2026-01-11: Corrections in the Eyes of the Gods
- Log: Corrections in the Eyes of the Gods
- Cast: Yua Ijuuin, Tamaki Uchida
- Where: Alaya Shrine, Sumaru
- OOC Date: 2026-01-11
- IC Date: Sat Sep 08 2012
- Summary: After a long party, Yua convinces Kimitake to come to Alaya Shrine to inform Miho's Gods that the marriage was a sham. There, they meet Tamaki -- and when Kimitake has to step out to make a call, there are things the two women have to say to each other which they'd rather keep to the Gods' privacy, too. When Tamaki starts talking about a woman who was lost 'like her', though, Yua takes it much differently to the way Tamaki meant it, and flees the shrine before she's pressed to say anything incriminating.
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ijuuin has posed.
Ayame taught Yua how to approach a shrine -- though she didn't teach her here. (Alaya Shrine... would a Persona User come here willingly, when this place feels so awful? ... not that it's at all obvious Yua has a Persona; she keeps her Resonance tightly under control.) She washes her mouth and her hands, without Kimitake even having to prompt her; of course, he follows suit.
He's in a suit, too -- a well-tailored burgundy suit, with matching tie. Yua's wearing a Western cocktail dress, light pink at its base with sheer black fabric at its skirt and top, sleeves to her elbows. She wears a queer decoration on her right hand, fabric stretched from a ring at her middle finger over to a bracelet at her wrist, covering the back of it; and of course it is hardly the only piece of jewelry she's wearing, her wedding ring and that bracelet joined several other gold pieces, all centred around a pair of lovely pink diamond earrings -- they must have cost tens of thousands of yen!
(Miho bought them for her, when she started working, as a celebratory gift... and Yua wanted to carry something of Miho's into the lunch she attended with Kimitake, so she's put on her finest jewelry. Of course, they were all just impressed he could afford something like that for his wife...)
Despite their apparent wealth, though, they're still equal in the eyes of the Gods: they have come to pray, this evening after dinner, the night air hot with memories of summer or something worse. Yua, clapping her hands together, swears to Miho's Gods that she is Miho's wife in truth, and she is very sorry for deceiving them, and so she prays for their understanding.
Kimitake prays for... something else.
<Pose Tracker> Tamaki Uchida has posed.
As of late, Tamaki has been considering re-opening some doors she had long thought closed. Alaya Shrine isn't her final destination on this outing -- rather, she intends to travel the trail beyond it leading through Mt. Iwato. Get some exercise, do some self-reflection, enjoy nature -- you know, things of that sort! It's here that Tamaki comes across the newly-married Ijuuins as she jogs up the footpath.
Dressed in a forest-green camisole with an open long-sleeved white blouse layered over it, beige slacks, and white tennis shoes, she makes her way near to the shrine, aiming for the foothills past it, though her eyes drift in the shrine's direction as she does so.
She can't pinpoint why she thinks this, but the thought crosses her mind: Maybe some doors are best kept closed.
And yet, some other part of her rebels against this -- some part of her recently stirred up again by the memory from several years ago of seeing Miho make her claim that she would find Yua.
"Ooshi -- er. Ijuuin-san! Heeey!" Tamaki yells and waves from afar as she approaches the shrine. Immediately after yelling her greeting, she sheepishly drops her arm and shrinks back, realizing that she may have just interrupted their prayers. She clears her throat, slows her pace down to a respectful walk, then waits some distance away for the couple to finish their conversations with their gods.
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ijuuin has posed.
Yua isn't easily disrupted from her prayer; this isn't her Shinto, but she is still a religious woman, and she doesn't dare to disrespect Miho's Gods by interrupting her pleas.
It is a few moments after, then, that at length she rises -- and Kimitake straightens up, too.
Now, Yua turns to Tamaki -- smiling and waving to her. "Uchida-san! Hello!"
Kimitake turns, too, smiling to her. "Uchida-san... you're Chief Todoroki's apprentice, aren't you?" Of course he would be familiar her boss; he's an Inspector, it's his job to know more than the average beat cop.
"We were just praying after dinner," Yua explains, smiling to her. "Are you out on a walk, or were you coming to visit, too...? Oh," she adds, her hands waving merrily beside her, all curled at the elbows, "by the way, I really like your camisole!!"
<Pose Tracker> Tamaki Uchida has posed.
