
“So, Jun,” Mio began, causing Emi to immediately groan miserably.
“You promised you wouldn’t mention him by name!” Emi sighed. “If you do, you know he’ll appear. I don’t have enough room for a proper shimenawa, and the dorm mother gets mad about all the bowls of salt.”
“Silly baby senpai,” Mio shook her head sadly. “You know mere bowls of salt can’t keep Jun out. I know. I’ve tried.”
“And you said the word again,” Emi groaned. “He’s like that evil guy in Harry Potter. Who knew the author’d lose their mind and become a tin foil hat wearing hate fountain?”
“I know! Right?” Mio shook her head sadly. “Someone caught the crazy big time.”
“I hear it spreads through social media like the bubonic plague through fleas,” Emi shrugged. “There’s really only one way to inoculate yourself.”
“Dial up?”
“Dial up.” Emi agreed glumly.
“I’ll take my chances with the crazy. Tik Tok will never load over that sort of thing and if I don’t get my cat videos and party fails, I’ll propagate the crazy myself,” Mio warned her.
“Just be careful,” Emi sighed. “The crazy is everywhere. One minute you’re watching some kid getting candy drunk and falling through their birthday cake and the next minute you’re hiding in your closet screaming about homosexuals spreading their pheromones through the waterways and turning river plants gays.”
“That’s just stupid,” Mio scoffed. “We’re totally smarter than that. Air born is the only way to go.”
“Through the contrails,” Emi nodded.
“Obviously,” Mio nodded.
“So, what has ‘he who should not be spoken of’ done this time?”
“Oh my god,” Mio growled. “What hasn’t he done?”
“Ever been a reasonable facsimile of a decent human?” Emi supplied.
“Hmmm…touché,” Mio nodded. “He quit college.”
“Honestly, I was surprised he went,” Emi frowned. “He doesn’t seem smart enough to get through nap time at a daycare, let alone into college.”
“You’re not wrong,” Mio shrugged. “But it’s not the fact he dropped out of college that’s surprising. It’s why he did.” Emi and Mio looked at each other through their phone screens in silence for a few long moments.
“Well?” Emi finally exclaimed.
“You have to do the thing,” Mio sniffed imperiously. Emi scowled at her.
“Really?” Emi finally growled.
“It’s the rule,” Mio shrugged. “I don’t make it up. I just follow it.”
“That is a dirty lie!” Emi exclaimed. “You totally made that rule up! I never agreed to it!”
“True,” Mio admitted after a moment.
“What if I don’t want to hear about it?” Emi challenged.
“I got my teeth cleaned today!” Mio beamed at her, opening her mouth wide and pointing to her teeth. “Do they look shiny?”
“This is how it is?” Emi sighed. “This is really a thing right now?”
“I asked them to use the minty stuff, but they were out, so I got the peppermint instead,” Mio’s smile faded to a frown of disappointment. “I mean, peppermint’s a favorite, but it’s not as much of a favorite. You know?”
“I’m going to need to invest in a salt company with your family around,” Emi groused.
“All the salt in the world can’t stop me, baby senpai!” Mio grinned wildly.
“I don’t doubt that one bit,” Emi sighed. “Fine. Do I have to do the knees thing?”
“It depends on how bad you want the info,” Mio smirked.
“This is cruel to torture me with my natural need to know the good gossip,” Emi slid off her bed onto the floor with a groan.
“Curiosity killed the senpai, you know.”
“It definitely killed my dignity, that’s for sure,” Emi grumbled. She took a deep breath before stretching her arms out, holding the phone strategically to capture her whole body. She bowed her head to the ground and took a deep breath. “Oh, mighty Mio-sama! Please impart your wisdom unto this one! This one beseeches thee!”
“That’s not the whole thing!” Mio scowled. “Do the whole thing!”
“Ugh! Fine!” Emi rolled her eyes but put the phone on the ground below her regardless and kissed the screen tenderly. “Your baby senpai must be enlightened!”
