Sailor Moon X by Starling Sinclair
Chapter 8: A History of You and Me
April 5, 2019
It was finally happening. Mamoru was taking Usagi on a real date. And she was panicking.
A real date. Not getting drunk at a club and going home with him. Not getting drunk at an izakaya and going home with him. Oh lord, was she capable of spending sober time with him? Okay, yes, they had spent some sober time together, but everything seemed so much easier when inhibitions were gone.
And what was she going to wear? Usagi stared into her closet.
"I don't know why you're even looking in there," Luna interjected. The cat sat atop a large pile of laundry where a coffee table used to be. "It seems everything you own is on the floor out here."
"You are not helping Luna!" Usagi griped.
Luna pawed away some of the clothes on the pile, then tugged at a simple black dress. "I think this would be a nice choice."
Usagi groaned. "You don't understand. Nice isn't good enough. This has to be the perfect dress!"
Luna's expression resembled the closest thing to cocking an eyebrow a cat was capable of. "I thought things were going well with you and this Mamoru. I mean, you haven't been home the last couple of nights…"
"Yeah, well, this is the first time he's taking me out in public," Usagi said. Luna stared in disbelief.
"Okay. That's not exactly true. This is the first time it's a real date. Like, classic date stuff. Expensive dinner. Something cultured. Then maybe another night at his place. Shit, I need my good underwear."
Usagi started rummaging through her laundry and pulled out a lacy blue matching set of bra and panties. She sniffed them. Eh, passible.
"Why don't you call your friend Naru then," Luna said. "Maybe she can offer some insight."
"Great idea!" Usagi said, grabbing her cell phone. She opened up her text thread then stopped. "Terrible idea!"
"Why?" Luna asked, genuinely baffled.
"Naru doesn't know that Mamoru and I are dating," Usagi said.
"So?"
"I don't want to tell her yet," Usagi said.
"Why ever not?"
"It's super complicated. But let's go with Naru would not approve," Usagi said. She flopped down on the bed.
"Well, then maybe you shouldn't be taking this so seriously," Luna chided.
Maybe she shouldn't care so much about what Mamoru thought of her. If he really cared, then he wouldn't have cut off all contact six years ago. Then what about the anxiety in his eyes when he'd held that skillet of eggs? No, Mamoru was a different man now. He didn't seem like he was going to waste this new chance.
"Nope. Naru is wrong," Usagi said. She looked down at her phone. Who could she text? Motoki's sister Unazuki? No. Then it would get back to Motoki. Did Mamoru tell Motoki? Probably not, otherwise she would have said something by now. Motoki couldn't keep a secret to save his life.
Usagi scrolled through her contacts, but, many of her friends had long since left Tokyo. Or gotten married. Or she simply just didn't see outside of Facebook. What about Minako? Mmm, probably not. That would lead to a canceled date and more boring, pointless meetings on the mysterious purple flower. She chewed her lip, then paused at the next contact.
Her finger hovered over Rei's contact info. She and Rei got along. Ish. Rei also seemed like a classy gal. Rei had helped with all the flowers after all. Maybe she could help now…
Usagi carefully composed her text.
XXX
Rei was lying in bed, scrolling through Instagram. It was a guilty pleasure of hers, so she limited her exposure to no more than twenty minutes a day. Most of the time. So, she saw the text as soon as it appeared.
Usagi: I need your help.
Rei sat up. Her mind racing. Was Usagi okay? Where was the monster? Why wasn't Minako in this text?
Rei: What is it?
Rei stared at her phone screen, watching the three dots that signaled someone writing. She chewed her lip.
Usagi: I need to borrow a dress
Rei's jaw dropped. Resigned, she closed it. How dare that brat bother her with such trivial matters! She was a very busy woman and...
Rei looked around the room. She wasn't busy right now. It was her day off, and she was alone. She couldn't even go into work if she had wanted to because the other priests had told her she'd been working too hard lately.
But why would Usagi message her?
Rei: Don't you have other people to bother with this?
Usagi: You're so sophisticated! I need like a real adult friend.
Rei smiled at the comment. Sophisticated huh? She sighed, looking at her small closet, mostly filled with robes. Still, there was a small corner for herself. Some fabulous dresses her father had bought her that she rarely used. Plus, it beat spending the day alone in her room.
Rei: I'm on my way.
