"Miu?" JK looked up from the magazine he'd been reading as Miu sulked into the Rabbit Hutch, trailing large puddles water as it dripped off of her. Tomoko and Ryusei had gone to investigate some leads on the Horoscopes, and Kengo, Yuki, and Gentaro had gone off to practice switch combinations for Cosmic. Oshugi was probably grading tests or something. He didn't know where Shun was - College classes, maybe? - but he knew for now it was just the two of them.
JK put the magazine down and looked around for a towel or a blanket, managing only to find Gentaro's jacket that had been left behind days before. It was better than nothing, so he brought it to Miu, wrapping it around her shoulders as she sunk unhappily into the lawn chair that was Shun's usual spot. JK crouched beside the chair and frowned, reaching out to carefully push the wet hair stuck to Miu's face away from her eyes. "...What happened?"
"It's raining." Miu said blandly, curling up in the chair, keeping the borrowed jacket pulled around herself, though it didn't help much in the way of warmth since now it was getting as wet as she was. "It wasn't -supposed- to, so I didn't bring an umbrella today." JK sighed and stood, stuffing his hands in his pockets.
"I'd have thought our Chairwoman would be better prepared than that." JK mused, sitting at the table in the center of the room, still facing Miu. "They make those small ones women can keep in a handbag now. I'd thought you would have had one." Miu just rolled her eyes at him.
"They still take up too much space. The bags I usually carry aren't that big." Miu huffed, then sneezed.
JK frowned and looked around. "You'll get sick if you stay in wet clothes. Weren't you already coming down with a cold?" He sighed, digging through the box under the bench seat at the table for something she could change into. "You should have passed it to Shun when you had the chance."
"Idiots can't catch colds." Miu responded. It's not as if she thought badly of Shun, it was just frustrating that even now he was still trying to win her back and doing such an obviously poor job of it. "And since when do you worry about stuff like that?" Miu sighed, "You're acting like you're my mother or something. You don't usually get concerned about things unless it involves someone attacking you."
"That's not true!" JK whined, finding Miu's old cheerleading uniform in the box. He wasn't sure why it was there, but it would do fine for now. He handed the dry clothes to her. "If something happened to you, the Kamen Rider Club would be clueless. You know we need you to keep us organized. JK pulled off his uniform jacket and the hooded jacket he'd been wearing under it. He held the warmer, blindingly colorful rainbow leopard print jacket out to Miu. "And I don't want to see you looking so cold and miserable. It doesn't suit you."
Miu took the clothes carefully, trying not to get them wet, staring down at them a moment before moving past JK to the room where Kengo adjusted the switches to change. "You've been really cool lately." Miu called back to him as she peeled off the wet clothes, setting them aside.
JK sat at the table with his back to the room to give Miu some privacy, mostly because he knew she'd probably punch him if he didn't. He lifted his head, almost looking back as she called out to him, having to stop himself just in case. "Cool? M-Me?" He was a little startled by it, though he sat up and tried to laugh as if it were something obvious. "W-Well of course I'm cool!" Even so, JK couldn't stop his voice from shaking slightly. "I'm the coolest guy around here!" He tried to sound confident, but he was sure Miu could still hear his uncertainty. -Gentaro- was cool, Ryusei and Tomoko were cool. Hell, even Kengo was cool sometimes. JK just -seemed- cool to people who didn't know better. And he was sure Miu knew better. Of course she did. She was cool - Maybe the coolest after Gentaro. - and clever and observant. Of course she'd know that JK wasn't nearly the bright, cool, funny guy he made himself out to be.
Miu smiled, stepping out from the back, pulling the jacket on over her old uniform. She felt much better now that she was in dry clothes, and it was sort of nice to wear her old cheerleading outfit again. She laid the wet clothes out on the already damp lawn chair and sat don next to JK, reaching over and stealing one of the clips out of his hair.
"H-Hey!" JK's face flushed a bit as he leaned away from Miu. She just laughed and used the clip to pull her damp hair up off of the back of her neck.
"I meant when we've been in fights. You stood up to Tatsumori all on your own." Miu said, and it startled JK just how proud she sounded. "You weren't following on one of us. You were the one who stepped up there. We followed your lead." Miu reached over, trying to fix the part of his hair she'd disturbed by stealing the hair clip. "It would have been really brave for any of us. But for you..." She smiled leaning on his shoulder a bit. "It really showed how much you've changed in the past few months."
JK lowered his head, a deep blush rising in his cheeks that he was trying, and sure he was failing, to hide. "W-Well... I mean..." His voice shook again, though part of it was from remembering that day than how close Miu was. "A-After Gentaro... I just..." JK bit his lower lip, and Miu frowned as she felt him tense up. "...You guys are the only real friends I'd ever had and I couldn't let them take away any more of you without a fight!"
