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It can’t be anything but a promise from the world when the young lady who claims to not drink alcohol all that much, shows up at the tattoo parlour for the second time, drunk.
It isn’t raining tonight, unlike the way it was storming a week ago. Yoimiya kicks her feet up, folding them tightly as she tries to nuzzle into a comfortable spot on the couch. She taps the edge of her pencil against the clipboard, staring at the unfinished drawing of a heron on the paper—a design that’s due tomorrow but far from being a concept she’s satisfied with.
She can’t be sure where the thought of birds came from in the first place—even if most of her designs are conjured out of a whim—and she doesn’t think far enough to recall that herons are Ayaka’s favourite bird. Ayaka has a silver pin in the shape of a heron that’s always neatly pinned to the top left of her chest, over a pocket on her breast. She has the silhouettes of herons on her business card, the same one that basks in flickering amber light on Yoimiya’s desk, safe from graphite stains and ink.
A sigh leaves Yoimiya’s lips as she tips her head back against the tattered leather couch, unkempt with strings flying loose from its stitching and awkward patches of ink. She relaxes her arm around the pencil, at a loss for an idea that’s creative enough to match her standards that have, recently, been rising too high. She engages in a staring contest with the ceiling lamp dangling overhead, the bulb watching her from intimate closeness.
I haven’t congratulated her on the opening ceremony. Must’ve been a huge thing for her, she thinks solemnly, only because the realisation brings her a no better idea of what to say.
She tried to text that day, thumbs poised in the most cautious of positions around her phone, waiting to type words she only meant with utmost truth. Sincerity comes easy to her, the same way honesty has always been a habit. Though, when she tried to text—it was like she didn’t know any words at all. None of them seemed fitting enough, between ‘congrats on the opening!’ and ‘HEYYY you looked rad during the event’, it felt like none of it was proper enough for what she wanted to say.
Yoimiya tries to search for Ayaka from quiet corners, in whatever subtle way her heart loves. Not to say she’s hard to find at all. Being the heiress to a multimillion-dollar company brings the expectation of seeing a new article about her in the papers every now and then, or on the covers of business journals as a leading example for the next generation of hopeful entrepreneurs. But Yoimiya indulges in her admiration between pockets in time, the fleeting coincidences that have chased her over the past few months. She hopes to walk by her on the same road, bump into each other on the same train, or lock eyes across a bar. It’s the kind of thing that has happened. Maybe, just maybe, it could happen again.
Yoimiya revels in the silence, vaguely punctuated by the peaceful sounds of the small world around her—this world that has always been the brick-coloured walls that confine her studio, posters of her favourite bands, potted plants hung over the windows that still creak like rickety bones when they’re moved. She closes her eyes after it dawns on her, too late, that staring at the lamp is what’s making her eyes burn and nothing else, but something pulls at her heartstrings thereafter.
For a second (and as dangerous as it may be, a little longer), she indulges in thoughts about Ayaka—what it’d be like to be her friend. Friends mean a lot of things, and they do a lot of things, but the two of them may have strayed too far from the definition of the word. They could be friends if it means occasional texts on weekends because weekdays are too busy for either of them. They could be friends if it means thinking of each other when eating cha siu bao. And maybe they are friends because acquaintances don’t send each other pictures of the sky, finding it so pretty because of the sole fact they’re both under the same one.
Yoimiya angles her head towards the other side of the room, slowly mustering the strength to do anything more than sitting on her couch and thinking, that too about matters she shouldn’t dwell on, for dignity’s sake more than anything else. In the middle of it all, the past few moments that have slipped away with almost complete silence. She jerks up to the sound of her door rattling. She kicks off the couch out of impulse, reflexes working too fast for her to process what she’s doing till it’s done.
Then, the epiphany that follows comes with so much disbelief, and half-hearted confusion, that Yoimiya pauses in the middle of her tracks. She tilts her head at the sight of yet another coincidence on the precipice of unfolding in front of her. Ayaka stands on the other side of the glass, the weight of her body leaning against the single knuckle that has been knocking on the aged wooden door. She looks up with livid eyes and flushed cheeks.
Is she drunk again?
It is an awkward thought. Quite honestly, it would be a little disappointing if the foundation of their friendship continued to be built on circumstances influenced by the dazedness of alcohol. By the end of it, they might only be drinking buddies and nothing more—a thought that makes the latter squirm.
