บท 128: The Circle of Trust
Akane sighed, looking over the wrecked state of the bedroom she shared with Ranko. Her girlfriend had really made a mess in her temper tantrum when she left.
"Stupid girl! How immature could she be?! Hiding money, throwing stuff around like that. She's being such a jerk! What's gotten into her lately, honestly?!"
Akane stalked into the living room, snatching up the heart-shaped glass photo frame from where she left it on the couch and looking into the smiling eyes of her girlfriend and herself with a sad sigh. All she wanted was for them to work as a team, love and trust each other. How was that too much to ask of an adult? Sure, Ranko was still a high schooler, but that was a question of academics, not maturity. She was certainly managing responsibility in every other way, so why wouldn't she just communicate? She stalked back into the bedroom and returned the frame to its rightful place on the dresser.
She walked to the far wall, picking up Ranko's underwear drawer from where it lay on the floor. A small triangular dent had been pressed into the drywall where it made contact. That'll ding the security deposit. Damn it, Ranko! The damage fell within the rectangle outlined by the pinholes from the Rise poster, so if she re-hung it, at least it would be hidden for the time being. Kasumi had become quite the home repair expert thanks to the damage Akane and Ranma had constantly inflicted to her family home, and Akane made a mental note to call her and ask for advice on how to patch the crater when she had a moment.
She picked up a handful of Ranko's panties, carrying them and the drawer to the bed. Setting the empty drawer on the unmade bed, she began gently folding the small satiny garments and stacking them four high in the drawer. If someone told me a year ago that there would come a day that I would be standing in my college apartment going through Ranma's panties, she thought to herself with a frustrated and half-amused smirk. Heading back to the corner, she scooped up the remaining hipsters from the floor and began folding those as well.
Akane carried the full drawer over to the dresser, sliding it into its place before turning to her bed. It hadn't been made in over a week, and Akane had assumed it had been because Ranko was too busy or too tired to do such things if they weren't strictly necessary. It hadn't occurred to her until just now that perhaps her girlfriend had just… given up.
She knew that keeping their secret had been wearing on Ranko somewhat, but she saw no reason for her to be so checked out of their relationship. She still smiled when Akane paid her attention, most of the time. The sex was still great, when they found time to have it. But there was definitely a spark in her eyes, and a determination regarding things like keeping house, that had been missing of late. Akane missed it, and not just because Ranko's cooking beat the hell out of the microwave dinners she'd been subsisting on as they constituted the extent of her culinary skills.
Akane righted the upside-down drawer on the bed, picking up Ranko's pink bra. It made her blush every time Akane mentioned it, but she knew it was Ranko's favorite. She wore it almost every time if she knew Akane had plans for her that evening. Akane smiled wistfully, remembering better nights than the one she found herself having, and missing them. Whatever was really going on with Ranko to cause this angry and almost vindictive behavior, she needed to get to the bottom of it and fix it, even if that meant forcing her to drop some classes or something. Akane had tasted what life with a happy, healthy Ranko could look like, and she was desperate to have it back.
She folded the pink bra in half, tucking one of the cups inside the other and placing it gently in the drawer before reaching for the white one with the black bow at the base of the cleavage that dangled off the edge of the bed. She folded that one as well, and then the black one with the white bow that had been its inverse twin. She reached for the yellow one, which had flown further across the bed than its companions, planting her hand on the middle of the bed to steady herself as she stretched across the mattress. As she did, she felt something hard tucked partway under the bunched-up blankets, where it must have come to rest after bouncing out of the drawer when it flipped over.
That's weird, Akane thought, and she slipped her hand under the blanket, fishing around until her fingers came in contact with something solid, small, and square. She withdrew her hand, pulling out a small box, maybe four centimeters in all three dimensions, covered with a plush navy blue fabric and accented with a tiny white satin bow on the top opposite the hinges.
What the hell? What else are you hiding, Ranko? Buying yourself jewelry now, too? Big superstar, even though we're broke as hell, huh? Let's just see what was worth paying rent late and having a huge fight for, shall we?
She sat cross-legged on the bed, pulling the box open. The hinges made a little squeak for the first half of their journey, and then the lid suddenly popped the rest of the way open all at once, rocking the box backward in her hand just a bit.
Resting in a groove in the beige padding at the bottom of the box was a thin silver ring. Its setting bore the tiniest sapphire Akane had ever seen; it almost looked like a piece of blue glitter more than a gemstone. The stone, if one could call it that, was in the shape of a heart, and two square diamond chips, equally miniscule, flanked it on each side. Its design wasn't that dissimilar from the silver dragon bracelet that was never absent from Ranko's left wrist except when she was bathing. Oh, this isn't so bad, Akane thought. Something this tiny couldn't have been terribly expensive at all.
Akane had never seen her wear it, or any ring, for that matter. It wasn't the sort of gaudy bauble that girls typically bought when they were out to spoil themselves, and if she'd been going for something to attract attention on stage, she'd have gone for some cheaper costume piece with larger, fake stones that would be more easily seen at a distance by the crowd. It made no sense at all. If anything, it looked more like the sort of ring that...
Akane gasped, dropping the box on the bed as if it had spontaneously shocked her.
She'd seen a similar style of jewelry on more than a few girls last year at Furinkan, usually the seniors with steady boyfriends who were about to go off to separate colleges. They called them promise rings. It was the kind of thing boys gave their girlfriends when they wanted to propose, but couldn't, often due to money, familial obligation, or for a variety of other reasons.
Other reasons, for example, like the boy having suddenly and irrevocably become a girl.
Akane gasped and bit her lip hard, picking the box back up and cradling it gently in her hands, tears welling in her eyes as she gazed down at the tiny little ring. Never before had a piece of jewelry that cheap looked so beautiful. She looked up at the ceiling, speaking aloud to the woman she would have given anything to still have in the room to hear her.
"My gods, I am such an idiot! Ranko, you shouldn't have done this, you silly girl. But I can't believe I yelled at you, and you were trying to… gods, baby, I'm so sorry..."
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