seriously fell for a straight guy.