The morning came too quickly.
Yuuta woke to sunlight streaming through the windows and the distinct sensation that someone was watching him. He opened his eyes—the one that wasn't swollen shut—and found Erza standing over him, her arms crossed, her expression the particular shade of cold that meant she had been waiting for him to wake up and was not pleased about the delay.
"How long have you been standing there?" he asked, his voice rough with sleep.
"Long enough to know that you sleep like the dead and snore like a dying animal."
He sat up, wincing as the bruises on his face protested the movement. The room was clean—he had spent two hours last night putting everything back in order, stacking the books, throwing away the snack debris, making the living room look like people actually lived there instead of using it as a battlefield. Elena was still asleep in the bedroom, her soft breathing the only sound beyond their voices.
Erza looked different this morning. She was wearing one of the dresses he had bought her—a simple white one with pale blue embroidery along the edges—and her hair was brushed and braided back from her face. She looked almost approachable. Almost.
"You look better, My Queen" he said. "Did you sleep?"
"Dragons do not need as much sleep as pathetic mortals who pass out in piles of books." She turned toward the center of the room, where she had pushed the furniture against the walls sometime in the night. The coffee table was gone, the chairs were stacked in the corner, and a large stretch of open floor waited for them. "We begin now."
Yuuta's stomach dropped. "Now? I haven't even had coffee. Or breakfast. Or—"
"You do not need coffee. You need to learn how to move without stepping on my feet." She held out her hand. "Get up."
He got up.
His legs were unsteady. His head was pounding. The bruises on his face throbbed with every heartbeat. But Erza was standing in the middle of the room with her hand extended, and she was waiting, and he had the sudden, terrifying realization that he had no idea what he was doing.
"I don't know how to dance," he said.
"I am aware."
"I've never done it before. Not once. Not even at school dances. I always sat in the corner and ate the snacks."
Her eyebrow twitched. "That does not surprise me."
"So you're going to have to—you know—teach me. From the beginning. The very beginning. Like I'm a child."
"I had assumed as much." Her hand was still extended. "Now take my hand and stop stalling."
He took her hand.
Her fingers were cool against his palm, her grip firm, her skin impossibly smooth. He had held her hand before—once, on a bench at the zoo, when neither of them had known what they were doing—but this was different. This was deliberate. This was something they had agreed to.
His palms were sweating. He hoped she could not tell.
"Put your other hand on my waist," she said.
He froze. "Your what?"
"My waist. The part of my body between my ribs and my hips. Surely you know where it is."
"I know where it is, I just—" He swallowed. "Are you sure? That seems—"
"You would prefer I put my hand on your waist?"
"No!"
"Then stop complaining and put your hand on my waist."
He put his hand on her waist.
It was warm. That was his first thought. The fabric of her dress was soft beneath his fingers, and beneath that, he could feel the warmth of her skin, the slight give of muscle, the impossible reality that he was standing in his living room with his hand on the Dragon Queen's waist.
He was going to die. Not in a year. Right now. His heart was going to give out.
"Good," she said. "Now do not move. I am going to show you the basic step. You will follow."
"I don't—"
"I said do not move."
She moved.
It was subtle at first—just a shift of weight, a slight adjustment of her body against his. Then she stepped forward, and his feet moved without his permission, stepping back, making space, following her lead like he had been doing this his whole life.
He blinked. "What—"
"Stop talking. Pay attention."
She stepped to the side. He stepped with her. She stepped back. He stepped forward. They moved together across the floor, and Yuuta's mind was completely blank, his body moving on its own, his hand somehow still on her waist, his feet somehow not stepping on hers.
"How am I doing this?" he whispered.
"I am doing it. You are simply not getting in the way."
She turned, and he turned with her, and for a moment—just a moment—they were not practicing for an interview. They were not a mortal and a queen. They were just two people, moving together in the morning light, and Yuuta's heart was pounding for reasons that had nothing to do with fear.
He looked at her face. She was focused, her eyes fixed somewhere past his shoulder, her jaw set, her expression unreadable. But her hand was warm in his, and her waist was warm beneath his fingers, and she was letting him hold her.
"Erza," he said.
"Do not talk."
"You're actually good at this. Teaching, I mean. You're—"
"If you finish that sentence, I will step on your foot on purpose."
He closed his mouth.
She turned again, and he turned with her, and they moved across the floor in a slow circle, and Yuuta realized that he was smiling. He could not help it. His face hurt from the bruises, his eye was swollen, his head was pounding, and he was smiling like an idiot because the Dragon Queen was dancing with him.
She stopped.
"What is that expression?" she asked.
"What expression?"
"That one." She gestured at his face with her chin. "The stupid one."
"I don't have a stupid expression. This is just my face."
"Your face is stupid."
