"It's just a letter," Soul had said, trying to inconspicuously push the slip of paper underneath his homework. "Don't worry about it. It's not for you to see."
Just a letter? Was it really? Maka wondered to herself that morning in Dr. Stein's class. She couldn't help but be curious about it. Despite Soul's obsession with being cool, he was truthfully a shyer person. But because they were both partners, meister and weapon, Maka could usually convince him to tell her what was on his mind.
"What was that letter you had on your desk today?" she had asked casually at dinner the night before, scooping herself a spoonful of pasta parmesan onto her plate.
Soul blinked, swallowing a particularly large mouthful of the dinner. "I believe you already asked me that."
"I know," Maka said, sitting down and placing her napkin in her lap, "but it's just that… you never get any messages. And stuff."
"So?"
It bothered Maka how stiff he was being, so unengaged. "Well," she began, voice taking a different edge with premature aggravation, "what was it? Who was it from?"
"You know, it's really not cool to be interested in other people's mail," Soul answered plainly.
"You can at least tell me!" Her shout was loud enough; but Soul knew how loud she could get and this was only halfway to the highest. "I'm just curious because… I thought I saw my name on there. Please tell me?"
"It's nothing bad," Soul promised his pasta. "Don't worry about that, Maka. You don't have to be so tense about everything."
She had dropped the conversation there, though she was still infinitely curious. Maka scribbled down the lessons that Stein was teaching like a pro but her mind was farther away, lost in thought. Soul was sitting next to her, as per usual, taking less efficient notes in his ragged scrawl.
"Maka," he whispered, returning her to reality abruptly. "How do you spell 'Chesapeake'?"
"C-H-E-S-A- why?" Maka stopped, quickly twisting in his direction at the strangeness of the question.
"S…A…Y… Funny, I thought it would have a few more letters-"
"No!" hissed his meister. "Chesapeake, that has nothing to do with the class, why would you-?"
"Ah, Maka and Soul," Stein interrupted in his usual voice and tone, one that implied no emotion yet clear irritation. "Care to enlighten us with your no doubt mandatory conversation?"
"Oh! Excuse us, sir," Maka apologized profusely, blushing slightly.
Stein overlooked it - Maka was a good enough student, surely whatever she'd had to say was valid enough that her internal organs didn't need threatening - and turned back to the chalkboard where a long, complex formula was being written. Maka sighed and began to copy the compilation of squiggles and lines.
Soul yawned heavily, baring his elongated shark teeth. He had been up for a while last night, in contemplation. He couldn't let Maka see the note. That would be of dire circumstance. No doubt she would jump to conclusions and think the worst, when really it was nothing like that.
But he couldn't let himself forget about what the letter he had written said either.
'Maybe, he thought to himself, I should just forget about her.'
"Hey! Maka!!" yelled a certain blue-haired deity-to-be. "I'm going to lift this ridiculously heavy 135-pound weight for all to see! Care to spot me?!"
"Uh, even if I wasn't in a hurry, I wouldn't do it. See you," Maka said briskly and rushed down the endless stairs.
"What? No takers?" Black Star shook his head, tsking. "Everyone must have something going on today! You think people would be lining up for this sort of thing. But what could possibly be more important than the great me? Nyan ha ha ha! I guess their priorities are out of order. Lucky you, Tsubaki, it looks like you get to spot me again."
"Y-Yay!" Tsubaki whooped half-heartedly, giving the air a small pump with one fist.
Meanwhile, Maka jogged home, school bag swinging precariously off her left shoulder. She hadn't bothered to wait for Soul, as she usually did. She wanted to get home first. She wanted to read the letter before he could hide it or burn it or eat it or destroy it in some way that wouldn't allow her to find its meaning.
Up the stairs, down the hall, to the bright red door. Maka shoved her hand into her pocket and came back with… a fuzzy ball of lint and a couple yen. No keys. Uh-oh.
"Blair!" Maka cried, banging on the door with both hands. "You'd better be in there! Open up, open up!"
