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A thumb reaches out to rub at her cheek, a firm almost harsh pressure in a swipe. Kasumi’s thoughts jerk back from the birds flying outside. Maybe if she’d been faster today, maybe if—
“Eh?”
She follows the pad of the thumb back up to Mai frowning back at her, eyes narrowed almost disapprovingly. Almost. Kasumi’s known Mai for just long enough now (two months? three?) to know this expression means concern. (Mai doesn’t express much besides annoyance and disdain but Kasumi’s been very quick to notice that it’s never been directed at her.)
“I’m fine!” She nods, lifting both her hands quickly. “See? Nothing wrong at all, just—” Her hand goes to the spot Mai just rubbed at. “Just a little dirt?”
Kasumi smiles, hoping Mai will believe her.
Mai’s eyes soften a little in that way Kasumi has come to associate with her, but not enough this time and Kasumi knows Mai doesn’t believe her. But Mai is Mai and Mai doesn’t ever say what she really wants to say so all Kasumi gets is just a soft, almost inaudible, “I see.”
It’s almost worse than if Mai believed her.
“What’s this?”
It’s three weeks later and Kasumi opens her eyes to a gentle touch on the bandage on her forehead. It’s Mai.
“It’s nothing!” She pats at it with her own hand and it’s only the slightest of dull aches, not the sharp edge of a cut that meets her. “They just said it’d be better to keep the bandage on for a little longer. I’m all good.”
Mai frowns. Mai’s hair, Kasumi notices, is a little straighter than it usually is in the dim late night light of the dorm pantry.
“Did you just get back?”
Mai sits down in lieu of answering. Her hair is a little damp from the shower, Kasumi can now tell, which would explain the difference in texture and there is the faintest whiff of the citrus shampoo that she knows Mai uses.
Again Mai’s fingers trail over the bandage, her eyes flicking from it back to Kasumi’s. The concern is all too clear now and it sits a little uncomfortably in Kasumi’s stomach. She’s not used to it. It’s just… She’s useless Miwa, after all, and she couldn’t save those people the last time. But that was the last time. Today was different and even if she got a little hurt, she completed the mission, didn’t lose any money, and—
There’s a weight to Mai’s gaze now, almost like Mai knows. But she can’t know. Can she? It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t. Kasumi has a goal to work towards and she’s finally taking steps towards it now, finally figuring out what she can do, what she has to do, how far she has to go.
“I’m fine. I promise.” She nods rapidly. “And this time we saved them all before it was too late. Well, I could have done even more if I were stronger, but—”
A hand fists in her collar and before Kasumi knows it there’s a soft pressure on her lips, frisson down the back of her neck, the gentle brush of warm air on her skin.
No, the kiss says. I don’t want you to do that. I don’t want you to get hurt. I—
The kiss is broken before she can even begin to kiss back and there’s the clatter of Mai’s chair. Mai herself is on her feet, backing away like this was a bad idea.
It wasn’t. It isn’t. It is not.
“Mai?”
Mai freezes just as Kasumi’s hand closes over her wrist and Kasumi’s not sure if the rapid beating she feels beneath her fingertips is hers or Mai’s.
“Why did you—”
“Why do you do this? You don’t have to. There are other ways to—” Mai swallows and her voice falls. “Don’t get hurt, Kasumi.”
Kasumi opens her mouth to answer but Mai takes a slow, shaky breath and looks away.
“If you get hurt you won’t be able to keep earning money.” A swallow. “So don’t.”
Then Mai’s hand pulls out of Kasumi’s loosening grasp and Kasumi watches the back of her head disappear down the corridor.
Oh.
“That wasn’t fair,” Kasumi says the next day when she finds Mai alone by the firing range behind the school.
It’s kind of cute, the way Mai almost jumps and then pretends she wasn’t startled in the first place.
“Kasumi,” she says, eyes softening in that way Kasumi’s long since recognized, “you didn’t have to startle me.”
Kasumi smiles and takes a step closer. Mai looks like she wants to take a step back. Kasumi takes another step and now Mai does step away, the sunlight filtering through the leaves of the trees onto her hair.
“It wasn’t really fair.”
Mai swallows.“I’m sorry.”
Kasumi’s head tilts.
“You are? What for?”
A look of confusion in Mai’s eyes. “I—” her tongue darts out and Kasumi can feel Mai’s gaze on her lips “—I shouldn’t have…”
“You shouldn’t have run away afterwards,” says Kasumi with a smile and a nod, all too aware that that’s not what Mai had been about to say.
Mai stares back at her, wide gold eyes clearly caught off-balance, a tinge of red on those cheeks.
It’s cute, Kasumi quickly decides.
“You’re teasing me,” comes the surprised words. “You’re not actually mad that I—” another swallow “—kissed you.”
Now Kasumi can’t help the warming of her own cheeks.
“No,” she says with a firm shake of her head. “I’m not.” She pauses. “Maybe a little mad you didn’t let me kiss you back.”
Kasumi’s now absolutely sure she’s never seen Mai more gobsmacked.
“You—What?”
Kasumi takes full advantage of this and reaches over, grabbing the high collar of Mai’s uniform. There’s the sharp hitch of Mai’s breath, an almost disbelieving look in Mai’s eyes that has Kasumi doubting herself for a moment. No. Now’s not the time for doubt. There’s nothing to doubt. Mai kissed her first, after all.
So Kasumi takes a deep breath and then yanks Mai down to her, muffling the sound of surprise with her lips.
“I don’t like it when you get hurt,” Mai says, thumb drawing light pattens on the back of Kasumi’s hand.
She nods, brushing back with her own fingers. “I know.”
“That was the part where you were supposed to say you won’t.” Mai swipes at her shoulder.
Kasumi smiles. “I won’t.”
“You did that on purpose,” Mai grumbles, cheeks reddening.
Kasumi’s smile widens.
This time too, instead of saying anything, Mai leans over and kisses her.