REASONS
Chapter 51
AKKO
Akko was not usually the type to get nervous. It wasn't as though she practiced any methods of remaining calm, of keeping the anxiety at bay. Calm was just something that came naturally to her, an innate part of her personality that she had come to appreciate when it came to competition and other stressful situations. She was the reliable one, the anchor (pun intended?) for a team that was usually a bundle of nerves.
But, this time, she was the nervous one.
"It's gonna be just fine, Akko," Lotte reassured, placing a soft hand on Akko's knee as she smiled into the Japanese girl's red eyes. "We'll do great. You're still better than everybody out there. Even if you're a little rusty."
"Yeah, I'll admit you're decent," Sucy murmured. She shrugged and flashed her trademark smirk at her two teammates. "We'll get by."
Akko sighed, fiddling with the earbuds in her fingers that were still blasting K-pop. "It's not that," she said, shrinking down into the seat of the van. Behind them, Jasminka and Constanze were passed out, the smaller German girl slouched against her larger, snoring friend. Amanda was busy playing something on her phone, her own music a distant noise that was drowned out by the droning of the van's engine.
"Then what is it?" Lotte gave her knee a squeeze and peered at Akko, her blue eyes bright behind thick lenses. "If you're worried about getting hurt again, we'll make sure nothing happens."
"It's not that either." Akko frowned, flicking on the screen of her phone and navigating to the most recent text message that Okaasan had sent her. "This is the first major competition my parents have come to," she admitted. "And… my wrist." She turned her braced wrist over on her leg, glaring at it as if it had offended her somehow. And, well, it kind of had, because it broke without her permission. "If anything happens while I'm riding I'll be dead," she finished with a dramatic groan.
Sucy side-eyed her from where she was slouched against the window, her shoulders rattling with the van. It was windy and the vehicle was being pushed all over the road. Akko didn't want to imagine how stressed out Miss Nelson was driving because she got anxious even on the best of days. "Well, that's kind of your fault," Sucy pointed out. "You're the one that didn't tell your parents you broke your wrist."
"I didn't want them to worry." Akko let her head fall back against the headrest and sighed. "I didn't know they were going to fly out west to watch me ride!"
"If I had parents," Sucy grumbled, "I would have told them I broke my wrist. And I'd be excited to have them at one of the most important competitions I've ever ridden in."
"Sucy," Lotte scolded.
Akko glanced at her lavender-haired friend. "It's okay, Lotte," she said quietly. "She's just saying it how it is. Sorry, Sucy."
It was rare for Sucy to bring up her orphaned past and Akko and Lotte were privy to very little of what the other girl had gone through during her childhood. All Akko knew was that there was foster care but never adoption, and her quiet, snarky roommate had drowned herself a modest equestrian program to get through her youth with hand-me-down equipment since the orphanage couldn't afford anything. Like Akko, she, too, had a full ride, having thrown herself head first into a scholarship opportunity for children of her background.
Sucy's past didn't seem to upset her, and so the topic was something that was in the pile of "unmentionable" within the trio's friendship. It was just there: a fact of life, much like Akko's sexuality, much like Lotte's struggle with poverty growing up in Finland.
"It's cool," Sucy muttered. The corner of her lip cricked back into a half-smirk. "I don't care."
"You know, you say that a lot," Lotte pointed out, "but I'm pretty sure you do care."
"Ah." Sucy's lips pursed together as she nodded firmly. "The gig is up. The curtain has closed. My attempts at hiding my true feelings have all been for naught. I am exposed to the core." She pressed her fingers to her heart and feigned a dramatic faint.
Lotte scowled, running a hand through her messy orange hair. "Knock it off, Suce," she growled. "You don't have to be such a—"
"What happened?" Akko heard herself ask. She glanced up from where she was poking at the Velcro of her wrist brace. Maroon and blue eyes turned to her and immediately she felt guilty for the question, though she pushed forward anyway because… well, she wanted to know, and she felt like she hardly knew much at all about her very quiet roommate. "To your parents?" she clarified.
