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About a month and a half into their hiatus, Rumi feels like her world has just become larger. It’s not the first time.
A slideshow of memories crosses her mind, some fuzzier around the edges than others; some give her a headache, but most warm her heart and make her yearn for days past. She sees a thick forest, a sprawling state surrounded by nature and the kind of open space you can’t find in the city. She sees a massive tree, barely dwarfed by perspective as the years go by, and can almost hear its rustling leaves, its creaking branches. She can almost smell the morning dew in the grass, feel the coarse earth under her feet, see the damp headstone bearing her mother’s name, untouched by time under her friend’s care.
She sees Celine, imposing and steady and impassive. As her surrogate mother, as her mentor, as her guide, as her chosen executioner-
“Rumi?”
It’s early morning when Zoey snaps her out of it, having found her leader in a tank top and sweatpants, sitting at the kitchen counter and stirring a cup of ramyeon while staring off into space. Or the still warm kettle upon the stove. Rumi startles, badly, but recovers quickly like she’s always done. The familiar action carries a strange weight now. Zoey doesn’t acknowledge it, not now. That’s what the night rides are for; for the heavy stuff.
“Oh, hey, Zoey. Sorry, didn’t hear you come up.” Rumi’s smile is small but sincere, a small comfort.
The ramyeon has gone cold.
“Yeah, sorry for scaring you. Uhm, everything alright?” They still tiptoe around each other, whether intentionally or not, but it’s not walking on eggshells; barriers have been brought down, walls turned into fences. With gates and all. Quite quaint if Zoey may say so herself; but still, they creak and crackle and need to be handled with care.
“Yeah! Actually, yeah, I think I just zoned out there.” Rumi grimaces after taking a mouthful of cold noodles. “Ugh, mistakes were made.” Defeated, she places the cup in the microwave and ignores the horrified little gasp from her band mate. She opts for an attempt at normal conversation. “You, uh, you good?”
Holding back a fond snort in the face of her awkward friend, Zoey crosses the space and drapes herself on Rumi’s shoulders, holding her tight. “Perfectly fine.”
And this, this is the new frontier Rumi had been thinking about. The easy contact upon bare skin after years of covering up leaves her almost overwhelmed, but she’d rather take the near unpleasant tingles than the pain of rejecting it again. So she lets Zoey settle and gives herself time to adjust and relax and just feel. She categorically ignores the flashes of light she can catch in her periphery and just stares intently at the microwave like it owes her money.
Zoey knows, of course she does, but she doesn’t push. She doesn’t acknowledge the minute tensing of Rumi’s muscles whenever contact is made; instead, she focuses on her favorite part, which is feeling Rumi slowly melt and lean further into the touch, like she can’t get enough. Her marks pulse a gentle rhythm, they match her heartbeat and make the interaction all the more endearing.
Mira finds them still entangled later, with Rumi back on a stool with properly heated ramyeon and Zoey sleepily hanging off her back like a koala. She reels in the urge to kiss Zoey and maybe Rumi too, and just passes right by them and to the couch, although her eyes linger a little too long on Zoey.
Now, Rumi has eyes. The other two forget and she knows that they do, but Rumi has done nothing but watch for the better part of a decade. She’s done nothing but long and yearn, and wish to be part of the dynamic between her bandmates. She couldn’t before, and now she can, but old habits die hard and so Rumi remains observant. And it’s because of this that she notices the millisecond something changes between Zoey and Mira.
Rumi is not blind and Mira is not subtle and Zoey is easily distracted, and so Rumi can tell that those two had a moment of some sort; much like that first car ride she had with Zoey. The invisible wall — not as solid, maybe just a poorly placed curtain — that had been between them is gone, replaced by their usual closeness, and it’s back with a vengeance. Hushed words, fond looks and held hands; same as before, but different. Heavier and lighter all the same, strange yet so natural in the way they dance around each other.
