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Mabayu knocked on the door three times “It’s me, Akemi-san!”
A faint ‘come in’ came from the other side of the door, and so she opened the gateway to the bizarre home of Homura Akemi.
Usually, they didn’t meet this afternoon, so it was to her surprise when Homura texted her and asked her to visit, but hey, maybe she had come up with something, whether it was a new way to try and keep Madoka out of trouble, or some way to deal with Kyouko Sakura, who had recently been a problem for them as they hunted in Kazamino.
At this point, she was used to the bizarre decorating that Homura had done in here, with the blinding white walls and floating picture frames, but she still wondered how she paid for this place, or why exactly this was her taste in interior decorations. Any attempt to ask her though just led to the other magical girl dodging the question, however, so Mabayu just decided to not think too hard about it.
Homura was standing by the table, as she usually was whenever Mabayu arrived at her home for a strategy meeting, so without delay, she made her way Homura had long since stopped being actually imposing to her, so now when they met up, even when they were only discussing their mission to save Madoka from her fate, it was kind of hanging out with a friend.
Well, at least it felt that way to her.
“Do you know why you’re here, Mabayu?” Homura asked as soon as Mabayu made her way over to her. “Or, more precisely, do you know what day it is?”
Uh… Wednesday? Thursday? Looping through the same month so many times had made her start to filter out less-important information. “Er… it’s the same day it usually is, isn’t it?”
In response, Homura just flipped her hair, obviously not satisfied with the answer. “It’s been 336 days since I left the hospital for the first time. If we had never gone backwards in time, today would be…”
“Be…”
“You’re the senior here, Mabayu, surely you can do some basic math.”
“Erm…”
After a few moments, realizing she wasn’t going to get the correct response, Homura decided to hurry up the conversation. “...Today would be February 14th. Valentine’s Day.”
“Valentine’s Day?!” The revelation surprised her, until she remembered that she had never particularly cared for the day. “Wait… that’s not a big deal.”
Of course it wasn’t. Well, it had never been a big deal in the past, because it wasn’t really like she was popular with her classmates, and it really wasn’t like she was getting any love confessions. So… why was Homura bringing this up?
“I suppose it isn’t. Regardless, I got something for you to mark the occasion.”
Homura’s eyes glanced down to the table, and Mabayu’s eyes followed to see… a plain, reddish-brown heart-shaped box, with a green ribbon keeping it shut. Wait, did Homura get her chocolate?!
“Akemi-san, is this…”
“I’m not good with things like this, but…” She glanced down to the box, before looking back into Mabayu’s eyes with a firm expression. “As I’ve said before: I don’t think I could have made it this far without you. Please accept this as a token of my gratitude.”
So, it probably was chocolate… but wait, why was she doing this now? Previously, Homura usually just said a ‘thank you’ and it had seemed to suffice for her. Wait, was she… “…Wait, are you trying to buy my future cooperation? Well, I’ll let you know that I, Mabayu Aki, am not that cheap!“ But chocolate did sound pretty good… “Alright, maybe I can be bought…”
“I assumed I already had your future cooperation, Mabayu,“ Homura said, rolling her eyes. “This is just chocolate.”
“W-Well, it’s not like I’ve done much to warrant that…”
“That’s not true,” she responded, with a simple shake of her head. “You’ve done so much for me, for no personal gain. My regrets lie more with the fact that I can’t do more to thank you.”
Really? Homura wanted to do more? “Ehehe, well-“
“…Don’t push your luck,” was the reply, as if she had read Mabayu’s mind. “This was difficult enough.”
“Right, right.” Alright, so maybe she’d ask Homura to have a movie night with her some other time. But then, she realized something. Homura had called it ‘difficult’… “…Akemi-san, hey, lemme ask you something.”
“Hm?”
A smirk grew on her face as she got a devilish idea for more teasing. “So, did the cute Akemi-san with the glasses ever give chocolate to any of her crus-“
“Stop.” A sharp look that looked like it could cut her throat appeared in Homura’s eyes, and Mabayu knew it was a good time to shut up. “As a matter of fact, you would be the first.”
“Wow, I feel so special, ehehe…”
“It’s not a big deal,” Homura remarked.
