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Today, October 31st, is a day Mabayu has been waiting for.
Mabayu has been eyeing this film festival coming to Mitakihara for months, the freshman directors with their debut films looking so promising she could almost forgive that one director for pulling their film mere days before it was happening. But it's here! And she's so giddy!
Homura, who had been uncharacteristically invited over by Mabayu to "just hang out", notices her excitement. She leans over the girl's shoulder, looking at the phone with the information on the film festival on it. "What are you looking at?" She asked flatly, causing Mabayu to hurriedly turn around and pass her phone to Homura.
"An indie film festival is coming to Mitakihara tonight! A bunch of new directors are showing off their first movies! And they're all gonna be horror movies! You know, for Halloween." Mabayu's smile grew as she quickly moved to look at her own phone with Homura. She's already read all this a million times before, but she'd read it a million more times just to make sure it was really real.
Homura nodded as she glanced over the text on the screen, handing the phone back to Mabayu and half expecting her to go on another tangent about all the individual films. Mabayu scrolls down to the movies section, now sitting right up against Homura and unconsciously leaning into her. She's so entranced by the movies that she doesn't even think once about how weirdly close they are, as she begins to harp on about them.
"There's gonna be so many good ones! Like, The Sweet Life, which is a slasher about a serial killer who has a double life as a detective in Hollywood. The director for that one already used to be a critically acclaimed horror writer, so when she comes to the big screen with a big budget it's gonna be incredible! Then there's Memories of the Grove, the one I'm really looking forward to. I heard that the entire test audience all had similar nightmares that night. Which is just the coolest thing ever! But also Something Good-" Mabayu stopped mid sentence, realizing she's been going on and on with no reaction from Homura. She looks down, ashamed, and her volume follows her head. "S-Sorry. I'm just, um, I'm excited."
Homura looked away to conceal her smile, straightening her face to match her cool persona before looking back at her. "Don't apologize," she said, "I really don't mind when you talk a lot. It's rather soothing, honestly." Mabayu didn't seem to recognize the nature of Homura's comment. Mabayu looked back up at Homura and gave her a slight smile. "…Thank you, miss Akemi."
She pauses, mustering up all the courage in her to actually go through with her initial plan and invite her. "S-So!" She blurts out as soon as the thought jumps to her head, and much louder than she had intended. Quickly lowering her voice down to a normal level, "Um, having heard all that, would you m-maybe go with me? I-If not, that's fine! I-I just thought we'd go since we're both already here."
Homura responded instantly and flatly with a simple, "Sure."
…! Woah! She accepted? All of her anxieties disappeared in a moment. She had half expected Homura to beat her within an inch of her life with a golf club for even asking.
"Yes!" Mabayu shouted excitedly. "I didn't think you liked horror movies, miss Akemi. I figured you just wouldn't enjoy them."
Homura keeps her neutral expression as she responds, "If you think I'd be too scared, you're mistaken." Mabayu laughs it off, causing Homura to smile along with her.
It started in only an hour, so if they go now they'll be able to reach it a little early to snag good seats before they're all gone. "It's actually gonna start pretty soon. Let's go before all the good seats are taken!" Mabayu exclaimed.
Homura agreed, and they walked out of her room minutes later. Her aunt, Sakie Aki, stands alone behind the counter in a completely empty cake shop. Sakie stops them as they're coming out of Mabayu's room, calling out her niece's name. "Mabayu, dear, where are you going?"
The two girls turned to her, and Mabayu responded, "We're going to see some movies at a film festival a bit away. I'll be back in a few hours." Sakie nods in acknowledgement, "Well, hm, I think you've worked enough hours to deserve this. Goodbye then, girls! Come right back here when it ends!" As Mabayu is walking out, she replies with a lazy, "Okaaay."
Homura quickly follows suit, but Sakie stops her specifically. "Homura Akemi, yes?" Homura stops and takes a few steps back towards Sakie, replying with her same cool tone, "Yeah." Sakie giggles softly, confusing the girl in front of her. Sakie put a hand on her own cheek as she spoke again, airheaded as usual.
