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“...”
Juna Crawford rested her head on her palm as she sat on the dining table on the side, her eyes fell silent at a certain direction.
They stayed still.
“...”
Five minutes of bobbing her head left and right as she hummed a random SPiKA music that she could remember from the top of her head, Juna finally stopped doing so as her eyes fell upon the same direction as earlier.
They still hadn’t moved an inch.
“...”
Another ten minutes passed as Juna browsed the collection of the books on the shelves on the far side of the room before she returned to her previous seat, her eyes once again fell upon their direction.
Again, they gave zero reaction.
“...”
Yet another ten minutes of… Doing whatever random activities that she could find in this small house of Machias’, Juna finally had enough. SHE WAS NOT MADE FOR THIS! As she groaned in frustration, the now twenty one years old Thors (Branch) graduate stormed to the kitchen where Emma was washing her household’s flatwares that they had used for breakfast this morning, before the aforementioned pink haired girl tackled her senior’s back, almost improperly so.
“Emma!”
“Eep-!” the previously-Millstein-gonna-be-Regnitz-soon female yelped as she frantically moved her shaky legs around to regain her balance. After a moment of desperately juggling the glass that hooped around between her arms, she finally managed to grab it before it crashed against the counter. Letting a deep huff of relief, Emma finally turned her head around to put her attention towards the cause of her short panic, the one and only Juna. “Please don’t scare me like that, Juna…”
Juna didn’t say anything. She merely pouted and scowled back right at Emma’s face.
“Um… Excuse me?” Emma tilted her head in confusion at the younger girl’s expression. “Is there something going on?”
“On the contrary-!” Juna immediately retorted back, stomping the floor of the kitchen incessantly. “There’s nothing going on. At all!!”
…O…kay? That didn’t help Emma at all as she only quivered her eyebrow hard at Juna, emphasizing on how disconcerted she was right now.
As Juna crossed her arms together and grumbled, she merely pulled the long-braided woman’s sleeve as she led her to the pathway of the living room and pointed at the chess table on the corner of the said room.
“They haven’t budged an inch. At all. For more than twenty seven minutes! I am going nuts just by watching them!!”
Even though Juna’s voice was unsurprisingly loud for her standard (and that said something), the two men that she indicated seemingly did not register her voice at all. The said two men, Machias Regnitz and Kurt Vander, were sitting on the respective chairs that sandwiched the small chess table, both of their attentions undivided towards the board game in front of them.
Just like Juna had complained, for the past twenty minutes or so, they had made very minimal movement. Sure, either of them had raised their shoulders, or just bent their spines forward to get better looks at the pieces on the chess board, but there basically hadn’t say a word, at least not anything that Juna’s ears were capable to hear. Their silent treatments toward the said girl were still ongoing. Right now, their focuses were so unearthly it was not even funny. Even Emma, who had spent the past one and a half year as Machias’ girlfriend, noticed how intense Machias’ stare towards the board was.
“Well, this is curious…” she commented as she watched the rare expression of her lover - the stare so sharp that it could cut diamonds had it been a pointy end. It was quite charming on its own right though, Emma had to admit. Not that she’d mention that out loud while her juniors were around. “It has been some time since I’ve seen Machias so focused in his game…”
“Took the words right outta my mouth,” Juna gnarled from her side, crossing her arms as her own stare befell upon the figure of her occupied boyfriend. “Kurt didn’t even budge an inch even though I have been walking around his back earlier. He never did that before!”
Honestly, if she had known that things would end up like this, she would have not asked him to go along with this. Sure, it would be very rude for her to not to ask him to greet Machias and Emma, who had finally decided to upgrade their relationship and purchased a small house here in Armorica village to spend the remaining of their lives together just one week ago, but Juna still felt that she got robbed of her quality time with her boyfriend. After all, Kurt was now a teacher for his family’s swordsmanship school, while Juna herself was an active officer in the S.S.S. and they could barely meet every other week!
It was petty, indeed, but she would stand her ground for this one. Nobody was going to take her long-awaited, at most biweekly, date with Kurt if she could help it.
