Game Changer | Petalz 🌸🍃

Chapter XXII

After a four-hour train ride home, the majority of which Sakura spent dozing off on Kazuha's shoulder, they're back at their apartment in Tokyo. Hana-chan rushes to greet them, meowing loudly. Kazuha scoops her up, showering her with kisses while mumbling apologies for leaving her alone for so long. Then they both disappear into the kitchen.

Sakura stands in the corridor, stunned by how everything feels so perfectly...normal. Her dad isn't waiting for her to tell her, 'I know what you did in Osaka.' Kaname isn't greeting them with a sneer, 'You're just using the poor girl, Sakura. Admit it, you're no better than me'.

Of course, it's ridiculous to think any of that would happen, but then, if someone told her two months ago that she would be kissing Kazuha in Osaka on a high school soccer field where they'd met years ago as kids, she would have found the idea equally, if not more, outrageous. At this point, she assumes anything is possible.

Still, there's no dad, no Kaname; instead, there's Kazuha announcing from the kitchen that they forgot to take out the trash. Chuckling under her breath, Sakura drops her bag and toes off her sneakers.

"We'll take it out on our way to the training," she says as she enters the kitchen and goes to grab a carton of orange juice from the fridge.

Kazuha hums in agreement, setting a bowl with fresh water on the floor for Hana-chan to drink. She observes the cat for a moment with a smile before she looks over to Sakura. "By the way, how are you feeling? You seemed pretty tired on the train. Couldn't sleep?"

"Nah, I slept fine," Sakura replies as she pours the juice into a glass on the counter. It actually surprised her how well she slept, but she guesses it had something to do with how the PJs Kazuha gave her smelled just like her, and that apparently had a calming effect on her. "I guess it's because of how early we had to get up." She takes a sip of the juice, but upon tasting it's off flavor and fizziness, she immediately spits it out into the sink.

"Went bad?" Kazuha winces next to her.

Nodding, Sakura wipes her mouth and pours out the reminder of the juice into the sink.

"Let's go grocery shopping after the training."

"Yeah," Sakura agrees, and then blinks as the realization hits her that they've never gone grocery shopping together before.

Is this who we are now? Girlfriends living together, raising a cat, doing groceries, and so on? She wonders, because that's how this feels.

Kazha stares back at her with her head slanted to the side. "What?"

It seems obvious that the girl isn't going through a similar revelation, and so Sakura just shakes her head. "Nothing."

Kazuha chuckles, then she reaches her hand and, using her thumb, gently wipes the corner of Sakura's lips, as if that's the most natural thing for her to do. As if for her, there's nothing to wonder about, and everything is already clear.

"We should get going if we don't want to be late," she says, smiling softly.

Sakura only nods, too afraid to ask any questions in case all of this is just in her head.

🌸🍃

What if Kazuha told Yunjin? A startling thought occurs to Sakura as they enter the locker room.

She's pretty sure Kazuha told Yunjin about their almost kiss at the bar, so she feels justified in thinking she might have shared with her what happened yesterday as well. The two have become pretty close friends, and those are the kinds of topics that close friends tend to discuss with each other, right?