(continuing from above post)*Start playing at appropriate time: you'll know when*It's not necessary, but it's more fun***
** ** **
“This one, this one! I want to play this one next!”
Reina dashed over to another game machine and popped a 100 yen coin in. She immediately took a hold of the game controllers and started to blast away the aliens by furiously pressing the “gun shoot” button. Eri couldn’t help but laugh.
“You know, I still can’t believe the place you’ve always wanted to go to is the arcade,” the turtle giggled.
“What’s wrong with wanting to go to the arcade?” Reina asked, still focused on the game. “I’ve never been here before.”
“There’s nothing wrong with wanting to come here,” the turtle explained. “But you just always seem so ladylike and a real ‘ojou-san’. It’s not something I would’ve expected.”
“Well, I didn’t expect to ever see you wearing a skirt either,” the kitten smirked, eyes glued to the exploding aliens. “But that happened too, didn’t it?”
“Touché,” Eri grinned. And she was awfully glad that it happened. After the little “experiment” session she had with her girlfriend the day before, both of them had gotten a lot comfortable with the idea of seeing each other.
“Yes! I win again!” the ex-yankii exclaimed as the game screen displayed a “You Win!” fanfare. Chains of tickets started to stream out of the machine and the kitten collected all of them, folding them carefully. “This is so much fun. I can’t believe I haven’t been here before!”
“Yeah, me neither,” Eri chuckled, happy to see her girlfriend having fun.
“Eri, you haven’t played anything this entire time,” Reina said. “What do you want to do? Let’s go find something you’re good at!”
“It’s okay, you can keep playing by yourself,” Eri smiled. “I’m happy watching.”
“Come on, don’t be like that,” the kitten groaned, tugging on the turtle’s sleeve. “I don’t want to be the only hyperactive one today. We’ll go find something together! There’s so much to do here!”
With that, the shorter girl pulled her lover all around the arcade, scourging the place for something interesting to do. In a couple of seconds, the girls finally noticed small commotions going on at some of the booths. Reina grinned as she pulled Eri towards one of the crowds and squeezed through the people to get to the middle. There were two boys dancing on a DDR platform, battling each other. The audience was cheering for one or the other, getting pumped up with them and dancing along. The song soon ended and announced the boy on the right side as the winner. The crowd cheered loudly and clapped.
“And that’s my 30th victory of today!” the teenage boy on the right announced. He was wearing a sweater and baggy jeans with a cap on, as though he was a street dancer, but he had a name tag on his shirt. Eri figured that he was probably an employee who battled costumers while offering prizes. “Is there anybody else willing to challenge me for any one of these prizes?”
The boy pointed towards a cart off to the side with rows of stuffed animal stringed together. Reina inhaled as she took in the amount of stuffed animals there were. But for Eri, only one certain doll caught her eye.
“I’ll challenge you!” the short-haired girl said, raising her hand.
“ERI?!” Reina yelled, shocked. “You’re going to dance? Do you know how?”
“It’s worth a try, right?” Eri smiled. Truthfully, she was rather nervous inside as well. She was pretty athletic and speedy for a girl but she had never tried to dance seriously before. However, her desire for that one specific doll topped all other emotions.
“Alright, young lady, come on down!” the dancer invited, eliciting a cheering from the crowd.
As Eri walked up to the DDR platform, the crowd started to whisper amongst themselves, about how the next challenger seemed like a meek little girl who doesn’t know what she’s getting herself into. After all, she was still in her school uniform and looked nothing more than average.
“You can choose the song,” the employee offered. “But the level is obviously going to be expert.”
“Alright,” Eri nodded. She scrolled down a little bit until she found the right song, a happy song that would get herself pumped up enough. She jumped on the middle square to start the battle. A series of drum beats came out and the two challengers started to dance right away. Eri jumped around a bit before shouting towards the crowd, “Koko ni Iruzee!”
A fun ska beat flowed out of the speakers, sending the audience in a frenzy. The steps were fast and almost impossible to follow but both of the dancers managed to catch all of it so far. Reina exhaled sharply in disbelief as she started to grin. Who knew her girlfriend had this kind of dancing skills? Instead of even just focusing on the steps and arrows, she was actually dancing while flipping her hair and moving her arms around this way and that. It wasn’t a game; it was a performance.
