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It’s not like he had intentionally wiretapped the locations they’d be at. He had just wiretapped any public phone that seemed like it would be a good place to gain lots of information at since there would naturally be a lot of people around it, so it wasn’t his fault that he knew more often than not where Maya, Ulala, and Katsuya were in town because of it.
When he had first heard their voices at the other end of his wiretapping, they hadn’t known each other yet so to him hearing their voices was no different than the other hundreds of residents in Sumaru city, but now that they did know each other and he considered them close to him (even going as far to call them his friends if he was drunk and vulnerable enough to admit it) he couldn’t help but feel a tad conflicted sometimes when he heard their voices in his recordings.
At first he thought he could keep himself professional as he listened to their voice, that he could separate his personal feelings on the matter and sort through the sounds of the three of their voices without effecting his tap busting duties to dig up valuable information, but whenever he heard their voices at the other end of the line, he couldn’t help but find himself lingering longer than ought to. He found himself prioritizing listening to lines wherever any one of them happened to be at compared to listening to any other ones.
He justified it to himself that he was just keeping tabs on them, that he was only listening to them out of concern to make sure his companions stayed safe.
I mean with Ulala’s bad luck with men combined with her dangerous combination of drinking way too much alcohol for her own good anyone would be worried her, plus Katsuya got involved with plenty of shady individuals in his line of work as a detective so he naturally had to keep an eye out for him too so no one pulled a fast one him, while Maya on the other hand, despite as capable as she may have been of herself, had the tendencies to go to any lengths she needed to in securing a scoop or protecting the people she cared about, that she more often than not forget about taking care of herself in the process, which meant that she needed someone to look out for her and made sure she stayed safe as well in return for all the lengths she went for everyone else.
Of course, none of them knew about this, about his technically secret wiretapping on them, even if they knew he had wiretaps placed throughout Sumaru city in general. There had never been a good time to bring it up (not that he ever thought there would be one), plus he didn’t think they’d understand it if he did, so he hadn’t ever said anything.
Okay, sure maybe he could hypothetically see Maya understanding it if he explained his motives that he was simply looking out for them, but Ulala would certainly throw a fit about it if she knew, and Katsuya would most definitely try to arrest him on the spot for invading their privacy.
So that’s why his secret wiretapping of his friends was something that stayed only between him and his hideout.
…
“Oh, you look so beautiful in that Ma-ya! If I was a guy, I would’ve totally fallen for you on the spot!” Baofu overheard Ulala suddenly speak up and say over one of his wiretaps.
He checked the name of the line, it was coming from Rosa Candida which meant the two of them were probably trying on clothes as she said that.
“Really? It’s something different that I usually wear so I didn’t know if it would look good on me…” Maya admitted with a slight nervous tone in her voice she usually didn’t have.
It’s strange he had never considered Amano-kun the type to fret over her looks, since she was good looking as it was, now Ulala on the other hand… he could totally see getting worked up over something like that.
“Nah, it looks perfect on you!” Ulala continued to encourage her, “Wearing a badass suit like that would make you look perfect standing next to Katsuya! Think about it! With both of your backs face to the sky and your guns drawn together, you’d two look like the perfect crime-fighting partners that no one in the city could stop!”
He heard a few “pew pew” sounds leave Ulala’s mouth after that, before he heard Maya suddenly break off into a small fit of laughter. Since he could only guess what they were doing based on sounds, he could only imagine that Ulala had just broken out a few finger guns of her own in demonstration to show how badass Katsuya and Maya would look together as a crime fighting duo.
An unconscious smile appeared on his face as he thought of their antics. Ulala really could be a silly woman sometimes, though he’s not sure she’d exactly take that as a compliment if he told her that.
“That’s great and all, but it’s not like I changed up my look just for Katsuya or anything,” Maya shyly told her friend when she finished recovering from her laughing fit.
“Just for Katsuya…?” Ulala caught the double meaning by the other woman’s words and said, “Don’t tell me Ma-ya, are you playing with the hearts of multiple men?”
Anyone would have had to been blind not to notice Katsuya’s crush on Maya, he was the most obvious man in the world when it came to his feelings for her, but she was always so nice and cordial to him that it was hard to tell if she actually saw him as anything more than a dear friend to her since she seemed to treat everyone the same way. Which meant, that hearing that she might really like him back too after all this time, granted with some potential competition, was a very interesting development indeed.
“I’m not playing with their hearts!” Maya quickly defended herself, “We’re all just friends so I’m not sure they would ever even see me that way in the first place.”