"You're the one who agreed to dance with it."
She stared at him. He stared back.
Then she did something he had never seen her do before.
She laughed.
It was not the cold laugh she used when someone said something foolish. It was not the sharp laugh she used when she was about to kill something. It was a real laugh, small and surprised, like it had escaped without her permission.
Yuuta's heart stopped.
Then it started again, faster, louder, pounding in his ears like a drum.
"Your face," she said, still half-laughing, "is the color of a tomato."
"So is yours," he said, which was true. Her cheeks were flushed, her pale skin warm with color, and she looked—she looked—
She let go of his hand.
"That is enough for now," she said, her voice returning to its usual cold, but the color did not leave her cheeks. "We will practice again this afternoon. In the meantime, you will read about etiquette. The books are on the table. Do not make a mess."
She turned and walked toward the hallway, her steps quick, her back straight, her hands clasped behind her like she was trying to hide them.
Yuuta watched her go towards Sofa.
"Erza," he called.
She stopped. Did not turn.
"You're good at this. Really. I know you didn't want to do it, but—thank you."
She was quiet for a moment. Then, without turning around, she said, "You stepped on my feet three times."
"I did not."
"You did. I was being generous. Tomorrow, I will not be."
Yuuta stretched his arms above his head, wincing as the movement pulled at the bruises on his face, and looked around the living room with something that might have been satisfaction. The books were stacked neatly against the wall. The papers were organized in a folder he had found somewhere. The crumbs were gone, the floor was clean, and the room looked almost like a place where people actually lived instead of a battlefield where knowledge and panic had gone to war.
"Okay," he said to no one in particular. "It's still early. I have time to make breakfast."
He paused.
"Shit."
His hand went to his pocket, fumbling for his phone. The screen glowed to life, and there it was—the time, the date, the reality that he was supposed to be in class right now. His professor was probably already calling attendance. His classmates were probably already taking notes. And he was standing in his living room, bruised and exhausted, trying to remember how to make an omelette without setting anything on fire.
He dialed the number, his heart pounding, his mind racing through excuses. He had never missed a class before. Never given them any reason to doubt him. His reputation was the only thing he had, the only thing that made him worth anything in this world, and he was about to throw it away because he had been too busy learning about a school his daughter might not even get into.
The phone rang.
"Hello, this is the university attendance office."
Yuuta cleared his throat and made his voice rough, scratchy, the voice of someone who had been coughing all night and was not sure they were going to survive the day. "Yes, this is Yuuta Konuari. I need to report that I won't be able to come in today. I have a fever. It's—it's pretty bad. I think I need to rest."
There was a pause. He heard the sound of typing, keys clicking in the background.
"Mr. Konuari?" The voice on the other end sounded surprised. "We don't usually get calls from you. Is everything alright, How is your health?"
"Still had a bad flu. I should be back in a few days."
"A few days.. again? How long are you expecting to be out?"
Yuuta looked at the calendar on his wall, at the days marked in red, at the interview that was getting closer every hour. "A week. Maybe more. I'll let you know when I'm feeling better."
Another pause. More typing.
"Well, your attendance record is excellent. We can approve a week of sick leave. Please let us know if you need more time."
He hung up before they could ask any more questions. His hands were shaking. His face was burning. He had just lied to his university—lied to them for the first time in his life—and it felt strange and wrong and necessary all at once.
Erza watched him from the sofa.
Erza sat on the sofa, her posture straight as ever, yet her fingers betrayed her—tightening slowly against the fabric as if trying to ground herself.
Ba-dump… ba-dump…
The sound of her own heartbeat filled her ears, louder than it had any right to be. It was steady, powerful… yet strangely unsteady at the same time.
This feeling… she didn't recognize it.
Erza, the Queen of Dragons, had mastered countless forms of dance. In the grand halls of her kingdom, beneath chandeliers that reflected her authority, she had performed flawlessly. Every step precise. Every movement elegant. A symbol of perfection.
But she had always danced alone.
There had never been a partner. Never a need for one.
In the Dragon Kingdom, the title of Queen was absolute. There was no king title, no equal, no one worthy of standing beside her. Men existed, yes—but never as counterparts. Never as equals. Over time, she had stopped seeing them as anything more than insignificant beings, far beneath her notice.
Dancing with a man had never even crossed her mind.
She had never seen a man as an equal. She Had never wanted to. Had never imagined she would want to.
But Yuuta was different.
She did not know why. She did not know how. She only knew that when his hand had touched her waist, she had not wanted to kill him. When his feet had followed hers across the floor, she had not wanted to push him away. When he had looked at her with that stupid smile on his bruised and battered face, she had felt something she had never felt before, something that made her want to hide her face in her hands and scream.
She buried her face in her book instead.