"I'm so glad you found Mabayu." Homura looks and sounds confused, slowly answering with, "…You're welcome?" Sakie giggles again, more forcefully this time around as she opens her mouth again, "You know, Mabayu has always been such an introverted girl, I never expected her to find a girlfriend so quickly-"
Mabayu's entire face went a molten pink upon registering what her aunt was saying, cutting off the rest of her sentence with a yelp. "Aah! N-No! Don't say that- It's not like that! It's not like that at all! Ignore her, miss Akemi!" Homura blushes and looks away, replying in a much less cool tone than before, "We're, um, n-not dating."
Sakie's eyes widened in surprise, but her voice sounded almost disappointed. "Oh! Sorry, sorry. Silly me You two just seemed like a cute couple to me, so-" Mabayu cuts her off yet again, her face way too bright for the situation at hand, "Stop it!! Miss Akemi, let's leave! We'll be back tonight!" Mabayu practically drags Homura out of the cake shop and onto the street.
"I-I'm so so so sorry, she's really weird, haha. I don't know why she said that…" Mabayu starts to speed walk to the train station, mentally cursing herself as Homura silently tails behind her. It's a silent and rather awkward walk to the station, and Homura only speaks once they're actually waiting in front of the train.
While standing in front of the railing together, Homura puts her hand on Mabayu's shoulder and causes her to jump in surprise before looking up at her. "Y-Yes?" Mabayu asks, and Homura tenses slightly as she formulates her question for Mabayu in her head. "You seem really stressed out. Is everything okay?"
Mabayu blushes as she's been caught. "I-I'm fine, really. Did Sakie weird you out at all with that… um, assumption?" Homura shakes her head, but Mabayu still looks anxious. "Uuuu… This is the worst… I should just die or something…"
"Stop this." Homura's voice had more presence than usual, almost intimidating Mabayu into perfect silence. She continued, "Take a breath or something, you're fine. Sakie thinking we're a couple doesn't deserve this reaction." Mabayu is silent for just a moment before responding. "…You're right. Thanks…" Homura releases Mabayu, hoping what she said would calm Mabayu down even a little bit.
Suddenly, two notes play and an intercom speaks to the entire station. The train is arriving soon, so it says. Within the minute, a train slows to a stop in front of them and people begin to climb in. They weave through the crowd as quickly as they can before slipping into the train car.
Entering the train car with a flood of other people, Mabayu and Homura quickly find two open seats in between two school girls to the left of them, and a fast asleep elderly man on the right. Their thighs and shoulders are squished up right up against each other. After a short wait, the intercom buzzes something and the doors shut as the train starts moving and accelerates quickly on the rails. Whispering and talking between passengers eventually breaks out onto the crowded train like white noise that's much too loud to fall asleep to.
The girls sat together in silence for the first part of the ride, Homura stoically crossing her arms and staring forward into the sea of men as the green haired girl next to her awkwardly played with the hem of her overalls and stared at her own socks. Mabayu, slightly overwhelmed, tried to think of something to bring up to make the ride less boring. The movies? No way, she's already spoken too much about them. Madoka? No no no no no, it'd be weird to bring up Homura's crush out of nowhere. The braids and glasses?
"Miss Akemi, why'd you stop being cute?" Crap. Why did she say that? Stupid girl. She regretted it immediately, her face growing more and more pink as Homura sighed. Panicking, she quickly followed it up, "I-I mean!! You're still really cute!" Homura's breath caught in her throat, but Mabayu continued. "I just, I just meant like your hair! And glasses, you, um, stopped acting cute. And started being cool and stuff." But again, to Mabayu's surprise, Homura wasn't upset in the slightest. Maybe Mabayu misinterpreted how much Homura trusted her now.
"You saw what happened. When Madoka…" She skips a word, "…I couldn't go back to how I was. And before I met you, I didn't think or need anyone to trust me either. So I didn't even pretend to be that girl again."
After a heavy silence, Homura spoke again. "…I'm not looking for consolation, though. Let's discuss the movies instead. What's going to be first?" Homura shifts the conversation, much to Mabayu's very guilty relief. "I don't want to just… sweep it under the rug, cause I care about you. But, I mean, if you don't want to talk about it, I'll oblige. um, movies! First up is gonna be Something Good!"
The mood of the conversation perks back up as Mabayu leads their conversation through the upcoming movies. The girls next to them have fallen asleep on each other's shoulders. Mabayu, seeing this, leans into Homura's shoulder as she's absentmindedly yapping about the movies, not mentioning what she's doing. Homura rests her neck on Mabayu's messy green nest of hair. It's so very soft. She smiles.
