265 An hour of sunlight left
“But tonight, I want to spend with just you.”
It was such a simple statement. Yet, one that would be extremely weird for a girl in a normal world.
After all, it implied that there were other girls that the spokesperson behind those words was used to spending nights with.
“Hah?” Nadia jumped a little, taken aback by Mathew’s statement. Yet, as pleasantly surprised as she was, her face pretty quickly melted into that of worry. “Is this…” she hesitated for a little. Then, she stepped half of a step closer, putting her face right in front of Mathew’s.
“Is this about what happened earlier?”
Every second of the last three days was packed to the brim with events. Every passing moment of daylight their group would spend rushing from one objective to another, taking only the minimal amount of rest between.
And during the night, Mathew would exhaust all of his physical and mental power catering to the natural desires of the girls he bonded with.
‘Huh?’ Mathew twitched when he realized what the girl was talking about. ‘It’s been so lo…’ he thought, only to put an end to his thoughts before they could even fully form. ‘No, it wasn’t all that long at all,’ he thought, realizing the obvious thing.
Sure, ever since he had his mental breakdown, the girls helped him to get over it. Then, they helped him to sort out his thoughts about the changes that happened to his system.
Yet, as soon as he was back in his right mind, Mathew was already rushing to prove his words of promise to Beatrice weren’t empty. And as soon as he noticed the opportunity in the middle of the rescue operation for the survivors left behind in the police cars, he transformed it into an even greater mission.
In the end, from the moment of his mental breakdown, save for when the girls tried to help him out of his mental hole, Mathew had little to no time to think about that event.
Only now, when Nadia pointed it out, did Mathew realize an obvious truth.
‘It’s still eating me from inside,’ he thought, gritting his teeth. Yet, rather than showing his weak side to Nadia right away, Mathew simply put a small smile on his lips.
“Partially, yes,” he said, pulling the girl closer before hugging her tightly. “But what I had in mind was actually far simpler,” he revealed right as he gently shoved the girl away.
“Do tell,” Nadia said. She looked right into Mathew’s eyes as if hoping to see the truth behind his ambiguous words.
“Don’t make such a sad face,” Mathew asked with a defenseless smile.
The kindness and sympathy in Nadia’s eyes were too much for him to handle.
‘Like a bright sun in complete darkness,’ he thought, unable to find a better comparison to how Nadia’s caring smile made him feel.
“How could I not when I’m worried about you?” Nadia asked while pulling her eyebrows together. Yet, for how intimate this statement would sound in anyone else’s mouth…
The girl actually stared at Mathew as if she couldn’t comprehend just how much of an idiot he could be.
It wasn’t the stare of a teenage girl trying to be adorable.
It was the look of a friend genuinely amazed the other party could be surprised by their worry in the first place.
“Right, that’s my bad,” Mathew admitted his loss. His body deflated along with a breath he exhaled. “Still, when we are all together, it’s taxing,” he then revealed the crux of the matter.
“It’s an extreme pleasure, one I could never ask for in my entire life,” Mathew said quickly while raising his hands in a gesture of surrender when he saw Nadia raising one of her eyebrows. “Nevertheless, it’s not the way to spend the night… if I just want to have some peace of mind.”
This time… Nadia didn’t appear to be displeased by Mathew’s statement. Her expression softened up a little. She then lowered her head and took a deep breath.
“Well, it’s not like I mind it,” she said once she regained the clarity of her thoughts and raised her face back up. “The question is, how are you going to tell that to the girls?”
Mathew had forgotten about that problem.
How was he going to explain his intentions to Daria and Leila? The two were likely to make a fuss over this, given how wild they would go at him during all the nights they spent together previously.
‘I guess I’ll just have to go with the flow and see how it goes,’ Mathew thought, realizing he had no other choice.
“I’ll just have to explain it to them as best I can,” he said, shrugging. “If they are reasonable people, they should understand.”
Nadia simply nodded in response. Yet, a second later, an awkward smile found its way onto her face.
“Sure… if that’s what you think,” she then said after taking another deep breath and coughing lightly into her palm due to the sudden change of topic. “In any case…” Nadia quickly changed the gears of her mind. She then looked up, towards the sky.
The sun has yet to even approach the horizon. It was close and it was a matter of at most an hour before it would cease to provide its warm rays.
And given how they approached the matter of time all this time so far…
The topic of Mathew’s and Nadia’s private time had to wait until their group would squeeze every last second of the daytime they were given!
“We should look through the spoils, ensure no survivor got bitten, and then convey this problem to the girls,” Mathew said with a sigh, already exhausted by just thinking about the list of things that had to be done before he could retreat for the night to Nadia’s welcoming arms.
“I will take care of checking our people, then,” Nadia said, placing a gentle peck on top of Mathew’s forehead. “I bet Daria is already busy counting the cores, so…” the girl took a short pause while a weirdly vicious grin appeared on her lips. “I will leave the task of conveying your decision to Leila, then!”