Work Text:
“Any luck, Hitori-chan?”
Kita’s sudden appearance makes Hitori jump out of her skin… and the chair she’d been firmly seated on just seconds ago, sending her tumbling to the floor. Kita rushes to help her back up, profusely apologizing for scaring her like that.
“I-it’s fine,” Hitori mumbles, feeling anything but. Still, she’d feel bad if she made Kita feel bad, and it’s not like it’s even Kita’s fault that she just scares so easily. She was just so focused too on what she was doing prior to her near-heart attack that she was practically on the other side of the planet. “And, uh, no. N-not… Not really.”
What Hitori should have been doing was writing the lyrics for their next original song, but what she’d been doing instead was procrastinating by practicing her signature again. She wishes she could just fling her notebook to the other side of the room or set it on fire but there’s no hiding her futile attempt at writing lyrics and crafting a rockstar-worthy autograph from Kita now.
Kita doesn’t judge her for it, of course. What she actually does might be worse for Hitori in the grand scheme of things, though, because she scoots so close to her, close enough that all of her warmth envelopes Hitori, and close enough that she gets a dizzying noseful of Kita’s sweet, sweet perfume, and it puts her on the verge of another heart attack.
“I wish there was something I could do to help you,” Kita pouts, and Hitori can only wonder if maybe she just hasn’t suffered enough and that’s why the cosmic powers that be have decided to really push her past her breaking point today (and everyone knows it doesn’t even take much to take her there in the first place).
Hitori definitely feels bad now for making Kita feel bad about something she has no business feeling bad about in the first place, so she tries her best to sound reassuring and confident (she’s failing miserably at both, she knows it) when she tells her, “It’s okay, I’ll figure something out.”
She instantly regrets saying anything at all, though, because Kita gives her that look again, eyes sparklier than an entire glitter factory’s worth of glitter, and the weight of all her expectation bears down on and crushes Hitori. Squeezes the air right out of her lungs.
“Well, whatever you come up with,” Kita says, smiling so big and bright it almost blinds Hitori, “I’m sure it’ll be amazing! Hitori-chan is a genius, after all.”
Hitori wishes the ground would just swallow her whole. Wishes Kita didn’t mean that with utmost sincerity because it’s just not good for her poor, poor heart. Wishes she didn’t want Kita to always look at her like that, like she’s something more than she really is—like she’s someone actually worthy of Kita’s praise and admiration.
When Hitori gets home after a long evening of practice and then work at STARRY, she’s exhausted but somehow still so restless. Kind of buzzed, even, so much so that she can’t just drift off to sleep like she normally would.
She tries to wear herself down by doing advanced reading for one of her classes but she just can’t get herself to focus on the paragraphs and paragraphs of words before her, not when all she can think about is the way Kita was looking at her earlier. About how she always smells so, so nice. About how her name rolls off of Kita’s tongue and how that makes her head spin, makes her heart ache in a way she can’t even begin to comprehend.
Hitori places her textbook back inside her bag and pulls out her lyrics notebook instead. She flips it open to a fresh, blank page and, taking a deep breath, puts pen to paper.
The new song was Nijika’s idea, naturally.
They’ve been preparing for their next performance at STARRY, hoping to capitalize off of their increased popularity after their otherwise successful performance at the culture festival. It’s ‘otherwise successful’ because while it was definitely good publicity for Kessoku Band, Hitori continues to be haunted by the stage-diving she did, which was anything but successful.
But that aside, Nijika’s really been pushing for them to debut at least one new song at their next gig. They had a solid roster of original songs for a band still mostly in its infancy, but they had to keep pushing forward with it, especially if they wanted to get their first mini-album out there as soon as possible.
Hitori is somewhat used to it by now, but that doesn’t necessarily make the process any easier. If anything, it’s only gotten all the more difficult for her because on top of how it’s generally not easy to make music, she’s got a whole new problem to deal with now too. A Kita problem.
“Are you okay, Bocchi-chan? I’ve noticed you’ve been really out of it,” Nijika asks as she hands Hitori a can of soda. She turns back to the vending machine to get the rest of the drinks and Hitori catches her mumble under her breath, “Or at least more out of it than the usual.”
Hitori’s face heats up. She tries to come up with something— anything— other than the painfully embarrassing truth, but she ends up just saying nothing at all. Purses her lips, keeping them shut tight to keep herself from letting everything spill forth. When she looks up again, she finds Nijika smiling at her gently.
