"Wow, that's the 5th one you've won today!" Chiyo cheered as Sakaki pulled out another plush.
"I'm not that good, just lucky." She explained, giving the plush to Chiyo to put in her bag.
Kagura emerged through the archway and approached the two of them.
"Oh, Miss Kagura, are you ok?"
"Yeah yeah, I'm just coming out here, it's kinda hot in there."
"Well Miss Sakaki has been doing really good at all these machines. She's barely spent ¥1000 in total and she's won 5 plushies!"
"There's, um, one for you." Sakaki quietly said, looking away and rubbing the back of her head.
"Thanks Sakaki, that's real nice!"
"Let's wait until we go home, then we don't have to worry about losing anything. Want to go play some games with us?" asked the young child.
"Yeah, sure thing. I'm all cooled off." The trio began to walk back into the busy arcade.
Osaka and Kaorin were meandering around the arcade, not talking to eachother after what had unfolded. While they were walking, Osaka broke the silence.
"Say, how would that have helped sort things out, anyway?"
"Wha- you said it would work!" Kaorin exclaimed from beside her. Osaka thought about it for a moment.
"Ah, you're right."
Kaorin was silent at this, unable to tell if she was joking or serious.
"So where are we goin'? We've been walking for a while."
"I wasn't leading us anywhere! I was just walking!"
"Oh." The two stopped again and were silent. Osaka was again the one to initiate conversation.
"Wanna find the others?"
Kaorin sighed.
"Sure."
"Miss Sakaki, tell them how good you are at the claw machines!" Chiyo energetically said as they walked back to her house.
"Oh, you played on those machines again?" Kaorin asked.
"A...a little, I guess." She began to blush.
"You're really great, Miss Sakaki!"
"Yeah, totally!"
She began to smile out of embarrassment. Kagura and Osaka were walking a few years behind their friends so that Kagura could distance herself from Kaorin.
"So did ya enjoy the kiss?" Osaka obliviously asked. Kagura gasped andfelt her heart skip a beat, making her immediately grabbed Osaka's hand, running down a street they had just passed.
"Miss Kagura, slow do-"
Kagura felt Osaka's hand slip from her grasp and heard a thud behind her. She turned around, and saw her fried faced down on the pavement. She gasped and ran back and crouched down to try and help her friend.
"Osaka? Are you ok Osaka? Osaka?"
She began to lift herself up with her hands, getting onto her knees, before yelping and falling onto her back. She began to cry, Kagura quickly noticing her knees had been horribly grazed.
"W-why woulja p-pull me like tha'?" Osaka stuttered out between tears.
"Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry, I-I'm going to fix it for you." She helped move her friend further away from the road, and ran to the nearest convenience store, purchased a pack of disposable tissies the largest box of band-aids, and ran back to Osaka.
"Ok Osaka, I'm gonna help you." She got out one of the tissues and tried to remove most of the blood from her left knee. She cleaned up around the outside of the wound and dabbed on the areas with small amounts of blood, then pulled out a large band-aid and placed it into her, cleaning up around the wound to the best of her extent, Osaka cringing each time the tissue went into the opened areas. They repeated the process with her other knee.
"Ok, try to get up."
She stood up, and began to walk around for a while.
"I-its better, ah think. T-thank you."
"I'm sorry that I hurt you. I was just trying to go somewhere private."
"Why's that?"
"Because you asked me about the kiss, I don't want anyone else knowing about it. I don't know what happened but I woke up and me and her were kissing, and it was really disgusting and I didn't like it at all."
She had turned red from her explanation, but this didn't stop Osaka.
"Kaorin told me she didn't know how it happened either. Ah don't think she'd want to kiss ya on purpose."
"I know, she told me that she didn't want to, but I'm not sure."
Osaka pondered over this for a minute
"Were ya dreamin' about having a kiss?"
Kagura turned red again.
"Kinda, yeah, maybe."
"Aha!" She exclaimed. "You and her were both dreamin' of kissing, ya came together and kissed, so that's why y'all were kissing this morning."
Kagura thought about it for a second, and it began to make sense.
"Huh. That, it could make sense."
"So I'm right?" She said with excitement.
"Yeah, I think so. Did you tell Kaorin that, too?"
"Nah, just you. Ah only thought about it recently."
"I'll talk to her when we get back. Wait, we need to go meet with the others, come on!"
