"Did you hear? Did you hear?"

"Hear what?"

"Tanizaki got a love letter!"

"WHAT?"

"I know, right? Like, who would want to kiss that?"

"Someone who has a screw loose, that's for sure!"

The chatter throughout the school continued in this vein for the whole day. As if Yukari needed the confidence boost from her peers. She'd already been feeling awful, having just blown her latest math exam; it wasn't her fault the numbers were swimming off the page, but her teacher wouldn't listen, kept insisting she was making things up again. She had just gotten to Phys Ed when she noticed a gaggle of girls around her locker, some nearly in hysterics, passing around a piece of paper.

"Hey, Tanizaki," one of them said, grinning evilly, "you got mail."

"Gimme that! If it was in my locker, you shouldn't've peeked!" Yukari snatched the paper away, a fierce shade of magenta.

"Yeah?" the girl retorted. "It's not like you could read it, anyway."

The group laughed some more as Yukari stuck it in her bookbag and went to the showers. She wasn't alone. In one of them, by the corner, sat a small girl with short black hair about a head shorter than Yukari. She had her knees hunched up to her face, trying to make herself as small as possible. It looked like she'd been crying a lot. A gentle cascade of water fell on her like her own personal raincloud.

"They didn't get you too, did they, Minamo?" Yukari asked, quickly kneeling down and helping the girl up. She shook her head. "But the things they were saying about you were really...really mean, and it hurt to listen to, and-"

"Sh, sh, sh, I can take it," Yukari said soothingly. "Let's get you up. It's swim day, after all, and you know what that means!" Yukari smiled with a huge shit-eating grin.

"I get to beat you in a race again?" Minamo replied, sniffling and smiling a little.

"HA! As if! The day Kurosawa beats Tanizaki is the day the sun explodes!"

"But I beat you last time!"

Yukari's face didn't shine a lumen less. "So you did! Last one to the pool is a rotten egg!" She helped Minamo up, and smiled gently at her before dashing off.

It was at that moment that Minamo knew that her heart had found the right person for her. Of course, the largest source of anxiety was not that she had chosen wrong, but if her closest and, really, only friend rejected her advances. But if she knew Yukari-and she knew her better than pretty much anyone else-she'd be okay.

That night, Yukari sat down to attempt her homework. Stress on 'attempt', because no matter how hard she and the doctors complained, getting proper accommodations for dyslexia were extremely difficult and most of her teachers didn't care. Her pattern was usually struggling to read for thirty minutes, developing a thrashing headache, and going to bed seeing spots. Tonight was, initially, no different. And then the 'love letter' that the girls at school had been teasing her mercilessly about fell out of her book stack.

Should she read it? She held it gingerly. She had trouble reading it, but she couldn't see any name other than her own on it. An anonymous love letter. This made her considerably more nervous, especially considering she wasn't the most popular person in school. She set it on her desk and decided to try and read it.

Loveliest Yukari,

Ever since I had the great fortune of seeing you for the first time, my heart has been aflame with the most sensuous of feelings. Nary a night goes by when I don't think of you, my love. In all my young life I have never felt so passionately, so fiercely, about someone as I do for you. I wish to wrap my arms around you and pull you in, breath bated, as we give each other a tender glance before our lips meet. Is this just a silly little girl's fantasy, to kiss her best friend? But it's not just a kiss I desire from you, but your love. I want you, Yukari. I want to feel your love, your passion, all of your red-hot emotions. I feel like my love for you is infinite, and will not stop at the end of things. If only I could show you how much I love you! To feel your gentle touch, and see your smile, for the rest of my life...if I were to have one dream in my life, it would be that.

Eternally yours.

Yukari felt her heart race, and she broke out into a huge smile. Not a malicious one, not at all, but one of sheer elation, the feeling of being loved and complimented. She read it again, and again, the words dancing around on the page but she ignored the headache brewing because the high she felt from it was just too overpowering. She read it again before dressing in her nightclothes, again after brushing her teeth, and again in bed before turning out the light.

If only I knew who wrote it, she thought...and then she turned on her light, and read it again. Her eyes nearly lept out of their sockets. She knew that hastily written script anywhere. She set the letter on her desk, turned out the light, and lay awake in bed for the next hour, not knowing what to think.

When she saw Minamo at school the next day, their eyes met for a flash, and then parted, both girls flush with embarrassment and not a small bit of fluster. It almost seemed as if they were deliberately avoiding each other, and Minamo feared that she had gone too far. As the day progressed, the pit in her stomach opened up more and more, the anxiety worsening exponentially every class. Eventually, it got to be too much to bear.

At the end of the day, when the girls normally walked to school together, she rounded on her friend and said, quite loudly, "Will you just break my heart already!?"

Yukari turned and stared at her. Minamo's face was contorted in absolute anguish. "I know you don't love me! I know you know I wrote that letter! Will you just say what you're feeling?"

Yukari stood there, shellshocked for a bit. She...she really didn't know how to respond initially. Minamo was asking her if she loved her. Did she? It seemed rather...risky, being in love with a girl. Her mother would definitely not approve. But it's not like she could really be any less popular at school. It's not like the teasing would be any worse than what she already got. And here was this extremely cute girl, who she did have feelings for, confessing her love...

"I...I love you." She said it quietly at first, and then more confidently. "I love you!"

Minamo's face softened. "You...you love me?" she asked, coming closer to Yukari, who nodded. "I love you, Minamo."

Minamo came right up to her. She gulped and repeated the words. "I love you."

Their hands slowly entwined, nervously at first, and then with more purpose as they kissed. Yukari wasn't really sure what she was doing, but that didn't seem to matter to the other girl. Minamo was gently guiding Yukari's hands to her waist as she held Yukari's, closed her eyes and pressed more into the kiss. It was unlike any feeling Yukari had ever experienced before in her life, and she'd give anything to make it last forever. Eventually, Minamo broke off.

"We should, um, probably get home now."

"Y-yeah. We...we should."

"Can I...can I come over to your house tonight?"

"That, that should be okay, my mom loves you after all," Yukari said, still slightly afloat mentally from the aftershocks of the kiss.

"Because we could like, study and then, um, kiss some more."

"That sounds lovely," Yukari said, in a daze from what just happened but also extremely, very happy.

Together, they walked home.