The teenage boy glimpsed at his challenger, who was smiling and jumping around. Beads of sweat formed on both of their cheeks. The boy’s lips curved up a little, intrigued by this thin little girl who was actually managing to exert more energy them himself. As he was staring, an error message lit up on his screen, indicating that he missed a step. The crowd all cheered as Eri continued to dance on without any mistakes. That one misstep was to be fatal. Reina smiled for her girlfriend but also raised an eyebrow at the boy, suspicious of how a professional like him managed to make such a rookie mistake.
Eri jumped around like crazy as she couldn’t stop smiling. She had never felt so free like this before! All the happiness that she knew in the world seemed to wash down at her: the joy of meeting Reina, of sharing the same feelings with Reina and of being able to be honest to Reina as well as herself. The song soon came to an end as Eri and the boy both jumped on their final steps. The crowd exploded into a cheer as the screen announced the turtle as the winner. Reina jumped up and down, cheering and smiling.
“Yatta!” Eri exclaimed, hopping up and down.
“Hey, that was a good battle,” the boy said, offering his hand. “You’re a really good dancer… um…”
“Eri,” the turtle grinned, shaking his hand. “It’s Kamei Eri.”
“Kamei Eri-chan,” the boy smiled shyly. “My name is—”
“Excuse me, can you not be so friendly with Eri enough to add –chan to her name?” a cold voice said as someone linked arms with the turtle. Reina was glaring at the boy as Eri looked at her with a confused expression. “You guys just met, didn’t you? That’s kind of rude.”
“I’m sorry, and you are?” the boy said, frowning.
“Oh,” Eri started, smiling nervously, “she’s just my—”
“GIRLFRIEND,” Reina cut in. “Unlike you, who is a complete stranger to Eri.”
“… Oh, so you’re
that kind of girl,” the boy muttered, unimpressed.
“What do you mean
that kind of girl?” the kitten growled, unsatisfied by the boy’s attitude.
“Nothing,” the boy answered, scowling. “Whatever, just pick your prize and leave.”
“Uh… yeah, we will…” Eri mumbled, still a little nervous about the sudden turn of atmosphere. She dragged Reina off the platform and headed towards the prize cart. She picked out the doll she wanted and hugged it to her chest.
“Did you get what you want?” Reina asked, not looking at her girlfriend.
“Uh-huh.”
“Then let’s leave. I don’t want to stay here anymore.”
With that, Reina grabbed Eri’s wrist and started to pull her through the crowd towards the exit. When they were outside, the turtle thought that her girlfriend would let go of her but instead, they continued to walk briskly down the street past the rest of the people.
“Wait, Reina, can you let go now?” Eri huffed, still tired and out of breath from the dancing. “My wrist hurts…”
The petit girl didn’t answer. Instead, she pulled her girlfriend off towards the side behind a building and faced her. The space between the two walls weren’t that sufficient but it was wide enough for the two girls to properly look at each other.
“Will you not shake anybody’s hand like that and tell them your name?” Reina scolded. “Didn’t you ever hear of the saying, ‘don’t talk to strangers’?”
“It was just a greeting kind of thing,” Eri said, raising an eyebrow. “A way of saying it was a good game. Why are you so mad about this kind of thing anyway?”
“Are you kidding me?” Reina scoffed. “He was totally hitting on you! I saw the way he was looking at you while you were dancing.”
“Hitting on
me?” Eri laughed dryly. “That’s a good one, Reina. Guys hit on cute girls like you, not a tomboy like me.”
“Do you not look in the mirror every morning?” Reina groaned. “You’re pretty enough for guys like that to come flirt with you.”
“Why are you getting so worked up all of a sudden?” Eri asked again, still a little surprised by the way Reina was acting, since she was usually calm and poised. “And being all protective too… I thought I was supposed to be the boy between the two of us.”
“Girls get jealous too!” the kitten argued. “I mean… not like I’m jealous or anything… because I’m not that type… yeah.”
“Uh-huh… Whatever you say…” Eri said, smiling a little.
“Well, wouldn’t you feel the same way if a boy was hitting on me?” Reina shot back, her cheeks turning slightly pink.
“I suppose…” Eri admitted. “But I assure you, I’m not interested in anybody else except you. You believe me when I say that, right?”
“Of course I do,” Reina sighed. “And I hope you’ll believe me when I say I only got angry because I love you back.”
“I’ve always believed that,” Eri smiled.
“I’m sorry I blew up on you,” the kitten mumbled. “I guess I kind of overreacted a little back there.”
“That’s okay,” Eri assured. “I was just worried about you getting even angrier. I was hearing a little bit of your dialect coming out, so I thought you would go all yankii on me but I’m glad you didn’t.”
