I

It is the end of summer, but the leaves have not yet begun to turn that shade of orange that Asuka likes, and the lake in the park is too warm for Rei to consider dipping her toes in at the edge. It's this kind of heat that drives Asuka from her house, one of dozens that look exactly alike except for the alternating positions of their doors, to any multitude of places. Sometimes she climbs into the forest that stretches beyond her backyard, never going far, never able to find a brook or a lake or anything other than spindly trees that are surrounded by more decaying bark than shade. Something keeps her from going too far into the woods, be it the heat beating down from above or the quiet, never-indulged urge to invite Rei up with her to explore, so that when they discover something it will be new to the both of them.

Instead Asuka wanders out of her neighborhood and its twisting, identical streets, and heads for Rei's house. Rei lives only a few miles away, and yet as Asuka runs the perfect arrays of white and sky-blue houses become a tangled pallet of color, of red brick walls and slate tile roofs and peculiarly colored fences; two of the few disorderly things in Rei's life- those houses, and Asuka.

At the end of one cul-de-sac is the faded pink house where her best friend lives. The paint on the porch has begun to chip, as Asuka knows it does every few years. This house was a creamy white before it was pink, and before that, the same blue as Rei's hair. Asuka doesn't remember the porch ever being blue, but the pictures from their childhood that Rei keeps in her room are evidence enough.

She bounds up the porch with two great strides, taking the stairs two at a time. In the middle of the top step there is a crack, where Asuka remembers Rei fell when she was six and skinned her knee, and where the two of them had sat until Yui, Rei's mother, pulled up in the driveway and found them there. Asuka will never admit that on that day she was the one who nearly cried (she didn't, of course; she's never cried in front of Rei), and Rei the one who sat there, watching the blood on her knee crust over with a calmness unbefitting someone her age.

Asuka's hand connects with the door, rattling it about its frame so loudly that it's a wonder she hasn't broken it down already. She pauses, listening for the sounds of footsteps against the creaky floorboards in the hallway beyond. She hears only the muffled chirping of the birds perched in the surrounding trees. Then, just as her thumb has pressed the doorbell and sounded the familiar three-chime tone, the door opens.

It's not Rei who answers the door, but Yui, smiling at her as if she'd been expecting this visit all along. Of course she has, there hasn't been a week in a dozen summers past where Asuka hasn't come by. "Hello, Asuka."

"Hey." Asuka smiles, shuffling her feet. Yui's the nicest mother anyone could ever ask for, and yet Asuka's always felt awkward around her. No mother, she thinks, can be this pleasant without hiding something, but Yui seems to defy that expectation. Asuka sucks in a breath to ask if Rei is home, wondering if Yui's anticipated that question as well.

Then comes the sound of rusted hinges from deeper within the house, and Rei pokes her head out into the hall. Her blue hair is ruffled and unkempt, and she blinks slowly at the afternoon sun. "Was that Asuka?"

"How'd you know?" Yui asks.

"I just did. Shinji's out, so it couldn't be Kaworu."

Yui smiles and steps aside as Rei runs the length of the hall to hug Asuka, her momentum staggering them both over the threshold. Her arms slip under Asuka's and cling tightly to her back, acting out a reunion that suggests they've been separated for years rather than days. "Good to see you too," Asuka laughs. "You just get up?"

Rei nods, her cheek brushing Asuka's shoulder, and she releases the hug that's been held for just one moment too long. Asuka doesn't mind though; it's Asuka. "Been reading all day," she says. "Come in?"

Yui is already in retreat to the kitchen, leaving Rei to nudge the door shut with her foot and pull Asuka along the length of the hall. Its familiar scent fills Asuka's nostrils: of the flowers that Yui likes to keep around, and of wiped-down floors, a holdover from when Rei's health was at its lowest and that affliction which made her skin pale hung around like a shroud affixed to the house itself, refusing to be removed.