Minutes later, Mabayu is still talking in a more sleepy and quieter tone, "…the camera direction of that first trailer alone had me so hooked. And the way that actor turned around was just so cool! Then-" Two notes ring out over the intercom, and the automated voice takes over the hushed voices of the subway. Neither of them catch the whole thing, but their stop is next. "Oh! We're here!" Begrudgingly, the two escape their prior position and stand up, shuffling through the slightly thinner crowd of people to the door.
The walk to the theater is much less awkward than the walk to the station, Mabayu leading Homura through ordinary people and just as the sun is beginning to set, they see it. "Yes! We're not going to be late! Lucky us!"
The girls step through the entrance and enter the theater, an outdoor theater with countless seats for the numerous people chatting and finding seats of their own. The girls who were by them on the train were here too, the cheerful, younger girl dragging the scary, older girl into a seat. Mabayu glances over at Homura, thinking it'd be cute to do the same, maybe grab her arm and cutely go "Let's go, let's go!" and laugh the whole time, but Homura already found a seat right behind the girls. Mabayu quietly takes the seat next to her.
At the exact same time that the sun disappears over the horizon, the screen turns on. The beautiful orange and purple sky sticks around for a moment longer, complimenting the few decorations out and about. It fills Mabayu with the best kind of anxiety, the expectant and apprehensive kind akin to what horror movies bring. She kicks her feet and whips her head around to her friend, "Hehehe, I'm so hyped! What about you, miss Akemi?"
Outwardly, Homura was completely stoic. The mask she became. In reality, Homura was absolutely terrible with horror. At a very young age, she was exposed to the entirety of The Exorcist, which gave her what felt like hallucinations for days and nightmares for a whole year. So needless to say she was not excited for this. "I am," she lied, "I bet you are more, though." Mabayu giggled again, as the first movie actually started.
The first movie came and went. It was more like a thriller than an actual horror movie, keeping Mabayu on the edge of her seat the entire time and keeping Homura curled deep into hers. The ending left Homura shocked, the main monster that was toying with the main character and his friends' souls turned out to be an eldritch beast disguised as everyone the main character knew. So there were only two characters in the entire movie? Of course, he died a brutal and gory death that Homura couldn't bear to watch. Once it ends, the theater breaks into applause, including Mabayu who looked like she had real stars in her eyes. Homura tentatively clapped along too.
"Ooh, that was so peak!" Mabayu exclaimed, her mind racing a mile a minute as the credits rolled. "What a twist! You know, during that one scene where Somi was having a seizure and nobody but the main character came to help, I was thinking like 'why isn't anyone helping her?' but it was all to break the hero even more! They really nailed it!" Homura nodded along, hoping her hands weren't literally shaking from it.
"Y-Yeah," She hoped Mabayu didn't catch that slight stutter, "I thought it was amazing. The way that it was revealed was just perfect." Mabayu nodded forcefully, before leaning all the way back into her own chair.
The 5 minute bathroom break passed quickly, Mabayu kicking her feet while thinking about the film as Homura steeled herself mentally for the movie ahead of her. She could handle so much more than this usually. Was she losing her edge or something? Before she could even think of spiraling, Mabayu spoke, "It's starting!"
The theater comes to a silence as the countdown for the next movie hits zero. This was about a serial killer or something, so she thought. At first, that was the case. A Japanese detective transferred to Hollywood, California where he loses his mind in the first 20 minutes of the movie and goes on a brutal killing spree that he investigates himself for most of the movie.
The second hour of the movie slowly shifts into something more psychedelic. His victims haunt him, giving him terrible nightmares of blood and flesh. Homura's breaths speed up before very suddenly grabbing Mabayu's hand forcefully. Mabayu squeaks in surprise, turning towards Homura who is avoiding eye contact like her life depends on it. And blushing. They're both blushing a bright red.
Homura doesn't fully let go once the scene passes, though. She changes her grip to properly hold Mabayu's hand, to the girl's intense embarrassment. She doesn't say anything about it, letting Homura do as she pleases with her hand. Even if Homura is almost crushing the thing. It does actually work for Homura, the terrifying scenes unfolding in front of her are not nearly as bad anymore.
