Archive of Our Own ^beta

 A year had passed since Taiga left.

There had been letters, emails, and internet chats of course. Starting the day after she had arrived in America with her mother and stepsisters. They had come steadily at first and, for a brief span of time, Ryuuji could pretend that Taiga was only on a short trip. A vacation from which she could return from at any time.

The letters came less often now, each one with less and less information.

“You look broody.”

Ryuuji looked up from his plate and saw Ami sliding into a seat across from him. They were in the school cafeteria, he had chosen a table tucked away from the more populated ones.

“Well,” she continued, “that’s a silly thing to say. You’re always brooding.”

He flicked the tab from a can of coffee. “No I’m not. Besides,” the tab let out a loud clink as it tore off, “I’m just thinking.”

“About Taiga?”

The name split him apart. Vicious, freezing cold carved through him and his vision swam. For a blessed, brief moment he saw her, her tiny frame hidden by the fierceness of her scowl. Then the palmtop tiger grew dimmer, though he tried to cling to her, until she was replaced entirely by the bored expression of Ami. 

 “Do you write to her?”

“Yes,” he said, the answer coming out before he considered why she cared. Perhaps she didn’t. She rarely did.

Her violet eyes watched him, a lioness waiting patiently for a gazelle to move. When he didn’t speak she sought to coax the information from him. “She doesn’t write you back?”

A flash of frustration rose, but he couldn’t find the accusation in her tone to justify the anger. Hell, there was barely any interest coming from her while she examined her perfectly kept nails. Why did she even make small talk?

“She does,” he said.

Those infuriatingly knowing eyes watched, “But?”

He wanted to argue but he pushed the feeling to the side. There weren’t a lot of people he could talk to about this. “But,” he surrendered, “she writes one to every three of mine.” 

Kawashima’s mouth twisted upward into a cruel smile. It matched the ones she gave early in their friendship when she tortured him.

“No!” he nearly screamed the word, “She’s just busy! And with the timezones and schedules it’s nearly impossible to video chat. Writing’s the only way we can stay in touch.”

“Yet she doesn’t write as much as you.”

“She’s busy,” he repeated, more for himself than for her. “There’s a lot to do,” the last words were soft and without conviction.

“Seems a cruel thing to do to the person you thought you loved.”

Heat rushed over his face. He opened his mouth to respond, but Ami shushed him by holding out her hand.

“It’s not my place, I suppose.”

They sat in silence. 

“Kawashima!” Someone called from across the room.

Ryuuji watched as her face adopted the mask she wore so often. That cruel smile tossed out and replaced by a wide grin, her eyes that pulsed with predatory heat replaced by sparkling innocence. She turned and waved to the girls who called out to her. “Hi!”

“Come sit with us! Takasu can come too.”

“Okay!” Ami yelled, her voice light and airy. She stood and faced Ryuuji, her face returned to a frown, “Come on,” she commanded, her voice noticeably more subdued but still with that  air-head tone she wielded like a weapon.

“No thanks. I’ll stay here.”

“Suit yourself.” She picked up her tray and walked away.

Steel gray clouds had gathered over the sky. Weather reports had been screaming of rain for almost a week and now it seemed like their predictions were coming true. Students leaving the school shielded themselves with umbrellas and hurried home, hoping to escape the worst of the storm before it descended.

A drizzle started not long into his walk and Ryuuji was left defenseless. His umbrella lay at home, safe and warm in its stand while he was trudging hunched through the puddles. He told himself that it was just a slip of the mind, that he didn’t believe the weather reports. 

It had been two and a half weeks since her last email, and she hadn’t returned his last reach out several days ago. It was under his skin, distracting him from school, life, and whether or not he would need an umbrella.

He felt cold water sink through his uniform and onto his skin. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

This wasn’t the longest she had gone without writing to him, but it was close. Still, it matched a trend that had been ongoing for months. The letters, as he told Ami just the other week, were getting shorter and less frequent. Paragraphs on her thoughts had become cagey statements and vivid descriptions of life in America faded to dismissive remarks about the food or her classmates. It was as if time had been turned back for the two of them.

Once again, his mind was dominated by thoughts of Taiga. On the bright side, the mental flagellation kept his focus from the rain that was soaking through him.

