The Moon Bunny and the Love Letter
(A Sailor Moon and Ginban Kaleidoscope ficlet crossover)
It was afternoon break. The class was an interesting one. I was floating in that familiar afterglow of academic satisfaction. Another successful session and some of the most fascinating essays on the theme of contemporizing classic Edo Period tales yet. I enjoyed reading them so whilst correcting them. Oh, I was in my element, and the discussions in the morning session were awesome.
Samantha Ikoshuto was by far the best of my students, not only because she and I were good friends; the girl just dripped story magic. I found her reading the Manga as I slunk into my chair, the girl looked up happily at me, her signature waist-length hair hanging over her face.
How does she manage to read with those bangs in her eyes? Gomen Nasai, I digress, allow me to continue.
She smiled and simply said, "I got it, Usagi, come look!"
Sam's beautiful Eurasian eyes, extraordinarily large, filled with that look of wanderlust only the Manga could generate, a look I knew all too well, gazed at me expectantly and I sat by my friend and we lost ourselves in the enigmatic mosaic that is Manga, a Bleach Manga I think, from memory.
"Oh I love that fandom. You know, would you like to set that as the topic for the Cherry Blossom Festival essays and our group challenge?"
"Why sure, mother and I have been writing on similar themes of late Usa-chan, each night for an hour before I finish my essay writing for you and Kumi Sensei. I am also helping her translate a Chinese text, and though the linguistic nuances are a little tricky, I am enjoying it and both mother and father want me to join the family publishing business after I graduate!"
"Congratulations Sam!" said I, enthusiastically, blowing a triumphant bubble with my strawberry cream bubblegum, evoking a giggle from my fave student and non-Senshi friend. She was spirited and great fun. We told jokes and I talked about the baby. I was so looking forward to motherhood. She would light up at the mention of the baby and longed to have her own family one day.
"Of course, I need to meet somebody first, Usagi Sensei…whoops, Usagi, I know you like me to drop formalities when we're alone chatting like this, but it's a habit hard to break, you know."
I loved her banter, and if I were ever down, puking in the bathroom off the lecture hall early in my pregnancy, Sam would be the first to be at my side to help me out and make me laugh. She was not much younger than I was, or is it more appropriate to say, I was not much older than she was, no matter. We were good friends.
Shingo had a crush on her, and she was slowly warming to him and I was glad. He, Umino, Naru, and I only started meeting up at Sam's home on Friday nights as part of the Manga and Anime group in the Juuban prefecture in the last few months. We had most of our member's meetings either on campus or on-line. But it was always these more intimate gatherings I loved best. Mamoru and I would bring pizza or rice balls and sushi with other treats and we had heaps of fun.
"Usagi, you're spacing out again?" she raised an eyebrow, giving me that quizzical look. I pouted, and we both laughed.
After we finished our lunch, I decided to go for a long walk in the sun. I loved the sense of freedom the warm air, the open spaces and the fragrance of the gardens here on campus brought me.
I noticed a piece of paper caught in the rose bushes, and plucked it out of its thorny keeper's tendrils and sat to read. I hadn't given it a second thought. This was some sort of personal letter, a most touching, love filled outpouring, and I couldn't help myself, sap that I am.
So there I was, kneeling on the soft lawn, the cool grass tickling the bare skin of my knees as I began to read. Within the sanctuary of the campus gardens, I found myself moved to tears at its depth of feeling and sincerity, wondering if I could find its owner and return it. But first, I was compelled to finish it and finish it I did.
I sat there staring at the hand written letter, sighing with the sweet sentiment rising from the thin sheet that looked as if torn from an exercise book.
"Such beautiful thoughts, a guy with a heart so vast, his lover must be a very dear and special girl to be blessed with a man like this. She is like me. I am so lucky to have the best guy in the universe."
My thoughts, opening to the words of this man's proclamation of love for his girl, went back, back to those days when I was a vivacious and irrepressible teenager, blowing hot pink bubbles of Love Gum – little has changed there -- scrambling my books and other belongings into my pack on the way to or back from Juuban Junior High. I was a girl with dreams alight in my eyes.
Cuteness, this often said of me by my friends, was a natural extension of my being. Often Rei would say, "Usa-chan, you don't emulate Kawaii, it emulates you!"
Makoto would laugh , stuffing another chocolate cookie into my mouth. I would utter my incomprehensible garbled response, giggling as the crumbs flew from my lips like a benediction upon my bare thighs. I brushed them away quickly and swallowed, totally mortified as a dark and very handsome shadow assumed the shape of my then chief nemesis, Chiba Mamoru.
"Owl's eyes, that's what you have when you engorge yourself, Odango Atama!" said he , the coffee addicted thorn in my side and rib-tickling dispenser of witticisms and puns, with me on the receiving end.
