#rrl01d82

Gen One, Day Eighty-Two

Robyn smiled. Of course it was the first dress. Today was bittersweet. Her little girl was growing up so fast, she didn’t know how she was supposed to handle all of this. With grace and dignity, she supposed, but it was hard to not just sit here and break down crying when she saw how beautiful Eris looked in that flowery red and black dress she’d picked out. 

Standing up, she didn’t say a word, just came forward to help Eris zip it up all the way, placing her hands on Eris’s shoulders as they both looked at her in the mirror. “You look beautiful, sweetie,” Robyn said and she couldn’t help the way her voice quivered at the end of it. 

Eris, ever in tune with her Mom’s feelings, turned around, feeling her own eyes start to sting. As exciting as it was to be getting ready to graduate and go off to college, she knew for sure she was going to miss her family. It wasn’t like it was goodbye forever and they’d never speak to each other again, but it was definitely going to be different. 

“You think?” she asked, smiling brightly through the tears. Robyn nodded and Eris hugged her Mom, a solid, tight hug that she held onto for longer than what was needed. “Thanks, Mom,” she whispered to her. “For everything.” 

“I am so proud of you,” Robyn answered, pulling back and brushing Eris’s hair behind her ear. “You’ll always be my baby, no matter how old you are.”

Gen One, Day Eighty-Two

“That your boyfriend?” 

The question caught Charlie by surprise as they were playing video games in his room after school one day. A few more days and Touya would be heading back to Mt. Komorebi. It was bittersweet, because he thought that a real friendship had formed here. They already agreed that they would be pen pals and send postcards wherever they went that was cool. They also would talk online or play online games together whenever they could, though Touya said his internet wasn’t as great as it should be for that. 

Charlie glanced at him, confused for a second, but then he saw Touya look at the picture of him and Harvey on his nightstand. He chuckled. “Oh, no, that’s Harvey,” he said, like that should explain it all. “He’s...well we grew up together. He’s my neighbor, but he’s like my best friend. Almost like a cousin or something, his Mom and my Mom are best friends, too.” 

“That’s cool,” Touya said, and then gave a small shrug. “Also...good.” 

It had Charlie looking at him, but Touya didn’t meet his gaze, only smirked at the game raging on in front of them. Charlie smiled back, chewing the inside of his cheek for a moment and felt like leaning over once again to kiss the other boy, but he held himself back. He wanted to say, yeah, I’m single or good because you want to be my boyfriend? but neither one of those were thoughts he’d say out loud. Especially when he wasn’t the only one doing the flirting here. If Touya hadn’t acted on it, there was a reason. He’d respect it. But damn was he going to wonder and miss him when he went back home.