XXX
"I thought you needed me for Senshi business," Rei said, walking into Usagi's apartment. She carried six or so dresses over her arm and was a little nervous because it was the first time she'd been in someone else's living space in years. She hadn't even been to Minako's. They'd always met at the temple.
Usagi took the dresses from Rei then rushed over to a mirror. She wore an oversized tee shirt, and from what Rei could tell, some very fancy blue panties. Using the hanger, she held the dress in front of her, weighing it's potential.
"If you really thought that, then you wouldn't have brought dresses!" Usagi said, switching over to a different dress. This one was red with a boat neck and three quarter length sleeves. "I knew you'd have something classy!"
Rei smiled when she thought Usagi wasn't looking.
Walking towards what she could only assume was a chair, (it was hard to tell with all the clothes on it), Rei asked, "Luna, how do you survive here?"
Luna was curled up on laundry that hid the coffee table. "I eke out a space when it's not date night."
Usagi was shimmying out of her shirt and into the red dress. Rei looked away, surprised by Usagi's boldness. She wasn't sure why exactly. Maybe it was that no one in her adult life had ever been so comfortable with her before.
"Is this bar guy?" Rei asked.
"Huh?" Usagi answered.
"The guy you snuck out with at the bar. During the Dark Pandora thing," Rei said, smirking like a fox.
Usagi turned beet red.
"It is!"
"He's more than just a bar guy," she said. "Like, ugh, we have, a bit of a history?" Her face contorted as she looked for the right words.
Rei waggled her eyebrows. "History?"
"We were kinda arch-nemeses as teens," she said. She smoothed the front of the dress as she watched in the mirror. "Then, he did this super nice thing, and ghosted me for six years."
"And you want to impress this man why?" Luna interjected. "Your friend Naru is on to something. You're wasting your time."
Rei looked pensively at Usagi. When she'd first met the woman, she had read Usagi's tea leaves. At the time, she brushed it off. What did love have to do with Senshi business? But it wasn't just any love. True Love. Soulmates. It was such a strong force that it was all she could read in the leaves. Was it possible that this asshole could really be the one for her?
Usagi chewed on her lip. "I think I'm oversimplifying."
"Then un-simplify," Rei said, lounging back into the chair. "I'm not in any rush. I just got here. Besides, I could use a juicy story."
So, Usagi told her.
XXX
Usagi and Mamoru met one lackluster day outside Naru's mother's jewelry store. She had been walking Naru home in order to avoid her mother and the inevitable punishment she would receive for bringing home such an abysmal test score. In a last-ditch attempt to hide the evidence, Usagi had thrown it over her shoulder and hit Mamoru in the face.
"Ow, are you trying to make bumps on my head too? Odango Atama?"
So it began.
For three years, Usagi and Mamoru had been... frenemies. At fourteen, he'd teased her mercilessly about everything from her poor test-taking abilities to her fashion choices. The inevitability that Mamoru would somehow be nearby whenever she did something embarrassing became the cornerstone of their relationship. The reality was, he just visited the same arcade as her since his best friend worked there, and Mamoru was quite terrible with people.
At fifteen, she'd mastered retaliation. For every insult he hurled, she had a quip to fling back at him. Their word games became legendary. Their aggression dimmed. He'd even started tutoring her in math. Many afternoons they would sit at the cafe above the arcade while he worked through her homework with her. She never became particularly good at math, per se, but she stopped failing.
At sixteen, she'd found herself in Mamoru's inner circle. They still primarily interacted in insults, though any maliciousness (if there had been any to begin with) had long since faded. It took Mamoru finally seriously dating a girl named Hina for Usagi to realize that she had a little bit of a crush on him. The guy was hot as hell, in college, completely aloof, and suddenly completely unavailable. As his only female friend, she was the one he turned to for dating advice. It had felt like salt in a wound.
At seventeen, Mamoru and Hina faded away, and Usagi started dating. Kaito wasn't terrible as far as boyfriends go. He was above average in looks and below average in personality. He was selfish and impulsive. Usagi was enamored with being enamored more than anything over their seven month relationship.
Their years of unusual friendship shifted irrevocably the day Kaito broke Usagi's heart.
She'd made it through the school day. She thought that she would have made it to Crown, and Motoki, and someone whose shoulder she could cry on, but she didn't. Instead, she'd stumbled, heartbroken, into the alley beside Crown, and just cried. She knew it was a terrible place to be. Nothing good ever happened in Crown's alley. Of course, that made it the perfect place to wallow in heartbreak.