"Uh." Sucy hesitated for a moment, her gaze switching to the backseat where Constanze and Jasminka were fast asleep. Amanda, too, had let her eyes drift shut, her phone loose in her hand as her chin bobbed with the movement of wheels against the road. "They died."
Akko blinked. Lotte had become completely silent, her body rigid with the tension surrounding the conversation.
"Akko," Lotte said carefully, "I don't think this is appropriate—"
"It's okay. Do you want to know what happened?"
Sucy's lips were pursed in a tight smile as she glanced back and forth between her two friends.
In that moment, as Akko studied a somewhat saddened expression that was far from Sucy's usual neutral, disinterested look, she realized that she did in fact want to know more about Sucy. Sure, she knew her friend was a Biology major, knew she was a vegetarian and had a collection of succulents in her room that could put an actual desert to shame, but… on a personal level, there was nothing. The other girl mostly hid in her room and kept to herself, rarely interacting unless altogether forced, and had never uttered a word about her home life or feelings in general.
So, for her to open up, well… it was something new entirely.
"Yes," Akko breathed. She didn't want to sound desperate, but she did want to get to know her friend.
"I suppose." Lotte's tone was tentative, nervous. "If you feel comfortable."
"Ina fell ill when I was very young," Sucy said, her expression deadpan as she stiffened and stared straight ahead, almost as though she was looking into the past and not at her friends. "Tuberculosis. Came on suddenly from what my lola told me and progressed too quickly for doctors to help." She shrugged, looked down.
Lotte's expression softened. She reached over and wrapped a hand around Sucy's, frowning when the other girl ripped her hand away in surprise. "Sucy, I'm so sorry."
Akko swallowed. Nodded. "And your dad?"
"Ama was an addict," Sucy stated matter-of-factly. Her face hardened, teeth clenching beneath the thin skin of her cheek as she rolled her jaw thoughtfully. "He left shortly after."
Lotte's orange eyebrows stitched together in confusion. "Then how do you know he's dead?"
Sucy took a sharp intake of breath and leaned back against the soft upholstery of the van seat. She met blue eyes with flashing red, any semblance of kindness dissolving with the shadow that passed over her face. "He's dead to me," she replied, her tone so sharp it seemed to cut into the air between them.
Akko frowned. She said nothing, though she felt like she should say something—
Luckily, Lotte had taken over. "Why didn't you live with your grandmother?"
Sucy forced a smile and sighed, shaking her head. "I did. For six years. She passed, too."
Lotte's mouth snapped shut. She shot Akko a sideways glance before looking away, staring thoughtfully at the repetitive landscape of northern England as it blurred by. Her hand fell to the NightFall book in her lap, her thumb absent-mindedly fluttering through the slightly bent pages. Silence spread between them, the only sounds the gentle creaking of the van, the music muffled in Akko's earbuds, the gentle breaths of Constanze as she slept behind them.
"Do you want to know why I love succulents?"
Akko blinked up. She hadn't expected Sucy to speak again, and she most certainly hadn't expected the soft, almost pained tone that ebbed around the words that left her mouth. She nodded hesitantly, watching as Sucy's lips parted and she continued speaking, almost as though she was talking more to herself than her two friends.
"They can live almost anywhere. They're made for hardship and neglect." She stared off into space, blinking slowly as her fingers curled into her palms, nails digging half-moons into the thin skin. She was quiet for a long moment, one in which Akko knew better than to say anything at all, before finally offering a weak, wistful smile.
"I like them," Sucy said, finally raising her eyes to meet those of her friends, "because it takes a lot for them to die."
"Akko, you need to chill. You're stressing me out," Amanda muttered, watching as Akko zoned out staring across the St. Andrew's equestrian center for what felt like the hundredth time.
But it wasn't that Akko's parents would even show up there, right? Okaasan had clearly stated they'd found last minute lodging ("This is a very expensive bed and breakfast," Okaasan had bemoaned over the phone. "Old, too. It better not be haunted, I don't need Otousan going into cardiac arrest—he's liable to at his age, you know—"). Besides, Akko was supposed to link up with them for dinner.