Until, Ryuuji realized with a start, he didn’t feel soaked. He didn’t feel the rain at all. A vicious pink umbrella was floating above him, a thin arm holding it to his left. He turned and Ami walked beside him, her face furious.

“You’re an idiot,” she said.

“Kawashima! How long have you been there?”

“Longer than you would think. I’ve been waiting for a thank you for at least two blocks.”

Ryuuji rubbed the back of his neck, “Right, um, thanks I guess.”

A soft snort, “Really, you are such a gentleman.”

“I’m sorry,” he sprinkled a bit of acid into his apology and immediately hated himself for it. Here she was being a friend and he was being an ass. “I’m just...”

“Deep in thought, yes, I noticed.” She let out a laugh, one directed at him, and said, “Four days of forecast and you don’t bring your umbrella. I’m shocked that you were the one who forgot it out of all of our class.”

“What does that mean?”

Her eyes bored into him, “Would you have let Taiga forget her umbrella?”

“I-” the question stunned him. If he had caught Taiga without her umbrella for a reason as silly as having her head in the clouds he would have never let her hear the end of it. Would probably have earned himself a kick in the shins for it.

 “I had a lot on my mind,” was all he could say. 

Her frustration seemed to ease for a moment. Her eyes softened and the frown lifted ever so slightly. She stopped walking to face him and, with a pang of guilt, Ryuuji saw that her left arm and a fair portion of her side had been soaked. She’d kept the umbrella outstretched to cover him entirely and exposed herself to the rain.

“Kawashima, I’m sorry!”

She ignored his apology. Reaching out her hand with agonizing slowness, she started to run the tops of her fingers through his hair. A vicious heat crept up his neck that burned hotter at each graze of her fingertips upon his scalp. The world twisted and his heart pounded.

“What are you doing?” Ryuuji asked, his voice cracking. 

Ami removed her fingers and held them up, “You’re soaked to the bone,” she shook her hand to dry it off. “Are you moping so much that you’re looking to catch a cold?”

“No, I just-”

“You had a lot on your mind,” her tone left no illusion as to how much she cared. After taking a moment to look him up and down, she gave an exasperated sigh, as if he was a child who’d made a mess of toys, and said, “Come on, let’s get you warmed up.”

Warming him up meant a hole-in-the-wall ramen shop. Fairly packed, the smells escaping from the door sent his stomach into a vicious growl. A bright poster on the window advertised over a dozen types of toppings.

The walk had chilled him even with the umbrella. The rain had soaked through his clothes and settled deep within his bones. Ami had not fared as badly, but the guilt of forcing her to share was still with him. He could have avoided all of this if he had simply remembered that he needed an umbrella. A silly thing to forget. 

“You didn’t have to hold the umbrella entirely over me,” he said as they opened the door to the restaurant.

She called him an idiot again and he dropped the subject.

Passing under the threshold of the ramen shop’s doorstep was like passing into another world entirely. Heat from the half dozen burners in the kitchen expelled the chill from the rain, and the scent of fish, beef, and all manner of meats cooking in a myriad of spices had his stomach screeching for food. His nose picked up hints of frying pork, seared scallops, and rich broths. From the smell alone, his bones began to thaw.

Ryuuji ordered tonkatsu ramen with shrimp and a seasoned egg, Ami chose the same except added several dashes of a brilliantly colored chili paste.

“Where do you want to sit?” Ami asked, holding her bowl. The heat from the chili cut through the rich aroma of the shop and burned his nostrils. 

“By the window?”

“Come on then,” she grabbed his arm with her free hand and led him through the crowd of people. They sat down and warmed their hands over the bowls of blistering hot broth. The steam from the broth slipped their fingertips and left warm droplets of condensation on their skins. Outside, the rain continued to patter against the windows.

“I’ve never been here before,” Ryuuji said, “how did you find out about it?”

“It opened a few weeks ago,” Ami said, stirring her bowl. The chili paste had turned her broth a distinctly more ferocious shade of red than his. “It looks a bit,” she paused for a moment to consider the best word before continuing,  “rustic, so a lot of people from school have avoided it.”

“You don’t want anyone to find you,” Ryuuji picked up the meaning of her statement. “You want to be alone.”

“Not alone,” she said, but didn’t argue his first observation.

“I don’t understand you. If you don’t want to hang out with people, why go through the trouble of hiding? Why not just tell them you need to be alone?”