"Rrrr-ooowrr! Mmm… You woke me from my cat nap," a voice purred from inside sleepily.
"Sorry," Maka snapped dryly as she anxiously rattled the doorknob. "Let me in, Blair, I really need to get inside. It's urgent."
"Where's the 'please', hmmmmmm?" the cat-witch droned. "Ooh, you look so funny through the keyhole! So little!"
"That's really very exciting, Blair. Please let me in," Maka begged. After a brief hesitation, debating whether or not the kindness was genuine enough, the door swung inward.
"Nya, nya, nya. Could be a little nicer," Blair pouted.
"Hello, sorry, thanks, bye," she sputtered, dropping her bag on the floor and racing off.
Maka burst through Soul's bedroom door and immediately began to tear the room apart. It was already cluttered with junk, old homework, laundry that still needed to be done, etc., and Maka wondered how her weapon possibly survived with the lack of order that she herself couldn't live without.
"It's got to be around her somewhere…" she mumbled to herself, tapping her chin with her index finger.
"Oooh, is Maka snooping?" Blair sprung onto Maka's back in her purple cat form.
"Just a certain… piece of… paper… Ah-ha!" Maka wrenched open one of Soul's desk drawers and found the crumpled sheet. She was sure this was it.
"Let me see! Let me see! I love a good secret!" Blair giggled.
"Hey, Soul wrote this," Maka immediately noted by the handwriting.
"Hmm, I wonder why. Is it like a diary entry?" the cat questioned.
"Shh. Let me read." So the two of them poured over the words together. As their pupils slid across the page, Maka's eyebrows slowly began to knit, first in confusion, then in anger. Finally, her trembling hands turned to weapons themselves and compressed the paper into a ball.
"Wait, wait! I wasn't finished!" Blair yowled defensibly.
"I've read enough!" Maka yelled in frustration, feeling the tears begin to bead. How could Soul write something like that? "I hate him! I can't believe him!"
"Oh, Maka," Blair huffed, unsure of what to say. She placed a reassuring paw on the girl's knee, but Maka showed no reaction to it.
"Oi, Maka! I'm home!" the all too familiar voice said. "Why didn't you wait for me? What had you running? Hey! Hello?"
Maka heard the dull thunks as Soul kicked off his shoes and dropped his backpack next to hers. He traipsed into the room, backpedaled when he saw her, mostly at her expression.
"Hey, what happened?" he asked, leaning down near her and placing a hand on her shoulder. She shrugged it off. "What's the matter with you?""I should ask you that!" she spat from behind her hands, both covering he tear streaked face.
"Oh no, no, nyo, I don't want to be part of this!" Blair sped out of the room with her tail raised.
Soul watched the cat leave and turned back to Maka with concern. "I don't understand," he said sympathetically. "Seriously, what did I do?"
"That stupid letter!" Maka's tone now reached fever pitch and she shoved him away from her. He grabbed her wrists as she came to do it again.
"Why did you read that?" His own voice was hard as stone with understanding. "Maka, I told you not to! That isn't my fault, if you go looking at other people's stuff! I freaking told you not to!"
"Well, I'm glad I did!" Maka was sobbing but didn't whine, for the most part keeping her head. "I bet you wouldn't have said straight out that you wanted a new meister! You would have just walked right out, wouldn't you?!" An unstifled hiccup managed to escape from the cage of her sadness. "Like something my father would do!"
Silence reigned in the room. The kitchen clock tolled each second with a delicate click.
Soul let a heavy breath out of his nose. "Listen to me for a second. I know- I know you don't want to, but… look at me."
Maka reluctantly raised her moist face. A bubble of tears had collected at the end of her chin, and she sniffled liquidly. Soul's red eyes met her green ones.
"I… I didn't mean the beginning part of it," Soul started in a broken voice, his face and irises now matching in color. "The part about wanting to get rid of you. I would never leave you, Maka. I promise."
