Chapter Text
Ako runs in front of Lisa and hops over a puddle. She miscalculates, landing at the edge of the pool of water, and her shoes become darker as water seeps into them. Lisa frowns with worry, but the eight year-old just laughs as she jumps in the water, creating small splashes that darken more of the pavement.
Lisa beckons Ako towards her with her hand. “Do you want to talk about your day, Ako-chan? How was Rinko-chan today?”
Ako’s smile widens even further, her eyes shining with excitement at the mention of her best friend. She takes her foster mom’s hand and chatters away.
“Did you know that Rin-rin’s mom is in a band?”
Lisa gives Ako a quick warning to be careful as they descend down the train station’s steps before she answers, “No. What’s her band’s name?”
“Um… I’ll ask her tomorrow! Anyways…”
Without pause, Ako moves on to a convoluted story about what she and Rinko did that day. Lisa listens and interjects with questions and reactions, but her attention is divided.
Even after all of this time, the mention of a band makes her think of Minato Yukina.
It’s a weak connection. Rinko’s mom is likely not even a singer. If Lisa had to guess, Rinko’s mom was probably the keyboardist, and that’s where Rinko's love of piano came from.
However, try as she might, the memory of Yukina haunts Lisa. Her friendship and blinding talent. Then, her disappearance from Lisa’s life, her bedroom window permanently covered by curtains.
Everyday, Rinko gives Ako a hug before she leaves school with Yukina. It warms Yukina’s heart, seeing her daughter be comfortable with someone her age. She can give Ako hugs and look her in the eye and raise her voice if she needs to.
“Bye bye Rin-rin! Bye bye Rin-rin’s mom!” Ako yells out the window as Yukina and Rinko walk down the path towards the gates. She’s the last child left.
“Bye bye Ako.” Rinko and Yukina wave goodbye.
“How was your day?”
Rinko smiles as she lifts up her hand. On her wrist is a woven band of black and white threads with a music note charm attached. “Ako made me a friendship bracelet. Can I make one too?”
Yukina nods. “I’ll order some materials when we get home.”
Their walk to their apartment is quiet, save for Rinko’s humming. Yukina worries about tomorrow, the dress rehearsal for Roselia’s next concert. Their bassist has been distracted lately, coming to rehearsal just seconds before it started and making more and more mistakes.
“Do you have a best friend?” Rinko asks.
“Probably Sayo.” It still surprises Yukina how easy the answer is. Her high school self would have scoffed at the thought of making friends through her band.
“How about when you were a kid?”
Yukina almost says she had no friends. She was asocial and arrogant, not a good combination. However, she did have a best friend. Buried somewhere in her parents’ house is a friendship bracelet made out of purple and silver threads with a cat charm.
“Now we’ll be friends forever,” Imai Lisa had said as she clasped the bracelet around Yukina’s wrist.
The end of forever came sooner than Lisa and Yukina could have ever predicted.
Lisa is smothered in a hug the moment she steps into Ako’s classroom. She picks up the rambunctious child up in one swift motion, spinning her around before placing her down.
“Hello, Imai-san,” a small voice says. Despite never having seen this soft spoken girl, Lisa immediately knows that she is Ako’s best friend, Rinko. She shifts closer to Ako, hiding herself behind the shorter girl.
Lisa is surprised to see her still here. Unfortunately, Lisa works far away, so Ako is usually the last child left.
“Is Rinko’s mother coming soon?” Lisa asks the tired looking teacher.
The teacher pulls her phone out of her purse and sighs. Everything in the classroom has already been tidied and the teacher already has her jacket on, ready to leave. “She hasn’t responded to any of my texts.”
“Mama has a dress rehearsal today,” Rinko mumbles. Her fingers are gripping Ako’s sleeve, like she is holding her favorite stuffed animal.
“Well, do you know your father’s phone number?” the teacher asks.
“I don’t have…” Rinko shakes her head as tears build up in her eyes.
Lisa speaks without thinking, only concerned with Rinko’s building distress. “I can look after Rinko until her mother comes.” She squats so she and Rinko are at the same level. “Your Mama will be here soon, I’m sure of it.”
“And in the meantime we can keep playing,” Ako adds on.
