Abby and Violet (Yuri Light Novel)

It was the first of May, but temperatures were already stifling. If it carried on like that, when Summer came by, I’d have to only put the food outside for it to cook.

Abby’s flat had an AC in almost every room, so that was mostly were we were hanging out now. Unfortunately, her father started working from home a while ago, so most of our alone time was now one that we had to be careful not to make too much noise. That meant I wasn’t allowed to give her a tickle attack as I usually would when it got too hard not to put my hands on her as payback for her teasing.

There was also the fact that we had to go back to prepare for exams as classes would end at the end of the second week of June, leaving the last week of May and the first of the following month dedicated to exams and delivering school assignments.

We were having one such study session in her bedroom. The AC was on, making the air a bit chilly on my exposed arms and legs, but that served me well. That way I could sit with my legs crossed while she sat on the empty space formed between them.

I had my chin on her shoulder as she checked my work in search of mistakes.

“Ok, some answers need to be more extensive, otherwise you’re doing great,” she said, putting the notebook down. “Wanna do math next?”

“…Let’s take a break.”

“Already?”

“Yeah.”

“…Ok.”

She grabbed the TV remote and turned it on. She began searching for something to watch, but I wasn’t particularly interested in that.

“Sorry, I’m not in the mood for that,” she told me quite dryly as I slanted my head to tickle her neck.

That was another hindrance. It had gotten better recently, but she still didn’t seem to want to get too intimate with me.

It had been like that after the day her sister apologised. On that day, she was constantly latched on to me. A bit of a pain, but completely understandable. However, after we woke up on the next day, she had completely changed. No good morning kiss or cuddles, no holding hands, nothing. Any time I tried touching her, she’d pull away, always saying “not now” or “I’m not in the mood”, or the likes. It was super confusing for me, but when I asked her multiple times with no offered clarification, I began worrying I had done something to get her mad instead of her solely feeling depressed from having had an argument with her sister.

“Abby? Did I do something to make you angry at me?” I asked for the third time in a week.

She smooched my cheek, quite sweetly in contrast to how she sounded ten minutes ago. “I’m just going through some stuff, you did nothing wrong.”

“…Ok.”

“…”

She turned off the TV and pulled away from me, sitting across me. We were in for a serious conversation, it seemed.

“Sorry for being so distant lately,” she told me after thinking how to begin our talk. “The truth is… the argument I had with my sister made me think about a lot of stuff… including how you and I interact.”

“…I see…”

If the argument had anything to do with what I thought it did, and I felt very sure it was, then I could finally make sense of her behaviour lately.

“You think we are too close?” I asked to confirm my suspicions.

“…Maybe… I don’t know… It’s not that I think we are doing something wrong, but… there are certain things that… muddle the waters.”

“…Like what?”

“…”

She looked down, seemingly taken by sadness.

I felt like reaching out to her, but in those conditions I reframed from acting on such impulse.

“Violet, I’m so sorry. I’m such a mess, and you always have to put up with me,” she said, choking slightly on her words.

“Abby, no matter how much you might cause me trouble, I’m not going anywhere. And most of the time, I enjoy being with you. The other times, I choose to stay by your side. Walking away never ever crossed my mind.”

“…Because you’re too nice.”

“Pfft, fufu, maybe, but… I’m quite happy being like this.”

She looked up, surprised by my reaction. Seeing me smile made her smile in turn.

“Seriously though, you’re too nice,” she repeated.

“Hmm, I’m aware of that. I still don’t care.”

I opened my arms as an invitation. She fought against her will to dive in, but it had been a while since we last hugged mutually, so she eventually fell on my trap.

Grabbing hold of her, I tumbled back, almost hitting my head on the headboard. She struggled a bit, not wanting cuddling to that extent, but once I asked her for us to stay like that just for that one study break, she again gave in.

Now that she was pacified, I could hold her more gently, my fingers running through her hair and lower back.

She let out one of her “happy-Abby-noises” before planting her chin on my sternum.

“Yes?” I asked with the most inviting smile I could make.

“…What do you feel when we are like this?” she asked.

I don’t think she meant to ask me that out loud as she made the same expression she did whenever she thought she made a blunder.

“Let’s see,” I began, sitting us up.

My legs were pressed together and extended, giving her enough extra height while she straddled me for her head to be close to my lips without bending my spine too much. How to answer her question without it sounding like a confession?

“I guess… I erm… feel… happy…? Erm, yeah… very happy.”

“Why?” she asked with a whiny voice.

Why indeed.

I did know why, but I had no idea how to say it without being too obvious.

“Erm… because… you’re nice to cuddle with and, erm… it… it makes you happy too, right?”

I felt her moving her legs, her heels touching my rear as she hugged me with them too.