“I’m sorry for putting you under so much pressure to write our next song, Bocchi-chan,” Nijika says, sincerely apologetic.
“N-n-n-n-no! It’s fine!” Hitori sputters out. Seems like Nijika has caught on to her songwriting dilemma, just that she’s slightly off the mark on the specifics of said dilemma. On the Kita of it all of said dilemma. “Really, it’s no— I have no problem at all w-with it. I’m… I’m happy you trust me with…” Her face heats up all the way to the tips of her ears. She averts her gaze again and mumbles, “I’m just… worried about what I’ve written, I guess.”
Nijika hums thoughtfully. “You can always ask Ryo for help, or we can all go over what you’ve already written together and—”
“N-no!” Hitori squawks, taking Nijika by surprise. “I’ll just ask Ryo-san when she’s free. There’s really no need for you to trouble yourself over it.”
If Nijika is suspicious there’s something more to this than just the usual old writer’s block, she seems to decide it’s not worth digging deeper and further into for now. “Well, anyway, we should get going. You know it’s never a good idea to leave Kita-chan alone with Ryo for too long.”
Hitori helps hand out the drinks when they get back. Ryo thanks them and promises to pay them back, which both Hitori and Nijika know better than to believe, but when Hitori hands Kita a bottle of tea, their fingers brush and electricity travels up the nerves of her hand.
Hitori recoils, drawing her hand back to her side, balling it into a fist around her skirt, and scurries back to where she left her guitar. She decides it’s better that she doesn’t know Kita’s reaction to that, or if she even noticed anything at all.
She picks up her guitar and slings it back on. When she builds up the courage to look up again, she finds Nijika watching her curiously. Dread settles like a stone in her stomach when she realizes Nijika, ever perceptive Nijika, saw. Panicked, she looks away—back down at her guitar, at her shoes, at anywhere but Nijika—and thinks that now would be a really good time for the ground to just swallow her whole.
The real reason Hitori can’t let anyone, not her bandmates, not her parents or little sister, not even Jimihen, see what she’s written is because the only thing she’s been able to write about is Kita—or all of the very confusing things she makes Hitori feel, anyway, which is basically the same thing.
Something came over Hitori that night: she was a woman possessed, writing furiously for what felt like hours and hours on end before her exhaustion finally caught up with her, her back aching terribly from how long she’d been bent over her notebook. When she finally read what she’d written… To say she was horrified would be the understatement of the century.
What makes things worse is that even after she tried to write something new from scratch, something that would not be about Kita, she still ended up writing about her anyway. Over and over, she’s tried to write about anything but Kita but she keeps finding herself circling back to her—to those feelings usually buried somewhere deep, deep down Hitori’s heart—and now she doesn’t know how to get herself out.
It’s like Hitori is stuck waist-deep in quicksand and the harder she struggles against it, the deeper and deeper she sinks into it. Kind of like how the harder she tries to ignore the things Kita makes her feel, the more she just… feels them.
Hitori has always liked Kita, but she also always used to think that that’s just how things are supposed to be. Everyone likes Kita, and why wouldn’t they? Kita is pretty, and she’s kind, and she’s sunshine incarnate. She’s earnest, and she works hard, maybe harder than anyone else Hitori knows, and she sees the best in everything and everyone.
She sees something—so many things, really—in Hitori that Hitori doesn’t even really see herself, and as incredulous as she is that the Kita Ikuyo thinks she’s cool, it still makes her heart soar. Makes her want to live up to all of Kita’s admiration and expectations, even if she knows deep down that she’ll only ever fall short of them.
Hitori looks down at her latest attempt at not bleeding her heart out on paper and resists the temptation to repeatedly bash her head against her desk.
She brought a lemon to a knife fight. She never stood a chance.
“Hitori-chan!”
Hitori’s breath catches in her throat. With some difficulty, she turns around to face Kita, who catches up to her with a bounce to her steps. Her friends trail behind her.
It’s hard not to feel a little self-conscious around Kita’s friends. They’re mostly used to it now, Hitori and Kita’s unlikely friendship, and they’ve been nothing but nice to Hitori, but it’s still taking Hitori some time to get used to… this. To Kita casually and even somewhat proudly flaunting her friendship with her to her friend’s faces. To Kita actually letting anyone at all know that they know each other.
“See you tomorrow!” Kita says to her friends, waving bye to them as they go, then she turns all of her attention back on Hitori—she isn’t sure if she should be happy about this or not, given the effect everything Kita does has on her—and says, “Let’s go?”