Those touches and glances linger between them and within Rumi’s mind, and the logical part of her brain says that she should be jealous, should have always been. Maybe a tiny part, the selfish, greedier part of her, does see green in what she wishes she had; but for the most part she’s frankly just glad those two have stuck around. In spite of the crazy magic shenanigans, grueling music production, and her own demonic situation, they’ve stayed, and Rumi feels she can’t ask for more.
Furthermore, Rumi still has a gap to bridge. She is a professional vocalist second and serial overthinker first, and cannot help but wonder if Mira has always been this distant with her, or if intimacy is being put into perspective.
Zoey clings, and Rumi clings back harder after their talk and subsequent repeats. But Mira wasn’t there the first time, or any time. And while the air between them isn’t tense, there is still an odd separation that Rumi cannot identify anymore. Had it always felt like this? Was she simply overreacting given the development of her interactions with Zoey? Or with Mira?
God forbid, the thought of Mira not wanting to touch her speeds by the forefront of her mind. It shouldn’t, she’s locked up the thought in a safe and thrown it into the ocean of her subconscious; and that had been the problem. Because the thought lurks and morphs and she remembers the way Celine’s hand trembled, hovered over the patterns, the sorrow in her eyes-
Rumi exercises. The Honmoon hasn’t rippled in alarm for as long as their hiatus has been going and the restlessness is starting to get to the vocalist—a constant thrum under her skin that makes the patterns pulse and flash in a kaleidoscope of what might be too much energy. So she exercises in their home gym.
It quiets her muscles but not her mind. So Rumi fills the space with music and podcasts and machinery. Zoey calls it an audio jungle; unlike her leader, she also refuses to adhere to a regimen now of all times that they are finally free of schedules and rehearsals. Instead, she makes the couch her residence and leaves Rumi to her shenanigans.
The audio jungle helps. It distracts her and overwhelms her, in that same barely tolerable way she’s come to associate with comfort. Better to feel too much than nothing, she reasons. She’s repressed everything way too long and she’d rather bleed than leave in a plexiglass box any longer.
Mira observes from afar, because Rumi is still stuck inside her refurbished maze, locked up in what resembles a suburban home now. It has white picket fences instead of walls and uncovered windows and thin walls, and Mira can see and hear perfectly fine how she struggles and squirms, adjusting to her new space and reality. It’s still Rumi, but less guarded, more exposed; a raw nerve of a woman.
Mira aches to reach out. She could, realistically. Right now even. Something stops her and irritation blooms in her chest. At herself for being a coward, at Rumi for not asking for help, and at Zoey for—something. She’s pissed and annoyed and perhaps a little sad too, which then loops back into irritation. It bothers her and makes her skin crawl and a part of her wants to ask Zoey for advice. Which, she can just ask for. So she does.
And as she comes up with the words for such a request an earlier conversation orbits her mind once more, something that had bothered her and remained in the periphery of her worry. So she scraps the speech and does what comes easiest, which is barging into Zoey’s room unannounced once again.
“You’re still mad at Rumi.”
Zoey blinks.
“Hi, I’m fine, thank you, how are you doing?” She rolls her eyes, mockingly going through the motions of a conversation they’re not having.
Whatever. Surely the words at the tip of her pen will return. Eventually. Ugh.
She scratches out the half formed sentence.
“Yes, hi. We never circled back to it. Why are you still mad?” Mira narrows her eyes from her perch on the doorframe, like she’s scanning her girlfriend—what a word—for any extra information.
Zoey whirls around on her desk chair, and then does an extra twirl because it’s fun. “Weeeell, I was still mad like a week ago if you even care to remember, which doesn’t mean I’m angry now-”
“And are you? Angry?”
“Oh, well, kind of. Not exactly? Not really at her. Much. Maybe.”
A beat.
“Care to elaborate or…?”
“Close the door first? She’ll get a panic attack if she hears this.”
