Ahhhh I need to finish my Naruto fic what am I doing writing Hakuoki oneshots! Also, Souji is a bit of a selfish POS, but I really think he could be better than he seems so I say that with a lot of affection. Maybe that's the draw here, Chizuru inspires him to be better than he would otherwise be. Also, I like the idea of her being weirdly indispensable. The games make her seem like furniture.

Disclaimer: As expected, I don't own Hakuoki, but if I did I would localize SSL like yesterday.

It took five emails and about an hour and a half until Souji realized that Chizuru wasn't at work. It was such an impossibility that he actually got up from his desk and went out into the weird little area that held her desk and filing cabinets immediately behind a support wall and looked for her ridiculous mauve bag. He hated that bag, with its sensible zipper and many pockets, but she carried it everywhere she went and obviously if it wasn't here then neither was his executive assistant. She hadn't requested a vacation day—two weeks in advance minimum per company policy—so that left a couple possibilities.

She could have quit. But it would be a cold day in hell before Souji figured that would happen.

Or she was too ill to drag herself in. That was a troubling thought, as Souji contemplated his own sickly childhood. Weekdays spent in front of the television, waiting for his sister to come home from one of her many part time jobs and perhaps plop some ramen in front of him if he were lucky. More likely she would tell him to get some cereal for himself, irritated that he got sent home yet again with a fever. Maybe if he'd had better nutrition he would've been sick less he often thought to himself.

Chizuru hadn't missed a day of work in three years. Or so far as Souji knew she hadn't. He'd missed a few days here and there, but often still checked his work email and she would dutifully respond to any and all inquiries so he knew she wasn't playing hooky when he was. Even that one year everyone in the office got that weird stomach virus she had been a bastion of health, handing out vitamin packets to everyone pushing papers in Mergers and Acquisitions.

Maybe Saito knew something. He was too observant for his own good, but he also tended to keep it to himself. Saito's absolute devotion to discretion had given them a pretty good working relationship running the department, as most of the other department heads and VPs got tired of putting up with Souji's tendency to bait them. As far as Souji was concerned, Hajime Saito might be incorruptible, and there was more than a little respect there. Occasionally they would drink together at company functions, pretending to talk to one another so that they didn't have to talk to anyone else.

"Hey Hajime, you know where Chizuru is today?" Souji didn't bother to knock, instead striding into the office that lay opposite his as if he owned the place. It took more than that to ruffle Saito's feathers.

"Sick." Was the one word reply as Saito crossed something out on a report and made a note next to it. He didn't even look up, having gotten used to Souji's impertinence over time.

"How do you figure? She didn't send any emails."

Saito, whose dark hair seemed to be perpetually on the verge of nearly obscuring one eye, looked up with the visible orb and there was a quirk to his mouth that hinted he was considering smiling. "She set an out of office message on her email."

Souji never had time to read those things. They never said anything useful. Either someone was there and he could get his work done, or they weren't there and he'd have to wait for them to get back from whatever inconvenient wedding or funeral they were attending so he could get his work done. Companies weren't going to dismantle and reorganize themselves, after all.

"I don't suppose she said how long she was going to be sick in her message…" It was rhetorical, and all Saito did was snort before he lost interest in the problem of the missing executive assistant. "You should really get an assistant, Hajime. I bet Sen could find someone for you just like Chizuru." What he was really thinking was that it would be nice to have a backup assistant to borrow for the day who didn't need to be trained on what got filed where. Damned if he knew where his memos got sent half the time other than probably somewhere in the direction of Legal.

Saito actually frowned at the suggestion and the ongoing silence gave him the broad hint that Hajime didn't have time for whatever it was Souji was doing. Nothing to be done but leave the dour man to whatever he had been doing. Making sure to be petty and close the door loudly in his wake, he glanced back at Chizuru's neat but empty desk and saw Chikage Kazama lingering around it.

Think of Legal and a lawyer shows up, it was as if he had summoned a devil. A blond devil in a vintage Brioni suit.

"Kazama," Souji said, nodding and coming over to lean against Chizuru's empty desk. It was a weirdly territorial gesture, but Kazama had a tendency to do what he wanted when left to his own devices. That kind of arrogance was familiar enough to be annoying even if Souji was self-aware enough to understand his hypocrisy.

"Okita," Was the frosty reply. His eyes darted around, seemingly examining the neat space that usually held a petite brunette; Kazama seemed more irritated than usual.

"Those are for me I take it," Souji said gesturing to the thick folder that no doubt contained a draft contract to read through. "Unless you came purely for the pleasure of my company." He tried to keep his tone light, but suspicion was edging around his mind that something was amiss.

Kazama's tone was severe, but he never rushed his words. "Naturally, it's the former. And I expect this contract to be reviewed and returned before the end of the workday. And I mean 5pm, not whatever time you feel defines the end of your day, Okita. Not all of us are made of time." He dropped the folder in Chizuru's inbox where a stack of unopened mail also waited.

