The music booming from below the hillside carried scattered memories from Christina’s teens. Both of them, and all mixed together.

First she couldn’t understand why she’d mix up memories from more than thirty years apart, but then as the remembered just how ancient some of the music was, things fell in place. There were songs from a time before the idea of a life with fashion ever entered her mind, and most of them she shared with Ulf, even though she hadn’t known about him at that time. That came later, as did her reintroduction to old, and usually pretty awful, music.

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Still, something nagged at her mind, and it wasn’t until an especially atrocious melody reached her that she remembered how the last weeks of the first trimester during that awful year brought smiles and grins to them all. It hadn’t been Ulf’s doing, but rather Noriko’s and the strange bunch of visitors’ who stayed with them that summer.

Noriko, I owe you an apology, and more than a little gratitude. Christina ended that thought as she turned on her heels and started walking in search of her friend. You were the best rival I could ever have wished for.

Less than a minute she found Noriko chatting with Kyoko, and Christina felt a wide grin splitting her face open. “Noriko, Ko-chan, do you remember...”