Kita - 100000, Hitori’s heart - 0, and Kita didn’t even have to really do anything this time. “Y-yeah.”
They walk together in mostly comfortable (and now, familiar) silence. Hitori stares down at her shoes, trying to stop herself from sneaking glances at Kita and failing miserably. They’ve been doing this almost everyday now since the culture festival ended, walking together to STARRY, but it’s just another one of those things Hitori doesn’t think she’ll ever really get used to.
Hitori steals another glance at Kita. It’s probably not a very good idea for her to be alone with Kita like this, not with everything she’s got going on, but she can’t help the part of her that looks forward to these kinds of moments—when she has Kita all to herself, when she doesn’t have to compete with everyone else vying for her attention and affection—with her.
She’s snapped out of her thoughts when Kita very loudly and very shamelessly whines, “Ahh, it’s so cold!”, and suddenly scoots closer to her, hooking her arm through Hitori’s. “I hope you don’t mind.”
Has Hitori’s heart not suffered enough? She’s going to go gray at the tender age of sixteen because of all the emotional distress she’s experienced these past few days alone.
“I-it’s fine,” Hitori mumbles, trying her hardest to be… normal about this. A few seconds pass and she finally relaxes into Kita’s touch, now thankful for all the warmth she provides. It has gotten colder, with winter coming along.
It’s quiet again for a while after that, until Kita suddenly tells Hitori, “Someone confessed to me today.”
Hitori hopes Kita doesn’t notice the way she tenses up. She stares down at her shoes, unable to think of what to say to that, but fortunately—or maybe unfortunately—she doesn’t have to say anything at all because Kita continues, “I turned him down. I feel a little bad about it, he seemed like a really nice guy, but I think being honest with him is better than getting his hopes up, no?”
Hitori hums, resisting the urge to look at Kita, to see what expression she’s wearing. “Yeah, I guess so.” Not that I have any experience rejecting people… or being confessed to.
Kita says, quieter this time, her grip on Hitori’s arm tightening, “I just… can’t return his feelings like that, you know?”
Heart sinking, Hitori thinks, Of course you can’t, and there’s a very obvious reason why.
“I’m sorry for just dropping all of that on you so suddenly,” Kita says, laughing. Feather-light and so completely oblivious. “I guess I just had to get it off my chest.”
“It’s fine,” Hitori replies, hoping Kita is convinced.
The rest of the evening passes by in a blur. She’s the first to leave after they finish cleaning up, leaving no room for her bandmates to ask her if something is wrong, because there’s no doubt they’ve caught on. She heads straight to her room when she gets home and crawls under her blanket.
Hitori thinks about what Kita told her earlier that afternoon. Replays the conversation, however one-sided it was, over and over in her head and thinks of course Kita can’t return that boy’s feelings. Can’t return anyone’s feelings, not when Ryo exists.
There is Ryo, and there is everyone else who isn’t Ryo, and unfortunately for Hitori she falls squarely under that second category. Kita sees her but she will never see her the way she sees Ryo.
Hitori rolls over to her side and her gaze falls on her bag, which she’d haphazardly dropped by her desk. Before she can change her mind, she pushes herself off her futon and walks over to the bag. Reaches into it for her notebook—and writes.
Ryo
https://www.gomapy.com/search?g=xxxxxxxxx
Meet me there tomorrow, 1 PM
Bring the lyrics
[sticker]
Hitori imagines Nijika must be behind this… intervention of sorts. It has been some time now since she was first assigned the task of writing the lyrics to their next song, and some time since anyone has followed up on it. Nijika must be worried that the pressure has finally gotten to her, and, well… She wouldn’t exactly be incorrect about that. Just slightly off the mark, but not entirely incorrect.
“Bocchi,” Ryo calls, waving at her from one of the tables by the window, “Over here.” She’s made a significant dent in her pasta already.
Hitori orders a glass of iced tea and waits for Ryo to finish her meal. It’s not as awkward as it was the first time they were alone together, but she doesn’t really know what to do while she waits, and she still feels a little guilty for that bout of jealousy she felt after Kita told her about the boy who confessed to her.
Ryo wipes at the corners of her mouth with a paper towel. “Nijika asked me to help you with the lyrics.”
Hitori stares down into the rich, syrupy brown of her iced tea. Nods.
Silence hangs between them, long and heavy, and just as Hitori’s mind starts racing, Ryo reaches over and says, expectantly, “The lyrics?”
