"So, how was Kokoro last time you saw her?" I asked Chris as we sat together, practically alone in the room. All around us were tables with people of course, but at a restaurant like this one that meant there was almost a full four meters between tables, and sometimes more than that. No one could overhear us by accident, and I was not so paranoid as to believe we were being followed every minute of every day, though I wouldn't put it past some of the people who worked against my employers.
"She was fine. A little down that her latest project flopped, but Julian cheered her up pretty quickly. I hear he got her roses and chocolates because he thought he'd done something wrong, and that had set her to laughing all night long," said Chris with a chuckle as she looked towards the door, her eyes focusing in such a way that they seemed to be looking through the door, which they were in fact doing, though no one within several miles at least would understand how she was doing it.
"They're coming now. I see Kokoro got the boy into a tux at least. She's probably going to give me at least a little grief over seeing you in your work clothes," commented Chris as she reached under her plate, and withdrew a menu it had been sitting on top of, a setting that made the table appear to have even more room than it already did, which it already had quite a lot of, truth to tell, the four of us going to easily fit on it so long as we kept out orders below seven plates each.
"You know how I look in a tux. Remember the Spirits' Day Festival Office Party last year?" I asked her, and she smiled at me, able to recall exactly what I had looked like. The suit had fit perfectly of course, after all it had been tailored specifically for me, but that had not stopped me from feeling confined in it and I ended up spending most of the night adjusting my collar and other activities, to the point that one of the company heads had asked me to dance with him, which had proven to be the highlight of the evening, as he turned out to be an excellent dancer, for a anthromorph anyway.
"Shush," she admonished me as Kokoro and Julian entered the establishment, Kokoro almost glowing in her dress, even more radiant than usual, which was quite a feat considering the Japanese Princess was among the most beautiful women I knew, which said a lot more than it seemed to because I knew several women who could have easily won beauty pageants. Looking for all the world like she owned the restaurant Kokoro strode past the front podium, and the one who led us to our table did not even try to stop them as they joined us
"Hello Ko, it's so nice to see you away from work," said Christine as she rose from her seat, and gave Kokoro two quick kisses on her cheeks, a ritual that Kokoro repeated. Rising myself I held out my hand to Julian and shook it in silent greeting as he sat down in his seat, just as the server arrived and poured us each a single glass of wine, leaving all four bottles in the center of the table as he moved over to myself and Christine, obviously wanting to give the new arrivals time to think over their choices for meals.
Christine herself of course ordered without having to look at her menu a second time, handing it to him with a smile, her voice sounding as if the language in which the dishes name was written was one she had been born with. Not daring to tempt fate and ask for the same thing, something that had brought me grief in the past when girlfriends ordered either something live, or something rotting, I looked down at the menu and found that there were translations for each items name written under the foreign words, and sighed with relief, flipping through until I found something I thought would be good enough to satisfy my hunger, but I knew how to eat at the same time. Which in the end left me only with a turkey sandwich, which was what I ordered, handing the menu to the man, who stalked off, seeming to have no emotion whatsoever over what had been ordered.
"So, how are you two doing tonight?" asked Christine as she watched the waiter stride into the kitchen, his walk promising that our meal would be out post haste, probably because of Kokoro herself. She was getting special treatment because of her birth, which wasn't all that surprising. She was fifth in line for a throne in the East, from what I heard from Christine, though I'd never cared for that. We worked together, that was all I knew, in almost the exact same lab, which wasn't so surprising, as our fields of study were complimentary, along with Christine's own, which was also how I'd met her.
Looking around I was startled to see that the patronage of the establishment were all faces I knew from work as well. About the only one not from work in the entire restaurant, as far as I could tell, were the staff and Julian, which left Julian as a bit of an oddity in the group, but a welcome one. I'd always liked him, and I knew Kokoro did to. Christine always kept her opinions of people to herself of course, which meant I didn't know one wit of what she thought of him, but her smiles towards him had always been warm, and that led me to believe she liked him too, at least for now.
Women, even one's like Christine, had a tendency to change their minds about a person midsentence in my experience, which had always been something I'd found amusing about them, and made them an adventure to be around. Of course, had Christine not liked him I didn't know what I would do, as I had known him much longer even than I had known her, a fact she was well aware of, and meant she saw him as a potential rival for my affections, though I reminded her every time she brought it up that Julian and I didn't like each other in that way, which always got her to asking if that meant I liked her more, and not wanting to lie, I always held my head down without answering.
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