The Goddess Needs A Break!

"Two tickets to Our Starry Eyed Story please."

"Right away sir. That'll be $14.99."

"Here you go."

After a couple minutes, Takei and Akari made it to the theater without much trouble. They waited in line for a substantial amount of time since the movie they wanted to see just happened to come out the day before. An eternity later, the duo made it to the front of the line and purchased their tickets.

Akari tried to pay for her own ticket, but Takei quickly stopped her. His pride as a man would be ruined if he let a girl pay for herself when he was with her.

"Here's your change. Please enjoy the movie."

"Ah, thanks."

After paying for the tickets, they walked into the movie theater. Out of nowhere, Akari had stopped walking and had accidentally pulled Takei backwards.

"What's up?" Takei asked.

Akari fidgeted a bit and looked at Takei. "Um, I don't know how to say this..."

"I'm all ears."

Akari looked at him seriously. "Promise you won't laugh?"

Takei looked conflicted since he felt Akari was acting a bit weird. "I promise."

Akari relented after hearing his verbal acknowledgement. "...this is my first time at a movie theater. I just thought that the place looked really grand."

Unable to hold in his laugh anymore, Takei started to chuckle. "Pfft..."

"Hey! You promised me you wouldn't laugh!"

Takei had to explain himself or Akari would've cut his life short on the spot. "I'm sorry, I just didn't expect that. It sounded really serious at first so I was bracing for something really bad."

"..."

The silence permeated the air and left Takei unable to do anything. Akari was clearly mad at him for laughing at her expense. After giving up on finding the solution, Takei resorted to bribery.

"I'll buy any snacks you want if you forgive me."

"Deal!"

A simple bribe consisting of promised snacks was enough to quell the goddess' anger. Takei was quite surprised at how fast she gave up though.

Jeez, how simple can you get? I thought it would've been way harder for her to forgive me.

"Can you buy licorice and a chocolate bar? Pocky sticks too?" Akari begged.

"Urgh, um. I mean that's fine."

Movie theater snacks were obviously extremely overpriced compared to supermarket snacks so that left Takei in a pickle. He didn't want to waste money on overpriced snacks, but death awaited him if he didn't. The unlucky boy was stuck tiptoeing on a thin rope that was about to snap.

Looking back on past situations made Takei realize that there was only one choice that would save him. After mustering his resolve, Takei chose to live and bought the snacks for her.

"Thanks so much~"

"Yeah yeah, let's go to the screening room already."

The two walked towards the screening room and entered to find the theater jam packed full of people. Many of the seats were filled up with couples occupying several of them. It was an awkward scene for Takei who wasn't used to the concept of love.

"Oh, I see some empty seats over there. Hurry up, Takei!"

"Got it, let's go."

Both of them luckily managed to sit down next to each other even though there was limited seating thanks to the popularity of the movie. Takei distributed the snacks he bought and checked his phone to see a text from his sister.

Have fun at the movies! Make sure you woo her enough, I want an older sister~

Takei wondered how Airi managed to find out about their date until he realized that she and Akari exchanged contact information earlier in the week. Judging from that, it was likely that Akari told Airi about their date since she was excited about going to see a movie. Takei believed that she must've texted Airi while they were waiting in line for the tickets.

While Takei was lost in his thoughts, Akari was sitting next to him munching happily on snacks. Then, the lights in the screening room began to dim until it got to the point where there was barely any light at all.

"Takei, the movie's starting!"

"Yep, can't wait."

Takei wasn't that particularly enthused to watch a romance movie, but Akari seemed excited so he just went along with her whims.

While Takei was glancing at the beautiful girl next to him, the lights completely turned off in the theater room and the movie began.

This movie in particular was your typical coming of age romance story between a girl and a boy. It wasn't anything special, the reason for its popularity was due to the attractive male and female leads and the timing of the release of the movie.

During a season of mostly action movies, a romance movie was a rarity. People must've been bored of seeing constant fighting because this movie broke several records when it was released. To add on top of that, both the male and female leads were very attractive and likeable which made the movie an instant success.

The movie was going along well as expected. Everyone in the theater was mesmerized by the couple in the movie. To be specific, the main couple stole the whole movie and were the complete MVPs of the movie.

Akari was one of those mesmerized people. The kind ocean blue eyes that belonged to her were completely glued to the movie screen. Takei glanced at her for a moment and noticed how alluring she seemed. He was quite entranced by her and found it hard to remove his eyes. Takei believed that these feelings were only of admiration, but he wasn't too sure of it either. Nonetheless, he found her beautiful and out of his league.

A small murmur leaked out of Takei's mouth. "Amazing..."

Akari seemed to notice Takei trying to tell her something. "Did you say something?"

Takei quickly covered up the mishap by thinking of an excuse on the fly. "Yeah, I said the movie is amazing so far."

"Right? It's no wonder that this movie is so popular. It has everything a person can want in a romance movie. Drama, suspense, comedy, need I say more?"

Takei had barely paid attention to the movie, since he was busy staring at Akari the whole time. Lying about understanding the nuances of a movie genre he didn't understand that much about was most likely his best shot. "Nope, I totally understand your thinking."

Akari was quite pleased that Takei was enjoying the movie as well. She was also happy that he understood her reasoning. "I see."

A brief two words with a smirk was enough to convey the message to Takei...

She must really like the movie. Wait, what was that smirk? Is she on to me? Does she know that I don't like romance movies? Oh shit, I better think of an excuse.

...or not.

And so, this would later lead to Takei studying more about the romance genre in order to gain a better understanding of his comrade-in-arms.

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Akari's Affection Meter: N/A (will be updated at the end of next chapter, which is also the last part of this arc)

Next chapter will reveal Akari's reasons for wanting to be with Takei. Please look forward to it! :)