“I don’t think I should be this happy, though,” she said, casting her eyes down.

The happiness I was feeling holding her like that… yeah, I now understood why she’d look sad completely out of nowhere. Liking someone, a moment with them feeling special, but the knowledge they didn’t feel the same mixed in… it almost felt dirty, didn’t it?

“…Abby, I—”

“Don’t mind me. I’m just being depressive. I’m sure this will pass, eventually. Just give me some more time, ok?”

“…Ok.”

I hated my cowardice. She liked me, I liked her, why was I scared of saying anything?

“Erm, we should go back to studying, don’t you think?”

“…I wouldn’t mind staying like this a bit longer.”

“I’m sorry Violet… Until I figure out how I feel about this, can we keep it to a minimum?”

“…But you still like this, right?”

“Of course I do! I just… you know…”

I was satisfied with our heart-to-heart. Knowing she still enjoyed it and that I had done nothing wrong was enough for me to be more patient towards her.

“Can I have just one more thing?” I asked.

“Sure. Whatever you want.”

I lifted her chin and lowered my head. The kiss I gave her, I realised after the fact, was a bit cruel as it was very close to her mouth, so close that I felt her puckering her lips as I made contact. It wasn’t on purpose, but it was a very misleading.

“You’re so pretty,” she said in a daze.

“Oh… erm… t-thanks…”

She turned bright red, and so did I, but she kept staring at me. At my lips, to be exact.

“Does it bother you?” she asked, touching my lower lip.

Was she talking about my scar or about us sharing a lip-to-lip kiss right there and then?

Don’t be stupid, it’s the scar she’s talking about.

“Not at all. It did at first, but now… I kinda see it as a badge of honour.”

“…Aren’t you worried it will turn away potential suitors?”

“…No. No, it does not,” I said, looking her straight in the eye. “Do you?”

She retracted her hand and hid her face on my neck. They’d have to be real idiots, she seemingly muttered.

“…”

“…”

“…We should go back to studying.”

“Yeah… we should…”

“…”

“…”

“Don’t feel like moving though.”

“Fufu, yeah. It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”

“…Yeah… too long…”

But finally, things were going back to normal. Until two days after, that is.

“Excuse me but could I ask you a question?” a female classmate asked while Abby and I were headed for pancakes after school.

I looked at Abby, thinking she was the target of the conversation, but the girl was also looking at me.

It was annoying, but if it was just a single question, then I’d make the effort and put up with it.

“Is the rumour true?” she began.

“What rumour?” Abby asked.

“That you two… you know…” she paused and leaned closer, continuing in a hushed tone. “That you two are dating.”

Abby pulled away her hand from mine very forcibly, that hurting me more on an emotional level than anything else. Despite that, the emotion I was feeling more was anger. Why had that huge idiot come and say something like that? I had to endure two weeks of Abby distancing herself from me, with this happening now that she was feeling comfortable with holding hands again, who knew how long it’d take until she came back to normal. Or what I’d have to do to make her comfortable with us touching once more.

“You got this all wrong, Violet and I are just friends! In fact, best friends, but that’s just it.”

“But… you’re wearing matching chokers with hearts and all.”

“T-that’s…”

“You’ve got a problem with that?” I asked, having grown tired of the conversation.

“N-no! I think you make a very nice couple.”

“Why, thank you, but like Abby said, we are just close friends. And us wearing matching chokers with hearts, or holding hands, or whatever is our business. Ours, and ours alone. You got that?”

Finally, the realisation that it had been a bad idea coming to us with such invasive questioning was a huge misstep into that empty head of hers.

“…I was only asking.”

“And you’ve got out answer. Anything else?”

She shook her head and I pulled Abby away.

A few steps back she started wriggling her hand free.

“Let’s stop doing this kind of thing in public. And we shouldn’t go out with our chokers either.”

“Nonsense,” I told her back.

“But Violet… people are getting the wrong idea.”

“Abby, do you feel bad because of that?”

“Of course I do! I don’t want people talking bad about you behind your back!”

“That’s very sweet of you, but I don’t care.”

“…Violet, please let go of my hand.”

“No.”

“Violet!” she shouted.

I was forced to let her hand go.

People around us were staring and whispering amongst themselves while Abby seemed about to start crying.

Seriously, it’s a huge pain after the other. Haah…

“…Abby? Let’s talk about this at home, ok?”

She gave me no answer.

“Abby? Do you want to go home now?”

To that she nodded.

“Please, lets. I can’t…”

Her shoulders shook up, cutting her words off.

“…Come on. Let’s go home,” I said, trying to put an arm over her shoulders. She received that well, thank goodness. I’d be at a complete loss if she didn’t.

