I've always loved her. I had loved her in my first life, and I love her in all the other ones. I never got the chance to tell her, though, since I kept having to deal with my wretched Fate. But now that Fate has been conquered, I'm not afraid to get even closer to her. I used to be scared to start a relationship with her in my past lives, because I had known that she, along with the others, were just going to die all over again.
I had been there with her through all the bad times in her life. The death of her parents, her abusive aunt and uncle, and the disappearance of her older brother. I had tried my best to protect her from those who wanted to hurt her.
It's been a month since we defeated Fate. Things have changed a lot since then. The villagers, along with the head of the Sonozaki family, are no longer mean to her, but instead think of her (and the rest of us) as heroes for saving the village from Takano. Detective Ooishi has retired and also no longer blames the Sonozaki family for all of the mysterious deaths, since we had uncovered the truth behind them. Also, Satoshi, the older brother of the one I love, has awoken from his coma and is in great condition. He now goes to school with us.
Sometime after he had woken up, Shion had confessed her love for him, and they started going out. Mion and Keiichi, after finding out about each other's hidden feelings, started dating, too. One day, I'll confess to Satoko, the one I'm in love with.
Right now, I'm sitting next to her, watching how flirty Shion's being towards Satoshi. I'm very happy for her, since she's been wanting to be with him ever since she had met him. But I also feel a little sick watching her be all lovey-dovey. It's not that I have anything against them being together. It's just that seeing them so happy together makes me feel sad about how Satoko and I are still just best friends, even though I want us to be more. I'm not sure if she loves me the way I love her.
"Hey, what's wrong?" I hear a voice say to me. I look up and see Mion standing in front of my desk.
"Oh, it's nothing. Nippa~!" I put on a fake smile.
"You seem very spacey, though. I hope you're not getting sick, especially since we're having club activities today."
"Yeah, Rika. Don't you want to see me beat Keiichi again?" Satoko asks, smirking. Shion Satoshi laughs while Keiichi begins glaring at her.
"I think it'll be me who'll be beating you," he says, pointing at her.
"Sorry, Keiichi, but even someone as old as you can't beat someone as tricky as Satoko," I say, standing up for her. Hanyuu nods in agreement. I give Satoko a big hug and she smiles, her little gang tooth showing.
Rena jumps up from her chair and runs over to us. She picks up Satoko and begins spinning her around.
"Hauuu! Satoko's so cute when she's happy! I'm taking her home!"
All of us, even the younger kids, start laughing. Rena puts down Satoko, who's very dizzy now. I help Satoko to her desk and help her sit down.
"W-Why is the room spinning?" she asks, holding the sides of her head with her hands. I chuckle. She's so cute.
After school's over, we get a deck of cards out and begin playing Go Fish. Mion wins the first game, Satoko wins the second, and Rena wins the third. When we're done playing Go Fish, we all decide to head home, since Hanyuu wasn't feeling well.
Whenever Satoshi first came back, he had asked Satoko if she'd like to live with him again. Fortunately (for me, anyway), she decided to keep living with me instead. Shion moved out of her apartment and, with Satoko's permission, started living with Satoshi in hers and Satoshi's old house.
Hanyuu still lives with Satoko and I. She's the only one who knows about my feelings for Satoko. She says that I should wait until the future to ask Satoko out, but I don't think I can do that. I've gone through so many years of not being able to be with her. I may only be physically 12 years old, but my mind is much older. I'm mature enough to know what I want. I want Satoko.
The next day, during school, our class got to play Zombie Tag outside, with Keiichi being the first zombie. So far, Keiichi had turned Hanyuu, Rena, Satoshi, and a few of the younger students into zombies. Satoko and I were running towards the back of the school, away from him. As we try to catch out breath, he suddenly jumps out of nowhere, ready to squirt Satoko with his water gun. Without thinking, I jump in front of her as the water is being sprayed, causing me to get hit instead.
"Run, Satoko!" I yell. She runs away as fast as she can.
"Why'd you let her go?" Keiichi exclaims. I try to stop him from running after her, but I'm too weak against him.
I watch as he takes off running before he suddenly falls into a hole that had been covered by a bunch of grass and leaves. I guess he had been so focused on turning Satoko into a zombie that he hadn't even realized that there was a trap there.
I try hard to stifle my laughs, but to no avail. I burst out laughing. Serves him right for trying to get my beloved Satoko.
He climbs out of the hole, obviously pissed off.
Satoko and the others appear. They're also laughing at Keiichi, who's now covered in dirt and grass.
"Ohohohoho, Keiichi, you're so easy to trick!" Satoko chirps happily.
Keiichi starts to run after her, but trips on something and falls backwards into the hole. That's just makes us crack up even more.
Shion and Satoshi both reach out to pat Satoko's head, causing their hands to touch. They both blush and chuckle to each other. Now I feel sick all over again.
That night, while Satoko was asleep, I decided to talk to Hanyuu about my problems again. I usually talk to both of them, but I can't talk about my love for Satoko with Satoko. Well, not yet, anyway.
She told me that she has seen how sad I get when I'm around other couples. I do try my best to hide those feelings from others, but it's hard.
I look at the sleeping form of Satoko. She's on her side, curled up in a fetal position, as if she were a baby taking a nap. I can't help but smile at the sight of her.
Maybe, one day, I'll be able to hold her hand and call her mine.
Satoko and I sit down with the others for lunch, ready to eat the bentos she had made for us and Hanyuu. Rena, as usual, had brought a neatly-packed bento full of delicious-looking food for lunch. Everyone else was drooling over it.
"Wow, that looks tasty, Rena," says Keiichi. He reaches his hand out to take some of it, but Rena slaps his hand away.