“Swoon!” Mio giggled, rolling onto her back.
“There! I did the thing!” Emi groused. “Now spill it!”
“I can’t talk!” Mio gasped. “My heart is full to bursting!”
“Mio…” Emi growled in warning.
“It’s too much!” Mio fanned her face frantically with her hand.
“I have to know!” Emi leaned back on her knees and shook the phone impotently.
“Ok!” Mio giggled, flipping back over onto her stomach. “So, it was actually my parents that made him quit!”
“That’s…” Emi frowned in confusion. “…kind of weird, actually. Wasn’t he your mom’s golden, mentally incompetent ticket into the country club set? He was going to get his degree in…whatever he was going to school for-”
“Sports medicine with a focus on massage,” Mio supplied.
“Wait…seriously?” Emi cocked her eyebrow quizzically. Mio shrugged.
“He wanted to get hired by the women’s soccer national team.”
“Oh,” Emi sagged. “That makes sense. What a tool. But he was going to marry a princess or baroness or whatever and be your mom’s barely sentient uber driver to international recognition and respectability first. So, why’d your parents put the brakes on his dream of oiling up the national team?”
“Do you have your grape juice?” Mio peered at me intently. Emi reached into the mini fridge between her and Asami’s beds and produced the requested can of juice.
“Ready, captain!”
“He got someone pregnant!” Emi stared at the phone for a long moment, the mounting horror of what she feared would be next rising in her chest. “Can you believe that idiot?”
“Wh – “Emi began, but found her throat was suddenly very dry and wouldn’t make proper sounds. Mio had been absolutely right about the sparkling juice, that’s for sure. She cracked the top on the juice and took a deep drink. “Uh…who did he get pregnant?”
“That’s the twisted and messed up part,” Mio’s enthusiasm for the gossip waned with the weight of the reality. Emi felt the blood drain from her face as she blinked into the phone. “That American girl Kas…er…you know… was dating for a bit.” Emi caught the grimace of pain flash across Mio’s beautiful face for a moment before it dissipated as quickly as it had come.
“Aria,” Emi whispered numbly.
“Yeah,” Mio nodded. “That’s her.”
“Damn,” Emi muttered, her thoughts swirling wildly. This was bad. No. This was worse than bad. This was the most baddest.
“It gets worse,” Mio intruded on her thoughts like a sledgehammer.
“How could it get worse?” Emi gaped at her.
“Her family showed up a week ago and had a loong talk in the living room with mom and dad. They were not pleased,” Mio had to stifle a smile. “I’d never seen mom so scared in her life. They were threatening lawyers and stuff and finally got to the really, really rotten part. She’s moving in here.”
“What?” Emi stared at Mio as if she’d suddenly morphed into a giant multi-headed wasp singing ‘Sukiyaki’ at karaoke.
“Yeah,” Mio nodded. “Said Jun had to take responsibility and since he was a student that responsibility transferred to them. They kicked her out and her parents wouldn’t take her back, so my parents are on the hook until, according to them: the kid’s all grown up or ‘Jun learns to keep it in his pants.’”
“Joke’s on them,” Emi muttered. “That moron won’t ever learn that little trick.”
“At least until some ticked off boyfriend removes what’s in his pants for him,” Mio shuddered in disgust.
“Truth,” Emi nodded absently.
There was no chance of ever seeing Kasumi again, now. She suspected with Kasumi’s innate stubbornness it would be a long time, but that there was still hope. This nightmare fuel removed that hope completely. It hurts to think about, Emi thought miserably, an icy pain seeming to wrap around her heart. Her best friend was truly gone for good, now, and Emi was at least partially to blame for all of it.
There was no chance of ever seeing Kasumi again, now.
Well, us following all of the author's stories know that it's not quite so impossible.
You are most likely correct :)
I'm loving the dynamics Mio and Emi have together c: