What we once were

Chapter 13: Foodless picnic.

Current day:

"So what was it?" Tenzin asks me.

"Hm?" I turn my head to meet his eyes.

"You said you wouldn't stop until you find out, so what was it?"

"Oh, I have no idea." I laugh "I did like, some pretty impressive detective work for a 17 year old, even got some advices from Mako, But Asami was a bunker when she wanted. I only have a general idea of why things escalated between them, but that's about as far as I got."

"So what was your general idea?"

"Spoilers."

He laughs and shakes his head dismissively.

"What? I got pretty into that story telling." I cross my arms and lean backwards in protest.

"No, please, by all means–, continue." He gestures me with his hand.

"So, the next couple of months went by with me trying to find out two things about Asami: the first being if her father is an abuser, the second being whether or not I have a shot with her. I kept postponing the telling her part, because I was a coward teenager, and also because I focused mostly about her family dynamic. I somehow managed to both keep my sexuality and my crush on her a secret, or at least I think so, if she did know, she said nothing." I sigh.

"About halfway through my junior year, things began to escalate even more. She barely hang out with us outside of school, and when she did, it was usually somewhere far enough so that there would be nobody that could recognize us. Her father would call a lot, demanding that she comes home, and she complied. She never acknowledged that something was different, always assuring us that everything was alright and we have nothing to worry about."

_______________________________________

5 years ago:

"I got an answer from Republic city university today."

"You applied to Republic city university?" I ask her curiously.

"Yeah!" Her eyes lit up "It's a reputed institution, and they have a great engineering program, also I'll be close to you guys, so we could keep in touch and see each other really often."

"Will you still live in the Sato estate?" I ask curiosly and lean on my hand.

"Fuck no." She shakes her head and laughs.

"Huh, why wouldn't you still live in your big ass mansion? I bet it's better then the dorms the university offers." I try to push her further into telling me anything about her life at home.

She shrugged "I need independence is all, also it's part of the experience."

"And that's it?" I push more.

She thinks for a moment "I need a place to bring girls to?"

Not. Jealous.

"And that's it?" I repeat.

"Uh," She blinked in confusion "yeah? I mean, do I really need so many reasons to make this insignificant desicion?" She laughed.

I sigh, letting it go for the moment, "so what was their answer?"

"I got in."

I snort "That's it? They didn't offer a genius like yourself a full scholarship or something?"

She shrugged "I didn't apply, I don't need a scholarship, they should give it to someone who can't afford an expensive education like that."

"Awww, you are so sweet!"