Saturday, April 26th, 2014.
Waking up to Samidare cuddled up with me in bed was one of the best feelings I've ever had the pleasure of experiencing. If I'm fortunate enough to one day marry her, being able to have that feeling every morning would be pretty life-fulfilling in itself. I guess the only thing that's pretty weird between us is the fact that I'm about a good half a foot taller than her, or something like that. Our height difference is pretty conspicuous. But hey, height doesn't matter.
Samidare had woken up before me and turned off the alarm so that I wouldn't wake up and urge her to go back to the dorms, and she stayed with me in my room. She ended up bringing a spare uniform for herself when she came in last night, so that she can just get dressed here, although she'd have to sort out her hair and other things teenage girls usually do in the morning to prepare for the day. And the fleet was sleeping in again like yesterday, so it turned out not to be a big deal that Samidare hadn't snuck back into the destroyer dorms.
So we just spent some time under the covers together, talking about all kinds of stuff...things that people who'd recently become friends would ask to get to know each other more. The barrier between me and Samidare, the relationship of commander to soldier, got demolished our first night together, so I felt like Samidare was a lot less hesitant and shy than before, definitely more open to me than she was when we first met, for sure. I mean, it was as though we were just a normal couple enjoying each other's company, with no attention paid to affiliation, position, or circumstance. She asked me what I'd always looked for in a potential girlfriend, since she was curious, so I told her my preferences, like long hair, preferably long black hair, and a respectable chest, which disappointed Samidare, since she, well, let's just say she's not confident in the upper armor area. It's not that she's lacking, and it's definitely not a turn-off for me, because I think she's already far sexier than I deserve, but she pledged that she would start drinking milk every day. The way she said it, she sounded pretty serious. I told her she was perfectly fine the way she was, that she didn't need to go out of her own way just to make our night battles more exciting, to put it euphemistically, and she accepted it.
"I'll still drink more milk, though," she told me.
As we got dressed for the day, Samidare told me all the things that she wanted to do with me, and they were literally all the moe fantasies that male anime enthusiasts would fantasize about and get off to in their own virtual realities. Bathing together, cooking dinner together, traveling together - she even mentioned having children together, and she clearly wasn't thinking straight when she said that last one, 'cause she nearly broke my closet door banging her head against it in embarrassment as her boilers overheated like mad. This must all be part of some nefarious plan to let my guard down, because Samidare is growing on me alarmingly fast, and I'm not sure how long I can last before I really do earnestly decide for myself that I in fact do love her. I mean, maybe I already do, and I just haven't noticed it yet because I'm just not used to knowing what loving and being loved feels like.
But since she mentioned wanting to cook together, I offered Samidare a chance to make some breakfast with me, just for the two of us, which she gladly accepted. We did meet Houshou in the kitchens alone, and Houshou explained that she'd offered to take over Mamiiya's and Irako's morning responsibilities for the weekend to give them a well-deserved break. When she saw us come in together, she gave us one of those wry smiles, the kind of smile people make when they know what's up. We (as in me and Samidare) tried to explain ourselves, saying that we'd just so happened to meet in the halls and decided to come to the mess hall together for something to eat, but Houshou's all-knowing grin wasn't about to get deceived so pitifully, and she asked us if we'd finally gotten together, and we were forced to admit that we were, for the time being.
Houshou knew that Samidare and I were in a relationship. Remember that night when Samidare first offered herself to me? Houshou revealed to me that on that same night, Samidare went to Houshou for some advice on how to make her advance onto me, and she'd told Samidare to bide her time and wait for a right moment, and then just j-j-jam it in!
That was an extremely tasteless and bad joke, and I should be court-martialed for it. Please forgive me.
But bad jokes aside, I was surprised that it was Houshou who suggested that Samidare's best chance of making our relationship progress was by doing something over the line, such as the night we spent aboard my flagship on the first night of Operation Rising Sun. Because Samidare knew that at the time, there were so many layers and barriers between the two of us for a normal relationship to ever develop, like racial barriers, superiority barriers, and even physical barriers (I'm noticeably taller than Samidare, as mentioned earlier), so Houshou determined that the best chance Samidare would have was to...well, go Nike and just do it. I always imagined Houshou as a conservative, motherly figure, so the fact that she was the one who suggested to Samidare all of this is a bit strange to me, almost out of character, even, but I suppose if it's for the sake of seeing all of her ship daughters be happy, then she'll become whatever she'll need to become. And I say ship daughters specifically because everybody at base, not just the carriers, more or less call Houshou "Okaa-san", or "Mother". Well, that's changing a bit now that we have Taigei at base, and the submarines and even many of the destroyers, Samidare included, have been addressing Taigei the same way, so much so that even the light cruisers and Suzuya and Kumano have been joining in on the Whale Mother hype. I have a tingling suspicion that Houshou views Taigei as a powerful rival in the Most Motherly Ship Girl category, since she's been the undisputed title holder for the last four months before Taigei came along. But that's a topic for another day.
Being able to make breakfast with Samidare was the most fun I've had doing anything in a longer time than I can remember. Ever since I entered the military, starting with my college career at Hargraves, I just kind of felt like I was accepting the harsh realities of life as an essential part of who I'd become (or have to become), so I naturally grew desensitized to all of life's experiences, and this process was expedited once I actually did enter military service. But now, Samidare is threatening to chip away at the desensitization armor that I've been wearing all these years, because I enjoyed something that should be one of the most mundane chores of all, making breakfast, way more than I usually do. I've had fun making breakfast for the fleet before, but never to the extent as this morning. But at least for this I know why: I've never taken the time to appreciate all the little things that consists of everyday life. It's like everything I've done before that I considered irrelevant and boring was boring because I never thought I'd ever get to the point where doing them would make me put a big fat stupid smile on my face. But making breakfast and eating together with Samidare changed all that.
Just being able to do normal things with a girl I like is so extraordinary to me, it's magical.
Once the rest of the fleet got up, we went on a big ol' trip over to town nearby to get the girls some beach clothes and casual clothes, and we spent the entire morning and afternoon running around and hitting all the clothes stores we could find. I tagged along with the Shiratsuyu-Class and the Yuugumo-Class destroyers and had to be their fashion designer because they kept coming to me for clothes advice, which I wasn't qualified to give at all. I'm surprised that Naganami and Hayashimo have warmed up to me a little bit too. And it was heartwarming to see Kiyoshimo up to her usual shenanigans just like we remembered her before she sank herself. She just doesn't make comments about how she wants to be a battleship one day, because well, she's already got battleship-par firepower anyway, now that she's modernized. In the end, though, the girls did generally make their purchases secret from me, since they claimed they wanted their outfits to be a surprise for our vacation to Emerald Beach. Only Samidare showed off what she'd bought to me earlier this evening, obviously in private, and she looked amazing in her two-piece and her white ribboned hat.
We also hammered out the details of our big ol' launch day party for both Urakaze and Akagi, since we're going to be celebrating them at the same time. Akagi didn't care what we did so long as there was going to be plenty of food and bauxite, so her birthday preparations are going to be easy. Urakaze's, however, was a bit more complicated, since she wanted better weapons, a Kai upgrade, more makeup accessories, some cakes from me, etc. etc. We had to discuss that one with Seal Team Six.
Now that the war against the Abyssals is over (for now), it's like my base has become less of a military base and more of a private boarding school dorm, minus all the teaching and boring shit. It's vacation time here at Okinawa, and we're all enjoying every single moment of it while it lasts.