She sipped her ramen and Ryuuji felt a lecture about his stupidity coming. “Because that is very rude to do,” she said as if explaining to a child. “You will lose all of the friends you made last year if you act dismissively to them.”

Ryuuji frowned. The year with Taiga had seen his classmates finally willing to overlook his delinquent presence and hang out with him. He couldn’t pinpoint when it happened, but one day people just didn’t seem to be frightened of him. Classmates said hi or waved when he walked through the hallway. He was popular for once.

He had done nothing to force people to see him like that, though. To his knowledge, he had never put on any mask to earn that.

“Why should it matter?”

This response seemed to surprise her and she didn’t comment immediately. Instead, those violet eyes watched him, the lioness amused at the words of the gazelle.

He swallowed a bit of shrimp and said, “You need to be yourself. Friends should understand that. They should be able to be told that you can’t entertain them or need to be alone. Friends understand you need space.”

She smiled without humor, “That’s rich coming from you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing,” the response was curt, like she had suddenly realized she had made a mistake. Her gaze returned to her bowl of ramen.

Ryuuji wasn’t one to seek out a fight. That had always been Taiga’s preference, he thought with a sharp pang of nostalgia. So he let the comment slide and ate. Ami sought no argument and from there the conversation turned to school and friends. 

It was a funny thing. When Ami wasn’t hinting at some deficiency, she was a good friend to talk to.

Without Taiga, and Minori and Kitamura so focused upon college, Ryuuji had found Ami was the only one he could have a real conversation with. Provided there weren’t many other students around.

“The other day I went to this little ramen shop outside of school,” one of the students said.

Ryuuji glanced up from his cafeteria tray. Today he sat in the cafeteria with a group of classmates. Kitamura was in front, Ami down the table surrounded by a gaggle of her friends. Ryuuji saw that she did not look thrilled at the opening of this conversation.

“Oh?” Someone asked.

“Yea, and when I went there I found Ami. She discovered it weeks ago, and it is amazing.” There was a chorus of ooh’s at this. Ryuuji chewed a bite of his food, still watching her response. She smiled politely at everyone, even him.

“Guess what,” the girl continued, “she got like fifty dashes of this really hot chili paste in it.” The chorus grew louder as if this was the most fascinating thing they had ever heard. What titan could stand such mighty pain as that? 

“Oh no,” Ami said, her glamorous smile screwed on and her hands waving as if the statement could be hushed with a gesture. “It was only a little bit. I certainly couldn’t handle that, I’m not much for heat,” the last words came out with a giggle and Ryuuji felt bile rise from his throat. 

Her defense did not seem to sway the other girls, who insisted on trying the ramen shop as soon as possible. Schedules were immediately thrown about and Ami began to dance around the offered times.

“So not tonight?”

“No, I'm busy. We have that exam.”

“Next week?”

“I have a modeling job, but maybe after.”

Perhaps feeling his eyes on her, she looked to Ryuuji. When their gazes locked, her smile faded into the briefest look of frustration, which he was satisfied to see. She looked so much more like Ami that way so he smiled. She turned away and the mask returned.

The scene bugged him, so he told Kitamura he would be back in a moment, grabbed his tray, and left to toss it in the receptacle. He had just dumped the food and placed the tray away when he heard a voice.

“Hey.”

Ami stood behind him.

“You didn’t bring your own food today,” she said, noting that he had taken today’s meal from the cafeteria.

“No, I was...” he stopped. How do you explain that you were up through the night reading half a page of a letter? No way to say that without being ridiculed. So he lied, “I was up late studying.”

The lie was an obvious one. He made a poor charlatan at the best of times, but in front of her he had no chance. Ami’s eyes were always able to peer inside of him and see the truth. If she decided to put the screws to him, he wouldn’t last long.

She watched him long enough to make him suspicious. He was curious what angle of attack she would use.

“What are your plans tonight?” She asked.

The question caught him so off-guard he took a half step backwards. 

“Nothing,” he said, “studying, cleaning, a bit of cooking. The usual stuff.”

“Do you want to study for the exam?” She was not acting like her typical self when they were alone, all frowns and frustration. But she was still a far cry from how she acted around crowds, all giggles and air-headedness.

“Sure. I’ll make us some dinner too.”

