She shouldn't have waved.
The thought hit her the moment her hand left her side, too bright and too familiar, too much like she knew him.
The common area on floor twenty-three hummed with the nervous energy of fifty strangers trying to pretend they belonged. Coffee cups clinked, chairs scraped, and voices overlapped in a polite corporate drone.
Sakura stood near the window clutching her own cup like a shield, her heart still doing that strange stutter-step rhythm from the elevator ride up, from the basement, from him.
"You look better," Yuki said, appearing at her elbow. He looked less pale than yesterday though his tie was still slightly askew. "Sleep okay?"
"Mostly." She lied, for she had spent half the night staring at her ceiling replaying the way water had dripped from Haruto's hair and the way he had said nowhere, usually. "You?"
"My mother called." Yuki grimaced. "Twice. She thinks I'm starving."
"You are starving." Sakura grinned despite the tension coiling in her stomach. "You need real food, not corporate vending machine snacks."
"I need survival." He corrected, then lowered his voice. "So, the guy on your floor."
Sakura's grip tightened on the cup as heat rushed to her cheeks. "What about him?"
"You mentioned him yesterday." Yuki's eyes were curious. "The one with the kitchen in the basement. You sounded interested."
"I'm not interested." She said it too quickly. "He's just lonely, I think. He doesn't use the kitchen. It's a waste."
"A waste." Yuki repeated, amused. "Right. Just a kitchen. Nothing else."
"It's a crime against kitchens." She insisted. "Everyone should cook. Everyone should eat."
"You're a good person, Tanaka Sakura." Yuki's voice softened. "Don't let this place change that."
Before she could answer, a voice cut through the chatter, sharp and bright and calibrated.
"Okay everyone, gather around!"
The crowd shifted and formed a loose circle, pushing Sakura toward the front where she was sandwiched between a tall woman with tired eyes and a man who looked like he hadn't slept in weeks.
"I'm Watanabe Miki." The woman smiled, the expression not reaching her eyes. "I'll be coordinating this month's integration activities. We have a lot to cover."
Sakura nodded along, trying to focus, but her mind kept drifting down forty-five floors to the hum of servers, to the smell of garlic and ozone.
Where is he?
He had said he worked here, said he maintained the data architecture. Surely he would be here. Surely she would see him again.
"First," Miki continued, "I want you to meet some of the people who make this program work. Your mentors."
A man stepped forward.
Sakura's first thought was too handsome, and her second was he knows it.
Sato Ren, fifth son of the Sato zaibatsu, wore a suit that cost more than her father's shop and a smile that was easy and practiced.
"Welcome, everyone." Ren's voice was warm. "I know how overwhelming this can feel. I remember my first week. I cried in the supply closet for an hour."
Laughter followed, real this time.
"I'm kidding." Ren winked. "I'm too pretty to cry."
Another man stepped forward, the contrast immediate and stark.
Aoki Takeshi, legal counsel, third son of the Aoki zaibatsu. Where Ren was warmth, Takeshi was ice, tall and severe, dressed in dark colors that seemed to absorb the light.
"Don't commit corporate espionage." Takeshi's voice was flat and unamused. "Don't break any rules. Don't give me reasons to learn your names."
Silence fell.
Ren grinned at him with an expression that looked, impossibly, like affection.
"That's Takeshi." Ren stage-whispered. "He's nicer than he looks. Actually no, he's exactly as nice as he looks. But he's good at his job, so we keep him."
Sakura smiled, polite and automatic.
But her eyes were scanning the room.
Where are you?
She swept the crowd as faces blurred and names blended. Nakamura Kenji, Yamamoto Jin, Kobayashi Riku.
Then.
Near the back, half-hidden behind a support pillar.
He was almost invisible, and if she hadn't been looking for him, she would have missed him.
Haruto.
Her heart jumped, stupid and inexplicable.
Before she could think, before she could weigh the appropriateness of it, her hand rose and she waved. Brightly and happily, the way you wave at a friend.
The room didn't just go quiet. It tightened.
It wasn't the casual pause of conversation stopping, but the sharp intake of breath that happens when someone breaks a rule they didn't know existed.
Heads turned, eyes followed her gaze, found him.
Found Haruto.
And then, from the front of the room, an older man's voice, surprised and formal and respectful in a way that made Sakura's stomach drop.
"Sixth Young Master Suzuki. We didn't expect you to attend."
Sixth Young Master. Suzuki.
The words collided in her brain, refusing to form meaning, refusing to connect to the man in the basement, the man with the empty kitchen, the man who had said he belonged nowhere.
But everyone was bowing now, or half-bowing, or nodding in that particular way you nod at someone who outranks you.