The peppermint scent of the aromatherapy treatment that Tamaki had undergone at Kaori just before this hiking trip may still faintly linger in the air around her. She still wears her rokumonsen choker today, too.
Several moments pass while she just has to sit and stew in the atmosphere she created with her recent display of coarse manners. Her enthusiasm got the better of her this time.
When the pair approaches, her face is still tinged with embarrassment at her volume. She starts by quietly apologizing, pressing her hands together and closing one eye, "Sorry about that, I didn't mean to be so inconsiderate. If I disturbed you, please let me know how I can make it up to you."
Tamaki bows lightly towards Kimitake. "The very one, sir! I'm learning a lot under his tutelage." Her sense of decorum could still use some work, however. "If you ever need our assistance, you can call on us!"
Somehow, it seems inappropriate to add her usual tagline: We handle everything from love affairs to ghosts! Especially not in front of a newly-married couple, and especially especially not with this couple. Tamaki casts a silent glance towards Yua as her mind filters this thought so it doesn't reach her mouth.
"Thank you!" Tamaki beams at Yua from the compliment. "A friend of mine helped me pick it out, I was just doing shopping with her earlier today in the shops around Lotus Plaza." As for her purpose here, she adds, "I was actually on my way to the mountain trail for a jog." She glances around at their surroundings, shrine and all. "I try not to stay around here too long in general. I've got a -- " Tamaki visibly pauses for a moment, searching for the right word she wants to use here. Fraught? Syncretic? Antagonistic? " -- complicated relationship with the gods, myself." Despite her words, she punctuates her statement with a bright smile.
Tamaki takes notice of Yua's own outfit. "You look gorgeous, yourself! You're both dressed to the nines, my goodness." Her eyes pause on Yua's fabric-covered hand, and for a brief moment, the smile on her face vanishes before returning. No, no, her mind's playing tricks on her, she doesn't feel any Resonance from Yua, nor from Kimitake. She chides herself to quit thinking of the Marks which Umie and Tatsuya (Suou) have and files the notion into some far-flung distant corner of her thoughts.
After that brief drop in her sunny countenance, she grins at Yua again, full-blast. "I haven't given jewelry too much thought in my wardrobe, but now I'm starting to reconsider. Are those from your husband, or ..?"
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ijuuin has posed.
Peppermint... it's so nice! Yua usually likes some nice lavender; it's how she usually smells.
"No, no, not at all!" Yua insists, waving her hands, when she sees Tamaki so apologetic over her interruption. "I was just in the middle of a conversation, that's all!" A... conversation? That's one way to talk about prayer...
"I'm pleased to see Yua-san has friends happy to see her," Kimitake adds, smiling. "So please don't feel too out of place." (Does that mean feeling like she's stepped out of her place a little is fine...?) He pauses, lightly, before he adds: "You private detectives play a vital part in maintaining order in our society... I thank you for the security you can offer the people." The people, he says.
Yua smiles, hearing Tamaki's plans to jog. "I like going on trails, too! It's so relaxing..." ... but she doesn't answer her complicated relationship, at first. Instead, she glances aside when she hears her praise over her own outfit, her fingers veiling her smiling lips. (Unpainted nails... they're short, now.) "Oh... we were attending a party," she says, with a light pause. "It was a fundraiser for heart conditions, you know...? So of course we want to look good!" Her head cants, as she makes her smile brighten, looking to Tamaki with her one eye again. "Kimi-san even bought me this nice dress! It's not my usual style... but it's very cute!!"
"Just as you are," Kimitake assures her, placing a hand at her shoulder.
Yua's fingers lift, to brush her earrings. "Ah..." She starts, looking to him; seeing the ghost of a nod, she returns her attention to Tamaki. "Everyone thought so, but really, Mimi bought me these! I was so excited to start working at my new job, and... and she wanted to congratulate me!!"
"Our cousin is very generous," Kimitake agrees. "We ought to --" But here there's a chime from his pocket; his hand drops from Yua's shoulder, as he retrives his phone. "Inspector Ijuuin speaking," he answers, and falls silent, briefly. "... I see. One moment."
Lowering his phone, he touches Yua's shoulder again, briefly, calling her attention to him. "Sorry, Yua-san, I need to take this. It's for work," he explains, as she dutifully frowns. "I'll be in the car."
"Okay," Yua pouts, as if quite put out.