Maka glanced away. "Father said that, too, and look at him…"
"I'm not lying, Maka! You know I'm better than that." Soul's voice coaxed her back to him. "I've just been… eh, worried, I guess. How uncool, right?" He laughed nervously, but was unable to clear the desolate mood. "But we've gotten into a lot of dangerous situations… If anything happened to- to you-" He swallowed, sweat beading at his forehead. "Oh man… I'm really sorry that it upset you. I won't… say things like that again. Like what I wrote in the last part. I just… feel really upset myself now."
"What? About what?" Maka turned an eyebrow up at him.
"You know," Soul sulked, head held low as a beaten dog's, "kind of… rejected. I know you're not trying to be harsh, but it just feels so…" He trailed off, the words just out of reach.
"Rejected? What are you even talking about? I understand you don't want to get rid of me now, but… I'm lost," Maka muttered, smearing her sadness away with the back of her wrist.
If possible, Soul's face was now an even darker shade of scarlet. "A-About the last part. You know… the part with the… the stuff about…"
Maka clapped herself on the side of the head. "Oh, shoot, Blair was right! I should have read the whole thing!" She reached for the note.
"No!" Soul dove in front of her and grabbed it.
"Hey! Give me!"
"No! If you didn't read the end, than its not worth showing you!
"I didn't even know you kept a diary! Now give me-"
"It's not a diary, it's a journal! Diaries are for girls!"
"You chauvinist pig!"
"Ow! What was that for?!"
"For being a chauvinist pig!"
"You clarified that, you didn't have to hit me in the jaw!"
In the turmoil of the now perfectly normal argument, the letter lay forgotten on the ground. A certain cat picked it up in her mouth and dragged it under the sofa.
"What does it say? What does it say?!" she mewled merrily. "I can hardly wait! Ooh! Alright, let's see… I left off at Maka wouldn't be fit as my meister any longer. Worrying about her all the time is so uncool. I just wish I could fight and know she was safe at the same time. Then I'd be the most efficient weapon, completely without fear. Maka would hate me for putting her on the sidelines… But even when she hates me, she's got that certain look that just so irresistibly cute. What do I see in her anyway? I don't know. Maybe it's what I don't see in her. There's no hate, just compassion. Even when she beats me up, I know at the end of the day we'll still be friends. Seriously, why does it have to be just friends?"
"Nya, nya, nya! Well, lookie there! Soul has a crush on Maka!" Blair squealed. "And Maka's totally in the dark about it! I'll have to do my best to keep that juicy secret to myself. It'll be more interesting if Maka finds out on her own…"
Blair crept out from under the pillows, watching as Maka hit Soul with his pillow and scolded him for being a might bit sexist. Soul grinned, holding up his hands in mock defeat.
"Goodness! A boy getting beat up by a girl and still smiling about it when she's through!" Blair awed. "If he can put up with that… I guess that he really does like her!"
"You're so infuriating!" Maka snarled. "Now I wish that I had a different weapon!"
"Say what? Now who's mean?" Soul blinked, finally taking the cushion away. "Oi, you're beating the stuffing out of my poor pillow. Stop it."
Maka folded her arms and hunched over. "Hmph! Fine! I need to think about all this anyway."
Soul placed the headrest back, fluffing it slightly. "Taking a bath then?""Yes. A very, very long one." Maka grabbed her bathrobe, along with seven novels, before slamming the door forcefully behind her.
"I guess dinners on me then." Soul rolled up his sleeves and snorted, miffed.
"I see you've got feelings for her!" Blair crooned, toeing into the kitchen. "I read your letter. Boy, was it a good one! But don't worry, I won't say a thing. Tee hee!"
"Yeah, well," Soul mumbled, the flush returning, "I'll get the courage one day. Until then, I'll-"
"Get spanked with a pillow like nobody's business?" Blair offered.
Soul grunted and clenched his eyes shut with aggravation. "Argh! She can be so… uncool!"
My first story that involves shipping. If you read the long thing all the way through, thanks! Even I couldn't read it all the way through... XD
Comments are always appreciated. Suggestions are always accepted. Flames are always hilarious.