Yoimiya attends to the door with a toothy grin. “It was open, actually,” she points out doggedly, scratching the back of her neck. Thereafter, the gentle pressure of another body leans its weight against her, holding the warmth of their bodies together. Her eyes widen at the gesture. Ayaka rests her chin in a comfortable crevice of Yoimiya’s neck, arms slowly enclosing them in a hug. She says nothing for a few moments, offering enough time and too much for the other to catch onto the stench of alcohol.
“Did something happen?” she asks, voice softer—careful, even.
Ayaka pulls them closer, and they’re pressed so tightly against each other that Yoimiya can only worry more about her. She forgets about herself, how her skin tingles when it’s brushed by warm breath, or the discomfort of having her shorts rolled up so high and not being able to fix them. “It’s gonna be okay… whatever happened,” she comforts and smiles softly into the embrace.
It’s uncharacteristic of her to initiate something so bold, and she predicts the apology before it happens, but they remain in this position, wordless, for a long while. Ayaka pulls away with bated breath, the sheepishly pretty smile that she came with missing from her face. She holds her purse against her hip, clenching her arms around it tighter. “I’m sorry,” she whispers, and all of it was so predictable, except the amount of ache in her voice. She lowers her head. “I hate to ask for your help again.”
“Hey, hey, no—” Yoimiya frowns, stepping forward. She cups her hands against Ayaka’s cheeks, and the action comes to her so naturally that the gravity of her actions doesn’t dawn on her in time. She tilts her head downwards and with the position they’re in, naturally forces Ayaka to meet her eyes. She returns the pensive expression with a sincere smile—tight-lipped and shabby, on a face stained with flint and ink—and earnestness like this is hard to turn away from.
“You don’t have to keep apologising to me. We talked about this, right? I don’t mind if you show up here drunk now or a thousand times again—though, uh, maybe it’d be nice if we could have a sober conversation once. You’ll always be safe here. You can trust me. You’re always welcome here, in this messy studio that reeks too much ink.”
Something changes, between now and the second after, when it hits her that she’s going too far with a friend she’s seen too little to consider a friend. She continues to look at Ayaka with the flame in her eyes that rages whenever she allows the passion to spill into her rambling words, eyebrows creased and fingers curling even further to mould themselves into the shape of Ayaka’s face.
Between now and the second after, she’s positive her heart has never raced so quickly over a speech as all over the place like that. In her grasp, instead of that softened-eye look that she often has, Ayaka starts to giggle. It is an unexpected reaction to something that was said with so much feeling—enough to be a scolding if it wasn’t said by somebody too capricious to be angry. Yoimiya pulls away, hands lingering in the air as she chokes out a singular laugh, not knowing what else to say. “...Did I say something funny?” she feigns a chuckle, heat rising to her face.
“No, well—” Ayaka speaks in between breaths. “—it was a charming speech, is all. When I saw that eyebrow-furled, pouty-lipped expression you made, I was sure you were going to scold me.”
Yoimiya rubs the back of her neck embarrassedly. “Oh yeah, I see how you might’ve taken it that way,” she grins, letting out an easy laugh afterwards. She feels lighter like a switch was flipped in the few moments between what she blurted and everything that happened after. She looks up and sees Ayaka like she did the week before, only, this time, she’s smiling and less drenched.
“If it’s any comfort, I haven’t had enough alcohol to be drunk,” Ayaka speaks up, a punctuated moment later. She cups her hands in front of her hip, and it must be a habit by this point for her hands to return to this learned pose. “I came to see you,” she coughs out shyly.
“See me?” It shouldn’t come with so much surprise when Ayaka’s right there, in front of her, and with no reason to lie about her sentiments. It does, and there might always be a part of Yoimiya, deep down, that believes she’s too little of a person to ever mean anything significant to anybody as big as Ayaka—big, by so many means because she’s talented, skilled, and awfully, awfully pretty. “Ah, well, it’s an honour. Is there anything you wanted? From me.”
Yoimiya’s gaze falls, and on a column of exposed skin beneath a cuffed sleeve, she notices the tattoo standing as a memory of the last time they were in a position like this. She grazes her thumb over the other half drawn on her skin, carving out its shape while she awaits an answer. Ayaka doesn’t answer as easily as she meant to. Instead, she presses her lips thinly and averts her gaze.
“What is it, Ayaka? Tell me.”
“Truthfully, I’m not supposed to be here because I have an important conference to attend, and I—”
“—you what?”
“Yes, I know it sounds bad,” Ayaka holds out her hands, urging the latter not to panic any more than she is at the present moment. It’s taking a lot out of her to maintain her composure, to pretend that she’s collected when her sudden, unplanned reappearance at the tattoo parlour is nothing like her organised character would normally suggest. Before succumbing to the urge of turning away and leaving without the purpose she came with in the first place, she asks, “Are you free tomorrow?”