“U-uh, right,” Hitori stammers. But she doesn’t move to actually retrieve her lyrics notebook from her bag. She just sits there, frozen, hands balled into fists around her skirt.
After another long moment of disquieting silence, Ryo says, “If you need more time, or if you’re just not up to it right now, you can tell us. We don’t want you to feel pressured, and I personally don’t want you to compromise just for the sake of debuting a new song in time for our next performance.”
That gets Hitori to finally look up and at Ryo. “I-it’s not that,” she mumbles, looking away and then looking back at Ryo before she just looks away again in the end. She chews on her lip, mulling over what to say.
She never should have gone here. She should have just made up an excuse to not go, should have just lied about not feeling well or something. There’s no lying her way out of this now, and even if she tried, Ryo would just see right through her anyway.
Still, when she got Ryo’s messages, not once did it cross her mind to do any of that. She was dreading this meeting, sure, but at the same time she’d somewhat just… accepted it. Knew deep down that there was just no going around it, not for much longer, and maybe…
Maybe there’s a part of her that actually does want someone else to know. Maybe she does want to show these lyrics to Ryo, just so she relieves herself of some of her burden.
Hitori reaches into her bag for the notebook and, as she hands it over to Ryo, admits, “It’s not that I can’t, it’s… what I’ve written.” She knows that is incredibly vague and not at all unconfusing, but she trusts Ryo to figure it all out for herself.
She waits for Ryo to finish going over everything, and it takes her some time to do that because of how many times Hitori started over (and over, and over, and over). There’s nothing left of Hitori’s iced tea when Ryo finally looks up from the notebook and says, “I’ll be honest.”
Hitori braces herself. No going back now.
“It’s going to be funny watching Ikuyo sing about herself, especially with lyrics like these.”
Hitori blinks. It takes her a few seconds to process that, and when it finally sinks in, she stares back at Ryo in horror.
A smile flickers over Ryo’s face. She’s definitely enjoying this, maybe even a little too much, but instead of teasing her any further (...for now) she asks, “Is that why you didn’t want to show us these?”
Hitori picks at a stray hangnail on her thumb. It’s true: she’d been worried that if she let her bandmates read what she’d written, then she’d be found out. She knows how silly that sounds, and how that’s over-the-top paranoid even for her, but…
“It’s just a crush,” Ryo tells her in what Hitori assumes is supposed to be a reassurance. Nijika’s always been far better at these kinds of conversations. “You don’t need to beat yourself up over it.”
Before Hitori can think twice about it, the words are out of her mouth: “Yeah, but it’s… It’s Kita.”
It’s Kita, who’s her friend and her bandmate, who is sweet and kind and believes in Hitori more than she could ever believe in herself sometimes, and who could never possibly like her back. She’s sitting in front of one of the reasons why.
Ryo’s eyes soften. “For what it’s worth,” she tells Hitori, with meaning, “these are all good. Awkward, maybe, but honest.”
Hitori thinks about that on the train ride back home. She’s glad—relieved, actually—that Ryo thinks the lyrics are good, because that means all the turmoil she’s been in would have been for something, but she’s still apprehensive about showing what she’d written to Nijika and Kita, especially. If Ryo knows, then Nijika definitely knows, and Kita…
She pulls her notebook out of her bag again and flips it open to a random page. She knows the words by heart—she wrote them, after all—but she tries to read them again through a different lens.
Awkward, definitely, and clumsy in the way Hitori is with expressing her feelings, but… honest.
Hitori’s phone buzzes, snapping her out of her thoughts. She pulls it out of her jacket pocket and reads the message Ryo just sent her.
Ryo
Thanks for spotting me again today
Promise I’ll repay you
[sticker]
Hitori just sighs.
“Wow, Bocchi-chan,” Nijika remarks, “this is… different.”
Hitori shifts uncomfortably in her seat, trying desperately to avoid eye contact with Kita, who’s seated just beside Nijika.
After ruminating and losing sleep over it, Hitori decided to finally show everyone what she’d written. She almost chickened out too but somehow managed to talk herself out of it. That’s why they’re here now, gathered around this table just before STARRY opens shop, and she’s been waiting with bated breath for Nijika and Kita’s reactions.
