If, one day, the girl you liked pressed you against the wall of a rooftop, no one else in sight…
Skin against skin, her soft pink lips just before your eyes.
What… would you choose?
…
This isn’t a dream…
I haven’t gone mad either…
Satsuki had been pushed back into a corner by Sakura, her back already against the cold wall.
Yumizuka Satsuki felt as though her mind was about to be burned away by the sweet, honeyed scent of Sakura’s breath.
“Sakura…” Her throat was dry and hoarse, thirst burning in her chest like a clump of fire.
Listening to her own voice, Yumizuka Satsuki felt she was no longer herself.
Her gaze stayed on Sakura’s sweet face, drifted slowly down.
Through the collar of Sakura’s blouse, the delicate, snow-white neck showed; in the sunlight Yumizuka Satsuki could make out the pale blue of the veins beneath the skin.
The tempting fragrance of blood—sweet, sweet—kept needling at her tongue, her nose.
Sakura was playing with fire.
She herself was only a sheet of foil—and yet she had to wrap that fire tight, not let the slightest heat escape.
The monster in her was roaring, snarling, demanding she tear the girl to pieces and drink her blood deep.
But… Sakura.
Sakura, of all people, was the one she could never hurt.
God knew what had gotten into Sakura this week.
Those clear, sky-blue eyes had been fixed on her constantly, with a look that said I’m curious about you.
During lunch breaks Sakura would even take her by the hand and drag her up to the roof.
To be led by Sakura’s sweet, soft little hand should have been pure pleasure—and yet, now, it had become torment.
Joy so wild it bordered on madness, joy she absolutely had to suppress.
“Has Satsuki really become a vampire?” Sakura tipped her face up to look at her.
“Yes…” Her dry throat moved.
The intoxicating scent of blood, rising in waves to her face—it was driving Yumizuka Satsuki nearly mad.
“Please don’t do this.” Yumizuka Satsuki begged with everything she had left, her voice as weak as the buzz of a mosquito.
“Sakura… get a little farther away from me.” A voice almost ripping itself open with the strain—hoarse, half-sobbed.
It startled Sakura.
Sakura stepped back, lightly.
It looked like she’d caused Satsuki a great deal of suffering.
As Sakura retreated, Yumizuka Satsuki seemed all at once to slump like a girl who’d been bullied half to ruin, all strength wrung out of her.
She slid slowly down the wall and sat on the ground.
But… at least… she had eased back.
Sakura looked at Yumizuka Satsuki’s eyes, bright with red.
“Satsuki… do you want to drink my blood?” Sakura crouched down slowly.
This time, she kept a small distance between them.
Yumizuka Satsuki’s legs were trembling. This chapter was taken from g.com without permission.
She forced her eyes away from Sakura with everything she had.
“Yes.
So Sakura, please stop tempting me.” Yumizuka Satsuki breathed hard.
Even at this distance the rich fragrance pouring off Sakura was stirring the beast inside her.
“Mmh…” Sakura ducked her head and thought.
“If it’s Satsuki—then okay!”
“But only a little bit.
If my sister finds out, you’ll be in terrible trouble.” Sakura rolled up her sleeve and held out her hand to Yumizuka Satsuki.
A snow-white forearm in front of her—Yumizuka Satsuki could even see the flow of blood beneath Sakura’s tender pink skin.
Drink a little~ One little drink wouldn’t hurt.
The devil in her heart whispered, and Yumizuka Satsuki’s eyes wavered, her red gaze slowly widening, fogging.
Sakura watched Yumizuka Satsuki edge closer, her own heart thudding in her ears.
The skin of her wrist grew damp.
Sweet little fangs pressed into her flesh.
Sakura shut her eyes.
She was a little afraid of seeing blood, and a little afraid of the pain.
But…
The scene she’d braced herself for didn’t come.
Slap—
A heavy sound.
Sakura opened her eyes—and saw Yumizuka Satsuki’s head turned aside, her cheek swelling red.
As though she had just slapped herself, hard.
“Satsuki!” Sakura lunged toward her in alarm, hand brushing the red welt on Yumizuka Satsuki’s face.
The strange impulse in her chest seemed to have been put out by that single slap.
Trembling, Yumizuka Satsuki lifted her arms and gently circled them around Sakura’s shoulders.
“I won’t…”
“I won’t hurt Sakura…”
“Here and now, I swear it.
I’ll never, never hurt Sakura.”
A premonition rose in Yumizuka Satsuki: Sakura’s blood would be the beginning of a forbidden thing—Pandora’s box.
Once she tasted it, she would crave it, hunger for it.
And eventually… she would hurt Sakura.
“I’m sorry,” Sakura said to Yumizuka Satsuki.
She lifted one finger and brushed the tear-damp corner of Sakura’s eye.
“Sakura has never needed to apologize to me…”
“The one granted salvation—was Yumizuka Satsuki.”
The long-buried memory in Yumizuka Satsuki’s heart began to lift its veil—
Back then, she had just transferred in.
New to the place, knowing no one, she had been pushed out.
She’d developed so early, so fast—she must be one of those girls into compensated dating—that kind of dirty rumor had been used to deliberately isolate her, to bully her.
They had even used a teacher’s name to trick Yumizuka Satsuki into the equipment storeroom, then locked the door from the outside.
Yumizuka Satsuki had huddled in the dark, trembling.
In the world of a little girl, the endless dark was like a monster from a nightmare, gnawing piece by piece at her heart.
She had lost all sense of time.
She only knew that tears had smeared themselves across her face, that her throat had gone raw with shouting.
And just when her fingertips had gone numb with cold, when it seemed she could no longer force a single sound out of her throat—
The door was pulled open.
Light poured over her—and a girl more dazzling than the light itself.
“Aah, aah, are you all right?
Should I get the school nurse?” The Sakura of then, anxious, had reached out for her.
“Satsuki… Yumizuka Satsuki, right?
That’s a lovely name.” She had stood there bathed in sun, smiling like an angel.
“I’m Sakura.
Asagami Sakura.
Pleased to meet you.” She had wrapped Satsuki up in a hug without a hint of distaste, had warmed her with her own body.
“Yumizuka-san, could you keep watch for me?
I’d like to change my underwear.”
A girl, a bit shy, asking—and Satsuki had stood at the door, dumbly, on guard.
Without quite meaning to, the Yumizuka Satsuki of that day had turned her head, and looked at the girl who was younger than her by several years—the prodigy who had skipped grades.
The slim, fair curve of a back.
Yumizuka Satsuki’s throat had moved.
She had swallowed.
Maturing early—she’d thought, for the first time—isn’t actually shameful at all.
No, it’s—it’s beautiful, isn’t it~~~
“Come on, let’s go, Yumizuka-san.” The girl had held out her hand.
“Yes.” Yumizuka Satsuki had answered.
She was… her light.
From that day on, Yumizuka Satsuki had sworn it.
(Sakura)