Yoimiya glances at the sketchbook with unfinished designs and the set of papers due for apartments piling up on her counter. She nods without hesitance, pushing any defiant thoughts to the back of her mind.
“Would you… like to go to a bookstore with me?” Ayaka offers. “To clarify, you can say no. I wanted somebody to accompany me because I have a few errands to run in the area and didn’t want to be alone since I usually spend the day with Thoma and—” and then, she’s cut off abruptly upon being grabbed by both shoulders. She looks back at zealous eyes watching her, the colour of marigolds.
Yoimiya huffs, “You could have texted me. And yes, I would be glad to go out with you.”
“Really?” Ayaka gasps in awe, like there was a chance for any other response. In the wholeness of it all, she remains ignorant of the fact that she’s thirty minutes late to a meeting, at the corner of the city that’s too far from the office, tie loosened and her coat hanging precariously at the edge of her shoulder. And now, it’s evident that she’s more than a little tipsy—perhaps tip-toeing the borders of drunkenness but this is certainly no condition to return to a meeting in. Yoimiya can only look upon the situation with fondness, fidgeting happily at the knowledge that she can see these flawed, candid details about the seemingly perfect Kamisato Ayaka.
Like, the things she would do to ask a friend out to the bookstore.
“Right, so I can help you do your makeup and fix you something to eat real quick,” Yoimiya plans, leading her to the couch where she’d been working. She moves her sketchbook to the table in front instead to allow Ayaka enough space to rest. “I have, hm, leftover pizza in the fridge. Mushroom pizza, and soup from dinner last night. Any preference?” she asks, scurrying into the kitchen that’s barely anything more than a small refrigerator and a stove.
Ayaka looks over the couch to watch Yoimiya shuffling through the options in the fridge. “I’m grateful you’re willing to do so much for me. You don’t have to do so much for me, especially after just agreeing to go out with me tomorrow.”
“You’re talking like you’ve done any disservice to me,” Yoimiya interjects, pulling out a Tupperware container filled with the soup she tried making yesterday. She’s no chef, and she doubts anything she could make wouldn’t match up to the standard of food that Ayaka must eat on the daily. She might even have private chefs, hired to craft each dish to her preference—and, admittedly, this knowledge only puts more pressure on Yoimiya’s shoulders as a novice cook.
“By the way, I’m not that good at cooking. Don’t set your expectations too high.”
Ayaka chuckles. She turns around so that she can rest her chin against the backrest of the couch, eyes shimmering with affection. She watches the artist pace around the kitchen, picking up condiments from a basket of them that’s attached to the fridge, or pulling out utensils from a straw basket on the counter. The sight brings with it an emotion that she has never felt before—something wholly unexplored, a foreign heat bubbling at the pits of her stomach and growing to her chest. She feels her heartbeat against her chest, thrumming to the sound of clattering crockery and the hums of a voice.
“Do you think it’d be too bad if I skipped out on the meeting to stay with you instead?”
Yoimiya wrenches her neck to see Ayaka looking at her with a particular look in her eyes. “Yes,” she replies, although it would only be a gift to spend an entire evening with her. She doesn’t allow herself that much privilege to start influencing the life of a friend who’s been too generous with her time, if anything, knowing her tight schedule. “We’re meeting tomorrow, anyways! You shouldn’t stay around here for too long or the smell of ink’s going to hurt your lungs.”
Ayaka hums back in response. “Why? I like to think I’m well-accustomed to the stench already.”
“Because,” Yoimiya tries to retort, only to fall short of words. She hears a snicker behind her, so she turns and sees a cheeky smile dancing on the lips of the poised, proper, perfect Kamisato Ayaka. She stifles a smirk in return and swallows the remnants of what she wanted to say. “I didn’t think you could make a face like that,” she folds her arms, leaning her hips against the counter. The soup boils in the pot on the stove, gurgling softly to the tune of the grumbling fire.
“A face like what?” Ayaka cocks her head, batting her eyelashes. With that mischievous lilt to her tone, it could only mean that she’s not a good liar, or isn’t even trying to feign her innocence.
And for a second, that look in her eyes return—
“That! Like that—hey!” Yoimiya yells, pointing at her, bursting into a subsequent fit of laughter. Ayaka follows, and it comes with no surprise that this is the most relaxed she has felt in a while. Every second of meeting her is like a momentary escape from her reality, the stress that she has to carry on her shoulders as a result of the corporate life and its expectations. Soon enough, over the sound of more chatter, Ayaka turns around to a bowl of radish soup in front of her, served on a saucer with miniature fireworks.
