(32) Day 4 Bathtime Nervousness (5.3 cm > 5.2 cm)
So after dinner was a bath. A bath… Childhood friends like me and Yae had admittedly taken baths together before. When we were kids, there were times when we were in the same bathtub. Our parents were close and we were still children, so there really wasn’t any trouble at all.
That was when we were young though. A bath together with Yae at this age was unheard of. Not even with kids Yuri’s age would take baths would boys the same age as her. Yae and I were high schoolers, mature high schoolers who were nearing adulthood.
I was surprised Ayame-san allowed this and even more startled it was being condoned by Sasakura-sensei who requested Yae do this in the first place. No, she didn’t simply say ‘Just use a sink and test it out’ she actually wrote down ‘Try it out in the bath’.
“I can’t complain, but Sasakura-sensei, you really shouldn’t be promoting this to high school students,” I mumbled to myself.
“Something wrong, Touya?” I heard out in the distance. Looking over in that direction, I saw Yae, or rather, there was nothing to see except Yae.
“It’s nothing important, Yae,” I sweated not just out of concern but also from the heat. “Urgh… this is hot…”
“Is it? Well, I guess this is bigger than any onsen, isn’t it?”
“More like an ocean.”
Of course, it wasn’t an ocean. I was taking a bath inside Yae’s bathtub... while she was in it at the same time. I wasn’t simply swimming in the bath water, though. I had all of the proper bathing necessities around me from soap to shampoo to towels.
This was accomplished through Reduction Item number seven: The Indoor Open-Air Bath. A miniature onsen that could be filled with bath water was floating on the surface of the water Yae was bathing in. It was equipped with waterproof, watertight, and firmly affixed facilities and drainage pumps that allowed it to survive and float back up even if it was pushed under water.
To quote Yae, this was surreal. I was wearing my swim trunks and having an onsen bath on a 15 cm by 15 cm floating square that was between my childhood friend’s legs and her breasts.
Thank goodness Yae was also wearing a swimsuit. The frilly two piece from last summer was cute, but the frills couldn’t hide her cleavage, and to be between her spread legs, I wasn’t exactly sure where to look. I had a beautiful view of an island sized girl and a nice hot bath.
“It’s like you’re a bath toy,” Yae remarked.
“And you’re like an island,” I gave her a counter comparison while looking in her direction.
“H-Hey, stop smiling like that. Really, don’t look so much, Touya,” Yae blushed, though from the way her eyes gazed up again after saying so, she clearly wanted me to look a little more. Yae was as much a queen of mixed messages as I was sometimes.
“Just be careful, okay?” I requested. “I’d rather not practice swimming in a place that has a drain.”
“I’m blocking it so you should be fine, but I understand why you’re worried,” nodded my childhood friend. “I’d rather you not do that either… I’m not prepared yet… At least give me a few minutes...”
The water was clear enough that I could see Yae’s hand in the water reflexively trying to cover her bikini bottom clad crotch. She was embarrassed despite having pushed herself to do this.
“Well, we both might as well enjoy this, right?” I suggested. “I know I sure am appreciating this view. I should thank Sensei for letting me see this.”
“No fair, I have less to see,” Yae pouted while her ears turned red from my comment. “You should do something to even this out, Touya.”
“I’m not going to strip.”
“N-No. I just wanted to watch… Wait, that’s not what I meant...”
“What do you mean then?” I raised an eyebrow, wanting Yae to get more flustered.
Yae struggled to work up the nerve to speak up. “Well, actually, Touya, maybe you cou-”
“You two better not be getting up to anything lewd in there!” We heard Ayame-san shout from outside.
“O-Okaa-san!” Yae’s body jerked as she shouted, flustered. I and the floating bath were nearly knocked over by her movement.
“Wah! Yae!”
“Kyaa!” Yae saw and heard me just in time to grab hold of the floating square before it tipped over and capsized. “S-sorry, that was my fault.”
“That was close… Is this how it feels when a kaiju destroys a ship?”
“Sorry…,” Yae bowed her head, pushing water as her body leaned forward. Her wet hair sending water flying in my direction with a powerful spray.
“Whoa, careful!” I raised my arms to protect myself.
“Sorry! Sorry!” Again, Yae moved, causing waves to rock the platform. I was already on unsteady ground but the wet floor made me slip and fall. I nearly fell back into the water again. “That’s my bad, Touya. I don’t think I'm ready yet for this.”
Ready for what, I wondered. Still, more than enjoyable, my current predicament was really dangerous. I wasn’t in any good condition after the near capsizing for the platform. It wasn’t exactly easy to enjoy a bath when the bath itself was being rocked about so easily. If there was any observation I wanted to make to give Sensei later, it was that.
“Gak… Well, if I’m going to get knocked off the platform, maybe I should just go all the way,” I gave up and stood up in the floating bath.
“Touya?”
I neared the edge of the platform and pointed up at Yae. I was ready to admit that the sight of her swimsuit-clad giant body all wet and towering over me like a mountain was gorgeous. I was about to recklessly approach it.
“Might as well just enjoy myself for a bit. If there’s an ocean, you’ve got to swim, right?” I told myself before diving into the bath.
Plop!
