Chapter Text
"I'm sorry, Ano-chan."
Anon looked up from her desk. She had been cleaning up their class's plans that was to be submitted to the student council when Tomori spoke up. She laughed nervously.
"What for...?" She implored.
Tomori clenched her fists into her uniform. "For always... leaving it to you."
The pink-haired girl looked down again. Tomori had scribbled down the class's ideas while Anon stood in front, prodding at their thoughts, moving the conversation along when it went off the rails.
"Ah, this? It's no problem!" Clerical work was nothing new to Anon— she reveled in it. Her time as student council president ensured as much, and the main reason her classmates nominated her as class representative. Tomori was the logical next step according to them as well.
(She's the class mascot, after all!)
(You guys are in a band, right?)
She doesn't know how that fact helps them work, but it certainly beats working with someone she’s not as used to and didn’t share most of her schedule with.
"Uhm, thanks for that too, but..." Tomori looked up, meeting her eyes. "When Taki-chan tried to take on everything herself, when Soyo-chan was lost, and..." A pregnant pause, as the girl seemed to take a breath. "Saki-chan."
The name catches Anon off her feet, too. She didn't know the full breadth of their relationship, but after that first live, the daily notes on her locker, and asking to be in a band... it didn't take a genius to know she was— is important.
Tomori seems to take her silence as confusion. She pulls out a notebook from her bag and starts writing on it. Her expression slowly grew intense, her breathing quickening. After a while, she offered a page to Anon, resolute.
Our lines were all tangled up. I couldn't let go of them, but I could never reach them. No matter what I did, I was always out of step.
When she finished, she looked back up at Tomori.
"Thanks to you, I could be in that warm place again." The vocalist held the notebook close like it was a lifeline. Her voice was slow but sure. "You've helped me so much, but I haven't done anything. I'm sorry." She lowered her head.
She scrambled to put up her hands, dropping her pen. "T-Tomorin! That's not true! I-I'm happy playing in a band with you, you know!"
That day in the aquarium, Tomori threw her own words back at her, and it felt like penance. ‘ Just try your hardest so it doesn’t go wrong next time ’, she said once. But what did she do, coming home from England? She wanted to erase everything. She didn’t fear forgetting as long as it stopped the pain. Ironic, that the words that got Tomori to her feet were a product of her self-loathing, her hypocrisy.
“Don’t you remember? You put bandaids over my heart.” Anon's voice shook. When did she start tearing up? “Thanking me is…” She wanted it, but did she deserve it? So much of her actions were to cover up how colorless her life really is. Was this ball of insecurity worthy of Tomori’s affections?
Tomori didn’t wait for Anon to steady herself, already writing something down when Anon spoke. She offered it to the girl when she finished.
I thought I was a rope unravelling, but in your eyes I was sprouting.
Anon gasped. She looked at Tomori wondering if she read her mind, but no. Tomori was just like that– cutting into the heart of the matter and putting the most visceral of feelings into words. After Soyo and Taki were enraptured by her poetry, it looks like Anon was the next victim.
Unfair. Tomori really is unfair; but if she’s enough for her, maybe Anon’s doing just fine.
“Ano-chan, I don’t have a bandaid on me, so…” Tomori spread out her arms and stood stiffly.
“Huh…?” Anon tried to make sense of Tomori’s actions, but she couldn’t see as she wiped her tears.
Tomori’s torso made contact first. Then, the girl slowly wrapped her arms around Anon.
“I’m not letting go... for the rest of our lives."
Tomori was warm, and more than that, the closeness soothed her heart. But why did she bring up bandaids…?
“ Pfft– are you trying to be a bandaid?!” Anon couldn’t contain herself and started giggling. She leaned into the embrace, wallowing in the contact. “You were almost so cool, too…”
“I-I’ll be cooler next time!” Said Tomori, and Anon could feel how much of her voice came from her chest. Lub-dub. Lub-dub. She could feel Tomori’s heart clamor in her ribs, like her heart was too big for her body.
And maybe it was.
Anon looks at the discarded pen and paper on the ground, smiling to herself. She worked better under pressure anyway. “I’ll be cheering you on.”
“Mhm.”