Homura shudders in relief as the applause comes and the film comes to its end. The ending had the detective in an open shootout in his own home, which he loses or something. She doesn't remember the details that well. Just glad it's over. Then, she lets Mabayu's hand go.
Mabayu withdraws her hand swiftly, shaking it with her wrist loose to try and alleviate the pain from Homura's intense grip. She looks up at Homura and laughs softly before speaking, "Haah, geez, miss Akemi. I thought you said you're not scared of horror movies? You're such a liar!" Homura instantly snaps back, "Shut up. I might have… lied. Sorry if I ruined the movie a little."
"Eh?! N-No! You didn't! I was surprised but it was actually kind of…" Her voice lowers as she realizes what she's about to say, her cheeks already a little flushed, "…k-kind of nice, actually." Homura's eyes widened and started to feel somewhat shy herself. She sheepishly waits a beat before responding.
"Glad you agree," she swallows, "Would you maybe like to do so again for this movie too?" Mabayu rapidly nods her head aggressively, her nervous frown quickly becoming a huge smile. "Y-Yeah! Yes! Let's, um, do it!" As the girls smiled at each other, the lights began to dim as the moon shone bright in the sky. The projector powered up, shining black over the giant projector in front of them. "Okay, okay. Memories of the Grove. Are you ready, miss Akemi?" Mabayu asks in a raspy, growly voice, eliciting a short nod from Homura.
Mabayu gives a silly, villainous laugh as a haunting tune of the first scene rings out and Mabayu holds her hand out for Homura. The girl hesitates for just a moment, but all it takes is a quick glance into Mabayu's sweet smile and single, clear, radiantly joyful eye and Homura sweetly takes it.
The movie finally begins proper, and barely a third of the way in, Homura knew that rumor about the shared nightmares wasn't a lie. The villain was disgustingly terrifying, the scenes so tense they could almost crush her through the screen, the story that she couldn't shake the relation to Madoka's fate… it was almost designed to terrify her. Mabayu, surprisingly, was almost shaking too, every tight squeeze drawing attention to her reactions. She couldn't shake the thought that it was the cutest thing ever.
Just as she's thinking this, the movie enters a somewhat relaxing section of the movie. Maybe not relaxing, it was still frightening, but comparatively not as bad. Homura takes another look at Mabayu.
She was just… dazzling. When they first started working together, Homura thought there wasn't a girl as lame as her. Just a weirdo with no social skills who was stalking her. Now though, Mabayu's grown on her, and after seeing her best moments, maybe even cool sometimes? But cool wouldn't be a half-decent term to describe her, no. The term she would use is overwhelmingly cute.
Mabayu glances at Homura, somehow feeling the girl's intense gaze on her, and does a double take upon seeing she really is staring with the intensity of a thousand suns. They make unbreaking eye contact, and Homura very slowly scoots to the fringe of her seat towards Mabayu.
This intense gaze gets Mabayu herself thinking of Homura, of how cool she is, of how cute she used to be, of how strong she is physically and mentally, of how naturally beautiful she is, of how effortlessly alluring she is, of how soft her lips look, of how- wait her lips?? B-Beautiful!? Alluring!? No! Stop, stop, stop! God, she really is a pervert! Is Homura even into girls?… Um, yeah, obviously but still! She can't believe how intense that eye contact is, especially for a girl who barely did eye contact! Mabayu suddenly breaks eye contact, and zips her eyes back in front of her.
Homura stops dead in her tracks too, Mabayu cutting the lock having also cut her train of thought. Was she really about to kiss her? During the movie she was so excited for? So selfish. So, so, so selfish. Ashamed, she also brings her gaze forward.
But the last thing they expected to see was happening right before their eyes, just below the screen and the many rows before them all the way to right in front of them. Mabayu gasps silently and Homura simply watches. The two girls that had rode with them and sat down just in front of them, were sharing a kiss right there. It breaks apart just moments after the girls see them, and the older girl's quiet theater voice doesn't stop the girls from catching what they say.
"Merda, Fool Girl. There. Now, don't distract me from the movie again. I'm pleasantly surprised by this one after the last two disasters." She seems extremely irritated, but it doesn't seem to phase her purple haired junior, who simply responds with, "I love you too." After hearing that, Mabayu and Homura stop listening in.
