“I’ve got a little extra room in my bag, if you want me to take back some of the souvenirs and stuff. Less for you to haul around,” Akane said, sighing as she looked up from her open, packed suitcase on the hotel room bed to her wife. A cheap pink plastic lei rested atop her folded clothing and a pile of Polaroid pictures taken on her weekend excursion to Hawai’i in the mid-sized red-and-white polka dotted wheeled bag.

“If you want,” Ranko said hollowly, not turning from the open window as she watched the waves crash to the white sand of Waikiki Beach. Her own packed bags rested in the corner of the room closest to the bathroom, ready for her nine-hour mid-afternoon flight to Auckland with her bandmates. She had barely spoken all morning.

Stay strong, Akane. Remember what Mom said. This is what’s best for her, even if she hates it. “Hey.” She approached, wrapping her arm around the hips of Ranko’s mint green dress. “Smile for me, beautiful.”

“I can’t smile,” Ranko whispered, resting her head on Akane’s shoulder but not turning her eyes from the water through the window. “You asked me not to lie to you again.”

Akane winced, sighing softly. “I’m sorry it’s hard. I really am. It’s killing me too, I promise. But hey, try to focus on the positive! You’re gonna be in New Zealand tonight! I’m sure there’s lots of cool… actually, I have no idea what the hell they do in New Zealand. But, I bet it’s way better than Old Zealand!” She giggled a bit.

“Where the hell is Old Zealand,” Ranko asked, not taking her eyes off the window. “Never even heard of it.”

Akane shrugged. “No one cares. That’s how much better the new one is! And, after that, you get to go to Australia, and hang out with all Jake and Ariel’s people! I’m sure that’s gonna be super fun! I’m crazy jealous that you get to meet Zoe! I’ve heard so much about them, and they seem so awesome!”

Ranko sighed again, turning to her lover. “You don’t have to be jealous, Akane. You could… You could just come with me. I told you before that it was bugging me that you didn’t, but I was trying to understand your reasons. Everybody told me it was for the best, and I tried to accept that, but I feel like if it’s so great, it shouldn’t fucking hurt like this. Now that you’ve come out here, and I’ve seen how perfect it can be, doing this with you here with me, I don’t want it to stop.”

Akane cringed. Yeah, I was afraid of that when I decided to come out here. “Hey, don’t be like that. Come on. You were doing so great before I got here. You told me yourself, you were hanging out with Emi and Hitomi, and the boys besides, having a good time. If half of Jake’s stories are true, you and Zoe are gonna be peas in a pod, too. You’re gonna be just fine, silly girl.”

“I don’t want to be fine, Akane! I want to be great. I want to be amazing. And that doesn’t happen without you. If I try real hard, I can get to okay. But with you? I can be who I’m supposed to be.” Ranko reached out, taking Akane’s hands in hers. “I’m asking you, Akane. I don’t ask you for anything. When I couldn’t walk, I wouldn’t even ask you to get me a soda out of the fridge. But I’m asking you for this. I’m begging for this. Stay with me, Akane. Please.”

Her shoulders slumping, Akane squeezed Ranko’s hands tight before releasing them. “I… I can’t, Ranko. I’ve gotta do this, baby. There’s important things going on for me back home, and you…” She chuckled. “You’re out here conquering the world one stadium at a time, and you don’t need my help to do it.”

Ranko whirled, the sadness in her eyes seeming to give way to anger. “What important things, Akane?! You’re on school break right now, same as me! There’s no reason you can’t stay with me, except that you don’t want to.”

The singer’s wife sighed, collapsing heavily onto her backside on the bed next to her open suitcase. “Well, the Phoenix, for one. Mom needs a break. She’s whipped, after having covered for Yui so long. They need me.”

The redhead shook her head forcefully, her red braid whipping over her shoulder. “Yui’s back in action, Mom says. With it being quieter at the bar, and everybody being there, they’ve got plenty of people, even if Mom takes it easy for a few days. They could manage.”

Akane nodded. “Even if that were the case, just because I don’t have class, doesn’t mean I don’t have school work. They assign us all kinds of homework and stuff to do during the breaks to get ready for the next term. It’s normal in college - you’ll see when you start - but it’s even more so with medical programs.”

Ranko peeked into Akane’s open bag. “Plenty of room in there for a couple of textbooks. Nabiki has a key to our apartment. She could ship your stuff overnight to the hotel in Auckland for you, easy.”

“It’s not just the homework itself, Ranko. Like, there’s so much to cram into my skull, and I need all the head start I can get. The extra clinical time and one-on-one practice is a huge help. Sho and I are meeting to study three or four times a…”

“There it is.”

Akane blinked, rocking back a bit on the bed. “There what is? What are you on about, Ranko?”

“I’m about to go play five packed houses in Australia, and you can’t find the time to come, but let Sho ask you out for a fuckin’ sandwich and you drop everything.” Ranko growled, turning back to the window and hugging herself across the chest. “Including me.”

“I…” Akane rocketed to her feet so quickly she almost tripped on the skirt of her yellow sundress. “Are you kidding me right now with this? Are you… actually jealous?! Of him?!”

Ranko sighed, slamming her palm hard into the black aluminum frame around the window. “I’m not an idiot, Akane! I know how he looks at you. I’ve seen it when he comes to pick you up for your little study dates. Don’t think I don’t talk to my sisters, either. They got phones, too. I know he’s been hanging out at the bar more and more lately, right around the time you’re suddenly so anxious to start picking up all these extra shifts at work.”