She began to run off, and noticed her friend wasn't running too.
"Osaka?"
"Sorry, I'm comin', it's hard to run with these band-aids on mah knees."
"Oh, right."
"Hey, where are Miss Kagura and Miss Osaka?" Chiyo had noticed that they weren't behind them as she reached her house.
"Hmm, maybe they're just taking their time." Suggested Kaorin. "It's nice outside, so maybe they just wanted to take it slow."
"You're right, let's wait outside for them, since it's so nice."
The three girls sat down and waited. Sakaki wasn't her normal self, and hadn't been for a while. She knew why, but hadn't talked to anyone besides Kaorin about it.
"Am I going to be a burden if I tell anyone else about it? I don't want to make people feel like I'm using them, because I'm not, I just need to get it out. Chiyo-Chan is too young, so I don't want to talk to her about it, and Osaka is too spacey, but she is nice, but she could tell people without knowing, and I don't want that. Tomo wouldn't be that good either. Maybe I can talk to Kagura about it some time, or to Yomi. But what if they turn me away? What happens then?" Sakaki kept these thoughts to herself, wondering about what to do. Kaorin and Chiyo had been talking to eachother while Sakaki had spaced out.
"Heya guys!" Osaka yelled from a few houses down, waving to them with Kagura.
"Hi Miss Osaka!" Chiyo returned, standing up and waving back. They all went in to her house and went upstairs while Chiyo went to grab something for them all to drink. Kagura made an effort to sit near Kaorin, trying to show that she wasn't that mad anymore.
"H-hey, I have something for you guys." Sakaki quietly said, Kaorin and Osaka stopped talking and all three od reaching for Chiyo's bag.
"I-I won these, and I wanted to give one to each of you." She pulled out four of the five small toys she had won. Each one was about the size of her palm. She gave Kagura a wolf, Kaorin a penguin, Osaka a fish, and saved a rabbit for Chiyo.
"Awww, thank you Miss Sakaki!" Kaorin said, blushing and smiling with joy.
"Yeah, thanks a bunch Miss Sakaki!" Osaka said, trying to balance the fish on her head.
"Thanks, Sakaki." Kagura said, smiling at her. It made Sakaki feel warm inside, that she was able to make other people happy, even if she wasn't.
"I have drinks you guys!" Chiyo announced, walking into the room and laying down a tray of drinks on the table.
They spent the rest of the day talking about various things, Kaorin and Kagura occasionally talking about something together. When it came time to sleep, they stuck to their previous arrangements. Chiyo said goodnight and closed the door like the night before. They got onto their sides of bed and faced away from eachother. Kagura shortly broke the silence between them.
"I'm sorry for being mean earlier."
"I'm sorry for kissing you."
"Wait, you did mean to kiss me?"
Kagura sat up and faced her, causing Kaorin to do the same.
"No, no! I didn't, I'm just sorry, that it happened is all."
Kagura sighed.
"I'm sorry too."
"Don't be, it wasn't that bad." Teased Kaorin, winking at her. Kagura blushed and looked down.
"Do-do you think I look pretty?"
"Uh, I-I was just teasing you."
"I know, but really, do you think I am."
Kaorin thought about it for a while.
"I think so, but it's all subjective I guess. Why?"
"Oh, uh, no reason."
She laid down and rolled back over. Kaorin moved closer to her to whisper into her ear.
"Do you like someone?"
Kagura nodded.
"Who is it?"
She was hesitant about answering.
"Just a guy, from our home room, near the back. His name's Furanku."
Kaorin smiled.
"Awww you two would be so cute together!"
Kagura blushed harder than before.
"Anyways, goodnight Kagura."
She rolled back over to sleep on her side.
"Goodnight Kaorin."
"Why do I feel so...trapped. It's like I can't get out, I'm barricaded by my own emotions. Everytime I see this glimpse of happiness it just fades away, and this sadness catches up."
Sakaki was laying down, unable to sleep. Her mind was tormented by the thoughts that she was a burden to everyone. Her parents divorce was still fresh on her mind, and it hadn't eased up on her at all. Osaka and Chiyo were peacefully sleeping.
"Why couldn't I be one of them. If I was Chiyo I wouldn't have that much to worry about, if I was Osaka I would be able to forget about everything. Why couldn't I be them?"
Her thoughts traveled in and out each minute, eventually ceasing as she fell asleep.