“Do you want something to drink? To eat?” I asked while we took our shoes off once we got to her place. I had no idea where or how we got there, only that it felt like an eternity.

“…No. I just want to have that talk and go cry in my bedroom.”

“…Ok.”

Things were bad, but at least she seemed to be honest about how she was feeling.

We sat on the living room on opposite sides. Since she wasn’t starting any conversation, I stepped up.

“I’ll make things clear; I don’t care if people get the wrong idea about us.”

“…You’re just saying that to make me feel better.”

“Abby, you know that I’m not. Have I ever agreed to something that I wasn’t on board with at least more than against?”

“But when it’s about me, you always choose the thing that favours me the most… even at your own detriment.”

“…Is seeing you happy really to my detriment?” I grumbled under my breath before continuing the conversation. “Abby, let me tell you something very clearly. I worry about a thousand different things. I worry a lot about what people think of me. But I don’t want to worry and change what comes natural to me, and that makes me happy just because people might think badly of me, whether they are right for thinking that or not. Honestly, I find it a bigger pain to be self-conscious about my actions and constantly walking on eggshells than acting normal and causing bad impressions. What we do, there’s nothing wrong about it. We are very close friends, we might be too clingy, but if we are both ok with it, what does it matter what other people think? Abby, let me ask you this; are you happy that we go walking around holding hands and with these chokers on?”

“…Yes, but—”

“But what?”

“…”

Maybe cutting her off was too aggressive, but she was getting on my nerves with how much of a wishy-washy attitude she was having with our relationship, friendship or otherwise. I loved her, but goodness gracious, did she get on my nerves at times like these.

“…Can I go now?” she asked meekly.

“…Yes. If you don’t have anything else to say, I guess you can.”

She stood up and headed to the corridor accessing the bedroom. As she passed by me I think I heard her whine a “sorry”, but I was too distracted with my own emotions to be sure of it.

Once I hear her steps fade away in the corridor, I leaned forward, rubbing my face as I barely held my glasses off my face with a single finger.

“…Haah, seriously… it’s one thing after the other.”

It was all so draining.

In some things, we were doing all right, but in others, it seemed like at each step we’d trip on some new issue, or one would be thrown under our feet.

I was grumbling to myself, still with my face buried in my hands when a voice snapped me right up.

“Are you two having problems?”

“Mr- Will!?” I gasped as I jumped on my seat. “N-No, erm… yes. Sorry, but… we argued again.”

Admitting that to my future “father-in-law” was like admitting I wasn’t fit to be his daughter’s girlfriend. That was, assuming he’d go along with it.

Haah, great. Another thing for her to stress me about even further.

Me too, for a matter of fact, but if she was going to be as hard to deal with as she was being at the moment, I’d be screwed.

He sat down holding a cup of coffee he got from the machine in the kitchen.

“What is it this time? If I’m not intruding, of course.”

“…A classmate got the wrong idea about us…” I said, almost squeaking.

“Oh… and Abby was the one that didn’t take it well?”

I tilted my head, confused with the question. But it made sense that he asked that. I was the one who, supposedly, was the fussy one. Maybe I hadn’t been a good influence on her on that aspect.

“Erm… to be clear… we really are just friends…”

“Hmm? I know. Not that I’d mind having you as an in-law.”

It took me a while to react at that statement, that I might add, was done super casually.

“H-Huh!?” I shouted, pushing myself against the backrest of the couch, wide-eyed and with my jaws almost hitting my knees in surprise.

“What? After all you did for her, and continue doing, who else would be better as a suitor?”

It couldn’t be that easy! Surely I had tripped while going up the stairs and hit my head on every single step until I reached the ground floor and was either seeing what my life would be had I not tripped, or I was delusional as I was rushed to the hospital. If at least he said something in line with “I’d take some time getting used to it.” Seriously? Not even anything like that?

It looked like he was making an impression of my father with how casual he was being.

Maybe my family isn’t a good influence on anyone.

“You know better than anyone that she’s going through a lot. Honestly, I can now see that her mother left her with lots of issues about her self-worth. It’s very unfair of me to ask you this, but… can you stay by her side, even if for just a bit longer? I understand that at times you feel like it’s impossible, but… please, she absolutely adores you.”

“…Yeah… I won’t be going anywhere. Ever.”

“…Thank you.”

He was back to being something I was more familiar with. A man saddened by regret and seeing himself useless and forced to rely on someone who didn’t have to get as involved as I was. Thing is, as painful and troublesome as it could get, I couldn’t see myself walk away.

The conversation lightened up after that.

We talked about school and how he spent his time with my father, which was full of surprises. Turns out, my dad had been being a good influence on Mr. Will after all, the latter learning to slow down a bit and enjoy the… sillier hobbies my dad had.

