Takashi has been doing a reasonable job of keeping the feelings at bay long enough to get work done - for various meanings of the word work - but that kind of came crashing to a halt with the first day of school. Because he shares homeroom with Madoka Kaname - and that brought emotions and feelings roaring back to the surface of his heart with a brutal force.
It's why instead of going home, Takashi wandered the streets, hands in his pockets, in a very unlike him way. Still trying to think his way out of the little pocket he found himself in.
When he passed by the automatic doors of the Game Center Crown, they opened, and the noise actually somehow got his attention, pulling him out of a stupor.
So he went inside, thinking maybe a milkshake - or a chess game, if the right person was there - would do wonders for his mind. But the booth Ami would be in was empty right now - and he didn't feel like /calling her specifically/ so he's just stopped and sighed as he looked at the clearly empty bench.
No such luck. The look on his face is clearly the look of someone who's got more on his mind that a missed opprotunity to lose at a game of chess.
It's times like today that Usagi really wishes being 'SAILOR FRIKKIN MOON HECK YEAH' would actually help with the whole school thing.
She always forgets about the feel of impending doom the night before, the dread of the morning of, and just how UG SCHOOL the day is.
So she's at the crown with the sheer determination to find the answers to all her woes at the bottom of a milkshake glass. Several, in fact. (She is now bringing back her third, which is why the booth is empty! At least until she sits down.)
As she takes a long sip, full of ineligance and a distinct lack of grace, she looks up and spots Takashi.
She nearly snorts the shake out of her nose! Owie, brain freeze! Ug! The Dark Kingdom brings no pain quite like this!
Still holding her head, she looks up at him again, all wide Bunny Eyed.
"Were you thinking about sitting here? I'm sorry, I should have made my place holder more evident!"
She picks up her purse from the booth and plops it on the table.
But that could be seen as rude!
"B-but! You can still sit here if you want!"
Milkshake slurp.
Takashi looks up. Takashi sounds very distinctly not-quite-like hismelf - if Usagi recognizes the arrogant little **** who fought Apatite and refused Mamoru's healing.
"Sorry." he says, quietly. "I was kinda hoping somebody I know was here... unless you think you want to play a game of chess." he says, managing a kind of sad half-smile out of his own joke. Because Usagi does not look like the kind of girl who plays chess - just... a hunch Takashi has.
"No, it's alright. I didn't see your purse because I wasn't looking for it." he adds. Also because it wasn't BLUE and BLUE is a really easy color to focus on looking for. "I think I'll just grab a milkshake and go home."
Usagi blinks at him while he speaks. Not out of rudeness, she's just very busy with her milkshake!
Hmmm. Someone who sits here. Chess. The guy who fought Kyouko and refused Mamo-chan's hea--
"Ahhhh!" She points at him in recognition. But then she's sipping her milkshake again. And giggles. "Nope! I don't play chess, I just watch it!"
She feels warm and floaty just thinking about it! "Their faces get so intense and passionate and I just love it!"
She is, of course, talking about Ami-chan and Mamo-chan.
Speaking of. Slurp slurp. "I hope you're feeling better! Ami-chan was worried!"
Takashi looks up. She makes a sound of recognition, but then she's slurping down milkshake. And he waits, and she explains, eventually."Oh. Yeah, that's who I was hoping to see." he admits. "I... yeah, a little intensity over something like that would do wonders for getting my mind off what I'm thinking about." he says, as he stands at the booth for a moment. But Usagi /did/ say he could sit if he wanted.
Sitting sounds good right now, and so he does. Leaning back - nope, definantly slumping.
"Yeah, she was worried for like two days." he admits about Ami-chan. "I told her I'd be okay but I guess it's not easy to believe me when I'm falling all over myself." he adds, smiling a bit again.
Slurp slurp slurp.
Yay, he's sitting! And he still looks sad...
Slurp. Contemplate. Slurp.
"Ami-chan's probably doing next week's homework." This is a Statement of Probable Fact, not a jab. "But I'd love to watch that game!"
Wait. Would watching an Ami-Taka chess game be like cheating on the Ami-Mamo chess games?
She decides not!
And then she gets a little sad, of course, because she remembers who attacked him. "I'm sorry for what happened. I know he would be, too. He's just not himself right now, promise!"