“No, I’m over all that,” Reina denied. “I don’t fight or anything on purpose anymore. The dialect is just habit.”
“I kind of like that habit though,” Eri said. “You were too perfect anyway; it’s good to have a perk that sets you aside from a robot.”
“I am nowhere near perfect, Eri,” Reina laughed. “I might make myself out to be like it, but it’s not completely me… yet.”
“Well, I’m just glad you were angry over something like this and not about what that boy said,” Eri sighed.
“Huh? What did he say?” Reina asked, cocking her head to the side.
“You know… about us being…
that kind of girls,” Eri mumbled, “after you told him you were my girlfriend.”
“Oh, that,” the ex-yankii muttered. “Well, to be honest, I was a little offended by the way he said it but I didn’t mind announcing to the public that I’m your girlfriend. It feels… natural. I’m pretty sure I’ve told you this before but… being with you feels so right that I don’t really want to hide anything anymore. People can think what they want but that’s not going to change me. I love you as you, not as a girl or a boy.”
Reina blushed a little as she looked away to the side, unable to meet eyes with her lover. Eri smiled as her own cheeks blushed a rosy pink, pleased by her girlfriend’s confession of feelings. She then held out the stuffed animal that she had been hugging the entire time.
“Here,” Eri offered, allowing Reina to lift her head again. “Take this.”
“But that’s your prize that you won.”
“I won it for you.”
The kitten’s eyes widened as she slowly accepted the doll and looked at it. After a more careful examination, she finally realized that it was actually a stuffed turtle that was the size of a cushion. Not too big and inconvenient but not small enough so that one can’t cuddle it.
“It’s a Kame, like me,” Eri grinned. “Put it in your room so that whenever you miss me, you can look at it and think of me. Just something to remember me by.”
“… It’s like… a present?”
“I guess so.”
Suddenly, Reina’s face turned bright red as she stared at the cartoony turtle in her hands. She blinked a couple times before she hugged it tightly to her chest and looking up shyly at her lover.
“I… uh… I’ve never received a… a present before…” she mumbled. “This is my first time…”
“You’ve never gotten a gift before?” Eri asked, her eyes widening. “But what about birthdays? Valentine’s day? Christmas?”
“My parents gave me money so I could buy something myself,” the kitten explained. “I’ve never gotten a material present before… Arigatou… Hontou ni arigatou!”
Reina squeezed the turtle into an even tighter hug as she smiled. Her small giggles and red cheeks and bright eyes made her look like a child who had just seen Santa Clause. Eri couldn’t help but chuckle along as she observed her girlfriend’s happy face. When she was like this, it was unbelievable that she was actually an ex-yankii. She could be elegant and poised but also fiery and passionate. She could be a lot of things but most of all, she was just a girl in love.
“Well,” Eri started, grinning. “Do I get a reward for being the first person to give you a present?”
Reina giggled as her girlfriend leaned closer and trapped her against the wall between her arms. The kitten closed her eyes as a warm sensation pressed against her lips, working its way softly and gently. Their tongues danced around each other, fighting for dominance; Eri won this time around, since Reina was feeling way too loopy with the innocent happiness she had been experiencing. Eri began to stroke the smaller girl’s cheek and her neck, drawing out a soft moan. Before they could continue on, Reina pulled away a little bit to breathe.
“Um… since I intruded on you for the past two nights,” she started, not making eye contact, “do you want to come to my house today? You could help me set up the turtle…”
“And maybe see how much you’ve improved?” Eri whispered playfully.Ad w
“See how far we can go tonight?” Reina offered, smiling shyly.
“I’d like that,” Eri smiled. She planted another quick kiss on her cute girlfriend’s lips before taking her hand to head towards a more appropriate location for their previous actions.
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*sigh* It's so hard to write Reina as the less dominant one...
Next up is TakaGaki!
Also, in case you guys haven't noticed, I opened the poll again for something else. Basically, it's just a survey; it doesn't decide anything. But I was just curious about the other couples you guys might like besides TakaGaki, TanaKame, SayuJun so I picked some other couples that I like out of many and decided to do just a little voting thing. Once again, this doesn’t decide anything, it’s just for my own knowledge. So even if I don’t pick the most voted couple, no anger, okie?
and I've noticed that a lot of people here are against GakiKame. I felt that way at first too but then I thought of an amazing storyline so I decided to put it in the poll. But I want to assure you guys that whatever couple I write about, I'll make it work!
Again, the poll is just out of my own curiosity and my own indecisiveness, so please vote!