Danyu’s voice reached my ear like a whisper. I clenched my fist and turned my gaze away from her. The hand curled into a fist trembled faintly.

“If you’re uneasy because I’m not your first love, you could simply be the first. In a different sense of the word, of course.”

Danyu reached out and turned my averted face back toward her. The moment our eyes met, a seductive smile played at the corners of her lips. I bit down hard on my own lip, but now even looking away from her felt beyond me.

At times, in the deep of night, I had imagined Danyu and held her in my arms again and again in my mind. But none of those imaginings had ever been like this. She was a woman who deserved to be treated with more tenderness and care. I did not want to use her cowardly to quiet my own anxieties.

“Miss Danyu. I don’t want to rid myself of my unease this way. This isn’t right.”

“Who decides that? I’m the one telling you right now. That it’s all right.”

Danyu’s hand lightly swept down my chest. The hand that had been wandering over my shirt soon moved to the buttons. Even as they came undone one by one, her eyes remained fixed on me. I gazed quietly into Danyu’s eyes, trying to read her thoughts. Her steady grey irises were filled with unwavering certainty.

And yet.

I raised my arm and caught Danyu’s hand as it worked at the buttons. Unlike her eyes, full of conviction, her hand was trembling faintly.

“Miss Danyu.”

I called her name as a roundabout way of pointing out that fact, and the smile that had filled her lips stiffened.

“You’re trembling. When you feel a little more ready, then—”

“It’s all right if it’s you, Astaire.”

The words left her mouth like a quiet vow she was making to herself. For some reason, that small voice rang in my ears with the force of thunder.

“It’s all right if it’s you. Whatever it is.”

At those words, spoken once more with unmistakable clarity, I could no longer keep my distance from her. The hand that had been holding her back as if to push her away came to rest against her cheek instead. At the gentle touch of my fingers against her cheek, her shoulders drew inward.

“You are far too good for a man as pathetic as me. There will never be another gift like you in my life.”

I pressed my lips to her forehead and slowly stroked her shoulders. With every careful touch, as though soothing a Danyu stiffened by tension, I felt the warmth of her skin.

“I know you’re unsettled right now. It’s probably because my own anxiety shook you. I know all of that, and I know I should send you away just as you are, and yet.”

My lips found the corners of her eyes, then the bridge of her nose. Not a deep kiss, but light, like pressing a seal. As my lips drew back and my gaze dropped, her radiant bare form filled my eyes. The sight alone of her pale, soft skin and graceful curves set something burning inside me.

“I am a cowardly man. So I won’t let this chance pass. From this moment on, I will never let you go.”

At my clumsy warning, Danyu smiled without the slightest falter and looked up at me, and the sight of it made my throat run dry. I lowered my head and pressed my lips to hers. As I moved my tongue along the inside of her mouth, which opened softly without resistance, a strange heat bloomed in her eyes that had been fixed solely on me.

The deeper the kiss grew, the tighter Danyu’s grip on my shirt became. Unable to bear the weight of the man pressing into her, Danyu slowly stepped back. Even knowing this, I pursued her relentlessly.

At last, Danyu’s body caught against the edge of the desk. With nowhere left to retreat, her body arching back, I lifted her and set her directly on top of it. At the sudden rise in height, Danyu let out a small cry. That was as far as the relentless kissing went. Trapped between my two arms braced against the desk, Danyu caught her breath and let out a soft laugh.

“You know what? I like that you’re a cowardly man.”

Perhaps it was the air that had grown so warm between us. Those perfectly ordinary words felt unbearably sensual. I smiled faintly and cupped her br*ast with one hand. Danyu, who had done nothing but catch me off guard with every unfamiliar sensation, opened her eyes wide for the first time.

I teased her br*ast with one hand and brought the other lower. My impatient hand quickly passed her waist and reached her thigh. As I stroked the inner side of her thigh, her tensed hand rose to stop me.

“Astaire. Just a moment.”

“Don’t worry. I won’t hurt you.”

I was the one who knew best that beneath my composed tone, impatience was hiding. Unable to hold back any longer, I took her round br*ast into my mouth, and from above my head came a sound caught between a m*an and a sob.