"And yet, you could have sent a lackey here to drop it off if you're so overloaded. Amagiri too busy defending one of your parking tickets to drop off some measly forms?"

While Kazama's legendary disregard for meter limits and red zones was probably more of a lack of concern with traffic law rather than a purposeful thumbing of his nose at them, it didn't change the fact that he probably owed hundreds in fines at any given time.

"I wanted to inform Chizuru of an opening in Legal. The pay is better and she needn't associate with the riffraff that infests your department." Kazama looked around with mild distaste. "Saito is the only classy thing about your floor."

Souji wished he could put the next boot on Kazama's Aston himself. "The next director's meeting ought to be fantastic. Maybe you can talk about all that court filing you did, Kazama. Or that triumphant moment you handed me a contract to initial in triplicate."

"I know you don't respect Chizuru enough to inform her of her options, so I'll come back another day." Ignoring the barbs entirely, Kazama turned to go without any further pleasantries and Souji didn't let his friendly smile drop into a sneer until the elevator doors had fully closed. Chikage, that bastard, was trying to poach Chizuru! She'd never leave so easily. Would she?

Something told him that this wasn't the first time Kazama just so happened to drop by with forms and a blatant job offer. He had known precisely where Chizuru's desk was, after all, despite being tucked around a corner and missing the nameplate. Usually she made up for the lack by introducing herself immediately, and he had scolded her enough times for acting like a receptionist when she didn't need to in her position. She always stammered out an excuse about how she liked being helpful, and he always let it go. Kazama didn't have use for friendliness among his legal assistants, it wasn't his way, so probably stealing her out from under Souji for the purposes of annoying him was the goal.

Plucking the folder out of the inbox, Souji wondered how many days Chizuru was going to be out since it was hard to know how sick she actually was. After all, she was the sort of person who would stay home with a cold because the HR director was her best friend and Sen didn't tolerate people coming to work sick. Then again, she was also so ridiculously responsible that if she wasn't that sick she probably would have offered to work from home. It was hard to tell where the cards fell on this one. Maybe Souji should send Sen an email.

While thinking through what exactly he would say in a professional email that was secretly asking a personal question, a pair of shiny shoes invaded his periphery. Looking up into the always irritated face of the second most important person in the whole company, Souji wished Hijikata would head back up to his war room. The fact that he was here was a shock in of itself as people came to him not the other way around, and even more curious was how the man's violet eyes were darting towards Chizuru's empty chair.

"Oi Souji, where's Yukimura?" No time for greetings, not that either of them was the type to mince words. Toshizo Hijikata gave a pinched and searching look towards where Chizuru should have been if all had been normal with the day.

"My executive assistant is sick today," Souji knew he sounded a bit petulant, so he tried to lighten his own mood. He noted Hijikata clutching a wrinkled piece of paper. "Come to bring Chizuru a little love note? I'm sure if she wasn't sick before I'd have to send her home immediately in that eventuality."

Hijikata, as usual, wasn't about to be teased. "Cut the shit. Yukimura picks up my migraine medication. If she's not here then I'm going to have to make some intern call my doctor and find out which damn pharmacy I use. This is what happens when you work your assistants too hard, Souji, they drop like flies."

Everything always had to turn into a lesson with Hijikata, and Souji managed not to roll his eyes. "Chizuru is a big girl, and she'll be back to apparently run your little errands in no time. Though I wonder why you don't have your own assistant do something like this."

"Don't be stingy, you know I can't keep an assistant longer than a couple months and I'm between them right now. Yukimura's the only one with staying power, though how she tolerates you is an absolute mystery to me. If there had been a betting pool I would have thought she'd quit within the first year." Hijikata grimaced and pinched the bridge of his nose. "I'm going back upstairs, but if she comes in today…"

Souji may not have been fond of Hijikata but he also wasn't about to hinder the normal workings of the company by denying the man his meds. "… I'll send her right up. Though I suspect she won't be in today."

"Good man." Hijikata clapped Souji on the shoulder with force and then stalked away to terrorize some intern into doing his bidding.

The packet of contracts that Kazama had dropped off actually occupied most of Souji's attention in between emails and it was with some surprise that he realized he had skipped out on two meetings due to the concentration he had lavished on the fine print. Normally Chizuru would step in and warn him when she noticed he was too absorbed in his task to see the Outlook reminders pop up. Typically he'd wave her away and then she'd come in again when he was five minutes late and do that funny thing where she'd shift from foot to foot in her sensible kitten heels because she wasn't quite sure how to let him know he needed to be somewhere else. Souji's favorite was when she'd bite her lip.

He was staring at the door like an idiot. Green eyes darted around, making sure no one had seen him spacing out like he was simple. It wouldn't do to appear like he was losing his edge.

