Chương 107: What a Girl Needs
Akane turned the key in the lock outside her little apartment, sighing quietly. Nearly everything about college was better than her high school experience, but night classes were for the birds. At least she didn't have much homework tonight. The first few days of class had been murder with assigned reading and getting things started for the year, plus there'd been a lot of social things around campus she had been expected to do after the volleyball roster was formally announced, but things were finally starting to settle down and she was glad of the respite.
She hoped Ranko had gotten off easy too; the poor thing had been killing herself between the bar, school, homework, housework, gigs outside the Phoenix with her band on occasion, and then also taking extra coursework through the agency that had helped her catch up to eleventh grade in most of her subjects. If she stayed on top of it and absolutely nothing went wrong, she had a razor-thin chance to catch up enough to graduate in one year, and Ranko was determined not to spend one more second in a girls' school uniform than she had to. Akane had suggested she slow down, take a few more classes after the school year ended, and free herself up some time to breathe once in a while, but Ranko wouldn't hear of it. If there was one thing she retained from her time as Ranma, it was her stubbornness.
The cramped apartment was filled with a cacophony of insistent electrical beeping, as if everything in the place with a power cord was screaming for attention at once. Dropping her backpack on the little white dining table near the door, Akane walked first into the kitchen, switching off the burner under a large pot and lifting the lid. Even she, with her utter lack of culinary prowess, could tell that the pork was badly overdone. Leaving the pot lid off to vent some of the burning smell and turning off the timer on the stove, she walked next to the open closet door branching off from the bathroom, where their compact vertical washer and dryer were stacked. Both machines were flashing lights and chirping merrily, indicating that they were also finished with their tasks, and Akane pushed the cancel button on each to silence them. It wasn't like Ranko to let things go like this. This was starting to get weird.
"Hey, Ran-chan? You home, hon?"
Akane nudged the slightly-ajar bedroom door open, hearing the sound of muffled music from within. She couldn't help smiling at the scene. She found her girlfriend nestled on the bed, piles of clean and half-folded laundry surrounding her. She wore her lavender sundress and a white floral half-apron. She never expected Ranko would actually wear that thing; Akane had bought it for her as a joke after Ranko had insisted she'd handle the cooking in order to keep them both out of the hospital. Her hair was in the mussed remnants of a ponytail, and the headphones of her Walkman dangled loosely around her neck, still quietly emitting the last track of a Michael Jackson tape. A splayed-out English textbook and a yellow spiral notebook rested on her ankles, but Ranko herself was slumped over to her right on a pile of clean mismatched towels, quietly snoring.
Akane smiled sweetly and carefully picked up the textbook, closing it and setting it on the desk against the far wall. As she reached for the stop button on the cassette player, Ranko stirred. "Mmn? Akane? Oh, hey. How was your day? Dinner should be… shit, what time is it?!" She rocketed up in the bed, adrenaline doing what no amount of caffeine could have for her awareness.
Akane laughed. "Easy, you. I'm afraid dinner is a loss, but we'll figure something else out. Don't worry about it."
Ranko sighed, slumping back against the headboard distraughtly. "Damn it! I'm really sorry, Akane." She shook her head, admonishing herself for her mistake.
Akane sat on the edge of the bed. "Don't be so hard on yourself! I know you're exhausted. You don't have to do everything around here, you know." She reached for a towel to fold.
"Leave that. I'll take care of it," Ranko said, her voice hollow with disillusionment. She sat up and started to swivel her legs off the bed to stand, but Akane rested her hand on her thigh.
"Hey. I mean it. You're gonna run yourself ragged at this rate. Why are you so stressed about this stuff? I mean, school and work, I get all that, but, honestly, I could have done a load of laundry before practice tomorrow or something."
Ranko sighed, looking out the window to avert her eyes. "How was your day?"
Akane rolled her eyes, pursing her lips. "Fine, but you're changing the subject."
"You wouldn't get it. Don't worry about it, Akane." Ranko sat back, resting her back on the headboard and starting to straighten one of the towels that had come partway unfolded under her shoulder as she slept, looking for anything for her eyes to focus on except her girlfriend's face.
