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Finally home.
Miki Makimura greets her parents in a warm embrace, tears in their eyes and panic in their voices. Miki reassures her parents that she’s fine until they feel safe to let her retreat to her room. As soon as she shuts the door behind her, she shakes and feels the tears stinging her wide eyes. Nothing could have prepared her for the ghastly massacre at the track meet, not even all of the violent movies she sometimes saw Taro watching when their parents weren’t home. Nothing.
Miki collapses onto her bed and lets out a single restrained sob, then covers her mouth with her arm, bites down on it. She can’t think about this, can’t dwell on this, because if she does, she’ll have to acknowledge that her entire world is changing into something apocalyptic, something that should only be entertained in fiction. Will her family be safe? Is everyone doomed? Can Akira do anything to protect her and her family? Protect everyone?
The tears don’t stop spilling from Miki’s face, and she sniffles, trying to push out her worries with a shaky breath. She needs to relax, think of something nice, something hopeful, something that was maybe good about the day. That’s all humans really have now. The small things.
Her thoughts wander to the locker room, to Miko’s reappearance after days of no contact. The new way she wears her hair in a braid, her strong cheekbones and jaw, her collected, almost smug expression, the way she scares the other girls. And her larger breasts.
They definitely looked larger. Miki’s used to seeing Miko’s nude form in her peripheral vision — it’s a given for athletes who share locker rooms — but they certainly caught her attention today. It was hard to not stare at them, and Miki wore her smile with her eyes glued to Miko’s face out of respect. Still, she had noticed how toned and attractive Miko is, even more than before. She can feel the pink in her cheeks just thinking about them.
Miki bites her lip and gently slaps her cheeks. “You can’t do this,” she whispers to herself. “You can’t keep thinking about her like that.” She knows it’s weird that, of all the boys from school, she only thinks about Miko. Lately the girls have been pawning over Akira, to whom puberty had been generous in the last few weeks, but even this supposed new and improved Akira doesn’t strike that feeling in Miki. If anything, she was worried about him. His personality is different now, more confident, more arrogant, more masculine. And Miki would worry more about Miko if puberty hadn’t also graced her as well.
Miko is standing in front of her again, clad in only her gym shorts, her eyes narrowed, a grin on her face, and that image alone sends tingles down Miki’s body. Her legs feel weak, and an uncomfortable wetness is between them. She knows she has to stop herself, resist the urge to caress her own skin, what her body and mind really want to do. This isn’t Christian. Her father’s face always flushed as he simply told her not to give in to such thoughts and feelings for long, not before marriage. Worried about her wanting sex with boys, she supposes, but she doesn’t want that. And she doesn’t know if thinking of her close female friend instead of boys is worse or not. Certainly other Christians think so, but Miki doesn’t see any problems with being gay. She finds it comforting. But she isn’t yet comfortable indulging these thoughts.
Miki has to forcibly cast out the image of Miko’s chest before her body gets too tingly, that one particular sin too tempting, and the first thing that creeps back into her thoughts is the blood-soaked stadium. She gasps and tries not to sob again. Miki wants to be in Miko’s arms, curled up, safe, and loved, but instead she’s alone and scared of everything. Being with Miko, the new Akira, Ryo, the apocalypse. All of the changes are happening so suddenly and too quickly.
Miki pushes her tears and screams into her pillow until her eyes hurt and her head throbs, and she is so depleted of energy that her body can do nothing but sleep.
But she can’t escape thoughts of Miko. She dreams of being together with Miko, completely.