I hopped into the water beside the floating onsen and began to swim around. It was the same type of water as what was in the onsen so it wasn’t too different, but there was a definite change in feeling since this was directly Yae’s bath water.
“Uwaaah… You actually did it,” I heard Yae.
Swimming back to the edge of the onsen, I used one hand to keep myself from floating away and the other to push to activate the microphone and speaker. “It’s not too different from the onsen. I’m still taking a bath, aren’t I?”
“I thought you were afraid of the drain too… But Touya… I’m really not comfortable with you being here…,” Yae was red in the ears.
“It’s still the same bath, isn’t it? And let’s be honest, I’m in the mood for some exploring,” I regained my adventurous spirit from earlier today and swam away from the platform.
“Kyaa~! Touya! What are you doing!? Wait, where are you heading?” I heard Yae shout. I could feel her muscles tense through the ripples in the water. She had frozen up the moment I swam towards her.
I couldn’t reply while swimming, but Yae had every reason to be flustered, in any case. I really could be a pervert. My destination was Yae’s breasts. They were floating in the water. Floating. Like islands. Among any of the other landmarks from Yae Island, I still probably would have chosen this one first if not second. I was a man with clear desires after all. I wouldn’t just deny them.
I swam as quickly as I could to my goal. I was curious how it’d be like to climb onto Yae’s chest. I had been pressed against it and also scaled it earlier, but a swimsuit clad Yae was an SSR rarity. I wanted to enjoy it. It was just going to take the effort of swimming the fair distance. Then again, everything was. The walls of the bath tub were far enough away that they alone seemed like distant cliffs. Anything beyond that was out of focus or blurred out in my vision due to the steam of the hot water.
“Huh? Touya?”
Unfortunately, my little adventure was cut short. I had been too slow to get there. Honestly, my pace was so slow, Yae had calmed down enough to see my miniscule body trying to make the distance. I hadn’t even gotten half way there.
“Is that it? Touya, that’s… That’s just...”
After realizing she had nothing to worry about and then getting angry from my reckless action, Yae decided to stop me. Her hands came up out of the water from below. Like a net, her cupped palms caught me and raised me out of the water.
“Wah!” I shouted as I found myself captured and brought up to Yae’s face. Her wet hair fell over her eyes and shoulders, but I could still see her glare.
“Caught you. Touya, that really wasn’t cool,” she frowned. I could tell she was more than just embarrassed.
“I’m sorry?” I was a bit nervous when I apologized. Yae clearly had all of the power here. I had known that all along, but she never showed it out of courtesy for me. My stunt had forced her hand, unfortunately, literally at that.
“I wasn’t ready yet, Touya. Don’t try that again,” she told me. It felt more like an order than a request. “If you want to do something, you should ask me first. Get consent, okay? I need to prepare myself first.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I straightened up in fear. Yae was a gentle girl, but I may have crossed the line and gotter her angry.
Yae sighed after hearing my answer. She lowered me back onto the platform and leaned back into the bath. I could feel the water level rise as she put more of her body into the water.
“You really are crazy, Touya,” Yae remarked. “Just why do I like you again?”
“Because I’m honest?”
“You honestly love me way too much… You really don’t make this easy, Touya. I thought we were supposed to be holding back.”
“We should be… Sorry, I guess I just lost out to temptation?”
“Well, I guess when you’re like this, I can be a real temptation…,” Yae chuckled. I was starting to get her approval back at least.
“I’m trying here. I know you are too, so can you forgive me?”
“I don’t think so,” Yae frowned. “You worried me by jumping in all of a sudden, and you were trying to swim towards my chest too. There’s such a thing as too much freedom, Touya. You can’t just do things without asking. I’ve been asking you properly, haven’t I?”
Mostly in any case… I guess getting permission was becoming a must for Yae while she was being flustered. I didn’t seem to be having any freedom right now seeing as I couldn’t exactly escape the bathtub and Yae’s grudge. “Please forgive me, Yae?”
“Hmph. No way, Touya. Not after that,” she pouted.
“Really?”
“Really.”
“I’ll do any one thing you ask me to.”
“Anything?” Yae paused. She liked that idea. “... Well, I’ll think about it…”
Upon seeing the sparkle in Yae’s eyes, I probably should have rethought that. Unfortunately that was the first thing that came to my mind to try and appease Yae, and I had already said it.
“Wait… actually, let me rephrase that.”
“Nope. I’ll forgive you, Touya, but I’ll hold you to that.”
“Seriously? Can I get a rain check on this?”
Yae didn’t respond because she was satisfied with my proposal. I wanted to bargain further, but Yae wasn’t going to listen to me any more. She slumped her entire head down into the water and began blowing bubbles. The platform shook and rocked from her simple bubble blowing. More than me, it seemed she was the one who needed to relax and calm down her racing thoughts.
In the end, with Yae no longer willing to talk to me, I reluctantly returned to the miniature onsen and tried to bathe quietly. I debated whether or not I wanted to tell this story to the other guys when everything was over and wondered just what it was that Yae was going to ask me to do.
There was a lesson to be learned in all of this. Beware chasing the carrot dangling right in front of your nose. For someone my stature, I had been a bit too much of a daredevil.
“Anything, huh?”