"Words I Couldn't Say"

Disclaimer!: I don't own Azumanga Daioh or "Words I Couldn't Say".

Pairing: Osaka/Kagura

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In a book- in a box- in the closet

Ayumu Kasuga was packing her belongings box by box. She was moving back to Osaka. There was nothing left for her in Tokyo anyway. Chiyo was in America, Yomi and Tomo were engrossed in their studies (and each other) at Tokyo U, Sakaki was far away at some veterinary college and Kagura had gone to a college with a great sports education in hopes of becoming a future All Star.

Digging through her closet she found an old, worn out cardboard box decorated with Hanshiin, evil pigtails, father cats, flying little girls, bread rolls and kitties. Inside it was a dusty blue book – she recognized it to be her old diary. Blowing off the dust she began to read.


In a line- in a song I once heard
In a moment on a front porch late one June
In a breath inside a whisper beneath the moon

Several entries of tired ramblings of failures at the Sports Fest, failure to be understood, and failures to tell someone how she felt about them in ways that were not vague. Several songs, based off many she heard in Osaka and one she heard from America in Yukari's English class once when she was too bored to teach. She rather liked her songs but doubted anyone else would…

'Living with this regret, so many things left unsaid, I wonder where you went

I'm so tired of moving that I just wanna stay in bed

'cause everything I dreamed is far off or dead

If I could

Then I would

I'd never let you go but you're already gone

I'm leaving too

So long, it's been fun

I'm going no where fast

I don't think I can last without you by my side

Because I die without you'

She remembered when she wrote that – she had been sitting on her porch during a summer night, singing the lines as they came to her head. It was the summer after Kagura has joined Class 3. She used her happier songs to soothe her little siblings to sleep. They were lucky in her distant eyes – she usually had to cry herself to sleep to get any sleep at all.

There it was at the tip of my fingers
There it was on the tip of my tongue
There you were and I had never been that far
There it was the whole world wrapped inside my arms
And I let it all slip away

Like with Tomo and Yomi there was really no logic as to why Ayumu fell for Kagura. Like Tomo and Yomi, Ayumu and Kagura were opposite in all but one thing – they were Numbnuts, Bonkura. Unlike Tomo and Yomi, their love was requited to each other…. While Ayumu loved Kagura, Kagura loved Sakaki… Sakaki was bound to never love until a matured Chiyo returned to Japan.

Still… it was apparent that they were just as good as friends as Tomo and Yomi were. 'Osaka' made Kagura laugh and made her think, Kagura got up in Tomo's face when the wildcat was mean to the 'space cadet', and Kagura was always pushing Osaka to get stronger physically and emotionally.

Kagura protected Ayumu from male jerks; Ayumu cheered a hardened Kagura up. In short, Kagura's home life sucked ass. Her father was a heavy drinker, her mother was an addict and all either of them cared about was Hideki – an older brother who was like Sakaki in every way but looked just like Kagura. Because of her drunken father and perfect brother Kagura hated men and shamelessly admitted that she preferred women. She didn't mind having friends that were male; they tended to understand her better as Kagura was a painfully obvious tomboy.

Ayumu supported her and didn't seem to understand why it was such a big deal to Kagura. When Kagura asked about Ayumu's sexuality she said she was heteromosexual. Kagura fell over laughing although she hadn't a clue what that meant or even if it was a real word. In Ayumu's point of view, it meant she liked tomboys – girls like Kagura.

Once Kagura left Osaka decided that not expressing herself was like letting the world throw you off it to suffocate in space – or freeze to death. Ayumu never considered what would overtake a human's system first but each day without the handsome female felt like both. She sometimes couldn't tell if she was breathing or if her heart was beating and often felt panicked. It sacred her – she had begun to scare herself, eventually settling into depression and anxiety, trying to assure herself that was in fact physically healthy.

What do I do now that you're gone
No back up plan no second chance
And no one else to blame
All I can hear in the silence that remains
Are the words I couldn't say

Ever since her best friend left her, Ayumu felt helpless as ever. Like an amputee in the middle of nowhere. Unlike a wounded being she had no one to blame but herself and as far as she could she would have no second chance. It had been years since Kagura had called or wrote a letter. She wondered if this is how the Sakaki-obsessed Kaorin felt… surrounded by nothing, not even white noise, all because of the words she never said…

There's a rain that will never stop falling
There's a wall that I tried to take down
What I should have said just wouldn't pass my lips
So I held back and now we've come to this
And it too late now

Ayumu watched out into the night as it rained – the streets of Tokyo were depressing right now. She usually loved the rain but now it was like the heavens were reflecting her like a mirror – dark, gloomy, and depressing. Gray.

If only she had spoken her feelings rather than let them get blocked by a wall of her own stupidity. Everyone, even her teacher always told her she was stupid. They were right all along – she was stupid. She was as stupid as they came. Kagura would've understood… at least then she wouldn't be killing herself, letting her loneliness drive her to temporary masochism. After a week of knife-work on her arm she decided that she was only being more stupid… and selfish.

She couldn't die. Chiyo would cry… Sakaki, Tomo, and Kagura would too.

Even Yomi might…

Chiyo. Chiyo Mihama was the glue that brought them all together… without her they all fell apart in random pieces. Tomo and Yomi just happened to fall together as they were glued long before Chiyo. The rest though… they were like… a toothpick figurine. If you pull a certain one out the rest will crumble. Chiyo was that toothpick. Chiyo was the one toothpick, Yomi was what gave it shape, Tomo gave it edge, Sakaki kept it balanced, Ayumu gave it creativity to make it unique, and Kagura was all the effort put into it. Kaorin and Chihiro were if anything the flags to decorate, assuming the figure built was a bridge. The teacher Minamo and Yukari were the ones that brought the effort to them – Minamo seeing how lonely Kagura was in her own class asked Yukari and the Principle to handle it so the welcoming class three had her. Kimura represented the many times the bridge would shake up.

What do I do now that your gone

Without the effort of Kagura, Ayumu stopped offering effort of her own.


No back up plan no second chance

She asked around for Kagura and nothing came up…


And no one else to blame

If Ayumu said those overused underused three words to Kagura, Kagura would've never let them grow apart.


All I can hear in the silence that remains

The book collapsed from Ayumu's hands but no noise was heard. When the tears, the rain, and then Ayumu fell, nothing reached her ears. Nothing and no one reached her.


Are the words I couldn't say…