Of course Rei survived, but some part of Asuka (no doubt the one which dictates which nightmares she'll have) seems to have missed the memo despite everything that Asuka knows telling her that yes, Rei is alive and no, someone who is seven years old should not have to lie awake in bed long into the morning, wondering if today is the day when she will lose her best friend, when death will come into her life a second time.

Rei pushes the door to her room aside with her elbow and leads Asuka in, bodies still connected by their hands. It's the little moments like these where Asuka wonders what would happen if one or both of them refused to let go when they've reached their destination. Would it be her, the supposedly braver of them both who does it, or would it be Rei who clings to Asuka with that quiet urgency with which she regards the things she loves?

In all of Asuka's imaginings it is Rei who engages in this, who folds her fingers over Asuka's, compacting an embrace into that single gesture. Reality is a different matter; Asuka has told herself tens of times that it must be her who acts first, that today will be the day she holds on for longer than she should.

Rei's fingers slide out of hers, tugging past her knuckles, and Asuka is shaken from her thoughts. That opportunity is gone, and as Rei walks over to her bed Asuka can only follow, stepping carefully around the little maze Rei has built for herself.

Rei's bed is over against the wall, under the window with its curtains parted to let just the right amount of morning sun inside, another remnant of her sick days. A desk, the only object in Rei's room that's in some visible state of order, sits right next to it. Around the room are scattered seemingly random stacks of books and boxes with even more books, and to Asuka it seems like the room itself is a monument to a future that thankfully never came to be, although Rei has prepared, even resigned herself to it should it come.

Then there's the bookshelf against the opposite wall, sitting between the door and the closet, and the array of trinkets atop it. There amidst the silver sheen of dust are two framed pictures, one of Rei with Asuka and the other with her family; beside those are a series of braided cords knotted at both ends, Asuka's attempts at friendship bracelets. Asuka's never asked why Rei still keeps them- better to let herself imagine, than to hear an answer other than the one she wants.

Rei plops herself lengthwise onto the bed and pats the covers next to her. On the windowsill beside Rei, Asuka sees the book she was reading, lying on its back with a bookmark sticking from the top about halfway through the pages. Rei reaches for it as Asuka climbs into bed next to her, leaning awkwardly against the headboard. Somehow Rei's managed to make it into a sturdy back support; for Asuka, it just digs into her shoulders.

"Why are you here?" Rei asks with the same mildness as if she were asking what Asuka had for breakfast.

"Air conditioner's broken. Dad hasn't had time to fix it yet."

"So you're using me for my air conditioning."

"Pretty much, yes," Asuka laughs and slides down the bed, propping herself up with an elbow. "Ignore me. I just didn't want to..."

She wants to say she didn't want to be alone. She wants to say she wanted to come see Rei.

"To die of heat stroke at such a young age?" Rei's eyes lift from the page she's reading; Asuka sees hidden beneath their red a twinkling of amusement, and her heart jumps excitedly in her chest.

"Yeah, that."

Rei twitches her eyes towards the ceiling, not quite a full roll but enough of one to convey a sense of exasperation. Asuka offers her a smile, one that's just false enough to not be considered innocent, but merely benign. She will hold this smile until Rei looks back down at her book, and then she'll allow her eyes to wander over the cover of the book, another addition to Rei's library, doubtless a piece of realistic fiction with just enough fantasy to keep her engaged. That is how Rei lives, in moments like those described in books, and sometimes Asuka thinks she's catching a glimpse of them.

Like now, when Rei lies with the sun to her back, her edges blurred by a golden light that seems to radiate not from the sky, but from herself. She turns a page, and the glow moves with her. Rei has become a second sun, or perhaps a moon, reflecting the sun's light, and Asuka wonders what would happen if she reached out, touched Rei, perhaps that same light would transfer to herself-

Rei looks up from her book again; the light shimmers, then disperses throughout the room. Asuka checks to ensure that she hasn't moved, wasn't the one who caused this disruption, and no, she wasn't. Rei sets her book aside and this time, Asuka notes, the bookmark has not been placed inside it.

