Chapter 39: Equation
It's the start of a new year, and now the characters must move on from what happened at the New Year's Party! Let's begin with Miki, shall we?
Just when is the first time the two spoke?
Maybe it's when I first began taking an interest in him.
Miki's cursor hovered over a status as she tried to keep her giggle in. This "SoundlessVoice09" always had interesting statuses, whether they were hilarious or something serious. They even shared many of the same interests and opinions in several topics. She always joked with herself that he was either her soulmate or best friend. Then she'd berate herself for thinking an odd thing and click out of his profile, not wanting to seem like a stalker. Not like he would notice her "likes" anyways.
Then, one day, she began noticing that he was liking a lot of her statuses. Heat flew to her face as she stared at the screen, wondering if this status would capture would capture his attention. He began commenting. Again, another smash into the keyboard. She cursed at herself for being so self-conscious.
Day by day, her mouse moved over to "Message SoundlessVoice09". Unfortunately, the shy mouse would always scurry away.
One day, after coming home with no photography success, she went online to chat.
"RedHairedWonder" requests a chat with you.
Soon enough, Piko would open up the notification and see her request. Miki congratulated herself for the effort but sat back down once a reply was made. Every click made her heart flutter.
"I was wondering when you'd talk to me :)"
He wanted to talk to her too? Was he waiting? How long was he waiting? What did this-
"Anyways, how are you?"
She set aside her questions and replied.
The night had long passed and the clock was screaming "3 A.M.". They hadn't spoken one word to each other before, but now, they spent the night passing along messages for six straight hours. How could that be?
Miki wanted more of this.
Her fingers hesitated as she typed the next message.
"If you don't mind, can we speak more? I mean, not now, since we're both exhausted, but on other days."
She facepalmed herself for being awkward. Weren't girls supposed to play hard to get and make the guy go chasing after them? Instead of making him run, Miki was shyly tugging his shirt, asking if she could go along with him.
"That was awkward ^^;" RedHairedWonder sent.
"Sure, I'd love to talk more ^^" SoundlessVoice09 replied.
With that small piece of hope, they said their goodbyes and logged out.
Her concentration levels sank, and she began periodically thinking about him in classes. A start of a new school year and already her grades began to drop. Not only that, but her friends began questioning who she texted so often. Gumi left her alone when she gave simple answers, but Teto tried to hack into her account. Miki found out quickly enough and stopped her from doing so. Although Teto knew almost everything about everyone, Miki was often too much of a mystery to her. Perhaps that's why they're friends.
Wanting to keep her high rank, she began studying more and balancing her time with SounlessVoice09.
Even when their relationship began developing into something more, where they would be saying "good night" every night, Miki couldn't help but wonder who he was. She always believed that you could only put trust in things that can be seen. She never cared much for religion and wasn't one to believe that love truly existed. To her mind, more than half of the human existence was stupid for believing in invisible things.
As she told him one night, when he questioned her philosophy, her parent's marriage was nothing more of an agreement, no love included. She was an accident, a mistake, and marriage was the easiest band-aid to deal with the problem. Nothing more than a product of two horny teenagers, she didn't really feel that there was anything special. As her father told her, it it wasn't for her, they wouldn't be together. They didn't kiss or say sweet things to one another, like the photogenic actors on the screens portrayed. Her little sister? A drunken night tangled in bed sheets and bam, another accident made.
"You can't expect me to believe that something like 'love' exists. There is no proof," RedHairedWonder said.
She wondered if his parents were the same. Turned out that he lived with his single mother.
Is divorce sweeter than this? she wondered.
Even when she blocked love out of the equation, she couldn't find an answer to why she felt such an emotion to SoundlessVoice09. She began to realize that everyone was looking for this "dreamy" formula.
Such an awful numerical formula...
Is it simple? Linear? Does it come back down or up like a quadratic formula? What's "x"? Who is "y"? When you take their words and pile them up, "now" is born. His messages, my messages, when you add her smiles, subtract the months, divide the time, multiply her heartbeats, square her mistakes, subtract her shy apologies, add his sweet messages, you get...
Miki lowered her pen and facepalmed herself for trying to solve the equation. Equations, formulas, charts, graphs- that is how she always solved her problems.
She always blocked emotion out of the equation, but what if it was the product?
One day in class, she watched Aito mindlessly doodle on his paper. "Aito + Luka = Love".
Suddenly, the idea wasn't so silly anymore.
He was so understanding. Whenever she'd start crying and became a mess in their conversations, he'd stay the whole night through, making sure she was okay. He wasn't the kind to just throw in compliments or say things to cheer her up either- he meant every word.
Even when she began replying utter nonsense, he'd laugh right beside her. She didn't-no- she couldn't feel out of place with him. Exactly how many people could you say made you feel special? That you're not a mistake, no, you were born to become something great. Who would be kind and caring no matter how you treated them?
This kind of companion... Miki didn't want to lose him. She didn't just want to be friends though, she hoped he could be sin squared. Then, her being cos squared, the two could come together and be one.
But everything wasn't about Miki.
He didn't say much about himself, but when he did, it wasn't for long. Although she wanted to know more, she never pried.
Life with his mother was pleasant, he said. He didn't mind taking care of his little sister and brother all the time, he said. His mother went out dating often, but he didn't mind, he said. Although he said all that, texts could hide the real meaning.
Miki learned he had a strange habit of blaming himself . He'd take in as much guilt as he could, sometimes accidentally lashing out on her. He was very studious and did not take his grades lightly. And once he did wrong, Miki could tell from his words that he had low self-esteem.
"If you want to ever talk about anything, I'm always here."
"Thanks ^^"
Her words didn't help ease his heart though.
Miki sighs as she wakes up and glimpses at her cell phone. They haven't spoken since the party, and that was a few days ago.
Throwing the covers off herself, she slips on her slippers and walks to the bathroom to start her daily cleansing duties. As she spits out her toothpaste, she wonders what will happen at school. Depending on what happened at the New Year's Eve party, she guesses that the news about the new couples will spread like wildfire. With everyone focused on that, she can easily talk to Piko...
... if she can pull out the courage to do so.
And just when SoundlessVoice09's mysterious mask has been lifted, it is apparent that Piko has been wearing a second one closer to his skin. Maybe to hide the bruises?
The laptop I use to write chapters keeps randomly turning off on me, so I have to use my sister's now. If I ever stop replying to your reviews, I'm sorry, but I am still very grateful for them all, so don't get the wrong idea! Since we reached the 600 review mark, I want to try and speed up the next chapter to show how grateful for you all ^^
As always, thank you for reading this chapter and you can always review below if you'd like. Bye bye~!