"Excuse me, Uchida-san," he nods to Tamaki, once he's addressed his wife. "Please have a good evening." With that, he turns, and walks down the steps to where their nice car is parked...
... leaving Yua still standing there.
"It's okay," Yua assures Tamaki, smiling. "Even on the weekends, Kimi-san has a lot of important work to do... but hey, I'll tell you a secret!"
She leans a little closer, cupping her hands as if to whisper. "I don't really have a relationship with the Japanese Gods at all... I totally stick out here! But there was something I had to make sure to tell them, so we came by... normally, I don't pray in places like this!"
<Pose Tracker> Tamaki Uchida has posed.
Peppermint is for clarity of mind! Mental focus! Sharpened senses! It's just the thing a woman like Tamaki needs for both her professional and academic pursuits! Each scent has their purpose like so, and lavender is said to relieve stress.
Prayers are conversation! Or at least framed as one. The notion doesn't strike Tamaki as odd at all!
Something about the way Kimitake says that rankles Tamaki's sensibilities. Not the 'the people' part, no: the 'maintaining order' part. It is true, but only to a certain extent: that 'order' is what led to the ostracization of Ideo Hazama, alongside many others cast aside by society. She still smiles politely to Kimitake, but that smile stretches more thinly as he says it. "Of course. The police do a fine job of that, as well." It takes her no small amount of effort to keep her tongue still and her manner cordial. Her role requires her to remain respectable, and this is no time to make waves.
Yua's thoughts on trails and their manner of dress bring Tamaki's thoughts back to lighter things. "A fundraiser, huh?" Tamaki's own upbringing was squarely middle-class, so the lifestyles of the rich still puzzle her somewhat. "If my own engagement hadn't ended, I wonder if I would have had to attend those, as well." One thing strikes Tamaki's curiosity, and she grins as she asks, "Well, now I'm dying to know. What is your usual style?"
Miho bought her the jewelry! Tamaki's grin widens slightly as she hears that. How intriguing! "She's got good taste, from the looks of it! You know, I practice sabre fencing, myself, and I watch the Olympics when they're on, but she's on a whole different level."
Tamaki's thoughts on her own fencing skills as compared to Miho's amount to a brusque shake of her head and Nah, I'd lose.
Kimitake takes a phone call for work, and Tamaki gives him a polite bow in farewell. "Do take care, Inspector." She wonders if she'll ever reach a point where she's that busy. Right now, her time is fairly structured, but she only works part-time and her university courses come with regularity. She gives Yua a sympathetic frown. "I suppose that's how it goes. Law enforcement's gotta be rough. I don't know if I could hack it, myself!"
"Something to tell them?" Tamaki's eyebrows raise in curiosity, then she leans forward and cups her own hand to whisper, playing along with the bit by mirroring Yua's gesture. "May I ask what?"
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ijuuin has posed.
Yua does has a lot of stress to alleviate.
And Kimitake...
Well, he is a man who loves order. He is an Ijuuin, after all. "Thank you," he nods, to her, when she recognises the police's efforts just the same.
(Yua... keeps a smile on her face, when the police come up, even knowing what she knows.)
"We need to support the people who are working to make life better in Japan," Yua says; and for all her idiosyncrasies, she is an excellent performer. "Kimi-san's family are always patronising causes and events like these... it's an honour to join them!" Miho tends to patronise the arts, but that is not the only avenue crying out for sponsors. Still, Tamaki was going to marry a wealthy man, too...? She wonders; she has the sense not to ask.
"I'm fortunate to have such a lovely woman by my side," Kimitake adds, smiling.
Yua smiles, brightly, as she goes on: "I like wearing leotards! I'm always overheating, so they're the best choice, every day! Besides, if I'm in my leotard, I'm always ready to dance, one hundred percent!" She said 'one hundred percent' in English... really quite good English, honestly.
She's not wearing dancing shoes right now, though. She's wearing shoes with good ankle support! ... and compression socks.
"Mm, mm!" Yua hums, happily, her hands waving again. "Mimi's taste is the best! Oh, but you're a fencer, too?" She clasps her hands together, smile brightening. "You should come by the hall when she's practicing! I bet she'd show you a thing or two! It's this nice place in Aoba -- oh, hang on..." Yua reaches into her handbag to pull out her purse, flicking through cards, until she finds the card for the practice hall and hands it over. "Here!!"