Sad slurps of the milkshake this time.
She studies him for a moment and tilts her head. "What's wrong?"
Takashi laughs. "It's probably less exciting than you might hope. I've only beat her once - I'm still learning. Usually it's just us talking while she slowly beats the crud out of me."
It's taking Takashi longer to place the odd familiarity of this very happy girl than it did her - because he was busy getting hit by a pole a lot at the time. But when she brings up being sorry for what happened, it slowly connects.
"Oh, you were the girl who was snogging Chiba-san while he was watching me get clobbered. Which, in retrospect, makes the whole... oozing with Dark Energy and punching me thing more understandable." He's figured quickly if she knows Ami and Chiba, and knows he's not himself, she probably has an in to magical things and might get the conversation. It's also clear from the tone in his voice and the way he says the words he's no fan of Usagi's beloved.
She tilts her head and leans in a bit, and he answers, too. Vaguely. "I'm just trying to figure out if I did something wrong to someone, or if I did the right thing and it just feels bad anyways."
Usagi shakes her head. "Nope! It would still be interesting! And during the boring bits, I'd probably just eat something, so win-win for me!"
Slurp slurp---
Blush!! "Excuuuuuse me, we were only 'sweetly kissing' because someone said they didn't need our help!" HRMPH! The nerve.
And then! Oh! And THEN! Hands slam down on the table, and her almost empty milkshake glass topples over. She ignores the spreading ice cream drink because this is more important!
"It does not make sense! That's not who he wants to be! He didn't have a choice!"
Oh, heh heh. People are staring...
Blushing slightly, she sits back down to slurp her milkshake aga--
Awww, it's empty! Sad Bunny Eyes at Takashi.
And even though he just insulted the BESTEST PERSON EVER, she's still curious and concerned. "How so?" Because there are many ways something like that could occur. "Was the someone a friend? Or...you know, a friend?"
"That was a little more than sweetly kissing." Takashi says, a bit amused at her sudden and dramatic reaction. Even in his lows, something about him just likes to push buttons.
And then she's up and being dramatic. This earns a grand total of a single eyebrow raise from Takashi. "Yeah, well he was kind of a jerk to me long before he walked up to me and punched me in the face, although that didn't help my opinion of him. The first time we met..."
Takashi stops there, though. Not because of angry Usagi, blushing Usagi, or sad eyes Usagi - but because the first time Takashi and Mamoru met was when he cut in on the dance he'd gotten with Madoka. And then she shifts from her moment of sadness to her concerned question, and he takes a moment to follow it up. "Well, she was my girlfriend up until that, yeah."
Her blush deepens. "Well...He had to keep me occupied somehow. Otherwise I would have disregarded your wish and gotten punched myself! So there!" She sticks her tongue out at Takashi.
Her eyes grow sad, maybe with a hint of fondness. "Well of course he was a jerk. You're not the only one he was a jerk to, you know. But...he's also not really a jerk. It's..." Mamo-chan not knowing how to people? "But if he really a jerk to you, he probably had a reason."
She listens thoughtfully, tapping her chin, before standing up. "Stay right there. School started today, so I can't think without a milkshake."
She gets herself the same as she had - strawberry cheesecake! - and gets him one, and her revenge against his Low Mamo-chan Opinion is not asking what flavor he wants, huehuehue!
Back at the table, she slides his - plain boring strawberry, sweet revenge! - toward him before slurping her own once again.
"If you want, you can tell me as vague as you want about stuff, and I can try to help!"
Takashi isn't sure how to react to Usagi, for a lot of reasons. (He is probably not the first person to feel this way about Usagi.) Her mood differs from his own, and she's rambling a bit, but it's almost infectuous, or at least a shelter from the rampage going on in his own emotional state.
"Well, I'm sure he thinks there was a reason." is about as much of a concession as she's going to get out of him on wether or not Takashi too might have been a jerk.
He looks at the stawberry milkshake with an almost questioning glare before tasting it and discerning it's 'ok' - one day someone will get him a proper vanilla shake! One day!
"Well, I kinda came here looking for a way to not think about it..." he says, trailing off. "..I was doing really good until classes started up again, but she's in my homeroom."