This seemed to surprise her. Her eyes widened and he saw her mouth twist into a frown as she prepared to say something not entirely pleasant, but she paused for a moment before straightening her jacket. “Okay. That would be nice.”

Ryuuji watched as he watched away, the feeling of having done something wrong twisting his stomach into knots.

If someone was going to visit his home, then that meant that Ryuuji was morally compelled to do what he did best in the world. The deepest, most thorough cleaning that could be managed by human hands. Back from school, he threw himself into it and swept, wiped, and scoured every inch of his apartment.

Considering that he was rigorous about keeping the apartment as tidy as possible, such a scouring did not take much time. He found himself with a bit of free time during which he read Taiga’s recent letter, removed what was needed for dinner from the fridge, and read the letter again. By the time Ami knocked at the door, he had read the letter four times and begun deveining the shrimp.

They said their greetings and Ryuuji returned to the kitchen. “I was thinking we could do questions while I cooked, then more detailed stuff afterwards,” he said before proceeding to dismantle the vegetables into appropriate sizes for quick pickling. As he cut, there was a rustling of paper from the living room.

With a start he realized he had left the letter on the table.

Ryuuji cursed, spun, and saw Ami sitting at the table, the letter unfolded in her hands.

“Kawashima what the hell?” He hurried over and snatched it from her hands. There wasn’t much use, it was quite short. Her face was blank, which threw him off. He expected a smile and a snide remark.

“She’s not coming back, then?”

The appropriate way to answer that was by telling her it was none of her business. That it was the height of rudeness to read someone’s mail like that. A blatant invasion of privacy. There was no shortage of things that he had every right to grill her for.

“No.”

A small letter, but more than enough to tell everything. Her mother could get her into a good college there, things were going well with her stepsisters. There wasn’t much reason to come home.

“So what does this mean for you?”

Ryuuji shook his head and dropped the letter back onto the table. It didn’t really matter if she read it now, did it? He started for the kitchen, but Ami grabbed his arm to stop him.

“Don’t jump so much,” she said, a slice of humor returning to her voice. She kept her hand on him and asked, “What does that mean for you?”

“I don’t know.”

“You need to know Takasu.”

“I don’t.”

A frustrated sigh and she released his arm. “Fine. I’m only trying to help.”

Ryuuji returned to the kitchen and continued prepping. Behind him he heard Ami remove books and flashcards.

“Her letters have been shorter and shorter,” he finally said, “I should have seen this coming.”

“You hoped it would go differently.” The pity was clear.

He didn’t answer, just focused on the vegetables in front of him. A rustling sound as Ami stood and crossed the house to watch him from the entrance to the kitchen.

“You’re not doing too well. You didn’t have to cook for us.”

“We have to eat. No use in spending money when I can do it here.”

“You know I’m capable of cooking.”

“My place. Besides, it isn’t like I mind.” It at least kept him from rereading the letter.

She didn’t argue, instead choosing to grab a deck of flashcards from the table and begin quizzing him.

They took a break when the food was ready and made a clearing on the table so they could eat. They spoke as friends rather than classmates, on their plans for the weekend and what they would do on breaks from school. A trip to the beach house was floated again, with Kitamura and Minori joining if they could free up the time. Once finished, they placed the dishes in the sink for later and continued studying.

After an hour and in need of a break, Ryuuji stood, stretched, and approached the kitchen. From the cabinets he removed several bento boxes. He spooned carefully measured amounts of food into each.

Footsteps approached him. 

“What are you doing?”

“Since we’re studying I figured we would be here late. That would make preparing for tomorrow’s lunch difficult so I made extra.” The box he was packing closed with a satisfying snap and he held it out behind him. “Here you go.”

“What?”

“It’s for you,” Ryuuji said, keeping his hand outstretched. “You will have just as little time as I do to get anything ready.”

She took it, her eyes locked so intensely on the bento box that it seemed like it may disintegrate under the gaze. Ryuuji would have assumed she was simply being polite and trying to decide the best way to respond if it hadn’t been for the way she kept her fingers wrapped around the box in a white knuckle grip.

“You didn’t have to do this,” the words were slow and measured, but he could hear the heaviness in them. Something was wrong.

“I was making extra anyway,” he stammered, finding his confidence in this act suddenly severely undermined. Taiga had never rejected food he thought, which only made his heart scream in anger. Was everything going to lead back to her?