She watched Mamoru notice her in the alleyway. She watched him hesitate, then walk over to her. She didn't want to play their name-calling games. She didn't want insults. She didn't want someone who hesitated.
"Go away Mamoru. This isn't the time," she said, voice hiccuping.
"I'm not here for…," he paused, inhaled sharply, then continued, "Usagi, are you okay?"
She shuttered. He never called her Usagi. For three years she'd been Odango Atama, baka, kid, and on occasion, Usa. But not Usagi. Hearing him say her name now just made everything feel so much more real.
She turned into him, tears slipping down her cheeks. The hesitation was gone, and he wrapped his arms around her. They stood that way for a long time. She sobbed, snotty and tearful into his ridiculously soft, and expensive, yet stupidly pink shirt. He held her securely, rubbing slow circles on her back.
"Kaito," she finally whimpered.
She felt Mamoru stiffen. When she didn't continue through her sobs, he darkly said, "He didn't… do something to you, did he?"
She couldn't answer but shook her head no. Her nose rubbed into a damp spot of his shirt.
"I wouldn't… with him," she said between sobs. "He wanted… but I said no…"
Mamoru pulled away enough to look at her. She glanced up but couldn't keep eye contact. His blue eyes were intense and angry. Of course, he would think something like this was foolish.
He gently used his thumb and knuckle to turn her chin up to him. His gaze softened as he searched her face. She would have flushed if she wasn't already so pink from crying.
"Are you telling me that asshole dumped you because you wouldn't have sex with him?"
She looked away from him again. She rubbed the back of her hand against her nose, appalled by just how mucousy she was. She rubbed her hand on her skirt, then realized that his shirt was even more mucousy than her hand. Oh god. How embarrassing. She took her sleeve and tried to dry his shirt with it.
He stopped her, taking her hands in his.
"Odango…"
"We had plans to go to the Fussa Tanabata Matsuri. We were going to make wishes and eat all the yummy food," she said, sniffling. It was hard to say this next part. "He found a love hotel, and I didn't want to…"
"Usagi," Mamoru said, very solemnly, "You should never feel bad about saying no to something like that. It's a big deal, and you don't have to take it lightly."
She looked up at him, a little star struck. "But…"
"He's an asshole, and you're beautiful, and he's just the first guy of many in your life," Mamoru interrupted. "You'll find the right one someday."
"Did you just say I was beautiful?" she asked. She had heard him casually throw that in, right?
"For an Odango Atama."
She rolled her eyes. "But, I was looking forward to going to the Tanabata."
She heard him inhale sharply through his nose. "It's this Saturday, right?" he asked.
She nodded.
"How about I take you?" he said. "Then you can make a wish for a better boyfriend."
"Are you serious? Why?" she asked.
He shrugged. "Why not? You had all these plans. It would be a shame to let them go to waste because of some dick."
She stared at him for a moment. Was Chiba Mamoru asking her on a date?
"Come on, Odango, before Motoki finds us out here and thinks you're crying because of me," he said. He put his arm around her shoulder and slowly led her to the arcade entrance.
He kept his word. Though she wasn't sure it was a date. He did wear his hideous green jacket. (Surely no one would intentionally wear that on a date.) They met at the station on Saturday morning and rode together in an oddly companionable silence. Mamoru had brought a book (because of course he did), and Usagi played on her phone. The train became more and more crowded as they drew nearer and nearer to Fussa.
With space running out, she shifted and shifted, trying to get comfortable while being pushed into Mamoru's shoulder. He sighed and looked at the ceiling. Then he wrapped his arm around her shoulders. He pulled her closer, and she found she fit quite perfectly under his arm.
He didn't really look at her the entire time, keeping his eyes on his novel. She kept stealing glances as she played through the various free plays of her many cell phone games.
They disembarked with the masses of others visiting for the festival. Upon leaving the station, they were greeted with colorful banners and smells of street vendors. Usagi's eyes sparkled with excitement and anticipation.
"What should we do first?" she nearly squealed.
The day proceeded like a movie montage. There was food, parades, food, shopping, food, dancing, food, and at some point, Usagi even convinced Mamoru to rent kimonos for them to wander the streets in. She did have to promise that she would not spill any food so that he could get his deposit back.