"Are you hungry?" Rei asks. "You walked here. You must be."

"Not really. I ate before I left. Why, are you?"

"A little." A pause. Asuka wonders if Rei is missing that light, or whether she even noticed it was there at all. "Would you like some ice cream, Asuka? It's Rocky Road."

"Thought you didn't like that?"

"I was going to try it, to see why you liked it so much. But mom overheard, so she got me an entire tub of it."

"Amazing. I'll help you finish it, if you're really that desperate."

"It's not that bad," Rei says. "I'll bring it up. We can eat it out of the tub."

"Who are you and what have you done with my- friend," asks Asuka, wondering if Rei will pick up on that nearly imperceptible stutter. Even she doesn't know what she would've said; it sounds like, if she'd allowed herself the opportunity, she might have said Rei instead.

"It's almost the end of summer. We should enjoy it a little."

"Fair enough. I'll just be here... trying not to make a mess out of your neat freak world."

"I'm not a neat freak," Rei sighs as she navigates her self-prescribed pathway to the door. "You're just hopelessly disorganized."

Asuka doesn't reply. She watches Rei slip out the door, leaving it just open enough that a sliver of hallway peeks through the two white pieces of wood. So Rei's not as orderly as she seems. Of course she's not; having known her for so long, this shouldn't surprise Asuka. And yet every single time she manages to, like these little occurrences are parts of Rei that only Asuka will know, for she is the only one who can detect them.


It seems that Asuka's bought the lie Rei told her, the one about how exactly a container of Rocky Road managed to make it into the freezer. Yes, it was Yui that bought it, but it was Rei who slipped it onto the shopping list in the first place, wedging it in between 'pie crust' and 'paper towels' in cramped little letters that would pass it off as just another eccentricity Yui needed to buy. Yes, Rei had been curious as to how it tasted, but she wanted most of all to be prepared, in case for some reason Asuka's favorite flavor of ice cream was needed. It's the kind of want that pushes her to be closer to Asuka, despite her inherent dislike of close contact, that same dislike that's prompted her to flee to the kitchen.

Here she is, standing with a cold wind blasting into her face, trying to find the ice cream amidst a dozen brown paper packages, all because Asuka Langley Soryu's favorite flavor is Rocky Road and Rei, in spite of all their time together, still gets nervous around her.

Being in love will do that. Combine an aversion to physical intimacy with a crush spanning at least three years, and suddenly being in a room with said crush is a task bordering on the impossible.

Rei takes a deep breath and sticks her hands into the freezer, feeling around for a hard plastic cover. The cold bites her skin, but it's a welcome sensation, something else to feel besides the nervousness compressing her lungs. Someday, she thinks. Someday she'll be able to bear sharing the same space as Asuka (that is of course, assuming Asuka accepts whatever her botched attempt at a confession is).

For now, she'll return to her room with the tub of ice cream and two spoons in hand, before Asuka notices she's been gone too long. She'll think of pausing before entering her room, only to step too heavily on the old flooring and produce a creak audible through the entire hall. And when she opens the door she will smile the smile she gives only to Asuka, the one that says I love you, I wish you knew, I wish you loved me, too.


Rei's brow is furrowed as she enters the room, like she's concentrated on not spilling a drop from the container nestled between her hands, only it's ice cream she's carrying and not something that's so easily lost. Then something changes as she crosses the threshold, a softening of her face perhaps, or maybe it's just the light playing across the room, showing Asuka that Rei's been smiling like this all along and she's just reading into things too deeply.

That was Asuka's worry when Rei left: that her arrival has by some means (the same means that clothe Rei in golden glows) turned the silences between them awkward, that Rei's journey to get them ice cream was more a way of finding, for some short moment, a place in which Asuka did not reside.