Even if Tamaki would lose, Yua seems pretty convinced that Miho would happily give her some tips...
Yua sighs, though, when Kimitake leaves. "I don't really understand his work... but it's very important," she repeats, again.
"Well, it's just not good to lie to the Gods, you know? Even if they're not my Gods, they're Mimi's, so..." Yua answers without thinking, before she realises what she's implying, and waves her hands in front of her. "I-I mean, I totally didn't get how it worked the first time I visited a shrine and said something funny that wasn't true! But what if the Gods believed me?! I don't know if Gods joke around on the mainland, so--!!"
<Pose Tracker> Tamaki Uchida has posed.
While Yua praises Kimitake's support for various causes, Tamaki has some words of praise of her own for Yua. "True, but it's also important to give support to people who would otherwise be left by the wayside. I really admire the program you help run for students, you know?" She glances down the road. There's been a lot of high school students coming down to the Agency as of late. A concerning amount. "Making sure no one's neglected or forgotten is what I'm all about, so it's good to see you doing the same."
Yua's style is leotards, right. Tamaki remembers that now, having seen her on other occasions. "Yeah! I get what you mean, though for different reasons. I usually wear tennis shoes so I can run if I need to. And -- I wear long-sleeved tops a lot." She lowers her voice to just above a whisper. "I get a little self-conscious about my arms. Some kids teased me by calling me 'muscle freak' in school."
On fencing: "Yeah, I've been practicing -- " and then some, as Yua may recall of what Gretchen showed her " -- since middle school. I don't have any aspirations for serious competition, but it's a fun way to keep fit!" She takes the card and briefly reads it before placing it in her purse. "I'll have to take her up on that, then."
Tamaki would lose, but she would learn. As she does, and has done, over and over.
Talk of Miho and fencing reminds her of another conversation she had once. "You're also friends with Ryuuja-san, right? I remember seeing you three at that restaurant, Fleur de Lis, and she was seated by Miho at the wedding, right? She once came by the gym where I practice these days!" Tamaki rubs the back of her neck. "She hasn't come again since then." Back to a smile, she adds, "I was a little worried that Ryuuja-san had dropped the sport entirely or something, but hearing there's another hall where Miho-san practices makes sense, though! It's ... quite likely that Ryuuja-san's there, too, I take it?"
She glances in the direction of the car where Kimitake went off to. Come to think of it, what are the reasons why an Inspector might need to take a weekend phone call? "It must be, yeah," she says, if only out of politeness.
Tamaki listens to the first part of Yua's answer and raises her eyebrows again. Mimi's gods, not Kimi's, and she has a sneaking suspicion just what that lie might have been. "You know -- in my experience, they don't." (They don't joke around, that is.)
With her eyes wide, she presses her hands together and inhales sharply as she considers whether she should broach this next topic. "I think they'll understand that you do what you have to so as to not rock the boat, though," she settles with. "I've recently been wondering if I would have had to have gone through similar hoops for someone I used to -- er." She halts when she realizes she made a similar tacit admission of her own, then slowly brings up a finger as she narrows her eyes. " -- we ain't saying shit to anyone else about this, right?"
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ijuuin has posed.
"It's important to me," Yua insists, clasping a hand at her heart, when Tamaki praises her own work. "Even something like my studio... I make sure to discount my prices for students so that the children can come there, even if their parents are having trouble affording things, or -- or even if they find they have to pay for their hobbies themselves!" Yua doesn't know what it's like having unsupportive parents -- hers have always been her allies -- but she knows very well that support isn't guaranteed.
But Tamaki discloses how the children would mock her, and Yua frowns. "They used to say I was simple because I was from the country," she shares, a touch dour. "But why would anyone insult you for being muscled?! That's a great thing for women to be! Mimi looks amazing with her muscles, you know?!" Yua sure says a lot when she thinks no one's listening for that kind of thing, doesn't she?
Yua does, indeed, remember the and then some... and that, if anything, factors into her advice to seek Miho out. ... no one can fault her for angling a Persona-User into their orbit, even if she's suggesting she improve her skill with the blade, right? She brightens up, though, as Tamaki mentions -- "Recchi!" Apparently she definitely knows Ryuuja. "Yeah! She's one of my best friends! Mm, mm! Don't worry, she definitely didn't drop out!"
But when they're alone, Tamaki comes to talk about the Gods, and...
