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Thunder boomed overhead, sealing the lid on the coffin of Tomoe and Rinko’s plans to go out that evening. Rinko had been looking forward to it, but unpredictable weather couldn’t be helped this time of year. They rescheduled their date, and Rinko was getting ready for some high quality me time, accompanied by hot milk, scented candles, and the last two hundred or so pages of her current book. It was really the perfect weather to curl up by the window and read. She was just getting situated when...
“Sweetie? Tomoe is here,” Her dad called from outside her door. Rinko blinked.
“...What?”
“She’s downstairs. Did you not know she was coming over?”
Rinko got up, trying to think back if she had said anything, but Rinko was sure they had just postponed their date to tomorrow. As a crack of thunder sounded again, Rinko started to worry, wondering if Tomoe was okay. She headed downstairs and saw Tomoe, dripping wet, but perfectly fine, laughing and talking to her mom.
“Tomoe...? What are you doing here?”
“She ran over here to see you! Isn’t that so romantic,” her mom cooed, clutching a dishtowel dramatically to her chest. Rinko, bewildered, glanced between her and Tomoe, at a loss for words. Tomoe grinned sheepishly.
“Sorry for coming all of a sudden, I just really wanted to see you,” she explained, looking at the floor.
“Aww, what a sweetheart!” Rinko’s mom smiled. “That’s Aries season for you. All our good ideas just come flowing out, and we can’t contain ourselves!”
They went upstairs so Tomoe could shower and get on some dry clothes after making sure it was okay for her to stay the night, then headed into Rinko’s room.
“So, what was that your mom said about Aries?” Tomoe asked, drying her hair off.
“It’s March 21, the first day you can be born so that your zodiac sign is Aries,” Rinko explained, turning on her lamp and switching the bright ceiling light off.
“Oh, I didn’t know you were into that kind of thing, Rinko,” Tomoe raised her eyebrows, impressed, as she walked over to Rinko, throwing her arms around her from behind and leaning her chin on her shoulder. Rinko closed her eyes, leaning into the warm, fresh-out-of-a-hot-shower hug.
“I’m not particularly... I know the mythology, but my mom is the one who really believes it...” She shuffled around, facing Tomoe and snaking her own arms around her. Tomoe wasn’t usually Aries-level impulsive like this, but Rinko was glad she came tonight. She felt Tomoe smile.
“I love your mom,” She muttered.
“She’s an Aries, like you,” Rinko smiled. “And my dad is an Aquarius, and I’m a Libra... but... it doesn’t fit me very much.” She sighed into Tomoe’s chest, leaning on her support.
“Aw, why not? I dunno a lot about astrology and stuff,” Tomoe squeezed her tighter, rubbing her back before they went to sit down on the bed. Tomoe leaned against the headboard as Rinko curled up next to her, tracing the letters of the old college sweatshirt of her dad’s that Tomoe was wearing.
“The constellation Libra is represented by the scales... so they’re indecisive, and prone to hesitation, which is me... but they’re also supposed to be one of the most charming and social signs...” she trailed off.
“I think you’re charming,” Tomoe said.
Rinko hummed, grateful but unconvinced. “And I’m a Scorpio moon, and Pisces ascendant.”
“I didn’t even know you had more than just the one,” Tomoe raised her eyebrows. “What are my other ones?”
Rinko pulled out her phone. “Do you know what time you were born?”
Tomoe shook her head. “I’ll ask my mom whenever I talk to her.”
“Couldn’t you text her...?”
“Umm...”
Rinko looked up at Tomoe, who flashed her a grin.
“I didn’t wanna get my phone wet, so...”
So she didn’t bring it when she came over here in the pouring rain, Rinko finished, unsurprising, but painfully endearing. She hid her face in Tomoe’s chest. “That was dangerous...” she sighed as lightning flashed outside. “You shouldn’t have come...”
Tomoe giggled, patting her head. “I just really missed you all of a sudden when we had to cancel. Is it really that weird?”
Rinko sighed, pulling up a website to find her complete birth chart and trying not to think about how cute and romantic and sweet Tomoe really was.
She filled in the information of Tomoe’s birthdate and location, and hit enter. Tomoe put her hand up behind Rinko’s, holding up the phone so she could see too. Rinko scrolled down to the chart.