Lisa feels a bit of guilt mixed with her concern for Rinko’s mother when Rinko wipes her tears and nods. If Rinko’s mother doesn’t come, then the hope Lisa has planted in Rinko’s heart will only hurt her.
Ako’s smile has not wavered the entire time, but Lisa knows she is worried too. A parent who never arrived… Lisa knows Ako’s story. Two years ago, she waited by the swings with her sister as the sun setted and never made it home.
The sun isn’t gone yet, Lisa reassures herself as they leave the building.
Lisa sits on the fountain’s edge as Rinko and Ako run around. She tries her best to understand the plot of the story they are acting out, but all she can figure out is that Rinko can shoot fire and Ako is some sort of dark princess. She’ll have to ask Ako about it when they go home.
Half an hour passes. The two children have tired themselves out, choosing to sit in the grass and whisper in each other’s ear. Lisa knows they’re mentioning her by the way their eyes keep flickering over to her. She waves and their gazes quickly avert.
Lisa’s worry is growing into fear. Maybe it would be best to go to a police station now, but if Rinko’s mother is almost here, waiting would be better.
Thankfully, she never has to make the choice.
Lisa sees the exact moment Rinko notices her mother. Her eyes widen, and they immediately fill with tears. Rinko sprints faster than her short legs should allow and runs into her mother’s embrace.
Lisa knows the exact moment she recognizes Yukina. At first, all she could focus on was her relief. When Ako comes to her side, she wraps an arm around her foster daughter, a second reassurance for them both. When she looks back at the reunited mother and daughter, it takes less than a second for Lisa to recognize her.
Yukina does not recognize Lisa until she introduces herself. The last time Yukina saw her former friend, she was dressed in full gyaru fashion, exploding with laughter at a joke Yukina did not overhear. Yukina pushed down the wave of nostalgia, the urge to say hello and goodbye one last time, and forced herself to move through the mall’s crowd.
Yukina does not initially connect the professionally dressed woman to the girl she used to know. Yukina thanks her again for looking after Rinko and waits for Lisa to mention anything about their former relationship.
Lisa doesn’t seem to recognize her.
“Thank you,” Yukina says again, squeezing Rinko’s hand even tighter.
“Mama,” Rinko says, bringing Yukina’s attention back to her daughter. Her daughter’s cheeks are already dry, but Yukina’s tears are not yet spent. Right now, in front of Rinko, she will stay strong, but she knows that later tonight, she’ll cry again as guilt resurfaces.
She pulls her hand out of Yukina’s grasp to go to Ako’s side. Yukina’s hand wants to reach out to Rinko, but it settles on her own skirt, clutching onto it the way Rinko likes to when they walk home.
“Mama. Imai-san. Can… can me and…” Rinko’s voice quickly withers away.
“This weekend, can me and Rin-rin venture out into the dark.. the dark.. um.” Ako looks at Rinko, who smiles before whispering into her ear. “The dark kingdom where adventurers meet their doom!”
“The dark kingdom?” Yukina glances at Rinko and then at Lisa, confused.
Lisa is perplexed for only a moment. “You want to go to the park?”
“Can we please, Lisa-nee?” Ako pleads.
“If that’s okay with you, Minato-san.”
Hearing Lisa address her so formally is off putting, but Yukina swallows down the urge to ask Lisa to call her by her given name. They’re strangers now, not friends. When Yukina closed herself off, when she stopped accepting Lisa’s invites to hang out, when she refused to meet Lisa’s eye as they passed each other in the hall, didn’t she want this?
“I’m free on Sunday.” Yukina knows she’s going to be worn out after Saturday’s concert, but a smile blooms on Rinko’s face and Yukina cannot regret her decision.
Lisa tries to distract herself by focusing on Ako and Rinko running around the playground. She tells herself she’s just being a responsible guardian. She’s making sure that they don’t do anything dangerous. Despite her effort, she still feels Minato Yukina's presence.
They sit on opposite sides of the bench. Yukina is wearing a purple dress and black jacket. Her fashion sense hasn’t changed since high school, but she cuts her hair short now. Seeing her hair short makes Lisa nostalgic, and she wants to comb her fingers through it, like she used to.