Maybe it was time to get some lunch. His body reiterated that that was a good idea as his stomach flipped painfully, having nothing in it but the morning's coffee. Belatedly, he realized he'd have to order his own lunch rather than send a quick email to Chizuru and wait for food to appear. All he needed to tell her was a genre of cuisine and she'd know what to order for him but he had no clue where she got any of his usual orders from. It was closer to 1pm than noon so he might be able to get something delivered quickly, but he was suddenly indecisive.

A loud banging and a curse coming from outside his door captured his interest and with knit brows Souji investigated, food dilemma forgotten. Shinpachi Nagakura, head of Sales, was opening all the drawers in the immediate vicinity of Chizuru's desk and cursing loudly. The loud bang was him hitting his knee against one of those drawers he had left open which he did again once Souji made his appearance. Overall, the sight was confounding.

"Does my assistant owe you money, Shin? Or is there a good reason you're destroying Chizuru's desk?"

"Ah! Souji! Help me look for a shirt, would ya?"

That made no sense whatsoever. "Why would Chizuru have a man's shirt in her desk, let alone yours?"

"The girl picks up your dry cleaning, doesn't she? She told me one time that she stowed a shirt or two away just in case you need a change after lunch or if you got rained on or whatever, and I asked her if she could do the same for me! And look at this!" Shinpachi was a great salesman, but he was also a messy guy in about every aspect of his life, and it looked like he had splattered some sort of soup all over his white dress shirt. "I've got a meeting with a client at 1, you gotta help me Souji!"

Rolling his eyes, Souji strode back to his desk and took out the spare key to the filing cabinets. Souji pretty much exclusively bought his suits from Burberry and given the cost (of which Chizuru was well aware) she would most likely lock his shirts up. Being tidy by nature, no doubt she stored the shirts together if she indeed kept any shirts for Shin at all. It seemed highly unlikely she had went out and procured shirts for Shin based on a casual conversation, but he was acting like this was something she had done for him before and when Souji pulled open the bottom drawer to the smallest filing cabinet there were several shirts in plastic one of which had a piece of masking tape with 'S. Nagakura' written on it in Chizuru's neat script.

"Yes!" Shin shoved him aside, no mean feat given his height and musculature but Shin was a beast of a man, to snatch up the shirt and rip open the plastic. He stripped off his stained shirt right there only to unceremoniously drop it on Chizuru's chair. "You're a lifesaver! Tell Chizuru thanks for me. I'll buy her lunch sometime, promise." New shirt in hand, Shin took off in his undershirt and tie to no doubt dress in the elevator. More muscles than sense, sometimes, but it was hard not to like Shin.

Unsure what to do about Shin's discarded and dirty shirt Souji took a pen from the holder near Chizuru's ergonomic computer keyboard and used it to deposit the shirt in the trash. Served Shin right for being so careless. The man probably wouldn't even remember, and if he did then Chizuru would likely stammer an apology for losing it even though she wasn't even here to receive it. If it came down to it he could send her to a department store on his dime with the thirty bucks Shin had no doubt spent to get a new shirt, and then he'd send a strongly worded email to the bonehead about how he should keep a stash of clothes in his own desk.

Everyone thought he worked his assistant so hard, but it seemed to him it was all this extra crap people asked her to do that was probably filling up her time. Souji realized he was frowning and immediately schooled his handsome face back into his usual studied careless smile. He glanced back over at his dry-cleaned shirts sitting in the filing cabinet and the forced smile became gentler. Dumb girl. Clever too, though, since he was pretty good at keeping track of the details of his life and somehow she had secreted away these shirts without him knowing. What other secrets was Chizuru hiding? He had thought her an open book, but he had also thought she was quiet and reclusive and instead it seemed every damn director in the company was asking her for favors. When had she had time to talk to them all?

Having never really gotten his act together to purchase lunch, Souji was in a rotten hangry mood when there was a polite knock at his office door. When the serious countenance of President Kondo's assistant, Kazue Souma, was the one peeking his head in he managed to coach himself into an appearance that was more professional and less frankly bitchy. Honestly, he didn't give a damn what Souma thought about him, but as an extension of Kondo's will Souji always had time for him. He'd do anything up to and including take a bullet for the man who had seen promise is a fresh from college business major with nothing much else to offer. Kondo's faith shown again and again through quick promotion had done more for Souji's sense of self-worth than all the fancy material goods he had purchased with the gads of money that had been thrown at him since.

He was who he was because of Kondo.

"What do you want Souma, spit it out," Of course that didn't mean he had all day to stare at the nervous looking assistant.

"I have to be honest with you Mr. Okita, I was actually looking for your assistant Ms. Yukimura." Kazue, with his perfect posture and overly polite mannerisms, always rubbed Souji the wrong way. "Where might I find her?"

Chizuru. Always Chizuru. You'd think she was the one who should be sitting in this office, given how many people wanted her time. "And what strangely specific task does my delightful assistant perform for you? Babysit your cousins? Cook homemade meals for your cat?"

