Another Miracle (3)
Once Han Seoyeon was home, Ninomae hurried off to the kitchen.
When she came back, she had summoned one of the Black Goat's handmaidens, and in her hands was a slice of cake with a candle planted in it. She cleared her throat once. Then, shyly, she began to sing.
"Happy birthday to you—"
Han Seoyeon's eyes widened a fraction. The melody had long since made its way to Japan, but Ninomae was singing the words in Korean, clumsy pronunciation and all.
"My beloved Shion..."
Perhaps she had wanted, if she could, to give the blessing in Seoyeon's own mother tongue. Seoyeon never learned the precise reason. All she knew was the strange tickle rising in her chest as she leaned in and blew the candle out.
The room, softly lit a moment before, sank back into darkness all at once.
A brief rustling followed, and Ninomae's familiar switched on the light. The handmaiden plucked the candle from the cake and slipped away to throw it out. Ninomae watched her go, then carried the cake to the table and set it down.
"So, um... shall we sit?"
"Yes. Let's."
They drew out their chairs and sat facing one another.
"I, um, picked a small one on purpose. It's just the two of us, so buying a big cake would only leave us stuck with leftovers..."
An awkward silence drifted through the room, and Ninomae filled it with whatever came to hand. Han Seoyeon nodded, a faint smile on her lips.
No. This is no time to keep dithering. Steeling herself, Ninomae held out the thing that had been waiting at the corner of the table.
A flat box, no bigger than a palm. Engraved in one corner was the logo of a jewelry brand from the department store they had visited not long ago.
"This is..."
"Yes. It's your birthday present."
Ninomae let out a sheepish little laugh and went on.
"Honestly, I agonized over it. What kind of gift would actually make you happy, Shion?"
And she had — enormously. Not because Shion was particular. The opposite. Because she seemed like the sort of person who would smile and accept whatever she was given.
"I couldn't land on an answer no matter what I tried, so I even got as far as a photo of me being all lovey-dovey with Shar— with Tsunashi, or, um, the socks I wore all day through dance practice... Wait. Hold on. Could you please not make that face like you're desperately tempted?!"
"I'm not. It's only that you stimulate my tastes as an otaku and my personal proclivities one after another, and then you go and say a thing like that..."
"B-be quiet, you pervert, Shion."
Han Seoyeon, of course, received even this scolding as a kind of reward.
Ninomae sighed at the mood she had failed to set, then looked back at the box.
"In any case — may I open it now?"
"Of course."
What emerged from the opened box was the silver cross necklace Ninomae had been eyeing the other day. Han Seoyeon lifted it with care.
The arms of the cross were equal in length and breadth, and at its center a purple gem — cut so that it read as an octagon when seen from above — glittered.
"...It's lovely."
"Amethyst. Yes — your birthstone, Shion."
The chain gave a soft clink, and the silver cross, stone and all, swayed gently from side to side.
"Honestly, I went back and forth between a ruby and an amethyst right up to the very end... But I thought a birthstone would work at least a little better as a charm. Your safety comes before anything I personally wanted."
"Anything you personally wanted? You make it sound as though your own taste had leaned toward the ruby."
The explanation that followed, though, made Han Seoyeon tilt her head at the odd nuance. No particular reason Ninomae would have preferred that one came to mind. Had the design simply been a little more to her liking?
While she was still turning it over, Ninomae pointed to her own nape — more precisely, to the silver chain hanging there.
"Because the stone in the necklace you gave me was a ruby. I just... if I could, I wanted them to match. As a couple's set..."
Her cheeks flushed pink, but she fumbled the truth out all the same. Only then did Han Seoyeon realize that the necklace in her hand was of a design remarkably like the holy relic she had once given Ninomae.
"Shall I stop by the district office and file to have my birthday corrected? To a month when the birthstone is a ruby."
"Pfft — what are you even saying? Don't make weird jokes."
"..."
"...That was a joke, right?"
A peculiar little to-do followed at once. In any case.
"Here, give it to me. I'll put it on you."
Ninomae took the necklace back. The chain unspooled with a bright little rattle, the cross dangling at its end. She rose with it in hand and slipped around behind Han Seoyeon, undid the clasp, and looped it about her neck as if drawing her into an embrace.
Over her shoulder, she looked at the cross lying against Seoyeon's chest. The purple amethyst glittered under the fluorescent light. Then she turned her head, left a light peck on Han Seoyeon's cheek, and drew back with a bashful smile.
She pulled out a chair and sat — not in her old place, but right beside her this time. She stayed there a moment, then scooted the chair in, closing the distance, and smiled as if she were up to something.
"Hwah—?"