Ako jumps down from a ledge, making Lisa wince. Triumphantly, she laughs before encouraging Rinko to leap too. Rinko doesn’t jump and takes the steps instead. Ako still celebrates her descent, punctuating it with images of dark dungeons and heroic adventurers.
“Do you remember?” Lisa wants to ask Yukina. “Do you remember when we were like them?”
She doesn’t ask. It’s been over a decade since they last talked to each other, a quick congratulations at their graduation ceremony. Over a decade for Lisa to smooth the wound that Yukina ripped in her heart. And it has healed.
So why does it sting so much? Why did Lisa’s heart twist when Yukina introduced herself like they were strangers?
“I’m Rinko’s mother, Minato Yukina,” she had said.
Lisa almost said, “I know.” But she bit back her tongue. “I’m Ako’s guardian, Imai Lisa.”
Rinko tugs on Yukina’s skirt as they walk home from Yukina’s parents’ house a few weeks later. Lisa had offered to look after her, but Yukina couldn’t bring herself to accept. Even though she knows Rinko will have more fun with Ako, Yukina feels ashamed every second she spends with Lisa.
“Mama, were you friends with Imai-san when you were a kid?”
Yukina tenses for a second, unprepared for the question. Did her parents have any old pictures stored away? Did they mention a child named Imai Lisa while recalling a story of their daughter’s childhood? Or, did Rinko just notice her mother’s unusual hesitancy around the other woman?
Yukina tells the truth.
“Then why aren’t you friends anymore?”
Yukina takes the hand holding onto her skirt into her own hand. The friendship bracelet Ako made peeks through her Rinko’s sleeve.
“Because I was a bad friend.”
Rinko’s eyes widen with disbelief. She stares at her mother, waiting for another answer but Yukina cannot give her one. She wonders if she should. If she should sugarcoat the story or play her answer off as a cruel joke. Yukina has never believed in sparing people’s feelings, but when her daughter looks down at her shoes instead of meeting her eye, she wants to take it all back.
They walk in silence. Rinko doesn’t even hum. Then, as Yukina unlocks the door to their apartment, she says, “You should apologize.”
“Is there something wrong?” Lisa asks Ako as they walk home. “Are you worried about next week?”
Ako shakes her head. She’s too quiet, too still. They pass a low hanging branch, and Ako doesn’t try to jump up and tap it.
Lisa pressed a palm against the younger girl’s forehead, but finds that it’s a normal temperature.
“Lisa-nee,” she finally says. “Rinko says that you and her mom used to be friends.”
Of all the things Lisa imagined Ako would say, that was not one of them. She stops in her tracks, at the top of the stairs to the train station.
If Rinko knows, then Yukina must have been the one who told her. Then…
Lisa’s fist is trembling as she holds back the anger bubbling in her again. Anger that she hasn’t felt in over a decade.
“Yes.” She takes Ako’s hand again and hopes that she didn’t catch her slip in maturity. “We used to be friends.”
“Aren’t you sad then? That you aren’t friends anymore.”
There’s no point in being sad or angry or disappointed over something that happened in high school. Yukina is her own person. An amazingly talented person too— she’s a star. Lisa knows this, she’s always known this.
So the pain in her chest, the nights staring at her childhood bedroom ceiling, the unanswered texts. None of it matters.
So why? Just a moment ago, she was okay with how she and Yukina ended up. Strangers, two people with completely different lives, unimportant acquaintances to each other.
But that isn’t true. Yukina remembers her. She remembers the days they played in the park, the way Lisa wiped her tears when she cried, the promises they exchanged without a care. But those memories mean nothing to her, do they? Has Lisa ever meant anything to her?
Talking to Sayo never gives Yukina instant any relief. After she finishes her venting, Sayo stares and stares as she chews on her fries, and if Yukina looks close enough, she can see the gears turning in her mind. It’s rather nerve-wracking, being the center of Hikawa Sayo’s intense attention, even when it was being shared with salty slabs of potato.
Finally, Sayo leans back on the cafe chair and crosses her arms. “Isn’t this just like that time Roselia broke up in high school?”
Yukina’s cheeks immediately turn red. It’s one thing to make the connection herself, it’s another to have Sayo call her out on it.
“Or that time we were having trouble finding new members. Or when you got preg—”
“Your point being?” Yukina cuts off.