"My cat eats food I purchase from the vet down the street." Kazue replied, confused as usual due to a literal mindedness that worked well for his dealings with Kondo but which would have driven Souji up a wall. "No, Mr. Okita, I hesitate to mention it but President Kondo was quite insistent that I ask and I simply must know where Ms. Yukimura keeps her tea."

"Tea." He said flatly to the young man.

"Yes, sir. It's a jasmine green tea that she brings to President Kondo every afternoon when he's here. I always send her an email in the morning letting her know the President will be at the office and in the afternoon she brings him tea she special orders from some website." Souma's explanation seemed to stumble as Souji was clearly getting stormy.

He'd never begrudge Kondo anything, and he was actually insanely proud of Chizuru for finding something that pleased the President so much. However, the whole setup sounded so menial given her skillset. One thing he had never asked her to do was make him tea, and yet Souma thought nothing of it. "So, pray tell, Souma… why is my assistant making tea for your boss? That sounds like something that should, I don't know, fall under your duties?"

"You know, I never questioned it, Mr. Okita. It's been that way ever since I started."

That meant that Chizuru had been doing this for months, at least. "All I do all year round is take apart and reassemble companies, Souma, and you know what my least favorite phrase is? We've always done it that way. It tells me that one person had a decent enough idea one time years ago and then no one questioned it since. Maybe it's time you asked Chizuru where she buys her tea so that next time she's sick, Kondo doesn't have to be disappointed. Or, and here's a revolutionary idea, you could start making the tea yourself."

"Ms. Yukimura is sick?! That's terrible. I'll let the President know that he'll have to make due with his usual morning tea instead." Souma was incredibly good at shrugging off things that didn't fit his world view, and the idea that Souji might have been rude to him then was hard for the man to reconcile with his respect for the executives of the company. "I'll be sure to secure a supply of tea from Chizuru in the future as suggested."

When Souma backed out of the room with his usual efficiency, Souji realized he had the most recent contract page he had been skimming balled tightly into his fist. Somehow he was at the end of his rope with this business with Chizuru. He hated that she was gone. He hated that he had missed meetings and lunch. He especially hated it that she was doing all these special favors for other people, even though it didn't seem to interfere with his own needs. Somehow it made him feel… less, and all he could equate that to was losing. There was only so much Chizuru to go around.

It was time to go to HR.

He glanced at the clock then back down at the contract. Shit. It was time to go to HR once he had gotten this revision handed back to Legal. Kazama was a bastard, but he didn't make baseless threats or requests. If he rushed through the last bit he'd make it well before five, and he could probably sweet talk Sen into telling him where Chizuru lived.

"For the last time N-O means NO, Okita." Sen brushed some long hair out of her face and sighed in Souji's general direction. "I will not release any employee's personal information to you, even if you have good intentions. I'm getting tired of saying this today. I will be visiting Chizuru this evening and if you want me to take something to her then you can add it to the pile."

Gesturing to a low table near some cushy chairs in her bright and cheery office, Souji looked at the heaps of junk he had initially ignored when he had sauntered in. The HR receptionist had told him that Sen was leaving soon, but that suited him fine as he was planning on heading out as soon as the HR director told him what he needed to know. Eying the bag of medicine that, given Hijikata's need for today probably had been procured at that time, he instead poked a giant teddy bear and gave Sen a questioning look.

"You know who else had to stay home sick today?" Sen was all mischief as she examined Souji's grim expression. "Heisuke. That's from him. He feels really bad that Chizuru got sick, especially since I had told him very clearly earlier this week that sick people needed to stay home no matter how important his marketing presentation was for Harada. Sometimes he and Chizuru have lunch, and when the bear came in today that absolutely confirmed it."

Toudou was a dead man when Souji saw him next, but the bear was not as mysterious as the energy drinks and cups of instant ramen. He picked up an energy drink and shook it at Sen, eyebrow arched.

"Sannan, maybe Yamazaki. Maybe both? Chizuru was the one who started shipping a case of energy drinks and quick meals to the programmers every month. Sannan fixes her computer for her when she has trouble sometimes, which is how I found out she was doing that in the first place. Really nice of her to think of them, since they always feel so forgotten and shut in since the latest product deployment schedule was announced."

The CIO did tech support for his assistant?! What in the seven hells was going on?! "Sannan fixes Chizuru's computer?" He couldn't stop himself, he had to confirm that the only person in this whole building less friendly than Hijikata was doing favors for a random executive assistant.

"He sends Yamazaki when he doesn't have time, Chizuru says."

Ah, clearly that made sense. If the CIO didn't have time to do tech support then send the Lead Programmer. Clearly. Of course. He realized belatedly that Sen was watching him with that canny way she had, and he reminded himself he wasn't on his floor with Hajime and that Sen would actually be sensitive to his rapidly shifting moods. In fact, he was getting the feeling like she was telling him this stuff purposefully to see how he reacted. Well, he would keep up the charade if for no other reason but to prove to her that he did not care at all that every male in the damn company seemed to have taken an interest in his Chizuru.

