[Saturday, July 27]

It’s close to 8:00 when I finally wake up. Sitting up. I stretch and yawn. I brush Chinatsu’s hair away from her face and quietly say, “Bon matin. Réveiller Mon Amour.”

Opening her eyes, she smiles and tells me, “Good morning. You know I don’t speak anything except Japanese, English and a little Spanish, so I have no idea what you said.”

I chuckle for a moment and then kiss her. “That was in French and I said, ‘Good morning. Wake up my love’.”

“Sounded sexy, tell me something else.”

“Sure. J'aime tout en toi, which means, ‘I love everything about you’.”

Smiling happily, she says, “You’re my everything too. I’m curious though, how many languages do you speak?”

I shrug. “I’m fluent in Japanese, Chinese, English, French, Spanish, German, Russian and Italian. I can pretty much understand a bunch of others, but I’m not fluent.”

She shakes her head and pulls me down to her to kiss me. Afterward, I cuddle with her and she murmurs, “I’d like you to work with me on my language abilities too.”

I kiss my way up her neck and quietly say, “What do you think I’ve been doing?”

“Mmm~ I know, but I mean more. I’d like to know a few more languages.”

I raise up to look at her. “Chinatsu, I don’t mind teaching you, but I don’t want you to try to overdo it either. Let’s focus on Spanish for right now and we can go from there, okay? You can burn yourself out trying to take on too much. I seem to remember many people telling me the same thing not long ago.”

“Sora, I want to learn for several reasons, but I’m always afraid you’ll leave me behind.”

Sighing, I tell her, “Chinatsu, I really wish you’d get over that. I’ll never leave you. You said it yourself, we’re soulmates. You’re my heart, just like I’m yours. I can’t live without you. We share the same man we love and I rarely go anywhere without you. What more do you want me to do?”

She looks me in the eye with a serious expression as she says, “I want you and Ryu to marry me.”

I caress her cheek and tell her, “You already know that I said I would talk to Dad about filing a lawsuit for us. Whether we win it or not won’t ever change the fact that I love you and consider you to be my wife.”

She adamantly declares, “I don’t care if it’s legal or not, I want you and Ryu to marry me.”

I sigh. “Chinatsu, I’d happily do that, but I doubt that there’s a chapel around that would marry us. Even a pretend marriage might get them in trouble.”

She vehemently states, “Then buy the damn chapel and make them marry us!”

My eyes widen in surprise at how adamant she seems to be about this. I quietly ask, “Are you serious?”

She quirks an eyebrow at me as she says, “Do I not sound serious?”

Sighing, I say, “Okay, give me a second here.”

I reach over, pick up my phone, and click on the contact for Hestia. When she picks up, she says, “Good morning, Sora. How may I help you?”

“Good morning, Hestia. I have a question for you. Is there a way, legal or not, for me to get married right now?”

A couple of seconds later she says, “Of course. There’s a blessing wedding ceremony. Basically it’s just a pastor, priest or the like officiating you dedicating yourselves to each other before God. It’s not legal, nor are licenses required. You exchange rings and vows just like a regular ceremony.”

“Can you do me a favor and check if there are any chapels in Okinawa that will do this for me?”

“Certainly, Sora.”

“Thank you. You can text me what you find out.”

“Certainly, Sora. It shouldn’t take very long.”

I set my phone down, sigh and look at Chinatsu. “I have no idea what Ryu’s going to say about this.”

“You’ve always said there’s nothing he wouldn’t do for us, and he says that he loves us, so it shouldn’t be a problem for him to proclaim his dedication to us.”

“Dearheart, Ryu isn’t you or me. We’ve not been dating him all that long. Yes, he loves us. I have no doubts about that, but this is asking a lot. I mean, this is him in a tux, us wearing wedding dresses, exchanging rings and declaring that we three will be together for the rest of our lives before God. That’s not something he’s going to take lightly.”

“I would damn sure hope not.”

My message alert chimes on my phone. I reach over, pick it up and open the message. ‘There’s a chapel in Okinawa that is willing to do it. I informed them of your ages and they had no problem with it.’

“Hestia found a chapel that is willing to do this for us.”

She smiles and says, “Good.”

