Hello, H0shizora here! I don't really know what to say, but I'd like to mention that this is my first fanfiction, so some constructive criticism for this story would be much appreciated! I actually tried to do a one-shot funny story, but it didn't work out well. The inspiration for this story actually came when I thought about why Ruby cut her hair. Apparently, like Dia, Ruby used to have long hair, and correct me if I'm wrong, but I think Kurosawas weren't supposed to cut their hair or something. (Again, correct me if this piece of info is wrong, because I can't remember where I saw this info)

Edit (9/30/18): Heyo, everybody! I came back to edit this and fix up any errors I had spotted, so hopefully this is easier to read now. A few people have been requesting for Dia's POV, so I'll write and upload that as soon as I can. Unfortunately, I have a few approaching exams right now, so I don't have a lot of time to write; thus why Dia's POV may take a bit of time to finish.

The Love Live series is one of my favourite Anime series, and my best girls are Ruby and Hanamaru, so I decided to focus this story on Ruby.

Warning: OOCness, cringe, first fanfiction

Disclaimer: I do not own the Love Live! Series. If I did, Hanamaru would be the main character instead of Chika

Inferior.

For as long as she could remember, Kurosawa Ruby was always the second fiddle; The background character; The second choice.

It couldn't be helped that her sister, Dia, had been born first. No, that was just Mother Nature doing its job.

But even as much as Ruby loved Dia, she couldn't supress that tiny, spark of jealousy that was always there, no matter how hard Ruby tried to push it away. It was always at the back of her mind, reminding her of her inferiority. It had all started when she was five. She was an innocent, naïve, child. She didn't understand why her parents paid more attention to Dia. Was she doing something wrong? Did her parents hate her? She tried her best to copy Dia; But no matter how hard she tried, Ruby couldn't replicate Dia's grace and talent.

Ruby was clumsy, timid, fearful, shy...

Everything a Kurosawa shouldn't be.

On the other hand, Dia was graceful, refined, mature, polite.

To Ruby, Dia was the epitome of perfect.

And as vehemently as Ruby denied it, a small part of her wanted Dia to fail.

Wanted Dia to, perhaps, stumble in her traditional dance.

But it never happened.

And so, the first seed of envy was sowed

At the tender age of 6, the seed began to sprout.

Staring at her reflection in the mirror, Ruby noted all her imperfections and unconsciously compared herself to Dia.

Ruby's skin was blemished and dry. Her palms were scarred, scalded from when she accidentally spilt boiling tea on herself.

Ruby's hair was unruly, unkempt and tangled, full of knots.

Her eyes was the only thing she remotely liked about herself.

They were a beautiful shade of green, much like Dia's.

Frankly, Ruby thought those eyes were wasted on her.

Ruby ran her hair through her cherry red hair absent mindedly.

How she got that colour of hair, Ruby would never know.

None of her close relatives had red hair. No, their hair was black or dark brown. Why was she the odd one out?

Dia was skilled in playing the Yamatogoto and Kitsuke. Ruby was not.

So, Ruby decided to, for the first time in her life, stray from her sister's path.

She refused to be Dia's shadow any longer. She refused to be viewed as 'useless'. It was a momentary spark of courage, a spur-of-the-moment decision. One that she would not regret.

And that was how Ruby learned about school idols.

That was how Ruby learned about μ's.

She was overjoyed. Perhaps she could be a school idol, she thought. Perhaps she could, for once, grab the attention of her parents. She spent hours fantasizing about it. But even then, Ruby knew that her dream would never come true. She was too clumsy. Too shy. But still, a girl could dream.

Imagine her disappointment when Ruby realized her sister held the same interest.

It had happened when Dia had caught Ruby reading a school idol magazine when she was supposed to be doing her homework.

Honestly, Ruby was torn.

After said incident, Dia begun to spend more time with Ruby. They would dress up as μ's, and pretend to dance along with the music as if they were school idols. Ruby was overjoyed at the amount of attention Dia was giving her. In one week, it was more than what little attention Ruby's parents had given her in her whole 7 years of life.

At the same time, Ruby thought she had finally escaped from her cage; her sister's shadow. But no, the darkness had teased her with a taste of hope, light; only to let her be engulfed by darkness yet again, leaving Ruby broken down.

Ruby was never good around people of the opposite gender. In fact, apart from her father, she had never once interacted with another male. Once, when a distant cousin of hers was invited over for a family gathering, her parents had encouraged- no, forced her to talk to him. She was a stuttering, stammering, bumbling mess. She could barely even manage a simple 'hello'. When Ruby attempted to bow, she had fallen on her face because she leaned too far forward. Tears threatened to leak from her eyes as she struggled to her feet. Her hair was disheveled from the fall, and her kimono was wrinkled. Her knees were bruised and she desperately wanted to flee from the site of incident. She could feel the disapproving glares her family members were giving her burning into her scalp. Her parents were probably embarrassed by this failure of a girl that they had raised.