“Bon appetit, Miss Kamisato.”
Ayaka quirks an eyebrow at the formality. “Merci, Miss Naganohara,” she smiles, sitting forward to help herself to the soup. She glances in the direction of an antique wooden clock posed on the top of the front wall, reminding her that she’s fifteen minutes away from being an hour late to the meeting. It would mean a smudge on her reputation, and she’d have to deal with questions from her brother about her behaviour—not that he would care too much about one missed conference. If she feels any sense of urgency to leave, Ayaka doesn’t let it show on her face.
“One second,” Yoimiya excuses herself, running into one of the rooms with a bead curtain for a door. She comes out a few seconds later, having foraged through her entire closet for the particular thing she comes out with. By that time, Ayaka has already devoured half of the soup.
Upon seeing her return with a box around the size of her palm, she lifts her head and compliments, “This soup is incredibly refreshing. Does the recipe have a name?” she asks, still eyeing the box.
“I could send you a picture of the recipe later on, but you should focus on finishing it now before you miss the entire conference!” Yoimiya rushes, egging her on to finish the meal faster. With a look of remembrance, Ayaka continues drinking the soup, like she forgot the urgency she arrived with.
Yoimiya wouldn’t normally think of herself as the composed one between the two of them, but it has started to seem like Ayaka doesn’t want to go to this meeting at all—from the looks of how slowly she’s eating. She hops onto the couch, finds enough space for herself, and starts rummaging through the box in her hands, pulling out a fist full of makeup. She scatters them all on the table—lip tint, an eyeliner pencil, and red eyeshadow. “My collection is sparse,” Yoimiya announces.
“I see that,” Ayaka muses.
“My lack of makeup aside, do you feel better?”
“Yes, much better—”
“Alright then, sit back,” Yoimiya interrupts, standing up. She squeezes in the small space between the table and the couch, holding a grand sum of her three makeup products in her hand. She pulls out a handkerchief from her pocket and dabs it around the corners of Ayaka’s mouth to wipe the splotches of soup. “Trust me with this,” she reassures, and that, perhaps, provides more reason for concern.
“Should I not?” Ayaka furrows her eyebrows, looking up.
“Mm, well, I should have pretty stable hands,” Yoimiya talks, bending forward. She presses one of her hands against the couch, right over Ayaka’s shoulder. She has the poor woman trapped between her arms, but neither of them opposes it, each for different reasons.
Ayaka reluctantly closes her eyes. “You’re not confident?”
“It’ll be over in a second,” Yoimiya assures, though it sounds more like self-consolation than otherwise. She presses her knee between Ayaka’s leg to allow better stability in her position, and when she’s drawing the wing of the eyeliner, she realises how close they are.
Their faces are close and perhaps, in the grand scheme of things, this shouldn’t be a problem for a tattoo artist. But it’s Ayaka. She’s sitting right there, eyes closed to allow the process and perfectly obedient, and it isn’t anything like leaning up close to a regular customer.
Yoimiya’s hands pause in mid-air as she hovers in this position, unmoving.
And, suddenly, the moment becomes surreal—so vivid, that it’s like she’s overly aware of every detail in the still room. She hears her father snoring in the other room, the chirp of birds as they flock to their nests for the evening, and the creak of the ancient fan.
“Is it done yet?” Ayaka asks, not opening her eyes just yet.
Yoimiya gulps. “No.” Her focus continues to waver, her heart being of no help to her case.
───────
On her desk, that night sits an open sketchbook with sketches of a heron and a goldfish—intricately designed in a style she’d never attempted before.
Perhaps it’s too intimate to be drawn on a customer, something she pried out of the private depths of her heart, but she might have it tattooed on herself if she has the time, one day. Somewhere on the left side of her chest, where it belongs.
───────
For the fear of arriving late for their first planned meeting, Yoimiya arrives at the bookstore an entire hour earlier than what was planned. It was a little bit of forgetting the time and having to assume it herself, and the jitters that came with not knowing what to wear on an occasion like this, but a large part of not wanting to show up late when she’s not trying to leave a bad impression of herself. She leans her shoulders against the windows and kicks a pebble on the ground, hands stuffed in her pockets.
She feels impatient after a while, but it’s the type of sensation that lingers subtly without effect. It comes with anticipation, and the overwhelming excitement of getting to see Ayaka outside, in a world that’s far from the silver spoon life she has to bear with everyday. She couldn’t get a wink of slip the night before, the kind of thing that happens every once in a while when she looks forward to something too much.