As her glassed eyes studied further and further, Emma finally arrived at the conclusion. Nothing would interrupt the two’s shared holy ground of mental combat anytime soon. They were too off in their world to budge even at her request. A sincere chuckle escaped her lips. “There’s no interrupting him if he’s like that,” Emma spoke as she adjusted her glasses. “Come to think of it, Juna, you haven’t tried the new honey apple candy that they sold just next to the inn, right? Want to give it a try?”
Juna blinked at Emma, her eyes now filled with some newfound interests reflected by them. She then directed her face towards the still-unmoving Kurt and Machias before she let out an irked murmur. “Well… I guess it’s better than just watching them acting like a pair of mimes like that…”
Emma clapped her hands together a bit joyfully.
“That’s perfect. Shall we, then?”
“Mmm..!”
As they stepped away and made the beeline towards the main door, Emma stopped around the doorway just in case. “Honey, I am going out for a bit. I’ll be back soon.”
…Unsurprisingly, no response came. Not even any sort of gesture.
Juna just made a face back at them while Emma had already predicted the zero response and laughed a bit as the two women stepped out and closed the door behind them.
“Wow… This is pretty delicious…!”
Juna’s gleeful feedback erupted as she took a bite of the apple candy that they had bought just now. As she savor every single bite inside of her mouth, she couldn’t help but grin ear-to-ear due to how sweet the candy tasted. “They don’t sell something like this in the city!”
Beside her, Emma was smiling back at Juna as she took a bite on her own apple candy. “See what I told you?”
“Mmm~” Juna answered, still in bliss from the heavenly taste of the desserts. “You can totally still taste the fresh honey glazing around it~ This taste is absu~rd~ I should get some for Ken, Nana, and my parents later!”
There was a soft sound of crunch emitted as Emma’s teeth bit into her own share. “It’s but one of the many reason that I really enjoy living here, I have to admit.”
…Well… Now that Emma brought it up…
“Oh yeah, Emma… Can I ask you something?”
“Hmm? Sure? What is it?”
“Why did you choose to get a house in Armorica instead of, you know, the main city of Crossbell? Wouldn’t it make it easier for Machias to go to work everyday?”
Emma just stared at Juna back, blinking her eyes in what could only be called as a great mixture of curiosity and epiphany.
Er… There was no kind of animosity or anything from the way Emma was staring back at her, but Juna still felt like she had kinda stepped on a landmine.
“Um? S-sorry, did I just get too personal over there? In that case, p-please-”
“Oh no, no, no! It’s not like that at all!” Before Juna could even finish her stuttering, Emma crashed in with a soft giggle. “It’s just that… Well, there’s some sort of romantic narrative behind that. Want to listen to it while we’re waiting for them to finish their little game?”
In Juna’s defense, while she was not as big of saps for fairy-tale stories like, per say, Musse or Alfin, Juna had her own girly streak burning inside her. The girl tilted her head to the side a bit, her face lit up slightly. “Oh, do tell me please!”
At first, Emma had considered the option that included bringing Juna to the inn or somewhere else where they could have some story time, but she ultimately decided to not to and to just do it while they could walk around the village. It was not like she was going to read a story book or such, after all.
“To be frank, I said the exact same thing to Machias when we were discussing about our new living arrangement. Exactly the same like what you just said, word per word.”
“Oooh…”
“Much to my surprise though… Machias easily rejected my offer. Straight on my face,” Emma stopped her stride momentarily, crossing her arms together in front of her chest and raised her shoulders as well as deepening her tone of speaking. “’No, Emma. That will not do at all!’”
That easily prompted Juna to stop her pace as well and furrowed her eyebrows at Emma’s direction before she finally realized what she was trying to imply and went into a laughing fit almost immediately. Okay, that was not really the best Machias’ impersonation that Juna had ever seen, but woe be her if she would say that she couldn’t imagine Machias pulling such a pose.
Emma herself seemed to be having a little fun reenacting her fiancee’s antics as she pushed her glasses up to the bridge of her nose intensely. Well, intense in overly-dramatized Machias’ way, at least. “As an inspector who’s assigned in Crossbell, yes, it would do me very good to opt to stay in Crossbell city. But before I am an inspector, I am a man. YOUR man. ”
It was at that moment that Juna started to get fully enthralled in Emma’s story as the said girl continued on with her farce.