All his good intentions to remain aloof were blown out of the water when he picked up the card that was attached to a beautiful flower arrangement and saw that it had been ordered by an H. Saito. Recently bleached teeth ground audibly as Souji crushed the tiny card in his hand, feeling the sharp corners of the cardstock prick at his palm.

"I may not be able to tell you her address, Okita, but I will be leaving shortly and there's nothing in the policy that says you can't get a ride home from me today. Not that I'm encouraging creepy behavior at work, but if perhaps you wanted to help me carry some of this stuff to a sick friend then I don't mind the company."

"Why don't you call Saito, looks to me like he's absolutely gagging to prove himself useful to Chizuru." Jealousy had a tone, and Souji's words positively dripped with it. He knew it and he still couldn't help himself. It had been a long day.

Sen actually laughed, rubbing her hands together like she relished his bratty behavior. "Okita you are seriously the most ridiculous person! Think on this: Kazama in legal has listed the same position three times in the past year, upping the salary and changing the qualifications to make it more attractive every time, but he doesn't really need any help and the search fails every time. You know why? Despite better advancement prospects, a better salary, and a lot more prestige Chizuru seems to think what she does for you is more important."

Clicking her mouse a few times, Sen's computer began to power down. She rummaged under her desk for her purse and continued. "I'll let you know something, Okita, her work for you isn't important at all. I've told her so. And still she won't leave your side. You can think on that and join me at my parking spot on level 2 or you can go back to your office and plot your revenge against, oh, looks like half the executive suite at least." Spinning her car keys around a manicured finger, he watched the sparkling crown keychain reflect the light of the late afternoon sun. Instead of meeting her eyes, he looked over at blown up pictures of Sen and her wife Kimigiku in front of some Grecian ruins. They looked happy. "Either way, Chizuru is sick and I'm going to see her. If it makes you feel any better, she's even more blind to all of this than you, ah, were. But at the same time that can't stay true forever."

Packing the energy drinks and noodles in with the medicine, Sen stowed the bear under one arm and grabbed the flowers with her other hand. Clearly she didn't need help with Chizuru's get well gifts, but then he hadn't thought that to be the case in the first place.

While the woman was breezing past him, Souji realized he was at a crossroads even as Sen beckoned him out of her office. He could pretend like this conversation hadn't happened and go about his life and career, and no doubt in time (be it weeks or months) Chizuru would be drawn away from him personally then professionally. Or, he could fight for her, in which case he had about the space of a car ride to decide what that actually meant.

Looking at Sen's retreating form, Souji was well aware all he really knew how to do was fight and the choice was a false one to begin with. Lying to himself was where he had to draw the line. Time to go talk to Chizuru and clarify a few things for his own peace of mind.

The commute wasn't long, perhaps thirty minutes in moderate traffic to a nest of older style town houses. It was a respectable part of town, and there was no way that Chizuru could have afforded to purchase a home here on her salary but Souji dug out of his mind that she had grown up with her uncle, a doctor. The man had passed away before Chizuru had come to work for Souji but she spoke of him and her twin brother occasionally. Honestly, he didn't listen that closely, but enough repetition had happened over time that the large details stuck. Dead parents. A caretaker growing up who didn't quite know what to do with a kid, let alone two. Estranged family. They were easy things to remember because it sounded close enough to his own young life that he hadn't needed much more to fill in the emotional details.

In fact, Souji wished he were more estranged from the Okita family. While his sister often didn't bother with much more than the obligatory Christmas card, he would get calls from aunts, uncles, and cousins asking to borrow money for some investment scheme or to post bail. Ever since he'd changed his number those calls came to his personal phone less, but he'd also noticed that over time they had fully ceased at work and he suspected that was due to Chizuru screening them. She knew more about his embarrassing family than anyone but Kondo and Hijikata, and they only knew more because they had to have read through the background check prior to his promotion to director.

The loud, annoyingly upbeat music that Sen had been playing for the entirety of their drive which had been tolerable from the point of view that is meant they didn't have to say anything to one another, cut off as soon as she parked.

"Get the flowers, and follow me." Sen didn't hesitate as she climbed out of her car and made her way towards a townhouse. They all looked alike and the sameness was disorienting, but she seemed to have no trouble locating the one that contained Chizuru as she ascended the steps in front of it, Okita at her heels.

They waited a rather long time, long enough that Souji checked his watch more than once, but Sen waited with supernatural patience and a smile until a disheveled Chizuru opened the door. Bags under her eyes, cheeks rosy from fever, and hair a tangled mass, it was with a sinking sense of the inevitable when Souji realized his first feelings were rather warmer on seeing her than he expected. It took everything in him not to drop the flowers and stalk away because it felt to him like he had walked into a spider's nest, led by Sen, and the resentment at being outmaneuvered was strong.