Sayo frowns, and for a second, Yukina is afraid she’s going to wait for Yukina to admit it to herself. But that’s not the friendship they have. They point out each other’s flaws, and push each other to a brighter stage, knowing that on their own, they’ll ignore what they don’t want to see.
“Do you want to befriend Imai-san again?”
“It’s not that simple.”
“How come?”
“Because…” Yukina places down the fry in her hand, stomach too uneasy to take anymore food. Sayo is still glaring at her, silently coaxing her to spit it out. “I don’t deserve it.”
“Because you were the one to cut Imai-san out of your life.”
The day she slammed closed her curtain because Lisa was distracting her from lyric writing. The day she texted “I have better things to do than hang out.” The days she said goodbye without ever saying hello. All of those days and moments tighten around Yukina’s neck.
Sayo takes another handful of fries, and Yukina wishes she had the appetite to do the same.
“Does Imai-san want to be friends with you?”
I’m Ako’s guardian, Imai Lisa. “She doesn’t even remember me.”
“Which makes this simpler,” Sayo says without hesitation. “Does Imai-san want to be friends with you? With who you are right now.”
Yukina stares blankly at Sayo, and sensing that her friend is not understanding, she continues. “Minato-san, I can testify to the stubborn and social mess you were during high school, however, you have changed.”
“I can’t pretend the past never happened.”
“You don’t have to. Just be honest, Minato-san.” Satisfied with her advice, Sayo stood up and went to order more fries, leaving Yukina alone with her thoughts.
Yukina wondered who she had to be honest to. Lisa? Or herself?
Rinko doesn’t directly mention the apology again. However, Yukina knows she’s still thinking about it though, waiting for her mother to finally make her move.
“Mama, Ako is going to the amusement park to see her sister on Saturday,” she tells Yukina over dinner. “Imai-san will be there too.”
“If I’m free and you do extra practice this week, I’ll ask Imai-san if we can come along.”
Rinko nods and goes back to eating.
Roselia is taking a short break after their concert. Rinko always practices more than the hour a day her piano teacher prescribes. Lisa will definitely say yes to their request.
After dinner, Yukina sends the text to Lisa. Her fingers stay hovered over the keyboard.
“You should apologize.”
Rinko isn’t the only one with the apology on her mind, but Yukina thinks that her young daughter sees the situation in a simpler way than her mother. It’s a clearer way, too.
Too many “what ifs” are clouding Yukina’s judgment, holding her back from blurting out what she has to say.
“On Saturday,” Yukina mutters to herself, staring at her reflection as her screen fades to black.
Ako doesn’t wait to ask Lisa.
There isn’t a pause between her saying goodbye to her teacher and asking if Rinko can come with them to the amusement park.
“I’ll do extra chores this week and go to bed early and not go on my Switch before I do my homework.”
Lisa laughs as she nods. She was going to say yes even before Ako started trying to negotiate. However, what is said cannot be taken back, so she is going to hold the eight year old to her words.
“Hey. Hey. Hoh! Wait, have I told you about the cool new catchphrase Hii-chan taught me?”
“What’s the story?” Lisa asks because there’s always a story or a grand adventure guiding Ako’s life.
As Ako rambles, Lisa establishes a few things for herself to help her face Minato Yukina.
The friends who sang together in the park are long gone. They’re different people now. They are acquaintances for the sake of their kids, and Lisa needs to live with that.
But there is still one question interrupting Lisa’s peace. Can she and Yukina be friends again? Could they start over, when Lisa still longs for a time that has passed?
“Wait, Ako—”
Ako laughs as she runs into the waiting arms of her sister’s friends, not minding Lisa’s call to not run across the parking lot. Thankfully there were no cars nearby.
Himari’s mother greets Lisa. She looks relieved to have another adult finally here.
“I hope I didn’t leave you waiting for too long,” Lisa says.
“It’s okay. We only just arrived.” She turns to the group of middle schoolers. “Girls, say hello to Imai-san.”
“Good morning Imai-san,” they chime in unison.
“When’s Onee-chan getting here?” Ako asks.
Ran takes out her phone and shows Ako a text message. “She said she got off the train five minutes ago.”
“Huh? Lisa-nee, didn't we get off the train five minutes ago? Why didn’t we see Onee-chan?”
