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"Hey, tell me a secret."
In the middle of braiding her long hair as was her usual routine before going to bed, Rei paused in the middle of a plait and glanced up, arching an eyebrow at Minako, who was spending the night at the shrine after yet another stupid fight with her mother. "Excuse me?"
"Tell me a secret," she repeated. Minako dipped a wand into the bottle of nail polish she was using to give herself a manicure and swiped the hot pink color over her left thumb. "You must have at least one or two…"
"Even if I did, why should I tell you?"
"Come on, I'm your best friend!"
"Not a good enough reason," Rei said, resuming her braiding. "Besides, why are you even asking all of the sudden?"
Minako shrugged. "I just read the first volume of this new manga series everyone has been raving about lately," she said, painting another nail. "It's about this class of close-knit middle school students. Everyone gets along great until this mysterious transfer student appears. He...she...it?" She frowned, cocking her head to the side. "You know, I'm not really sure what gender to refer to them as, to be honest. I'm pretty sure they're an alien, so maybe they don't have one?" She shook her head. "Well, anyway, whoever they are, they have the ability to change their appearance to impersonate anyone they meet, which they use to start sowing discord in the classroom by starting these awful rumors. When the main character finds out their secret, the class decides to get together and reveal stuff they've never told anyone else in order to outsmart the alien and protect their identities."
"So I should tell you one of my secrets because...of a manga?"
"Hey, something similar could happen to us!" Minako insisted. "You never know. It's not like we haven't fought alien beings before."
Rei rolled her eyes. She was used to Minako coming up with some strange ideas, but even for her, the explanation was a stretch.
"Okay, how about I tell you one of my secrets first?" Minako offered. She had finished with her manicure, twisting the wand back inside the bottle and setting it on the tatami mat beside her futon. "Even trade."
"I already know all your secrets."
"I wouldn't be so sure about that…"
Finishing off her braid, Rei secured the end with an elastic band. "Oh?" she said, curious despite herself.
Minako grinned. "You want to know now, don't you?"
"No! Absolutely not."
The heat she felt rushing to her face betrayed her.
"Liar!" Minako said, laughing.
Rei sighed, flipping her braid back over her shoulder so that it fell down her back. "Fine, what's the big secret, since you're apparently dying to tell me?"
Careful not to ruin her still-wet nails, Minako lay down on her futon and stared up at the ceiling. She inhaled a deep breath before admitting, "I… I'm no longer a virgin."
"W-What?"
"I did the do. Got lucky. Made the beast with four backs. Hit a run home. Knocked shoes. Got jiggy with it."
"Got jiggy with it?" Rei rubbed at her forehead. Where on Earth had Minako even picked up that ridiculous phrase? "Okay, okay, I get the picture...although I'm fairly certain some of those idioms are wrong."
"Yeah, they seemed kinda off to me, too..." Minako said with a cute crinkle of her nose. "Well, whatever. I had sex."
"With Sato-san?" Masao Sato was Minako's most current ex-boyfriend, who had dumped her only a couple of weeks ago.
"Yeah." She let out a sigh. "Probably shouldn't have done it, in hindsight. I knew he was losing interest, but I just liked him so much… I thought if we started having sex, he'd want to stick around." Swiping a hand over her cheek, Minako turned her face away from Rei. "God, I was such an idiot."
"Oh, Minako…"
Without thought, Rei found herself crawling down from her bed to join Minako in her futon on the floor. Minako fully rolled over on her side, allowing Rei to spoon against her back as sobs began shaking through her body.
Rei never considered herself a person good at consoling others. That was more Usagi's department. She tried to think about what Usagi might say if she had been there, but everything that came to mind seemed so insincere when she imagined the same words coming out of her mouth, especially considering that she had been far from Masao's number one fan. Selfishly, she had counted the days until Minako came to her senses and finally dumped the guy, only for Masao to dump her instead, breaking Minako's heart.
She had wanted them to break up, but not like this...
"If anybody is the idiot, it's him," Rei finally said as Minako's cries softened.
Minako sniffled, turning back around. "Yeah?"
"Yeah." Rei used her thumb to wipe away a wayward tear running down Minako's cheek. Masao was lucky that she wasn't one to abuse her powers as a Shinto miko or as a Sailor Guardian. If not for her pesky morals, she'd "Fire Soul" his sorry butt for breaking Minako's heart. "Anyway, you deserve better than that jerk," Rei said. "I told you from the start he wasn't good enough for you." Granted, she may have had ulterior motives for doing so, but the point still stood. She hadn't liked Masao from the moment Minako introduced them, sensing a bad aura surrounding him that went beyond her general distrust of most men.
"You did, didn't you? Maybe I should have listened to you…"
"That's right. You should always listen to me," Rei said haughtily, provoking a small smile from Minako.
"Rei always knows best."
"Well, perhaps not always..."
"You were right about Masao, and you're right about most guys. Like, I know that not all men are scum – just look at Mamoru! – but I always seem to attract the worse of the worst for some reason," Minako said, propping herself up on her elbow. "You know, maybe I'll try going out with a girl next time, for a change."
Rei's heart leapt in her chest. "Wait, do you like – I mean, are you even attracted to women?" she asked, sitting back up.
"Yeah. I came to the realization I'm bi a few months ago," Minako said casually, as if she was merely talking about the weather instead of dropping an even bigger bombshell than losing her virginity.