"Yo, it's full!" Amanda was yelling at her side.
Cold water was pouring over her hands and down the sides of her 20 gallon bucket, sloshing over her paddock boots and splashing up at the bottoms of her jeans. Akko grunted and pulled the bucket away so Amanda could fill her own.
"Sorry," she grumbled, tilting the bucket to the side to dump out a little over the overflowing water. "Zoned out."
Amanda rolled her eyes, watching as Akko mindlessly picked at the Velcro of her wrist brace. "You know, you could easily tell your mom you sprained it," she quipped. "She won't know the difference and it's not like you'd call them freaking out over that. I mean, I wouldn't, anyway. Not that I'd tell my parents if I broke anything, either, they can suck—"
"I'm a terrible liar," Akko cut in. She squeezed her eyes shut and sighed.
"Hell." Amanda pulled a full bucket away and replaced it with a second. The heavy stream of water echoed against the hollow plastic. Amanda had decided to finish both of her water buckets for Star off in one fell swoop. Unlike Akko, who was much more concerned about the strain of the weight on her wrist than finishing quickly. Though, Akko was kind of convinced it had way more to do with flexing for all the girls around them and less about actual time management. Amanda had carefully rolled the sleeves of her shirt up to the elbows—even though it was bitterly cold out—to show off the rolling muscles of her forearms.
"Diana bought your shit, didn't she? And so did Nelson." The redhead slammed the handle of the water spicket down to turn it off, green eyes flashing up to meet Akko's with a devious smirk. "Though I'm not sure how. You really are an awful liar."
"I know I am," Akko whined. She wrapped her hands around the thin metal of the bucket's handle, taking a deep breath before heaving it to waist height. Amanda followed suit, ignoring the water that splashed out of her own buckets as she made a big show of carrying one in each hand. It was obvious it took effort, but the slow reddening of Amanda's face and the huffing as she lugged the buckets through the aisle did little to keep her from lifting her shoulders a little every time another girl passed by.
Not that they even looked. Or cared. Akko rolled her eyes.
"Hey, Akko!" a voice came from across the aisle. Akko grinned at a girl she recognized—except, well, she didn't remember her name—and lifted a hand to wave while completely forgetting the bucket in her hands. Water poured from the side, spilling in a wave of shocking cold over the thigh of her jeans.
"Smooth," Amanda said when the girl had turned and walked away.
Akko frowned, righting the bucket and ignoring the sting of icy water against her leg. Ahead, Chariot stuck her nose through the bars of her temporary stall and snorted. She was still in the process of settling into her new accommodations and was anxious, circling the stall and desperately searching for anything recognizable. Star was stabled next to the little chestnut pony, but she couldn't see him through the massive stone wall that separated the stalls. In her mind, she was very alone.
"Why would I care about being smooth?" Akko asked, quirking an eyebrow as she side-eyed Amanda. "I have a girlfriend. I'm not trying to impress anybody."
"Well, we all know you have a girlfriend," Amanda grumbled. "Because you kind of asked her in front of everybody. But, I don't know, attention's nice. Don't you think? Besides, it's a compliment to Diana that other people find you attractive."
Akko stopped in front of Chariot's door, ignoring the hot air that flooded from the mare's nostrils onto the side of her face as she lowered the bucket with a relieved sigh. "I don't really care what other people think, though," she said thoughtfully, straightening up and reaching forward to stroke at her mare's smooth neck. "Only Diana's opinion matters."
"To each her own. I like seeing how possessive Hannah gets. Star, get back, would you?"
There was a bang, a curse, a loud snort and a stomp of a hoof from next door. Akko watched through the bars as Amanda hoisted up her buckets and attached them to the wall, ignoring the little bay pony behind her as he crowded her personal space.
"Oi, Akko, good to see you here!"
