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Saki hadn't given much thought to Makoto after the night at the summer festival. At the time, she had felt incredibly grateful to him for saving her from an uncomfortable situation, and she still is of course. It's just that she hadn't spent much time pondering on the moment afterwards, instead opting to spend the rest of her summer vacation having fun with Anzu, Junta, Kazuki, and occasionally Riri or Rio.
The fact that she'd long since conditioned herself to not think too much about boys in the first place, was a completely different topic, one that 'probably needs to be discussed with a therapist', according to Riri, but Saki digresses.
So she was surprised when Makoto came up to her on the first day of second year, all smiles and sunshine.
"Saki!" he waved as he approached her, and she gave a small wave back. "Did you see that we're in the same class this year?"
"Oh, we are?"
"Yep! Class 2-3, you, me and Hosshi," he elaborates, followed with a little chuckle, most likely from his unintentional rhyme, Saki assumed.
Cute.
Well, that was one way to catch yourself off guard, Saki berated herself as she quickly erased the thought from her mind, for it to hopefully never appear again. She gave Makoto a small smile, hoping it was enough that he hadn't caught on to her inner turmoil.
"I'm happy to hear that, it's always nice to be in a class with friends."
"Right?" Makoto nods, reminding Saki slightly of a golden retriever, as they head on over to their new class. "I mean Hosshi and I have been friends for a while now, but I only really knew you from being her friend, so let's get along well this year!"
Despite herself, the boy's positive energy was seeming to rub off on Saki, as she gave him a smile much more genuine than her previous one. "Yes, I hope we will."
×××××
Saki hadn't told Anzu and the others about her run in with Mori, and consequently Makoto, during the summer festival. She hadn't felt the need to honestly; as Anzu would've just gotten mad and acted as her bodyguard for the rest of the summer, Junta and Kazuki didn't know about her past at all (and she preferred it to stay that way), and Riri or Rio would probably be less concerned with Mori and more concerned with Makoto saving her, making something out of the situation where quite frankly, there was nothing. As far as Saki was concerned, it was just a nice guy trying to help a friend — technically a friend-of-a-friend — out of an uncomfortable situation.
So, seeing as the two were going to be in the same class this year, Saki decided that the most logical thing to do would be to try to pretend that night never happened and treat Makoto as she would any other friend.
Emphasis on "try".
Because every time she sees him, she's reminded of that night. And, to her confusion, it's not Mori or his awful words that she thinks of, but rather Makoto's hand on her wrist, dragging her away from him without her even having to say anything, and it wasn't lost on her that for the first time, she — who avoided men like the plague her entire life — had felt safe being touched by one.
God, she thought. Riri would have a field day if she could hear this.
Thankfully, the sight of Anzu's curly red hair approaching her was enough to pull her away from her thoughts and back to the real world.
"Are you going to the cafeteria today?" she asks, as Anzu takes a seat in the empty chair across from her.
"Nope. Kazuki made lunch today." Anzu grabs her bento from her bag as Saki grabs her own. "You know, he could make one for you too. I mean he already makes three, what's one more?"
"One more is four bentos for one person to make," Saki laughs. "I'm sure he'd appreciate it if you and Junta helped him out every once in a while."
A smirk appears on Anzu's lips. "Nah, he wouldn't. He thinks we're more of a mess in the kitchen than we're worth."
Before Saki could say anything else, Anzu turned her head at a whiplash-inducing speed. "Makoto!" she shouts, waving her arms around.
Said boy beams at his name being called, waving back with the same energy as Anzu had, walking over to where the two girls were sitting.
If Anzu had known about her inner turmoil, this would've been the perfect moment for Saki to glare at her. But she didn't know. so unfortunately, Saki can't glare at her. Instead she looks up at Makoto and gives him a small smile, one which pales in comparison to his bright one.
"Hosshi! Saki!" he says as he approaches them. "You guys brought lunch today?"
"Yep!" Anzu nods. "Wanna join us?"
Though Saki's facial expression remained unchanged, every cell in her body was shouting please say no, please say no! Just seeing him was enough to jumble up all her thoughts, so she wasnt sure how long she could handle being in his near vicinity.
Fate smiled on Saki today, as Makoto shook his head regretfully. "Sorry, I'm heading to the cafeteria today. but maybe some other time?"
"Yeah, definitely," Anzu says as Makoto turns around to leave, waving at the girls, and Saki lets out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding.
