a/n: figured i'd come up with something nice and small for reina's birthday!

It was a bit of a shame, Reina thought, that they couldn't make it to Daikichi this time - that they couldn't make it anywhere, quarantined as they were.

Kumiko had, in efforts to make things a little cheerier, bought a packet of Twinkies from downstairs, had stuck a match in one and asked Reina to make a wish, and she'd appreciated it. However ridiculously fancy her Animal Crossing island might have been without any distractions, however much more she would've been able to practice alone, the thought of being back in her New York dormitory while the streets resembled a ghost town terrified her.

Really, the thought of being anywhere alone terrified her, but she didn't say that. She couldn't. There were certain things that even years of support couldn't necessarily help.

"I'm going to serenade you now," Kumiko said, and very dramatically lifted her euphonium to her lips before setting it back down and bursting into a pitchy rendition of Never Gonna Give You Up. Reina nearly spat out her Twinkie.

"You're terrible," she wheezed, cackling as Kumiko continued singing. "Oh my God, stop!"

"...and there we go." Kumiko took a deep breath, still laughing herself, as her euphonium sat, unused, on her lap.

"There's a reason neither of us are singers."

"Yep."

"Thank you, though."

"I-I mean, of course. It really doesn't take that much effort to do something like this." Kumiko glanced down at the patterned carpet, which both of them had taken to memorizing, recently. Reina was certain that if she ever made it home (wherever home was, anyway, she wasn't entirely sure) the muted colors and diamond shapes would imprint on her dreams, would be there whenever she slept.

Honestly, the thought of returning anywhere was strange enough. The days felt endless, crippling, all of that.

"It was still something, though." Reina reached out, held Kumiko's face in her hands because for a moment she worried that she'd disappear if she didn't.

"Glad to hear it."

"I won't do anything like this for you." Reina flinched as Kumiko drew back sharply.

"W-why not?"

"Because we'll be on Mt. Daikichi by then." Reina stood up, shaking Twinkie crumbs out of her skirt. "I'm willing it into the world."

"I can't imagine that it wouldn't bend to your will, Reina," Kumiko murmured.

"What, the world?"

"What else?"

"You're ridiculous."

"You're a romantic."

"You put matches in a Twinkie for my sake." Reina kissed her girlfriend, once on the cheek, then let herself stay there, the euphonium still driving a bit of an awkward wedge between them. Kumiko noticed it a beat after Reina did, setting it down after she did, careful and neurotic at once. Reina leaned in closer, knowing that if Kumiko internally waxed poetic about their kisses like she did then she definitely wouldn't have much to say - nothing that was all too poetic, anyhow. Twinkies had never won anyone the Pulitzer.

Those thoughts, too, faded as Kumiko put her hand around the back of Reina's head and pulled her in, and there was nowhere for them to go, but for a little while that was alright.

a/n: she-ra and the princesses of power brought hope and joy back into my heart