... mentions her engagement, again? Is that what she meant...? That's what she'd have to have meant, right?
Wait, but... since she slipped on her tongue, does that mean...?
Stress winds itself onto Yua's face, as she takes a few steps away to look down the stairs... to make sure no one's coming. It's only when she's sure they're alone at the shrine -- or as alone as they can be, the sacred tree of the kami is right there -- that she steps back to Tamaki, still quite tense.
"I-- I won't tell anyone," she promises, then.
<Pose Tracker> Tamaki Uchida has posed.
They're in the same boat -- Tamaki had caring parents, as well. While she may have gone through some hard times, she was fortunate enough to have the resources and support network to be able to bounce back. It's nothing intrinsic to her as a person, she figures, it was just good fortune. Tamaki smiles more softly than she usually does -- something more gentle than her typical 'go-get-'em' cheerleader energy. "I try to find ways to keep things cheap for clients, but, uh, whoof. My own finances are thin enough as it is."
She frowns as Yua shares how she was mocked, in turn. "Of all the -- that's even worse! Yeesh!" As to why anyone would make fun of Tamaki's musculature, she shrugs. "It's ... actually pretty common for girls to get bullied for seeming 'unfeminine', like having well-defined muscles. I was into several sports, though, so I couldn't really help it." She does smirk before she adds, "The one who came up with the name was my ex-fiancé. In hindsight, he was just vying for my attention, and to be fair, he did cuat it out after I gave it to him." She snickers after revealing that detail.
As for Yua's tendency to gush about Miho when she shinks she's flying under the radar: oh, Tamaki's very much taken notice of that. It's been enough for Tamaki to realize that over the last few weeks, she has often done the same thing about a certain someone else. She's going to have to unpack that later.
"Good, good!" Tamaki grins at Yua's mention of Remi. "It'd be nice if I could talk to her again, too. Seven Sisters' fencing team must have been stacked, huh? I think St. Hermelin's was still pretty good, but I'm biased." Karukozaka's fencing team, on the other hand ... well.
She didn't mean her engagement, no.
"And likewise," Tamaki firmly replies. Her expression softens. "I haven't actually had to juggle ... those concerns at the same time. I did genuinely like my ex-fiancé, but, well, our separation was some -- look, we were from different worlds, and external forces were at play, and I'd need a corporate lawyer to even begin to better understand it, myself." What she's trying to get at here is that she's bi, and he wasn't a shield in the sense that Kimitake seems to be.
Tamaki exhales out a sigh and brings both of her hands behind her head. "Before that, there was someone else. Uh." She looks more directly at Yua for a moment, averts her gaze, then pushes past her hesitation to look at her and stay looking at her. "I don't mean to dredge up any bad memories, but you were lost for some time, right? I remember watching the Olympics one year and heard Miho-san promising she'd find you. It's kind of like that,"
Through narrowed eyes and a pained expression, she averts her gaze to the road leading back to the fancy car. "Except in my case, she's been lost since then. I've thought about trying to go find her again, somehow, but ... she doesn't want to be found."
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ijuuin has posed.
"I'm very fortunate," Yua smiles, "that the Ijuuin family is supporting me. I would have quite a lot of trouble on a part-time salary if I wasn't. So please, don't be too hard on yourself for needing to charge for your services..."
She sighs, shaking her head. "Mimi was always super popular, since she came from a good family, and she was practicing for the Olympics... but that doesn't mean I don't understand." Even Yua -- the femmiest femme to ever wing her eyeliner -- remembers getting crap from highschoolers about being a fisherman, and it would have been even worse if her arms were as built as her legs. She puffs her cheeks out, though, when she hears about Tamaki's ex-fiance teasing her. "Ohhh... that really isn't very nice!"
... luckily, Yua is entirely oblivious as to how obvious she is.
"Oh, but the fencing team was amazing!" She chirps, happily. "Though Recchi was more involved with the theatre... when the drama club collaborated with the dance club, we even performed together, once!"
It's... not easy for Yua to tell people, though, even if she doesn't suppose Tamaki will tell. What she can do more easily is listen to Tamaki -- and it's a familiar-sounding story, really. "I see... it's difficult to enter another world, even if it's for someone you love," she admits, softly. "... I'm sorry it never worked out for you."
Her hand clasps to her heart, again, as she frowns; her left hand grasps over the right, covering that fabric decoration twice over.
