TODAY
By: Aijou

Chapter Two

Hikari couldn't find the words to say, let alone the words to think.

There she was, her former best friend on top of another girl and not just any random girl, but Tsubomi. Of all the girls in St. Spica, Yaya was...intimate (Hikari chose the word carefully in her mind) with the so-called "annoying Pinker". Yaya's words, not hers. Hikari let the syllables roll out of her mouth as soon as they came. A shakey voice vocalized her reaction in the form of a strangled question.

"Yaya-chan?" The name came out of her like breath blowing dust off of an old mirror. "Uh...um..." And when Yaya hurriedly got off of her partner, the whole situation became that more real. It wasn't a nightmare she could wake out of. It truly was Yaya with the younger girl, after all. "Tsubomi-chan, too..." After that, the short sentence trailed off, leaving Hikari alone, a silent bright red. Yaya and Tsubomi sat up, very aware of how close they were sitting to one another. Still, neither moved from her spot on the bed.

The three girls spent some time frozen, looking at the floor before someone finally took it for herself.

"Hey, Hikari-sempai." Tsubomi asked positively. "How are you?"

"Good, um, and you?" She could only form short, disjointed monosyllables, that's how messed up this all was.

"Amazing," she gloated. "Isn't that right, Yaya-sempai?" Tsubomi patted Yaya's leg. It made Hikari sick. "Don't we all feel wonderful?"

"Y-yeah, sure." Yaya couldn't keep her gaze away from Hikari's face. It was turning colors in a bad way. First, a lovely rose, then a choked blue. Everything was reeling.

"That's great!" Tsubomi's voice was louder than it should've been. Not like she cared. She wanted to make it obvious to Hikari that she wasn't ever going to get her old friend again. Should've taken the chance when you could have, stupid. It wasn't like Tsubomi hated Hikari or anything. She didn't. She simply thought that the blonde was stupidly naive - stupidly too late in realizing Yaya's feelings. "Hey, Yaya-sempai, didn't you have to show me something?"

"What?"

"Yeah. You were telling me we were going to go see something. Remember?" She jabbed Yaya in the ribs. "Don't play dumb."

"But, maybe I should--"

"Should what?"

"Should talk to her." Yaya's eyes hadn't left Hikari's face. "Um, Hikari-san, we need to talk." She didn't know what to tag onto the end of Hikari's name. Nothing sounded right.

"No," Hikari replied monotonously. "You should go show her that thing she wants to see." Right on cue, Tsubomi linked arms with her senpai. Yaya pulled away abruptly. "Just go. I don't want to talk to you right now."

There was nothing more to say. She'd done enough damage lately, Yaya decided as she grabbed her hat off of the floor. On their way out, the pair noticed that Hikari, besides her body trembling, hadn't moved from where she'd been standing. The baby-faced female kept staring at the bedsheets, her hands shielding her face from view. Words weren't enough to fix things. By now, they were far past that stage, leading them to a point no one could guess.

"Hey, why aren't you saying anything?" Tsubomi waved her hand in front of Yaya's face.

They had been wandering in the dorm hallways for a while. Since classes were over, the halls were crowding. Friends were joining friends, girls were making plans, and people were whispering in hushed tones. Yaya could tell they were talking about her, but gave up on the idea of fighting with them. Why bother? She felt more like crawling inside of a hole than doing much of anything else, including walking around with Tsubomi. Tsubomi and her...it was a nice thought, except, reality...

"Maybe it's because you won't shut up." Yaya tugged the brim of her hat downwards. "What was up with you and Hikari?"

"Oh, please, like you didn't want to leave. Besides, she told you she didn't want to talk!"

"Because you were there."

"No, because it would be weird." Tsubomi dropped to a gentler, quiet tone. "Hey, Yaya, want to make all the girls in this hallway go crazy?" She grabbed Yaya's hand.

"No, I'd rather not." She pulled her hand away.

"C'mon, you're that upset over Hikari? You've got to be kidding me." They stopped walking. "You...you suck. I don't get you, Yaya. I really don't."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, first you're messing around with me, then you're acting like you don't care about me. What is it?"

"We're friends, Tsubomi. I don't know why you're the one getting mad. I'm the one who has more reason to." Yaya leaned against a wall, struggling to regain her balance. "Shit, I can't believe she walked in the room. I feel like my heart's gonna explode." She listened to her heart going gwuhgwuhgwuhgwuh painfully. Distressed but wearing a flat expression, Tsubomi leaned on the wall opposite of Yaya.