But, I had to admit, he tickled my heartstrings as well as my funny bone. Truth was, I lived for his teasing, and I really did, but kept it to myself. I would simply react in kind, and hurl whatever cliché fit at the time and joust with him in mortal combat. I can't honestly remember now.
The Bunny and the Coffee Pirate, at it again, within the cozy confines of Crown Arcade, or on the street, at school or wherever our paths crossed. We thought it perfect for our little clashes.
As I often did on such auspicious occasions, as was my way, I would just poke out my tongue at the infuriating bane of my existence. But I would also wonder, why is it I feel the tight sensation in my chest, the stirring of a whirlpool of wind in my fluttering tummy.
"Baka!" I blurted.
He was mocking me, grinning at Rei – while said ‘best friend' was blushing like a tomato and giggling like a baka herself, preening like one of those gorgeous crows of hers -- those birds understand every conversation and subtle nuance as we sparred as they looked on I'm sure, most entertained.
Rei's Grandfather, in his emerald green robes, joined the gathering and bowed respectfully to Mamoru and the girls. Then winking, he did so to me and me…twice. I blushed.
"Usagi, you look well this day, and the sun agrees with you and I am glad your friends have come to pay us a visit again!" he would say, eying the girls possessively.
Taking another cookie from Rei's platter, he winked at Mamoru and placed it in my mouth, open with surprise and shock at the action.
But this reaction on my part was nothing on how I reacted to Mamoru next. The said love of my life -- not quite there at that stage, but close -- then did something I never expected of him in a millennium -- Silver or otherwise. He spoke my name, not calling me Odango Atama.
"Happy birthday Usagi. I think you will like this present."
"W-what?" I muttered dumbly, swallowing the last of the delicious cookie and he handed me a flask of strawberry flavored milk he took from my pack.
"Thank you, Mamoru ba/ I mean, Mamo-chan! Oh!" I covered my mouth, and closed my eyes. More giggles ensued as I opened my eyes again. Actually, they flew open as I sensed him close and he was looking at me as if he'd only just seen me for the very first time, and Kamis knows, I think he had.
I dared myself to fall into their deep blue depths, and thought to myself, Why not! As his lips met mine, and my arms flew up around his neck, I knew there was no going back. I didn't care. The w00ts, clapping and cheering continued as I tugged at his shirt, felt my mouth open and the taste of cinnamon and a sweet sigh escaping my lips as we deepened the kiss. I didn't care about anything else in that eternally beautiful moment.
Mamoru held me in his arms and I just said as we came up for air, "How can you be such a lovable baka and do that to me, I want to go again, you up to it, Mamo-chan?"
"I'm up to the challenge, Usagi… Err, I mean Odango/" I cut him off with another tonguey.
I felt the sensation like maple syrup flowing through my body like a hot well in my abdomen, rush through my heart, and fill my senses. Why I relived these sweet moments now, I couldn't say, likely the passions in the letter I was reading that accounted for this.
There was I, a member of staff, on campus, kneeling on the lawn reading somebody's heart. Chiba Usagi, mother-to-be, there I was, reliving my early adolescence, only days away from giving birth to Chibi-Usa. Upon reading the secret love of a heart who had found what Mamo and I had found, for this sojourner of love's highest hope, expressed the fervent wish to have his love reciprocated. I cried with the sweetness of this plea and felt a little guilty for reading it. But I knew fate meant this to be, as was the case with my acceptance of the mantle of sovereign of the whole world and beyond.
But right now, here in this sun-splashed setting, I felt honored and very fortunate to see into a sweet guy's heart, a rose of the sweetest kind.
I blinked the tears away, and as I continued to kneel on the soft grass, the scent of Sakura taking my senses I spoke aloud, "You're a beautiful guy, and I hope she realizes how lucky she is to have you…"
Letter to my Secret Love
A lifetime is a longtime to be a watcher of dreams. I thought I'd never find you. Am I too late, are the leaves that have fallen for me in my solitude – my autumn – my season be too far away from you, my beautiful Lady Spring? Will you not take the hand of the man who loves you.
I stare at the sunlight. Its refracted prisms dissolving into the silhouette of an approaching girl I thought would never love me, yet she is here by my side.
I sigh, catching the fleeting fragrance of a reality I entertained as a dream, her voice, her touch, and her company. Oh, how I love you so. She is a thought, a wish, a dream made real by the shifting of the tides that carried her to me, mere chance? I think not.
Could you love a guy like me? There is a place for you in my heart where I prepare the ground to receive the bloom of your affection. Torn apart by such distances, the stars we kissed and the moon we beheld with a secret thought, a fire, a need and a longing no amount of denial would diminish. Your eyes might not see the color of the world abounding, but I have enough sight to be your eyes, my heart -- we were meant to be.