When thirty minutes pass and Yoimiya’s still kicking at the pavement aimlessly, she pulls up her messages with Ayaka and pouts her lips together. She blinks at the series of messages rolled out on the screen, and it dawns on her with eventual gloom that she arrived too early. Her face falls and she stomps her foot against the ground, having been standing outside with so much anticipation, only to find out she’s too early and she has to dawdle around for another thirty minutes.
Yoimiya, admittedly, isn’t a reader, nor is she good with words. It’s been years since she touched a book, or maybe longer, and there should’ve been no reason for her to agree to a meetup like this. She doubts she would’ve, if it wasn’t for how much time she tried to sneak with Ayaka, in between work days and events that she attends when the invitation is extended to her.
I guess I’ll step inside first, she thinks because standing in the sun for any longer might leave her sweatier than she already is. There are stains underneath her arms, and on the sleeves of her shirt, and it’s bad enough that she showed up in a striped shirt and sneakers for something like this. A meeting with a friend shouldn’t mean anything special. Yoimiya has been out with friends before, but she’s never been as nervous about those as she is about today. She turns around to the bookshop, sandwiched between two cafés and sticking out like a sore thumb because of its flamboyant walls, against the eggshell white backgrounds lining the street. By the time she opens the door, she hears a voice call out her name.
“Yoimiya!”
Before the dread hits her, there’s awe. She glances at her wristwatch and concludes that there’s still thirty minutes on hand before the time they agreed to meet, and there should be no reason for Ayaka to already be here, wearing the same beret as the time they met at the bar, and in a long coat that hugs her figure in a sophisticated manner. Her heels add to her height and by the time she’s close enough, Yoimiya notices the gap in their heights, more noticeable with the heels.
Compliment her! Tell her you think that her clothes are cool, or her beret is nice!
She looks down at herself, beads of perspiration still trickling down her forehead, and realises she should’ve retired to the comfort of the air-conditioning earlier.
“Did I make you wait too long… oh, I’m so sorry,” Ayaka apologises profusely. She bends, dipping into a slow bow, and it’s only disappointing because the latter thought their friendship progressed far enough to settle misunderstandings on verbal apology. “I had a feeling I should come earlier but I didn’t know that you’d also be around so early so I sincerely apologise if you’ve been waiting here for so long—”
“Ayaka,” Yoimiya holds her hands. “It’s okay.”
She isn’t, and it’s starting to show through her sweaty palms—well, sweaty everything . Her face has started to glisten with the coat of sweat that pooled against her face, and she can only be grateful that the smell of her father’s deodorant is enough to mask its smell.
Ayaka presses her hand against her nose at the whiff of the strange scent, but if she has any reservations about the matter, she keeps them to herself. She shows a tight-lipped smile and loses her fingers around Yoimiya’s hand. “It’s hot today, isn’t it?”
Yoimiya swipes her hand away, cupping it behind her back. “Yep!” she laughs awkwardly.
And then, a hand brushes against her own, urging her to follow. She looks up and for a second, she catches a glimpse of a smile dancing on Ayaka’s lips, hidden by a strand of her fringe that falls by the curve of her face. She feels the corners of her own lips pull up as red dusts her cheeks, and anything that might’ve felt bad about the day vanishes in a second.
A few steps away from the entrance is a tilted stack of books, abandoned in the middle of the aisle like its owner discarded it when they left. Floorboards creak under the pressure of footsteps against them, and with careful inspection, one would notice the paintings on the ground. Peach-coloured walls enclose the bookshop, bringing them through a myriad of collections, shelves organically arranged with hundreds of books from the same genre, somehow small enough to fit in the small space that is this place. It’s like walking into a galore, inhaling the details of this quaint place, every nook and cranny filled with a unique flair.
Yoimiya peers into the bookshelves, through the gaps between the books, and she watches a quiet customer pass on the other side. She drags her fingertips against the spines of the books, gingerly, and reads the names under her breath, knowing full well she won’t recognise any of them. Old disks glint under the light of the ceiling lamps, hung on the walls like a record through time. “Is there anything you’re looking for?” she asks once she realises they’ve been walking everywhere in this nowhere, and Ayaka hasn’t picked up any books she wants to read.
“I’m trying to look for the magazines. A business magazine, in particular,” she replies absent-mindedly, walking with slow steps around the bookshop even though she ought to know the place well enough from her past visits here. “They moved a couple of things around since I was last here, but my heart still adores it the same,” she continues, that too, with a smile. She continues to search with that same particularity as a few moments ago, resting her finger against the labels on the shelves, and then lightly pulling a book out if a title captures her attention. She searches with a motive, and it’s clear from the way she doesn’t hoard everything of interest like Yoimiya would if she were in a records store.