Was it normal for one moment with someone to affect a person this much? Somehow, she doubted it.
if Riri were here (and was somehow privy to all of Saki's internal monologue), Saki knew she'd be gushing on and on about how this definitely has to mean that Saki was in love with Makoto.
As she turned her attention back to her lunch, her eyebrows furrowed in thought, she wondered, is this what love feels like?
She didn't know.
×××××
The sound of each of her footsteps was loud and clear against the sidewalk, along with the sound of the raindrops hitting the ground around her.
She was late for school. And it had started raining approximately five minutes after Saki had left her house. And of course, she hadn't brought an umbrella with her.
So now, she was running to school in the rain with her backpack acting as a makeshift umbrella (with little success), and thinking about how she didn't have any gym clothes in her locker that she could change into. She could perhaps ask to borrow Anzu's, but even if she did happen to have some, considering how much taller Anzu was then her, the clothes would probably be significantly big on her.
Oh well, beats being in wet clothes all day.
As she walked into the school building, leaving drops of water behind her, she headed toward her locker to drop off her stuff before going to class.
She hadn't expected anyone else to be out in the hallways at this time.
"Saki?"
Saki turned to the source of the voice, seeing Makoto at his own locker with an umbrella in his hand. Clearly someone was smarter than her today.
"Makoto," she gave him a hesitant smile as she walked towards him. "You're late too?"
"Yeah, I had a fight with my sister right before I left, something about me taking her notebooks or whatever. You didn't check the weather forecast before you left?" he asked, a barely visible smirk appearing on his face.
Saki rolled her eyes in a way that she hoped seemed playful, and not passive aggressive. "No, I didn't. I overslept and left in a hurry."
"Ah, I see," he nodded in understanding as she finally made her way up to him. And just as it seemed he was about to open his mouth to say something else, his eyes suddenly widened and he quickly turned his head away, as if he suddenly couldn't bear to look at her anymore.
Just as Saki was about to ask him what the problem was, she remembered her her current situation and quickly looked down at her clothes.
Sure enough, her entire shirt had been soaked through and was sticking to her body like a wet napkin, offering a free view of her bra for anyone who looked at her.
At that moment, Saki couldn't find the strength in her to look up again as her fists clenched around the hem of her skirt. Great, she thought. Just what I needed. To give the all the boys here more material to tease me about.
She could walk into class right now and ask Anzu for her gym clothes right away, but by then everyone else would have seen as much of her as they would ever need to see. She could text Anzu, but she probably wouldn't check her phone in the middle of class. Was there any way that her clothes would dry before the bell rings?
Just as Saki was starting to seriously consider ditching school and going back home, she suddenly saw a wad of clothes being thrusted at her.
She looked up to see Makoto, who still wasn't looking at her but now had a faint red color dusting his ears, handing her what appeared to be a pair of gym clothes. "Here," he mumbled, just loud enough for her to hear. "Please wear these."
Saki hesitated for a couple of seconds before taking them, figuring he wasn't much taller than Anzu anyway, so his clothes would probably be about as big on her as her's would.
"Thank you so much!" Saki exclaimed as she bowed, even though he still wasn't looking at her. "I really can't thank you enough. I promise I'll wash them and bring them back tomorrow."
"Don't worry about that," he shakes his head as if brushing the matter off. "I-I'll see you in class."
Saki nods as she holds the clothes to her chest and runs towards the bathroom to change.
As she was changing, she came to the realization that this was now the second time that Makoto had saved her from a very uncomfortable situation.
It also dawned on her that, while most of the boys in school would have taken the opportunity to tease her and ask her perverted questions about her cup size, Makoto wouldn't even look at her properly, even though he was in a position that almost any other guy would have loved to be in.
He really is different from all of them, she thought. And that thought, combined with his previous actions, was enough for her heartbeat to start speeding up.
No, Saki! Get it together! He's just a nice guy trying to help a friend out, this doesnt mean anything for him or you.
After she got her heart to settle down, she headed to her classroom, apologizing to her teacher for being late.
As she started heading towards her seat, she first made eye contact with Anzu, whose face went from worried to relieved in an instant.
And just as she was about to sit down, she came eye to eye with Makoto, who gave her a small but genuine smile.
That smile was enough to once again make her heart beat faster, and as she turned around, pretending to pay attention to the lesson, she thought to herself: is this what love feels like?