“I-I was thinking… Don’t you think Armorica resembles Elin village a lot?” the witch of the Hexen clan stuttered. Or so Juna had thought originally, because after she studied Emma’s expression for a bit, she could tell that Emma was still trying roleplay as Machias, down to his stuttering. “I-I mean-! Ahem-! By that I mean- I, uh, kinda half-guessing about it because I never stayed in your birthplace long enough, so I wanted your input too-! I want to stay in a place where I could spend the rest of my life with you by my side instead of where I need to be.”
Oh…
…Wow…
Juna didn’t even realize that she was furiously blushing just from listening to Emma’s story. She had never been that close with Machias so she’d never guessed that he was such a-
“Yeah, um… Machias is… surprisingly romantic, isn’t he?"
“He has always been one,” finally dropping her Machias’ impersonation mode, Emma laughed gently. Or dreamily, actually. “He’s just bad at expressing himself but one of those times, he will really man it up.”
For some short while, Juna could just blankly stare back at Emma, cheeks already too red from the woman’s word. This was a little bit too much for someone like her who… was surprisingly passive at moving her relationship up with her own boyfriend because she was… uh, Juna. Welp. The pink haired girl felt the tension inside of her getting faster as her heart raced in full curiosity. She gulped the nervous lump in her throat before she finally could voice her curiosity out.
“A-and then…? What did you say back at him, Emma?”
This time, Emma’s cheeks went a little pink from the image of what had actually happened. There were a series of nervous, barely audible chuckle coming from Emma’s lips before she replied. “I said nothing, I hugged him instead,” Emma continued. “It was pretty embarrassing now that I am reminded of it again. All of that took place in the middle of the road in Crossbell city. I embraced him in broad daylight with a lot passerby watching us.”
…
…Alright, that was it. That was officially too much for Juna’s maiden heart. Spunky maiden heart, but it was still one regardless. Even someone like her needed to put both her hands over her lips so that she wouldn’t let out those giddy, uncharacteristically erratic squeals that were trying to slip out.
Emma, of course had noticed the drastic expression on her junior. Well, she was blushing deeper than she had before herself. “I remember being so touched at that moment that I didn’t really pay any attention to other things. Needless to say, Machias was as red as we are right now. He did return the hug first before he frantically whispered that we weren’t in private.”
Juna didn’t respond immediately, though it was more of a case of where she couldn’t rather than didn’t because if she were to open her mouth, the giddiness that she was trying to hold would come out instead.
It took her some moment before she could finally drop her palms from her face to her side. Her smile still intact, howbeit. There was a hint of sadness concealed just behind the big smile, shockingly.
“That makes me jealous a little bit, jeez…” the ponytailed girl said again, forcing herself to keep the smile plastered. “I wish Kurt would be more assertive to me like that.”
“Oh?” it was Emma’s turn to voice her desire to know the other girl’s relationship with her man. “He has never done such thing to you?”
“Ah…haha…” Juna replied with a nervous laugh. “I think… he sometimes doesn’t consider me feminine enough for him to be like that…”
Well, yeah… Even Emma could see that from Juna even though they were never that close. She reeked of plucky aura too much that her other sides were mitigated by it.
“Then,” nevertheless, Emma’s smile was still standing strong on her face. “you need to be assertive to make him assertive, Juna.”
Juna blinked back. Once. Twice. Before she made a confused frown back again at Emma’s face.
“I mean it,” Emma continued almost immediately, seemingly ignoring Juna’s scowl at her. “Ask him to be more militant at you.”
Even though it was definitely a good advice, Juna couldn’t help but get flustered a bit at that.
“T-that would be weird, wouldn’t it? Not to mention, it’d probably make him uncomfortable.”
“Exactly,” Emma interjected, again, almost immediately. “Consider this in mind. Is there any possibility that he has been thinking the same thing all along?”
…Ah.
Juna tried to open her mouth to say an objection to Emma’s words, but as her mouth was wide open, every single sentence that she had in mind somehow got stuck inside of her throat and in the end, Juna was silenced as she nervously look to the side. Emma got her good.
“Juna, do you love Kurt?”
“...Huh…?”
That took her again. Juna looked in surprise at Emma, who was smiling wide at her. Honestly, if Juna hadn’t known Emma any better, she would consider that smile as some sort of a shit-eating grin. But no, Emma’s smile was radiating absurd amount of honesty just from it.