My sweetest love -- Wise and pretty, a myriad wonders are you. You are a dancer in my dreams and imagination that longs for the softness of your voice and of your full lips. Now yours are mine and mine yours, mutual melting moments of bliss and surrender, the thorn and the rose has found her home and the bedraggled warrior a new reason to go on.
The future, we know is perpetual presence, all things are truly possible. I know that now. Thank you my love for realizing a life-long dream, to be with you.
We laugh. We sometimes spar. The tenderness of thoughts in words that yearn to be realized in the form of a kiss, to feel your warm body pressed against mine. I would allow the love to fill me to the brim, back when we were fleeting acquaintances wishing for that same radiant passion to flow between us. How I longed to feel my lips upon the soft skin of your face, stroke your soft dark tresses and lose myself in those deep wells you have for eyes.
I would sit looking into the well of my coffee cup, a life spent in search, taken down byways and alcoves, a candle dragged down to the pool of melted wax. But my light is alive and will not be extinguished, thanks to you. My flower, my smiling and lively song, my only love.
I know we are sometimes like snow and sun. The Rain falls hard upon the earth and I must grow through seasonable trials. I know this is all part of the game, the jousting and the times we are clashing, it is for the deeper things we seek. I know I may overwhelm you sometimes, but I know you love me, and you know my heart is yours.
I am not afraid to say, how much I love you, and if you had turned away, at least you would have had a moment to inhale the scent of the rose of love I bestowed upon you before walking out of my life.
A moment in time can be a gracious eternity, to remember the touching of fingertips, the suspended moment when we revealed our deepest feelings. I will always love you and stand by your side so long as you want me there.
I long so to hold you, to kiss you and listen to your soul as you bask in mine, be my flower!
Your secret love
I noticed these last words slightly blurred as teardrops had fallen, the paper was of good quality, well worn, but also well loved. I then saw the initials, Dr. C. P. L. and though the surname was unreadable due to his tears, I didn't need to see it.
The stamp of Tokyo University looked back at me. I was wide eyed at this and gasped. I knew who these people were, at least by reputation, the most popular couple on campus. Pete and his new wife, Tasuza. I felt as if I‘d intruded upon their private world, but I couldn't help myself.
And as I looked up, I saw the girl, a short and petite woman walking with her husband in my direction, the tall striking man, his eyes seeking something. I knew what it was he sought. I smiled to myself and brushed the grass off my knees and rose to greet them. I folded the paper and approached the couple.
He was still looking around when he spotted the folded letter in my hand and I smiled and handed it to him.
"Oh, thank you. I am Pete by the way and this is my lovely wife, Tasuza."
"Hi, isn't it a fabulous day?" she said sweetly, her dark locks falling over her cherry-red T-shirt, and dancing about her hips. She wore a pair of stretch jeans and her fair-haired husband sported a black leather jacket and jeans.
"Oh, it is all right about the letter, I don't mind if you read it," he said, as Tasuza squeezed his arm affectionately, her carryon opening as he slipped the letter inside. "I thought we'd never find it. You see I was reading it aloud to Tasuza and it was pulled from my hands and taken on the wind. We came back to find it, and you found it for us, thank you again."
"Anytime, I am Chiba Usagi. I too teach on Campus, English honors students, actually... I love it! Oh, and my husband, Chiba Mamoru teaches in the medical faculty and works part time in the Tokyo hospital as a specialist consultant…pleased to meet you both…"
"Thank you, Usagi-chan, seems we have much in common," Tasuza said, cheerfully.
I noticed the folded white object in her hands; it was a mobility cane. I looked then at the sweet faced woman who despite her dark glasses, had a light that saw beyond the limits of her non-seeing eyes as she stepped forward and embraced me. "Thank you for finding this for us, you see, it is our first anniversary today, for Pete had proposed to me here, and I accepted. We have decided to live here in Japan. I am a Braille and digital translator working with blind students on and off campus while Pete teaches in the Cinema and Theatrical Studies unit within the English faculty. You must come to our home," she said, warmly.
I smiled, "Mamoru and I would love to come, and thank you for the kindness."
"Not at all, Usagi," Pete said, smiling.
We set a time and exchanged contact details, said our good-byes and went our separate ways. What a wonderful and romantic encounter.
~*~
That night, whilst we lay in bed, Mamoru's hand over the bulge of my pregnant belly, I smiled contentedly. I then looked up at his sleepy and loving face, saying, "I love you so much and I know we are the luckiest people in the universe, but our new friends, Tasuza and Pete are pretty close to having what we have. Proves love is truly alive and…kicking?" I giggled as Chibi-Usa punctuated the moment with a firm reminder that she was listening in, and in days, she would be in my arms. I was truly blessed. This day a truly wonderful one.