"No, no, Keiichi. This food isn't for you," she says, wagging her finger at him.
We all begin talking about random things to each other like we usually do. We were laughing over something funny that Keiichi had when a boy around my age came to our table.
"Will you guys keep it down?" he asks rudely.
"We were just laughing. No need to get all mad at us," Keiichi says.
"Shut up," the boy retorts.
This guy was beginning to puss me off. Why couldn't he just leave us alone?
"Hey, don't you tell him to shut up!" Satoko exclaims, glaring at the boy.
"How about you make me, you little brat."
That was the last straw. No one should ever talk to Satoko like that. She's been through so much already. She doesn't need another person in her life to put her down. I abruptly stood up out of my seat and punched the boy straight in the face. He stumbled backwards a little bit from the impact. He was holding onto his nose, which was now bleeding.
"Rika!" Hanyuu yelled.
The boy grabbed my hair and yanked it hard. I let out a cry and grabbed the boy by his throat and slammed him down onto the ground. I got on top of him and began strangling him.
I don't know what the hell was going on with me. I just get so pissed off when someone picks on my friends, especially Satoko, since she had been picked on a lot in the past.
"Don't you ever call her that again," I say through gritted teeth.
I feel someone grab my shoulders. I'm about to smack their hands away when I notice that it's Satoko who had grabbed me. I immediately stop strangling the boy.
"Rika, what's going on with you?" she asks. She didn't look mad, but instead worried. I guess that's normal, since I never lash out at people like this. I look at the others and see that they all look worried, too. Now I feel ashamed.
The boy quickly slips out from underneath me and runs out of the classroom.
"I'm sorry, Satoko," I say as tears begin to brim my eyes. I didn't mean for any of this to happen. I just hate it when people are rude to Satoko. It makes me so angry. I've had enough of it, and I'm pretty sure she's tired of it, too. I just want her life to be perfect. I want her to be happy all the time.
"Rika, what's wrong?" Satoko asks, crouching down in front of me.
"I-I'm just so sick of people being mean to you!" I exclaim. I wipe my eyes with the back of my hands. It comes away wet.
"Rika..."
"Why are people so mean to you? What did you ever do to deserve it? You shouldn't have to go through so much pain, especially at such a young age!" I can't stop the years from rolling down my face. I might as well just let them fall instead of trying to wipe them away.
"I love you, Satoko..."
I had finally said it. Yes, I've said it before, but I had meant it as a sister during those times. I hope she can tell that, this time, I meant it in a different way. I hope she understands my feelings for her. I want her to know about the feelings that I have been hiding for such a long time.
"I love you, too, Rika," Satoko says, blushing. "I always have." I wrap my arms around her small frame and pull her close as I cry into her chest.
I can feel everyone's eyes looking at me as I cry, but I don't care. As long as I'm with Satoko, I'll be fine.
Later that day, all of us decided to hang out together at the toy store. Mion said that she wanted to cheer me up. We all rode our bikes there together. I kept seeing Satoko steal glances at me, but I pretended that I didn't notice. When we arrived at the toy store, we held each other's hands as we walked around and looked at all the different things on the shelves.
"Hey, look at this," Satoko says, holding up a toy. It was a cute stuffed cat. It was completely white and had a red ribbon that tied into a now around its neck. It was adorable.
Rena pops up behind Satoko. "Hauuu! That looks so cute! I wanna take it hooome!" she exclaims.
"Sorry, Rena, but I was going to give it to Rika." Satoko looks at me and smiles. My heart skips a beat.
Satoko turns her attention back to Rena. "I bet there are other cute things here, though, that you could take home, as long as you pay for them first."
Rena gives a thumbs up. "Okay~!" Then she happily walks away.
"Did you really mean that?" I ask Satoko.
"Of course," Satoko replies cheerfully.
I couldn't believe it. Satoko was going to give me something. It was as if we were actually going out.
I had been so surprised when she admitted that she loved me back. Although, I wasn't exactly hoping that my confession would happen right after trying to kill someone.
Unfortunately, Ms. Chie had decided to punish me by suspending me from school for a day, which I didn't really mind. I'm just happy that I'm now going out with Satoko. I was relieved that everybody else was fine with our relationship. Satoshi said that he's just glad that Satoko had found someone to love.
Apparently, after punishing me and sending me to the principal's office to calm down, Ms. Chie had given that boy a lecture about being nice to others. Then, after that, in the hallways outside of the principal's office, I heard Shion and Satoshi force him to say sorry to Satoko. I had been smiling to myself while he was apologizing to her.
Satoko ended up buying the cat for me. Thankfully, it wasn't expensive at all. I was going to get her something, too, but she told me that she already got what she wanted: me. That had caused me to tear up. Not out of sadness, but out of joy.
When Satoko, Hanyuu, and I get back home, Satoko starts making dinner. She makes some okonomiyaki, with a side of onigiri. For dessert, we have wagashi.
"That was delicious!" I exclaim after we're all done eating our shares of wagashi. That was the best wagashi I have ever had.
"I need to use the restroom," Hanyuu says before leaving.
Satoko gets up and starts cleaning up our dishes. I help her wash them and put them away. After we're done with that, we join Hanyuu in front of the TV. We all decide to have a movie night. We drag our futons into the living room. Satoko and I get comfortable in our futons, while Hanyuu gets the movie ready. Hanyuu turns off the lights and then gets into her futon on the other side of Satoko, who's in between us. I snuggle close to Satoko as the movie begins.
She kisses me on the cheek. "I love you, Rika," she whispers.
"I love you, too," I whisper back.