She clears her throat and starts, “I-if you don’t think any of these are…. A-are suitable for Kessoku Band—”
“No, no! That’s not what I mean at all,” Nijika reassures hers. She sets the notebook back down and smiles warmly at Hitori. “It’s different, but that doesn’t mean it’s bad. I mean, it’s a lot to pick from, but they’re all really, really good, Bocchi-chan!” On her other side, Ryo nods with a soft hum. And Kita…
Well, Kita still hasn’t said anything, which is incredibly unlike her. Hitori doesn’t know what face she’s making because she’s still stopping herself from looking directly at her, but Nijika turns to her and asks, “What do you think, Kita-chan?”
Another beat of silence, then Kita says, suddenly back to being as chipper and bubbly as she usually is, “Yeah, these are really good! Who knew Gotou-san was a romantic deep down?”
Hitori can’t not look at Kita when she says something like that. Kita is smiling her usual smile, big and bright, but somehow… lacking the usual warmth it holds. Her joke didn’t even really feel like a joke, lacking any affectionate teasing to it. And ‘Gotou-san’...? It’s been a while since Kita last called her that—a long while.
After they settle on which of the (many, many) lyrics to use, Ryo gets to work on writing the song and they spend the next few days leading up to their performance practicing until they’re all just about ready to drop dead.
Things are… mostly normal, apart from the teasing glances and remarks Ryo and Nijika make to Hitori when they catch her gaze lingering just a tad bit too long on Kita (but they at least have the decency to try to be subtle about it… which Hitori can’t really say for herself). But it’s only mostly normal because things are definitely not normal right now between Hitori and Kita.
Hitori can tell that Kita is avoiding her. She’s not giving her the cold shoulder or anything, but they haven’t walked together to STARRY after school like they usually do since Hitori finally showed everyone her lyrics. Even in practice, where she’s a lot more relaxed around Hitori, Kita still feels a little distant.
It gets bad enough that Nijika feels the need to pull her aside and ask, “Are you and Kita-chan fighting?”
Hitori’s eyes flicker to Kita, who’s behind the counter taking orders, definitely far enough from earshot. “I don’t think we are,” she mumbles in reply, heart aching. Before Kessoku Band, she never even had any friends to be in a fight with in the first place so this is an entirely new and horrifying ordeal for her. “D-do you think… it’s because of…”
A light wrinkle forms between Nijika’s brows as she thinks that over. “Well, I personally don’t think so. Those lyrics could be about anyone, you know? Unless Kita-chan’s discovered the ability to read minds, anyway,” she jokes to lighten up the mood a little. She’s quiet for a moment again before she offers, “Do you want me to talk to her about it?”
Hitori mulls that over. On one hand, Nijika is the most well-equipped person to handle these kinds of things. On the other hand, she doesn’t think it’s fair to put all the burden of sorting this out on Nijika. In the end, she shakes her head and replies, “It’s okay. I-I’ll talk to her when I’m ready.” Easier said than done, of course.
Nijika nods. She even looks a little proud of Hitori’s answer. She claps her on the shoulder and says, “Well, we better get back before Onee-chan starts thinking we’re slacking off.”
Because Hitori is busy serving drinks to their customers, she’s spared from having to talk to or be around Kita for too long. She hates this, whatever it is, but for now it’s probably a good thing for the both of them.
Kita is surprisingly the first to leave. She says something about having to leave early so she can still get some reviewing done when she gets back, because she’s got an important exam tomorrow, then is out the door. Hitori catches the way Nijika and Ryo exchange glances with each other, some kind of quiet understanding forming between them.
Hitori says goodbye to everyone before she leaves and just as she steps out the door, she hears Manager-san ask Nijika, slightly exasperated, “Are Kita-chan and Bocchi-chan fighting or something?” Not for the first time she wishes the ground would just swallow her whole.
Their performance is a success. Without a pesky typhoon getting in the way this time, the turnout is much, much better than the turnout of their first performance, and Hitori even spots several familiar faces from their school in the audience. The new song is well-received too.
“To a successful performance,” Manager-san says, raising her glass of beer. They all clink their glasses. “Cheers!”
Hitori bites into her karaage gratefully. With all of the adrenaline from performing flushed out of her system now, she’s extremely tired and hungry. With how far apart their live performances are, it’s easy to forget just how mentally and physically taxing it actually is for her to go on stage and perform in front of people, but at least her pre-performance jitters aren’t as bad as they used to be. They’ve gotten only marginally better, but that’s still something.
She looks around the table, taking in everyone’s boisterous laughter as they chat about this and that, happily stuffing themselves with food. She smiles to herself, happy to be part of this, lucky to be part of this, but that smile falters when her eyes land on Kita. She watches her joke around with Manager-san and PA-san, and watches her dote and swoon over Ryo, like she always does.