They know she won’t hear. Her workouts tend to run long; longer than before, enhanced by something demonic they figure. They haven’t touched the idea. But Mira obliges and then sits on the bed’s edge and leans forward with her forearms on her legs, scrutinizing Zoey’s face intently.
“Look”, Zoey starts, closing her notebook and leaving the pen within its pages. “I actually can’t tell you much. ’Cause part of the reason goes into something she told me in confidence. Then there’s the other part. But- I think most of it is that she just assumed? That we’d turn on her? As in, during normal circumstances. As in, if she had just sat us down and explained the patterns and whatnot. Like a healthy friendship.”
She runs her hand through her hair in that way she does when she needs to shake off energy, when there are no pens nearby to chew through or notebooks to write on. Or in this case, when she ignores her preferred methods of unwinding in favor of staring on track in the conversation.
“But she didn’t tell us, and we found out in the worst possible way, and reacted in the worst possible way. Big deal! We talked it out, she’s fine, I’m fine. Mostly.” With a deep, weary sigh she stands from the desk and drops heavily by Mira’s side. “I know there’s a not really small part of her that’s still waiting for the other shoe to drop, like we’ll kick her to the curb or something. Like she’s on probation.
“Only part of the reason is because you two haven’t talked. Like, a big talk. But it’ll come.” Mira holds her and pretends not to see the sidelong glance Zoey shoots her. “Another part is her messed up self esteem. I swear I’ve never seen anyone go from feeling like the hottest person in the room to absolute trash quicker than her.”
And Mira knows this one, she’s seen it too. ‘I’m everyone’s type’, she’d say, striking a pose and playfully brushing back her impossibly long braid. Like she was feeling herself, filling a room with her presence, and it was true. But then she’d do something funny, say something embarrassing, and her ego would wilt like a dried up plant. She’d deflate and deflect, isolate, then come back carefully controlled. At least outwardly. She wouldn’t make the same mistake twice.
“And I think that’s when I shut up because it leads into the other other part of it. And I really shouldn’t bring it up. She’s told me things, Mir, and I kind of want to cry sometimes. She’s so detached whenever she brings it up, like she doesn’t realize it’s kinda messed up. I’ve tried to tell her and that’s when she clams up again.”
Zoey’s eyes are glassy but her freckles are popping out in her increasingly red face until she’s shaking Mira’s arm out of a need to expel energy somehow, in any way she can. Mira just tries not to fall off the bed and fight off the bewildered look on her face. “I’m so done! She won’t listen to me! And I get why and that makes me angrier! And I can’t tell you, which makes me even angrier, ugh!”
“Zo, it’s fine, I’ll talk to her. It’s been long overdue anyway-”
“Good luck making her listen! Maybe she responds better to you. But ugh! You know why she’s in the gym now? Because she got upset earlier! I could hear her on the phone in the balcony— she’s not as stealthy as she thinks, demon or not. I swear, next time Celine shows up I’m going to strangle her-” All emotion leaves Zoey’s body, replaced by pure panic as she covers her mouth with both hands.
A blink.
“Celine.”
“Mira.”
“Celine?”
“Mira, don’t.”
“Like, momager Celine?”
“Mira, I shouldn’t have said that. I should not have said that, I really shouldn’t have, don’t tell her I told you. Don’t make that face, she’ll know exactly what I told you and she’ll never speak to me again-”
Zoey is visibly panicking and rambling and Mira is not making any sort of face, certainly not one of deep indignation, like she’s been personally offended. “We knew Celine was kind of a dick, but in that way strict moms are. Is she really that bad?”
“Mira, she’s- No! I’m not saying anything else! Just ask Rumi! But, like, subtly. Like I didn’t say anything. You’re better at that! And I meant it before—maybe she’ll listen to you! You know, trauma bonding and whatnot.”
“Not what the word means.”
“Whatever! Just talk to her!”