He sighs a bit, leans back - and actually gives up a little information. "I broke us up. Because... It'd be wrong to say I wasn't happy around her, because I was. I'd even go to her when I was upset. But at the same time, there was... I dunno, something missing maybe? That sounds ridiculous, though. She went to a lot of trouble for me, and she was really great."
(He really isn't. Fate or destiny or whoever probably knows that's likely why it took six months for Mamoru and Usagi to actually get together.)
Feeling slightly victorious and mildly appeased, Usagi leans back in the booth, nose tilted somewhat. "I have no doubt he thinks he does!"
(Well, sorry, Takashi! She would have asked if it weren't for VENGEANCE!!! Maybe the next milkshake, if you don't tick her off too bad, will have that asking! And then you can have your vanilla!)
Her eyes are sympathetic when he talks about wanting to take his mind off of it. She leans back forward, fingernails tapping the glass, but this time she doesn't slurp. She doesn't even sip. "If you keep forcing yourself not to think about it...sometimes it becomes the only thing you can think about. And if you don't try to talk to someone about it, it just festers." Experience. She has this.
She looks up at him when he speaks again. The look she has isn't that of someone thinking it's ridiculous. "The missing thing. Are you happier with it, or with her?" She looks down at her milkshake again. A delicate sip. "I'm gonna tell you something, and if you make fun of me, I'm going to cry and people here will think you're the biggest jerk in the world." Another sip.
"If I knew...that he wanted to be there, that he chose to be there, it would hurt and I'd be very sad for a very long time, but I wouldn't try to get him back. But I know he isn't happy there. He didn't choose it. And the person he is now isn't happy there." Another sip. "Soooo. I'm getting him back. And even if he stays who he is now, and I'm not what makes him happy..." She looks up, and her smile is watery. "I'd be very sad and probably cry a lot, but at least he'd be happy."
Slurp slurp.
"Basically, I think if you love someone completely, their happiness is the most important thing in the world. And if you're missing something when you're with them...maybe...it's not that kind of love. Or maybe it will be one day, but not today."
Takashi actually listens to Usagi - partly because of the explanation she opened with. "Yeah, it seems worse today than it did when it happened." he admits. "I can only think it's because I kept putting off dealing with it."
Takashi tilts his head a little bit, drinking from his (really not all that bad) milkshake. "Well, it's not like I had a thing and then chose between them. It's just more like... there were things that made me know... it was probably not going to work out. Personality differences." He says. But then he looks into his milkshake, which has apparently suddenly become verrrrry interesting.
"And I was starting to feel like I was with her only because it made me feel nice, but it wasn't about being with her and just about me, and I felt like that wouldn't hold up." he admits.
Slurp.
"So of course now I've got nothing AND I feel bad that I wasn't satisfied with what I had at the time. And you don't know me, but trust me, that's not a very 'me' thing to feel." he adds.
Usagi nods. "It's kind of like tests! Put studying off, and BAM! out of nowhere, it's the test, and all you wanna do is throw up!" Never mind tests usually have well-in-advanced scheduled days.
"Was it the kind of personality differences that would make you clash, and not sort of...smoosh together even more than if you were similar?" She doesn't, of course, mean anything untoward by 'smoosh.' In fact, she doesn't even notice if it can be taken that way.
A chin tap. A slurp. "I don't think that would either, in the long run. I think it's gotta be...like I said earlier, you want their happiness more than your own. And you want to live up to who they see you as or who you can be. And it's okay if you didn't feel that with her. It doesn't mean you don't like her. It just means...if she feels more for you than you do her, you did a very good thing by saving her that heartache, you know what I mean?"
Slurp!
Ug empty...
"Just a sec." Wait. He hasn't said anything bad about Mamo-chan lately. That deserves...a REWARD! "What kind do you want now?"
Takashi... has to look at Usagi for a moment. And stare. And then finally take a drink of his milkshake. Because the thing she says about /tests/ doesn't make any sense to him, and he has to spend real brainpower turning it into anything that's logical or workable.
"I think so. Or, maybe they would've worked for other people, but not for me..." he adds, trailing off. Madoka's talked about her own parents enough to think of them in that analogy.
The idea of putting someone else first is alien too, but he can at least accept that - it's somehow less alien to him than being concerned about academics. "I'd like to think I did the right thing." he admits.
"I'm pretty sure I did, actually. So I guess I'd like to /feel/ like I did the right thing. Feeling and knowing are very different for me, sometimes."