"Ice cream for breakfast," Rei says, setting the tub on her desk and prying open the lid. "Don't tell mom."

"Wouldn't dream of it," Asuka murmurs in reply, finding to her surprise that the ice cream actually is Rocky Road. Which of course brings the question of why Rei would have Rocky Road in her possession, unless it is as she says and Yui in her overzealous motherliness bought Rei a tub, rather than a small cup.

"Here." Rei extends a spoon in a closed fist. Asuka takes it, careful not to let their fingers touch. She knows Rei is shy to contact, and she doesn't want to consider what might happen should she run her hand along the back of Rei's, a touch too intimate for even the best of friends.

Asuka expects Rei to say something. Rei dips her spoon into the tub, digs out a little scoop of ice cream and chopped peanuts, sticks it into her mouth. Asuka watches this entire process transfixed, forgetting the spoon in her hand, wondering if Rei will perhaps offer her the next spoonful she takes, the closest Asuka will ever receive to an actual kiss.

"Did you not want any, Asuka?" Rei asks. "You don't have to have any if you don't want to."

This is such a Rei thing, to be worried about having trod, intentionally or not, on someone else's desires with the heavy boot of hospitality. The familiarity of it is comforting in its own way, guiding Asuka back to a world where Rei sticks to her habits and doesn't consume large tubs of chocolate-laden ice cream on her bed.

Asuka shakes her head, carving out a large chunk against the edge of the tub and engulfing it whole. Rei takes another scoop, not too big, like she is taking only what is deemed polite and saving the rest for Asuka.

They are silent for a long while, using the ice cream as their excuse, eyes wandering the room and only briefly meeting before looking away, afraid that any prolonged contact will spark some unwanted communication between them.

Rei pitches her spoon into the tub once it's been emptied. Asuka follows suit a minute later, having licked the last traces of ice cream from it, sitting now with her hands folded in her lap, a distinctly un-Asuka-like gesture. It's not, of course, because she's nervous, but because there's a spot of chocolate left on Rei's cheek, standing out against her skin like a solitary tree upon the moon, something that common sense dictates should not be there.

Rei knows Asuka is staring. She tilts her head, the question in her eyes. Asuka is struck by this urge, this stupid, silly urge, to lean across the bed and lick it off her face. Instead Asuka raises a hand and taps the side of her own mouth, right where the ice cream is. Rei's tongue darts out, wipes it away, it's gone. Rei smiles, Asuka smiles. Everything is as it should be, even if Asuka's face is still a little red. With the way things are, Rei will probably think it's something brought on by the summer heat. And for now, though Asuka's chest clenches at the thought of it, she will be fine with that.


II

The same entropic force that caused Asuka's air conditioning to break down has come to visit again, this time popping the chain off Rei's bicycle and wedging it between the gear and the frame. Rei's tried to yank it free; when she called Asuka, asking her to come over and see if maybe she could get it loose, it sounded like she was about to pass out from the exertion.

Now Asuka crouches in front of Rei's bike, which she's propped up against an old table that hasn't yet left the Ikari household for some sentimental reason, with a screwdriver lying discarded at her heels and her hands covered in bike grease.

"Don't understand how you got it jammed this bad," Asuka groans. Rei, slumped against the opposite wall, just shrugs. She could almost be a second bike, her chain unwound and needing someone else to come along and fix it, and then she'll be up and going again. "Okay. I'm taking a breather. Any more of this and I'll break my finger."

"If you can't do it, it's fine. I'll fix it somehow."

"Bullshit. School starts in two weeks. If you don't have a bike, what're you gonna do? Wake up at six in the morning and walk?" Asuka scoffs, lies back against the garage floor, the concrete cold against her neck. "We'll get it fixed today."