Akko whirled, flashed a smile at the tiny blonde who was grinning back at her. Noelle was an acquaintance from past competitions—a girl from England, though Akko wasn't certain what university she rode for now—and her thick, cheerful accent flooded effortlessly through the noise of the busy stable. Behind her strode a chubby dappled grey pony with a roached mane who was looking around curiously at the rushing riders, the excited parents, the nervous horses.
"Hi," Akko replied, well aware of the wet lips that were smacking against the back of her neck.
"Haven't seen you in a bit. You alright?" Noelle gestured to the brace on Akko's wrist.
"Eh." Akko glanced down, turned her arm over. She frowned. "Yeah, no big deal. Just sprained it." The lie came out naturally. Was she getting good at it? Akko wasn't quite sure that was something she wanted to be good at.
Noelle nodded, accepting the fib without question. "Alright, then. Catch up later?"
Amanda was by Akko's side before the round rump of the grey pony disappeared around the corner of the middle aisle. "Jeez, does everybody know you?" She took the bucket from Akko, nudging her way into Chariot's stall. "I've got this for you. Don't want you hurting your wrist more."
"Thanks," Akko said gratefully. She propped her arms up on Chariot's stall door, leaning over as she watched Amanda lift the water bucket up and clip it to the bit of twine Akko had tied around one of the bars. "And I'm the only Japanese girl here. Of course they all know me."
"Thought you were Vietnamese." Amanda dusted a bit of dirt transfer off her pants and patted Chariot loudly on the back, ruffling the flaxen mane with an affectionate hand.
"Shut up."
A pause.
"She likes you."
Normally Akko would have argued, since somebody being nice didn't necessarily mean that they liked her in that way, but Noelle was different and had made it pretty obvious a couple of years ago. "I know," she said, closing Chariot's stall door behind Amanda. "She asked me out once."
Amanda's dark red eyebrows stitched together as she studied Akko's very neutral expression. "And you said no?"
"Well, yeah." Akko's eyes narrowed in confusion. She slipped a hand into her pocket and fished out a peppermint, offering it to Chariot's greedy, waiting lips. "I didn't like her like that."
"But she's blonde."
Where was Amanda going with this? Akko brushed her wet palm against her equally wet jeans and frowned, cocking her head to the side as she stared into her friend's genuinely confused eyes. "So?"
"Diana's blonde."
Akko latched the door to the stall, ignoring Chariot's muzzle prodding for additional peppermints, and turned to her friend with her hands shoved deep into her jacket pockets. "What's that got to do with anything?"
"Well." Amanda shifted her weight to one very dirty paddock boot, running a hand through her messy red hair. There was a bit of hay jutting out from the side and Akko unconsciously reached up to pull it out. "Thanks," Amanda muttered before adding, "And you're clearly into blondes. Right?"
"I mean, I—" Akko felt her face contorting with confusion. "I like her hair and all, it's really nice, but I don't think that's why I like Diana and I don't think that's why I should have liked Noelle."
Amanda glanced around, finding the stack of hay bales in front of Chariot's stall and plopping down. Akko hesitated—she felt bad relaxing when there was so much to do, but then again Sucy was leaning against Mushroom's stall with a very far-off look in her eyes as though she'd been there for a while—before taking a seat next to Amanda.
"Can I ask you something, then?" Amanda started. Akko had an idea what that question was, but she simply nodded and let Amanda finish anyway. "What do you like about Diana?" She paused before adding, "I mean, she's gorgeous and all, and I'm not saying she's a bad person, but she's just… I don't know, there's a lot about her that seems very hard to like."
It was a strange question, though a valid one, and one that Akko honestly hadn't thought too hard about before. Liking Diana had just come naturally. It was as simple as a steady breeze, barely noticeable at first, which had ramped up into a gale force wind that she couldn't ignore. She had fallen in love with Diana for who she was as a whole—for all the quirks and habits, both great and small—and it had happened in a way that Akko couldn't even pinpoint when she fell in love. Looking back on it was like piecing together a puzzle that had already been completed. She knew the outcome, she knew what everything looked like, and everything made so much sense that it was hard to separate.
