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“You’re up late.”
Maki turns but she knows who this voice belongs to—there’s only one person in the Zenin compound who would call out to her anyway. Sure enough, Mai sits down next to her on the veranda. She doesn’t stretch her legs out like Maki does but tucks her knees to her chest and Maki gets a glimpse of gangly limbs and sharp elbows.
“Ah,” says Maki.
Mai’s eyes flick over to her then back out to the large tree in the courtyard. Maki follows her gaze like she used to, back before she had these glasses, back when Mai’s gaze meant simpler, simpler things.
There is nothing there but the bare branches of a tree ready for winter and the gentle tickle of a late fall breeze.
They haven’t had a moment like this in a while and Maki knows why that is.
She’s been busy with the Kukuru squad, busy training with whatever hand-me-down weapons they’ll let her handle, busy rubbing salves into bruises and winding bandages around cuts. She doesn’t know what Mai has been doing but she hasn’t had the time to ask. Part of her knows she should ask, but she takes in the way Mai’s hair curls around her ear, the way her hands tuck themselves into the folds of her clothing, the way Mai manages to look smaller even if they are the same height, and Maki’s heart fills with the fire of determination, fills too full and she doesn’t have the space left in her to ask.
Maki takes a deep breath instead, letting the early chill tickle cold in the depths of her lungs. Mai looks at her again and in the moonlight there isn’t an edge to that gaze but a softness that crinkles her brow and it takes Maki a while to realize that she has missed this. This easy silence. This moment where she doesn’t have to be Maki the strongest or Maki the fastest or Maki the one who keeps getting to her feet. Where she can just sit on the wooden floor, stretched out in the cool fall air under the careful watch of the full moon and she doesn’t have to do anything but breathe.
It is easy, perhaps a little too easy to pack her days full of steps that will take her closer to her goals, to keep her eyes firmly on the prize, to take those first scrambling stumbling steps forward, to fall into a jog and know that she can and she will and she shall. But it is easy too to forget why she started in the first place and as they sit there, a small distance between them, Maki feels the edges of her heart starting to grow warm.
Mai sneezes.
It shakes her, her head buries itself further into her knees and for a moment her face disappears from Maki’s view. A soft sniffle and Maki’s heart melts like it always has and it always will.
She sits up and reaches over.
Mai flinches when Maki’s hand touches her shoulder but it is so fleeting Maki almost misses it. Mai’s shoulder gradually relaxes under her fingers.
“You’re cold,” says Maki.
Mai’s turns immediately to her, a retort on her tongue, her eyes flashing. But she seems to see something or find something and whatever that was and whatever those words were, they die on her lips. Instead her shoulders hunch up and it almost seems like she tries to wrap herself in her own arms.
Maki, of course, thinks this is entirely ridiculous.
“You should go inside.”
That Mai shakes her head, stubborn as always, does not surprise Maki in the least.
“Wouldn’t want you catching a cold.”
Mai’s jaw simply tightens. There is no retort, no ‘wouldn’t want you to catch a cold’ because they both know that Maki has never caught a cold in her life. Mai’s the one who falls sick like clockwork at the changing of the seasons, Maki’s the one who’s probably broken every bone you can by falling out of, into, or onto things. That’s just how they work.
“Then keep me warm,” Mai mutters and there is an edge now to the words that cuts and Maki doesn’t know what it is or why it does, but it does. Mai’s eyes rove around her face like she is looking for something but she looks away and breaks their gaze, fingers curling further into the cloth of her hakama pants.
Maki doesn’t know what to say.
Maki doesn’t know if she’s ever known what to say—Mai’s the one who is better at that, the one who wields words like Maki wields weapons and this is her domain.
But Maki isn’t good at giving up. So she doesn’t.
She reaches over and pulls Mai towards her, ignoring the indignant sound of protest that squeaks its way out from Mai’s throat. For all her bark, Mai doesn’t put up much of a struggle, an arm wriggling a little before falling obediently still. Mai’s wrist is warm, Maki notes, but as she gathers Mai in her arms, hands winding down to find Mai’s, she realizes with a lurch of her heart that Mai’s hands are icy cold even if Mai’s back feels scalding hot under her chin, pressed to Maki’s front.
“Don’t say anything,” Mai says even though Maki hasn’t said a thing and this, even this has her heart floating around in her chest, untethered.
Mai’s fingers are cold still when they twine between hers. They tense when Maki presses a kiss to Mai’s cheek, just far enough away from the corner of Mai’s mouth but near enough that Mai’s lips tremble, that the shiver that runs through Mai does not go unnoticed.
They rest cheek to cheek and Maki gets a moment to revel in how soft and warm and small Mai feels. Even as they are the same height, identical twins with near identical eyes, even as Maki is the older by mere minutes, denser in muscle and stature but not taller. Maki feels her heart grow full, her mind grow quiet and even as Mai's hands tense in their grip around hers, Maki's soul floats calm around the only other person in this world who would give her this moment.
Mai holds on and her grip has always been strong, has always been tight but tonight under the moonlight it feels like she might squeeze the life from Maki’s fingers, presses so hard that Maki’s fingertips go cold.
Mai doesn't say anything, strange because she has all the words and isn't afraid to use them, has never been afraid to use them. Maki doesn't know what it means that now Mai won't say anything with her words, will only grip onto her and let that say things she cannot bring herself to give voice to. The tremor that runs through Mai grabs onto Maki's heart and won't let go, bleeds itself through her skin and curls itself up, changes into the kindling for her determination.
Mai’s hands tremble as she holds on to Maki like she used to when they were little and for the last time before she leaves the Zenin clan, for the last time before she leaves Mai behind, Maki lets her.