a/n: this does not take place in an au where the events of finale oath never happened, and is instead about card games and double meanings and pining

listen to kacey musgraves' "slow burn" for the best reading experience

Kumiko lay down with Reina, side-by-side in one of the crunchy futons they used in band camp, and she yearned.

She knew, of course, that it was an overused word, that it conjured images of cherry blossoms and listening to indie music alone in bed, hands outstretched for someone who was never there, but that was all that fit right now. And besides Reina was there, close enough that she could just...just…

Well, there wasn't really anything she could do, having just dumped Shuichi literally ten minutes before and then having crawled back into the futon like nothing had changed, like the warm summer air hadn't sunk into her skin and left her with a misplaced sense of guilt. Logically, intuitively, she knew she hadn't done anything wrong, that Shuichi would find someone better anyway, someone who could actually return his feelings and enjoy his gross, sweaty hands that seemed to stick to her long after she'd let go of them. But she'd given back the hairpin and spouted something about focusing on her future and how he could give it back to her next year, if his feelings were still there, as if she didn't hope desperately that they'd be gone by then. The lie and the passivity that had gotten her to that point crept into her bones and left her unsettled. Reina, sleeping next to her, chest rising and falling, hair drooping onto the pillows, never would have put herself in that situation. She never would have gone along with this charade, of love, of the quintessential high school romance that everyone dreams of.

But Kumiko had never claimed to be like her. Just because she saw through Reina's façade of an ice queen didn't mean she couldn't admire her for it, just a little. Insults seemed to slide off her back, the opinions of others mattering little. This girl carved out her own path with her trumpet in hand like a machete, clawing through the undergrowth, fully expecting to make it through the other side. Kumiko would be lucky to follow along, if she wasn't entranced by the highway everyone else took first.

Silently, stealthily, Kumiko slipped out of bed and tried her best to avoid the creaky floorboards. Midori stirred, but quickly fell back asleep.

The hallways were eerie, this late at night, and Kumiko felt like a trespasser as she approached the third-years' room, where Natsuki and Nozomi were playing cards by the light of their phones while Yuuko and Mizore slept, curled tight in their futons. Natsuki looked up, hair loose from its ponytail for once, and waved her over.

"Hey, you're up too?"

"Uh, y-yeah." Kumiko shakily approached the two of them.

"We're just about done with this round if you want us to deal ya in. You can take the president's spot, she was out like a light as soon as we started." Natsuki looked down, fondly, at Yuuko's sleeping form. Kumiko's heart jumped and twisted in one quick motion.

"Thanks." Kumiko sat down, pulling her knees to her chest.

"It's been a while, euphonium girl," Nozomi said, shuffling the cards with nimble fingers. "How's it been?"

"Oh, it's been...good, I guess? Stressful, y'know, with the competitions and everything, but, ah, I guess you're already going through that too." Kumiko tugged at a loose thread in the carpeting. Nozomi flicked a card in her direction, its glossy surface reflected in the phone lights. "What're we playing?"

"BS."

"Okay." The cards piled up, quick, and Kumiko eventually found herself with a hand nearly too big to hold. Nozomi started putting cards down with a schlap.

"It's a good thing ya got here," Natsuki said. Schlap. "It's hard to play this game with two people."

"I couldn't sleep." Schlap.

"Something bothering ya?" Schlap. Mizore stirred a little, making a tiny little murmuring noise. Nozomi reached out for her. Kumiko almost missed her turn.

"Nothing too important." A belated schlap.

"You look worried, though." Nozomi was only half invested in the conversation, though, still focused on Mizore. Kumiko felt that twisting sensation again. "Is it the competitions?"

"Yeah. Sure." It was easier saying that than it was to say, oh, sure, Nozomi-senpai whose problems I got dropped in the middle of last year, I'll tell you all about my fake boyfriend and our fake relationship that he thought was real and how I hit him with an umbrella instead of kissing him and how now I can't bear to be in the same room with my best friend because I'm just too in love with her to handle it.

Though, considering how softly - how tenderly Nozomi was gently shaking Mizore awake from her nightmare, Kumiko suspected she knew a thing or two about these feelings.

"Bullshit."

"Sorry?" Kumiko was shaken from her thoughts by Natsuki's quick declaration. She pointed to the cards.

"That's not a five. I have all of the fives." Natsuki waggled her hand for emphasis. "Plus your poker face is kinda terrible."

"Oh. Yeah. You got me." Kumiko snapped her fingers, the universal darnit signal, or she tried to, but her thumb slipped and she didn't make a noise at all. She took the card pile, added it to her hand.

"I won't press you on it," Nozomi continued, though by saying it, Kumiko thought to herself, she was doing just that. Mizore had fallen back asleep, whatever nightmare she was experiencing apparently dissipated with Nozomi's presence. Kumiko tried not to be jealous.

She tried not to be a lot of things.

"You're stressed, yeah? Happens to the best of us." Natsuki set her card down with a slightly more decisive schlap than the statement called for.

"Bullshit," Kumiko cut in, quickly. Natsuki clicked her tongue and reluctantly took the handful of cards stacked on top of each other.

"Am I really that obvious? Guess it takes one to know one…"

"Y-yep." Kumiko felt a sigh bubble up in her lungs, let it go, wished that someone would win the game so that this series of double entendres might end a little sooner.

"Two queens." Nozomi smiled a little. Kumiko and Natsuki both looked at each other, said nothing. "I win!"

"Hrm?" Mizore decided to take that moment to lift her head like a bear coming out of hibernation, and in turn Yuuko grunted awake.

