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A rooftop is awash with the embers of the setting sun. In this momentary blaze of passion, a girl whose eyes are alight with determination declares these lasting words to her friend:
“You don’t have to say a word to me right now— I’ll wait forever if I have to.”
The sun sinks in the distance, its warm reds and oranges giving way to the cooler shades of the night sky. The bell rings and the girl hurriedly rushes to her class. A hidden bitter smile graces the other teen’s face as they laugh hollowly at their unsaid response.
-
Ever since that confrontation with Mizuki at the rooftop, Ena’s been making good on her promise. She stays by their side and keeps her mouth shut about her worries. While slightly less intense this time, Ena still watches over her friend, taking Meiko’s advice to heart. It’s a little hard not to, with the way their presence fill certain spaces in her everyday life.
As the days go by, she pays attention. She notices a couple of things.
Mizuki can go on and on about whatever amuses them at the moment- anime, fashion, dumb anecdotes, anything really. Out of the four of them, Mizuki’s way of speaking is the most animated, in a way that you can almost visualize what sort of expression is on their face, even through Nightcord’s voice chat. Their voice is bright and earnest- fitting for Niigo’s youngest member. Powerful in singing, easygoing in conversation and, as Ena recently found out, fragile in wavering vulnerability.
They can inflect their voice whichever way they want, but Ena finds that she likes it best when they truly sound happy. Despite her irritation, she can’t deny the ease she feels when she hears “Enanan~” in Mizuki’s teasing tone as they laugh carelessly, not when that simple joy drags them away from the problems locked up and hidden in their heart for just a moment.
It’s a sound that brings a warm feeling of something curl up in her chest. Mizuki has a cute laugh after all.
And whenever they meet in person, she’s subjected to seeing how Mizuki’s eyes glitter when they laugh. She’s seen them smile, eyes crinkling at the edges in the softness of their joy, seen it dim in worry and pain during tough times. Their pink eyes are one of their most striking features, Ena thinks, recalling that one time where she stared at them for too long, lost in thought, Mizuki calling her out on it as they alter her clothes. Eyes are said to be the windows to the soul, but Mizuki’s seem to have several veils obscuring them. Ena is determined to uncover them all, one veil at a time.
Ena learns to tear her gaze away from pretty pink eyes and lashes, landing on their hair instead. She often lingers on the motions of Mizuki tucking in a strand of pink hair behind their ear, on the sway of their ponytail or the way their bangs delicately frame their face. Sometimes the desire to see those cotton candy tresses fall freely in waves down their back and to comb her fingers gently through it swells up within her during those moments.
She’s not stupid, she knows what it means, its exactly why she pushes these thoughts and her pesky feelings down, deep down, until she can easily pretend it doesn’t exist like a fool. Whenever something slips out of her mouth she twists it to a form she’s more comfortable with: occasional offhand compliments about their haircare. Reaching out to touch Mizuki’s hair with an aimless tenderness instead of purposeful styling… it’s a tad too intimate for her to handle.
Their newly strengthened friendship is still too fresh for that. Ena only has a couple of people she could call friends and she does not want to fuck up one of her most treasured bonds.
And so she falls in step into their mellowing push-and-pull dynamic, their verbal spats still the same as ever, with a bit of unbidden fondness on Ena’s side. Playful banter aside, Mizuki is very partial to physical contact. She’s been dragged by the wrist constantly from store to store, silently wondering what it would feel if their hands were intertwined instead. But this kind of affection, an arm casually slung around her shoulders and soft hands a little larger than hers ruffling her hair in jest, Ena is perfectly happy with this.
It isn’t as painful or stifling as the stories say, when the person you’re a little too fond of happens to be one of your friends, blissfully unaware of your affections. Mizuki is her friend first and foremost. She’s content with that because she yearns for a happiness so different that it scares her, but she still longs for them, her friend who is distant and out of reach sometimes. Ena wonders, distantly, if Mizuki feels the same way.
(She’s not sure which feelings she’s referring to.)
Ever since that day on the rooftop, Ena worries and watches over Mizuki as quietly as she can, much like Meiko does. She pays attention and slowly pieces together little details she’s noticed.
Ena doesn’t see them as perfect, they’re far from it, like her, Kanade and Mafuyu. The world isn’t as kind to their little group as it is to most people, creating unseen cracks in their hearts in the process. And Mizuki fixes the cracks in them with gold, the ones that they could manage right now at least, and they’re so— so vibrant and beautiful in a way that’s so unapologetically Mizuki . She’s sure that the cracked sides she hasn’t seen yet are as beautiful as the ones they proudly display.
Bit by bit, she’s also accepted something she’s been trying to ignore for a long time: that Shinonome Ena is maybe, just maybe, a little smitten with her friend. She may have went through the entire process kicking and screaming in denial at first ( internally , God forbid she actually scream her head off every moment she thinks about it) but she’s strangely calm in the aftermath.
Her feelings for Mizuki didn’t come out of the left field after all. She now grudgingly sees past moments where she feels a little more fond of them than before, following those memories like tiny bread crumbs leading to the current Ena, cheeks often dusted with red and butterflies causing a ruckus in her stomach.
With the little pieces that she’s gathered so far, Ena finally realizes one evening, that falling in love with Akiyama Mizuki was inevitable. The way they wormed into her heart felt natural as the changing of hues in the sky. Not being by their side, even as a friend in the near future is a thought too painful for her.
Ena stares down at the doodles of pink hair and cat-like smiles in the spaces of her half-assed math notes. The sight of Mizuki’s form in her charcoal strokes makes the butterflies in her stomach to be rowdier than usual, her blush spreading to her ears. Damn these late night emotional epiphanies. For now, there is only one thing she could possibly do.
She closes her notebook with a slam and rests her head on the table, hands tangling in the back of her short hair and curses Mizuki for being so pretty.