Alice in Borderland

Chapter 44 - Cozy morning

I bury my face in the pillow and notice how I wake up slowly. I slept all night and never woke up from sleep or sweated. I hear the birds chirping outside and the sun is shining right in my face, which is why I curse annoyed into the pillow.

"Such words before you're really awake?" says a voice right on my ear, and a goosebumps spread directly on my back. I open my eyes tiredly and notice that I have not buried my face in any pillow, but on the shoulder of the man next to me.

"I thought you were my pillow," I say apologetically, putting my head in its actual place. I rub my sleep out of my eyes and pull the warm blanket to cuddle me one last time.

"The thought came to me an hour ago," Chishiya says, with his eyebrows raised, with his arms crossed behind his head.

"You've been awake for an hour? You could have just awakened me"

At the thought that I have been using it as a pillow for an hour, I will be a little embarrassed. I didn't want to put him on the back foot, I hope he knows that.

"No. You slept so quietly, I didn't want to break that"

Oh, I didn't expect that. He looks at the ceiling for a while, but when I don't reply, he turns his head to the side and looks at me with his typical look. For a moment I look at him in surprise before I can't hold a smile back and look at the ceiling.

"You were right, your bed is a thousand times more comfortable than mine," I laugh and turn on my stomach and close my eyes again to make it clear.

"Of course I was right," he says of course, and when I open my eyes again, I see him looking up with a happy smile.

"Of course," I emphasize again for fun and twist my eyes played. Chishiya laughs and I notice that his gaze on the clock goes beside him. He sits up and scratches his back of the head briefly before taking a deep breath and looking at me.

"Kuina is certainly waiting, we wanted to discuss something. If you want you can still shower here, there is warm water"

"You have warm water?" I notice and sit down. He looks at me amused and nods with a broad grin.

"Leadership, already forgotten"

"And you're telling me that only now," I laugh, and despite the pain, I blow him with my pillow. He just catches it laughing and gets up as I hit the ceiling, otherwise I'd fall asleep as soon as he leaves the room. When I look up, something soft hits me in my face and falls into my lap. I look from the pillow to Chishiya, who just grins at me and can't help but laugh. He nods at me again, saying goodbye and leaving his room.

I just shake my head smiling and put the pillow on the side. I climb out of the big bed and go into the bathroom to the left of the bed, where I stop briefly in the door. The bathroom is about three times the size of the one in my room, which seems quite unfair to me as a woman. I close the bathroom door behind me, turn on the faucet and actually warm water comes down from above.

I jump quickly into the shower and can't believe it. Since I've been here in Borderland it's the first shower with warm water. Otherwise I always waited until it was outside about thirty degrees and quickly took a cold shower. My muscles relax immediately and the vapours relieve the scratching in my neck for a moment. After twenty minutes I turn off the water and put my clothes on again. I grab my white shirt next to the bed and my black flummi on the bedside table before leaving the room and closing the door behind me.

I walk to my room and when I enter, I discover someone on my bed. I put the shirt and the ball down before I look into Izumi's worried face. 

"Sayuuri there you are! I'm probably waiting two hours here"

She runs to me and hugs me carefully, which shows me that she knows what happened yesterday at the game. I reply to her hug and as we loosen up I run to the closet as she sits down on my bed again. I pull a red bikini out of my closet and go to the bathroom to move. But I leave the door open to talk to Izumi.

"For two hours? I would have been looking for you this afternoon at the latest, you know that"

"Yes, but I wanted to see you right after what I heard. Where were you?" she asks, and I can see her raising her eyebrows and pulling a little mouth. I don't know why, but when I ask, my cheeks start to glow and when I notice it, I turn my mouth angrily. When I tell Izumi that I have stayed somewhere else, she wants to know where exactly. So I decide to get to the point right away.

"I slept with Chishiya," I say as I walk out of the bathroom and look at myself in the cupboard mirror. My belly side and torso look bad. My bruises from the car impact are now green, but at the point of the sprained ribs it is red and a little swollen. Presumably it will turn blue-purple in the next few days. I drive carefully over the thickened spot and shrug imperceptibly. I see in the mirror izumi looking at the same place in shock, so I quickly grab the black shirt from the bathroom and pull it over the bikini.

I sit next to Izumi on the bed and put my arm around her so I can press her again. It seems to work, because the worried look disappears behind an honest smile.

"Is it true that he has revived you. So you know, mouth to..."

"Don't know," I interrupt her immediately, "If you want to know, you should ask Yuudai, I was dead while there.

I wonder how easily these words go from my lips. The drowning was horrible, you can't get any more air and even though you're trying to show up, you can't do it and you're just pushed down. But the moment after that was somehow liberating. My body hasn't resisted, the pressure in my chest has disappeared and the water has filled my lungs. For a second that felt like an eternity, I was clear and got everything with me. And then everything became black, no more pain and no wildly flying thoughts.

"I don't know how you're doing, but I could tolerate a few drinks," I say with a conspiratorial look, and she replies with a grin. As soon as she nods, I swap the black shirt for the dress in my closet and together we drive to the pool area.