'What a failure'

'Her actions do not befit one of the Kurosawa family'

'Her parents' hard work must be wasted on her'

'A disgrace'

They had given their two cents on Ruby, giving snide remarks and sneering at her, thinking that she could not hear.

Perhaps it wasn't as bad as Ruby had thought. She was, after all, someone who easily cried and someone who felt easily hurt.

Oh, how she wanted to protest. Protest that in the first place, her family had not paid attention to her; had not cared about her. It wasn't her fault!

Yes, keep telling yourself that, a part of her sneered.

Who was she kidding?

Her failures was solely hers; no one else's.

She couldn't blame it on someone else.

Quietly excusing herself from the main room, Ruby ran to her room, breaking down once she collapsed on her bed, crying her heart out.

At that moment, Ruby had never been more grateful for Dia. For the fact that she, too had left the main room, solely to comfort her. To give her a shoulder to lean on; to cry on.

When Ruby was 11, only did she finally understand Dia's suffering.

It was the day before the start of middle school. Ruby, no matter how hard she tried, no matter how much she tossed and turned, she could not sleep.

Shifting off her bed, hugging her blanket, Ruby made her way to Dia's room, intending to seek solace in her company.

Discreetly sliding open the wooden door to Dia's room, Ruby's eyes widened in shock.

Before her, Dia was sprawled out on her bed, bags visible under her eyes. Her flower arrangement equipment was messily littered on the ground.

Quietly creeping in, Ruby knelt down, picking up a rose which stem was snapped. Upon closer inspection, the stem had been snapped, likely in frustration. Ruby's gaze swept across the room, her eyes landing on a badly written kanji. Calligraphy, it seemed like. She recognised her sister's handwriting. She shuffled over to the piece of paper said kanji was written on. The kanji for 'grief', Ruby noted. It looked like the writer had held the brush too tightly; Pressed it down onto the piece of paper too hard. In that one piece of paper, it had conveyed how frustrated, sad and lonely the writer, or in this case, Dia felt. Swivelling her head to face Dia, Ruby saw the weight on Dia's shoulders. The burden she was carrying.

And in her whole life, Ruby had never felt so...

Stupid

Dia wasn't born perfect.

Nobody was.

But Dia, whenever she had the chance, practiced.

Strived for perfection.

All so she could meet her parent's expectation.

And Ruby realized.

Dia wasn't born perfect. But she was born talented.

Talented enough to make her parents proud.

But she had went the extra mile.

For what?

And Ruby realized, for her.

Dia worked extra hard to cover for Ruby, when she didn't need to. Dia could've just let Ruby be.

If Dia hadn't been so 'perfect', their parents would've pushed the responsibility onto Ruby.

And Dia still found time to play with her.

Ruby felt terrible.

Perhaps a part of her knew; understood the pain Dia was going through.

But she didn't listen to that part of her. No, she let envy and jealousy render her unable to think properly; render her unable to make an informed choice.

Stepping out of Dia's room, Ruby dragged her feet back to her room.

And under the moonlight shining through the window, blade met red hair, as the sound of hair being cut resounded throughout the room.

And as cherry red hair drifted onto the ground, Ruby understood.

Ruby was Ruby.

And Dia was Dia.

They were their own individual, special person.

And no longer would Ruby delude herself into thinking she was a mere shadow of Dia.

And at that moment, nothing else mattered more.

UGGHHHH, finally done! This took me so long to write! I'm pretty happy with how it turned out, actually. I thought it would be REALLY bad. There are only 1732 words in this, so I hope it isn't too short. After proofreading this story, I realized that there are a few things that may not be clear.

1) The blade mentioned at the last part of the story is actually a pair of scissors

2) Yes, technically, it would be weird for Ruby to cut her own hair, especially at night. But because she has had lessons on a things like sewing, cutting fabric, flower arrangement (Cutting the stalk of the flower) I like to think that she knows how to cut her own hair.

3) Ruby actually understood that Dia was doing everything for her; she just refused to accept it. (Until the end of the story)

4) The part where Ruby gives up flower arrangement, traditional dance, etc. and cutting her hair is actually canon.

5) Basically, in this story, Ruby kept comparing herself to Dia, so Ruby didn't actually do that badly, just that comparatively, she DID do worse than Dia.

6) In this story, Ruby isn't confident and all that because she keeps beating herself up.

Anyways, thank you for taking the time to read this story! Please, offer some constructive criticism for this story so I can improve for the next one! And I'm not sure if it'll be a good idea, but I'm thinking of writing a kind of sequel, where it takes place at the same time as this story does, except in Dia's POV.

Whaddya think? Good idea or not?

Again, thank you for reading this story!

-H0shizora