"Fuck!" The word came out loud, sharp, cutting through the quiet of the morning. "Don't make so much noise! Make something for me, mortal! I am hungry!"
Yuuta, who had been tiptoeing around the kitchen trying to be quiet, nearly dropped his phone. "I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'll make breakfast right now, I just had to—"
"I do not care about your college! I care about food! Make it!"
She did not look up. Could not look up. Her face was burning, her heart was pounding, and if she looked at him right now—if she saw him standing in the kitchen with that ridiculous expression on his face—she did not know what she would do.
Yuuta stared at her for a moment, confused, then shrugged and turned back to the stove.
---
The morning passed slowly, the way mornings did when there was nowhere to be and nothing urgent to do. Yuuta moved around the kitchen, pulling ingredients from the fridge, cracking eggs into a bowl, whisking them with a focus that was almost meditative.
The bruises on his face throbbed. The swelling around his eye had gone down, but the colors were deepening, purple and yellow spreading across his cheek like a map of everything that had happened the night before.
He did not mind. The pain reminded him that he was alive, that he was here, that he was doing something for Elena that mattered.
He had called the college and told them he was sick. They had believed him—of course they had believed him. He was Yuuta Konuari, the quiet student who always showed up, always did his work, always stayed in the top ten even when he was running on three hours of sleep and instant noodles. He had never given them a reason to doubt him, so they did not doubt him now. They gave him a week. A week to prepare. A week to learn. A week to become something he had never been.
He was not sure it would be enough. But it was something.
The bread went into the pan, sizzling against the butter, filling the kitchen with the smell of warmth and comfort. The eggs followed, golden and soft, spreading across the surface like sunlight on water. He worked without thinking, his hands moving through motions they had done a hundred times before, his mind somewhere else entirely.
Erza sat on the sofa, her book open in her lap, her eyes moving across the pages without seeing any of them. She could hear him in the kitchen—the clink of the whisk against the bowl, the sizzle of the pan, the soft sound of his footsteps as he moved from counter to stove and back again. It was peaceful. More peaceful than she had expected. More peaceful than she had any right to feel.
She looked up.
He was at the stove, his back to her, his movements easy and practiced, and for a moment she let herself watch him. The way he tilted his head when he was concentrating. The way his hand moved when he was seasoning the eggs. The way he tasted the food with the tip of his finger, like a child stealing from the pan when no one was watching.
She looked away.
Her face was warm again. Her heart was doing that thing it had started doing lately, the thing she did not have a name for and did not want to examine too closely. She pressed her palm against her chest, trying to still it, trying to understand it, trying to make it stop.
It did not stop.
The eggs slid onto plates. The bread followed, golden and crisp, arranged beside them like something from a restaurant. Yuuta added a small bowl of fruit—just apples and bananas, nothing fancy—and carried everything to the table with the careful concentration of someone who was not going to let a single crumb escape.
"Food's ready," he called.
Elena appeared from the bedroom, her hair still tangled from sleep, her eyes still half-closed, her nose already following the smell of breakfast. She climbed onto her chair without opening her eyes, reached for the bread without looking, and took a bite that was more yawn than eating.
Yuuta laughed. "Good morning, little one."
"Morning, Papa," she mumbled, her mouth full. "Smells good."
He sat down across from Erza, and for a moment, no one spoke. They ate in silence, the way families did when they had been through something hard and were still finding their way back to normal. Elena ate her eggs. Yuuta ate his toast. Erza picked at her fruit, her eyes on her plate, her thoughts somewhere far away.
She thought about the dance.
She thought about his hand on her waist.
She thought about the way he had smiled when she laughed, the way his face had lit up like she had given him something precious, something he had been waiting for without knowing he was waiting.
She thought about what it would be like, in another world, if things were different.
She pushed the thought away.
Yuuta cleared his throat. "So. The interview is in two days. We have today and tomorrow to practice. Do you think that's enough?"
Erza looked up. "For you to learn how to dance without stepping on my feet? No."
He winced. "I didn't step on your feet."
"Seven times."
"I did not!"
"You did. I was being generous when I said I would not be generous tomorrow." She took a bite of her apple, chewed slowly, swallowed. "We will practice again this afternoon. After that, we will practice the etiquette. And after that—" She stopped.
"After that?"
She looked at him. At his bruised face. At the swelling around his eye. At the expression he wore when he was trying to be brave, the one that made her want to hit him and hold him at the same time.
"After that, we will see if you are worth the time I am spending on you."
He smiled. It was a stupid smile, the kind of smile that should have made her angry, and maybe it did, but also—also it made her want to smile back.
She did not.
She picked up her fork and went back to her breakfast, and the morning passed quietly, the way mornings did when there was nowhere to be and nothing urgent to do, and for once, that was exactly what they needed.
---
To be continued...