LMI 156

“Here, Koi.”

Ariel waved her hand and called him. Koi, who had been looking around at the entrance of the store, soon found her and hurried over. Ariel wasn’t alone. Koi belatedly noticed another woman with her and inwardly sighed.

“Say hello, Koi. This is Sarah. Sarah, this is Koi. I told you about him, right?”

Ariel, who had waited for Koi to pull out a chair and sit down, introduced them. Sarah smiled brightly and greeted him first.

“Hello.”

“Hello.”

Koi awkwardly greeted her back and then asked Ariel, “Sorry I’m late, did you wait long?”

Ariel smiled and shook her head at his apologetic tone. “No, Sarah was just telling me a very interesting story. Sarah, why don’t you tell it again?”

At Ariel’s words, Sarah gave a troubled smile and looked back and forth between Koi and her. “Oh… but I don’t know if you’ll find it interesting. It’s about the asteroid we discovered recently.”

“An asteroid? The one Dr. Hanson discovered?”

Suddenly, Koi’s ears perked up. He asked without realizing it, and Sarah blinked with a delighted expression. Seeing their reactions, Ariel quickly seized the opportunity and jumped in.

“Sarah works at NASA. Koi is also very interested in space. Right?”

“NASA?”

She asked Koi as if to confirm, but Koi didn’t seem to hear Ariel’s words and asked Sarah again. Soon, they enthusiastically started talking about everything from the newly discovered asteroid to all sorts of topics. Ariel watched them with a pleased expression, and then opened her mouth during a brief lull in the conversation.

“Then I’ll be going now, I have some things to do. I’ll order for you before I leave, so keep talking, okay?”

Koi looked at her in surprise for a moment, but Ariel paid no attention and turned her gaze to Sarah. Sarah took her eyes off Ariel, gazed at Koi, and smiled.

“A man who’s sexy all the way to his brain, that’s the best.”

Seeing Koi’s face turn bright red, Ariel exchanged brief greetings and left. She ordered a simple lunch to replace their meal so that their conversation wouldn’t be interrupted, and then paid for the food as well as the tip before leaving the store.

This time, Koi will be able to do well, right?

A satisfied smile naturally appeared on her face. She didn’t know how many meetings she had arranged already. Koi scored high marks in terms of appearance, but he was often rejected on actual dates.

He was handsome and a good person, but he wasn’t proactive, or he didn’t seem particularly interested in them. There were many reasons, but the conclusion was that Koi was too much of a novice and clumsy. Of course, from Koi’s perspective, it was closer to a ‘friend introducing another friend project’ than a date, but Ariel didn’t feel good about the repeated failures. She couldn’t bear the thought that Ashley might have predicted even this outcome, and she was furious. Now that things had come to this, she wanted to make Koi’s romance a success and connect him with someone other than Ashley no matter what.

This time, it will be a success, right?

She had even mobilized Garrett’s connections to find this person. Feeling confident after seeing their last interaction, Ariel walked down the street with a light step.

*

♬♪♩♪♪♬♩♪…….

Koi realized his cell phone was ringing only after he had already missed three calls. He had been so engrossed in talking about his favorite topics with someone who shared his interests that he hadn’t realized how much time had passed. Realizing that they had been sitting and talking for almost four hours, Koi’s eyes widened in surprise. But there was something even more surprising. When he checked the caller ID, his heart dropped in shock.

“Sorry, just a moment.”

Koi quickly apologized, hurriedly answered the phone, and blurted out, “I’ll call you back, sorry.”

Soon after, he hung up and gave an awkward smile to the woman sitting across from him. “Should we head out? I think we’ve been here too long.”

“Ah, you’re right. It has been a while.”

Seeing Sarah quickly get up, Koi tried to pay first, but he just stood there blankly when he realized that Ariel had already paid for everything.

“Ariel already paid. Even the tip.”

When he told Sarah, who had followed him out, she also looked surprised. Feeling the sudden awkward atmosphere, Koi hesitated, and Sarah quickly suggested, “Then should we talk more somewhere else? We could have dinner too.”

It was already getting close to dinner time. There had been a similar situation last time, but Koi had been oblivious and rejected the other person, and Ariel had smacked him on the back of the head. Having had a harsh experience once, and because he had enjoyed talking with Sarah so much, Koi readily nodded. And that day, he succeeded in going on his first date.

* * *

When Koi arrived home, took a shower, and came out, Ariel had called. When Koi called her back, she asked without preamble, “How did it go? Did it end well? Did you take Sarah home?”

Koi took a breath after the rapid-fire questions and replied, “Thanks for lunch. I had dinner with Sarah and then we parted ways, and I took her to the station because she said she was taking the subway.”

“Well, if you take her all the way home on the first date, it would be a bit much.”

Ariel, who had arbitrarily accepted that, asked again in a bright voice, “How was it, Sarah? You got along well and she was nice, right? She has a good personality too.”

“Ah, yeah. Thanks. I think I’ve made a really good friend.”

Ariel paused at Koi’s answer. An ominous premonition ran down her spine. She lowered her voice and quietly asked, “Koi, you didn’t split the bill for dinner, did you?”

“No.”

Just as she was about to breathe a sigh of relief, Koi added, “You bought lunch, and she’s a friend you introduced, so I had to pay.”

The focus was off, but the result was good anyway. Ariel took a deep breath to calm her emotions and then opened her mouth. “Anyway, that’s fine. Did you make another appointment?”

“Ah, yeah. On Sunday.”

Ariel tilted her head. “Why Sunday? What are you doing on Saturday?”

She asked, wanting them to meet both Saturday and Sunday if possible, and Koi hesitated before answering. “Um, well… I’m meeting Ash…”

“Ash?”

Suddenly, Ariel’s voice changed. Startled by the ominously lowered voice, Koi confessed honestly, “I got a call before I left the cafe, but I said I’d call back later and hung up. It’s not polite to talk to someone else when you’re with a group, and it’s not like it was unavoidable because of work… Anyway, we moved to another place and went to dinner, and I called when I went to the bathroom. There were two more missed calls, so I thought it was urgent.”

“So? How did Ash react?”

At Ariel’s rapid tone, Koi dejectedly replied, “Of course it wasn’t good, I didn’t answer the phone for a while.”

I don’t think that’s the reason.

Ariel thought, but didn’t bother to tell him and urged him to continue. Koi hesitated and added, “He asked if I was free on the weekend, and I said yes, so he said let’s meet on Saturday. But when I was about to meet Sarah again when we were parting ways, I realized that I had already made plans with Ash, so I said let’s meet on Sunday.”

“I see.”

At this point, Koi had done quite well for his level. Ariel took a deep breath to calm her emotions and asked, “Why did Ash suddenly call? And three times at that.”

“Um…”

Koi hesitated and corrected her. “To be exact, it was six times. There were three more missed calls at the cafe before that.”

“Huh.”

Ariel audibly let out a dumbfounded exclamation. “He said he hopes you’ll be happy, but he’s acting like some kind of stalker? That bastard.”

“He, he must have been worried because I didn’t answer the phone, so he called again. He’s not a stalker.”

“Of course not. How could he be.”

Ariel, who ignored Koi’s words in favor of Ashley, paused for a moment and then opened her mouth. “You said Saturday, right? You’re having dinner?”

“Yeah. We’re going to the restaurant we went to last time again.”

At the ready answer, Ariel said, “Is that so?” and gently started. “Then Koi, would you do this when you meet Ash?”

“Huh?”

At the sudden words, Koi asked without realizing it, and Ariel cast the magic spell in an even softer voice. “Please.”

Of course, the spell worked immediately.

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