"I don't think she's hard to like," Akko said at last, cupping her chin with her palm in thought. She knew that Amanda was looking for her to say something, was looking for her to list specific examples and lay it out for her like data on a spreadsheet. But Akko couldn't do that for her, and so she simplified it with, "I think she's easy to love."
"Sappy," Amanda muttered with a roll of her eyes. "And you think that even after all that she did to you?"
"She didn't—" Akko stopped herself. She didn't want to make excuses for Diana. After all, what she did caused a world of pain that was otherwise unnecessary. It had hurt, it had burned, it had shredded at Akko's insides in the most merciless form of heartache she'd ever experienced. And yet Akko had taken time to think about everything-to mull over exactly why Diana had broken up with her that first time-and the conversations, both hard and easy, had led her to a point of realization that suddenly clicked into place:
"She didn't do it to me," Akko stated plainly, plucking at a bit of hay and rolling it between her fingers. "She did it for her."
"Same thing, in my book."
"Well, my book is written by another author, then." Akko flicked the hay back onto the bale, standing to brush off the back of her jeans and shuffle her paddock boots against clods of dirt on the stone floor. "Because I think it's very different." She thought to her own predicament, to the lies she'd told both Diana and her team in order to be able to compete at Internationals. She hadn't lied to them, she'd lied for her.
She met Amanda's bright green eyes with her own flashing red.
"Sometimes you have to be selfish," Akko said, ignoring the pleading eyes of her pony, desperate for another peppermint. "Because the only constant in life is yourself."
Akko stared down at her phone, at the series of text messages she had sent to Diana, and frowned.
She had messaged her girlfriend hours before from Chariot's stall, just after Amanda had left to go help Constanze get Stan situated. Back when the thought of reasons for loving Diana were still fresh in her mind, when she had time to think with her fingers threaded through Chariot's mane and the peace of her pony keeping her from the hectic world around her.
Akko 3:37
Hi
I wanted to let u know I don't like u for ur hair
I mean
I like ur hair
but
Akko 3:38
I mean obv ur gorgeous
U know that
So does everyone else
Akko 3:39
but ur so much more
Ur smart in ways that I can never hope to be
(but that's ok bc I have u to figure things out for me)
And ur so brave even tho u probably think ur not
But u've been thru so much
And you're such a good person
Akko 3:40
So, brave
And ur kind
U always put me first and ur so supportive
(except that one time but ok that's in the past)
(we only go where the light touches, Simba)
Akko 3:41
(ok sry bad Lion King joke)
(oof)
(moving on)
I love the way u look at Beatrix
and even more the way u look at me
I love that I can trust u with anything
Akko 3:42
except maybe leaving u alone in my room and u not cleaning everything
(i like my dirty underwear in that corner tyvm)
and I love ur voice and ur laugh
even that wheeze u do when somethings esp. funny
(usually me)
and that smile u get when ur genuinely happy
Akko 3:43
ok should I sum this up now
bc I feel silly
and uh theres more reasons but
maybe in person
when I'm feeling sappy or s/t
Akko 3:44
but just so u know
for all that u are and all that I know u to be
I am in love with you, Diana Cavendish
Akko 3:45
K bye
It had been almost three hours and Diana still hadn't responded.
Akko sat quietly at the desk in her hotel room, fingers combing through her straightened brunette hair as she turned her phone off and shoved it away. Had she upset Diana by saying all that? Maybe she hadn't worded it right. Maybe Diana was really embarrassed because Akko rarely got emotional with her—after all, she did very much rely on her actions to speak for her—and hadn't liked it at all.
Diana could be difficult to read and maybe she just didn't appreciate it.
But maybe it simply fell to the fact that she might not have had her phone on her. After all, the Hunter/Jumper gala was that evening and Diana was surely getting ready with Hannah and Barbara. Aunt Daryl was coming into town and she'd likely be meeting with her aunt. And she was most likely helping Miss Meridies with getting the banquet all set up and probably very much focused on the award she was about to receive.