"Good morning, you two." Natsuki tugged at one of Yuuko's ribbon flaps. "I really don't get why ya sleep with these on. It's kind of a hazard, isn't it?"

"I'm fine," Yuuko hissed, trying to slink back under her blanket. "What's Oumae doing here?"

"Playing cards? Wanna join?"

"I'd rather get some precious sleep, thank you." Yuuko flopped over, curling herself up again.

"So much for that."

"I think I'll go back to bed, actually," Nozomi said. "It is late, isn't it? We need to practice tomorrow." She glanced at her watch. "Or today, if we're getting technical."

"Fine by me. I'll just play some two-person game with Kumiko here." Natsuki jabbed a casual thumb in her direction. "'Night, Nozomi-chan."

"Goodnight, Natsuki-chan." Nozomi snuggled back into her futon, holding Mizore's hand as she drifted away into dreamland. Natsuki stood up. Kumiko stared at her, a little confused.

"It looks like ya need some fresh air. C'mon." Natsuki beckoned her out the door, and Kumiko had no choice, really, but to follow. "Alright, out with it. What's wrong?"

"I broke up with Shui- Tsukamoto-kun."

"Good riddance." Natsuki kept a few steps forward, walking with a slouch in her back. Kumiko couldn't help but cast a wayward glance at her room as she passed it. "And ya feel bad about it, right?"

"I mean, yeah. Kinda. More than that it's just…" Kumiko trailed off. Usually, she'd only admit this stuff to herself, maybe to a cactus if she needed to process it out loud. Saying it to another person - especially another person who wasn't Reina - felt strange. "Reina, uh, she t-thinks that...it was real. And I don't know how to tell her that I didn't really feel anything at all for Shuichi without…"

"Without telling her that ya like her?" Natsuki supplied. Kumiko felt her cheeks go hot. "It's okay. I won't tell."

"I c-can't...I texted him on Daikichi, on our place while Reina was playing a song, b-because he felt bad for trying to kiss me since I hit him with an umbrella-"

"You're gonna have to tell me that story eventually, y'know."

"-and it was so bright, Natsuki. It hurt my eyes. I c-couldn't see anything else." Kumiko didn't realize she was gripping the hems of her pajama sleeves until one of them tore, just a bit. "Y'know, usually I think it's annoying when adults tell us we're on our phones too much, but I understood right then. I shouldn't have done that, a-and now Reina probably won't ever know that she's more important than Shuichi could ever be, t-to me. Even though he's been my friend since we were like four and I've only really known Reina for like a year, it feels longer. It feels like I've known her all my life."

"Yeah, hate to tell ya this, but that's love." Natsuki tipped her head back and sighed. She looked old, right then, infinitely older than she ought to be. Kumiko wondered what she'd seen.

"I know."

"Then I don't think I need to tell ya what you're supposed to do here." Natsuki pushed her, gently, not enough to really move her, in the direction of the door. Kumiko looked back, sighed long and slow. "I ought to get some sleep too. It's my last year here, y'know. Might as well make the most of practice tomorrow."

"T-thank you." Kumiko resisted the urge to wrap her friend in a hug, afraid that if she did, she'd start to cry. As it was, she just waved and went back into the room, where she tried to crawl back into her futon.

"It's not hard to fake sleep," Reina said, eyes still closed. Kumiko froze.

"H-how much did you hear?"

"I didn't hear anything. I just know you're awake." Reina didn't look awake, and it unnerved Kumiko a little bit. This felt too intimate, wrong somehow. "Something's bothering you."

"Everyone keeps saying that. Am I that obvious?" Kumiko chuckled dryly to herself, looking up at the ceiling fan spinning lazily about.

"To the people looking."

"There you go again, Reina, being cryptic like that. Who isn't looking?"

"Tsukamoto."

"Right." Kumiko winced. "I, uh, I dumped him."

"When?"

"Like an hour ago."

"Really?" Reina flipped over to face her, then, chin cupped in her hand. Kumiko had a moment of wondering if this had simply become gossip to her, if she was waiting for her to move on to some other gentleman suitor. The thought made Kumiko want to throw up.

"It just, uh, it didn't feel right." This was, technically, the truth.

"It's a good thing you ended it, then." Was it her imagination, or was Reina inching just a little closer? Kumiko's pulse sped up.

"Yeah."

"I've missed you." The plainness of the statement, the three short words it took, were nearly too much for Kumiko to bear. It'd hardly take anything for her to tell Reina how she felt, right here, now, hopped up on the adrenaline of a card game and a ceremonial dumping of a fake boyfriend, but something stopped her. What it was, she didn't completely know - fear, maybe, of the unknown, of misread signals and Reina inching away and saying that no, she didn't like her like that, didn't you know that female friends do this sort of thing all the time, Kumiko?

That would be too much for her to bear, more than any vague and likely sleep-addled sentence.

"Y-yeah, you too, Reina. I mean, I've missed you too." Kumiko pulled her knees close to her chest, as tight into a little ball as she could go. Midori could probably lay her entire body across the bottom part of Kumiko's futon, right then, if she wasn't already fast asleep on the other side of the room. Kumiko wondered who decided to put all of them together like this - Yuuko, probably, currently leaning against Natsuki as they waited for college.

"So you'll be alright, then?" Reina reached out and let her hand rest on Kumiko's cheek, not really doing anything but letting it just stay there. Kumiko wanted to cry.

"I think so, yeah."

And in some part of her heart she sensed that it was true, too.

a/n: stay safe everyone