It's not a question. Rei knows better than to continue. Her eyes disappear behind her eyelids, like she's finally surrendering to this dual-pronged attack of fatigue and summer heat. She won't mind then, Asuka thinks, that she's being stared at; the ground could easily start crumbling beneath Rei but she wouldn't notice, she's in her own world. And oh, what Asuka would give to know whether she was a part of that world or not, even only as a warm ray of sunlight or a solitary bird's chirping, a song just for her, every note of it tailored to be something Rei will love.

"It's almost their six-month anniversary," Rei says, her eyes still shut. "Shinji and Kaworu's. Should I get them something?"

"Get them a room. At this rate, they should get married. I mean, who writes a song to ask someone to prom?"

"Plenty of people do, Asuka."

"A song for the cello."

"Well..." A pause. "Maybe just him."

"See? There you go." Asuka drums her fingers silently against the floor, telling herself it's not nerves, she's perfectly fine discussing relationships with Rei.

"Mom asked him to come over for dinner tonight." Rei opens one eye, regards Asuka on the floor. Asuka wonders if Rei's tilting her head that way because the sun's in her face, or because she finds something (not the bike, not the dust-covered fixtures, it'd have to be Asuka) interesting. "You could stay, too."

"And watch them make eyes at each other the entire time? No thanks." Asuka snorts. If she stays, she'll have to acknowledge that Kaworu Nagisa, the one person stranger than Rei, has somehow landed a successful romance before she has. Should she leave, there's only home to return to- no Rei there- and what then? "Only 'cause you asked," she adds, this time quieter.

"Hm." Rei nods, closing her eye again, retreating back into herself. Asuka watches her take one breath, two, a third. She seems like she's waiting for something, though Asuka doesn't know what. Maybe she thinks it's Asuka's turn to ask something, be it something as trivial as an anniversary that will only be remembered once- no one celebrates year-and-a-half anniversaries, as far as Asuka knows.

"Hey, Rei?" Asuka waits for some acknowledgement, receives it in the form of Rei opening her eye- just the one- again. "Do you like someone?"

Rei opens her other eye and readjusts her back against the wall before answering. "Not really," she says. "Do you, Asuka?"

"You're kidding, right?" Asuka laughs. "You remember last year? When every single guy in our year tried to ask me out?"

"Of course I remember," says Rei. "You turned everyone down. You had to turn down...who was it- Tai?- twice. And then you complained about how you weren't in a relationship for the rest of the semester."

Asuka sits up, her back facing Rei, and she gropes for the screwdriver on the ground. It seems that Rei will not allow her to so easily dismiss those few months of half-hearted complaining, of hoping that Rei would somehow pick up on her subtle yet desperate hints and realize, perhaps, that there could be something more between them, if only she was interested.

"Yeah, well..." Asuka slides the screwdriver in between the gear and the bike- twist, pull- andthe chain comes free with a welcome jingling, something to fill the awkward silence that she's left hanging. I don't like guys, she could say. But then that would leave an implication, albeit a correct one, that Asuka prefers girls, and though she knows Rei will not judge her for that, it's still something Asuka doesn't need her considering. "I have very high standards."

Asuka's fingers thread the chain along the gear, stopping every few links to make sure everything is in place. She sits back when this is finished, surveying the bike that now works as it should, pushing the pedal along with her fingers while Rei, still sitting against the wall, watches her.

"Well, that's done," Asuka says. Her voice sounds calm and far too distant, like someone else is saying those words for her. It's because Rei was staring at her, she realizes. Rei could've been watching her the entire time, and for Asuka, the thought of not knowing for certain is somehow worse than if she had simply failed to fix the bike.

Rei nods, but does not get up to inspect the bike for herself. She merely pats the floor beside her, and the invitation is clear. Come here, you don't have to talk, you've done enough, let's just sit.

Asuka drags herself across the floor with her hands and feet until her back touches up against the wall next to Rei. Now that she's finished, she can allow the suffocating warmth blanketing the garage to lull her to sleep. "Can I stay here?" Asuka mumbles.

