He never returned to a restaurant once he had been there before. I wasn’t sure what he was like when he was working, but whenever we ate out together, that was always the case. It was such a clear and deliberate habit that even someone as unobservant as me couldn’t help but notice. He constantly took me to unfamiliar places, letting me taste all sorts of different foods.
Even someone as clueless as I was knew it wasn’t a simple task to choose a different place each and every time without repeating. Out of all the restaurants he must have visited countless times throughout his life, he had to remember and sort them into those he had gone to with me and those he hadn’t. Unless he was fully devoted to our time together, holding on to every moment without letting a single one slip from his memory, it would have been impossible. The depth of that devotion was overwhelming, a weight so heavy that no matter how hard I tried, I could never hope to repay it in my life.
‘There really must be so many restaurants in the world. There’s still so much I don’t know.’
The things I had yet to know weren’t limited to the variety of restaurants. There was also the true breadth of the affection he wanted to show me, and the unfathomable depth of his heart. To me, who had grown up in such a different world, it felt as though even the very units of measure we might use would be impossibly far apart, making it reckless to try and guess at them. So instead of laying bare my thoughts as they were, I revealed my feelings in another way.
‘I’m narrowing the distance. With you.’
His reply was, as always, something I could never have guessed.
‘Even if nothing else, at least when it comes to food, we can match equally. What I’ve eaten, and now you’ve also eaten. That may seem trivial, but it’s a profound common ground that cuts across a lifetime.’
For someone who thought that way, to revisit the same restaurant, even more than once, was extraordinary. And yet he had done so here, several times. The reason was simple: because I liked the meals here.
“…”
I thought I hadn’t shown it. But apparently from beginning to end, my delight had been plain to see. Or maybe my feelings were just so obvious to him that he could read them effortlessly. The fact that he asked me this now made me wonder how I looked in his eyes. Embarrassed, I tried to guess his intent, but no clear answer came. I finally spoke softly.
“How would that happen?”
Listening to my question that came after a short pause, he swept his gaze over my face, his smile lingering in his eyes.
“I could hire the chef here.”
“Ah….”
His crisp answer jolted me. The gulf between his common sense and mine was insurmountable.
“Do you want me to do that?”
“No.”
I cut him off quickly. Watching him speak so casually of bringing in a person this time, I knew I’d never adapt to his ways nor accept them with ease.
Giving me all sorts of gifts had become almost like a hobby to him. Despite his dry, distant nature, far from warm or affectionate, it was always an exception when it came to me.
It was just the same last winter.
‘Take it off only when you’re in the car.’
Before we went out together, he had wrapped a scarf around me up to just beneath my eyes and said that softly. The way he snapped the tag off with one hand was so fluid and natural that I almost didn’t notice it was a brand-new scarf. Thanks to the scarf he gifted me, I got to wear it every time we went out and I got through winter without a single cough.
‘You can wear it on other days too. It blocks UV rays too.’
One time, that was the reason he gave when he once handed me a tablet PC along with blue-light-blocking glasses.
‘Doesn’t everyone dress like this during exam periods?’
And that’s what he said when he gave me a hat that shaded my vision so deeply it was hard to look straight ahead.
He was the kind of person who could turn trivial little reasons into an excuse to lavish kindness on me. From gifts with short offhand reasonings to extravagant luxuries that were overwhelming to accept, he pressed them into my hands as if it were nothing. I felt burdened by the fact that I had to one-sidedly accept things I could never hope to repay him for, but I wasn’t in any position to refuse. So, even if it felt heavy, I had to first learn how to accept gratefully, saying thank you. That’s how my space filled with things that couldn’t be measured in monetary value. Even if I couldn’t stay entirely calm, I thought I’d gotten used to it enough not to be so startled anymore.
But no, I was still far from it.
“I was just asking how you would do it.”
Even now, from head to toe, every part of me bore his touch. And it would likely be that way from now on too. The meaning of not being able to escape his hands included all of that. My throat somehow felt parched with jitters, and I took another sip of chrysanthemum wine. My face flushed, and I felt like the intoxication would hit soon, so I stopped after one sip and set the glass down. For some reason, today my hand reached for the alcohol far more frequently. No, maybe that was the wrong order of things. Perhaps it was because he kept filling my glass endlessly that I couldn’t stop my hand.
“I like coming here to eat like this from time to time. It feels more special because it’s occasional, and because we’re eating together outside the house. I don’t think I’d be satisfied just having this food in front of me.”
The person on the other side of the table was quiet. Too quiet.
Had I made a mistake? Nervously, I lifted my eyes.
Even though I was careful and cautious, I still hadn’t learned how to completely avoid brushing against his nerves. Having lived my whole life reading my mother’s moods, I thought I would be specialized in not going against the grain of others. But the kind of attentiveness I was good at only applied to relationships with clear hierarchy and power imbalance. To his eyes, which expected the attitude of a lover, everything I did seemed inadequate. My attempts at being tactful often didn’t relieve the man’s anger, instead only provoked the opposite reaction.
That’s why he was still difficult for me, as if having to solve a problem without ever having learned the formula.
It was the same now. His eyes met mine, gazing at me steadily, but I couldn’t guess at the meaning hidden in those pupils.
Should I apologize? But he never welcomed my apologies. They didn’t ease him, they only worsened the situation.
While I was lost in those worries, a gentle light spread across his eyes. For a moment, I thought maybe I was imagining it because I’d been staring too long.
“Not bad.”
He smiled softly. It was a ticklish smile that melted the unease frozen in my heart all at once. It was the generous expression he wore when he was in his best mood, when he’d decided that if I asked for anything then, he’d grant it no matter what it was. I couldn’t tell what loosened him, what of mine had expanded his patience, but the important thing wasn’t the answer. It was that my words hadn’t irked him. More than that, they had pleased him. That was what mattered. Relief washed away my tension. My hand reached for the glass again on its own.
“Will you be able to drink more?”
Feeling lighthearted, I nodded without hesitation. This time, instead of setting my empty glass down and waiting, I held it out to him. This was the first time we’d shared drinks like this all the way to the end of a meal. More than whether I liked the taste of the alcohol, that fact itself felt good.
We split the last of the bottle between us. And only when my cup was finally emptied did a sudden realization wash over me. That I had just crossed the line where I should have stopped, right at the point of feeling pleasantly drunk.
***
Make me feel happy and supported by leaving a comment!
![The Villains Are All My Reserve Food [Quick Transmigration]](https://novels.space/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/Villains-are-Reserve-Food.jpg "The Villains Are All My Reserve Food [Quick Transmigration]")