The room's energy had shifted completely, deference replacing casual chaos.
Sakura stood frozen, still holding her coffee cup, still wearing her stupid smile, still waving at a man who apparently was not who she thought he was.
He didn't move, didn't acknowledge the bowing, the title, the sudden attention.
His eyes were still on her, and in them she saw something she couldn't name. Something that might have been apology, or fear, or please don't look at me like that.
Then he turned and walked away, disappearing through a side door.
The room exhaled.
Conversations resumed, quieter now, speculation buzzing beneath the surface like electricity.
"Did you see?" "Never comes to these." "What was she thinking?"
Sakura felt her face burn, felt the eyes on her judging and cataloging.
"Sakura." Yuki touched her arm. "Are you okay?"
"I didn't know." Her voice sounded thin. "He never said..."
"No one told you?" Miki was beside her now, voice gentle and eyes curious. "The man you waved at, that's Suzuki Haruto. Sixth son of the Suzuki zaibatsu. He works in the basement, avoids everyone, no one knows why. But he's basically royalty here. His father owns the building, owns half the company, owns probably your apartment."
Owns my apartment.
The words echoed, meaningless.
"I have to..." She couldn't breathe. "I need to... excuse me."
Sakura fled.
She didn't know where she was going, didn't care. Her feet moved, her heart pounded, her brain replayed every interaction, every word, every look.
I'm a fire hazard. Is that a problem? Nowhere, usually.
He had said he belonged nowhere, and she had believed him. Had felt sorry for him, this lonely man with his empty kitchen and his sad eyes. She had decided to save him, to feed him, to be his friend.
And he was Suzuki Haruto, sixth young master, son of the man who owned everything.
He had let her call him IT guy. He had let her cook for him. He had let her pity him.
The hallway ended and she turned, kept walking, found herself in a part of the building she didn't recognize. Narrower corridors, older lights, the kind of place no one goes.
Perfect.
She found a door, unmarked, and pushed it open.
Supply closet with brooms and buckets, shelves of paper towels, dark and small and completely blessedly empty.
She sat on an upside-down bucket, put her head in her hands, and tried to breathe.
What just happened?
She had made a fool of herself, that's what happened. Waved at a zaibatsu heir like he was her neighborhood friend, called him IT guy to his face, told him he was a fire hazard.
He must have been laughing at her this whole time, must have been watching her make a fool of herself, thinking look at this stupid country girl, doesn't even know who I am.
Tears pricked at her eyes and she blinked them back, furious. She wouldn't cry, wouldn't give him that, wouldn't...
The door opened.
Light spilled in, silhouetting the figure in the doorway.
Him.
Sakura's heart stopped and then started again, too fast and too loud.
He stood there holding something, not moving, not speaking, just looking at her.
She should say something, should demand an explanation, should yell at him for letting her believe he was ordinary, for not telling her, for making her feel like this.
But the words wouldn't come.
And then he spoke.
"You picked a better spot."
Sakura stared at him as he stared back, the supply closet very very small.
"What?" Her voice came out strange, half-strangled.
"The supply closet." He gestured vaguely, minimally. "It's outside my direct sightline from the workshop. If you're going to hide, choose somewhere I can't find you."
If you're going to hide. Choose somewhere I can't find you.
The words processed slowly, one by one, rearranging themselves into something that almost made sense.
"You were looking for me?"
He didn't answer. Instead, he stepped forward and set down the thing he was holding. A bento box wrapped in cloth, warm, and she could feel the warmth from here.
"What's that?"
"Food."
"I can see it's food. Why is it..."
"You didn't eat." His voice was flat and matter-of-fact, like this was obvious. "At the meeting. You left before the catering arrived. You've been in here for forty-seven minutes. You need to eat."
Forty-seven minutes. He had been counting. He had been watching.
"How do you know I didn't eat?"
"Because I was watching."
The honesty was so absolute, so devoid of pretense, that Sakura forgot to be angry, forgot to be humiliated, forgot for a moment everything except the fact that this man, this impossible man, had tracked her to a supply closet and brought her food.
"Why?"
"Why what?"
"Why do you care?" Her voice cracked. "You're Suzuki Haruto. You own everything. You don't need to, you shouldn't be. Why are you here?"
He was quiet for a long moment, the closet feeling smaller and darker and more intimate.
"Because you came back." His voice was so soft she almost didn't hear it. "You said you would, and you did. No one ever comes back."
Sakura's throat tightened.
"You let me call you IT guy."
"Yes."
"You let me think you were just some lonely guy in the basement."