"Sorry, I was sleeping and… Mr. Okita?!" Chizuru's spine stiffened and her hands flew to her head to smooth down her hair a bit. When that appeared to be abandoned as a lost cause, the next thing she did was twist her fingers in the hem of the long t-shirt she had no doubt spent the day in. Pajama pants with little anchors all over them completed her ensemble, and if someone had told Souji based on a picture of Chizuru in this moment that she was over legal drinking age he would have called them a liar to their face without hesitation. "Sen, I thought… you said that you needed to drop some things by for me."

"And I am, so are you going to stand there or are you going to let us bring you all your gifts?" Sen cocked her head to the side, and then barreled forward when Chizuru moved to let them through.

Entering the Yukimura household was a total time warp. Apparently, prior to his passing the good doctor either had a fondness for the eighties or he decorated his townhouse exactly once and then never bothered to change anything after that. The concession to the fact that this weird glass and neon home held children at one time were pictures of Chizuru and her brother up all around the entranceway, starting around elementary and then stopping right after a picture of Chizuru's college graduation which seemed to coincide with a picture of her stern looking brother in a dress uniform. He was overseas somewhere, Souji thought he recalled.

"Please come in and sit down. Do you need anything to eat? You must be hungry after work. I'll go get some water, at least." Chizuru seemed to have pulled herself together and was pretending like she was perfectly fine, even as Souji's sharp glance saw how stiffly she was carrying herself. She was in pain and trying to hide it.

"Don't you dare move from this room. You're going to sit right here and take something while I'm watching you. Hijikata sent practically half the cold and flu aisle so something will work from that bag." Sen chided her as Chizuru took the bag of medicine and laid its contents out on a glass topped coffee table in the living room. When she pulled out the instant ramen and energy drinks she gave a unabashedly happy smile to herself and Souji knew he had to wipe the corresponding frown off his face immediately before Chizuru noticed. Sen elbowed him none too discreetly.

Darting a killing glance her way, Souji stepped forward and cleared his throat. "Where do you want these?"

Chizuru took a look at the flowers and glowed, although that warm aura could have been from the fever. "You can set them here in front of me and I'll make sure to put them in the kitchen later so I can enjoy them. Thank you for being so thoughtful, Mr. Okita."

It wasn't in him to lie, but omission was par for the course and he darted a sly smile Sen's way as he deposited the flowers on the table. "Seems like you have enough mirrors in this place to see them from every room. I hope you like..." He looked down at the smelly things, slightly lost.

"Gardenias," She finished for him, knowing he had no clue what the flowers were. Grimacing a bit Chizuru looked around. "Uncle didn't really have time or energy for redecorating. It's been hard to get rid of things since I've lived with them for so long and every time I think about changing I get… sentimental."

Sen's glare could have bored a hole in Souji's back. He wasn't stupid. She was willing to allow a bad situation to persist due to personal feelings rather than objective need. Right, fine, he got it.

"I could 'accidentally' break a few mirrors on my way out. I don't believe in superstition." From the way Chizuru blanched, he suspected that if she hadn't been rosy from fever she would have gotten very pale at his suggestion. "You have to be tired of living in a dentist's waiting room for half your life. I think taking a hammer to a mirror would do you some good, Chizuru. We could take some after pictures and send them to your brother..."

"Okita!" Sen looked like she was about to scold him when her phone went off loudly in her purse. She dug it out while looking daggers at him, and had to visibly calm herself down before she answered. "Kimi! Yes, I'm starting home right away, I just had a quick errand to run…" While Sen was distracted and wandering into the dining room to finish her conversation in moderate privacy, Souji wandered the living room while Chizuru watched him apprehensively.

He had been serious about Chizuru wrecking the house, even if he had said it in a joking tone. The place felt like a museum dedicated to a dead person and not at all like a home. Souji didn't have time for the past, not in the way Chizuru did, and even though they had both lived through familial trauma she had chosen to bury herself in it whereas he ignored it. Probably neither approach was healthy.

"Sen told you to take some of that medicine, didn't she? You're going to disappoint her. Don't worry, your empty glass bottle collection is safe from me for now." Souji looked back to where Chizuru was following his wandering form about the room with her eyes. The display case he was looking at, filled with antique medical equipment, seemed particularly grim.

"Oh! Sorry." Finding something that looked promising in the cascade of boxes from the bag, she popped two pills out and, at a loss for how to take them, started fiddling with one of the energy drinks. "I don't want to keep you, I know that both you and Sen are really busy. I'll be fine here on my own. Especially now that I have all this…"

It only took a couple of strides of his long legs to make it over to the coffee table, and Souji deftly snatched the drink from Chizuru's hands. "No one should drink this garbage. Where's your kitchen?"

Chizuru pointed towards the dining room, and softly murmured something that could have been directions, but Souji figured it couldn't be that hard to find and started out to procure her a glass of water. His heart was hammering in his chest, and he had no clue why. Sen saw him round the corner with a question in her eyes, and held the phone away from her head.