As I drew her in as though to swallow her whole, the hand that had been wandering between her thighs soon found the soft flesh there. Wherever my hand passed, the spring that had been dry with tension slowly grew wet.

“Astaire.”

I slipped a finger inside through the entrance, slick and ready. At the careful motion searching within, Danyu’s hands gripped my shoulders. What had been a tight fit at first gradually softened. As the fingers went from one to two, and two to three, the sounds rising from below grew increasingly unguarded.

“Ah, the sounds, I’m so embarrassed.”

Each time my fingers touched her inside, Danyu trembled and exhaled. Her warm breath against my skin made my body burn all the more. I pressed her shoulder back and laid her down on the desk, and a strange feeling took over my mind. My most precious woman was lying on a desk scattered with sheet music, looking up at me.

That strange contrast made my body burn even hotter. I withdrew my hand from inside her and, without so much as a word of warning, entered her in its place. Through Danyu’s parted lips, beneath the weight pressing down on her, escaped a sound that was neither m*an nor scream but something between the two.

“Does it hurt much?”

At the question whispered in her ear, Danyu shook her head. Her furrowed expression gave an answer entirely at odds with her words, but I chose willingly to believe that lie.

“I love you, Miss Danyu.”

It was a confession I had already made many times, yet a smile bloomed across Danyu’s face as though she were hearing those words for the very first time. I kissed that beloved face and took her hand in mine.

* * *

I look at the woman lying disheveled in the sunlight. On her pale bare skin remained the marks left by last night’s lovemaking, like brands burned into her. When I traced those traces that lingered like scars, Danyu let out a pained sound and stirred. Last night I had been far too consumed, and I had not been considerate enough of her, for whom it had been her first time. Feeling sorry for her, I stroked her hair, and only then did her furrowed expression ease into something peaceful.

I reached a little further and touched her hand, resting quietly on the pillow. My fingers moved from her thumb to her index finger, from her index to her middle, and came to rest on her ring finger. This empty place will need a ring. I carefully picked up the piece of paper lying on the nightstand beside the bed, tore off a strip of suitable size, and wrapped it around her ring finger. I picked up the pen rolling beside the paper and had just marked the size of her finger when Danyu stirred with a great shift and opened her eyes.

“Mmm, what are you doing?”

Her eyes were open, but her mind still seemed to be somewhere in a dream; her mumbling voice had no strength in it at all. I hurriedly hid the paper in the drawer and pressed a light kiss to her forehead.

“Go back to sleep. It’s still early.”

“Mmm.”

In place of an answer came a drowsy, petulant sound. When I let myself be pulled along by her weak hand tugging at me, feigning helplessness, Danyu hugged my arm tight and burrowed into my embrace. The red hair brushing against my chest dyed my heart the color of red.

Tomorrow I will probably go to a jeweler and buy a ring set with a red diamond. On the way back, I’ll stop at a flower shop and pick up red roses wrapped in baby’s breath. A restaurant where the sunset falls would be nice. Or if not that, a lakeside where the stars are visible would do just as well. 

There I will take the ring I have kept close and slip it onto your ring finger, and place a beautiful bouquet in your arms. And then.

You once spoke of the meaning of firsts. It was the day I kissed you without asking. You said that a first is history. A history that will remain as eternity and as the one and only. Since history already carved by human hands cannot be erased, the first love inside you will never disappear either.

But there is no need to grieve. For in a history that will remain as eternity and as the one and only, it is not only the first that is recorded.

I will be your last. I want the final destination of your life, which has traveled through so many transfer stations, to be right here. I want to be the place of rest where you, who have walked a long and difficult road, can breathe a sigh of relief. You may remember all the years gone by. Only let the time that remains be filled with your smiling because of me, and let your music, because of that, be filled with me.

The time has come to bid farewell to the arrogance in my heart and to the prejudice I held toward history. The heart I believed I could control was never mine to begin with, and the first I believed to be the one and only history turned out to be nothing more than a starting line from which to move toward the last. All of this, you taught me. What remains is only to let this flowing heart go, until it reaches eternity.

Farewell, farewell.

At the beginning of the end, everything flows toward the future.

Pride and Prejudice — End