Then, Mabayu looked back down towards the box containing her Valentine’s Day gift, and noted a crucial detail about it once again. “Heart-shaped…”
“It’s store-bought,” Homura quickly responded. “It was the first one I saw on the shelf, so I grabbed it.”
Yep, that sounded like her, all right. Mabayu thought that store-bought chocolate usually came in those boxes that had a bunch of chocolates, but it wasn't like she had ever gone chocolate shopping for other people, so maybe she was wrong.
Wait, difficult… Mabayu had assumed that the act of going to the store and buying something would have been the thing that was difficult for Homura (it was like that for her, too, some days!), but wait, actually… wait, what kind of Valentine’s chocolate was this?!
Mabayu tried to not let her panic show on her face, probably to mixed results. “Wait, this is tomo choco, right?”
Homura subtly flinched, before quickly reassuming her normal demeanor. “Tell me, Mabayu, do I seem like a maiden in love to you?”
“Well, maybe when you’re talking to Kaname-san, or when you’re talking about Kaname-san, or you’re looking at Kanam-“
“Stop,” Homura interrupted once more. “You’re the one whom I’m giving chocolate to. There’s no need to bring Madoka into it.”
Well… that was true, but they were only companions due to the circumstances that they were in. In a world without witches, Homura would still probably be normal friends with Madoka, and Mabayu would still be a recluse holed up in her room. “Well, I bet that you’d rather Kaname-san be here…”
The black-haired magical girl shook her head again. “Don’t see yourself as a replacement, Mabayu. Both of you are important to me, but that doesn’t make you one and the same in my eyes. You are nobody else other than yourself.”
“Ehehe…” Mabayu allowed herself to almost melt into a puddle of mush at the praise (which definitely didn’t mean anything), thinking that Homura would probably pull her out of it with a cold follow-up, but instead, Homura just seemed to stare at her, studying her face intently with all the precision that she used in combat. The moment seemed to last forever…
Until Homura flicked her in the forehead.
“Hey!” Mabayu rubbed the spot where she’d been hit. “That hurt…”
“Sorry,“ was the response. “I needed some way to snap you out of it.”
To Mabayu, it kind of seemed like Homura needed to snap herself out of it more than she did Mabayu, but that was probably just a delusion. Anyway, something else more pressing rose to the surface of her mind. “So, you never actually answered my question, Akemi-san… y’know, about what kind of chocolate this is meant to be.”
“…Yes.” Homura responded, after a pause that felt too long. “I’m giving this chocolate to you as a friend.”
The words seemed too carefully chosen to not mean anything, but that wasn’t important compared to the most important thing, which was that, internally, she could breathe a sigh of relief, and her panic subsided just as quickly as it had appeared. Of course it was friend chocolate, because otherwise it would mean that Homura had, erm… stronger feelings for her, and that would mean that Mabayu would have to think about how she felt about Homura as well, and that was a door that she had promised herself that she wasn’t going to open, so it was definitely a good thing that that possibility had been totally shot down!
…But maybe it would be nice if she could make Homura smile just a bit more.
Ignoring that super inconvenient thought that definitely didn’t mean anything… well, she had a box of chocolate right in front of her, right? She began to grab the ribbon to tug it apart, and-
“Don’t open it right now.” An immediate, almost worried remark from the other girl.
“Huh? Why not?” Mabayu asked, as she continued to stare at the box. “Are you really gonna make me wait? Akemi-saaaan…” Chocolate sounded so good right now…
“There’s a note inside,” Homura explained, almost visibly uneasy, which was strange to the green-haired magical girl. “…It’d be weird for you to read it while I’m watching.”
“Ah, yeah, I suppose that would make sense…”
The two stood there for a moment, before Mabayu realized that they had probably exhausted her reason to be here.
“Er… that was all, right?”
Homura nodded in response. “Yes, I just thought that it made sense to give it to you in person.”
“A-Alright… I’ll be going, then,” Mabayu said, as she turned around, chocolate in hand, back towards the door.
Behind her, Homura nodded again. “Please get some sleep. Like usual, it’ll be a long day tomorrow, Mabayu.”
“Y-Yes!”
She opened the door… but something compelled her to turn back around and face Homura, who was still watching her, as she stood in the doorway.
“Akemi-san…”
“What is it, Mabayu?”