A soft noise, an affirmative, leaves Rei as she closes her eyes and begins to slide down the wall. Asuka thinks she means to lie down, but then Rei's head contacts her shoulder, and there are soft fingers folding over the back of her hand.

"Hey," Asuka protests, but does not move. Rei's touch is a gift so rarely given that it would be wasteful to do anything but allow it. "Don't do that. I'm all sweaty. There's grease all over my hands, too."

"Don't care." Rei sighs, rubbing the side of her face against Asuka's shirt. The fabric, Asuka thinks, must remind her of a pillow in some way. That she's wearing it has no impact on anything whatsoever.

"That tickles." Asuka tilts her head, resting it atop Rei's. A few strands of blue hair brush against her cheek, and that tickles too. Still she doesn't move. "Rei?"

"Shh." Rei smiles, her weight pressing into Asuka's, relying more on her than the wall for support. Asuka's palm turns beneath her hand, and then there are fingers gliding between hers. For a change, she does not want Asuka to speak; she is content with this silence between them. Her bike is fixed, Asuka is beside her, and in this moment, Rei could want nothing more.


III

The woods behind Asuka's house are unexplored, at least by Rei, who despite over a decade of friendship with Asuka can count the times she's been back there on both her hands. There's a reason for this, there always is- winter lays the ground with snow too thick to traverse, the midsummer heat beats down fiercely through the leafless branches, and at all other times Asuka's stepmother is home. Asuka, for some reason Rei does not inquire about, won't bring Rei around when she's there.

Today, though, Asuka's stepmother is away. Asuka didn't elaborate on the wheres and whys when she invited Rei over to her house; even if she had, Rei would have smiled and told her It's alright, I'll be there as soon as I can, and biked over anyway. That's the effect Asuka has, the ability to call Rei out from her room with all its books to walk with her amidst the trees.

"We've never been this far back, have we?" Asuka asks, hopping over a log. Rei is following a short distance behind her, peering over her shoulder every few minutes at the houses and streets below them, which continue to grow smaller every time Rei looks back. "I wonder what's up here. We should really try and explore this place before we graduate. What do you think, Rei?"

Normally Asuka doesn't require responses of Rei; she knows too well that Rei prefers to speak only when necessary, using few words even then. But today seems different, Rei thinks- Asuka is more talkative today, asking things that cannot be so easily answered by a nod or shake of the head.

"I wouldn't mind," Rei says, carefully climbing over the same log. She really wouldn't- she's enjoyed these excursions with Asuka in the past, and that this will be their last year in high school together makes these woods seem much more intriguing. Perhaps they'll find something deeper in that will act, somehow, as a catalyst, keeping them together even once they've graduated. Or maybe in this place, distanced from everybody save Asuka, Rei will find it within herself to confess at last.

That would, she thinks, be ideal.

"I wonder what even lives up here. I've never heard anything at night. There's no tracks, either. Maybe it's just birds and... snakes? Do we have snakes up here?"

"If we do, we won't ever know. They'll hear you coming and slither away."

"Are you telling me to be quiet?" Asuka laughs and grins at Rei, her blue eyes shining in the sunlight like the surface of the ocean, beautiful and inviting. "Nah. You love me too much."

Yes. I do. It's the perfect opportunity, if only she would take it. Rei stares at Asuka, her lips parted slightly, the air between them perfectly still. She could say it, Asuka could accept it, but what if she didn't? Would it seem too desperate to admit it now, would Asuka even believe her?

"Just messing with you, Rei," Asuka says, turning and continuing further into the forest. "If you wanted me to shut up, you would've said so by now."

And Rei thinks, No, I wouldn't have, I can't even tell you I love you.