"I am a lonely guy in the basement." A pause, almost imperceptible. "The other thing is just something I was born into. It's not who I am."
She wanted to argue, wanted to point out that being born into a zaibatsu family meant something, meant everything, meant he couldn't pretend to be ordinary just because he wanted to.
But looking at him now in the dim light of the supply closet, with his careful stillness and his bento box and his eyes that held so much more than he would ever say, she couldn't.
Couldn't be angry, couldn't be humiliated, couldn't be anything except somehow understood.
"Sit down." She said finally. "If you're going to bring me food, you're going to eat it with me."
He blinked. "I already ate."
"Then you'll eat again." She pointed at the bucket across from her. "Sit."
He sat.
She opened the bento, warm as she had been right. Perfectly warm with rice and fish and vegetables arranged with a precision that spoke of practice, of care, of someone who had learned to do things properly even if they didn't understand why.
"You made this?"
"Yes."
"You, Suzuki Haruto, sixth son of the Suzuki zaibatsu, made me lunch."
"Yes."
She picked up her chopsticks and took a bite. It was good, simple and honest and good. Not her grandmother's cooking, not yet, but good.
"You're getting better."
Something flickered across his face, too fast to name. "You think so?"
"I know so. The rice is perfect. That's the hardest part." She took another bite, chewed, swallowed. "Thank you."
He nodded once.
They sat in silence, eating. The closet was dark and small and smelled faintly of bleach, but somehow impossibly it felt almost comfortable, almost safe, almost like somewhere she belonged.
Later, after the bento was empty and the silence had stretched into something almost comfortable, Sakura spoke.
"Suzuki Haruto."
He looked at her.
"That's your name."
"Yes."
"Suzuki Haruto." She tried it again, letting the syllables settle. "It's a good name."
"It's just a name."
"No, it's not." She set down her chopsticks and looked at him directly. "It's who you are. You can't pretend it's not."
"I'm not pretending." His voice was quiet, but something in it had sharpened. "I'm just trying to be someone else, someone who... when you look at me, you don't see my father. You don't see my name. You see me, just me. No one's ever done that before."
The words hung in the small space between them.
Sakura felt something shift in her chest, something she had been holding closed since she arrived in Tokyo, since she left Fukuoka, since she first stood in front of the Crystal Tower and felt herself shrink.
"I see you." She whispered. "I don't understand you, but I see you."
He didn't move, didn't speak, but something in his face shifted. Something that looked almost like hope.
"Sakura." Just her name, just that, but it sounded like more.
"Suzuki Haruto." His name, given back. "What are we doing?"
"I don't know." Honest, always honest. "But I don't want it to stop."
She should leave, should go back to the meeting, to Yuki, to the other assignees who were probably wondering where she had gone. Should figure out what this meant, what he meant, what any of it meant.
Instead, she sat on an upside-down bucket in a supply closet with a zaibatsu heir who didn't want to be one and let herself be seen. Let herself see him back.
"Suzuki Haruto." She said again, softer this time. "What am I supposed to call you now?"
He almost smiled, actually almost smiled. "Haruto is fine. Just Haruto."
"Just Haruto." She nodded. "Okay, just Haruto."
The supply closet felt bigger suddenly, or maybe she felt smaller in a good way, in a way that meant she didn't have to be everything, didn't have to understand everything, didn't have to be anything except here and now with him.
"We should go back." She didn't move.
"Yes." He didn't move either.
"In a minute."
"Yes."
The minute stretched, became two, became five. Neither of them counted.
Finally Sakura stood, brushed off her clothes, and picked up the empty bento box.
"I'll wash this and bring it back tomorrow."
"You don't have to."
"I know." She smiled, real this time. "But I'm going to, just Haruto."
He stood too, slower, like he was reluctant to leave the small space they had built together. "Just Sakura."
She opened the door as light flooded in, harsh and bright. The world waited outside, complicated and confusing and full of things she didn't understand.
But for now, for this moment, she understood enough.
She stepped into the hallway and turned back once.
He was still there, watching her, his face half in shadow and half in light.
"Suzuki Haruto." His full name, but different now, not a title but a truth. "What are you?"
He didn't answer, didn't need to.
She already knew.
He was just Haruto.
She walked away, her heart pounding and her mind racing.
Just Haruto.
But as she turned the corner, her phone buzzed in her pocket. A notification from an unknown number.
Don't trust him. - Unknown
Sakura stopped and stared at the screen. The hallway was empty, the silence heavy.
She looked back toward the supply closet, toward him.
Just Haruto.
But someone else knew, and someone else was warning her.
She pocketed the phone and walked faster.
The deal was made, but the game had just changed.