“How long has it been?”
“A little over a year, I reckon,” and she says it so casually like sacrificing visits to such a beautiful place doesn’t mean anything to her.
Maybe it doesn’t, because being sad over something like this isn’t something she can afford when her mind ought to be busy with millions of important things all at once—nothing like Yoimiya, who holds places she loves with too much sentimental value to let them go. It’s why she’s always around in the same few areas, the same bar, the same supermarket, and the same cornershop in an alleyway that’s occupied mostly by her, and only her.
Dawdling around amid their search, Yoimiya realises she can’t fault herself for wondering, what if they’d met earlier, because, maybe if they did then Ayaka would’ve been able to learn how to relax. She would’ve known that her commitments aren’t the end of the world, and there is more to life than the expectations in her head. She would’ve known that there are people who care about the real her.
And Yoimiya’s more aware now, that there’s more to their friendship than fulfilling and fulfilment, that they are not entitled to show each other parts of the massive, massive world that they haven’t seen before. But, the time they have spent with each other has opened her eyes to the subtle want that formed within them, or herself, at the very least, to want to be the person Ayaka can relax with. She wishes they met younger, earlier, and that it happened so casually that they could’ve started as friends without the in-between—that they could’ve gone to rundown bars or neglected parks, or wherever else in the world that would accept two hideaways.
In her peripheral vision, Yoimiya notices a rack of magazines sitting by the unattended counter—several of them, actually—and out of instinct, tugs Ayaka back by the sleeve. “They’re over there,” she announces, exhaling a sigh of relief because this marks the end of their ten-minute search through the wrong part of the bookshop. She overtakes Ayaka to catch a look at the magazines herself. “So, what exactly do you need magazines for?”
“We’re discussing a collaboration with Tenryou Corp., so my brother wanted me to scry a few books and magazines that might tell us a little more about who’s running the company. I’ve only interacted with the heiress briefly at a high-society event, but never the president,” Ayaka explains, and like she hadn’t been aware of it before, Yoimiya becomes that much more aware of the responsibilities she must have as her brother’s right-hand, bearing the expectations of perfection on her shoulders. Ayaka bends over, shuffling through the entire stack of business journals and magazines on the rack.
It doesn’t look like the most convenient thing, especially when there are easily a hundred issues for her to look through, only to find what she’s looking for. “I could help, you know… we can pull them out and sort through them at one corner of the shop. Besides, there’s the internet so I could always look for articles on the company,” Yoimiya suggests.
Ayaka’s lips part in surprise. “That’s… not a bad idea,” she acknowledges and starts picking out magazines from the rack with the help of an extra hand. Together, they lug the entire collection to a back corner of the shop where they’ll go unnoticed by the handful of customers in the store with them. They release the entire stack of magazines onto the ground, and they scatter, pooling around them like a lake engulfing in its vast, vast waters. It’ll be a trouble to clean it up afterward, especially to search for a few journals at best, out of this entire myriad, but any rational thought that existed between them walks straight out of the door. “I find this quite hilarious, actually,” Ayaka jests.
“It is pretty funny,” Yoimiya giggles, gaping at the array of magazines at her feet. She folds her legs and snatches one of them up from the collection, sorting it away into a corner when it’s not what she was looking for. “I’m not sure why I suggested this in the first place. It doesn’t look like a very convenient plan, now that I’m looking at it properly,” she elaborates.
“Do you think anybody will notice us?”
Yoimiya glances to the side, where she notices a member of staff pass them, glancing at them once with a look of vague concern before moving on with her day. She stifles a laugh and nuzzles in closer to the corner to drag the magazines closer to herself. “When we met at the café, you did say that we’re insignificant people. I’m sure everybody else has better things to do than be mad at us, insignificant people, for making a mess of the magazines at a corner of the store.”
Ayaka curls an eyebrow in response. “I didn’t think you’d remember that.”
“I remember a lot of things.”
“It’s a useful skill,” Ayaka remarks back, starting to sort through the magazines as well. A small smile forms on her lips, but something about her darkened expression suggests that it isn’t all that sincere. She holds her silence for a few moments, pretending she is paying any attention to the task at hand, and not the abundance of thoughts that are running free in her mind. “Remembering becomes difficult when all you have to do all day is remember—the meetings I have to attend today and tomorrow, the list of parties and important events for the next month so my brother doesn’t have to take worry himself over such insignificant things, the records on recent papers because I’m in charge of publicity—Archons.” She drops a magazine a little too hard from her hand.