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

Akane glowered, a guttural roar in her throat. “I can’t believe you with this! Do you really think I would…”

The redhead shook her head. “I don’t know what to think anymore, Akane! I just know what it looks like, from across the mother fucking ocean. What it feels like, when you’re sitting on a plane for half a day with nothing to do but wonder why your person doesn’t wanna be there with you. And what it feels like is that Mr. Suave started circling you like a shark the second my plane left the ground, and now you’re in one hell of a hurry to get back there and leave me out here alone again.”

“You’re NOT alone! The whole band is out here with you! All your friends are looking out for you! And, I mean, you wanna talk about guys hanging all over people?! After I watched you joined at the hip with a half-naked Crash all weekend at the beach?! You two have actually kissed, and I still didn’t say a word about it when you flew off to parts unknown with him! If we’re putting it all on the table, Ranko, which one of us dated a boy for four months in school and didn’t tell the other? Which one of us woke up in some boy’s apartment a few months ago and didn’t tell the other? It sure wasn’t me!” Akane stomped her foot, turning her back on her wife with a loud hmmph.

Wait, she knew about that day? How… fucking Hitomi. Get a drink or two in her, and she’ll give you her damn bank account number if you ask. Damned motormouth.

“That thing with Crash wasn’t my fault! I didn’t know what was in Shin’s stupid cookies! I blacked out at the rehearsal joint, and Crash took me back to his place to sleep it off! I didn’t ask him to do that!” Ranko whirled from the window, leaning her backside on the glass. “Be reasonable!”

“Reasonable?! After you go and make this accusation when I’m about to get on a fucking plane?! Let me just ask you, Ranko: when you were high as a kite that day, did you touch him? Did you kiss him? Did you… more than that with him?!” Akane slammed her suitcase shut, beginning to zip it closed. “Well?! Answer me, Ranko!”

I… I can’t, Ranko thought with a grimace she prayed Akane did not notice. Not for absolute sure. I… don’t remember. But Crash swore I didn’t do nothin’ stupid, and gods, I hope he’s not lying to protect me.

“Of course I didn’t! And it’s different, anyway! I never liked boys, and you know it! You always did! I’m not crazy enough to think that goes away just because you started fucking a girl, Akane! I’ve always known I couldn’t give you everything you wanted. That you were… settling for less.”

“Oh, not this shit again, Ranko!” Akane stomped closer, thrusting the back of her left hand in Ranko’s face, her fingers splayed out. She did not strike her, nor did she intend to.

“You see that ring, Ranko?! I didn’t start fucking a girl, MRS. TENDO! I fucking married one! You know why I did that? It damn sure wasn’t for the money! I married you because I was committed to you, no matter what! I don’t give a shit that you’re a girl. I love you. Not boys. Not girls. I’m a gods-damned Rankosexual. I can’t fucking believe that after all this time, you can’t trust me half as much as you’ve asked me to trust you! Was there anything in that song last night that was the truth?! Or are we really back to all this bullshit now?!”

Ranko gasped. “Akane, I… I just…”

“You know what, Ranko? No. You’ve said what you had to say. Now, you are gonna listen. I have never led Sho on. I never would. Never! And the fact that you think I’d go along with that for a second and betray you… It’s like you don’t know me at all!”

She snatched her bag off the bed, yanking the handle upward hard enough to almost snap it off the suitcase. “I’m gonna call a cab from the lobby and head to the airport. You… don’t need to come with me.”

“But, wait! We… I…” Ranko stammered, reaching for her, but Akane stepped back out of her grasp.

Akane reached for the doorknob, pulling the door leading into the hallway. With one foot in the hall, she hesitated, not turning her eyes back to Ranko as she spoke.

“I love you, Ranko. I do, even though I really don’t like you right this minute. When you get home, I’ll be there waiting for you. I promise. I’ll see you in two weeks. I strongly suggest you use some of that time to think about whether or not you believed me when I promised you forever.”

----------------------------------------

“Folks, this is the captain speaking. We’ve reached our cruising altitude of just about eleven kilometers, and it looks like smooth sailing for the next eight and a half hours to Auckland, where it’ll be a brisk eleven degrees Celsius when we touch down just after midnight. In just a moment, our flight crew will turn off the seat belt sign and you’ll be free to move about the cabin. Our crew will come around shortly with drinks and refreshments. Thank you so much, and enjoy the flight.”

“Hey.” Hitomi sighed, resting her hand on the shoulder of the girl in the window seat. “Talk to us, Ranko. Please?”

The redhead shook her head, still crying into the back of the stuffed unicorn she clutched in her arms. She did her best to use Starlight’s plush body to muffle the sound of her sobbing and avoid disrupting her fellow passengers on the Boeing 767 airliner. She was sitting on her left hip, huddled on her side in the seat with her knees pulled into her chest and her forehead pressed against the window of the plane as the island of Oahu disappeared outside it, giving way to a wide swath of empty ocean reflecting the afternoon sunlight off the waves.

“Shh…” Emi reached around her girlfriend from the aisle seat, rubbing Ranko’s thigh where the skirt of her mint green dress ended. “You’re gonna be alright, honey. This is all gonna blow over. I know it. You’re just stressed and sad. You just miss her. She knows that. She’ll understand.”

Only a handful of words were audible through the fluff of Ranko’s stuffed companion, and through her sniffling tears.

“I screwed up ev… ryth-thing. I just wan… na go ho… home.”