“What if I asked you for something else?” This time the words were quicker and more pointed. “What if I threw a tantrum and said I didn’t like it?” He could see specks of tears in her eyes, giving them an almost glowing hue. Was a gift of tempura shrimp so offensive?

“Well, um, I-” the words were broken and clunky. He looked around for ideas. “There’s plenty of rice left, and with the oil I-”

“That’s the entire point, Ryuuji!” The yell caught him off guard and shut down any further suggestions from him. Violet-tinted tears began to fall from her eyes. “If I stamped my feet and demanded something else you would make it. I bet if I said I wanted food you didn’t have you’d go out and buy it.” She poured venom into every word, as if he was committing some heinous act by offering food. “Anything I asked you would do it. 

Frustrated, both at her and that damned short letter from Taiga, he fought back.

“I don’t see why that bothers you so much! The way you giggle and bat your eyelashes every time someone is around, I bet you’ve sent tons of guys to do random crap.” Hadn’t she been eager to do that very thing when they first met? Pretend to be some cute airhead and take advantage of him? For no other reason than because she could.

“That’s my point, Ryuuji! Those people do it because they want something from me, but you don’t. You do it just because. Because you would do it for anyone.”

“I don’t see why that’s such a big deal,” what the hell was the problem with being kind?

“Because you’re not anyone’s dad!” 

The words hit him like a bolt of lightning and he stumbled back against the counter. “You’re not my dad, you’re not your mother’s, and you weren’t Taiga’s either.”

The name derailed his entire thought process. Everything counterpoint and argument he prepped was gone in with that word. All he could muster was a weak, “Don’t bring her into this, she’s not part of this.”

“Of course she is. God,” she massaged her temple with her fingertips, “this is the reason she stopped writing as much.”

“What?”

She looked away, as if she was suddenly concerned with being rude. “Nothing.” 

Then a few heartbeats and a soft, “I’m sorry Takasu. I know this has to seem really bitchy to you.”

Ryuuji rubbed his neck, “Well, you certainly aren’t acting like a Saint.”

This didn’t frustrate her, instead she gave a small laugh. Not the kind she did to try and win over a gaggle of onlookers, just an earnest bit of laughter. It would win no awards or have a place in a magazine, but it was no less brilliant or beautiful.

A peace offering, enough to settle the frustration between the two of them.

Ryuuji returned her laugh with a smile, his own offering, and turned around so he could start washing the dishes. “Why don’t you sit down? I’ll finish up here and make you some tea.” He shook his hands free of the water and reached for a towel to begin drying, but a hand snatched it up before he could. Ami stepped to the side and held out an open palm to him.

“Scooch over, I’ll need room to dry.” He hesitated for a moment and then handed a dish over.

They worked without issue and then returned to their studies. After two hours, they were both yawning and the fatigue of weary students was settling upon them. They said their goodbyes and Ami left.

Alone, Ryuuji put up his books and thought over the night. Ami was so different in her fury than Taiga. She was less inclined to violence, and where Taiga could stew and remain angry for hours, Ami seemed to only explode at sudden intervals before retreating. Then she would be willing to assist in something he would normally have to coerce Taiga else into.

It was only after he had changed into his clothes for the night and stepped into the common room to turn off the light up that he realized the bento box he made Ami sitting on the table. She had forgotten it. Or chosen to leave it.

Ryuuji waited for Ami the next day.

He almost decided against it, but his eyes had fallen on her lunch when he reached for his own in the fridge. Grumbling to himself, he grabbed it and deemed to wait for her at a crosswalk not far from school.

While he leaned against a wall and waited, classmates passed on their way to school. They smiled and waved and he returned each one. Things had changed so much in only a couple of years. Before, people had fled from his look. Now, no one in the school seemed frightened of him.

Luckily, he did not have to wait long for Ami. After ten minutes or so she rounded the corner and gave him a wave. She approached.

“Hey Takasu,” she said, “are you waiting for someone?”

“You.”

This took her off guard, but when he held out the bento box she laughed.

“You left this at my house.”

Truth be told, he wasn’t sure what her response was going to be. There seemed to be a non-insignificant chance that she would smack it out of his hand and yell. He had considered not bringing it for that reason, but had decided to risk it. To his surprise, she thanked him, tucked it under her arm, and began to walk away.