"Mm..." Yua hums, quietly, looking to the ground instead of Tamaki, "... then you must find her." And she speaks with dread conviction, though her tone doesn't rise at all. "Or what is lost will perish, and you will have no grave left behind. What you have been told is not the truth which lies beyond what you see... there is no happiness to be found, for the lost."
<Pose Tracker> Tamaki Uchida has posed.
"Hey, don't worry, I'm not beating myself up!" Tamaki grins at Yua. "My limitations in that regard really help me to prioritize and triage."
About her ex-fiancé sticking her with the name 'muscle freak': Tamaki glances away with some measure of guilt. "It wasn't nice of him, no, but I might have teased him even worse in retaliation for it. I was kind of a little terror." She counts off on her fingers. "I called him a scaredy-cat, took him to task for gulping down all the sports drinks, pranked him any number of times -- " She looks at her hands, then spreads them out into a shrug as she flatly states, "You get the idea."
Remi was in theatre, not fencing! "Oh -- right, I think she had mentioned that, yeah! Wowww, that collaboration must have been something to watch, let alone perform." Tamaki curls a finger over her chin while she tries to imagine choreographed swordplay and which motions would strike the right balance between audience appeal and verisimilitude.
Then her thoughts turn to the possibliity of what a joint venture between her fencing club and Reiko's music club could have looked like -- and immediately shakes it from her mind like she's clearing a drawing made in the sand. Nope nope nope, thinking about that is just the mental equivalent of touching a hot stovetop with her bare hands.
Tamaki laughs with some small amount of nervousness. She smiles, but it's clearly a smile backed by false bravado. "Hey, so it goes, right? I'm still young, I've got a few years before the pressure really starts to ramp up."
She wonders: does Yua believe things have 'worked out' in her own situation, or does she still feel like she lacks something? Is she going to settle for table scraps, or does she still want to swing for the fences?
Tamaki doesn't press Yua on the matter, but she does add, "It was -- is ... definitely difficult, yeah." Whatever sympathy she can express, she tries to do so through her eyes, her expression, her body language, every means at her disposal except words: It must have been difficult for Yua, too.
...
Yua's most recent words cause Tamaki to slowly raise an eyebrow as she starts to feel the sensation of multiple conversational wires being crossed. Yua's no Persona-user (to Tamaki's knowledge), but what she says makes more sense when read through that lens than it does when she views it as the words of a dance instructor. And yet, Tamaki's own mode of conversation is firmly entrenched in mundane matters, the brief mention of Reiko being 'lost' aside.
She waves both of her hands in front of her for a moment before she speaks -- and for what it's worth, it's genuine confusion and doubt in her voice, not suspicion. "Uhhh -- hold on a second, Are we still on the same page here? I feel like I've lost the plot a little bit. What do you mean about 'what I have been told'?"
How can she assert that there's no happiness to be found for the lost? As much as Tamaki hates dealing with the consequences and the aftermath of it, Reiko made her decision of her own volition, and it's one that Tamaki can't -- won't -- fault her for.
There are several overlapping meanings which could apply to her next question: "How do you know?"
<Pose Tracker> Yua Ijuuin has posed.
"Oh, good!" Yua smiles, when Tamaki insists she isn't beating herself up.
She giggles, as well, as Tamaki insists she was a terror. "You know, it's not nice to be mean, even if someone's being mean to you!" She chides her, but it's not very effective chiding when she's giggling like that...
... but it's kind of revealing how she insists it's not good to fight back, even if she's not thinking about that angle at all.
"Mm, mm! It was 'A Midsummer Night's Dream!' I was dancing the part of Titania, and Recchi had a spoken-word role as Oberon... Mimi came and watched us all the time!" Apparently, Miho was a patron of the arts even as a teenager...
... unfortunately, Yua doesn't know there's a hot stove. If she did, she'd surely warn Tamaki away!
"It's a lot of pressure," Yua sighs, "but there are some very nice women who haven't found anyone yet, you know?" She's thinking of Ulala, and her frenzied feelings about getting married before the big 2-5... "So if you're not lucky enough for destiny, it really does come down to luck, finding the right person, I think!"
(If she's not... lucky enough for destiny...?)
... it's really hard to imagine Yua feeling destined to be with Kimitake, though. She doesn't say anything, when Tamaki echoes how difficult it is; but she looks to her, and she smiles, and there's a great weight behind it.