Han Seoyeon had been staring at her in a daze. Now, as if she could bear it no longer, she caught Ninomae up in a sudden embrace and pressed her mouth to the nape of her neck.
"And where, exactly, did you learn a move like that?"
"Who knows. I thought of you, Shion, and it just... ahn."
Han Seoyeon kissed her neck again. This one was deeper than the last, and it left a faint red mark on the skin.
Then she caught the chain of the necklace Ninomae was wearing lightly between her lips and tugged. The cross slid out from under her clothes with a smooth whisper.
"Shion...?"
"Since we've matched them as a set, how about a commemorative photo, at the very least?"
The moment Han Seoyeon opened her mouth, the necklace clinked free, fell, struck Ninomae's chest, and bounced back up. There was a split second in which to admire that particular spring — but Han Seoyeon had already decided the question came first.
A picture of the two of them wearing the necklaces together. Ninomae considered it a moment, then nodded, leaned in toward Han Seoyeon, and took out her phone. She raised it and shot from a slight downward angle, then lowered the camera further and took another, this time keeping their faces out of the frame.
"And the second one?"
"It's for social media. I'm still not sure I'll actually post it, but for now."
So saying, she turned the photos this way and that. Nothing was wrong with them — the focus hadn't slipped, or anything of the sort.
"...Huh?"
Before long, though, something felt off, and a puzzled sound escaped her. She lifted her head and looked down at her own chest.
The center of the cross. The gem set there was glittering, washed in purple.
"This... wasn't red?"
Faced with necklaces that had, out of nowhere, become a matching pair, Ninomae could only stare, dumbfounded. Han Seoyeon watched her, thought for a moment, and spoke.
"A miracle."
"A miracle?"
It was probably not a figure of speech. An Apostle would never use that word lightly, so she had to mean a miracle in the religious sense.
"But I don't even have a religion...?"
"What matters is not what one believes, but how. It is a matter of a yearning heart."
"...That sounds like the one thing a Christian cleric should never say."
Ninomae was turning the purple-dyed gem over between her fingers. To her, Han Seoyeon explained in a perfectly level voice.
"In other words — a miracle born of our hearts wishing to be together. Shall we call it that?"
"H-hwah?! You really do come out with the most embarrassing things..."
"...? Is it not the truth?"
"I-I wouldn't say I was thinking about it that passionately. No, it is true, it's just, um..."
Forget it. Ninomae abandoned the useless excuse at once and smiled. For now, she would simply be glad their hearts had reached each other.
"In any case, thank you for the gift, Ninomae. Thanks to you, this will be the happiest of birthdays."
"Ahaha, if you're that happy, then I'm happy too. Yeah. I'm really glad."
She said it, and smiled brightly all over again.
But not much time passed before her expression turned strange once more.
"Ninomae? And what is it this time?"
"Um, well, it's just... actually, there's still one more part of the birthday left. Maybe..."
It was something she had only ever turned over in her head. A fantasy she had planned, then put away, telling herself it would be better simply to let it pass. But seeing Han Seoyeon this happy, the idea she had buried so deep began to creep its way back up.
A longing to give her still more joy. A yearning to offer up more than she already had. Or perhaps only an impulse born of having already blown well past the hour she usually fell asleep — a little drunk on drowsiness, and so ready to take one step further.
Pressing down as best she could on the tickle of whatever was stirring in her chest, Ninomae carefully opened her mouth.
"The necklace I gave you, Shion. Would you look at the side of it?"
"The side?"
Puzzled, Han Seoyeon followed the instruction all the same.
"From Tep— no. Tepes."
And so she found the words engraved along its flank.
"Yes. That one is a gift to Sister, from me as Mary Tepes. My usual thank-you."
It was an utterly obvious thing to say. Ninomae was Mary, and Han Seoyeon was Sister. But the very fact that she bothered to spell something so obvious out only made it clearer that the words were carrying another meaning.
"So... this is the gift I'm giving to Shion, as Ninomae Hitomi."
With that, she made as if to rise from the chair — then turned and hopped. She set her hips on the table and perched there. The height left her looking down at Han Seoyeon as a matter of course, and though her face flushed with embarrassment, she went on.
"Um... the thing is. Actually, while I was waiting for you to get here, Shion... I washed my legs. Clean. Yeah. So it's all right, I think..."
"N-Ninomae?"
The tips of Ninomae's feet tapped lightly against Han Seoyeon's forearm. Seoyeon looked thoroughly thrown — though Ninomae was hardly any better off. She turned her face aside, red as a beet, and yet her eyes stayed fixed on Han Seoyeon's reaction.
"I-if it's only for today... it's all right if you lick my legs...?"
A gulp. In the house, late at night, Han Seoyeon swallowed.