Ryuuji watched as she walked. After several steps, she stopped and looked back at him, “Are you coming?”

“Oh, yea,” he hurried after her. 

“Kawashima?”

“Hmm?”

“Last night, you said something...” he trailed off, unsure of the best way to ask. She seemed to have an inkling though as she slowed her pace while watching him from the corner of her eye. He gathered his courage and continued, “You said that the whole point of you being mad was that I act like everyone’s dad. And that’s why Taiga stopped writing as much.”

Ami did not respond. They passed city blocks and streets and Ryuuji became concerned she would walk in silence until they made it to school. This must have been a tough topic for her. 

Or perhaps she pitied him and worried he would fracture. 

She finally spoke and said, “You took care of Taiga. All of the time. That’s one of the reasons she felt so strongly about you, but that was the problem. You took care of her because she couldn’t take care of herself.”

A restaurant they passed smelled of fresh rice and eggs.

“If you were near her, you could remind Taiga how important it is to write letters and check in with the people she cares about.” She gave him a pitying smile and his stomach twisted, he’d never seen her give that particular look to anyone. People were pitiful to Ami, but never worthy of her pity.

“Of course,” she said, “if you were there you wouldn’t have to. That’s some irony for you.”

“She went to America with her mother to be more independent though,” Ryuuji’s words came out much more frantic than he had intended, “To prove she didn’t need me.”

“She can survive on her own now, which is a grand improvement from the girl with a horrible apartment who made me do impressions for hours,” Ami agreed, “but keeping a relationship alive thousands of miles away? That’s something else entirely. Even for adults who have spent years together, not every relationship could have survived. I think you could manage it, but I don’t think Taiga was ready, even with her own growth.” That pitiful smile again, “I don’t think it means she didn’t care for you. Just that...” she pursed her lips for a moment, “the distance was too much, and she wasn’t ready to hold up her side without you looking out for her.”

“It probably didn’t help that we never ironed out what we were before we left.”

“No. Your relationship was up in the air. She wasn’t ready to write out those feelings in a letter without coaxing. So they dwindled because she couldn’t face them.”

He was desperate to argue. To say that Ami did not know the first thing about him and Taiga, but that would be a lie. The only reason they had as much time together as they did was because of this girl ensuring it. Not only would it be lying to say it, he would be being entirely unfair to her. To his friend who, despite her own issues with Taiga, had tried to make her happy.

“Would you write to me?” He asked suddenly.

The pitying smile was replaced by a blush of red on her cheeks. She stopped walking so suddenly her shoes squeaked on the sidewalk, “What?”

He felt his own cheeks start to burn to mirror hers, “Oh no, that’s not what I meant!” His hands came up in a placating gesture, “I meant, could you do it? A relationship at such a distance?”

This seemed to settle the awkwardness as her cheeks lost a bit of the scarlet. “I don’t know. I would want to try, but,” she frowned, “who’s worth it?”

Ryuuji laughed at that, “That’s fair enough. C’mon.” He started again towards school, but realized Ami didn’t follow. He looked behind him, “Coming Kawashima?”

With her finger on her lip she seemed deep in thought. Finally she spoke.

“Yea. Sure.”

The final letter came after another month.

If you could believe it was even shorter than the last one. Ryuuji had to give Taiga credit, she ended things instead of ghosting. That was growth there.

Ryuuji opened it expecting to cry, but found that he couldn’t do so. No tears gushed out to meet the breakout contained within the half-page. Instead he had sat at his desk and reflected on how funny this had all started, and ended, with a letter.

Happy was certainly not the word he would use to describe himself, but there was a profound lack of sadness. No sweeping sense of deep grief that made him want to hole up for an eternity. 

He was numb instead. When he woke up the next day, he ignored the letter, brushed his teeth, dressed, and went to school. Completely normal.

Ami found him sitting alone again in the cafeteria, rolling bits of his food around with chopsticks. She watched him for a moment without saying anything, her own tray held in a single hand.

“Another letter?” She asked, not unkindly.

He nodded.

“I’m sorry Takasu.” She placed her tray on the table and sat across from him. “How are you doing?”

“Better than I would have thought,” he admitted, “just sort of numb. I guess I was ready for it.” He mustered his energy to push through and give her a sad smile, “I suppose I have you to thank for that.”