"I need to take off here in a minute because we're having some friends over tonight, if I'm going to drop you back at the office I need to know now." It was a Friday and, unlike him, people made plans to hang around with others. No matter what he answered it would probably be wrong in the HR director's eyes, so he waved the question away.

In fact, he barely stopped moving towards the kitchen, "Go. I'm fine."

"It's not you I'm—hey you could at least pause when someone is talking to you!"

Sen's irritated tone faded away as he put distance between them and he searched the cupboards for one that held glasses or mugs. By the time he had located the mugs, nosed around to see what the other cupboards held, gotten some filtered water out of the fridge and headed back in to Chizuru she was in the processes of hugging her friend goodbye at the door. Sen was saying something very intently in low tones and the way she kept glancing at him like he was gum on the bottom of her shoe he was reasonably sure nothing she had to say was something he wanted to hear. Her approval didn't matter to him.

"Time to take your medicine, Chizuru." Tone light and airy, Souji held up the glass of water and gave his biggest fakest smile at Sen in an attempt to get her goat. It seemed to work as her mouth flattened into a line and she shook her head ruefully.

"Take care, Chizuru. I will call you tomorrow; let me know if you need anything from the store."

"Bye Sen, tell Kimi I'm sorry I have to miss dinner tonight."

As the door closed, Chizuru seemed unable to look up from the floor for a moment. Then, with a gentle smile that looked oddly forced, she met Souji's eyes and approached him to take the glass of water from his hands.

"Thank you, Mr. Okita."

"Souji. We're not at work right now, Chizuru." His tone was teasing, but there was no energy behind it. Nerves were catching up with him again now that Sen wasn't around to act as a buffer. "Standing there staring at me isn't going to make you feel any better."

Scurrying over to the couch as soon as he implied she was fixated on him, Souji sighed to himself. Had she always been this obvious? Was it because she was sick? Was it because he was aware of her in a way he hadn't been even this morning? They had been comfortable with one another for a while now, the push and pull of their moods so familiar that on the rare occasion when she was having a bad day (always associated with having talked to her brother the night before) he would order too much lunch and force her to eat a bit and do something mindless like highlighting all the mentions of the word 'efficient' in a report. Monotonous tasks relaxed her, and he was realizing that a relaxed Chizuru gave him peace of mind he couldn't buy.

At the moment she was so tense he couldn't concentrate.

She swallowed her medicine and then fiddled with the flowers while Souji came to sit in the chair opposite the couch. Silence that was usually companionable between the two was charged with unspoken words. She kept looking away and fiddling with her long dark brown hair, and he was aware that she was still self-conscious about her appearance. She needn't have been, he recognized with a sinking feeling that she looked just as good to him right now as she did at work. He knew enough of how people in general functioned that if that thought was really true, then he was screwed.

"I was thinking," He said, clearing his throat as fever bright brown eyes locked in on him. Years of attentive listening from Chizuru had never made him second guess his words to her before, but he knew he was taking a chance today. "You should report to Hajime for a while. He's got a lot on his plate right now and you've helped him out before. I don't have time to be making up busy work for you, anyway."

"… but I thought…" She looked hurt, but she also seemed to be too tired to fight him. They had both had a long day. "If that's what you think is best, Mr. Okita."

"Souji," He ran a hand through his auburn hair before launching into his next point. "And you should think a bit about that opening in Legal. Sen said that you're probably the right person for it." Chizuru looked skeptical, as if the first suggestion he had made to report to Saito had blindsided her then this straight out flattened her.

She struggled to find words. "If my work for you has been poor lately I would have expected you to tell me. Is this why we skipped my performance evaluation this year? If so then can you please give me a chance to improve before you send me off to another—"

"That's not it." He interrupted her sharply. He had sent in her performance evaluation same as last year with all high marks and no comments other than that she should be given merit pay as before on top of her salary. Picking out something she did wrong wasn't something he'd been interested in doing, and he'd been uncomfortable with the idea of talking to her for an hour about how wonderful she was on a day to day basis. "Let's say you get the job—and if you don't want the job in Legal I'm sure Hijikata would double your current salary if you were willing to fall on that sword and work for him—then maybe I'd like to take you to dinner. In congratulations. Publicly."

Chizuru looked confused. Usually she was faster on the uptake when it came to him. He'd like to think it was the fever making her slow.

"I can't be both Souji and Mr. Okita to you, Chizuru. I know which one I plan to be."

It didn't take much to turn the rest of her face red, and Souji was pleased with the soft "Oh," that came out of her mouth.

Then, in what was probably the most vulnerable moment he'd allowed himself in the past decade, he put forth the question, "That's what you want, right?" If she said no, he'd stand by what he said. He'd have her report to Saito (which given the policies on intra-office dating and the fact that a superior dating a subordinate was forbidden that would at least give Souji the satisfaction of having company in romantic misery) and he'd nudge Sen into finding Chizuru something high paying and as far away from him as possible.