“She’s taking a different train.” Tomoe’s foster home is on the other side of the country.
Ako pouts, not satisfied with the answer. “And where’s Rin-rin?”
As if on cue, Lisa’s phone buzzes.
We’ve arrived. Buying tickets right now.
“Rin-Rin’s your best friend, right Ako-chan?” Tsugumi asks. “The one who plays piano?”
“Yep! She’s really good, almost as good as you, Tsugu-chin. And one day we’re going to—” Her sentence cuts off and her eyes widen as a familiar red haired girl comes into view.
“Ako! Ran, Moca, Himari, Tsugu!” Tomoe shouts between heavy breaths. Like her sister, she doesn’t check for cars as she dashes across the parking lot, and then gathers her friends and sister into a hug.
After they’ve calmed down, Tomoe, still out of breath from running, says excitedly, “You won’t believe who I saw at—”
“Rin-rin!” Lisa manages to catch Ako’s arm this time before she runs into the parking lot again. Unable to run, Ako just jumps in place, excitement reverberating from every fiber of her being.
Once Rinko makes it to their side of the parking lot, the two girls hug. Tomoe and her friends take one step forward towards the newly arrived pair, hesitate, and then shuffle one step back.
It’s Tomoe who breaks their silence. “Um, are you Minato Yukina from Roselia?”
Yukina looks caught off guard by the question. “Yes.”
Ako gasps. “Rin-rin, I didn’t know your mom was famous.”
“Hey, Minato-san.” Moca places an arm around Ran’s shoulders. “Ran here is a big fan of yours.”
“Knock it off Moca.” Ran looks away but she cannot hide the growing redness in her cheeks.
“Yeah, she’s always asking us to cover Roselia songs.”
“Do you want to hear our cover of ‘Break your desire’?”
“But our cover of ‘R’ is way better!”
“What’s the name of your band?” Yukina says, interrupting the squabble.
“We’re Afterglow, Minato-san,” Ran says with her head held high.
Yukina nods. “I’ll be sure to check out your music.”
The girls squeal and Lisa cannot hold back her smile. Her eyes meet Yukina’s, and for a moment, Lisa can hear her heart beating out of her chest. Yukina is smiling too. Her eyes are sparkling and Lisa wants to take her hand. She wants to reminisce about the days gone by. She wants to uncover the buried threads that connect them, the dreams they shared and the moments they built together.
Say something say something say something.
“Let’s go. Let’s go. Let’s go.” Ako chants, interrupting Lisa’s impossible thoughts. With one hand, she holds onto Rinko. With the other, she holds onto Tomoe.
Himari’s mother and the rest of Afterglow follow Ako’s lead, leaving Lisa and Yukina to trail behind them.
When going to an amusement park with children, adults always end up left behind to hold their stuff. Yukina doesn’t mind. She tilts her head up to see the top of the rollercoaster Rinko is in line to ride. Even imagining the drop makes her stomach twist.
So, she’s sitting on a bench outside of the ride’s fence while the children and Uehara-san are in line. On the left, she sits, and on the right, Lisa sits. It’s uncomfortably reminiscent of their daughters’ play dates in the park.
Yukina twists her dress under her palms and takes a deep breath, like she’s about to go on stage. She’s been preparing what to say for days.
This won’t make things right. Maybe there’s a reason why she doesn’t remember Yukina. Maybe once she remembers, she’ll hate Yukina forever, no matter who Yukina is now.
It’ll be Lisa’s choice. Lisa deserves the choice.
“Imai-san.” Lisa looks up from her phone. “I would like to apologize.”
Lisa’s eyebrows knit in worry. “About what?”
There’s still a chance to go back. She can apologize for arriving late, and Lisa will laugh and say it’s okay.
But she has to stop being a coward. Yukina looks Lisa in the eye, and apologizes.
“I’m— I’m sorry for being a bad… when we were younger I had been a bad friend, and I want to apologize.”
“I shouldn’t have thrown away all of that kindness you gave me. Our friendship deserved better than that. You deserved better. And I—”
Yukina, the eloquent songstress, trips over her words. Lisa opens her mouth but no words come out. Her phone screen darkens automatically after the period of inactivity.