And really, Mira isn’t sure how. It’s not like she and Rumi have been ignoring each other; they can hold innocuous conversations well enough, chatting about nothing. They can brush shoulders in the hallway or exchange amused looks over Zoey’s antics, but the struggle is in the deeper stuff. In the ugly. In the guilt and grief that still resides within Mira’s ribs, in the discomfort and insecurities of Rumi’s new found self.
Mira won’t corner Rumi. She can get away with cornering Zoey, who immediately spills a dictionary’s worth of words to explain herself. Zoey is the only person able to corner Rumi because she’s soft about it, gentle. Mira would not be cornered under any circumstances; she’s the kind that snaps and bites and pushes back.
Rumi is skittish in the best of times, and after the Idol Awards she’s become a live wire. Her emotions are suddenly out in the open with the shifting hues of her patterns and it terrifies her; a life’s worth of hiding does that to a person.
Mira is blunt and aggressive and cannot get the image of a fearful Rumi out of her head. Fearful of her and Zoey. Of herself. So she avoids the conversation even more, swears to Zoey she will get around to it, and tries to come up with a plan.
Just shy of two months into the hiatus, Rumi doesn’t corner Mira. Not on purpose, at least.
Rumi is a being of routine, Mira has known this since they were teens. She’s always up at the ass crack of dawn, has her hobbies organized by a rotating schedule, and buys the same exact pajamas multiple times whenever they stop fitting or too many washes have torn them. ‘For the sake of consistency’, she had defended herself once when the other two pointed it out mockingly. All good natured teasing, as they had gifted her a couple of extra sets for the Huntrix anniversary.
Rumi thrives in familiarity, which doesn’t necessarily mean she isn’t adventurous. The vocalist would try anything at least once—at her own pace.
The demonic changes in her body cared little about pacing.
She can—and has—managed the extra energy, the restlessness, the rushing thoughts. Sharpened teeth and a single cat-like eye, which aren’t present often enough to alter her day to day, are easier to begrudgingly accept. Even the constant sight of her patterns out of the corner of her eye is becoming customary. She doesn't scramble to cover them as often anymore, doesn't flinch when the other two see. What gets her is the glowing.
Because it's overwhelming enough getting a grip of the feelings swirling in her mind and heart any given day without the light show that has become of her skin. Anything felt with enough intensity is immediately displayed and broadcasted for everyone to see, and in sparkling technicolor too.
And she's learning and trying so hard to get over it—she is—but it’s late and the lights are off and she’s stumbling upon the coffee table. Her shin hurts like hell. It’s been weeks of being on edge and it hurts and she curses, and then her patterns glow a deep horrifying red, almost like blood. It sends her on a spiral. Rumi can barely recall going out onto the balcony; the crisp night air of Seoul so high up bites at her skin and doesn't feel like enough.
She leans over the railing, gripping it for dear life, unable to make out the difference between her patterns shuffling wildly and the lights of the city below. Her eyes shut tight, hoping to block out the flickering. It barely works. Her breath won’t reach her lungs no matter how much she tries; fog rolls into her mind, slow and inevitable.
All this to say, Mira had expected Rumi to be mid workout, when in reality she was halfway bent over the balcony railing feeling like she was drowning. And Mira, soda in one hand and plate of tteokbokki in the other, has half a mind to drop them to the side before rushing to pull her friend back.
“Rumi!”
There is little resistance, though Rumi’s body is stiff and seemingly stuck in that doubled-over position, hands gripping at her arms like she’s futilely covering her patterns. They end up hitting the wall and sliding down, with Mira taking the brunt of it and keeping a struggling Rumi in her lap, although her touch is tentative, just barely holding her in place by the hips in fear she’d try and bolt away.
“Rumi, I need you to breathe, love. Can you hear me?”
She’s trying, can’t Mira see? But it doesn’t work, and her mind scrambles to remember how she’s fixed it before, how she’s fixed herself. How she has run and hid and grasped at straws to keep herself together before returning to her group and pretending everything was fine.
