Work Text:
Letting go
Miyu is already halfway through building herself a workshop when Hibiki gets discharged. Being a TS pilot, it took the JSDF longer to process her application than Miyu’s.
(For a while they were kept busy with the press tour, and Miyu made enough connections in the industry to make the jump to the Titanostrider developer side, but neither Miyu nor Hibiki wanted to stay.
They weren’t the only ones who couldn’t return to their old lives, after everything.)
Quiet life in the countryside doesn’t suit either of them, but big cities are stifling. They’re reminders. There’s so much to rebuild still.
They choose a town at random and, by a stroke of luck, they settle in easier than expected. Miyu fiddles with toys and household robots, Hibiki starts sketching outfits. There are two bedrooms, but one is used less and less.
As the world around them slowly heals, they explore.
Four seasons
Falls are for sweaters and scarves and Hibiki dragging Miyu to clothes shopping because she is a “disaster” who needs “more clothes than jeans and T-shirts” but Miyu loves seeing Hibiki excited so she learns to like these trips. Falls are for feelings to be fuzzy like the mist at dawn. Falls are for meeting the families for the first time, stumbling over “my friend” and sharing crammed childhood beds instead of guest futons.
Winters are for curling up together on the sofa with a mug of warm coffee while the television is on, for fluffy socks and silly hats, for long hugs and first kisses. Winters are for holding hands at night walks, watching their breaths coming out in puffs. Winters are for vacation with friends at Hokkaido and getting into snowball fights. Winters are for cakes and KFC and first shrine visits of the new year.
Springs are for hanami and reunions, for attending a school entrance ceremony, for new jobs and workshops and hope. Springs are for renovations and furniture shopping and converting a barely used bedroom to a guest room.
Summers are for rainy seasons and heatwaves, for beaches and sunburns and “No, Hibiki-san, I don’t want to learn how to swim.”
Summers are for anniversaries and nightmares to be soothed.
Seasons pass by, but the memories remain, old and new.
Vacation
On their shinkansen ride back from Hiroshima, Miyu gets hooked on the manga that Shelley recommended to her the day before right from the first chapter. It may be kind of strange to get manga recs from an American friend, but Miyu’s more of a BL reader, the yuri she occasionally reads are written by mangaka who also draw BL. But mecha and magical girls are an interesting combination, and Miyu’s capital letter Invested in the three main characters’ journey by the time she gets halfway through the first volume.
She’s about to tap on the Store app to buy the next—third—volume when something warm and heavy leans against her right side. She drops her tablet in her lap and sits up straighter. Hibiki nuzzles into Miyu’s shoulder in her sleep.
Miyu glances at the tablet then her girlfriend slumped against her, and the choice is easy. She locks the screen and laces their fingers together.
Too hot to cuddle
Miyu yelps when something cold is pressed against the back of her neck. Hibiki chuckles and dangles a can of soda in front of her.
“C’mon, time for a break. You’ve been sitting here for like an hour.”
“Hibiki-san!” Miyu beams, turns towards her, and makes grabby hands at the can. She takes the cold beverage, not even caring what Hibiki chose for her, and downs it in one go.
Oh. Peach soda.
“If I don’t fix the AC now, the night will be unbearable.”
“Sure, but we can put up with it for a day. Probably.”
Miyu pouts. “But Hibiki-san, tonight is Bad Movie Night.”
Bad Movie Night is tradition, and it’s not Bad Movie Night without snuggling up together, making fun of the bad plotlines and unsurprising plot twists, or the inevitable bad translations when they choose Hollywood movies.
Hibiki laughs. Miyu pouts harder. Hibiki raises her hands in surrender.
“Fine, I give up. But if you’re not done in 30 minutes, I’ll haul you to the living room myself.”
Miyu considers it.
Summer's end
Miyu hasn’t been to a summer festival since high school. Her last one was a disaster date with an upperclassman whose name she no longer remembers who she ditched because their alleged interest in mechas was all pretend, then the fireworks display got canceled due to a storm. This year, however, she’s with her girlfriend, holding hands as the first firework lights up the summer sky.
They’ve seen enormous firework displays in celebration of saving the world during the press tour, country after country, there’s not much variety after a while. But here, at a local festival with barely a hundred people in attendance, everything feels both novel and familiar. The festival food is mediocre and the fireworks don’t even last for five minutes, but they have made a home here.