The afternoon sun shines like a spotlight on the pair that once were the world to each other. And although their worlds have grown, at the center of it all, like a jewel waiting to be unburied once more, is still the other girl.
Lisa keeps her eyes trained on the scenery outside of the train window. Against the dark sky, she can see her reflection. Hers and Yukina’s.
Rinko and Ako are between them, leaning against each other and asleep. Yukina’s arm is wrapped around a giant stuffed cat, and Lisa’s hair is a mess after the one roller coaster she went on. They can hear the muffled sound of the train gliding across the tracks.
They still haven't talked about what happened earlier, mostly because they never seemed to have a moment together. Once Lisa finally recovered from the shock of Yukina apologizing, the rest of the group had returned from their ride. Now that the moment is here, she will not let it slip through her fingers. Through their fingers.
“Yu— Minato-san,” Lisa stutters with her voice low so as to not wake their children.
“You can call me Yukina if you’d like.”
“Is that what you want?” she asks. “For me to call you Yukina?”
“I want whatever you want.”
Lisa is stunned by Yukina’s answer. What does she want?
Lisa wants to cup Yukina’s face with her hands, and reach into her soul and know. Know that the future, despite the past, will be okay. Know that Yukina will not leave her heart broken for a second time in her life. The floodgates have opened, and Lisa wants to know what she has to do to make sure they never close again.
Yukina turns to look at her, or maybe look through her, and Lisa feels sixteen again.
She was at Roselia’s first live performance, and for a moment after the song ended, she and Yukina’s eyes met. And Lisa had never felt less like herself because Yukina's eyes brushed over her as if she was a stranger.
Lisa wonders if she looks at Yukina (the Yukina who is kind and apologetic and at peace, sitting on the train beside her daughter) that same way because Lisa doesn’t quite recognize her. Who is this woman who resembles both the shy girl that made her laugh and the distant songstress that made her cry? Yet, she is neither of them.
“Yukina-san…” Yukina breaks the silence again. “could you use that?”
“Yukina-san,” Lisa says, testing out how it felt in her mouth after all these years. She’s always thought her name sounded like the most beautiful melody.
“Lisa-san,” she says slowly in return, giving Lisa space to deny her permission. “I’m sorry.”
I won’t cry, I won’t cry, I won’t cry, Lisa repeats in her mind as her lips wobble and her eyes begin to sting. Crying means she’s been thinking about this— about Yukina. And she knows she has, but she still can’t let herself cry. She doesn’t want Yukina to apologize for her tears as well.
“When did you recognize who I was?”
“When you introduced yourself.”
From the very beginning.
“Did you recognize me?” Yukina asks, her voice wavering. Lisa’s memories tell her to reach out. To place her arms around Yukina and tell her that things will be okay, like she used to.
Lisa nods. “You look the exact same,” she says with an unsure smile, trying to lighten the mood. As beautiful as ever.
Yukina’s laugh sounds more like a scoff, but a light has resurfaced in her eyes. “You look completely different.”
“Turns out not a lot of places wanted to hire a girl with bunny earrings and acrylics.” Lisa looks wistfully out the window, where she can see the youth that escaped her in the night sky, in the lights of skyscrapers that dazzle like stars. “And I guess I grew up.”
A robotic voice announces over the loudspeaker the next stop, Yukina and Rinko’s stop. Yukina gently shakes her daughter awake, and in the process, Ako wakes up as well. They both yawn in unison, and the cuteness contrasts so much with the heaviness in Lisa’s heart, she wants to cry in relief.
“Aw, you’re already going Rin-rin?” Ako says as she rubs her eyes awake.
Rinko smothers her with a hug, and it pains Lisa to see them separate.
“Thank Ako and Lisa-san for letting us come, Rinko.”
“Thank you Ako and Imai-san,” Rinko says, her voice the loudest Lisa has heard so far.
The train slows as it enters the station, and Rinko and Yukina leave their seats. Yukina has to carry the stuffed cat with two arms, so her daughter holds onto her skirt.
“Yukina-san,” Lisa says as the doors open. “We should have coffee together sometime soon.”
Yukina looks back and smiles—small and shy— and nods.
Yukina’s fingers shift, forming a fist except for her pinky, which points towards Lisa.
Yakusoka .