The movie seems to be completely silent as they turn towards each other yet again. Homura, extremely nervous, trails her hand up Mabayu's arm to neck before finally reaching her cheek and cups the whole thing, gently getting a feel for the girl's unfairly soft skin. She trails a thumb to the girl's chapped lips, which makes the girl tremble slightly as her eyes dart around to make sure nobody is looking, before hesitantly putting her own hand over Homura's soft hand. Mabayu shuts her eyes tight and waits, completely unsure what to do in this situation. She, unsurprisingly, hasn't kissed anyone before.
With the little experience Homura has, puts a hand on the back of Mabayu's head and brings her in for a kiss. Unfortunately, they both feel a sharp pain right on their faces as Homura accidentally bumps her forehead into the recipients. Mabayu lets out a small "ow," and Homura an apologetic, "sorry" before she goes back into the kiss.
This time, their lips touch. It's very awkward, Mabayu being far too inexperienced to do anything but take whatever Homura gives. She does eventually lean back into the girl, gradually wrapping her arms around the girl's neck loosely. Homura's arm lowers from the back of Mabayu's head to her lower back. It doesn't get any more intense for a whole twenty seconds before Homura very carefully takes her time backing off with the quiet sound of her lips peeling away from Mabayu's.
Mabayu's eyes slowly creep back open as Homura's flutter open and they stare at each other. Both of their faces are completely red, Mabayu's blush so intense she's almost completely changing colors. Homura releases Mabayu's cheek from her grasp and they sit there in complete silence. A sudden loud scream in the movie suddenly reminds them that they are in fact both in public and in a movie theater, watching a movie.
No longer holding hands, they keep watching the film but are completely out of it. Mabayu keeps touching her own damaged lips, replaying the kiss over and over in her head before her stomach drops. She fully forgot. Madoka Kaname. Homura likes Madoka. Not her. Her giddy smile vanishes there on the spot and her heart feels like it's being smashed into a million pieces, a pain worse than death.
Homura, however, can't for the life of her stop smiling. She's not focusing on the movie at all either, instead constantly shooting glances at Mabayu whose face she sadly cannot see from that hair in her face. For the rest of the movie, she keeps her eyes on the screen and a smile plastered on her face with her mind on the shut in beside her.
The 52 minutes left in the movie tick by rapidly, and Mabayu barely waits for the applause before bolting up and beginning to walk out. She doesn't remember any of the second half of the movie. Did Mac even save Dennis? She'll have to watch it again later. Right now, her priority is getting out of here right now.
She coughs to get Homura's attention, and is looking fully away from her as she speaks, "We should, um, g-go home now. Sakie's expecting us." Homura nods and stands up too, going with Mabayu to the exit. Even despite Mabayu seeming to be speedwalking, Homura is right behind her.
On the walk to the station, Homura at least tries to strike up a conversation. "I really enjoyed that last movie. Memories of the Grove, right?" No response. "I get the appeal of horror movies now, at least. Very tense, but the catharsis from the scenes where it's all released makes it all worth it. Especially the scene where Sam has to learn how to make a tourniquet and apply it while the villain is right outside, it was executed flawlessly." Still no response.
They walk a block in utter silence. Homura tries to bring up the kiss, but stops herself. Maybe Mabayu hated it and was ignoring her. But that doesn't seem right, she seemed to enjoy it, to kiss her back so that means something must be weighing on her. It would definitely be too weird to bring up like this, she'll have to wait for Mabayu to talk about it herself.
Overall, it's just as awkward as the walk on the way there. With the way the two girls are acting, there probably won't be an honest conversation between them to fix the mood again. They walk down the steps into the station, glancing at a clock reading the time to be 12:53, just before one AM. Aunt Sakie is going to have… choice words for this. Just another stress to add onto the pile, Mabayu thinks.
Walking into a car, they see the train wasn't nearly as packed as it was on the way to the theater. In fact, they're the only people in this specific car. Mabayu rushes to a seat and sits perfectly straight with her eyes glued to her lap, while Homura calmly strolls to sit beside the girl. The doors shut, the train moves, and still no words are spoken between them.
A minute passes, making it 1:01. Then, 1:02. After that, 1:03. Mabayu nervously checks the time, which seems to be every couple seconds until Homura finally says something, literally anything to break the ice midway through 1:08.
