Day 41: Women's Showers

[revolutionise]

Utena was very, very glad that the patients were finally being allowed to go to the showers. Even for a girl more used to sweating than many in her gender, two days without a shower was definitely enough to make her feel stickier and stinkier than she preferred to be. Especially after all the running around and tearing apart of rooms she, Celes and Edward had done the night before.

I really hope those rooms magically turned clean this morning or something, like every other place in here seems to, Utena thought at that, hoping that no patients had awoken to the rather desperate-looking remains of a break-and-enter.

Taking a wash towel from one of the baskets, Utena headed for a free showerhead.

[Free. Limit: Any]

Comments

[himetsuru.livejournal.com]

Well now Falis was caught back in the position of knowing someone needed comfort and not exactly knowing how to give it. She fucking sucked at this thing, and she didn't want to make Kagura cry. Though she was getting the sense that the girl already was a little. Shit.

"Then he's not the guy for you," she said after a moment, her voice serious and barely heard above the running water. "Find someone who's world you do fucking exist in. People change, Kagura, on their own. They find new people and move on. We all do." She remembered something she'd once heard her mother say to her back when she was little. Hopefully, she wouldn't fuck it up; that had been a long time ago.

"People are like the stars. They start out in one place, with a group of other stars, shining for all to see. They think they're happy there being part of all that and the picture it creates, but eventually a star finds someone else, someone they have to be with and that when they grow a tail and swim through the skies to be with that one." She paused and frowned. "Okay, I think I fucked that story up. Damnit."

[kagurazuki.livejournal.com]

Simple and crude though it was, the message was easy to understand. Maybe she'd known it all along, maybe she'd just needed to hear it somewhere that wasn't inside her own head, but somehow it all clicked.

"N-no, no Alita-hime, I understand," she assured the other girl. Really, she was a far better friend than Kagura could have wished for in her own time and place.

"I have to find the right star for me, right? Even... even if it isn't easy now."

[himetsuru.livejournal.com]

Relief washed across the princess' face when Kagura didn't start bawling and didn't give Falis a look like she was crazy. She smiled as she continued to rinse all the suds out of her hair; it was taking forever.

"Yeah, you do. And you'd be surprised what that star is and where you find it," she told the other girl. "There's a lot of men... a lot of women, too, in this world that could be your star. And sometimes, that star will find you, see you and grow a tail to swim the skies to you. And... I'm done with the fucking metaphor before I start sounding really stupid."

[kagurazuki.livejournal.com]

Kagura nodded, giving a short laugh at Alita's attempts to keep up her story. She had a lot to think about, but it did feel better, to finally get that off of her chest.

"It's okay," she assured the other girl. "I just... it was what I needed to hear."

[himetsuru.livejournal.com]

"Really?" Surprise was quite evident on Falis' face. "Huh. You know I fucking suck at this kind of comforting thing."

[kagurazuki.livejournal.com]

She finished washing and picked up a towel, wiping her face and eyes before holding another one out to Alita.

"Mm, w-well, maybe you're better at it than you think?" she suggested, smiling slightly, but meaning it this time.

[himetsuru.livejournal.com]

The princess wring her hair out, subtly taking a moment to look over Kagura's exposed body before accepting the towel.

"Huh," she said wiping her body down and then simply wrapping the towel around her hair. "Imagine that. Milano would be amazed." Well, not really since Milano knew her better than anyone, but still. The girl would give the princess that knowing look which would practically melt Falis' heart, but that was not something to think about here.