“A bunch of Tauruses,” Tomoe noted the several planets in her chart that were aligned in Taurus, and Rinko smiled. “What’s so funny?”
“Just... the way you said it,” she said.
“So like, what does this all mean?”
Rinko scrolled down to the report under the chart, and Tomoe read.
“Aries, first sign of the zodiac... Aries is an active, energetic sign. Hm, seems pretty accurate,” Tomoe noted as she continued. “People with sun in Aries are direct, straightforward, and uncomplicated.” She laughed. “‘Uncomplicated,’ feels like a nice word for moron.”
Rinko giggled. “That’s not true, it just means you aren’t prone to overthinking.”
“Yeah, I know, I’m a stupid Aries with no brain cells, you don’t have to call me out like that.” They both laughed. “Oh look, it says here that I’m also apparently ‘not big on planning ahead.’”
Tomoe had fun pointing out all the little phrases like that in the rest of her report, but overall, Rinko noticed that it all was incredibly accurate.
“But more importantly than ‘stupid,’ which you’re not... athletic, brave, independant, ambitious... this all fits you really well.”
“You think so...?” Tomoe laughed, looking down at her nails as her face turned a light red. Rinko smiled, snuggling up closer.
“I really do...” she scrolled back to a part they had skipped over before, softly reading, “‘There’s a childlike quality to all Aries sun people, and it’s often quite charming...’ I think that part is really true.”
“Childlike?” Tomoe laughed, blushing even more. “What about me do you find childlike?”
Rinko’s heart skipped, and she couldn’t hide a smile as she considered it. True, Tomoe was very mature, but there were also parts of her that were just so...
“You’re… really excitable, and positive... “ she started. “...You have... a very innocent optimism, and faith in people...”
“...”
Rinko sat up slightly, to get a better look at the uncharacteristically quiet Tomoe, who drew back her arm from around Rinko and crossed her arms, turning slightly away from her. She leaned closer, brushing her red hair back to see her face that was just as saturated, and couldn’t hold back a short giggle. She leaned forward and hugged her, holding her tighter and enjoying it very much as Tomoe put her hands up in front of her face.
“I love you...” Rinko whispered.
“... I love you, too.”
Rinko smiled as she picked up her phone again, getting an idea. Typing in “Aries Libra compatibility,” she clicked the first result.
“Libra and Aries, the idealist and the hero,” Tomoe hummed.
“Libra and Aries are opposite signs in the zodiac and indeed these two personalities are in many ways the mirror image of one another. Libra is sweetness to Aries spice; Aries is physicality to Libra’s intellectualism; Libra is passive and Aries is active...”
Rinko rolled her eyes slightly as Tomoe snickered, continuing to read on her own.
“”There is almost always a chemistry and a... an attraction between these two...”
“You forgot ‘sexual.’”
“I was leaving that out...”
“But I am sexually attracted to you...”
She paused. Rinko stared at her, silently daring her to continue.
“It’s not because of your zodiac sign, though.”
She burst into giggles again, and this time Rinko really did roll her eyes, thinking of just two minutes ago when Tomoe was asking her why she thought of her as childish...
“Sorry, sorry, I just couldn’t not say it,” Tomoe laughed one last time before calming herself. Rinko shook her head in disbelief. There might be some truth to the phrase “Aries Season.” This was going to be a long month...
“Anyways,” Tomoe cleared her throat, and they continued to read together. They laughed and pointed out parts that didn’t make sense, or parts that were really accurate. Although Rinko affirmed that Tomoe was much more an Aries than she was a Libra, Tomoe insisted that Rinko fit all the traits. They combed through countless articles until Tomoe was yawning, and soon fell asleep. At that point, Rinko put down her phone and grabbed the book she had been planning to read with her alone time that never happened. When she couldn’t keep her eyes open any longer, she closed her book. Before she turned the lights out, she looked down one last time at her Aries girlfriend, who had long since been sleeping peacefully. Whatever parts of their astrology they fit or didn’t, however compatible they were supposed to be, it didn’t matter to Rinko. She turned the light off, laying down next to her, and fell asleep, knowing in her heart that they really were perfect for each other.