"We'll be at the stop in four minutes and thirty seconds." Mabayu jumped and whipped her head around to Homura before quickly looking back down. She mumbles out a thank you and Homura crosses her arms in irritation. The sudden silent treatment is annoying her to no end. "We're going to talk about this as soon as we get to your room. The silent treatment and the kiss." Mabayu nodded shamefully in response, blushing a bright red until the train ride ended and they got off the station.
It's another silent walk to the cake shop, giving Mabayu enough grace period to prepare for the disgruntled Homura. Few lights guide the path, and even fewer cars with their headlights drive by. The only light sources are the few street lamps and Mabayu's phone shining a map back into her own eyes.
As they finally close in on Récompense they see the lights are off, and a sign out front reads "closed." Mabayu fumbles with her keys in front of the door before shakily getting it open and walking right to her room. Homura awkwardly joins her until they finally reach her bedroom. Mabayu shuts the door behind her and before she can even turn around, Homura accosts her.
"Alright, tell me," she leers over Mabayu as she speaks in an unnaturally annoyed tone, "What happened? Did I misread the situation? Should I have not kissed you?" The mere mention of the kiss made Mabayu's blush intensify again, but she firmly shook her head no. She keeps fidgeting with the hem of her overalls as she struggles to tell the truth.
Homura's frankly intense gaze didn't make it much easier for her to defend herself but after a few painful seconds she managed to speak. "M…Miss Kaname…" She immediately felt ashamed but powered through and continued, "U-Um… Th-That kiss… You… Am- Am I getting in the way of you and miss Kaname?" The following silence was utterly deafening and Mabayu hurriedly followed herself up in order to silence her own screaming mind.
"L-Like! I thought- I could swear you liked her and I just didn't want to, you know, b-block that or anything cause I've seen you two and you're like two pieces of a puzzle together and I really just would hate it if because I forced you to kiss me that you would stop caring for miss Kaname despite how long and hard you've worked to keep her safe I mean you clearly love her and I'm just the weird girl who forced herself into your life even if I don't know if you think that but I just really love you and just want to help you no matter what I know I don't deserve to be with you- hmm!"
Homura was currently kissing her. She could see the girl's closed eyes right up in her face, taste her warm lips kissing her own, smell her beautiful and sleek hair, feel her cold hands grabbing the sides of her head, and then just as quickly as they come together, she hears their lips separate. She was stunned.
Suddenly recuperating, she looks up into Homura's purple eyes but gets cut off before she can ask anything. Homura's voice was much calmer than it had been moments ago, almost softly, "Stop. For just one second." Mabayu was at attention, eyes wide and somehow not breaking eye contact with the girl in front of her, "I want you to understand something right now." Homura moved her hands down to Mabayu's shoulders before leaning in and whispering, "I love you, Mabayu." Mabayu could do nothing but gawk in response. Her heart was beating out of her chest.
Mabayu gave it three whole seconds to hang in the air before she built up the courage to reply, holding herself back from breathing the entire time, "…I-I love you too, H- H- Ho- m-miss Akemi. So much." Homura opened her mouth to reply but Mabayu seized the chance and captured Homura's mouth with her own.
Homura gasps as Mabayu gets on her tip toes and throws her arms around her neck, accidentally stumbling into her as she does so. Homura catches her, quickly wrapping her arms around Mabayu's waist, and they stumble to Mabayu's couch just to fall over on top of it. It barely fits the two as they kiss, eyes shut and arms tightly held around each other.
Only after forty seconds of non stop kissing does Homura have to break it off to catch her breath, wiping saliva off her tongue as Mabayu rests her head against Homura's chest while panting like a dog. Eventually, Homura is the first to speak again, muttering it right into Mabayu's messy hair, "Can you just call me Homura?"
Mabayu nods against her shirt, her response muffled, "Yes, ma'am. Er, yes, H-Homura…" She smiled in embarrassment, shifting the cloth beneath her face by doing so. "Love you, Homura." Homura smiled in return, running her hand through Mabayu's green locks while replying. "I love you too." Mabayu giggles, struggling to hold back the giddy laughter. It even manages to make Homura laugh a little too. Soon, they fall asleep in each other's arms without even turning the lights off.
It was the best day of Mabayu's life.