Hanabi

Epilogue

Shiny brown eyes opened slowly, blinking at the brightness that presented the room with a bit of warmth. When Tomomi adjusted to the light, the blur in front of her took form and she could see the locked window, the white curtains left open and letting her see outside. She recognized the large trunk on the floor next to the wall, a couple of backpacks next to it and some clothes over it. She smiled, and her eyes wandered across the room to see the black cat sleeping over Mami’s recent sketches on the low table, curled into a ball.

Under the painting with the sakura tree on the wall there was a newer one, larger, depicting colorful fireworks in a midnight purple sky, two girls watching them from the street below, a brunette and a blonde. In Tomomi’s opinion that was one of Mami’s best works, and that was saying something. Mami had been painting brighter and happier things since what happened in Mount Kurama, and she could finally finish the old paintings that were previously left half done because she couldn’t handle the emotions in the right way.

While Mami painted, Tomomi spent a lot of time at Grandma Ono’s house, surrounded by cats and talismans. For a charismatic old lady without the gift of sight, her new teacher could be an extremely rough person when it came to her teachings. Tomomi could finally find resemblance between the woman and her granddaughter.

The arms embracing her waist from behind moved and held her closer, and she felt even warmer as her girlfriend’s bare body pressed against hers. She figured Mami had woken up as well, but when she turned to look at her she was still fast asleep. Tomomi smiled.

Mami’s blond mane had vivid blue streaks now, something that she suggested innocently once when Mami got paint in her hair at her studio. Turns out Mami took her suggestions very seriously sometimes. She sometimes underestimated how much Mami liked blue, too. Half of her new clothes - normal clothes as Haruna would say - were blue or at least had something blue on them.

The first time she took Mami into the city, the blonde never let go of her arm. Being around that many people was a new experience, one that Tomomi knew was scary for her, but at the end of that first day Mami was much calmer. Tomomi couldn’t help but laugh when they stopped to finally buy a phone for the blonde, and she had no idea what she wanted because she couldn’t understand half of what the seller was saying.

Now though, that phone that Tomomi chose for her seemed like it was a part of Mami’s body because she would never stay away from it. For Tomomi it was a good thing that instead of sleeping with a knife next to her pillow, Mami now slept with her phone nearby because she played all those silly games before falling into dreamland.

Shopping for clothes in the following times they went into the city was ten times funnier than the phone, if that was possible. In the first shop they entered, every single person stopped to look at the blond girl dressed in masculine traditional clothes. Mami assumed a shade of red that wasn’t very usual for her and hid behind Tomomi most of the time.

When they finally entered a store that looked promising, Mami was more relaxed and had seen enough to kind of know what she wanted, and then Tomomi had tons of fun with the store clerks’ reactions. First of all, they probably weren’t used to a girl speaking the way Mami did. The combination of not using keigo with the deep and serious tone she used to talk to anyone other than Tomomi was probably a bit unsettling to them. Then later on, the clerk who was helping them out completely freaked about the scars on Mami’s arms after the blonde came out of the tiny dressing cubicle with a sleeveless shirt. The real crown though, went to the moment when they were looking over underwear and Mami told Tomomi very audibly that she couldn’t understand “how that bra thing worked” and the clerk was right behind them. Blond girl enters the store dressed like something coming out of an old story book, asks for clothes that are simply “large and blue”, speaks funny and doesn’t know how to wear a bra. Can’t deal with shoelaces either. Tomomi figured those clerks would have stories to tell about that day for a very long time.