“I don’t know if I should take that as a compliment.”

“You should. You really helped me come to grips with it.” He forced the corners of his lips up a bit higher, “Thank you.”

“Ryuuji, I’m really sorry.”

“It’s life I guess,” he played with his food a bit more. His appetite was stripped away, but at least he wasn’t crying into his drink. You had to take the small victories. 

“I don’t regret it though,” he said, answering an unasked question. “None of it. I’m better for it and so is she.”

Ami reached out and touched her fingers to his. They were warm and their touch seemed to pierce through the shell he’d found himself in. A subtle, cozy feeling wiggled through and settled in his breast. Small, but nice.

“That’s mature of you, Ryuuji. Most wouldn’t take the moment to reflect on how they’ve grown.” This statement seemed to bother her as she made a sound and withdrew her hand.

“What’s wrong?”

Ami shook her head and shrugged off the question.

“Kawashima!” Someone called and Ami looked. Her friends were waving from across the room, “We’ve got a bigger table. You and Takasu come over here.”

Her eyes widened for a moment and she glanced at Ryuuji, who gave her his own pitying smile. “Really Kawashima, I’m fine. Go on and go.”

Her mask slipped on and that model beautiful smile screwed onto her face. Then she looked at her friends and said, “No thank you!”

It was a short response. No grand speech of her independence, but it was enough. The girls she spoke too glanced at one another before acknowledging it politely, if a bit awkwardly, and carrying on.

“You didn’t have to do that, Kawashima,” Ryuuji said. “I promise you, I’m fine. You don’-”

“I wanted to,” her response was stern and promised no further discussion. The smiling mask fell and she was frowning again. Now though, she was glowing. Not in the cheery, brilliant way like when she walked the hallways and waved at everyone and demanded attention, but a soft, somber glow.

Her chopsticks flashed forward and she plucked a pickle from his box. “You can repay me,” she said, “by sharing.” The haughtiness in her voice was back, in contrast from the higher voice she used when getting her way.

“That’s fine, I’m not hungry,” Ryuuji said. This time, he gave her a real smile. It came naturally, and the strength of it seemed to dispel some of the cloud of melancholy over him, like a sun peeking through the clouds after a rainstorm. He pushed the bento box towards the center of the table.

After that, he and Ami spent increasing amounts of time together. Not every day, but more than the scattered moments from before. With Kitamura and Minori preparing for their futures and Taiga a slowly fading wound, Ami was the only person left he wanted to call a friend.

“What are you doing after graduation?” She asked one day as they walked home from school, heading to his place to study.

“I’m not sure,” he admitted, “my mom insists that I should go to the best college I can. Even hinted that maybe I should try and go to America and chase” he choked the next word, “Taiga.” He was doing better, but such a word was not easy to speak.

There wasn’t a response. When he looked he saw Ami peering at him with a question on her face. She did not seem ready to ask, so he waited. “Would you do it?” She asked as he unlocked his front door.

It was a question he had given serious thought to, but not for as long as he had expected.

“No,” the answer was firmer than intended but true all the same. “I think that has to be done with. I shouldn’t chase the past. Besides, you were right.”

They stepped into the darkness, his mom having left early that day to be with her parents. She had asked him to come, but he’d needed to study and his grandparents gave him little time to do so if he visited. They were eager to make up the lost years.

“About what?” She asked.

He dropped his bag and said, “I did a lot to care for her with all of the food and cleaning. And while I’m certainly never going to stop doing that for others, I can’t always take care of people so much they can’t do it themselves. I have to make sure I’m able to do what I want.”

“What prompted this change?” Ami sat down at the table and removed several books from her bag.

“You. When you chose to stay at the table with me a few weeks ago. You probably don’t even remember it.”

The look she gave him said that she did.

While she prepared the study materials, Ryuuji stepped into the kitchen to prepare tea, “I was proud that you did something for yourself, which made me consider that maybe I never did that.”

There was no response from the common room while the water boiled.

“Don’t you think it’s funny,” he asked to stem the rush of silence, “that, despite the hell we gave one another for putting on a mask or acting like a dad, we had the same problem. We just wanted to do what others wanted.”

The response was barely a whisper, “I suppose so.” Sensing he had made her uncomfortable with the choice of topic, he resolved to drop it while he made the tea. 