Akane smiled reassuringly, reaching forward and tucking a wisp of Ranko's hair, which had largely escaped the black elastic that had once corralled it into a ponytail, behind her ear. "Hey. Talk to me."
With another heavy sigh, Ranko tossed the crumpled towel to the bed beside her. "I just… I wanted everything to be perfect, that's all."
Chuckling softly, Akane patted her girlfriend's thigh. "Don't you think that seems just a little unrealistic? I mean, I think things are going great. No complaints here!" She hopefully flashed an exaggerated grin.
"I knew you wouldn't understand." Ranko rolled her eyes, shaking her head with a frown and closing the notebook containing her English notes, another lock of hair flopping into her face.
With a disarming smile, Akane leaned forward over Ranko's legs, brushed the curtain of hair aside with the backs of her fingers, and kissed her cheek. She couldn't get over just how cute Ranko had become. Even on days where she was an absolute mess. Most girls had to work to be cute, but for this unique creature that was always a spilled cup of tea from being a boy again, when she missed the mark, it was somehow all the more endearing.
"Maybe, but I'm not going anywhere until I do."
"I just… I owe you better, is all." Ranko shook her head in quiet exasperation. That wasn't really how she meant for it to come out, but she was still half-awake and wasn't feeling particularly articulate at the moment.
Akane frowned a little, sitting up. Clearly, whatever this was, it was bothering Ranko more than she had originally thought. "Why would you say that? You don't owe me anything, Ranko."
Ranko nodded. "Yes I do. More than I can ever give you." There was a sadness, almost a remorse, in her voice that was beginning to worry Akane.
Frowning slightly more, Akane stroked the untamed red mane still surrounding her beloved's face. "If I am making you feel that way, I don't mean to, and I'm sorry. I think you're doing great, Ran-chan. I mean it. You're amazing."
Ranko looked down. "It's not about what I am. It's about what I'm not."
Akane sat up, looking the redhead over with a mien of concern. She did not like this self-deprecating air coming from Ranko one bit. "Ranko, you're scaring me. What do you think you could possibly be that I would rather have than you?"
Ranko mumbled something under her breath, fidgeting with her hands.
"I'm sorry?" Akane leaned closer.
"A guy." Ranko sighed dejectedly.
Akane shook her head sadly, reaching out and resting her hand on Ranko's shoulder. "Oh, sweetheart, you don't have to… I thought we were past this."
Ranko let her head fall back until it hit the white wooden headboard with a hollow bonk. "I know. I just, I know how you dreamed about getting married, and everything being all great and perfect with your white wedding and your picket fence and your two-point-five kids and all that. Like what Izzi and Kaito had. You used to talk to Kasumi about it all the time. I'm taking that away from you. Since we've been living together, it just feels so much more real that this is… that I'm… what you're stuck with instead. And like, just being here, even. You could have stayed at home with your family and had no worries at all, and instead you're here, broke as a joke, just 'cause I am. I love you to death and I'm so grateful you're here with me. I just hate how much you have to sacrifice to be with me, is all."
Akane frowned, resting her hand comfortingly on the back of Ranko's. "Is that what all this is about? Is that really what you think is important to me? Oh, Ranko, honey, no. All girls dream like that when they're little." Akane cringed to herself as the words left her lips, realizing too late that she was speaking to a girl who hadn't. "Like I told you months ago, none of that matters to me now. I want you. All that other stuff is great and nice, but I wouldn't trade being with you for it in a million years."
Ranko shook her head, fingering the silver dragon on her wrist that concealed the physical evidence of the worst defeat she'd ever suffered. She knew Akane couldn't understand how guilty she felt for being happy, and knowing that her happiness came at a price Akane would pay every day they were together.
Ranko sighed and tossed another towel aside despondently. "I guess what I'm trying to say is, if I can't ever be the boyfriend or husband you dreamed of, I wanna try and make it up to you and at least be the best wife I can, ya know?" The word felt foreign and uncomfortable on her tongue, and she blushed a little at the thought. "I mean, I'll never be Kasumi, but… I wanna take care of you. I'm trying as hard as I can, Akane, I swear. I just hate that you have to settle for less to be with me, and I really am sorry. I'm gonna do my best to be worth it, I promise."