"Do you still like her?" The whole world stood on edge. "You can tell me, go ahead. I won't care."

Yaya took her hat off. She vaguely remembered the day Hikari gave it to her. It had been a birthday present, the single gift she had gotten since she had refused anyone wanting to buy her something. Friendly words adorned the inside, a hidden poem from her best friend. "She's barely a friend. I can't even talk to her." She admitted. If she could without fear of it being stolen, she would've let the hat fall to the floor.

"Answer me."

The taller girl walked over to her junior, a slight saunter in her steps. "What do you think?" She pinned her to the wall, holding Tsubomi's arms up over her head. Tsubomi turned her face away. "Look at me, Tsubomi-chan."

"Yaya-sempai, this is getting a little inappropriate."

"Oh? You could do it before." Yaya smirked. "And weren't you the one who wanted 'all the girls to go crazy'?"

When Tsubomi turned to face Yaya, she could see a few girls standing behind her, watching their indecent display. It wasn't like Tsubomi minded the contact, just as long as it wasn't in plain view. "I didn't mean like this. I meant holding hands. Please, stop." Her eyes widened as Yaya leaned in, her mouth attacking Tsubomi's neck with a few wild kisses. "Yaya-sempai, stop it. I'm being serious." She breathed a sigh of relief when Yaya backed off, but caught that very same breath in her throat less than a second later.

"What is it? I stopped, didn't I?" Yaya followed Tsubomi's panicked gaze, turning around. She was face to face with the Headmistress and a chorus of girls going ''oooooh''. "Oh, shit."

"Nanto-san, Okuwaka-san; my office. Now."

"Hey, Tamao-chan, Nagisa-chan, wait up!" They did as told, waiting for their friend Takemura Chihaya. Mizushima Noriko, Miator's grand champion archer, caught up shortly after. "Did you guys hear about your friend Yoyo?"

"Yaya, not Yoyo." Noriko corrected.

"Whatever, I was close enough." Chihaya shot back. "So, have you guys heard? Noriko was right there when it happened."

"Yeah, I was." She nodded in confirmation. "I didn't recognize the other girl, though. Some Okuwaka...she was wearing a sweater."

"Okuwaka with a sweater? Tsubomi-chan?" Tamao asked, confused. "What happened?"

"Well, apparently, Yaya was making out with some younger girl or something." Chihaya said. "I mean, sure, there are some girls around here that do that kind of stuff but never in the open or anything. They were so brave, doing that in the hallway."

"What?!" Nagisa couldn't believe it. "Yaya-chan and Tsubomi-chan...together?" She tried picturing it in her mind. Of all the people to pair up with Yaya, Tsubomi was last on the list. They argued way too much over stupid stuff, like who has better looking teeth, who can stack cups faster, and who can laugh the loudest when tickled. Sometimes, they were kind of cute, but most of the time it was just dumb. "I can't see that ever happening."

"Me neither." Tamao's head hurt at the thought.

"The Headmistress caught them, so maybe you won't have to imagine them being together." Noriko said, shaking her head. "Yaya's been skipping classes, hasn't she? She's in my math class, or at least, she was until she stopped showing up. Somebody told me she had the flu...what a lie. She didn't look sick at all."

"She was up puking yesterday," Nagisa lied. "She wouldn't ever skip."

"Hey, tell that to the Headmistress. We're not the ones that could kick her out if we felt like it." Chihaya replied. "I skipped once and she was so mad. I thought she was going to kill me, I swear. Imagine what she'll do to her after catching her kissing someone."

"Trouble, trouble, trouble." The archer spoke everyone's thoughts. "I'm gonna go. I don't want to be late to practice. Talk to you later."

"I'm coming with. See you, Nagisa-chan and Tamao-chan!" With that, the couple left.

"I hope Yaya doesn't get into too much trouble," Nagisa had a worried look on her face.

Wistfully, Tamao said, "at least she has someone with her. Maybe, she'll stop feeling so sad."

"I hope so... I really do."

Today, I thought about you...

A/N: Chapter finished 4/26/08. My own real life drama made this chapter come a little late. This whole thing with my "someone" made me feel horrible yesterday and, well, yeah. I'm not going to cry about it online, since I did enough of that offline yesterday. Doesn't "love", or whatever this feeling is that hurts just as much, suck? ...I'll stop now, before I sound too pathetic. Hope you liked the chapter.