Abby and Violet (Yuri Light Novel)

After a particularly cold month of February, March seemed to be promising a less inclement weather as the air and sun outside were warm enough for Violet to not rattle her bones with her shivering, save for the occasional gust of wind. Even in those moments I could feel the cold air permeate through my uniform clothes, not to mention my barely covered legs. Violet had bought me some wool hold-ups and tights that I’d never wear before, but after having put them on one cold winter day to shut her up about me catching a cold, I was kinda sold on it, so I’d wear them when it was really cold to give her peace of mind over my health, but also on occasion simply because they were nice. And the fact that she said I looked super cute with them on didn’t help. No sir. Abby isn’t that easy of a girl, nope. Today, I wore the hold-ups, so the air that got under my skirt hit my little bit of exposed thighs, the contrast in coverage making it more noticeable than if I had my legs bare as I had always gone about, but oh well, at least I looked extra cute for my Violet.

“Haah.”

I looked at my sighing wifey, trying to fathom what caused it.

For the past two weeks, her state was mostly one of two: the lights were on, but there was no one inside or the house looked vacant but there was a rave going on inside. Right now, as I was all curled up on the couch pressed against her under a blanket with one of her arms around me, she was looking the former, the fingers of her free hand slowly tracing her choker. She was so out of this world that she didn’t even notice my intense stare on her, her eyes listlessly fixed on the TV screen, not registering at all the big momma cheetah cleaning up her protesting and misbehaving cub on the screen.

I decided to, very gently, start blowing into her face, a constant, light stream of air. I wanted her to notice me, but if I shook her or called out to her, Violet might think I had been talking to her while she paid no attention. This way, hopefully, she’d look at me from feeling the air hitting her face and either think I was messing with her, or not really register that I was doing and assume she just felt my stare.

“Hmm? What is it?” she asked after her head started turning towards me, a slow movement at first that then turned into a snap a second in. “You hungry?”

“Nope, not really. Well, not yet anyway,” I told her, fluffing myself up against her. “I’m just curious about what’s going on in my wifey’s mind.”

She smiled at me, but it was a yellow one. She then leaned in and kissed my hair, telling me that it was nothing really, she’s just thinking over some stuff.

This had been going on for the past two weeks ever since she had that PMS crisis. At first, I attributed her moodiness to that, but then came her period, and after that, normalcy, but she still kept the same moody aura around her. I had an inkling of what it could be causing that, but it was a very sensitive topic, and she clearly was thinking long and hard about it and still needing some time, so I was keeping that conversation quiet for now.

“Well, if you say so.”

“Should we go for a walkie?” she asked me, moving the hand she had on her choker to my shoulder, pulling be a bit tighter.

“I’m fine staying under the blanket,” I said, pushing aside my worries.

“I can also feel you squirming under it,” she said, her smile now more authentic. “Come on, let’s get you calmed down.”

She got up first, and I followed her after a second of thinking about where I wanted to be taken. My sister appeared then from the hallway together with my dad. I saw my sister’s eyes move down to Violet’s legs before she frowned. I then noticed that her shorts had ridden up while we sat, so they were now showing something not meant to be seen.

“Erm, Violet? Are those garter belts?” she asked, having noticed the black bands that were holding up her limp hold-ups with a metal clasp that were coming out from under her shorts.

“Ah! S-so sorry!” Violet gasped, adjusting her shorts, now pulling them a bit too low, forcing me to help her not show more of what she had under. Some black of the garter belt waist band was already showing over the blue waistband of the shorts when I got my hands on it, her face and ears quickly turning bright red. “I didn’t mean to be showing my underwear. And such an old lady’s thing too.”

My dad and Sophie glanced at one another before repeating back to Violet her comment about the old lady’s thing. You see, Violet wasn’t just embarrassed for having accidently shown her garter belt, but also because she thought it was old fashioned, not… provocative, as my sister and father were thinking. That was my time to intervene.

“Guys, garter belts don’t really have that connotation in her mind,” I explained, hugging Violet’s arm. “She uses them to extend the use of thigh-high socks that don’t holp up anymore but are otherwise perfectly good. And for stockings too, of course.”

“Oh!” my sister said, a drawn-out sound as the pieces clicked into place.

“Yeah, that explains why she said that,” my dad added.

“What? What am I missing?” Violet asked, looking at everyone, searching for an answer.

“You see, babe, the truth is… nowadays, garter belts are mostly used for lingerie. The sexy kind.”

