“E, eh!?”
When Yuzuru unintentionally raised his voice in surprise, Arisa’s eyes swam with a bit of ruefulness.
”U,um… you didn’t want to?”
Arisa sadly lowered her eyes.
Yuzuru hurriedly shook his head.
“No way! Nothing like that! Um, just that…”
Yuzuru examined the words and phrases many times in his head before asking Arisa.
“When you say ‘eat,’… specifically, well, what do you mean?”
The straightforward idea he came up with was the ‘directly by mouth’ option.
Since they had kissed each other many times, there was no great hesitation in kissing the skin – albeit on the chest.
At least, if Arisa would allow him to do so.
But if Arisa was not expecting that, it would be a big problem.
She might not hate him, but she might slap him in the face.
“U,um… L-let’s see”
Had she not thought about it?
Or was it something embarrassing to mention?
Arisa looked thoughtful for a moment before answering Yuzuru.
“Anything …is fine, you know? Eat… any way you like.”
“I-is that so? Then…”
Yuzuru thought for a moment and then reached for Arisa’s chest.
As soon as he touched her chest, he felt a soft sensation and body heat on his fingertips.
As he did so, he wiped the melted chocolate with his fingers…
And he brought it to his mouth.
“H-how is it?”
“How? …the taste of chocolate, I guess?”
“O-of course, right!?”
Somehow, the atmosphere had become awkward.
Yuzuru let his gaze wander in the air and then turned to Arisa.
And Arisa straightened her posture.
“Um… Arisa.”
“Y-yes?”
“…Shall we eat?”
“S-sure!”
The two of them continued to eat the rest of the chocolate fondue.
“It was delicious, right?”
After the meal.
Arisa said in a good mood as she wiped up the dishes she had finished washing.
Since she had already changed her clothes, she was not wearing the ribbon that she was wearing earlier.
“Ah…”
Yuzuru replied vaguely to Arisa’s words.
His attitude made Arisa look doubtful.
“…wasn’t that good?”
“No, it was delicious.”
Yuzuru shook his head.
There was no doubt that it was delicious.
But it could not be said so without any reservations at all.
“I just think the latter half was …a little difficult.”
Yuzuru decided to answer honestly.
He had become tired of the taste of chocolate halfway through the meal.
“Right?”
Yuzuru’s answer was met with a wry smile from Arisa.
He tilted his head.
“You too, Arisa?”
“No, I like sweet things. I didn’t get tired of it, but… Yuzuru-san, you looked like you were having a hard time.”
“I-I see…”
Apparently, it was in his face.
Perhaps it was blatant because his eating speed also slowed down in the later half of the meal.
“And although I didn’t get bored with it, it tasted the same throughout the whole time. I don’t think it’s strange to get tired of it. That’s an assignment to work on in the future.”
“Assignment huh… Do you have any suggestions for improving?”
Yuzuru asked, slightly interested, and Arisa nodded.
“The only thing that suddenly comes to mind is to prepare spices.”
“Spices? For chocolate?”
“Cinnamon, nutmeg, and …pepper also go surprisingly well with it. You could also increase the variety of ingredients or prepare different dishes…”
Just a sudden inspiration.
While having said that, Arisa presented more than one idea.
“By the way, Yuzuru-san, what do you think?”
“Let’s see… I think I would like to eat it at a party or something with a large group of people.”
The chocolate fondue itself was delicious.
However, it was a bad idea to try to have dinner with just this.
Yuzuru had been thinking so.
“A party? ….a wedding, perhaps?”
“W-well, sure, it would be a lot of fun to have a big chocolate fondue instrument at the wedding… Do you want to set it up?”
When Yuzuru asked with a wry smile, Arisa hurriedly shook her head.
“Eh, no, s-sorry! I didn’t mean… for it to be on our case”
“Ah, okay… but do you want it when we have it?”
“I think… that’s lovely.”
Arisa nodded with a slight blush on her cheeks.
Yuzuru also nodded.
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
“Thank you very much… for that. …by the way, may I ask you something?”
“Anything.”
“Yuzuru-san, what would you like your wedding …to be like?”
“…What do you mean?”
“You know, like a Shinto ceremony, or a Protestant ceremony… how many people to gather, or, on the other hand, to just have a photo shoot. Some people don’t even bother with a wedding ceremony, right? I’d like to hear about it while we’re at it…”
“Certainly it’s important to converse our thoughts.”
Yuzuru nodded in agreement with Arisa’s words.
Many couples in the world, he heard, have trouble deciding how to hold their wedding ceremony just before getting married.
Yuzuru wasn’t too worried about their case, however…
There was a need to get their thoughts across while they were on the subject.
“We’ll do it in the Protestant style. I don’t know how many people we’ll invite, but I’m sure …we’ll have over a hundred.”
“…surprisingly, you seem to like fancy things.”
“No, it’s not really my thing.”
Yuzuru immediately denied Arisa’s words.
Arisa then tilted her head.
“If it’s not Yuzuru-san’s taste, does that mean… is it your father’s? Or your grandfather’s?”
“No, it’s not really their taste either… no, my grandfather likes fancy things, so maybe it’s his taste, but it’s not like that.”
“Then…”
“It’s the wedding of the next head of the Takasegawa family, so it has to be a grand affair in its own right. That’s what I meant… Sorry, but we probably can’t even pick a place.”
It was not entirely devoid of the opinions of Yuzuru and Arisa, but…
The details of it will be greatly influenced by the strong wishes of Yuzuru’s father and grandfather, and incidentally, Arisa’s adoptive father.
In that sense, there was not much freedom.
“I-is that so…I-I see… Y-yeah, that is true…”
Arisa looked a little depressed at Yuzuru’s words.
Though it didn’t seem that she wouldn’t accept it…
But there was probably a particular wedding that Arisa wanted to have.
Not necessarily because she is a girl, but at least she seems to have stronger sentiments than Yuzuru regarding it.
Unlike Yuzuru, who regarded marriage as a political thing to some extent, Arisa’s strong desire for the free love aspect of marriage..,
was already known at the time of the school trip.
“It’s all right. I mean, it’s not that I don’t feel anything, but…”
“Don’t worry so much. You just have to do it twice.”
Yuzuru then tapped Arisa on the shoulder.
And Arisa looked up in surprise.
“…twice?”
“Yeah. If you don’t like the fancy one, you can do the modest one one more time. If you’re worried about the order… you can do the one Arisa wants to do first.”
“…Are weddings something that you have multiple times?”
“My parents did it three times, apparently. Two in Japan and one overseas.”
“…”
Arisa’s mouth dropped open.
She had never considered that idea. Such an expression was on her face.
“Three times isn’t enough? Of course, five or six times would be tiring, and I hope you would give me a break though…”
Yuzuru jokingly asked Arisa.
Arisa shook her head sharply.
“N-no, three times is enough. Then, I would like to have one to my preference and Yuzuru-san would prefer to have one…”
“Your wishes are my wishes.”
Yuzuru had no expectations for the wedding itself.
He believed that a commemorative photo would be enough.
“…is that so? Then, well, I’ll give it some thought.”
Arisa smiled happily.
TN: And thus Valentine’s Day ends…
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Impatient MTL Reader 
that was some underused ribbon costume huh….
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