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Both of them kept secrets, and Kirumi knew it full well. Tsumugi absolutely wasn’t an honest person, and it might’ve been because Kirumi held her own secrets that she could so easily tell.
But no one else seemed to notice. So Kirumi kept her mouth shut.
The “maid” would walk the halls of the Academy, looking at old paintings some of the halls held and peeking into unused labs to discover what they might hold. She would read books around the library, pacing back and forth with her skirts swishing around her ankles as she hummed and replaced the novels she was done with. She would glide around on the ladders attached to the shelves and find the warmest corners to read in. She would retreat to her room and close the door behind her, exhaling heavily through her nose and straightening her dress.
In the lighter moments, Kirumi would indulge herself in the activities she loved as a child. Before she was made to be a figurehead and serious, and before she had become Prime Minister. She would make sure the door to her room was locked before putting on classical music, Mozart or Tchaikovsky or Vivaldi, before grabbing a chair or a broom and beginning to dance. Oh, how she had loved to dance as a girl– escaping whenever she could to get lost in the music of a club, or of a school dance. She knew everything from waltzing to the more energetic party dancing. From elegance to excitement, Kirumi could do it all (except for hip-hop, she didn’t like that one much). Now, she might be considered to be too… stiff, for that sort of thing, considering she’d been labelled as a mother figure to the group. Understandable, since she acted far more mature than her true age.
The Prime Minister needed to keep up her image, after all.
Which was why she needed to remind herself of her act sometimes. She was playing the role of Ultimate Maid and she needed to keep up her front. She was a good actor– she’d had to act confident more than once in front of the entire country, acting like something she wasn’t was a mastered skill at this point. And Kirumi hadn’t always been as privileged as she was now, so she knew the movements. Everything else, she’d picked up from the workers around her house and her office space, to put it modestly.
The point was, she knew how to detect a liar because she herself was a liar, which would then mean that Tsumugi must’ve known what Kirumi was up to. Of course, not exactly what she was up to , but close enough.
Kirumi wasn’t sure how much she trusted the girl, but she had played nice at the beginning just in case there was something more sinister to the girl’s looks. The two were around the same age, close enough that they could somewhat relate to one another, and yet they were so incredibly different that it was impossible to relate at times. Their conversations had thus begun with books. Tsumugi was quite the bookworm, as Kirumi soon found, which she was quietly grateful for because it meant she was able to talk about her favourite classics with someone. It had taken some convincing to convince Tsumugi to read Frankenstein, and Kirumi withstood an equal amount of begging before finally relenting and reading Dracula. Neither girl overly enjoyed their respective novels, but they enjoyed them enough to be able to discuss them with one another. Slowly but surely, whenever the two would see each other in the halls, their greeting would morph from simple nods to quotes from their newest literary adventures, or Tsumugi launching into some long ramble about one passage or the next, or even a few debates (on slower days).
Eventually, the conversations on books turned to ones on music, and then brief mentions of childhood that were quickly discarded in favour of something less loaded with… well, with secrets. They knew what to press and what to leave, if only to protect their own fragile masks. So, the two ventured through literature and music, dances and schoolwork, their favourite courses in school and favourite meals and the occasional lucid dream that appeared in the night. As the group around them slowly began to shrink, they confided fears and suspicions to one another. They swapped all the secrets that weren’t their own, and Kirumi almost felt… happy.
Tsumugi seemed to feel the same, judging by how her face would light up whenever Kirumi smiled.
Even if Kirumi still mentally maintained their friendship was one of convenience, she had to admit that she too brightened at the sight of the girl now. Tsumugi’s gentle smile brought comfort into her life, her skirts sounding like a melody as they shifted with the movement of her walking. Her voice was musical, soothing with it’s low pitches as she read quietly under her breath and energizing as it grew louder and higher with the addition of excitement. Her skin was soft against Kirumi’s hands on the few occasions she’d taken her gloves off. Her lips were equally as plush against Kirumi’s own, and her hair was soft when she tangled her hands through it. Two pairs of long legs would tangle together in the night, two voices whispering and giggling like they were schoolgirls again, talking about nothing and everything all at once. It even got to the point that Kirumi no longer knew which shirt belonged to which girl anymore, or whose hair ribbon was in which room, or which pillow belonged to which girl– they all smelled like Tsumugi in Kirumi’s room, and so did her closet and parts of her bathroom. Hell, Kirumi was constantly finding long blue hairs everywhere (which made her eye twitch, just a bit, because for the love of god she had JUST cleaned that) , little hints of the cosplayer everywhere.
And yet, Kirumi still insisted that it was nothing more than an act. Nothing more than a lie, nothing more than just the actions needed to protect her own identity from the public eye. Their touches meant nothing, and neither did their nights spent together. Their conversations were born out of a need to shield themselves from the rest of the world, and the kisses they shared– the confessions– the dreams, the fears, the harsh realities of their situation–
It was all an act.
Kirumi told herself that every night as she drifted to sleep, every morning when she woke up to tangled blue hair, and every time she would glance over to see Tsumugi’s tongue poking out of her mouth and her brows furrowed as she practically glared into a book, glasses crooked and slipping down her nose. She told herself that whenever she would gently poke the girl’s nose, or plant a quick kiss on her cheek before anyone could catch them, and whenever she’d successfully make the girl blush and feel an overwhelming rush of pride within her chest as she watched the cosplayer squeak.
She repeated those five words like a mantra, even now.
“Honey, just put your sweet lips on my lips,” Tsumugi crooned, smiling a lovesick smile as the two swayed to the music playing in Kirumi’s room. Kirumi smiled back, softly finishing the line.
“We should just kiss like real people do.” Tsumugi giggled, leaning forwards to capture her lips in just that. Kirumi reciprocated wholeheartedly, thoughts being drowned out for just a second.
...Why can’t we love like real people do?