“Oh!” she said nodding, her mind still too caught up in whatever it was that had been occupying her mind to fully realise the implications. Then, it started to settle, her words drawn out with a bit of dread and embarrassment. “Oh… oh no…”

“Sorry, I’d have told you sooner, but since you never really wear it in situations others might see them and you also don’t wear them when we have PE, I kept quiet about it.”

This was me stating a fact, not just making excuses. When Violet wore garter belts, it was like she had rules about it.

She never wore them if whatever she had on could potentially show them (they were underwear after all). That meant she’d wear them under a dress, jeans if she wanted to wear long socks for extra warmth, and even under her uniform skirt as the hem hanged low enough that even when sat, the garter belts didn’t show. She also didn’t wear them when we had PE because she wanted to get in and out of uniforms as quick as possible so she wasn’t exposing her naked body and underwear for others to see. That latter point was true even before she started dating me and that turned her body into something she felt only I could ever see in such state, further adding to her urgency in the locker room. That article of clothing would just get in the way of being as fast as possible.

“Please Abby, tell me about stuff like this sooner,” she said, holding her red face with one hand. “Your sister and dad might have been left with the wrong idea if Sophie hadn’t spoken up.”

“N-no! We weren’t thinking anything bad!” Sophie urgently said, waving her hands in the air. “Right dad?”

“Y-yeah! We just thought it was a bit bold, but that’s all!”

“R-right! Nothing wrong in wearing then even if for, erm, naughty reasons! It’s your underwear after all!”

They had their hearts in the right place, but they were making it worse. A simple “well, anyway” before changing the subject would have been better. Instead, they were making Violet’s head approach a critical mass of blood rushing to it as they were just confirming that they did get the wrong idea.

“I got these from my grandma,” Violet mumbled, feeling the need to explain herself. “She told me to wear them if socks started to sag like these ones instead of simply throwing them away. She also even bought me stockings that need the garter belts that I still have since they are so durable. I even bought a few garter belts for myself after that. I really had no idea. I even thought the looks cashiers were giving me were due to thinking that I was being old-fashioned.”

“Oh Violet… surely, you noticed that some of those garter belts were… you know.”

“Not really… I just thought it was so people could better match it with the rest of their underwear or something... Like, when you match the bra with the underpants.”

I thanked my sister and father for creating a fine mess for me to deal with and pulled Violet away, telling her not to think about it and for us to hurry up and go catch some fresh air. Suddenly, the cold gusts of wind sounded very inviting.

Another sigh escaped Violet as we walked down a street on our way back from the park, me having walked us there to see the duckies, her cheeks still a bit flushed, but that could easily be from the cold wind that sometimes blew. I didn’t think she was still hang up on her accidental “indecent” exposure in front of my sister and dad. Yes, it technically was underwear, but to my mind anyway, it was as “indecent” as a normal belt to hold your pants up. But maybe that’s because I was her girlfriend and often saw her wearing them and so, they had also completely lost the sexual connotation to me. Not that I didn’t think she didn’t look cute or sexy on them, she totally did, it’s just that I had to switch that part of my brain to go “oh yeah, that’s a bit naughty, isn’t it?”. The things people get used to.

“Better?” I asked, bumping my cheek on her shoulder to catch her attention.

“Yeah, better,” she said, a bit muted. “I still can’t believe I got so careless though.”

“Just goes to show how much out of it you’ve been the past two weeks,” I said, using this opportunity to more directly address that particular issue so I could gauge her reaction. Doing it on a street in public wasn’t ideal, but if things didn’t go exactly well, we could just walk a bit more to clear out our minds instead of being mad at each other inside home.

“I really have, haven’t I?” she hummed, knowing it was futile to try and deny it and that I’ve been very patient with her. “Sorry, I’ve just been thinking a lot about some stuff. I’m still trying to get them to a point where I can actually talk to you about them and have you help me untangle this mess though, so I still need a bit more time.”

I nodded, understanding and approving her reasoning. There was also relief as she was actually being honest about it and not put a front so not to worry me.

“Ok then, if that’s how it is, I’m fine with it. Just try not getting too overwhelmed about whatever it is, ok?”

“Fufu! Don’t worry, I won’t,” she hummed, her giggle having been something I haven’t heard in what felt like ages. She then leaned over and kissed my head, looking at me with endeared eyes. Then, her eyes rose, and she saw something that made her stop us, someone bumping us from behind that we immediately apologised before both our eyes looked over to what had caught her attention.

It was a jewellery story, old and small, with two huge, well-lit windows showing their wares, the light bouncing off of them and turning the white light golden.

