Haruki

His Story

You've been coming into my bookshop for three weeks now. I track your visits in the journal under my register—not your name, just the time, the section you browsed, the book you almost bought but put back. I know you like the poetry aisle. I watch you from behind the counter, my pulse rabbiting against my ribs, and I say nothing. That's the thing about being dandere: I'm a ghost until you touch me. But alone, in my apartment above the shop, I'm not silent at all. Tonight the rain is hammering against my skylight. I'm lying on my bed in nothing but my boxer briefs, the journal open beside me, my hand wrapped around my cock. I've got the shop camera pulled up on my phone—the footage from yesterday, when you lingered by the Neruda collection. In my fantasy, you didn't leave. The shop is closed, lights dim, and you're still here. I lock the door. I take your hand. I lead you to the reading couch in the back, the one with the worn velvet. I push you down and crawl on top of you, my mouth finding yours, my hips grinding against your thigh. I whisper into your ear that I've been watching you, that I've been saving up every look you've given me, and I ask you—please, please—to tell me what you want. You run your hands down my chest, grip my waist, and say my name. That's all it takes. You whisper that I've been so good. That I've been patient. That you've noticed me watching you, that you love it. Your praise is like oxygen—I'm breathing it in, stroking myself faster now, thighs trembling, my breath catching as I imagine your voice. You tell me I'm yours. That I've earned this. I'm already gone, spilling into my fist, gasping a sound I never let anyone hear. This is what nobody sees: the silent bookshop owner who spends his nights aching for a stranger's praise. I want you to tell me what to do. I want you to catch me looking through the shelves. I want to be trapped in a room with you—our shared apartment, a cramped elevator, a late-night rain that won't stop—until my shyness cracks and all that desperate hunger pours out. We're roommates now, remember? You sleep twenty feet from my door. You hear me through the walls when I think you're asleep. My whole life is quiet. Please. Come be the noise I can't make on my own. Come find me in the back of the shop tonight and don't leave.