At the Year-End Party He Thanked Me for Doing His Paperwork, So I Took the Microphone novel · Chapter 23 of 24

Chapter 23: Cherry Blossoms

"Yes," Chiaki said, in the corridor outside the Kujaku Room. "You can have the thirty-first."

He let out his breath.

"You don't know what I'm going to do with it."

"I've negotiated with you for a year," she said. "I know exactly what you're going to do with it."

On the thirty-first of March the cherry trees along the Chidorigafuchi moat were in full bloom.

The trees lean out over the water from both banks until they almost meet.

The rowing boats leave dark lines through the pink on the water.

It was a Tuesday. Kaname had taken the afternoon off for the first time in eleven years, according to Setsuko.

He had rented a green rowing boat.

He rowed with great precision and no instinct.

They went in a slow, stately circle while a school group on the bank cheered him on.

"Left oar," Chiaki said.

"I'm using the left oar."

"Use it less."

He stopped rowing altogether and let them drift.

Petals fell on his hair, on his shoulders, on the knees of his navy trousers. He didn't brush them off.

"I don't have a ring," he said.

"I know."

"There's a clause about it."

"There aren't any clauses."

"There's that one," he said. "I kept that one."

He reached into his inside pocket.

For one wild moment Chiaki thought he had lied and there was a ring after all.

Instead he took out a small, flat bundle wrapped in a Tsukishiro Grand napkin and unfolded it on his knee.

Four pieces of cream notepaper, with the hotel crest at the top of one.

He had taped them back together.

The tape was very straight, and the edges didn't quite meet.

"You kept them," she said.

"I told the lobby I would."

He smoothed the pieces flat.

"I'm not asking you to sign anything," he said. "I wanted you to see I kept my word."

"Kaname."

"Hayase Chiaki." He looked up at her from under the petals. "Will you marry me? No date at the top. No clauses. You choose the ring. You choose the day. You choose everything you want to choose."

The school group on the bank had gone quiet.

The boat turned slowly on the water.

Chiaki took a pen out of her bag.

She reached across, turned his left hand over, and wrote on his palm in small, neat letters.

He watched her do it.

When she let go he read it.

"No end date."

"That's my only term," she said. "Yes."

On the bank, a teacher started clapping, and then thirty children in yellow hats.

A man in a passing boat shouted something congratulatory and lost his oar.

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