"... mm, she told you she didn't want to leave, right?" Yua asks, softly. "But sometimes, people have to say things... because it will be worse if they don't. Maybe that was the last time she got to talk to... anyone, outside..."
Her hands clutch each other tighter. Look closely: they're trembling.
"There was -- ah -- um, gangs? They -- they take people, um -- I'm sorry, I explained it all on that Higuma-san's show, I... I really can't..." remember what her cover story is, but she can't say that, and there's any number of reasons why it might panic her.
Any number of reasons why she might take a step back, and then another, towards the stone steps of the shrine.
"I-I'm sorry," she says, her voice tight. "I have to go --"
She turns, and she is a dancer in grace as she goes down a step in the same motion, hurrying down them as her hands hold up to either side of her. She hurries into a black car, parked on the side of the road; it is still, for a few moments, before it drives away.
Higuma's show... that must be the daytime talk show run by Hamana Higuma.
It's a lead... but does it lead to a ghost story, or an affair?
<Pose Tracker> Tamaki Uchida has posed.
Tamaki shrugs, still smiling. "It was ... mutual friendly bickering, of a sort? It did give way to affection, at least! Plus, I figured I could maybe change his behavior if I were nicer about it."
Her own admissions may also reveal something of Tamaki's own character: she's not one to let a challenge go unanswered, and she absolutely fights back.
(Not that she really had any other choice -- Tamaki is the end product of an environment which seemed expressly designed to churn out someone like her, the orchestrations of some infernal contraption. Her two choices were of two extremes: to remain as she was but remain unable to escape, or to undergo change and claw her way out, even if it meant becoming what her captor wanted of her. Sin. Punishment. Repentance. Deliverance. Salvation.)
"Oh, that's fun!" She tries to feign polite interest, but you know, she has frankly had enough exposure to A Midsummer Night's Dream in the last few weeks. That's not Yua's fault in the slightest, though, and her discomfort has to do with a different passage quoted in a recent capital-R Rumor.
Tamaki's thoughts also turn to Ulala as a pertinent example of the pressure that awaits her in the years to come. The two of them have even commiserated on this. "Yeahhhhh," she starts to agree, at least to the first part ... though she tilts her head at the second. Luck's a part of it, but one can still strategize around luck to maximize their odds, or so she'd say out loud if her thoughts weren't stuck on another part of what Yua had said: Destiny, though?
From Tamaki's perspective, the future is intrinsically unwritten, even moreso as the guardrails present in her primary school days are now absent in the adult world. Her fate is what she makes of it, for good or for ill.
Others might not have the same luxury as her. Case in point: the weight which Yua bears.
(... But does Tamaki have that luxury of freedom, really? Can she truly claim that such is the case when the path of her prior escape had already been laid before her?)
Yua provides more of her insight, and Tamaki's stare grows more cold and distant as she continues to outline a possibility that she hadn't seriously considered in Reiko's situation: coercion.
"She did decide to stay ..." Tamaki begins to say in a skeptic tone, in reply to Yua's question about how she said she didn't want to leave. Deciding to stay and wanting to leave are two distinctly separate things, and she is careful to retain that distinction in her own phrasing. It's been five years, and memory has a way of getting fuzzier and murkier as more time passes.
Would the situation have been worse if Reiko had said she wanted to leave?
No, she concludes: the two of them had won. The balance of power had shifted back in their favor, the same as it had been in the real world. The exit was open. They both could have walked out together and not looked back. Hazama had no influence left. And yet: Reiko took pity on him and decided to stay.
"... but even if I did want to find her, I'd have no idea where to even start." Whatever it was, it defies taxonomy.
Here, Tamaki realizes that Yua is, in fact, relaying what her own experience was like, not what necessarily what she surmises what Reiko's was like. Indeed, how could Yua say anything different?
Her earlier confusion and doubt visibly fade away from her expression, and having caught sight of Yua's trembling hands, understanding and apology appear in their place. "Ahh. Er -- hey, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to dredge up bad memories -- " (Funny how she has a habit of doing that.)
There she goes. " -- oh, um. Take care, Ijuuin-san!"
She had, in fact, already seen that episode of Higuma's show, but Yua's reaction just now casts it in a different light. A few moments ago, she would have thought merely the latter: an affair, and nothing more. Now, however, her guess is 'both,' though she can't exactly discern the reason why.