Rei is quieter today, despite all of Asuka's attempts to engage her. Asuka sighs, the sound barely heard above the crunching of leaves underfoot. It seems to her that even with Rei's love of fantasy books, Rei will only ever truly be comfortable in her room, distanced from the setting, regardless of whether Asuka is there or not (of course Asuka would have no impact on that; they are best friends, and nothing more).

The first time they came up here together it was spring- Asuka's mother Kyoko was still alive, Rei was seven and Asuka was six; their mothers were with them, lifting them over rotted stumps and fallen branches; the trees were covered in leaves and little buds that would one day become seeds, and the world had seemed perfect.

Nothing in Asuka's life has since captured that perfection, although when she's with Rei, it seems within reach. Asuka looks back again, watches Rei slowly climb her way up a series of large stones that could almost be a set of steps, but are more likely the last remains of a small stream.

She almost wants to stop Rei and say, Hey, if you really want to go back, we can, but then what? Even if Rei accepted her offer, what would she have to say on the walk down? It would, without a doubt, be another one of those moments that Asuka would never be able to fully puzzle out, like that moment in Rei's garage the week earlier (the instant Rei's fingers folded over hers replays endlessly in her memory, and Asuka hasn't yet decided what it means).

"Asuka?" Rei has reached the top of the stones, and now she stares with her head canted to one side, surveying Asuka with that same expression she's worn for the entire hike. Asuka wonders if Rei has even once smiled up in these woods.

"Sorry. I was thinking," Asuka says, and walks on.

She says that a lot to Rei, that she's sorry. Someday, Asuka thinks, her feelings will get the best of her and she'll reveal, by accident, the extent of her love; Rei will stare at her, her expression no longer neutral, and all Asuka will have to say is sorry. It would be more like a break-up for a relationship that never began, rather than the disintegration of a friendship, and Asuka would go on hoping that one day Rei can find someone who will love her more than she ever could.

From the slope behind Asuka there comes a sound, the snapping of brush. Asuka turns in time to see Rei fall from view, a groove roughly the size of her foot carved from the dirt where she'd been standing. Asuka is by her side before the dust stops trickling from that groove, extending a hand, but Rei is already sitting up and brushing herself off. "I'm fine," she says, answering Asuka's question before she's even vocalized it. "Just slipped."

Rei picks herself up from the ground, swiping at the dirt still clinging to her arms and the back of her clothes. She's gotten most of it, save for the few bits she can't see, still stuck to the shirt between her shoulders. Asuka reaches out, her fingertips brushing the dirt away, and Rei turns her head with such suddenness that Asuka can't help but jerk back.

"Sorry," Asuka mutters; that word again. "You missed some."

Rei hesitates before answering, pale fingers creeping over her shoulder to check that yes, Asuka really has gotten all the dirt off. Or perhaps they are rubbing Asuka's touch away; that seems the more likely possibility. Asuka watches with growing discomfort, her eyes wandering to the branches above, anything that'll distract her from Rei. She's forgotten, somehow, Rei's aversion to being touched, as if being up among the trees wasn't discomfiting enough for her.

"Thank you," Rei says at last, and stands with her arms dangling at her sides, seemingly waiting for something. Waiting, perhaps, for Asuka to say they can return now, that they've gone far enough, or otherwise for her to take the lead.

"We don't have to keep going," Asuka says, eyes still fixed to the tops of the trees. She can see, through the maze of protruding branches, the sky and the clouds drifting across it, and again she finds herself reminded of Rei. Everything, she thinks, is starting to remind her of Rei.

Something brushes Asuka's wrist, and Rei's soft voice is closer than before. "Asuka? I don't mind."

"You sure?" Asuka asks, and Rei nods decisively, the feeling of her fingers slipping away from Asuka's more like a tug than a parting.

Asuka imagines taking that first step back up the slope, the ground giving way below her. She would fall, arms flailing to the sides in a failed attempt to balance her, and then Rei would catch her, or they would both fall backwards into a heap; Asuka would laugh and that, their one moment of prolonged contact as they lay in the dirt together, would tell Rei everything Asuka wanted her to know, no apologies necessary.