Mira presses a hand to her chest and breathes by her ear, instructing gently. “Breathe with me. Four in, four hold, four out. Can you do that for me?” Because Rumi isn’t stealthy and more than once Zoey and Mira have tried catching her in the act, holding her before she bolts, but they have never been able to notice the signs until they realize she’s gone.
They had called Celine the first time. She’d waved them off with reassurances and confirmed she had been in contact with her charge, that she’d be back shortly, that she knew better than to walk out on them. Rumi’s face when she returned was an unsettling mask of pretend security and confidence; it stayed on for weeks. They hadn’t called Celine since.
Instead they waited, because Rumi always came back to them. Like the time they botched the Golden performance. Like the last Idol Awards.
Slowly, painfully so, Rumi’s breath evens out. She’s still shaking like a leaf and sweating bullets, but no longer hyperventilating, which Mira will still take as a win.
“There you are, tiger.” The hand on Rumi’s chest transfers to her shoulder, giving it a squeeze she hopes is grounding. “Talk to me. What happened?”
Her tongue feels like it’s made of lead and her jaw refuses to cooperate, trembling and cutting her attempts at a clear sentence. The frustration cuts through the fog at least, a buoy to cling to in a turbulent sea of thoughts. “I-I don’t know. Just. Too much.” Her muscles seize even as she tries to relax, minutely leaning further into Mira.
There’s silence for a moment, only filled by the sounds of cars and people below, muted by distance. The night sky above has barely any visible stars, still polluted by light even this high up; the expanse of darkness is hardly any comfort.
“Were you thinking of jumping?” Perhaps unintentionally, fear seeps through Mira’s normally guarded tone. Rumi isn’t sure what to do with that.
“Gods, n-no. No, ne- I wouldn’t.” She wants to say she’d never. But she’s promised to stop lying and some days she’s just so tired. “I just- don’t- couldn’t breathe. I didn’t realize how f-far-”
“Shh, it’s okay. It’s alright, I believe you.” Mira just holds her tight around her shoulders and around her middle, as close to herself as possible.
They stay like that for what could be a few seconds or an hour; time is still fuzzy to Rumi. But she’s grounded by the warm body pressed to her back, the steady breathing by her ear, the occasional word to keep her present. Not empty platitudes of comfort, but ‘It’s cold as balls out here’ and ‘We should install speakers in the garden’ and ‘You’re built like a brickhouse, shit’. The last finally pulls a weak chuckle out of her, and Mira visibly relaxes.
“You still with me, tiger?”
Rumi tries not to shiver at the familiar husk of Mira’s voice. Her ear still flickers an iridescent hue. “Yeah, I’m here, I think.”
“Wanna talk about what happened?”
And the thing is, she does in fact want to. Because she’s gone through the trouble of breaking down her sky high walls and prettying up her mess of a mind and she wants to open the goddamn door for once. By her own volition and at her own pace. So yes, Rumi corners Mira because she’s already sitting on her lap and when else would they have the opportunity? Briefly she wonders where Zoey is.
“I’m going to say something upsetting.”
Mira blinks. “Uh. Okay? Go ahead.”
“Zoey- She said I should warn people. Before dropping that. I- I think it’s upsetting? She said it was.”
“Ru, it’s fine. I’m a tough cookie, just tell me.”
“I’m, uhm. It’s a question actually. Kind of a weird one really. I just need some kind of confirmation that you don’t mind- does it bother you? Touching me?” ‘My patterns’ is at the tip of her tongue, but she’s still a coward at heart and can’t bring herself to say it.
“What? No. Fuck, Rumi, never.” As if to prove her point, her hold tightenswhile her cheek presses to her friend’s naked shoulder. The marks shimmer softly, affection shining through the apprehension. “I don’t have a problem with how you look, who you are; never have.”
A weight lifts from Rumi’s shoulders, which drop minutely releasing tension she hadn’t even noticed was there. “I just needed to ask. You’ve been distant.”
