He sends the texts less often now.
What had been a daily routine is now, roughly speaking, a fortnightly occurrence. The texts are his comfort when work gets a little too stressful, for the times when he goes to bed still angry with someone after an argument. Sometimes they happen when he's alone and suddenly remembers a joke she once told. Sometimes it's because he's had a great day out with Masayoshi and feels he need to reaffirm his love for her. But he always reaches for the phone on special occasions, regardless of his mood. His birthday, her birthday. On those days thoughts of her consume him because it feels only natural that she should be there beside him. She should have graduated alongside him, she should have been present for all his big moments, she should have had her own damn moments. . .
But he's not reliant on the texts anymore. They happen, and it's a habit that he can't be sure will ever be broken, but cutting down on them has been a radical change in his life so he's proud of himself, and he's O.K with the fact that they're will be no quick fix.
His life's been going in lots of new directions lately, mostly in directions that run parallel to Masayoshi's course. They haven't gotten married and there are no plans to do so for the foreseeable future. "Baby steps" might as well be the unspoken title of their relationship.
Hand holding, light touches. That's as much as they need right now, maybe it's just as much as they can handle. Regardless, they've set their pace and they're comfortable with it.
He's doing a lot of talking, or at least a lot of talking about talking. Masayoshi thinks he should talk to a professional, someone trained, someone who knows had to help him. He refuses; sharing his pain with Masayoshi is hard and awkward enough as it is, he doesn't think he could retell the whole story all over again to a complete stranger.
Or maybe he rejects the notion out of stubbornness alone, but his point stands that he's made some progress alone, and that's O.K for now. He'll revaluate the situation if he ever feels like he's slipping backwards.
Masayoshi's life is much quieter than it had been, though boring is most definitely not the word.
His presence is coveted on every talk show around the globe. Everyone wants a slice of the cake. He's so young, yet he's already lived a life that most people only ever glimpse through fiction, so the number of interview requests Sumi has to field each day surprises no one. He declines most, but on occasion he'll accept an interview with Akira Konno. He does it out of respect and gratitude to Sumi, as much as she protests any romantic involvement with Akira, the amount of times he's dropped by just to say hi raises some doubt. So he lets slip that he's been offered the role of Harakiri Sunshine in an upcoming reboot. He doesn't mention that he has no intention of accepting the role. He doesn't think pretending to be a hero on television will ever live up to his childhood expectations now that he's lived that life and saw it for what it really was. But he lets Akira have the scoop and High Rollers Hi's traffic hits an all time high.
Against the advice of everyone he holds dear, he visits Haiji every now and again. Friends worry that his company will reignite the boy's obsessions and undo any progress he's made. But neither the doctors, the guards, nor Haiji himself have ever demanded that he stop showing up, so he visits every couple of weeks. Their conversations are often stilted, but it's not due to any bad blood on Masayoshi's part. Despite it all he still sees the good in people, or at least the potential for good. So he talks to him in hopes that their chats can give him a sense of normality. He brings books, magazines and music in hopes that maintaining a link, however tenuous, to the outside world will serve him well for when it's decided that he's fit to rejoin it.
Mari still laughs about Masayoshi's pathetic attempt at a proposal. She says that he could have at least waited until they exited the crime scene when the topic comes up. Which is often enough because she does like to declare that she saw their relationship coming long before they did.
But as much as she likes to discuss that aspect of their love lives, she's been loyal in keeping the knowledge that a relationship even exists to herself. The whole thing is so fresh and unfamiliar to the pair, so they're not ready to make it known publicly just yet.
Mari can understand that, she's still with Moe and more in love than ever before, but it's still a closely guarded secret for the time being. She knows that her relationships will cause a buzz in the media when discovered. The paparazzi will follow them, much like they do now, but with more persistence. Photos of her and Moe will grace the covers of every magazine, and will have little to do with their talents. So for now she's comfortable sharing her good news with close friends and those alone.
Luckily, she's become adept at keeping secrets, Flamenco Diamond was great practice. She still get's the girls together for one last hurrah. Well, it's always intended as one last hurrah, but then she gets that itch again and soon enough she has them assembled for another night of making examples out of the unfortunate souls they encounter on the streets.
The music hasn't taken a backseat to love or to her hobbies, and MMM are about to embark on their first North American tour. Moe's been helping her practice some English phrases, and being the romantic that she is, decided to skip past the basic "This next one's called ..." needed for a concert, and jumped straight into confirming that Mari knew a multitude of ways to say "I love you."
So their lives are nowhere near as a chaotic as they have been. There are no monsters or aliens, nobody threatening the lives of their loved ones. But that's not to say that their lives are somehow less thrilling. They're going to live relatively normal lives with the people they love, and after all they've been through that's just as exciting as any superhero story.