“Besides it’s not like they are all just guys either…”
Maya had intentionally whispered that last part, like it was something she was afraid to speak aloud yet had done it anyway, but no matter how soft she spoke those words both Ulala and him had understood what she was trying to convey loud and clear.
“You like girls too?! Is it Yukino?! I always kind of got a vibe about her…” Ulala started to ramble on way too loudly, completely forgetting that they were in the middle of a dressing room in a store that everyone else could hear them in.
“W-Well, she is pretty, but it’s not Yukino! It’s…!”
The line went silent for a few moments, he had almost thought the power got cut off at first with how quiet it had gotten, but that was when he suddenly heard Maya speak up once more again.
“N-Never mind, you should just try on your clothes next Ulala!”
The rustle of clothes in the air could be heard as Maya shoved them towards Ulala. He had never heard Amano-kun this flustered before, whoever this person she had a crush on was must’ve been a sore subject.
“Okay, then if you don’t feel comfortable sharing who she is that you have a crush on then can you at least tell me who the other guy or guys are besides Katsuya?” Ulala compromised and said.
Ulala could never resist a good piece of drama when she heard it and he couldn’t deny he was a bit curious about the info himself. I mean if Maya did have a crush on someone else it wouldn’t do anyone any harm if he did a little background check on the guy to make sure he was good for her.
“Oh, and can you help pull the zipper up on the back of my dress to get it on?” Ulala asked mini shimmy of the dress on, “It’s hard to do it by myself.”
A quick “Yeah, I will,” left Maya before he heard her begin to pull the zipper up.
“The other guy is umm… don’t get upset when I say it.”
“I won’t get upset,” Ulala assured her.
“It’s… It’s Baofu…” Maya nervously confessed.
“BAOFU?!” Ulala screeched out, immediately losing her cool the moment she heard the other man’s name leave her friend’s mouth and feeling the zipper on her back dig deep into her skin in response to her sudden movement, “Are you talking about our Baofu or a different guy?!”
“Our Baofu…” Maya quietly double downed and said.
He felt his heart skip a beat as he heard her response, out of all the people he figured Amano-kun could have feelings for he’d never imagined him.
“I didn’t say anything because I know you secretly have a thing for him with how much you care about him and even though I know you try to push me to go after Katsuya I know you’re just hiding your feelings you have for him too from yourself!”
“Wha-?!” Ulala started to say, at a loss of words at first since she didn’t know really where to begin when it came to processing Maya’s bold accusations against her, “I don’t have a thing for either of them! Baofu’s so hopeless that I have to look after him to make sure he gets stuff done! And sure, I can admit Katsuya is good looking, most women can, but he likes you!”
“Katsuya likes you too!” Maya insisted, sounding a bit frustrated that her friend didn’t realize that, “You both look like you have so much when you two dance together! And you also have such amazing banter with him as well that it would be a shame not to pursue that!”
“And when it comes to Baofu you can deny it all you want but I’m your best friend, I can tell you both have a soft spot for each other despite how much you two bicker,” Maya continued to say.
“Well, sure I do have amazing banter with Katsuya and sure maybe Baofu and I don’t entirely hate each other as much as we both let on,” Ulala conceded to her friend, “but what are you trying to do here Ma-ya? You confess that you like both Katsuya and Baofu but you’re also saying that I should go after them too? Isn’t what you want inside and what you are saying contradictory to one another?”
He had to admit that Ulala had a point, what Amano-kun was saying out loud and what she was truly feeling weren’t matching. Maybe that’s why Ulala and her were able to get along so well since the words they spoke didn’t always match what they felt inside.
“No, they’re not contradictory because it’s just sometimes I think it would be better if all four of us could go all out together as one big couple!” Maya shouted.
It was as if he had reached the climax of a drama. He was hanging on the edge of his seat after hearing that giant bomb Amano-kun had just dropped.
“Ma-ya does that mean the girl you like is…?”
“Yeah…” Maya embarrassingly admitted.
The three people Maya had a crush on, the friends she had feelings for that had made her too nervous to admit, it had been Ulala, Katsuya, and him this entire time. He couldn’t see Amano-kun’s face now but he was sure it was looking down to the ground to hide how red her face had gotten.
“Ulala?!” Maya squeaked out and after he heard a sudden rush of movement from the other end of the line.
“I’ve… I’ve never kissed a girl before so I wanted to try it with you and…”
Ah, if he hadn’t crossed a line he shouldn’t have by now, then hearing Ulala share her first girl kiss with Maya certainly had been the final straw.