Mira bites down on her tongue, feeling the beginnings of a ‘says you’ in the back of her throat, but she swallows it and tries again, more gently.
“I didn’t want to press. And I’ve been working through some stuff as well.”
“You’re still upset.” It’s not a question, but finally a declaration of what hangs in the air between them, out in the open.
“I didn’t even notice; I don’t know how I didn’t. Years, Rumi. Were they always there? Since we met?” Hurt permeates her voice and Mira finds herself too tired to care, to stop it, and realizes how often that happens. How much of her aggression is exhaustion.
“Since I was born.”
“Fuck.”
“Yeah.”
Mira breaks the momentary silence, curiosity tinting her wounded tone. “How did you even get them?”
“I don't know. My mother had some- lapse of judgement or something and, well. Here I am.” A humorless chuckle struggles to make its way out of Rumi’s chest. “The worst part is I don't know if I can blame her. Not after Jinu.”
“Right, your boyfriend.” Mira doesn’t mean to sound so childishly annoyed, but doesn’t play it off either.
“Ugh, not like that. Never like that.” The mild disgust in Rumi’s voice is hilarious and Mira saves it in a little box in the back of her mind for later. “He was just so… normal. With his patterns hidden and his eyes… I couldn't even tell him apart from a regular man that first time.”
“But not the others?” Those damned Saja Boys. She’d jump off the balcony herself before listening to their music again.
“He was aware in a way the others weren’t. Even in the end, I think, he was still there. You’d think four hundred years would have broken him down.” Rumi’s gaze drifts down to her hands, marred by the jagged marks she had been cursed with. He had them too, a product of a bad decision. Rumi doesn’t want to think of what that says about her. About her mother. “He was a good listener, if nothing else. He understood.”
There is an edge of defeat in her voice, of bone deep exhaustion. Somehow that only irritates Mira further. “Did it never occur to you that we could understand too? Talk through it?”
“I’m so sorry, Mir. I really am. I wanted to tell you, so many times.” The desperation in her voice incenses Mira, because what kind of explanation is that? She ignores the little voice in her mind reminding her she’s not so different.
Rumi just tries harder, feeling the woman tense up. “But every time I’d think of the what-ifs, all those times Celine insisted it was a bad idea. I couldn’t risk it, not when I was so sure I could fix it. Celine always said it would work; I just needed the Honmoon to turn gold-”
“Yes, of course, how could I forget.” She can’t help it, she can’t stop it, even if the words scald as they come out of her mouth. Zoey’s words linger in her mind, with Rumi’s refusal to listen, and they react with her own irritation like acid and metal. “You always listen and do as mommy dearest says-”
“Don't you fucking dare.”
Mira startles, barely. She had known it would burn, that she had struck a nerve; but she hadn’t calculated the scale. She hadn’t known, couldn’t have known, and still twisted the knife. What startles her isn’t the otherworldly undertone, the unexpected strength with which Rumi breaks out of her hold, nor the blazing golden ring burning into her soul. No, it's the vitriol. Because it has rarely ever come out of her leader and never been directed at her. The occasional exclamation of pain, of self criticism, at demons, but never at her teammates. Never at Mira.
Because it goes like this: Mira has no interest in authority. When she was fifteen and put on a team and told to follow the perfect little leader Rumi, she proceeded to get in the girl's face and told her where she could put her stupid title.
Rumi hadn't backed down, because maybe she had no real power to boss her around and would never resort to violence, but she was going to demand basic respect from her teammates, and give back as much. And Mira had no argument against that. She disliked authority, but she wasn't some antisocial freak.
They had continued to butt heads for most of training and the early years of Huntrix, but the animosity died out, replaced by friendly rivalry. Rumi rose up to the position of leader with blood, sweat, more blood, and maybe hidden tears. And without even noticing, Mira followed. She has done so for a good chunk of her life now, and would gladly continue.