When they made it to the Wishing Trees, Usagi spent a long time staring at her tanabata. A wish was not something to take lightly, especially during the Tanabata Matsuri. So she had to make it count. This was her chance to wish for Keito back or to wish for someone better. It was her chance to wish for better grades or to win Natsume Yuujinchou Shi lotto. She tapped her pen against her lips and watched as Mamoru carefully hung his tanabata well over Usagi's head.
"But I can't read it," she lamented.
"Well, you shouldn't be so short," he answered.
She scowled and knew what to write. She wished for Mamoru to find his heart's desire. Mamoru was so secretive and so isolated. He was hard-working, and surprisingly compassionate. After all, he'd taken her to the festival. She'd find someone new eventually, and school was nearly over, and she was feeling lucky about the lotto. She made sure to tie her tanabata in with a bunch of others so he wouldn't know which one was hers. Feeling satisfied, she rejoined him.
"So what did you wish for, Odango?"
"Not telling," she answered. "Besides, it won't come true then."
He didn't seem satisfied with this answer, but before he could press, Usagi pointed to a yakitori stand. "Ooo! I'm so hungry!"
It worked, and he rolled his eyes while walking her to the booth.
As the day dwindled, she begged him to stay for the fireworks. She knew it was getting late, and there was still the hour train ride home, but she didn't want this to end.
They found a grassy spot to watch the fireworks. Several families were spread out over blankets. Couples held hands and talked secretively. Usagi found a space for them and sat on the ground. Mamoru hesitated. She patted the ground beside her.
"We've already returned the kimonos," she drawled. "You don't have to worry about your deposit anymore."
"Have you ever tried to get grass stains out of clothes, Odango?"
"No, but come on! It's fireworks! A few little stains will be worth it. Plus, you won't even notice them on that hideous green jacket," she retorted.
He grumbled, and she grabbed his hand and tugged him down beside her.
"What's your favorite firework?" she asked, scooting closer to him. Pressing into his side. He placed his hand behind her to allow for more room.
"I never really thought about it," he answered.
She gasped. "How could you not! Mine's the white glittery ones. It makes me think of magic."
She continued to babble, and as she did, she noticed that he wasn't really looking towards the sky or the setting sun. He was just watching her with this strange smile on his face.
"What? Do I have teriyaki sauce on my chin or something?" she asked.
He shook his head and closed his eyes.
"You're such an Odango Atama," he answered. Then he leaned in, slowly closing the gap between them. She kept perfectly still, hoping. When his lips brushed hers, she didn't even hear the fireworks starting.
It was the most gentle kiss she'd ever experienced in her seventeen years of life. (And honestly, she'd been chasing down that feeling ever since.) His lips were warm and soft. They pressed gently and lovingly against hers. She's the one who returned it with passion. And he followed her lead, letting her guide his lips open. Letting her touch her tongue to his. The kiss lingered, soft and gentle until she ran out of breath and had to pull away.
It wasn't much space between them, but she could feel his own shallow breathing against her lips.
"The fireworks started," he whispered.
"Uh-huh," she answered and kissed him again.
XXX
"So wait," Rei interrupted. "Let me get this straight. You two made out under fireworks after what I could only describe as a Hallmark movie date, then he didn't speak to you for six years?"
Usagi sighed and sat on the bed. "I found out later he was moving to America for medical school, and his flight left the next day."
Rei sat quietly for a moment. "I guess that makes sense. It was probably easier to not talk to you since he was going to be abroad for the next several years."
"Yeah," she said. "That's what I told myself. Also, I was seventeen. Like, what did I really know about love anyway?"
"But you're not seventeen anymore," Rei said. "So do you really want this or is this some unresolved adolescent crush?"
Usagi stared at herself in the mirror. Was this all about some teenage crush? Unresolved feelings from her youth?
"I want this," she answered, and there was more truth in it than she expected. "And I think he does too."
"Well, if nothing else, at least one of us is getting laid."
"Rei!" Luna gasped.
Usagi burst out laughing.
"What? I mean, we might die any day. I don't think celibacy is a priority," Rei commented. "I could use a booty call too."
XXX
AN: Thank you all you lovely people out there reading and reviewing! It really makes my day. This chapter actually started as a bonus chapter, but kinda spiraled out of control and into two chapters. Thanks Chelsea for beta-reading, and as always, a very special thanks to my hubby, even though I agree there are far too many characters whose names begin with M and end in vowels.