“So, you don’t think it’s strange for someone to love multiple people at once?” Maya spoked up and asked.
It seemed like this was something big that had been weighing on her mind a while now.
“I’d probably have a hard time believing if it came out of anyone else’s mouth but you,” Ulala told her, “but I know you have a big enough heart to probably love as many people as you want in there.”
Loving one person could be hard enough sometimes, but multiple people? Well, if anyone could do it then he certainly could picture it being Amano-kun be the one person he could pull it off.
“Thank you, Ulala. I really do love you and have for a long time,” Maya admitted as she wrapped her arms around the other woman and held her in a tight hug.
“I… love you too Ma-ya,” Ulala responded in turn, still clearly getting used to saying those out loud words like that even if it was clear she was genuine about them.
Baofu changed the line so he could let the two of them have their moment together. He had heard far more that he should as it was, so they deserved their own private time now.
He reached for a handkerchief he kept at his desk, so he could wipe the water that had gotten under his glasses. He definitely wasn’t crying at the two of them together, nope it was just sweat he had developed from the heat of all the computers and machines in his hideouts is all, nothing more than that.
…
“For my girlfriends and boyfriend?! What are you talking about?!” Baofu suddenly heard Katsuya shriek on another line.
Apparently, according to the line name Katsuya was in the Satomi Tadashi store in Yumesaki right now.
“Yeah, for that little rag tag group you always come with when you come here!” The Satomi Sister running the store said, “We’ve got a deal going on that you can buy some deluxe snack cupcakes for 500 yen each! And wouldn’t enjoying a sweet pastry with each one of your lovers score you some points with them that might end up with you enjoying some sweet love from them in return?”
“S-sweet love in t-turn?” Katsuya half stuttered out at the suggestion.
Apparently, the thought of him sharing some sweet love with Maya, Ulala, and himself, had caught him more than a little off guard, though he couldn’t blame him since the thought got his heart racing a bit too, especially after hearing earlier that Maya and Ulala both might not be all that opposed to it.
“Yeah, who knows? The deluxe cupcakes might work so well that you might even need to buy our signature Satomi Tadashi branded condoms to help you with all the action you’ll experience from all three of your partners at once!”
“Three partners at o-once?!” He could practically hear Katsuya’s face turn bright red as he shouted that, “No person could ever be able to handle that as much as once!”
“You’d be surprised what the human body could endure,” the Satomi sister replied.
“Ms. Satomi?!”
He wanted to act surprised with Katsuya there, but his wiretapping days had led him to hear many things he wished to unhear, especially when it came to the topic of passionate lovers hanging around town.
“That’s Ms. Satomi Sister to you!” She corrected him, clearly not going to elaborate any further on what she just said previously.
“So are you going to buy the goods or what? I need all the financial support I can get to beat my sisters at our rival stores before I use the rest of the money to take over the world.”
“Well, I don’t know about supporting your endeavors in taking over the world, but I’ll buy the cupcakes. Just the cupcakes,” Katsuya clarified to the older woman when she saw her try to hide a couple condoms between the cupcakes when she thought he wasn’t looking.
“Hey, I’ll even make them half off! You can never have too much protection!”
He had to admit, he admired hearing the older woman’s hustle when it came to weaseling as much money out of Katsuya as possible.
“The only thing I need for protection is my gun, Ms. Satomi Sister,” Katsuya calmly told her as he rested a hand on the side of his waist where he kept his gun to emphasize his point.
How uncharacteristically extreme of you Katsuya… Baofu thought, then again he didn’t think he had any hopes of winning against this woman if he didn’t use extreme measures.
“You’re right that would work too, then that means your total will just come out to 2000 yen then!”
He heard Katsuya rustle some money out of his pocket and put it on the counter before he retrieved his goods.
“Well, I already bought the cupcakes so I guess I might as well give them to Maya, Ulala, and Baofu,” he heard Katsuya mumble to himself as he exited the store.
And what a sight it was when Katsuya had finally decided to give them each one a cupcake, because it was clear he hadn’t looked inside the mysterious packaging of the cupcakes, since he was just as surprised as the rest of them were when they open it and each saw a gourmet cupcake written with the words “Will you be mine forever?” on it, as little hearts decorated surrounded it.
A blush had appeared on each of their faces when they first saw it, even his own (as embarrassing as it was to admit), and it was in that moment where he couldn’t help but think that Maya’s wish for them all to go out together as one big couple was going to happen a lot sooner than she probably first thought.