She’d follow even now, with her leader snarling at her and glowing a warning violet in the dark of night. This might be the prettiest she’d looked, she thinks, not without some trepidation.
Mira at least has the decency to apologize, all wide eyed but not fearful. Awed. When had she forgotten Rumi could stick up for herself? “I’m sorry.”
“You’re not.” It comes out more petulantly than she’d like, tone carrying through the hellish nature of it all. For once Rumi cannot bring herself to care.
“Maybe just a little.” A beat. “Celine still sucks though.”
There must have been something in Mira’s face that gave her away, because Rumi flinches, violently.
“Zoey told you.”
Mira can’t deny it, not now with everything so raw. “Barely anything.”
“But she told you something.”
A charged silence.
“Well you did vent to Zoey of all people-”
“Shut up.”
Another silence, though somewhat lighter.
“She’s just worried, Ru. We both are.” A deep sigh. “For what it's worth, she really didn’t say anything, it was in the heat of the moment. Said you had mentioned her before.”
“I didn’t want her to worry. It’s just- Every time I think I’m saying something normal she gets this look on her face, like I’m- like she’s-” ‘Looking at a beaten up stray’, Rumi thinks. She doesn’t say it.
But Mira knows. She’s been on the receiving end of those looks too. “She doesn’t mean it like that. But have you told her? That it bothers you?”
“I don’t want to upset her.”
“Jesus, you two are useless.” Mira rolls her eyes, quietly thankful for the lifted tension in the air. “What are those car rides good for? Tell her, Ru.”
“I will! I will, just- next time.” Rumi turns and leans heavily onto the railing, thankfully no longer threatening to tip over. She scans the city below, what she’s come to call her home, and the iridescent threads of the new Honmoon protecting it. She does like it better than the monotonous blue from before.
Mira stands nearby, then thinks better of it and leans flush against her leader, shoulder to shoulder. She pretends not to see the goofy little smile that threatens to break across Rumi’s face.
“So your repressed ass is Celine’s fault from what I’m getting?”
Now Rumi is the one rolling her eyes, but it’s closer to fond exasperation. “She’s not the monster you two are thinking of. I’m not saying she is the parent of the year, but I wasn’t put in a cage as a kid, Mir. She was just distant. Always has been.”
“Still a dick move, if you ask me. And I’m the resident expert in shitty parents.” She nudges at Rumi, prompting a small smile. A win. “You don’t get to tell your kid to hide from a fictional monster and call it protection, call it love. That’s paranoia.”
It was a joke, mostly. Sort of. Mira had understood the meaning of public scrutiny since she was young, and immediately decided it was bullshit. Her family could go and maintain their precious image all they wanted; she was going to do her own thing. And she did. She still cares about the public, she thinks, deep down, but it comes from an unflinchingly supportive fanbase that would do anything for Huntrix. That kind of loyalty can’t be bought or tricked.
However Rumi still stares out at the horizon, silent. Pensive. Then, glassy eyed, shades of blue run through her patterns like a tide coming in, like the thought is just now sinking in. She moves as if to hold herself, but seems to reconsider and instead latches onto Mira’s arm, much like she had seen her cling to Zoey before. The image warms Mira’s heart, and she holds Rumi’s hand with her free one.
“I don’t think I thought of it like that.” Her voice is still steady, if fragile, barely loud enough to be heard. “Her logic made sense; still does if I’m honest. What was I supposed to believe when I’m the monster under the bed?”
Something clicks, finally. After all, Mira cannot catch a lie that is not there. Because every time Rumi expressed the same hatred for demons as them, it was true. Every time she hid, refused physical touch, or avoided intimacy, she hadn’t lied so much as convinced herself that she simply didn’t get to experience any of it. There was no lie to catch because the lie permeated and thrummed within Rumi like the blood in her veins, like it had been woven into her soul.