She still didn't know
×××××
Saki didn't know what love was. Never had, even throughout her relationship with Mori. Though, thanks to him, she definitely learned what love wasn't, she still wasn't sure what it was.
And now that she thinks about it, she isn't sure that many people around her know either. Anzu, despite being the subject of envy from most of the girls in their school due to her closeness with so many ikemen, hasn't ever shown that she had romantic interest in any of them. Riri was obsessed with the idea of love, but Saki doesn’t recall that she's ever actually experienced the emotion herself. And while Saki was suspecting that Kazuki might be in love with Anzu, he had never said as much to her, nor was she about to ask him about it.
Though there is one person, she thought, who she's absolutely sure knows what love is. He does such a terrible job of hiding his feelings for Anzu that probably everyone around him is aware of them, including Anzu herself.
That makes him the perfect person to talk to.
"Junta," she said with a smile, as the boy walked out of baseball practice after school, waving bye to his teammates.
"Oh, hi Saki," he jogged towards her. "I assumed you'd left with Anzu. I didn't know you were part of a club too."
"Oh, no, I'm not. I was waiting for you, actually."
Junta furrowed his eyebrows in confusion, looked around, and then looked back at Saki. "Me?" he asked, and she could almost see a question mark forming above his head.
Saki giggles before replying, "Yes, you. Would you walk me home, if it's not any trouble? There's something I'd like to talk to you about."
Junta visibly relaxes with the confirmation, giving Saki a friendly smile. "It's no trouble at all. Please, lead the way."
×××××
As the two made their way toward Saki's house, making small conversation along the way, Saki decided it was finally time to talk about what's been on her mind.
"Junta, I hope you don't mind me asking you this — I'm only asking you because of your feelings towards Anzu–"
Junta suddenly starts stuttering, wide eyed and shaking his head, barely able to form a coherent sentence. "Me? Anzu? No, i–it's not like– I mean– I– is it really that obvious?"
Saki once again couldn't help but giggle at the state her best friend had gotten the school's baseball ace into with just the mention of her name. "It is, but it's okay. I think it's quite cute, actually."
Junta groans, covering his face with one hand. "Cute isn't exactly what I'm going for here."
Saki shrugged, a gleeful smile on her face, before returning to the reason why they were here. "Well, what I wanted to ask you is kind of about that. Well more like, umm, I'm just going to ask it directly if that's okay with you."
A nod from Junta. "Okay, well, I wanted to ask you, Junta, what it feels like to be in love with someone."
A moment of silence. Then Junta spoke up. "Oh, um, okay. May I ask who this is about?"
"Nope."
"Can I take a guess at least?"
"No, you can't."
"Okay then," he shrugged, not being able to get any extra information out of her. "Well, I guess it's different depending on the person, but for me, I'd say it started with sort of a denial stage? Like a time where I was trying to ignore my feelings."
Check.
"Then I'd find myself constantly replaying all of our interactions in my mind whenever I saw her."
Check.
"Then I couldn't help but notice how different she was from the other girls around me. And my heart would start beating faster at even the smallest things she would do."
Check. And check.
"Uhhh, what else? I'd also do things to try and get her approval a lot, but that might just have to do with my people-pleasing tendencies? I don't know. Like I said, it's different for every person, so I don't really know if this is helpful for your situation or not."
"No," Saki smiled at him. "It definitely was. Thank you for being so honest with your answer."
So this is what love feels like.
...
So I love Makoto.
Saki was surprised at how calmly she reacted to that thought. She had imagined that the realization that you loved someone would be one that would shake you to your core, but no. In fact, she felt at ease, finally able to make sense of her feelings.
Now the new question on Saki's mind was, does Makoto love me back?
That, she didn’t know.
×××××
Saki spent very little time sleeping that night. And the next night. And the night after.
Instead, she'd find herself spending her nights overanalyzing every interaction she'd have with Makoto during the day — whether it be a smile he sends her way, their fingers brushing against each other when passing papers in class, or even the way he says her name — to try and make something out of it, to understand if he held any feelings towards her other than friendship.
So far, she'd come up moot. But she wasn't about to give up. She just needed some help.
So the next day, Saki decided that she would finally talk to Anzu about everything, from the summer festival to all that's happened since the start of the school year, and ask for her help in better understanding Makoto's feelings.
Unfortunately, her lack of sleep caught up with her, and she found herself falling asleep during class instead.
When she felt that she was being shaken awake, she was relieved to see a head of bushy red hair in her blurry vision, instead of a teacher ready to scold her.
