Big Hero 7

Chapter 5 - Importance

Chapter 5

(Hiro’s POV)

                I was late. Akira was waiting for me to pick her up from the academy and I was late. Oh, and to add to my stress, it was raining. I had Baymax wait back at my house and I was racing down the streets of San Fransokyo on my bike. Almost there!

                I skidded to a halt in a puddle by the stairs. And there she was. Akira was sitting on the steps in the downpour without an umbrella. She was getting absolutely soaked waiting for me, and here I was being late. What a great friend I was.

                “Akira, why are you sitting in the rain? Nevermind, just get on the bike handlebars. Let’s get out of the rain before the lightening starts.” She nodded and carefully felt her way over to me and climbed up onto the bike with me. I put my cheek to her side so I could see around her as to not crash. I pushed off and began to ride back to Aunt Cass’ café, only to realize that I my cheeks were warm and reddened by Akira’s waist to my left cheek. I shook the thought off and continued riding. “You okay, Akira?”

“Mmhm. Sorry.” She laughed innocently. “Was just daydreaming.” I pulled up to the café and slowed down. She hopped down and waited next to me and I hooked my bike to the bike rack. “So this is your house, Hiro? Café downstairs and home upstairs, right?”

“Yeah. This is it. Here, I’ll help you in,” I placed my hand on her shoulder and guided her into the café. It was too early for it to be opened, so Aunt Cass was still upstairs. “We need to go up a flight of stairs.” Akira nodded and I walked slowly up the steps with her, guiding her each step. She had grown to trust me quite a bit. I shared the death of Tadashi and my parents with her, and she shared the story of her parents putting her up for adoption and her adoptive mother, Lyn, taking care of her. The only thing I hadn’t shared with her was my hero side. But that was what I planned to show her today. Everyone else would be downstairs in the garage to assist in telling Akira in an hour. For now it was just the two of us. My face heated up again at the thought and I shook my head. What the hell, Hiro?! Get it together! What’s been wrong with you the past week?!

We made it upstairs and Cass turned around from the kitchen counter. “Oh, Hiro! You and Akira are absolutely soaked!” She scolded. Baymax came barreling down the second flight of stairs with towels.

“This will dry you off. I will also heat my exterior to warm you.” He handed Akira and I the towels and hugged us both tightly as he turned his heater on.

“Thank you, Baymax.” Akira giggled.  Aunt Cass walked over to us.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Akira. Hiro talks about you all the time. And now I can finally meet you. I’m Hiro’s aunt. You can call me Cass or Aunt Cass. Either works.”

“Cass!!!” I gave her a ‘you’re embarrassing me, shut up’ look.  Akira blushed shyly and held out her hand to Aunt Cass. They shook hands and Cass went back to cooking.

“It’s nice to meet you too, Cass,” Akira replied. Akira took her ponytail down and let her damp hair fall over her shoulders. Baymax let go of us and I placed my hand on Akira’s shoulder.

“I’ll bring you up to my room until everyone else arrives,” I explained. She nodded and let me bring her to my room. The moment we got in with Baymax, she, almost obsessively, began feeling the walls and the objects in my room carefully and slowly. Her lips opened slightly (something I noticed she did when she was completely focused on something). I laughed loudly. “Akira, what are you doing? You don’t need to memorize the layout of my room.” She looked towards me blindly.

“Hiro… You’re important to me. You’re my first and best friend. You mean a lot to me. Unlike most people, I can’t look at my surroundings and know them instantly. I have to pick and choose what I memorize by touch because it takes a while.  I only memorize what’s important to me. Because you’re important to me, the things that are important to you are also important to me. That is why I’m making sure to memorize every detail of your room.” She looked back to the wall and continued. I blushed again. She said I’m important to her… I glanced back up to be entranced by the way her hands slid across each and every detail of everything on my wall.

“Thank you… You’re important to me too, Akira.  But ,” I laughed. “The room itself has no real meaning to me. You’d be better off learning specific objects.”

She stopped and turned to me as I sat on my bed. “Like what?”