"You're certainly full of secrets today…" To say the least.
"I wasn't really trying to hide it...or maybe I was? I don't know." Minako shrugged, one of the thin spaghetti straps of her tank top falling down her shoulder. "It just seemed so obvious to me that I felt like everyone else must have already known, too," she continued. "I mean, when I told Artemis, he wasn't surprised at all. He said I was the same in the past, that Princess Venus had both men and women as lovers. It makes sense when you think about it, right? I'm the guardian of love, so why should it matter if I fall in love with a boy or a girl? Love is love, and that's all that matters."
"Well, I didn't know," Rei said softly, averting her eyes. If she had...
Minako reached over and patted Rei's knee. "Hey, you're not mad at me for not telling you, are you?"
"No, of course not. It should be a person's own decision when and how they choose to come out, or if they even want to at all. I'm just...surprised, that's all."
"Oh, okay. Good." She sighed in visible relief. "So...now it's your turn. What's your big secret?"
"I don't remember ever agreeing to tell you."
"Oh, yes, you did! Don't try to weasel your way out of this, Rei Hino," Minako said with a wag of her finger. "You wanted to know my secret, so now you have to tell me yours."
"Fine…" Rei sighed. She supposed her agreement to the exchange had been implicit when she asked Minako to spill the beans about her own secret, as much as she hated to admit it. "You really want to know?"
"Yes, I really do, and it better be a good one – not something silly or stupid that you don't even care about. I told you two very personal things, so it has to be at least on the same level of those."
"Okay, okay… Let me think."
The only problem was, Rei didn't have any big, humongous secrets, other than the one she had promised herself she would take to her grave. After all, she had already devoted herself – mind, body, and soul –to Usagi, their beloved princess. Rei had never considered it much of a sacrifice, never having been all that interested in sex and romance in the first place until Minako started dating that stupid jerk and she realized the jealousy she felt was more than simply a friend feeling cast aside and ignored in favor of a shiny new romance. She had taken solace in the fact that Minako was seemingly straight, that she would never return her feelings anyway, but now that she knew that Minako was open to a romantic relationship with another woman…
"Rei?"
Was it okay to take back her vow of chastity? If she asked Usagi, Rei knew she would tell her it was fine without a second thought. Usagi had never asked her to make such an oath in the first place, and if she knew it was causing Rei such unhappiness, she would be the first to tell her to forget about it, to pursue her own love instead. That was just the kind of person she was.
But Rei considered herself a person of honor, someone who always kept her promises and stayed true to her beliefs. What would it say about her, if she threw that all away and chased after her most forbidden desire? Even if she did confess her feelings, that was no guarantee that Minako would return them. More than anything, Rei didn't want to lose Minako as her best friend, her true comrade in life and in arms.
Yet, could she possibly keep such a huge secret from Minako for the rest of their expanded lifetimes?
"Rei, if you don't have any deep, dark secrets, it's fine," Minako said with a laugh, rolling her eyes. "You really don't have to repay me. I've been wanting to tell you about what happened with Masao for a while, anyway."
"No, a deal is a deal," Rei insisted, straightening her posture. "And there's something I've been wanting to tell you, too. For a long time, really. It's just…" She closed her eyes, inhaling deeply through her nose to calm her racing heartbeat. Why was she so nervous? She could do this. In comparison to the battles she had fought as Sailor Mars, giving someone a love confession ought to be mere child's play. "The thing is," she began again, "I think I might be into women, too?"
"What?" Minako's baby blue eyes widened as she sat up as well, sitting up on her knees. "No way, I totally thought you were ace!"
"I still am...mostly. It's more like I'm into one woman in particular?" Rei again averted her eyes, staring down at her clenched fists sitting in her lap. Minako had yet to pull up her strap, the neckline of her tank top slipping even further downward now that she was sitting upright. "She's the only person I've really felt that way about."
"Well, who is this mystery girl, if you don't mind me asking? She must be pretty amazing, if she lives up to your high standards."
"She is. She's kind and brave and one of the funniest people I've ever met. No matter what kind of mood I'm in, I can always count on her to make me laugh," Rei said, her courage growing. She lifted up her chin, staring straight into Minako's eyes. "And, yes, she's beautiful, both inside and out, but she's so much more than that. She's my best friend, my comrade-in-arms and in life, and she's, well… Damn it, she's you."
For a long moment, Minako didn't say anything. Her only visible reaction to Rei's confession was to blink her eyes a couple of times, the rest of her body frozen in shock. Rei's heart sunk to her stomach, wishing she had never said anything. She should have known it would be a mistake to confess her feelings...
"You...like me?" Minako asked. Her voice was soft, barely louder than a whisper. "You really like me? Like...romantically?"
It was a chance for Rei to take it all back, to pass it off as nothing more than a poorly timed joke, yet… "Yes, I do," she said. "But it's okay if you don't feel the same way about me." She waved her hands in front of her chest. "Nothing has to change. If you want, we can pretend I never said anything and –"
"Rei?"
During her rambling, Minako had scooted closer toward Rei, placing her hands on Rei's upper arms. Rei sucked in a soft breath as Minako leaned forward, her eyes widening in shock when Minako's soft lips brushed against hers in a sweet and gentle kiss.
"Want to know another secret?" Minako asked, smiling. "I like you, too."