Tea in hand, he returned to the common room and placed the steaming mugs down. Ami turned the mug in her hands while he sat next to her. He flipped through a textbook and heard the whisper again.

“Ryuuji.”

The use of his first name struck him like a lightning bolt. 

“What is it Kawashima?”

“Do you remember a long time ago,” her hands were wrapped around the hot mug of tea, “when I asked what you would do if I showed you my true self.”

“Yea,” he laughed, “I had just made you a mug of tea and-” he stopped, the laugh dying in his throat and his neck beginning to burn hot. She had crawled towards him, not unlike a lioness going in for a kill, and made him think severely inappropriate thoughts.

“You’ve seen the true me since then,” every word was soft, “I always thought you’d turn away from it, but you’ve only ever encouraged me to show it to others.”

When he spoke, every word was like a mouthful of clay in his mouth. “It’s the real you,” he said, worried she would not be able to understand him. He sipped quickly at his tea, hoping that its heat would somehow overcome the searing burn on the back of his neck.

Her legs slid out from under the table and she turned to face him. Painfully slowly, she placed her palms upon the ground and crawled the tiniest bit forward. The lioness once more.

The tea was nothing, his face and neck were both an inferno that he had no chance of soothing. With a shaking hand he put the tea down out of fear he’d shake everything out of the mug.

“Do you remember what happened after that? What I asked you?”

His mouth refused to form words. Only grunts and choked syllables came out.

Ami crawled closer. The dragon had no chance against the lioness.

“I asked if you would fall for me,” she whispered. She was so close now, her head inches from Ryuuji’s own. Both painfully slowly and so, so quickly, she reached out a hand and ran the tips of her fingers down his face.

All sound in the room evaporated. The traffic outside, the ticking of the clock, voices of the neighbors, all gone. All he could hear was the pounding of his heart and the searing flesh from his neck. How were fingers not burning just from touching him?

“Do you remember that?” She asked, her mumble sounding like the roar of a predator. Her breath smelled of mint and citrus. He inhaled and managed to coax a weak, “Yes,” out of his mouth.

Her violet eyes watched him, but he could manage nothing else. Any minute now his flesh would bubble and slip from his bones.

Before, Taiga had entered the apartment and stopped everything. If she hadn’t, he had never known what Ami would have done. If he had to guess, she would have gotten closer, laughed, and said something like ‘You should have seen your face, did you think I was going to kiss you?’ She’d have tortured him with it like she loved to do.

But she hadn’t tortured him in some time.

This time no one came. Nor did Ami laugh or poke fun.

“Kawashima,” he said, his voice was raspy and parched. He thought of reaching for his tea, but did not want to interrupt this. Whatever the hell it was.

Hearing her name prompted a small grin from her. Not aggressive, like she did when she played tricks on him, but soft and, to his surprise, questioning.

Is this okay?

Shaking terribly, he managed to lift a hand and awkwardly tuck a bit of hair behind her ear. The act instilled enough confidence in himself to place his palm against her cheek to show he did not protest.

Ami’s eyes slid closed. The name, “Ryuuji,” slipped from her mouth so impossibly low it was nearly drowned out by the pounding of his heart. 

This time her breath washed over him. It was the most intoxicating smell he had even encountered. His brain briefly detached from his body and he let out a whimper. When he recovered, he mustered every fibre of his being to offer “Ami” in return. 

It was enough.

She pressed her lips against his with more force than he had expected.

Every thought and care he had been carrying upon his shoulders for months slid away. Not to be lost forever, but forgotten for a single brief and beautiful moment.

Unthinkingly, he wrapped an arm about her waist and she crawled forward more so that she was sitting in his lap. While he held her, she moved her hands up to caress his face. Their kiss deepened. Her tongue slid into his mouth, or perhaps it was his into hers. 

Their hearts pounded in anxiety and fear and excitement. 

Ryuuji’s life had been defined by never knowing a path. He had stumbled through school, stumbled into his friendships, stumbled into his almost-relationship with Taiga, and was stumbling through the whole college admissions thing.

Perhaps that was why he had always cooked and cleaned so much. It was easy. It brought order to the world and fixed what was wrong with it.

This moment, his lips on Ami’s and the feeling of her pressed tightly against him, there was nothing wrong. Nothing to stumble through or fix.

It was, for this moment, perfectly right.