I heave a sigh again and tell her, “Alright. We can talk to him about this, but you know there’s no guarantees one way or the other. I wish I knew where this is coming from. Neither of us is going to leave you, so I don’t see what you are worried about.”

She shakes her head. “I’m not worried. Sora, I’ve waited a long time to have you as mine. Yes, I know you’re mine and I know what you said, but we also have Ryu now. I simply feel I want something to show our dedication to each other.”

“I don’t feel like it’s really necessary, but if you really want it, we can talk to Ryu.”

I open the messaging app and text Ryu, ‘Get dressed, and please come over here. We have something we need to talk to you about.’

“Okay, he should be here soon. Let’s get dressed.”

I roll out of bed, help Chinatsu up and walk over to my closet. I grab a pair of hot pants and a babydoll blouse. Slipping on a fresh pair of panties, I quickly dress and put on my ankle socks. Walking over to the desk, I brush out my hair. Then I straighten up the bed. As she’s finishing getting dressed the intercom chimes and I head downstairs to get Ryu.

Passing by the dining room, I tell everyone, “Good morning. It’s Ryu at the door. Chinatsu and I need to talk to him.”

Everyone tells me, “Good morning,” and Dad says, “Invite him to have breakfast with us when you’re done talking.”

Smiling brightly, I tell him, “Thank you. I’ll do that.”

Opening the door, I tell Ryu, “Hi, Honey. Come on in.” Standing on my tiptoes I give him a quick kiss.

“Good morning, Sweetheart. What’s up?”

I take his hand and tell him, “Come on, we’ll talk up in our room.”

Once we get upstairs in our room, I close the door and lock it. I gesture to the desk chair and say, “Have a seat.”

He walks over to Chinatsu, kisses her and says, “Good morning, Babe.”

“Mmm~ Good morning. Give me another one of those.” She wraps her arms around his neck and melts against him as he kisses her. When he breaks their kiss, she says, “Much better.”

He sits down, looking expectantly at me and I tell him, “Don’t look at me, Honey. This is her show.”

He looks at her as she stares at her hands and fiddles with her fingers.

I sigh and say, “Chinatsu, you wanted this, so tell him.”

She looks at me, nods, and then looks at Ryu. “Umm… It sounded better when we were talking earlier, but I’d like you to marry me and Sora.”

He chuckles softly and smiles. “I’d already planned to do that.”

“Uh, no, I meant soon.”

I can see this is going to take forever if I let her try to explain it all. I walk over, sit in his lap and look up at him. “Sorry, she’s nervous and not explaining what she really means. She wants you to marry us now” He starts to say something and I touch his lips with a finger. “She knows we can’t, but I had Hestia do some checking. There’s a thing called a blessing wedding ceremony. Basically, it’s a wedding where we all promise before God to always be together. We still exchange rings and vows, but it’s not legally recognized, nor do we have to have a license for it.”

He looks at Chinatsu. “Do you think I’m going to run away from you two?”

She shakes her head. “No. I don’t think you are, or will. I just want this.”

He looks at me and I shrug. He looks back at Chinatsu and says, “Like I said, I’d already planned to marry you two. I don’t know what this is about, but if it will make you feel better and more at ease, then no problem, I’d be happy to.” He looks back to me. “Would you take care of all of the arrangements?”

“Of course. Honey, I have to say, you give me a new reason to love you more every day… Now that this is settled, breakfast should be ready by now, so let’s go eat.”

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After breakfast, the three of us head back upstairs and lock ourselves in our room. I pick up my phone and call Hestia.

When she picks up, she says, “Hello Sora.”

“Hi, Hestia. Can you do me a favor and make a reservation with the chapel you told me about for 11:30 on the 31st of July? If the time is taken, you can accept a later time that day, just tell me what the time is.”

“Certainly, Sora.”

“Thank you. Oh, if they require payment up front, you have my permission to access my account to pay them. Let me know if you do though, alright?”

“Of course, Sora.”

“Thank you, Hestia.” I end the call and set down my phone. Turning around, I look at Chinatsu and Ryu to tell them, “Too late to back out now.”

He chuckles. “I didn’t plan to anyway,” and Chinatsu nods in agreement. “By the way, I had a lot of fun last night.”

I smile. “Me too.”

Chinatsu chimes in with, “I did as well.”

“What really surprised me is how bubbly Miyuki was once we got her to open up.”

