Heres a short chapter for you guys, I figured I owed it to you to get one out sooner rather than later, please enjoy!
Opal stood in the living room as Kuvira disappeared through the doorway on her way to the school for some urgent meeting. "Well there goes the two of you getting to know each other this evening" Opal said before turning around to find Asami on the couch approaching total meltdown. "Oh honey" she whispered as she rushed across the room to embrace her friend. Asami pushed her face into Opal's neck, her sobbing rocking the both of them back and forth on the couch. The light from the lamp backlit Asami as she pulled away from Opal a few minutes later trying to suppress her sobbing, her eye shadow and liner had run into long wispy lines down her cheeks and smudged.
"I'm sorry I appear to have stained your shirt with my eye shadow." Asami sniveled.
"Don't even give it another thought babe, come here." Opal answered bringing Asami in for a brief tight hug. They separated again and Opal reached for the end table for a tissue to offer Asami. "Well now that it's just the two of us I guess we can get down to brass tax if you're comfortable with that." Opal offered handing Asami the tissue. Asami dabbed at her cheeks, her eyelids and wiped her nose, and readjusted her hair and posture trying to regain her patented Sato poise.
"I think I would like that" Asami finally answered her voice, normally a cool smoky tone, now cracked and rasped slightly from choking on sobs.
"Well," Opal began looking down at the floor, "I have to be blunt I'm a little surprised by this, you broke it off with Korra didn't you? I could understand being upset at Korra's being distant, we all are but you had to have seen that coming?" Asami's eyes sunk to the floor, avoiding looking into Opal's.
"I knew… I knew it would be bad especially because…" Asami's eyes began watering up again with renewed intensity, sobs escaping her mouth as she clutched the tissue to her mouth, attempting to stifle them. "Because of the terrible reason I gave in the letter I left, I didn't even have the decency to tell her to her face!"
"Letter?" Opal asked quizzically, placing a hand on Asami's shoulder for comfort.
"I… She never told you about the letter I left?" Asami sniffled, grabbing another tissue from the box.
"No, no she did not. Asami?" Opal asked making sure Asami was focused on her for the moment. "What were the contents of this letter? What was so terrible?" Asami hesitated for a moment and attempted to swallow the lump in her throat. "Would you like some tea?" Opal asked cracking a small reassuring smile, "I'll make us some and you can gather your thoughts."
"I'd love that, thank you" Asami replied returning Opal's smile. Opal disappeared into the kitchen and returned a few minutes later with a kettle and two mugs. Setting the tea on the coffee table she thudded back onto the couch and offered Asami her mug. "Thank you again." Asami said, her voice assuming its usual smooth, tranquil pitch. The light from the kitchen now flooded into the living room brightening the space, inundating it with a sense of openness and levity.
"So, pardon the expression but, spill it girl." Opal said after taking a few sips from her mug. Asami held the mug between her palms for a few moments feeling the heat permeate her hands, attempting to steel herself for what was to come.
"Well the short of it is, that I wrote that I could not keep seeing her, that I could not go on being involved romantically with a woman and be the future CEO and heiress of Future Industries, I told her that I no longer felt the same way about her and that I needed to focus on my future, and that she should…" Asami began choking on her words "Should get real and focus on hers without me." Opal sat with her back against the couch back, slightly aghast. "I didn't have a choice Opal, my father came to me the week before I left Korra that letter, he threatened to take future industries from out of my inheritance and refuse to even let me into the workshops, working there, with my hands is my life Opal. What was I supposed to do?!"
"Well it sounds to me like you did have a choice Asami, and you chose poorly." Opal answered heatedly, "I've known you a long time now and that is the stupidest thing I have ever heard come out of your mouth." Opal exhaled sharply after a moment, looking at Asami who now was hanging her head in appreciable shame, her listless gaze boring a whole into the couch cushions. "But," Opal continued slightly cooler now after seeing Asami's distress. " I still love you, you're my friend" taking Asami into a hug and talking low into her ear. "You're brilliant you know, you don't need your father's inheritance, you can make great things on your own."
"How can I get her back?" Asami whimpered
"I don't know honey, I don't know." Asami replied giving Asami another reassuring squeeze before letting her out of the hug.
"You can't tell anyone else about that letter Opal, please. Asami begged.
"Don't worry I won't, listen just chill out her for a little while, we will watch a movie, then you can head home and we can regroup tomorrow, maybe at least figure out how we can get you and Korra in the same room together voluntarily."
"Alright" Asami smiled.
A couple hours later Asami and Opal said their goodbyes for the night. Asami headed down the stairs and climbed into her car and began heading for her condo on the far side of town. It was early morning now, a little before two in the morning, it was slightly damp outside, it must have been sprinkling while the two watched their movie. Asami thought of the possibilities that lay before her, maybe regaining something she had foolishly given up. She halted her car at a red light near downtown as a few pedestrians made there way through the crosswalk when the bottom of her stomach fell out. In the crosswalk before was Korra, her arm draped around what appeared to be Opal's sister after what could have only been a night out. The two continued walking out of sight, before the light turned green and Asami resumed her drive home, Optimism dashed, eyes she thought had been cried out welling up again.
Opal had finished her nightly rituals, brushed hair, teeth, moisturizer, and pajamas and settled into bed when her phone buzzed on her nightstand. She was delighted to see it was a message from her boyfriend for the slightest of moments.
Bo: So you are not going to believe who Korra just walked through the door macking on and stumbled into her room with. I'll save you the trouble and tell you.
Bo: It's your sister.
