[Document Entry 001] - True Nature
(Takes place immediately after Too Sweet to Swallow.)

He was home. Akira was alone now, but the same stupid scene kept repeating in his head, over and over, like some awful scene from a TV drama. It hadn't him bothered him so much at first, but as the twenty-two-year-old's sugar rush ebbed, so did his giddiness. He began to realize exactly just how much of a fool he had been. Him and Seraphine, their faces - lips - inches from each other, the cheesy dialogue painfully fresh in his mind.

"Are you sure?" He'd been staring at her mouth like the idiot he was. "There isn't some left in there somewhere...?" Sure, he'd been high on sugar, but was that any excuse? Had it been any other girl, especially at his previous school, Akira was sure he would have been struck across the face right then and there. Or worse.

What followed instead was the smile that sliced into his ego like the blades of a Scyther. "I think that..." That gut-wrenching, hesitant moment of suspense that she had almost positively waited out on purpose. "I'm quite sure." And then the moment had been gone. It was still alive and new in his recent memories, though, and it seemed no amount of beating his head against the wall was going to rid him of it.

"AAARGHH, how could I have been so - so moronic?!" Akira yelled, certain his roommate would have thrown something at him for his volume had he not been out at the time. The brunet clutched at his hair, grasping the short locks in fistfuls of aggravation. "How could I have talked to her like that?! She probably gets spoken to like that all the time by stupid bastards trying to hit on her. She must think I'm one of them! How could I have treated her like that?!"

Groaning, he tossed himself onto the old couch in the apartment living room, burying his face in one of its cushions. For once Akira didn't care about the scent of cigarette smoke that still lingered about it. He just wanted to suffocate himself and die so he no longer had to bear the humiliation that was catching up with him now that his wits had returned.

What had Seraphine's reaction meant? Had she just been teasing him, or did she think him too forward? No, no, she would have told him if she'd thought he'd been going too far. Right? Or what if that was her way of telling him he wasn't her type? Or she could have simply been telling him that that wasn't the right time or place -

NO! No, no, no! What was he doing even considering something like this? He was - well, had been - a married man. It hadn't turned out well. He didn't like females that way...right? Ugh...honestly, he couldn't be sure of himself anymore. After his little crush on that oblivious girl in high school, Mitsuko Takara, and then his sister-like relationship with Momoko Aojiro...everything had him so confused. Getting to know Seraphine wasn't making matters any easier, either.

"Damn you, I wish you could just make up your mind for once," Akira cursed himself, lifting his head from the cushion to rest his chin upon it. Thinking back over the past few years, though...there had been quite a number of guys who had confessed having a crush on him, but had there ever been any girls? Momoko counted, he supposed, but...she hadn't even been able to talk, let alone flirt. Almost all other females Akira had known had either hated his guts or been his sisters.

Maybe Seraphine didn't yet hate his guts, though. She hadn't seemed exactly angry with him for trying to kiss her now that he thought of it, however angry he was with himself. She hadn't even been opposed to going out with him again. Not out out, but...for the first time that he could remember, a girl was actually flirting with him. She actually seemed to like him and he had no idea what to do. How long she would continue to have a good opinion of him and to what extent had yet to be determined, though, so until then he could only do his best to behave.

No more sugar around Seraphine; not even a little bit. Arceus knew it would be difficult enough to sort out his feelings about her as it was.

((Edited in 5/31/2013))