"Yes, Souji." It was so soft that he almost thought he imagined it, but the starburst of happiness in his heart told him it was true. The sudden sense of emotional security was like being on dry land after years at sea. He hadn't known he was always compensating for imbalance, and now that he was at his destination he felt dizzy.

"Well, ah," He stood up suddenly, as if he had concluded a business deal, and tried to stow the urge to shake Chizuru's hand. "I'll see you in the office on Monday, then. I'm sure if you're sick another day then even Kondo will come knocking at my door to make sure you're ok. Just about everyone else was there today." Keeping the mild resentment out of his voice was an impossibility. "For future reference, where do you keep your jasmine green tea?" Back to teasing, he was starting to think on every time he had noticed her in the past few months in a new light.

There had been the day she had come to work in a tight pencil skirt and he had explained away how his gaze had rested on her bending over her desk to lift a package as simply a natural reaction, and not based in anything inappropriate. He had still kept looking far past the point of objective decency.

She had changed her perfume a few weeks ago and instead of telling her he liked it, he had pointed out jokingly that she had forgotten the informal policy for a scent free workplace. The fact that he wore cologne every day seemed irrelevant to mention. Chizuru had, naturally, stopped wearing any scent at all. He still knew how she had smelled that day.

Then, what had probably started his descent into madness, there was the networking event last year he had ordered her to attend with him because he wanted to do work afterwards and she might as well have some fun first—and be his designated driver. She had worn that strapless blue dress that brushed her knees as she walked and flowed behind her like water. A sparrow compared to most of the women there, he had found himself following her subtly with his eyes anyway. He noted every person that talked to her, how she seamlessly integrated into every social group and left people noticeably happier in her wake. He knew that feeling all too well.

"It's in the bottom cupboard in the break room," She said, beaming a smile that made him feel like he could take on the world. "I didn't want to leave it in a cupboard that people use a lot, you know I can't reach the upper cupboards without a stool to stand on."

"You really need to fix that. Then again, I suppose I don't mind helping out here or there. You'll have to make it worth my while, though. I'm a busy man." Souji had inserted more than a little suggestiveness into his tone and Chizuru stared at him slack jawed, unused to being teased quite in this manner. Often she had prepared retorts for his more outlandish statements, but flirting was outside of her comfort zone. He was a little surprised at himself, to be honest, given his distaste for women flinging themselves at him. "Just don't wear that little black dress you came to work in about a week ago. Saito might hide in his office all day if you do."

Chizuru gripped at the edge of her t-shirt again, physically manifesting her internal struggles. "Sen keeps taking me shopping and insisting I need to dress more like an adult woman, and less like an invisible woman. She told me I need power suits, too, but I'm not like her and I don't enjoy being the center of attention."

"I always saw you." Souji knew he sounded like a hipster jerk off, doing something before it was cool, and he didn't even care. He knew he had it bad. Smirking, he added. "After all I knew from the start you'd be the kind of person who would sooner work themselves into the ground than admit defeat, and what better quality for an executive assistant?"

Chizuru shook her head slowly, eyes narrowing at him slightly. If they had been at work she never would have said boo to him, but in her home and with their relationship shifting she seemed to have grown a bit more spine. "You're a real piece of work sometimes, why do I like you?" Catching her words too late, Souji saw her bite her lip and knew for a fact that if she hadn't been sick he would have leapt over the coffee table to give her another reason to like him.

"A winning smile? Solid fashion sense? Discerning taste in people? Buckets of money? There's quite a lot I have to offer. Really, Chizuru, I didn't realize I needed to come ready with my elevator pitch."

Maybe, Souji thought, if he was really lucky she would let him stay long enough to have dinner and watch a movie. If he insisted on buying the food then she'd probably feel guilty enough to let him. The way she was already looking a little groggy told him she didn't have much fight in her, and she'd probably let him take care of her a bit. It was all for the best, after all, what better way to cement his position? He could plot out the subtle ways to make her comfortable in his presence and then use that to his best advantage later.

Being able to casually rest his hand on her shoulder without having her jump a mile.

Whispering a joke into her ear and getting an honest laugh instead of a nervous one.

Mentioning something intimate about her living space that would indicate to others he'd been there, but seemed innocuous enough that no one could comment on it without sounding pervy…

"How about you get comfortable and I'll order some dinner for delivery?" Souji tried to sound casual, but Chizuru was giving him a look like she was one step ahead of his game already. As expected, she simply shook her head slowly and capitulated. She could have protested but it wouldn't have been effective, and Souji was glad she saw that sooner than later.

The he noticed her smile, tinged with amusement at him rather than with him and he felt a spark of irritation. "Where are you going to order from?" She asked, and he was transported back to his lunch dilemma, reminded in force that he hadn't eaten anything today.

"I'm sure I'm perfectly capable of using the internet to figure it out."

Somehow, he felt like behind that innocent beatific smile she knew exactly the hell she had put him through today. And, damn it all, if he didn't respect her a little more for it.