#nakao

“Yeah, that’s true. But don’t you want to know who is her soulmate?” Nobu demanded.

“Can we not talk about my soulmate?” Risa muttered.

“Risa, any guesses?” Nobu asked. Risa sighed. She had known that if Nobu found out about her soulmate tattoo, she would never shut up about it. It was true it bothered her a lot but she had gotten used to it, just pegging it up as another lost chance and failed romance.

“Eh, there was a elementary school kid in the concert hall I talked to quite a bit that day.” Risa grumbled. Another reason why she felt the soulmate endeavor was doomed. Her best guess was younger than her, as if she wasn’t tall enough already!

“An elementary school kid?” Nobu shouted.

“Will you lower the volume of your voice?” Both Risa and Chiharu hissed as several people turned to look at them. Nobu fell back onto her seat and sighed loudly.

“OK, fine. I’m going to get to the bottom of this somehow or the other. I’m not going to tell Risa if I find her soulmate because there’s a high chance she could fall in love with him. But I’m going to find him one way or another.” Nobu declared. Risa wanted to just vanish into a hole.

“Do what you want,” Risa grumbled.

------o------

“So I figured it out!” Nobu yelled the moment she entered the classroom. Both Risa and Otani flinched as she ran at Risa, screaming at the top of her lungs.

“What the hell, Nobu? It’s early in the morning!” Otani snapped and Risa watched Nobu slap down a magazine onto her desk. Nobu opened up to a bookmarked page. Risa saw a large arrange of alphabetically arranged flowers and the page Nobu was on was the page for flowers starting with ‘g’ and ‘h’. Risa’s heart dropped into her stomach as she realized what Nobu was doing and also as she noticed Otani look at the magazine too.

“Nobu, how about late-” Risa started to protest.

“A Gladiolus symbolizes strength of character, faithfulness and honor. The Gladiolus flower signifies remembrance.” Nobu read out excitedly. “Isn’t that so cool? He sounds like a really good guy! Just perfect for you!”

“What’s this? Koizumi’s going to date a flower?” Otani snickered from his desk and both Risa and Nobu shot him glares.

“No, Risa’s soulmate tattoo is a Gladiolus flower and whoever her soulmate is, he sounds absolutely wonderful.” Nobu sneered. Risa snapped out of the face she was making at Otani.

“Nobu!” Risa protested.

“What? Koizumi has a soulmate?” Otani cried out. He made a mocking face. “I wonder which poor little idiot it is.” Both Risa and Nobu bristled in anger.

“Someone better than you at least!” Nobu growled and Risa nodded furiously. Otani looked like he was going to snap something back when the bell rang and Nobu dashed to her seat. Risa avoided looking at Otani after that.

------o------

It was after the Maity Sensei fiasco that Risa first felt bothered by the fact Nobu hadn’t said a word about her soulmate since. She had naturally assumed that Nobu had given up and couldn’t find any leads, or had just plain forgotten about it in the drama of their everyday lives. She had just walked into the classroom, her mind swimming with thoughts of having helped Otani back home and his sudden shout of: ‘the one Koizumi likes is me!’

Nakao greeted her and she turned to look at Nobu only to feel her stomach flip at the sight of that old flower magazine sitting open on Nobu’s desk and Nobu was biting her thumb as she flipped through it. Risa first deposited her bag on her chair and then walked over to her friend.

“Nobu, what are you doing?” She asked nervously. She really didn’t need any more drama in her life and whatever Nobu was doing made her feel like there was definitely more drama in store for her. Nobu looked up at her in surprise. Risa’s stomach twisted, Nobu was on the ‘g’ and ‘h’ page.

“Oh, I was just thinking, I really can’t find your soulmate and anyway, given with what happened yesterday, I don’t think I need to.” She grinned knowingly at Risa and Risa fiddled with her hands uncomfortably. Nobu’s smile rather unnerved her.

“Nothing happened yesterday,” Risa said quietly. Nobu froze and turned on her seat to look at Risa.

“What do you mean nothing happened yesterday?” Nobu snapped angrily.

“I took him home, he seemed angry, end of story.” Risa shrugged.

“Huh? What are you even talking about? That shouldn’t be allowed.” Nobu grumbled unhappily. Risa could only mentally agree. She was tired from all the drama, she was tired of loving. Maybe she should really ask Nobu to find her soulmate.

“Ah, Otani good morning!” Nakao greeted the boy as he walked in. Risa’s heart hiccupped in her throat and she turned to look at him. He looked exhausted. She walked up to him in concern.

“How is your ankle, Otani?” She asked pleasantly. He glanced up at her and then looked away, heaving a heavy sigh. “Oi! That’s so rude! Sighing when you see people’s faces!” Risa erupted.

“Hai, hai, sorry, giantess.” Otani muttered and he went to go sit in his seat. Risa snarled and Nobu and Chiharu had to restrain her.

------o------

Risa had of course promptly forgotten about her soulmate mark after she and Otani had gotten together and the discovery of Otani being the boy she met in the concert hall back then made her pause for a bit but then she decided against it since he didn’t have a soulmate mark from that incident. Pulling through their college years had been a challenge especially with Otani rarely having free time and her own schedule and sometimes she wondered if she would have had such troubles if she had been together with her soulmate. Things changed however when they both moved in together a couple months before their wedding.

“Eh, I totally forgot the high school reunion was today.” Otani said as he bit into a tangerine.

“Don’t worry, I figured you’d forget and I made sure your clothes were done.” Risa shook her head at him.

“Ho, when did you become so responsible?” Otani grinned. “Oh well, I guess it’s because clothes are involved. Just watch, I’m going to walk into the reunion and everyone is going to wonder who this charmingly dressed young man is,” Otani pretended to flip his hair with one hand and Risa was torn between laughing at him or hitting him on the head.