Yoimiya knows from the eventual look on her face that she doesn’t feel bad about what she admitted, but the fact that she thought about admitting it at all. That’s what they taught you when you were younger, didn’t they?—that you’re not allowed to feel because it’s too much of a problem. You’re not allowed to have problems because there are worse ones in the world, like the unsolved sum that’s sitting on your desk or the important email that’s due at night.
“I wish I could make things better for you.”
“You already do,” Ayaka looks up, and she shows a smile sweeter than honey. She tilts her hand against the magazine she’s flipping through, exposing the tattoo that snakes around her wrist. Yoimiya stares pointedly at it, and for the hell of it, tilts her wrist the same way—brushing their hands together.
───────
“So… I’m going that way.”
And gone is the happiness that they held in their hearts, the safeness that they felt with each other in the small bookshop in the middle of the city. Yoimiya wishes she could stay, searching for reasons for them to drag the day longer than it has been—doing anything, or even the same thing over and over if it means they can spend more time with each other. She musters a derpy smile, lips pressed together and looking down at the paper bag of magazines that Ayaka holds against her chest.
They’ll meet again—and once they do, there’ll come a time when she stops counting the seventh, eighth, ninth time that they meet and it’ll be more natural than the last time. She shouldn’t be so sentimental about leaving, especially when the day went better than she would’ve expected. Between having her shoulder used as a pillow while skimming through magazines, and stifling laughter over stupid jokes, she couldn’t have seen it being any other way.
Yoimiya nods her head and takes a step backward. “I’ll be going this way, then,” she says, and it’s better than a proper farewell. She isn’t fond of goodbyes, maybe because they’re too common and they always make situations seem more solemn than they are. They turn away at the same time, walking to other ends of the road with memories that hold more weight than the ones they’ve shared before. Maybe, if I’m lucky, we can spend more time with each other. I’ll call her and ask if she wants to go to the record store with me, or if she wants to watch the new movie that’s being released. She’ll say yes, right? Would she?
Yoimiya tightens her grip on the strap of her bag, looking down at the pavement, preoccupied with her thoughts. She doesn’t notice how slow she’s walking until something cold, and hard falls on her scalp and starts to trickle down it when she lifts her head. She doesn’t notice how much trouble she’s in when she notices dots of dark grey littering the pebble-grey pavement until she lifts her head to the sky and it’s overcast. A droplet of rain falls on her cheek.
She shrugs her bag off her shoulder and starts searching it for an umbrella. Yoimiya glances around, hearing the rain pick up pace around her, and notices the crowd scatter as they stop to pull out umbrellas or start making a run for shelter. And, of course, she feels around her bag with sketchbooks and pencils, having everything that can’t save her from a storm. If only Ayaka were here. She definitely has an umbrella, she knows because Ayaka is ever-resourceful.
Lamenting her bad luck under her breath, she throws her bag over her shoulder and braces herself for a run down the road, enough to find shelter for the time being. Her satchel isn’t waterproof but she can’t afford to get her sketchbooks wet because the pen ink will stain the pages. As it continues to pour around her, she quickens into a scamper, when she hears, “Yoimiya!”
Yoimiya turns her head, fringe wilting over her eyes with how soggy they are from the rain. Her clothes have started to cling to her skin and she’s curled over, trying to save her bag from getting drenched, but hearing her name in that sweet, sweet voice leaves her with no choice but to turn. Ayaka scampers towards her, holding an umbrella in her hand and her hand closed around something. “Yoimiya, wait!” she calls out breathlessly, and she must’ve run the entire length to reach here.
“Ayaka, what?” she gapes, pressing her satchel closer. She jogs forward, hair tie unravelling around her hair and releasing it onto her shoulders. She’s aware of the waves of emotion that leave her stomach in a twist, and it’s nothing like she has ever felt before. Yoimiya doubts a situation like this could happen often—standing in the middle of the rain, fighting for her life with no umbrella and her satchel, staring with widened eyes at the woman she’d been calling out to in her mind.
Ayaka pauses in front of her, holding an umbrella over their heads. She inches closer, and she heaves a sigh, having thought she wouldn’t be able to catch up in time. Several unfortunate things could’ve stopped her, like missing her footing on the pavement or calling out too softly but she is thankful, from the bottom of her heart, that the world entertains her fickleness. “Yoimiya,” she furrows her eyebrows and starts searching through her bag. “I forgot to give something to you.”