“Er… thank you!” Even with the difficult circumstances they were in, she was still really glad that she could be like this with someone as amazing as Homura Akemi. “When this is over, uhm… I hope we can still be friends then, too!”
A pause. “…Likewise, Mabayu.”
As the door closed, she thought she saw Homura’s trademark neutral expression curl into a smile.
“That girl,” Homura muttered as she laid in bed that night.
She had realized it last timeline, when Mabayu had been killed by Kyouko. The impossible decision that had been in front of her, when she faced Walpurgisnacht: if she won, would she abandon that timeline and that Madoka as well, to search for another where everyone had been able to live? Would she really condemn Mabayu to death after all she had done for her? Could Homura live with herself, then?
Of course, Madoka was important to her. Of course, she wanted to be her friend and spend time with her, and that hadn't changed since the start, no matter how much she had thought about denying it. But... over the course of looping time over and over and over, she had ceased to be able to imagine a life without Mabayu there with her, a constant support who was the only person who could ever understand what she had been through, the only person who made the endless repetition bearable and the only person who could keep Homura human, despite having lost her humanity long ago. So what did that make her feelings?
She had told Mabayu that she wouldn’t go back for her, as if it was an easy decision. In truth, she just wanted her to stop sacrificing herself, because she didn’t want to have to make that decision. But in case she did have to… she couldn’t allow herself to be swayed by her present emotions. That would betray the wish of the past Homura, who wanted nothing else other than for Madoka to be safe and happy. So, however she might feel about the strange, awkward, baffling, often enraging, brilliant girl who was the only one who was at her side and the only one who could pull her out of her darkest moments, she couldn’t admit it to herself.
But maybe, afterwards…
After the walk home, Mabayu opened the door… and was greeted by none other than her aunt and legal guardian, Sakie Aki, wearing a larger-than-usual grind that meant, as it usually did, that she was surely up to no good.
“Oh, Mabayu-chan, you’re back!” Then, she glanced down to the item resting in Mabayu’s hands. “Who’s that from? Have you been hiding a secret lover from me?”
“H-Huh?!” Mabayu leaned back in surprise, before realizing that she was being messed with. “C’mon, Sakie-san, we both know that I’m not popular enough for something like that…”
“Really?” Sakie thought about it for a moment. “So, you’re telling me that this chocolate isn’t from Homura Akemi-chan?”
Wait… what? Homura hadn’t even visited Recompense in this timeline, so there was no way that Sakie should have any idea who she is, and Sakie usually didn’t bring her up in any other timeline, besides the ones where Homura had visited their home herself, so she probably didn’t have a secret habit of sneaking in when she wasn’t looking for a piece of cake.
“Akemi-san was here?!”
“Oh, so you do know her!”
Mabayu frowned, not in the mood for Sakie’s teasing. “Enough. What happened?”
“To my surprise, a girl around your age came around yesterday asking if she could use the kitchen. I wouldn’t usually allow it, but when she brought your name up, I guess I just couldn’t help myself. She was pretty good with the equipment, but I feel like I would’ve recognized if she had worked here before.” Sakie giggled as she recounted her story, before her eyes widened, as if she had suddenly realized something. “I told her that I wouldn’t tell you, though! So it’s going to be our little secret, okay?”
“She said it was store-bought, though…”
“Really?” Sakie chuckled. “Now, I wonder why she would do that?”
“I don’t know,” Mabayu responded, confused. “I’m gonna go upstairs, Sakie-san.”
“Good night, Mabayu-chan!” Sakie said, the teasing lilt not having left her voice. “Enjoy your gift!”
With that, Mabayu took the stairs up to her room, throwing herself on her bed, the chocolate still in hand. Without further delay (because she was kind of dying to eat chocolate, and also know what that note said), she pulled away the ribbon and lifted up the cover to reveal a piece of heart-shaped milk chocolate, with a small note card on top of it. Picking it up, she read, in Homura’s plain but neat handwriting:
Mabayu,
Let’s make it to the real February 14th.
Homura
…So that was what Homura didn’t want to watch her read? She had called the previous, incredibly shy, glasses-wearing and twintail-adorned Homura cute… but maybe the present one was even cuter.
She took a bite into the chocolate, and it tasted like love… but she didn’t know whose.