“Wanna check it?” I asked, knowing she was curious. Question is, how curious was she exactly?

She twisted and turned her puckered lips before clicking her tongue as she said “no”, and getting us to walking again, giving my hand that she held a tiny squeeze.

Even though she had said no, Violet’s behaviour further cemented my suspicion that she had heard me and sis talking about me one day marrying her. It had been a playful conversation, something I said to sis half-jokingly but that still meant every word spoken. Violet must have really heard it when she got out of the bathroom. It was simply too much of a coincidence that her mood swung this way right after. It was the only possible thing.

We had talked about it before, us getting married, so I wasn’t quite getting why she was being like this. Was it perhaps because she heard me stating my intentions of becoming Mrs. Evergreen one day to sis?

Maybe.

Maybe she felt like it made it more official than our sincere but still playful banter and daydreaming. And if that was the case, she was probably complicating everything in her mind. That was my Violet after all. If my guess was truly right, I wouldn’t be surprised finding an obsessively detailed spreadsheet detailing all her plans to give me the perfect proposal, bachelorette party, wedding, honeymoon, ring, dress, legal stuff to deal with, etc…

“…Haah.”

“What’s wrong?” she asked me. “Are you getting bored?”

“Nah, I think I might be cooking up a headache,” I said, feeling a wave of affection but also exasperation towards my wifey.

“That so? Hmm, well, it’s about snack time for you, so maybe that’s just your body asking for it?”

I was feeling a bit peckish, now that she mentioned it.

As I was about to ask if we could stop by the place that sells my favourite donuts, we heard a couple of honks and someone yelling out our names. Right by us, on top of scooter, were a guy and a girl wearing helmets and goggles, both sporting matching leather jackets and jeans. It was our friends, Stephen and Mathilda, his helmet jeans-blue with racing stripes and hers, as was expected, a bright pink with a big white daisy on one side. They parked right by us, the engine of the scooter making a racket before he turned the engine off. Mathilda dismounted to hug us, not even taking off her goggles before pointing at their vehicles.

“What do you think?” she asked, super excited. “Isn’t it awesome?”

“Did he buy it?” Violet asked.

“Buy it!? No! He rebuild it!”

We let out a long, loud, impressed sound as we both nodded. That was impressive, because it looked brand new despite apparently being an old thing. I had thought it was just a brand-new model made to look like the classic Italian scooter. The chrome was chrome, the paint glossy, pearly-white on most parts and a cherry red for the steering column and side panels of the engine, not a spot of rust or even the slightest dent or scratch visible, the front and rear tyres showing a crisp white wall.

“It’s a TV Series 1 from 1958,” Stephen said proudly, his goggles now around his neck, as if it was supposed to mean anything to us. Well, it did confirm it was old, that’s for sure. “I even had to build some of the parts that needed to be replaced.”

“See! That makes it even more awesome!” Mathilda cheered, still pointing at the scooter as if she was trying to sell it through an ad.

“And you’re taking it for a trial ride?”

“Yeah,” Stephen hummed, drumming the dash with child-like glee. “And Mathilda had been gushing about some old Italian movies where she saw them riding scooters like this through town, so I decided to invite her to join.”

“You should try it! It’s so fun! I can still feel the engine buzzing on my butt too!”

“You do? Hmm, maybe I should add rubber rings on the engine mount.”

“Don’t! It gives it character!” Mathilda told him, doing the stereotypical Italian hand gesture, whether on purpose or not, I don’t know. “Ah! Pizza! Let’s go for a pizza! Bye-bye girlies!”

She hopped back onto the pillion seat, hugging Stephen tightly, his face going stiff for a second.

“Since we are stopped, could I ask you not to hug me so tightly?” he asked, turning around to face her.

“Oh, sorry! Am I hurting you?”

“Not really, it’s just… it’s a bit distracting.”

“Hmm? What do you mean?” she asked, further leaning more against him, his eyes fluttering a bit.

Violet and I looked at one another, a silent comment passing by us.

It’s her breasts.

And she was left ignorant as he turned on the engine before giving any answer and we parted ways there and then, Mathilda blowing kisses at us, having the time of her life with her secret crush.

Violet and I looked back at one another, processing what just happened.

“Should we tell her later?” I asked, genuinely curious about her opinion.

“Dunno. She’d certainly be embarrassed, but maybe she’d be a bit happy too? He does recognise her as a girl after all.”

That was our subject of conversation as we made our way to get us some donuts and a hot drink, and whether or not that had been a sign of progress between those two.

On one thing we agreed, they are perfect for one another.