She holds back a yelp when she feels a light pinch to her side. She turns to Nijika, who smiles at her and says in a whisper, “So, I’m guessing you and Kita-chan haven’t spoken about it yet.”
Hitori blushes. She looks away from Nijika and down at her food instead. Picks at it. “No,” she mumbles, “I… I haven’t found the right time to.”
Nijika hums. She looks over to Kita for a moment, then she turns back to Hitori. “You know, whatever it is, I don’t think it’s as bad as you think it is. Kita-chan doesn’t have a mean bone in her body, after all.”
“I-I guess,” Hitori says around a mouthful of karaage. Her eyes flicker to Kita when she laughs just a little too loud over something PA-san said. “I’m just worried she might hate me now or something…”
She almost chokes on her karaage when Nijika pinches her side again. “You know that’s not true. And I know you can be pretty dense about these things, but Kita-chan really admires you.”
Hitori really wishes Nijika hadn’t said that because it’s always the hope that kills you. Besides, if the past few days (and weeks, really) have proven anything, it’s that she’s not at all worthy of that admiration. Maybe this is just Kita realizing that for herself.
They stay for one more round of food and drinks before calling it a night. Nijika, Manager-san, and PA-san are all headed back to STARRY, and because she’s headed the same direction anyway, Ryo joins them. That unfortunately leaves Hitori alone with Kita.
Hitori shifts around uncomfortably, avoiding Kita’s eyes at all costs. She doesn’t want to be rude and just scurry off, but she also doesn’t think she can survive another five seconds alone with Kita. You could run a knife through all the tension between them right now.
In the end, Hitori manages to muster up the strength to say to Kita, “U-um… I’ll see you tomorrow.” She still can’t look Kita in the eye and it’s probably for the best that she doesn’t, but just as she turns on her heel, turns away from Kita, turns to leave, Kita says, “Hitori-chan.”
Hitori freezes. Feels her heart stop beating entirely for what feels like a whole second before it starts pounding like a jackhammer. She turns around, hoping she doesn’t look as mortified as she feels.
Kita delivers the killing blow by smiling big and warm and bright at Hitori as she says, “Let’s walk together?”
They walk together in awkward but not entirely unpleasant silence. Hitori tries her best to relax but that’s easier said than done when being alone with Kita is like waiting for the timebomb that’s been ticking to finally explode.
Still, she thinks back to her conversation with Nijika earlier and decides that maybe there’s no time better than now to just… get all of this, whatever this is, out of the way.
What feels like an eternity of silence passes before Hitori clears her throat and, eyes still glued to the ground, says, “Y-you did really well today, Kita-san. You’ve really improved a lot on the guitar.”
When Kita doesn’t reply right away, Hitori tears her eyes from the ground and looks up at Kita instead. She finds her staring back at her, expression colored with surprise, then a smile breaks over her face. “You think so?”
Hitori blinks, still a little dazed from the way Kita just smiled at her, then she stammers, “Y-yes! You’re a… a lot more confident now in how you play. C-comfortable, too.”
Kita’s smiling at her so big and so hard that Hitori wonders how it hasn’t split her face in half. “I’m really glad to hear that,” she says, heartfelt. If Hitori’s eyes aren’t playing tricks on her, it seems like Kita’s actually blushing a little when she adds, softer, “Especially from you, Hitori-chan.”
Hitori’s heartbeat thuds twice in her throat. Kita-chan really admires you.
—No. No, no, no. She can’t let herself get too carried away with this. Can’t let herself believe or hope that… No, it would be impossible anyway. It is impossible. This is just Kita being Kita. Nothing more, nothing less.
“You did really well too, Hitori-chan,” Kita says, pulling Hitori out of her trance. “Today, yes, but with the lyrics for our new song, I mean.”
Ah. There it is. Hitori knew they’d get to this point eventually, one way or another. Doesn’t make it any less unpleasant, though, now that they’re here. It’s her turn to ask, “You think so?”
“Mm-hm.” Kita falls quiet for a moment, staring straight ahead as they walk, then she turns back to Hitori and says, “Whoever you wrote that about… They must really be something, huh?” She smiles, but it feels strained. Sad, even.
Hitori is too dumbfounded to say anything. She’s pretty sure her brain has short-circuited too, but she manages to get the gears in it turning again for her to process what Kita just said. When it finally hits her what this has all been about, her knees almost give in from under her.
