“Her heroes taught her how to make her stand. An angel came and put a ring on her left hand. They turned the page, put her back on stage, and now, she's winning…”

Yui’s quiet singing slipped back into humming as she punched a box knife through a stubborn piece of packing tape and tore open the cardboard box on her bed. “I swear, babe, next time you move, if you don't label the damned boxes… Anyway, this one’s bathroom stuff.”

Sakura flitted out of the kitchen in Yui and Meii’s apartment - now hers as well - with a wide grin. “Oh, thank the gods. I love you, Yui, but your shampoo fucking sucks.” She ran her fingers through her greasy hair, which had been split into two messy pigtails with a pair of loose yellow elastics. Her heather gray tee shirt was drenched with sweat after hours of unloading and unpacking her belongings from the truck she’d rented in Fukuoka the day before.

“Yeah, well, I guess I'm just not as prissy as you are about my hair,” Yui said with a playful smile, tossing her a green plastic bottle that had fallen from the container. “I don't need to maintain curls or nothin’, so as long as it doesn't fall out or get long enough to end up in people's drinks, fuck it.”

Sakura giggled, turning and leaning her back against her girlfriend. “Well, what can I say? One of us has to be the diva if the other one's gonna be butch, and I suppose I'm gonna have to take one for the team and be the cute one in this relationship. It's hard work, but somebody's gotta do it.”

“Yeah, whatever, princess. Get off me! You're all gross.” Yui swatted her playfully on the backside. “Come snuggle me after you're all dolled up.”

Sakura laughed, turning and wrapping her arms around Yui’s neck. “I will cuddle you whenever I damn well please, lover girl. And careful with all the dolling up talk. We do still have that maid outfit from your birthday, you know.”

“Keep dreaming, girlfriend.” Yui gave an amused sneer in her partner’s direction. “Even if I wanted to - and I most definitely do not - it’s too much of a pain to move around in all that when we're busy.” She thrust the box from the bed into Sakura’s hands. “Go on. Put all your lotions and potions away. I swear, I don't have that many bottles behind the fuckin’ bar.”

Sakura took the box, heading into the bathroom and beginning to stock the cabinet under the sink. “Sheesh! Some of this shit looks like it's been under here for a decade! I don't think they even make this brand anymore! Can we get rid of it?”

“Don't look at me,” Yui called back from the bedroom as she grabbed another box from the pile and set about cutting the tape. “All that crap is Mei’s.”

Yui tore the box open after cutting the tape, dumping its contents out onto the unmade bed once she saw that it was full of clothing. She picked up a sweater dress with long sleeves, clicking her tongue. “You little shit! You said you didn't have my orange dress!”

“Sorry,” Sakura called back over the clanking of aluminum bottles being tossed haphazardly into the bathroom cabinet. “I found it behind the bed when I was packing up.”

“Yeah, but I thought you said you looked for it!” Yui shook her head, grabbing a hanger from the couple's open closet to put the dress on.

Sakura laughed, making her way back into the bedroom. “I did! Look, it wouldn't have gotten lost in the first place if you'd kept better track of your clothes. It's not my fault you were in such a hurry for me to get you out of them!”

Yui purred, stealing a kiss as her girlfriend walked past. “Oh, yes it is, and you know it, girl.”

“Mm. Guilty as charged,” the black-haired woman replied. “And absolutely no regrets.” She licked her lips suggestively. “None whatsoever.”

Yui chuckled. “Well, unless you want those jeans to go missing the same way my dress did, you'd better focus. Keep sticking that tongue out at me, and I'm gonna find something more interesting for you to do with it.”

“Not until we've both had a shower,” Sakura replied in an almost chastising tone of voice. “Maybe during us both having a shower, I suppose.”

“I’m never going to sleep again, am I?”

Yui looked up as her sister popped through the front door of their fourth-floor apartment, carrying one of the boxes from the truck. “Oh, you'll be fine, blockhead.” She blushed, nudging her girlfriend on the shoulder as Sakura hung a yellow business suit on a hanger. “If she gets too loud, I'll find something to stick in her mouth, don't worry.”

“Listen here, you,” Sakura said, depositing the hanger on the closet rod before turning back to Yui. “I am definitely not the loud one in this relationship. You're over here making me sound like I'm Ranko.”

“Besides,” Yui said with a matter-of-fact smirk. “Last time Seiichi was over, I seem to remember having to crash at Mama’s place because I thought your headboard was gonna end up coming through the wall into the fucking living room. So, don't play little miss innocent with me, Mei.”