Akane pursed her lips, looking sincerely into her girlfriend's eyes. "Ranko, I don't ever want you to apologize for who you are, ever again. Not to me, not to anyone. Even if I had all the magic and all the money in the world, I wouldn't change a single thing about you. You're everything I could ever want and more, just like you are. I love you so much, Ranko Tendo, and I'm so proud of you." She smiled sweetly at the reminder that Ranko had taken her name. Now that they were living together, it felt even more like they were a family.
"Besides…" Akane grinned mischievously, hoping to lighten the mood. "I'm the one who should be grateful. Think of all the hot, rich guys lined up around the bar every night who would love to date a cute little starlet like you, and you break all their hearts to stay with little ol' me." She did her best to put on a cute, doe-eyed face, despite the effect being betrayed by her gray athletics tee shirt and denim shorts.
Ranko's face flushed furiously, but she managed a coy little smile, playfully tossing a green dish towel at Akane's face. "Their loss, I guess."
It broke Akane's heart just how incredible the young woman in her bed was, how much she'd fought through to get to where she was right now, and how little she thought of herself in spite of it. She was kind, she was beautiful, she was considerate, and she was loyal. She was driven and she was fierce. Sure, she was a she, but all the things Akane had dreamed of in a partner, a companion? She had those qualities in abundance, and more besides. The last thing she deserved was to feel guilt for having made so many strides toward becoming the person she wanted to be. A person that Akane liked quite a bit better than the boy Ranko had once been, to boot. She had dragged herself out of the ruins of her old life to find some measure of happiness against all odds, and that was a feat to be celebrated, not regretted.
It wasn't Ranko that owed her anything, she realized. This fragile girl was not the brash, egotistical jerk that had once inhabited the rearranged collection of cells that now sat before her, and it was long past time for her to stop living a full-time apology for the person Ranma Saotome had been a lifetime ago, or for having left him behind. This was a girl, a woman, who had given anything and everything she had for Akane for nearly a year, who had nearly given her very life for her twice in that span, and Akane had rewarded her with distance and trepidation. With fear. No, it was Akane who owed Ranko. She owed the young woman with whom she shared her life far more than she'd allowed herself to give, based solely on the fact that the person who held her heart in their hands often did so with painted fingernails. In that moment, she felt no better than those mean girls that had kicked Nanami off the volleyball team.
At least that, though, Akane could decide to change for her.
As Ranko opened her mouth to say something else, Akane scooted a little further down the bed, toward Ranko's feet, ever so gently sliding her fingers down Ranko's right leg as she moved. It was the barest whisper of a touch, and Akane wasn't sure she'd have even felt it on her own skin, but she knew it was absolute torture for the girl with the curse of the Full-Body Cat's Tongue. That was precisely the point.
Ranko shivered, biting her lip, and whatever she was about to say was lost to a quiet whimper. "Hey, that's… not fair, you know, shutting me up like that."
"Who said anything about shutting you up?" Akane flashed her a wolfish grin. Gods, she was in love with that girl. What a fool she'd been for letting Ranko doubt it for a second.
"Then, what would you call it?" Ranko looked down at her with a genuine curiosity.
Akane leaned over, blowing gently on the exposed skin of Ranko's leg, and smiled with satisfaction as her girlfriend's breath caught in her throat and every fine little hair on her leg stood at attention. "Saying I love you."
"I love you too, but you already said that. And that t… tickles!" Ranko blushed, still squirming under Akane's attention. A little giggle broke its way through her melancholy.
Akane reached up, lifting the white floral apron until it rested on Ranko's abdomen above her waistline. She smiled lovingly into the redhead's eyes as Ranko blinked, her eyes wide, trying to process what was happening to her. With two fingers, Akane gently pinched the hem of Ranko's lacy lavender sundress, sliding that agonizingly slowly up her lover's body as well, making sure she let it torment every millimeter of goosebump-dotted skin it traversed along its path.
"Well, I think it's about time I said it another way, don't you?"
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