Takashi looks at Usagi, then back at his milkshake. "I'm good, but thank you for this one." he says, pointing at it. Then looking at her collection of empty milkshake glasses. He actively chooses to be polite about it, since she is being helpful to him.
Usagi is blissfully unaware of Takashi's confusion over her analogy. After all, everyone knows tests are scary.
Usagi nods in thought. "Maybe you're the type more comfortable with someone more like you. Or maybe you haven't met the right kind of opposite, yet."
Usagi swallows her latest milkshake sip, gasping at the sudden onslaught of brainfreeze! "I think you did, too."
Usagi thinks about things again. Some more. Pondering. As she does, that's when she's getting her next milkshake. And notices the look. "I have a fast metabolism. And I'm a growing girl."
A few minutes later, another milkshake. And a basket of fries, which she scoots between them before taking one for herself. And dips it in the shake. Oh so yummy!
"Feelings can be very confusing. Maybe...would you be satisfied, you think, knowing she has a better chance at being happy in the future now?" Fry dip. Chew. Swallow. "And feeling and knowing are almost always different. Like, I know he deserves someone better, right? But I feel I belong with him." She shrugs and sighs, and concentrates on a few more fries. "I guess it's normal, to have those get jumbled in your brain."
Takashi nods at, well, at least some of the things Usagi says. Sometimes, it's like she's got a real handle on what's going on. Other times, he thinks she's... well, not so much. But loathe as he might be to admit it, just having someone to talk to is nice.
"Or maybe just more like me, if not exactly - I guess it was like..." he pauses and smiles a bit at the reference. "Like trying to make a puzzle peice that's almost right fit. It doesn't work. You still have to find the right one. Close isn't good enough." he muses.
"Also, you know - you can drink that a little slower and not get a brain freeze. Or try to keep it from hitting the roof of your mouth - it's the nerves there that send the feeling to your brain." he adds, lapsing momentarily into his more standard know-it-all routine. When she returns, he takes a fry for himself (but it doesn't meet milkshake.)
"Well, I don't know. I hope she ends up okay. She's a wonderful girl and she really does deserve that?" Another fry, curiously dipped into the shake now. That's an odd taste! "I think you're right, and it's been the difference of those two that's causing me the trouble."
If Usagi were aware of Takashi's occasional advice on her (admittedly somewhat limited) advice on love, she'd give him such a sharp hmph! But fortunately, she doesn't.
As she takes another sip, this time sans fry, she blinks at him. Very insightful! And she's nodding as she swallows. "Yes! And eventually, the right puzzle piece will be found. But if you're too worried about the one that didn't fit, you may not realize it."
Now it's her turn to be confused by him. "Well...I know. Not the nerves in the roof of my mouth bit. But this here is my favorite flavor, and I just want it more and more. The flavor is worth the pain." She perks and snaps her fingers. "Oooo, that's a good love analogy."
She watches his fry dipping. "It's the salt and sweet. It's yummy."
Then she grins at him! "That's what I mean! See?" She what, she doesn't say. "And maybe your feelings will catch up to your logic. Sometimes emotions can take some pretty heavy bruises, even if they're self inflicted."
Takashi grins. The analogy about puzzle peices does have some strength to it. "Right. You have to let that one go where it belongs too - even if it was close - because it wasn't right." He's waving a fry at her a little bit before he finally eats it as he talks.
Takashi manages to keep his commentary about 'the flavor being worth the pain' to a small eyebrow raise. "Yeah, I think I knew we were not going to go very far when I didn't want it more and more. I tend to like doing everything to... high levels."
Takashi (finally) drinks the last of the milkshake Usagi brought him. He nods a bit. "This has helped. I don't think there's a magic wand that can be waved here, but it's been good to talk about this a little bit." he admits. "If you see Ami-chan before I do, thank her for me again, would you?"
"And your boyfriend's still a jerk, but I wish you luck in getting him back to his pre-darkness jerk levels." he adds with a bit of a smirk. Yeah, he's feeling better enough to poke at Usagi's weakpoint as he starts heading home.
Her eyes widen at his parting poke, and the straw drops from her mouth.
Instead of getting angry, probably as expected, she gives a grateful smile.
"Awww, that was so sweet of you to say! Thank you!"