“W-Wha-!? That was so-”
“Do you love Kurt?”
Emma was unfazed while Juna, was once again, going through the same issue with having words stuck by her throat. Although this time, they were accompanied by the beet red shades all over her face.
“I-I do…”
“I can’t hear you.”
Okay, was Emma just toying with her now? Juna scowled for a moment but she ultimately caved in to Emma's hypnotizing smile.
“I DO!! ...There! Are you happy now, Emma!?”
Thankfully, Armorica wasn’t exactly the most populated village and right now, there were nobody else in radius that could hear that outburst of hers safe for Emma, who proceeded to make a small laugh.
“There we go,” despite it though, Emma’s tone was filled with motherly atmosphere rather than with that of a teasing one. “It wasn’t so hard, was it? Communication is a two-way street, Juna. Speaks your mind to Kurt and he’ll listen. I assure you that.”
There was a single unsatisfactory groan coming from Juna’s end, though it faded out quickly. She was still blushing madly from randomly bursting her love towards her boyfriend earlier, still. “Will he…? How can you be so sure that he won’t be-”
“Oh, he will. I am sure of it,” Emma interjected to reassure the younger girl even before she could finish voicing her doubt. “It was the same with me. I asked him to be more of himself rather than holding back when on our first date. He was a bit uncomfortable with that at first, but he gradually opened up more and here we are. Living together here.”
Juna was about to say something to that, but a soft pat on top of her pink hair stopped her from doing so. Emma’s hand, which was unsurprisingly soft and gentle, was tenderly rubbing her head.
“Juna, boys are more prideful than they let on,” Emma delicately advised. “They would try their best to not to show their weak side to their partner unless we asked them to do so. Sometimes, it’s our job to take the first step instead.”
As Emma gradually pulled her hand back from her head, Juna could only stare at her in a weird mixture of uneasiness and happiness. It took moving her own hand towards her head to finally return from her mixed trance, smiling back at the older girl.
“...Thank you, Emma, I am glad I asked that now.”
“Anytime, dear.”
The two young women traded smiles back before Emma finally broke them out of it.
“Well, I guess we should get back now?” Oh wait- “Oh, I should probably get some apple candies for him too. Wait here, Juna.”
Him? Oh-!
Juna glanced at Emma’s walking figure before she herself decided to follow her senior’s footstep back to the stall. She probably should get one for Kurt herself, and perhaps stock some for Ken, Nana, and her parents back in the city.
“WHAT THE HELL-!? YOU STILL HAVEN’T MOVED A SINGLE FREAKING PIECE-!? That’s it! Kurt, you’re coming with me to Mishelam right now!!”
“W-wait, Juna! I could’ve put a checkmate if I moved my knight to- WHOA-!”
“Later, Emma! Later, Machias! Congratulations on the engagement! We’ll send you something later-!”
Emma could only watch in amazement as the younger couple made their way out, slamming the door of her house open. Well, it was more of Juna dragging Kurt by the back of his collar outside forcefully like they were coming out straight out of a gag manga - funny yet heartwarming at the same time. She just hoped that Juna would finally decided to speak up about what she had advised her to do back there.
Speaking of which though… Even though his opponent had already forfeited the match (courtesy of his girlfriend), Machias was still putting some sort of serious aura as his eyes still fixated themselves on the already-messy chess board.
“Moving his knight… I see, he could do that… If he put the knight to E2 and then the bishop right here, I would have to change my pattern and-”
Emma couldn’t hold her chuckle, witnessing how serious Machias still was. She put the plastic bag full of the apple candy as she scooted closer to Machias’ back and circled her arms around his neck, passionately embracing him from behind.
“Come on, Machias,” she merrily whispered just next to his ear. “You interrupted their quality time together.”
Finally out of his train of chess thought, Machias looked back over his shoulder. “Did I?”
“Ours too, actually,” Emma answered. “It’s weekend and you spent the whole morning just sitting and playing chess.”
Machias looked at Emma tenderly for a while before he finally let out a sigh of defeat, raising an eyebrow back at his fiancee. “I guess you’re right… We should get out too, shouldn’t we? Want to go on a date to Mishelam ourselves?”
Emma once again gave a smile back at Machias.
“As long as you won’t bring your chess board with you.”