"Saki?" Anzu asked, taking a seat in the chair in front of her. "Are you okay? It isn't like you to sleep during class like that."
Saki groaned as her vision started clearing up, lifting her head off of the desk. "Yeah, I'm okay. I just haven't been sleeping very well lately. How long have I been asleep?"
Anzu hummed in thought before answering. "Two classes, I think? I left you alone for a bit since it seemed like you needed the rest, but it's lunchtime now, and you need to eat too."
"Oh," Saki said. "Well thank you, then."
As her senses started to clear up, Saki noticed a weight on her shoulders that wasn't there before. She brought her hand to her shoulder and felt a sweatshirt that hadn't been there before she slept.
"Oh," Saki smiled at the kindness she recieved from her friend, taking the sweatshirt off. "And thank you for giving me your sweatshirt, by the way."
"Huh?" Anzu looked confused. "That's not mine."
And sure enough, Saki looked down at Anzu's waist to see her own sweatshirt wrapped around her.
But who else would cover me with their sweatshirt while I'm asleep?
Then suddenly, Saki thought of someone. She wasn't sure if it was a reasonable deduction or just wishful thinking on her part, but there was only one name that came to her mind.
"Where's Makoto?"
"Makoto? Oh, he's probably headed towards the gardens. I think he said something about eating lunch with Kazuki today," Anzu replied, raising an eyebrow at Saki. "Why do you ask?"
Without giving her friend an answer, Saki immediately jumped up from her seat and started running out of the door.
Saki could barely hear the sound of her name being called out from behind her over the sound of her own heartbeat, loud and clear in her ears. She held the sweatshirt close to her, hoping to reach him before he meets up with his friend.
And sure enough, as Saki ran out to the school garden, she saw exactly who she was looking for, sitting alone on a bench.
"Makoto!"
The boy turned around as he heard his name, and a bright smile appeared on his face as he saw Saki approaching him. "Saki! Good afternoon. Did you have a good nap?"
Saki nodded as she sat down on the bench next to him, giving him the sweatshirt in her hands. "Thank you for giving me this."
"Oh, umm," Makoto suddenly turned his eyes downwards, a red blush covering his cheeks and ears. "It was nothing. Don't worry about it."
As the two sat in silence for a bit, Saki's mind was running a mile a minute, one thought after another.
So it was his sweatshirt. He put his sweatshirt on me while I was asleep. Does that mean something? Or was that just him being a good friend? He's such a nice guy that I can't tell what his true intentions are.
I want to tell him. How I feel about him. But what if he doesn't feel the same way? Would that ruin our friendship?
But what if he does feel the same way? I won't know until I ask him.
Contrary to what most people would assume about Saki, given her fragile appearance and soft spoken nature, she can actually be quite bold when she needs to be.
And she decided now was a good time for that boldness.
"Makoto," she said, hoping her seriousness was conveyed in her voice. "There's something I'd like to tell you, if it's fine with you."
Makoto glanced at her with a concerned look in his eyes. "Of course. Is everything okay?"
Saki hummed in confirmation, giving him a smile, which seemingly eased the boy's worries. "Everything is fine, and I hope I won't ruin it by telling you this."
"Telling me what?"
A deep breath. Okay Saki, it's now or never.
"I like you a lot, Makoto."
A second of silence passed. Then two seconds. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven.
Just as Saki was starting to fear that she had ruined everything between them, Makoto speaks up.
"You like me... like you like me as more than a friend?"
"Yes, I do."
"And you're absolutely sure of this?"
"Yes, I am."
"So if I asked you out on a date, you'd accept it?"
Now it was Saki's turn to take time to process his words. "Is that something you'd want to do?"
"Of course it is." Makoto smiled at her, and Saki realized at that moment just how relaxed she felt seeing his smile. "Saki, I like you a lot too. Have for a while, actually."
Hearing his words, Saki could feel herself smile so wide her cheeks started to hurt.
"Well then, yes. I would definitely accept."
Makoto laughed at her response, and Saki could swear his happiness was infectious, and that she wanted to be around it as often as she could, for as long as she could.
"Okay, okay. Here goes. Takamine Saki, will you go on a date with me this weekend?"
"Oda Makoto, I would love to."
As the two of them started to plan what they were going to do this weekend, with exciting chatter and the occasional bashful look, Saki wondered to herself once again: is this what love feels like?
Thanks to Makoto, she was starting to find out.