She walks forward, putting more weight on her foot than she normally would, and pauses. There is no crumbling of the earth beneath it. Nothing happens, only a cloud sailing lazily in front of the sun, its shadow passing briefly over Asuka and Rei both, before continuing on its way.


It seems to Rei that for whatever reason, she wants to continue this hike more than Asuka does. Her desire to confess to Asuka no doubt plays some part in this, or maybe it's the idea of being distanced from everybody she knows except Asuka, whose presence seems, in this moment, as constant as the sun's.

Up ahead, Asuka has stopped at a tree that is more a trunk than anything else, charred black nearly down to the roots. "Wonder if lightning hit it," she mutters, walking a circle around it. "Hey Rei, think we can climb a tree up here? I've always wanted to."

"If we find one that can support us." Rei lifts her head, surveying the trees around them. These trees, unlike the ones downhill, do not rustle every time the wind blows; their branches are bare, like they opted to skip the other three seasons and live in a perpetual state of winter. "If one of us is hurt up here, it's a long way back."

"I was just-" Asuka begins, but she stops when she loops around the trunk and Rei is there, one hand pressed against the back, blocking her path.

"I know. I worry too much." Rei smiles gently, carefully; she mustn't let it seem like she is too concerned for Asuka- that's the fastest way to get her to do something reckless, if only in the name of proving someone wrong. "We can do it when we come back up here another time. Anyways, it's getting hot."

There's a flickering in Asuka's eyes, fleeting and gone too quickly for Rei to read. She nods, her feet shifting on the soil as if, despite her earlier suggestion, she has forgotten which direction is back and wishes only to travel deeper into the forest, if only Rei will allow her to.

Asuka starts past Rei, navigating the slope with slow, heavy steps. She does not look back, though she stops several meters away, waiting patiently. If she is going the wrong way, she trusts that Rei will tell her- but Rei remains silent, and Asuka resumes walking a moment later.

Rei follows after her, though her eyes watch not Asuka, but the trail of footprints leading in what she believes is the direction of home. It matters little to her whether Asuka is getting them lost; the longer they stay up here among the trees, the more time Rei will have to try to formulate some form of confession. It will be heartfelt; she will convey to Asuka, in one sentence (two at the most), how long she has wished for Asuka to know how she's felt.

And if Asuka should not return those feelings, well- life will continue. They will hopefully remain friends, and part on good terms at the end of the next summer, and perhaps one day in the far future Rei will remember their hike, this feeling of her stomach falling out from under her, this mixture of foolishness and mindless bravery that makes her want to run in front of Asuka, now, and tell her everything.

Her footsteps quicken, bringing her even with Asuka, the pair of them navigating the downward slope without a single pause. The air is in her lungs, ready to be released into the air in a stumbling, incoherent jumble. Rei lifts her eyes to Asuka's face, and her breath catches.

There on Asuka's face, flickering under the passing shadows of the trees, is a smile that Rei at first wonders is even there. Rei's steps slow as she realizes that yes, it is; Asuka is smiling, and it is a genuine one, not like the ones she so readily produces for the boys in school. Here in the tangle of trees and dried brush, Asuka has finally let her guard down, and that smile stays on her face as her eyes dart over to Rei, who has fallen behind.

"What is it?" Asuka asks, and her voice, like her smile, is soft.

It is the opportunity Rei has been hoping for, a second chance. But Asuka is happy in this moment, Rei thinks, and it would be beyond selfish to take that from her when she could just as easily confess later.

"It's nothing." Rei smiles back, the lines around her eyes filled with fondness for Asuka. Asuka hesitates, nods once, and starts down the slope again, Rei following close behind her. She will not, Rei thinks, regret having missed this chance. There will be more in the future, and even if she must wait days, or even weeks, Asuka's smile will have been worth it.