Kita wasn’t upset with her because of those lyrics. She hasn’t been avoiding her because those lyrics were about her. All this time, she was upset because she thought the lyrics were about someone else.
Hitori suddenly feels so dizzy, so faint, that she almost stumbles to the ground face-first. She’s only spared the humiliation of that because Kita, lightning-fast reflexes and all, catches her. “H-Hitori-chan! Are you okay? Hitori-chan?”
As Kita helps her stand on her own two feet, Hitori gets a noseful of her perfume again and it almost makes her dizzy enough to crumple to the ground again. Kita gently holds onto her arm as she steadies herself, blinking away the stars in her eyes. Terribly embarrassed, she murmurs, “I’m sorry…”
“It’s fine, Hitori-chan,” Kita says, still sounding incredibly concerned for her. She still hasn’t let go of her arm either. “I can walk with you to—”
“N-no, I mean…” Hitori’s face burns white hot and her heart is thundering in her ears, but she’s made it this far somehow so she can’t— shouldn’t —run away now. “What I mean is, I’m sorry that I… That I made you think— I should have just told you—”
Kita only looks more concerned now. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
Great, now Kita must think she’s gone mad. (To be fair, it kind of does feel like she has.)
Hitori feels silly for it, but she’s still a little scared to tell Kita she likes her. It would just be stating the obvious, but she has absolutely zero experience at this stuff. She’s had a few crushes here and there in the past, but they were never as intense as this; at most she just thought they were cute, but it was nothing ever more serious than that. This is different. Kita is different.
Kita is her friend, and her bandmate, and sometimes she looks at Hitori like she hung the stars up in the sky when all she’s done is strum her guitar, and she likes her so much that it feels like her chest could just cave in on itself. She likes her so much that she wrote only the gods know how many songs about her and even then it still doesn’t feel like she got all of it out, because there’s just so much she feels about her.
Kita is staring long and hard at her now, brows furrowed. “Hitori-chan?”
Hitori swallows down the lump in her throat. She knows that she’ll absolutely botch this, but she doesn’t want to back out now. It’ll be awkward, and clumsy, but most of all, she’ll be honest.
“Kita-san,” she says, a kind of calm washing over her, “I… I should have just told you. The song, and the lyrics… All the lyrics… They aren’t just about anyone.” She pauses, eyes flickering away from Kita for a moment before she sets them back on Kita’s face. “They’re about you.”
Kita gawks at her, completely gobsmacked by this revelation—this confession. So gobsmacked, in fact, that she can’t even get a word out of her mouth. Hitori decides that this is probably a good time to just get it all out there before she chickens out.
“I didn’t want to tell you b-because I didn’t want to make things weird or awkward between us,” she says, “and I didn’t want to make things awkward for the band either just because I—” She’s made it this far and somehow she still finds herself choking on those words. It takes her a second to recalibrate, but when she does, she finally says, “Because I like you, Kita-san. A-a-and I just—I just didn’t know what to do about it, so I… I wrote about it, and I was scared to show it to all of you because I thought you’d… I thought I’d be found out. And I… I didn’t want to let you know like that. I didn’t want you to know in general, and I didn’t want to tell you because I didn’t want to have to be rejected by you—”
That manages to snap Kita out of her state of shock. “Rejected by me?”
As if Hitori wasn’t embarrassed enough already. “Y-yeah, because… you know…” She ducks her head and wrings her hands. “You like Ryo-san, don’t you? And besides, how could you ever like someone like me?”
Silence falls between them again. Hitori’s heart is beating so fast, so hard, and so loud that she’s sure the entire neighborhood can hear it. Still, she waits, trying to count the beats of her heart to distract herself from the anxiety gnawing at her.
Then, finally, Kita says, “You know, Hitori-chan, I always thought you would never like someone like me.”
Hitori looks up so fast that it almost knocks her dizzy all over again. “W-What?”
Kita’s smile breaks over Hitori like the dawn. “I like you too, Hitori-chan,” she says, spelling it out for her simple as. “I… have for a while now. I’ve been infatuated with Ryo-senpai for as long as I can remember, but it’s you I like.” She purses her lips, looking away sheepishly. “I’m sorry for acting the way I did. I know it was childish of me, and it was also incredibly unfair to you because… Well, it’s not like you even knew, but I just… I couldn’t bear the thought of you liking someone else, and the fact you even wrote about them… I’m sorry, Hitori-chan. I should have just told you, too, but I was always just too worried that I wasn’t good enough for someone like you.”