Seconds later, she pulls out a keychain with a goldfish, vibrant orange. She holds it out on her open palm, and then another on her other palm, holding them together to form the shape of a heart. Yoimiya’s eyes widen as she stares at the keychain, hand relaxing under her satchel. She blinks, and she blinks, but a beat later, she’s left with the same lack of words as a moment ago. Ayaka watches her expectantly, hands trembling with worry. “Is it not to your liking?” she looks down, curling her fingers. “I apologise. I—I found it a week ago, when I was out in the market, and it reminded me of you. I wanted to give this to you today… because it felt like you had fun and I think it’s my only chance.”
“Ayaka,” Yoimiya whispers, looking at her through the gaps of her wet fringe. She combs her hand through her hair and pushes it away from her eyes, incredulous more than anything. “You didn’t have to give me this in the middle of the rain—and come on, of course I like it.”
Ayaka hides a smile. “Really?”
“We have to stop this before it becomes a habit,” Yoimiya says under her breath, taking the keychain into her hand. She holds it with nimble fingers, caressing its surface with her palm. A drop of water falls on it from her hair, wiping it cleanly off its surface, and even in this darkness—it shines. A gust of wind blows, though it’s hardly the reason for her goosebumps. “Ayaka, is this really why you ran through the rain? You didn’t have to,” she coos.
“Ah,” Ayaka lowers her head, the tips of her ears turning red. “I do land us in compromising situations very often, because of my impulses.”
Yoimiya rubs her thumb against the keychain, watching it gloss over under the peeking light of the streetlamp beside them. It flickers on as the world darkens around them, engulfing the city in bluish hues. She thinks of something to say—anything, how it’s never a problem because Ayaka always manages to show up when she’s thinking of her the most. It’s like they’re connected somehow, bound together with invisible thread, writing in invisible ink that they’re soulmates. “Do you think this is a compromising situation?” she asks like they aren’t standing in the middle of pouring rain, soaked to the bone.
“I would say so,” Ayaka replies. “I don’t think this is the best way to… confess.”
Yoimiya chokes on her words. “Confess? Wait—wait a minute.”
“Oh,” the latter pulls back, the smile wiping off her face. She takes a step backwards and she closes her hand around the keychain in her hands, pressing her lips together. “Uhm—actually, when I asked you out today, I meant it as a date but I think we’re both on different pages here… you should forget this happened, I’m so sorry—” she panics, taking a few steps backward. She doesn’t lift her gaze, shaking her head as she speaks fervently in an attempt to fix a situation she “ruined”.
“Wait,” Yoimiya says loudly, pulling her forward with her hands. “You like me? Ayaka, look at me,” she beckons, and that too, with such a sincere voice that she can’t help but obey. They lock eyes for a heated moment, and the entire time they spend in this silence filled with heavy breaths, they exchange so many unspoken words. If she knew the words to say, Yoimiya would’ve by now but a situation like this—
Ayaka doesn’t reply.
“What about the press?”
Ayaka looks up, silent. “What about the press?”
“Hypothetically, if we started dating—”
“Wait—” Ayaka gapes, cupping her hands over her mouth. She stops herself before she can continue, eyes widened, only because she lacks the words to explain even a fraction of her emotions. “You like me?” she echoes, blinking owlishly. It doesn’t make sense to her, not when she’d been the one building a fantasy for herself, only fated to break the second she tried to confess. And even a moment ago, she was sure it was one-sided because everything she’d been doing was hardly a confession. She hears the beating of a heart, either her own or not, mimicking the rhythm of the rain.
Yoimiya fidgets with her collar. “I could see my brain liking you more.”
“Then, what would that make us?” Ayaka looks at her. “If you like me more.”
“Anything you want us to be.”
Ayaka purses her lips. She tries to hide another smile, but it turns out to be a silly attempt when it sneaks on her look eventually. A beat passes, but each second is more fulfilling than the last—each moment of accidentally locked eyes, brushed hands, or intertwined breaths. “And the press—” she remembers, anti-climatically and only a moment too late.
“Right, the press—”
“It’ll be our secret,” Ayaka whispers with a giggle, face flushed redder than it has ever been. She’s never looked like this before, so happy that no worries in the world can reach her or ruin a moment as pure as this. Yoimiya looks at her with parted lips, a slow, affectionate grin growing on her lips as she learns how to live with her heart doing cartwheels in her chest.
She cups her hand over her mouth and whispers, “It isn’t too much of a secret if two of us know, isn’t it?”
Two can keep our secret.