With the usual severe eyes and gray hairs and a stick up her ass, the image of Celine comes unbidden to Mira’s mind. For a split second she feels dizzy with the sheer anger that crosses her mind. Zoey’s outburst makes more and more sense.
Because Celine may have given her an alternative when she had run from her family, but it was Rumi who gave her a purpose, and Zoey who gave her an anchor. It was the both of them that had given her a place to belong; Mira had little loyalty to spare on yet another uptight adult.
“Damn. If you’re a monster, what does that make the rest of us, huh?” The confusion breaks Rumi out of her stupor, giving Mira a questioning glance. “Such a crybaby for a monster.”
And indignant gasp. “Hey!”
“Or a light bug.”
“Oh, shut up.”
“Make me, tiger.”
Rumi shoves her, and Mira shoves back, and the sounds of the city are drowned out by their laughter and playful banter.
It turns into borderline sparring at some point; Rumi has never had to worry about holding back with Mira. But she’s just playing and exhausted from the emotional rollercoaster she had been through, and nearly slips in a puddle of forgotten soda before Mira catches her by the waist to steady her. They end up face to face, close enough that Rumi has to tilt her head up to properly look into Mira’s eyes.
“Oh! Hi.” She isn’t blushing, she isn’t. Her patterns do not flicker with light.
“Hey yourself. You alright there, tiger?” Mira’s annoying little smirk speaks volumes of what she’s noticed.
And Rumi would never admit it out loud but she loves the nickname. Because Mira says it so playfully, so teasingly, with such fondness that it hits Rumi like a truck. Because it acknowledges all the parts of herself she’s still learning to love. Because it’s such a Mira move to proclaim love in the little, subtle things rather than say it word for word. Because Rumi is so painfully in love she isn’t sure what to make of the emotion filling her chest.
“You're doing that thing.”
What.
“What?”
“With your face, that thing when you're thinking too hard. Scrunching up, makes you look stupid.”
Rumi gasps and tries to break out of Mira’s hold. “I'm not-! My face does not look stupid!”
“No, it does, I swear.” And Mira holds tight, because Rumi could escape if she really wanted to, but they're still playing.
“Shut up! You're insufferable!” She's laughing too hard, only half heartedly hitting Mira's arm in protest.
“It's the truth! Wanna know why?”
“Why?”
“‘Cause you wanna kiss me so bad it makes you look stupid.”
And Rumi just gapes and does her best impression of a bioluminescent fish as an increasingly fidgety Mira slowly takes half a step back.
“Or, you know, not, which is fine. Totally misread that. Whatever.”
The nonchalant tone and averted gaze are familiar, and Rumi is delighted to discover Mira is just as flustered as she is. It gives her the rush of confidence she needs to raise up on her tiptoes and kiss her. Which is frankly horribly awkward because Rumi hasn't kissed anyone before and Mira had not seen it coming, and they both stumble and end up laughing again.
Mira finally cups Rumi’s cheek and kisses her properly this time. Unrushed, tender and oh, so loving. Rumi could melt. And she does, arms around Mira's shoulders, keeping her close. A promise that she won't stray far either, not anymore, not from her team. Not from Mira.
They stay together like that, swaying gently to the tune of Mira’s humming and Rumi’s harmonizing, effortlessly in sync as they've always been. The Honmoon shimmers in time with Rumi’s patterns, strong as ever.
“You’re the strongest of us, Ru.” Mira murmurs in the quiet, a tinge of regret staining the otherwise fond compliment. “Gwi-Ma didn’t even get to you. Not the way he got us.”
Rumi doesn't even lift her head from Mira’s chest, and if anything, pulls her closer. “Nothing Gwi-Ma said was worse than what I say to myself on the regular.”
“Fuck. Heavy.”
Rumi snorts. “Right? I have like a notebook's worth of those.”
“Zoey could turn them into lyrics.” Rumi laughs, but Mira seems to be actually thinking about it.
“Zoey would cry reading them.”
“Actually, fair.”