Mei blushed furiously. “Look, I don't know what to say. I’d apologize, but I wouldn't mean it. I’m telling you, sis, you don't know what you're missing on the whole boys front.”

“I am missing not a damn thing,” Yui said, leaning on Sakura’s shoulder with a devious grin painted across her lips. “Everything a boy can do, a girl can do with the proper equipment, and then I can go back to not worrying about them leaving the seat up. All the fun of a boy, none of the gross bits.”

Mei shrugged. “I mean, doesn't work so good if you want kids, though.”

“Like I said,” Yui replied flatly. “None of the gross bits. Izzi and Aya can do the whole mommy dearest thing; it's more their speed. I'll be an awesome aunt, love my nieces and nephews, and when I've had my fill of the little shits, they go back to being somebody else's problem. That’s what we call a win-win, if you ask me. No, I'm perfectly happy with things just the way they are.”

As she spoke, she smiled dreamily at Sakura. It still felt like a miracle that she was back in Yui’s life after so long away. Her presence made everything easier. The good stuff felt better and the bad stuff hurt less. Just like that, she hadn't felt the overwhelming urge to drink anymore, though she had yet to permit herself anything more than a taste test of a cocktail since Ranko’s high school graduation nearly two months ago. She didn't know how she would have made it through the ordeal with her mother’s hospitalization without Sakura having showed up when she had, but she imagined she would have spent most of the last few weeks at the bottom of a bottle.

“Aww,” Mei said, pulling a stuffed pink Pac-Man ghost out of a box. “This little guy just has to live out on top of the arcade machine.” Receiving a nod of assent from Sakura, she headed out to the living room to place it.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

“Can I ask you a question, Sake?” Yui closed the distance to her girlfriend again, wrapping her arms around the slender woman’s waist from behind as she stuck another plastic clothes hanger through the neck hole of a cream-colored satin blouse.

“Anything, hot stuff.” As she spoke, Sakura teasingly wiggled her backside against the front of Yui’s jeans while Mei was otherwise occupied.

Yui leaned over her shoulder, kissing her softly on the cheek. “Do you have any idea at all how much I love you, and how grateful I am to have you back?”

Blushing, Sakura turned in Yui's arms, resting her elbows on Yui’s shoulders and crossing her wrists behind the blonde’s head. “If I had to guess, I would say about as much as I love you, and about as grateful as I am that you took me back.”

It was Yui’s turn to blush as Sakura leaned in for another kiss, stepping forward and backing the lithe bartender up against the tall dresser on their shared bedroom’s east wall without breaking contact with her lips.

“I'd tell you two to get a room, but I guess you already did,” Mei said, giggling as she set another box down on the bed. “You're gonna have a hell of a time explaining to the rental place that you couldn't get the truck returned in time because you couldn't keep your hands off each other long enough to unload it.”

“Are you kidding?” Sakura giggled as she broke the kiss, still pinning Yui’s body against the dresser. “Guys are weird like that when it comes to couples like us. Hell, he would probably waive the late fee if he got to watch me kiss her.”

Mei nodded. “I keep telling Ranko it's only a matter of time before somebody catches her making eyes at Akane, and in her line of work, she’d be in deep shit.”

Yui shrugged. “Kumiko has a freakin’ video tape of them face-fucking on the main stage at Steam. If it was gonna get her, it would've gotten her by now. Honestly, I think pretty much everybody knows about her and Akane at this point. And, if you ask me, Ranko and Akane are the last two people alive who don't know that everybody knows about them. As for me…” She rubbed her right wrist pensively through the sleeve of her jewel tone green sweater. “I'm sick to fucking death of being ashamed of who I love.”

Sakura released her, taking a box knife to the next cardboard carton that awaited her on the bed. “This one's kitchen stuff! I swear, it's like Christmas. Every box you open is a surprise when you find out what's in it.” She scooped the box into her arms, giggling as she slid past Mei and headed for the apartment’s narrow food prep area. Mei trailed behind her, leaving Yui in the bedroom alone.

Yui scooped up the box knife, flicking the lever on the side to expose the blade again. She didn't feel great about having a knife in her hand so soon after thinking about the scars on her arms, but she physically shook it out of her mind with a thrash of her head. I don't need to think about that shit anymore. I'm in a much better place now. I'm wanted, I have worth, and I have people who care about me.

Instead, she slashed through the strip of silver duct tape holding the smallish box near her headboard closed. She must have run out of the clear stuff, Yui thought as she tore through the few centimeters of tape that had not been thoroughly cut, pulling the box flaps open. More clothes. I swear, girl, you're as bad as Izzi.

