Akane pushed through the glass door of the Phoenix, her eyes scanning through the evening crowd. She honestly wasn’t sure if she’d even find Ranko down here; she half-expected her girlfriend to be upstairs in her old room crying. Ranma had never been one to let anyone see him cry, but since her transition and with the encouragement of her sisters and Hana to let herself feel and work through things, she had been more than making up for lost time.
Still, not two steps into the building, Akane knew exactly where to find her girlfriend, because Ranko’s voice rained down on her from the twelve speakers mounted from the ceiling. Wearing the form-fitting pink bodycon dress she’d snatched from the closet hours before, Ranko stalked the stage with her band behind her, running her hand tauntingly down Shinji’s gray button-down shirt as he backed away from her and plucked at his bass guitar.
“He’s a cold-hearted snake, oh! Look into his eyes! Uh-oh! He’s been telling lies!”
Akane winced. She hoped the song selection wasn’t directed at her, but she knew Ranko had every right to be upset. She was so angry with herself for not anticipating that Ranko could have used the extra money, that hadn’t been planned for in their budget, to do something so sweet. All that mattered to Akane at the moment was getting a few minutes alone with her girlfriend so she could apologize for making such a colossal fool of herself.
The stage lighting flickered electric blue under the command of Ariel Wright, Jacob’s friend from the exchange program. After designing the lighting for the first Rise performance, Ariel had been helping out more and more during the Dapper Dragons’ shows, freeing Mei up to cover more traditional bar duties in Izumi’s increasing absence.
“You’re the one giving up the love anytime he needs it, but you turn your back, and then he’s off and running with the crowd! You’re the one to sacrifice anything to please him. Do you really think he thinks about you when he’s out?”
Akane sighed, leaning on the bar and waiting for Yui to get a moment. Before Ranko’s sister could acknowledge her, though, she felt a tap on her shoulder. She turned, coming face-to-face with Fumiko Kanda, captain of her collegiate volleyball team. She was dressed in a black pleather miniskirt and a red tank top, and she was already more than a little tipsy judging by the look, and the smell, of her.
“Hey, Akane! I didn’t know you hung out here! This place isn’t half bad!” She raised her half-empty margarita, draining a good bit of it at once through a neon pink straw.
“Fumiko! Uh, hi! Yeah, I… uh, I come here fairly often.” Akane looked around the room for a place to escape, finding none from her position pinned against the bar counter. This was the last place and the last time that she wanted to have to conceal her relationship with Ranko.
Putting her arm around Akane’s shoulder and teetering a bit, Fumiko pulled her away from the bar counter. “C’mon, you. Me and the girls have a table over here.” Akane tried to resist, but the drunk girl continued pulling at her neck forcefully. She looked nervously up at the stage, praying she could get away before Ranko finished her song.
“You could find somebody better, girl. He could only make you cry. You deserve somebody better, girl. He’s co-cold as ice…”
Akane sat at a round table next to four of her teammates, squirming in her chair. As the last notes of the song faded from the speakers, Saki raised her hand with a loud whoop, waving her empty glass in the air and rattling the ice insistently.
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Moments later, in response to the girl’s unspoken request for a refill, their waitress arrived at the table. “Hello! Can I get you another round, girls?” It was then that Ranko’s eyes fell on Akane, out partying with her friends just hours after they’d had a fight, and doing it right in front of her, in the one place from which Ranko could not run.
Akane’s eyes went wide, and she shook her head pleadingly at Ranko, her face the picture of shame, silently begging her not to make a scene.
Reiko slid an empty glass across the table obnoxiously. “Man, the shervice here fuckin’ sucks.”
Glaring at Akane, Ranko put on her cheeriest customer service voice, entirely betrayed by the smoldering resentment in her eyes. “Can I get you anything, miss?”
Akane cringed and laughed nervously, trying to find any sort of way to downplay Ranko’s obvious anger. “Oh, no thank you, I don’t want to bother you, I’m fine.”
Venom dripping from her voice as she smiled, Ranko crossed her ankles and bent her knees mockingly, bowing her head and gripping the hem of her skirt. “Oh, please don’t worry about us, ma’am. We live to serve.” As Akane gasped, she snatched her empty tray fumingly and stalked off, leaving Reiko’s empty glass on the table.
Fumiko scoffed, swinging her glass around so hard she almost hit Akane in the face with it. “Ugh. What a bitch, right?!”
Ranko burst through the blue saloon door, ignoring Mei’s plea to stop as she charged through the kitchen and crashed her way into the back alley. She threw the steel door closed behind her as hard as she possibly could. With a guttural scream, she gripped the latch handlebar of the trash receptacle and began kicking it over and over, howling at the top of her lungs in her no-longer-repressible fury.
“Man, that dumpster’s a right asshole, ain’t it?”
Ranko looked up as Crash walked around from behind her, half of a lit cigarette dangling from his fingers. “You wanna talk about it, Ran-chan?”
Looking down at the crater she’d created in the trash receptacle with her foot, she growled. Next to the pink scuff that had rubbed off from her shoe, a dark brown spot marred a small corner of the cavity. Anyone else would have thought it just another splotch of rust on the ratty old dumpster, but Ranko knew better. That particular memento was left by the blood of the last person who had made her feel the level of rage she currently harbored, one Mikado Sanzenin.
“Tell me it’s ready, Crash.”
The guitarist waved his hands. “Whoa! Down, girl! You don’t wanna do that. Especially not when you’re this pissed.”
She whipped her head around to face him, the fire in her eyes almost turning the tears pooling in their corners to steam. “Yeah. I do.”
Crash took a long drag of his cigarette before offering it to her. She very nearly accepted, so great was her anger and anxiety.
The guitarist sighed. A part of him, the part that was quite possibly Ranko’s best friend, desperately wanted to talk her out of what she planned to do. What he’d agreed to help her do. He knew that would make Ranko the happiest. But another part of him, the part he had never admitted to Ranko was still there after all this time, would have given anything for Ranko and Akane to call it quits right then, tonight, and for Ranko to need someone else to run to.
“It’s not ready yet. A couple more days, tops. Jake just needs a little more practice on the synth solo in the bridge and we should be good to go.”
Ranko snatched the dying butt of his cigarette out of her friend’s hand, throwing it down into a dark puddle on the asphalt. “Tell him to play it on a fucking kazoo if he has to. We’re on in five.”