Ryu says, “From what I heard she was always that way until the beginning of last year when several people in her class started picking on her.”

“I’ll never understand why people do that. I mean, I realize that it’s because they have issues themselves in most cases, but making someone feel bad just so you can feel better about yourself? That’s just sick.”

He shrugs. “Sweetheart, whoever said people make sense?”

“Ugh! Whatever! I hate people like that… Hey, how about I invite her along tonight? She might enjoy it, and I’d really like to break her out of the shell she created to protect herself.”

He smiles. “I think that’s a great idea.”

Chinatsu says, “Me too. I got to talk to her and I really like her.”

I nod. “I think all of us do. She sort of reminds me of Keiko. Okay, let me call her and see what she says.”

I pick up my phone, find Hiro’s entry and click on it. He answers a couple of rings later. “Hi Sora. Is there a problem?”

“No. No problem at all. I’d like to talk to Miyuki if that’s okay.”

“It sure is! Hang on a second… Miyuki! Sora is on the phone for you!” I faintly hear her say, “I’ll be right there.” He comes back on and says, “She’ll be right here.”

“I’m going to invite her to come to the fireworks festival with us tonight, if that’s alright with you?”

“Of course it is. Sora, I have to say thank you. Miyuki’s been smiling a lot more, and she’s much happier since she was with you last night.”

“No thanks are needed. She’s a nice girl and we like her. Hey Hiro, it’s not really my place to say anything, but you might consider having her see a psychologist.”

“Why’s that?”

“Well, bullying is some insidious stuff and it can really mess with your mind. Look, I see one and she’s helped me a lot.”

“Do you really think it’s necessary?”

“Necessary? Maybe not, but helpful, definitely. Last night, after a lot of digging, we finally got to see the bright, bubbly girl that those bullies took from you. I’d like to see her come back to being that girl all the time.”

“Me too. Okay, I’ll do that. Who do you see?”

“Dr. Airi Sasaki at NTI Medical Center. Mention that I recommended her to see her, it may help.”

“Okay, thank you. I’ll give her a call. Hopefully… Here’s Miyuki…”

“Hi Sora,” she says brightly.

“Hi Miyuki.”

“You know, you can just call me Mii. That used to be my nickname.”

I chuckle. “Mii it is then. How would you like to go to the fireworks festival with us tonight?”

She gushes as she says, “I’d love to! I had so much fun with you guys last night.”

“We did too. Do you have a yukata?”

“Umm, no I don’t.”

“That’s alright, we can get you one. Let me grab a slip of paper here.” I go over to the desk and grab a pen and a notepad. “Okay, what’s your address? We’ll come pick you up and then go get one for you to wear tonight.” She tells me their address and I write it down. “Alright, if you’re not dressed you need to do so. We’ll be there as soon as we can.”

“Okay, see you soon.”

“Bye, Mii.” I end the call and look at Ryu. “Well, Honey, can you do me another favor?”

He smiles. “You want me to find a nice guy to be a date for her?”

I nod and chuckle. “You know me all too well. Thank you, Honey.”

“No promises, but I’ll see what I can do. Sweetheart, you do realize she isn’t all that pretty, right? I’m not running her down, just saying.”

“She’s cute, just not extremely pretty. Some makeup, a good haircut, and the right clothes will help with that. So, don’t you dare just get some slob to go out with her either. She deserves a lot better.”

“I know, Sweetheart. The point I was trying to make is it might be hard to get someone like Kei or Jim to go out with her.”

“As long as they are decent looking, well mannered, respectful and will treat her nicely, I don’t care that much if they are super handsome or not. Now, give the two of us a kiss and scoot. We still need to bathe and dress before we can go get Mii.”

His grin as he comes over to pick me up is enough to get me wet and the kiss he gives me is enough to make me want to tear his clothes off and jump him. He’s getting far too good at this for my peace of mind. It’s already hard enough for me to not allow him to make love to me.

I pull away and murmur, “Put me down, you gorilla.”

He chuckles, puts me down and goes to give Chinatsu a kiss. By the way, hot pants + wet panties = extremely irritating, so I’m wiggling around uncomfortably. After he gives Chinatsu her kiss, he tells us, “I love you, and I’ll see you at 7:00.”

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