Hitori’s knees buckle out from underneath her again, and Kita rushes to hold her back up again. “Hitori-chan!”
“S-sorry about that,” Hitori says, dazed and still so literally weak in the knees. It takes her a moment to gather and re-center herself, thoughts racing in her brain at the speed of light, until it all finally sinks in. Kita likes her back. Her face flushes. Dumbly, she says, “Uh…”
Kita smiles at her fondly, and it’s a miracle how Hitori didn’t drop dead right then and there. “Are you okay now, Hitori-chan?”
“Y-yeah,” Hitori replies, “but, uh… I mean… What now?”
Kita blinks at her, surprised, then she laughs. It sounds like music to Hitori’s ears. “Honestly, I don’t know either. I didn’t even think I’d make it this far.”
If Kita thinks she wouldn’t make it this far, Hitori thinks she wouldn’t make it at all. She laughs too, albeit awkwardly, then clears her throat and averts her gaze. She didn’t think confessing would be like this, and she definitely didn’t think being confessed to would be like this either, but now that it’s all out of the way…
Because her only point of reference is the movies she’s watched, she starts, “Should we… Um…”, but is instantly overcome by embarrassment when she sees the look on Kita’s face when she catches on to what Hitori is trying to say. “Y-you know what, never mind—”
Kita just giggles, but her cheeks are flushed pink too. “I didn’t think you could be so forward, Hitori-chan.”
“N-No!” Hitori stammers, her face burning so hot it could melt right off her skull. “It’s just— Well, in the movies— We don’t have to if—”
Kita moves her hands from Hitori’s arms and takes Hitori’s hands in hers. “I want to if you want to.”
Hitori’s brain short circuits again. If Kita wasn’t holding her hands right now she would be pinching herself all over just to make sure she isn’t just making this all up in her head. “I-I— Yes, I want to,” she says, mouth like cotton, “but I, uh… I’ve never…”
“It’s okay,” Kita reassures her, then she confesses more sheepishly, “To be honest with you, I’ve never kissed anyone either.”
So this will be both their first kiss. No pressure, right?
Kita steps closer to her—waiting, expectant. Hitori gulps and, taking a deep breath, she presses forward, hands coming to rest along Kita’s arms, and she leans in, and—
“Ow!” They yelp at the same time, clutching at their foreheads.
“I-I’m so, so sorry,” Hitori sputters out, stars still exploding in her eyes. “I ruined it, didn’t I?”
But Kita just laughs, feather-light and like music to Hitori’s ears, and pulls her back in. Leans in and presses her lips to Hitori’s in a soft and lingering kiss.
The kiss lasts for what feels like an eternity to Hitori. When they finally pull apart, Hitori is breathless and her lips trail after Kita’s. Kita giggles at that, making Hitori blush even harder, and she asks, “So? How was that?”
Hitori’s head is still spinning but she manages a totally romantic, “Uh… Yeah…”
Kita giggles again, thoroughly pleased with herself. She presses their foreheads together and softly says, “I’m glad it was you,” nuzzling Hitori’s nose with hers.
“Me too,” Hitori breathes out, still dazed and disbelieving. Kita is definitely the better one between them when it comes to being romantic, but when she thinks back to something Kita said earlier, she tries her hand at it too: “Kita-san, you— Y-you’re more than enough for me.”
Kita looks at her like she’s shocked those words could ever come out of her mouth and, frankly, Hitori’s embarrassed now for having ever uttered them— too corny, wasn’t it? —but then she smiles at her again and says, “You’re more than enough for me too, Hitori-chan,” and presses a kiss just by the corner of her mouth.
(Nijika quietly watches as Kita practically attacks Hitori’s face with tissue, dabbing away at the sweat on her brow from over an hour straight of practice. Hitori surprisingly doesn’t protest, just letting Kita have her way, but her face is flushed a deep, deep red.
She turns to Ryo and says, “It’s good that they’ve made up.”
“It might be worse than that, actually,” Ryo says as she chews on the egg sandwich she bummed off of Hitori.
“What do you mean?”
“I think they’re dating now.” Ryo shoves the remainder of her sandwich into her mouth and tosses the wrapper into the nearby bin.
Nijika turns her attention back to Kita and Hitori and catches the way Kita takes Hitori’s hand in hers, loosely intertwining their fingers, and shakes her head, smiling. "Of course they are.")