Of course after that they'd been ambushed, assaulted, and captured. JK hadn't truly been able to do anything at all. But he'd made his stand and he was a little proud of himself for that. It might have gone smoother to go his usual route and manipulate his way through the situation, but it hadn't been about saving his own life. For once, it had been about protecting everyone else. JK looked over at Miu and gave a weak smile, picking up her hairbrush fro the table where she'd left it the last time she'd been in the Rabbit Hutch. He reached over and took the clip out of her hair, then leaned over and started brushing it. Miu felt her cheeks warm up and she glanced over at him. "W-What are you doing?"
"Your hair's a mess from the rain." JK said softly, teasing a bit. "I can't let everyone see our precious Chairwoman like that. They'll all ready be concerned enough with how you're dressed." He laughed a little, and Miu laughed with him.
"Shun's going to make a big fuss over it once he finally gets here." Miu murmured, letting herself relax a bit as JK brushed her hair. "And I bet Kengo will make that face he makes when he questions why he's even friends with all of us."
JK laughed and nodded, "Oshugi-sensei will probably get all nostalgic about before you graduated, and Ryusei and Tomoko will just stand there while Gentaro gets caught up in the nostalgia too." Miu looked down at herself and smiled a bit, adjusting the skirt.
"I'm a little nostalgic myself..." Miu confessed. "I mean I wore this for three years. It's a big part of who I was." Though, to think back on it, she wasn't exactly proud of who she'd been for those three years. Sure, she had stuck to her convictions, and she was proud of that. Bit it had caused her to look down on people and alienate a lot of people who could have been good friends. The three years hadn't been bad though, and it had led her here, to people she cared about more than she thought was possible. So Miu knew she couldn't regret anything.
"It's a shame I only got to see you in it for a few months." JK murmured. Miu tilted her head a bit, looking back at JK, not having heard him fully.
"Huh?" She looked back at him curiously.
"Even back at Queen-Fest, I admired you a bit." JK murmured, "I mean.. Please don't take this the wrong way, but back then it was kind of cool seeing you be the one to get pushed, since you always looked down on me and the kids I hung out with, but..." JK sighed and shrugged, "Even when everyone turned on you, you didn't run away or cry. You were scared maybe, yeah. But you kept your head up." JK smiled weakly, "That's cool. I couldn't do something like that. And in the end you stood up to everyone. The whole school. And even after everything, you still became Queen."
Miu shrugged a little, "I wasn't the person I am now. I made a lot of mistakes." Thinking back on that week... It was part of the reason she couldn't forgive Shun. When she had needed him most, the support of the one person she had truly trusted to stand by her, Shun had betrayed her. She had let it go then, and she had forgiven him now. But that didn't man she'd just pretend it hadn't happened.
"You're talking to the king of mistakes." JK laughed a little. "But you were still so brave and cool... You still are. I just wish I could have seen that Miu a bit more too."
"That Miu hated you." She reminded him in a low voice.
JK shrugged a little and smiled, "Everyone hated me. Even the people who liked me hated me." He put the hairbrush aside and clipped Miu's hair up off of her neck. "There. Much better." He picked up the small mirror on the table, which was also Miu's, and handed it to her.
Miu took it, looking at her hair, tilting her head a bit as she thought about it. "This is.. actually kind of cute." Miu smiled a little and looked back at JK. "Thanks... I actually look almost presentable." She look down at herself, "Aside from he fact that nothing I'm wearing matches."
JK waved the last comment off and smiled. "It's fashionable! That jacket is actually pretty expensive! The cheerleading uniform with it seems kind of weird and trendy! It's a cool look!" JK assured Miu, who just rolled her eyes, shook her head, and smiled.
"So you 'admired' me last year, huh?" Miu teased, Watching as JK shifted hit hide his face again. She leaned back, dropping her head on his shoulder. "Well, I admired you last week. So we're even."
JK bit his lower lip, trying to keep his face from going completely red, and to keep himself from shaking as he lifted his arm and placed it around Miu's shoulders. "I... I won't let anything happen to you. I can't do what Gentaro and Ryusei do, and I can't drive the Power Dizer without it leaving me useless... b-but... I'll still find a way to take care of you. I promise." Miu stared up at JK from her place on his shoulder. She could feel his body shaking. She smiled and closed her eyes, leaning into his shoulder.
"I fear for anyone who tries to get in your way." Miu leaned up and kissed his cheek. JK tensed, coughing as his breath caught in his lungs. Miu laughed. JK frowned at her.
"I-If you're just teasing me, that's really mean!" JK whined a bit.
Miu sighed and sat up, turning to face JK, placing her hands on the bench and leaning toward him. "I don't do cliche love confessions, you know me better than that." She leaned in, catching him of guard in a brief kiss. "So you get that. Take it or leave it."
JK took a second to let his brain catch up to the rest of him. His face was completely red, and it felt like his heart was going to burst out of his chest. He gave a weak smile, kissing Miu again. "I... I'll t-take it.