I was also put in charge of reminding dad about lending Mr. Will the next volumes of a comic book he kept on forgetting. The idea of that man, so stern-looking and proper, sitting down reading one of those books just didn’t compute with me, but to each their own. I’m sure many would find it equally unbelievable seeing me, a cold staring girl who’s hard to approach being an absolute sweetheart to another person like I was with Abby.

Speaking of which…

“Excuse me, I’ll go check on her in an instant,” I told him, having noticed the time that had passed since she went inside.

She was in her bed, facing the wall.

I approached the bed as quietly as I could, despite her being a heavy sleeper and every joint in my feet and ankle taking the opportunity to crack with every single move.

Apparently, she cried herself to sleep while hugging Mr. Sealy, the plushie I gave her on Valentine’s.

I wrote her a note that I left by her head in a way that it would be the first thing she saw after she woke up, kissed her cheek and was about to get up when she opened her eyes.

“Hey,” I said in a hushed tone.

“Hi there…”

It was awkward, the air between us. We both wanted to say something, but none of us knew what.

“Violet? Are you still mad?”

“No. I can’t say that I still am.”

“Ok… Still… I’m sorry.”

“It’s ok. I understand why you were kicking such a fuss.”

She got on her back, still clinging to Mr. Sealy that hid half of her face.

“Do you really not care what others might think?”

“Yes, Abby,” I told her, sitting by her side on the bed. “I do care, but not enough that I’ll go changing my behaviour just to have people accept me, or not getting wrong ideas about me.”

“Then… I’ll try and do the same…”

“…Does it mean we can still hold hands and wear these?” I asked, touching my neck ornament.

“Yeah… although… It might be a good idea to reel in some of our clinginess in public. Just to avoid people giving us crap about us being… I don’t know… nasty or something.”

“But we only hold hands.”

“You also sometimes kiss me in the face or hair.”

“I do!?”

“Pfft, hehe! What? You don’t even notice that?”

I didn’t. There were times I did it consciously, and now that I was thinking about it… I had the vague idea I might have done that in class. Many times.

“Well, now you know.”

I couldn’t see it, but I was certain there was an impish smile behind that seal.

“…I still don’t think I should mind…” I mumbled.

She pulled herself up, set the toy aside, showing that her face was at least as flushed as mine, and she placed her chin on my shoulder.

“You’ve changed so much, I’m kinda jealous.”

That talk of her changing again… when would she learn?

“Abby—”

“I know, I know. You think I don’t need to change at all, but the truth is… there are at least one or two things you think I should, aren’t there?”

I couldn’t deny that. In fact…

“…I wished you were more confident on yourself, and that you were also more honest about your feelings.”

“Pfft, hehe. See?” she giggled, having taken my criticism surprisingly well. “I see… so it’s my self-confidence and lack of honesty when it’s about my feelings… ok. I already knew about the first, but the latter is a bit surprising. I guess I need to put in a bit more work. Anything else?”

“…No. Just those two.”

She kissed my face and laid on her back again. She began playing with the plushie, seemingly immersed in thoughts.

“I wanna try sleeping alone tonight. I want to see if I can have a normal night of sleep after we had an argument like today.”

“…But we made up.”

“True, but… I’m not a hundred percent satisfied with the results.”

“Huh? How so?”

“…There are still things I want to tell you but I am too afraid to say.”

“Oh… That’s fine. Take your time.”

“Thank you but… the school year is almost ending, you know? Time goes by, and I feel like I’m stuck in place at times. It’s very frustrating.”

“Yeah, I get what you mean.”

“Hehe, of course you do. I feel like you’re the only one that can.”

I moved a hand over her belly. She seemed pleased with that bit of touch as her face twitched into a small smile.

“Is this more like you’d like it?” she asked. “Me opening up, that is.”

“…Yes. I’d love if we had more of these conversations.”

“Hmm, I see… Aren’t they a pain for you?”

“Not at all! It’s…”

“…Yes?”

“…It’s… It’s one of the things I want the most…”

“…I just realised something.”

“What?”

“…Me being with you, it makes me feel so happy and safe. However… not sitting down and having these conversations with you… If we had more of these earlier, I’d be in a better place mentally and emotionally. You get what I’m saying?”

“…You’ve been using how you feel around me to run away from your issues?”

She laughed again, grabbing my hand and bringing it to her lips.

“Yeah. That’s exactly it.”

That pretty much marked the end of our conversation for the day.

As I went through the rest of the day, I kept thinking about our conversation, but mostly, that we’d have many more.

I wanted to help her, but I could only do that if I understood her. I needed those conversation.

Hopefully, that day marked the beginning of many to come.