Inner Peace, True Love, and Sushi

As I lay on the floor, among the scattered bits of take-out boxes and soy sauce packets, I am dimly aware of the rain pattering on the window. I realize somewhere in my mind that she left without her umbrella, the pink one, with the cherry blossoms on it. It’s leaning up against the coffee table, a memento now of the latest tragic episode, forgotten through the streaming tears and hurried rush out the door. She must be soaking, some corner of my brain thinks.

“I guess I’ve really screwed it up this time, huh?”

The shining eyes of the posters on the walls seemingly stare down at me. I don’t know why she was okay with me keeping them up. She would always look at them: the pictures of the faces, the hair with colors and styles that couldn’t exist anywhere out of drawings and animations, with a sort of respect. I could never get her to tell me why. My inquiries to the matter would always be met with a shrug and a smile. I hadn’t seen her smile all night.

“You’re so obtuse sometimes! Do you even care?”

I don’t know when it started, the general slide from a simple dinner date to the fighting and pointed words. The change was slow and gradual, marked by long gaps of small chatting, with not even the most subtle of hints to the brewing storm. Maybe I should have asked, maybe I could’ve somehow averted the crisis, with a simple question and caring glance straight out of shoujo. Maybe I could’ve hugged her with a sudden motion, swept her up and told her that I would change, a romantic warrior’s gesture. Reality is a harsh dictator, and in my hindsight I play back all of the would-haves and should-haves.

“Can’t we talk about this later?”

That delay really set her off. A string of words deadlier than any curse. An insensitive move from an insensitive guy, nowhere near the Tuxedo Mask I should’ve been. The opposite of suave, the antonym of cool, the wrong move. The end of the series, finalized with the last words:

“I wish I’d never met you!”

The clock’s moved by thirty minutes since then, and the rain hasn’t let up. She must still be outside, she always was one to be there before the bus. The pain still hasn’t gone away, the gnawing feeling still stays there, the umbrella still rests on the table.

“I need someone who can show me they care!”

My legs are moving on their own, my hands are grasping that pink handle, fumbling with the cheap doorknob and rushing into the downpour like lightning. The steps are nonexistent underneath me, four flights pass by like nothing. Scenery blurs from adrenaline and rain drops. There she is, before I know it, drenched, as suspected. My frantic running has already alerted her.

“What are you-?”

Words can’t capture the next moment. Arms wrapped around tight, then clasped on surprised shoulders, spilling out all the humblest of apologies. The profuse and hurried words that flow from my lips move faster than the rain, louder than the thunder. She’s my mary sue: overly perfect, no flaws. The one I’d go on the quest to rescue, the one I’d venture to find until I myself was no more. I finally finish, and a silence only filled by the storm remains.

“....”

A smile forms, the first one I’ve seen from her all night. Tears mixed with rain are washed away as she pulls me close once more. Her words echo in my ear, a quiet and joyous whisper that fills me with warmth as we reunite:

“It will take work, it will take effort, it will take everything we both have and them some. But I love you, and the end result is worth it: inner peace, true love, and a whole lot of really good sushi. I forgive you.”