She dumped the box out onto the bed, but as she turned to the closet for a handful of empty hangers, she heard something small clatter to the floor. Yui turned, searching for whatever had fallen and not finding it. Okay, I may be crazy, but I know I'm not that crazy. Something definitely fell. Maybe it ended up under the bed?

Yui dropped to her hands and knees, lifting the black dust ruffle around her queen-sized bedframe. Just a few centimeters behind it, butted up against a small plastic container where Yui kept… things she didn't want Mei to find, there was a tiny wooden cube. It couldn't have been more than three or four centimeters to a side, and it was constructed of a deep, well-lacquered cherry, not unlike the tabletops at the Phoenix. She retrieved it, supporting her weight on the mattress as she clamored back to her feet.

It's got hinges. It's a… jewelry box? I swear, Sakura, you've got more jewelry than any four girls need.

Yui popped it open, but she didn't recognize the diamond ring in the box. Its gold band was inlaid with several tiny ruby chips, surrounding a princess-cut diamond solitaire. It was far too muted for Sakura’s tastes, though; Yui knew her girlfriend had never met a piece of costume jewelry too gaudy for her.

But if it's not hers…

Yui gasped.

No… no way. She didn't. She wouldn't. No fucking way.

She closed the box with a loud snap, setting it on the dresser and pulling her hand back as if it had burned her skin. Don't let it get in your head, Yui. It's probably something one of her exes gave her, and that's why she never wears it.

She picked up an ivory blazer, threading the hook of a green plastic hanger through the little satin loop at the back of the neck and placing it on the rod on Sakura's side of the closet. As she returned to the bed with another empty hanger in hand, she couldn't help but glance up at the little box again.

Before she left, she was hinting like she… Yui shook her head. Don't be stupid, Yui. She's not the settling down type. Never has been. Hell, neither am I. At least, I never have been…

Still, no matter how much she tried to convince herself to ignore it, the little wooden box screamed for her attention every time she passed it with another article of clothing. After four such passes, she sighed, picking the box up and opening it again.

You're just gonna torment me until I prove to myself that you're not… that, aren’t you? Fuck it. Let's just go ask her and get this shit over with. Snapping the box closed and cupping it in her hand, Yui made her way to the kitchen.

Sakura was in the room alone, stacking a set of yellow earthenware dinner plates in the cabinet. “I swear, it's like a fucking dorm room in here. Did you girls have any two kitchen items that matched?”

“Sake, I…” Yui's face was aflame. “Sorry, I shouldn't. It's dumb. Nevermind.” She turned to walk back into the bedroom. Stupid Yui. Stupid.

Sakura followed her girlfriend, tossing a pale blue dish towel that had been used as packing material for the plates over the back of a chair at the dining room table as she passed it. “Hey. That was weird. What's…”

Her voice, and her breath, stopped as her eyes fell on the little box in Yui's hand. “Shit.” Sakura’s invective fell from her lips after nearly five seconds of silence which Yui was relatively certain had lasted closer to fifteen years.

“It's cool. I get it. You don't wanna talk about it. We’ve all got pasts.” Yui stepped forward, dropping the box in Sakura’s palm. And now you freaked her out. Nice going, dumbass. “S… sorry.”

Sakura smiled softly, her cheeks reddening. “It… wasn't about my past. More… future?”

Yui blinked, freezing mid-step on her way back to the bed to hang another dress. “...What?” Her voice was a full octave higher in pitch than usual.

Sakura nodded, stepping closer. “Before I left for Fukuoka, I told you I wanted to be with you forever. Did you think I wasn't being serious?”

“But…” Yui turned, her face the color of the little ruby chips surrounding the diamond in her girlfriend's hand. “You…”

“But then everything happened, and I turned into an idiot.” Sakura sighed wistfully. “And I went down south for some stupid job instead of focusing on what I sh…”

“Yes.”

Sakura blinked as she was interrupted. “Huh?”

Yui stalked toward her black-haired partner as fast as her bare feet would carry her, a flame of intensity in her green eyes. “Did I stutter? I fucking said yes.” She reached out, grabbing Sakura's face by the cheeks and pulling her into a furious kiss.

The women separated after nearly a minute of being joined at the lips. Sakura was halfway through sliding the ring onto Yui’s left hand when she heard a loud thump behind her. Both women looked up to see a cardboard box laying on its side, spilling a mound of towels onto the floor.

Standing just behind it, Mei’s hands were clasped to her cheeks in shock.