a/n: the title for this document is "kumirei except every time the author is mad it gets faster" which should give you an idea of where this is going. god i'm so mad i hate kyoani so much i hate 2016 i just want this stupid hell year to be over it's made me too bitter and jaded and i don't want that. i don't want to be bitter and jaded and yet here i am with the angstiest kumirei fic i've ever written

i yelled at an anon on tumblr today and i'm just tired and worried

The bus ride back to Kitauji was a bittersweet one, the band members' heads hung low as they moved restlessly in the cushioned seats, trying their very hardest to catch at least a bit of sleep. It succeeded for most, but sleep happened to evade two of the dejected students.

"I'm sorry," Kumiko murmured, tugging again at her seatbelt. "About the Taki-sensei thing, I mean."

"It's fine," Reina lied. "You don't have to worry about me." Neon lights blinked by, nothing but flashes in the shuttered bus window. Kumiko snapped the flower barrette between her fingers. "What's that?"

"Oh, this?"

"What else?"

"Tsuka- Shuichi gave it to me last night. He said it was a birthday present or something."

"You don't seem happy about it." Kumiko set down the barrette, twiddling her thumbs nervously.

"I'm not," she whispered, nearly too quiet to be heard. "I mean, it's a really nice gift - it's thoughtful, especially coming from someone like him, and it's cute, but . . ."

"But what?"

"He thinks it means more than it does and I've j-just been playing along with that, because why not?" Kumiko was shaking, now, and Reina tentatively reached out an arm to pat her on the shoulder. "That's what everyone wants, this sort of thing, right? Boy, girl, marriage and two kids in a picket-fenced house." Reina looked away. "And Shuichi's a perfectly nice guy, he wouldn't mind if I don't want to . . . y'know . . ." Kumiko made a series of gestures that would've made both of them turn red if it hadn't been for the relative darkness of the bus hiding her hands in shadow. "I'd be able to smile through it, right?" Reina clenched the ends of the plastic-feeling blanket she had cocooned herself in.

"Kumiko, are you . . . alright?"

"No, I'm not alright!" Kumiko snapped, clapping a hand over her mouth as soon as the words flew from her tongue, barbed and venom-tinged as they were. "Shuichi . . . he's supposed to be perfect, right? There's no guy better than Shuichi. Sure, he's kinda boring, but he's the guy at the end of the movies. The love interest, y'know? Shouldn't I be madly, madly in love with him? Is there something wrong with me, Reina?" A few of the other students had begun to wake, raising their heads curiously to find the source of the rabble. Tears had started to bubble in the corners of Kumiko's eyes, but she blinked them back. Reina gently rubbed her back, concern clear on her face, in her clenched jaw. "Of course I'm not alright."

"If it helps, I've always found Tsukamoto fairly boring, too," Reina said, a lightness in her words that did nothing to console the sniffling girl in her arms.

"I'm worried, Reina."

"You're fine."

"I'm not sure what to do, Reina." Saying the other girl's name helped Kumiko feel rooted to this bus, to this seat, to this world. "It's not like I can h-hop on a plane and fly to America or something, right? It's n-not like I can tell anyone, at least not until I'm a lot older. After all of us have graduated."

"I'm here," Reina said, holding her closer, holding her like the world depended on it, and Kumiko thought that she couldn't be more of a saint in that moment. "I'm here, Kumiko."

The bus continued to drive across the bumpy highway, and all the two girls could do was hold each other as the dream of gold flew further and further away.

a/n: sk8er boi by avril lavigne, aka the song with that terrible, legendary lyric "he was a boy, she was a girl, can i make it anymore obvious?" started playing on shuffle while i was editing this like what kind of awful irony is that