“First of all, no matter how well dressed you are, everyone will recognize you because of your height.” Risa pointed out. “Second, you’ll only look charming because I’m the one who picked out your clothes. If you would have had your way, you would have gone to the reunion looking ridiculous.” Risa reached for the the water jug.

“Hai, hai~” Otani shrugged. “What are you going to wear today?” Risa gave him a secretive smile.

“It’s something I was gifted by Akira chan,” Risa explained. “She made it herself.”

“Oh, Akira chan as in your friend from the same fashion class, right?” Otani asked.

“Yup! Nobu’s going to come over in an hour to help me with a couple of things. We should probably get dressed soon.” Risa said thoughtfully. Otani nodded. The two of them wasted time a little more, explaining how their day had went. The lady Risa was working under was a demon and was always trying to belittle Risa’s ideas even though the stars that Risa worked for loved her ideas. Mimi in particular made sure to put in any idea Risa suggested. Risa didn’t work as a designer for Mimi, but Mimi did often send her pictures of what she was wearing for a shoot and ask her opinion.

Otani was still a temporary contracted teacher who was still learning the ropes, so he didn’t have a very dramatic day. He had been helping out the kids in gym and showing them how to play a couple of things. Risa listened with a find smile on her face. Well, at least Otani knew how to handle kids well. That said good things about the future.

After that the two of them went to go get ready and Risa pulled on the backless dark purple dress. She grinned and sat down to make her hair and put on her makeup. She did her hair up in an intricate braided bun and did her makeup.

“Risa, can you help me with this- woah…” Otani walked in and trailed off. Risa turned and grinned.

“How does it look?” She asked. Otani reddened and looked away.

“You look pretty,” He mumbled. Risa laughed.

“You look rather dashing yourself!” she complimented him. He turned to look back at her and then his eyes widened. Risa blinked and then she realized he was looking at her back. “Oh, yeah, that’s my soulmate mark. Nobu’s coming over to cover it up in makeup.” Risa smiled.

“That’s a gladiolus…” He murmured. “I remember you and Nobu talking it about it in school.”

“I’m surprised you remember!” Risa said in surprise.

“I remember a lot of things about you,” Otani said, his face red. “When did you get that?”

“I got this at the concert we met at,” Risa explained and Otani’s eyes widened even more. “What?”

“Take a look at this.” Otani walked over to her and sat on the bed next to her. He lifted up his ankle and showed her a small bruise there. No, not a bruise, Risa realized. It was a flower. Risa looked up at him, wonder on her face.

“What does this mean?” Risa asked, her voice quiet and small.

“I thought I bruised myself after that concert and my mom kicked up a huge fuss about my having hurt myself because I gave my shoes to you so she was going to bathe my leg in medicinal herbs or something of the sort when she realized it was a flower and when we looked it up, it was a Hyacinth.” Otani explained, his face growing more and more excited as he explained. “It’s a multicolored Hyacinth so we were confused as to what it meant, but then my sister figured it just meant that my soulmate has all the characteristics of a Hyacinth and I wondered what kind of person she was.” Otani grinned widely.

“Then your soulmate is…” Risa breathed.

“You,” Otani laughed. “We’ve been right underneath each other’s noses this entire time!” Risa beamed and then laughed too. “You better call Nobu to let her know that she doesn’t need to come over and cover that up.”

“On it,” Risa picked up her phone.

------o------

“They’ve been soulmates this entire time?” Seiko gasped as she watched Otani and Risa joke with Abe and Kohori. Otani was glaring rather violently at any guy who looked at Risa for longer than his liking and Risa kept scolding him.

“Yup. I figured it out years ago before they even ended up together.” Nobu yawned.

“Huh? How did you?” Seiko, Haruka and Chiharu demanded to know.

“Remember when Otani sprained his ankle right before he and Risa got together?” Nobu asked. All of them nodded. “I was there to see them bandage his ankle. I noticed the flower and I thought, can it really be a coincidence that two flower tattoo soulmates are in the same class? And you see, the thing is, the reason why I pressed for Risa and Otani so hard was because I though Risa’s gladiolus kind of described Otani’s characteristics. So then I looked up his flower which turned out to be a multicolored Hyacinth which takes on all the characteristics of differently colored Hyacinths which symbolizes playfulness and a sporty attitude and in its extreme rashness. Hyacinths also denote constancy. Blue hyacinth stands for constancy, purple for sorrow, red or pink for play, white for loveliness and yellow for jealousy. I’ve had it’s meaning memorized for years so I could get the right time to tell them.” Nobu laughed. “That describes Risa very well and my suspicions were confirmed when Risa called me to tell me that she and Otani actually first met in an Umibouzu concert hall.”

Nobu’s little audience stared at her in awe and Nobu cackled like an evil witch. Nakao arrived with a drink for her and she turned to Haruka and Seiko.

“What about you guys? Don’t you guys have soulmate marks?” Seiko made a despaired face and Haruka looked angry.

“No, I don’t,” Seiko grumbled and Nobu noticed the way she folded her arms across the low neck of her dress.

“I have a soulmate mark, but I’m totally not interested in meeting them.” Haruka grumbled. “She thinks I’m annoying! Annoying! What kind of soulmate thinks that?” Nobu glanced back to Seiko who looked uncomfortable. Nobu had to suppress the cheshire grin that threatened to spread across her face.

“I can think of a couple who would think that way, Haruka.” Nobu said knowingly.

On the other side of the hall Otani was muttering something, red in the face and Risa was laughing loudly and holding Otani’s hand.