She knew Diana, and being busy was the likely culprit. Still, the gnawing ache of anxiety was fresh in her chest as she glanced in the mirror to make sure she was dressed appropriately. Okaasan and Otousan were picking her up for dinner shortly and Okaasan was a little particular about what she liked Akko to wear. And so she'd chosen a white button-up, only a little wrinkled from being transported in her luggage-though Akko had tried to smooth them out with her hands-and a pair of jeans that she knew her parents wouldn't complain about.
At least she wasn't wearing an anime t-shirt. For that much, Okaasan would be grateful.
One thing she wasn't wearing was her wrist brace. She had taken it off and carefully placed it back in her luggage, where the prying eyes of Okaasan would be least likely to notice it. She ran her fingers over the soft skin of her wrist, sighing deeply beneath the weight of her own lies, and glanced around the dimly lit room.
Akko usually liked to be roomed with somebody else, but she was actually quite pleased to be flying solo for once. If only for the whirlwind of clothing that had already flown around the room, the fact that she could jam to loud K-pop while she was getting ready, and the, uh, private time she had taken before getting in the shower.
But now her parents were going to be there any moment to take her to dinner and the sudden realization that they would likely see the mess she had caused within the three hours of being checked into the hotel made her even more anxious than her messages to Diana. And so that's what she was doing when the knock came on her door: desperately grabbing dirty clothes and stuffing them behind her luggage in the hopes that her parents wouldn't comment on how filthy she was (not like they didn't already know, but…)
She straightened up, running her palms self-consciously one more time over her wrinkled shirt before stepping to the door. She hadn't seen her parents in months, not since leaving them at the airport in Kyoto to head to Luna Nova, and she was both excited and nervous to spend time with them again. Or, well, she would be, until Okaasan resumed her trademark motherly nagging and Otousan asked hard questions about boys and school. Both of which she wasn't interested in.
"Coming," she called out in Japanese.
When she opened the door, she expected to see her parents: Okaasan with her bright and over-exaggerated grin, Otousan with the barely hidden smile ghosting across a face that betrayed his struggling neutrality.
But it wasn't them, at all.
It was Diana.
Akko blinked in confusion, her hand freezing on the edge of the heavy hotel room door as she stared into bright blue eyes rimmed with exhaustion. At blonde hair that was a little tangled and a little wavier than usual. At clothing that was surprisingly laid back for a girl who was usually very particular about what she wore in public.
At the hesitant smile that spread across the girl's face. A smile that said: I'm here, is that alright?
And it was alright. It was so alright. Thoughts of her parents washed away and there was only Diana, only the girl in front of her—the girl who very much should not have been—with a spark of love in her eyes and a bag over her shoulder.
"Hi," was all Akko could think to say. It came out in a choked whisper. "What… what are you doing here?"
There were a lot of questions Akko wanted to ask. Like: why wasn't she at the gala? How did she get to Scotland? Why didn't she tell Akko she was coming? She held them all back, her breath hitching with the confusion and surprise of the entire situation.
The corner of Diana's pale lips flicked up, her body seeming to sigh into Akko's acknowledgment, and she glanced down at the phone in her hand and lifted it slightly.
"There are a lot of reasons why I love you, too," Diana murmured. Her voice was quiet and husky with exhaustion. Cool blue eyes flickered back up to meet Akko's as she stepped forward. Her breath was warm against Akko's cheeks but her words were the spark that ignited the fire. "But I don't know how to tell you, so I think this will do," she said, her eyes falling onto Akko's lips as she leaned in and captured them.
Diana didn't have to speak them because the reasons flowed from her lips, quiet and soft and sweet, and Akko sank into the kiss, drowned in the girl who had suddenly appeared before her—in many ways, if she was being honest—and let herself forget the suffocating world around her.
Until a very clear, very surprised voice echoed from somewhere far too close for Akko's comfort:
"Atsuko?!"
