Maya was the first to arrive back at the flat. She was more then a little uncomfortable being alone in Ritsuko's home, especially after last night. She was unwilling even to sit down, feeling as if it was an invasion of her sempai's privacy. She settled for standing and looking out of the rear window, overlooking the small yard at the centre of the apartment complex. The tranquil waters of the small pond there offered stark contrast to the hubbub of the main street visible from the front window of the flat. From her vantage point three floors up, Maya observed a young mother with two small children, twin girls from the look of it, playing with small toy boats on the water. She was vaguely aware of a feeling close to tenderness evoked by the image but her mind was elsewhere. As she leaned on the windowsill she felt a sharp jolt of pain through her right wrist and withdrew it to her body, stifling a cry. She bit her lip as tears sprung to her eyes, gingerly examining the injured joint. Shigeru had bandaged it for her the previous evening but since then it had swollen even more and she could see bruising around the base of her thumb. Thankfully it didn't appear to be broken, but it had still taken a fairly hard knock last night. She refastened the bandage, managing to tie it awkwardly with her left hand, before heading back into her room to search for some more painkillers. Maya finally gave in to her complaining feet and sat down tensely on Ritsuko's couch, shooting a nervous glance at the clock on the wall every few seconds. Maya cast her eye over the coffee table and felt almost tempted by the open cigarette packet there, feeling a need for anything that may calm her nerves, but she resisted, drumming her fingers impatiently on her knees. She looked up at the clock again, surely more than a minute must have passed since she had sat down? Perhaps the clock was faulty, slow. She stood up once again, pacing to and from the window. She found herself praying once again that she had dreamt last night, or imagined it at least. Ritsuko would walk in as if nothing had happened and she would ask if Maya had enjoyed her night out with Shigeru and Makoto, then sempai would perhaps take a shower and they would both get on with their weekends, as two separate entities, neither knowing anything about the other they hadn't known the previous morning. What was the alternative? Ritsuko genuinely did feel the same way for her, after all, she had said as much last night, why would she lie? "To shut me up." Maya felt a lump rise in her throat as she reminded herself that she had been damn near hysterical last night, and with their lowered inhibitions, it wasn't beyond the bounds that Ritsuko's kiss was simply a tactic used to silence her. It had worked, she had been almost instantly placated by it, but for an action like that to have been taken in the sole interest of calming someone's temper was nothing short of malicious, and Maya found it hard to even consider Dr Akagi as having an ounce of malice to her name. She looked at the clock again, she had been pacing for three minutes, or so it said. "It must be slow" she muttered to herself "it must be." It then occurred to her that Ritsuko might still be at Misato's apartment, there was no guarantee that she had even left yet. Maya clapped her hand to her forehead for having not considered this earlier, she may have been waiting for someone who was not even awake yet, who may be sleeping off last night, completely peaceful. Maya picked up the cordless phone from the kitchen and glanced down the list of numbers tacked to the wall next to it. She paused only for a second to wonder why Ritsuko had contact numbers for commander Ikari's work, home and cell phones but dismissed it immediately, assuming that his contact details were issued to everyone over a certain rank. She found the number and it's speed-dial reference but before she had a chance to press the correct button down, the key turned in the lock. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ She had hesitated for a few moments at the front door, key in her hand, not really sure if she wanted to open it. What she had overheard last night had flooded her with joy, with relief, with love, the possibility of Maya feeling that way for her seemed far too good to be true but the way it had been revealed was all wrong. A slurred, loud, drunken revelation was not the confession of mutual desire she had hoped for and though what she had said to Maya last night was from her heart, there was still a chance that what Maya had said was simply a symptom of her inebriated state, at best an exaggerated expression of respect for Ritsuko, at worst the fabricated ramblings of a girl in the throes of alcohol poisoning. And what of her confession to Maya? True as they were, she couldn't help but feel that she had rushed into saying it just because it had seemed the thing to do at the time. Even if the sentiment was mutual, she wasn't convinced that she was ready to take that step with Maya yet, given more time to order her thoughts perhaps she would see more clearly whether this was what she wanted or not. After all, she was already in a physical relationship; to become involved with another person at the same time was simply immoral. But then, the dream. She had prided herself for the whole of her adult life on being a woman of science and believed dreams to have no meaning or relevance in the real world. They were to her no more than a series of chemical reactions, if she happened to feel emotions with them at the same time then it was simply a minor inconvenience for her, an unwanted side effect of the movement of potassium ions across the phospholipid bilayers of her neurones perhaps, but certainly not anything that could or should affect her life. She was more than capable of living ruled by her conscious mind alone, she was not one for allowing the flaky, unstable human subconscious to take her over. She had only woken up in tears from a dream on one occasion before, well, it had been several occasions, but the same dream, looking into a mirror and seeing her mother's face glaring back at her. Although at first it had shaken her quite considerably, she had moved on from it, passed it off as a side effect of her drive to distinguish herself beyond the reputation of her surname. Perhaps elements of the conscious life did come into dreams, Ritsuko was willing to accept that much, but found it hard to come to terms with the idea of letting them have any effect on her normal life. Still, the current situation could hardly be described as "normal". Not only that but Ritsuko still cringed at the mere memory of the feeling of emptiness and sorrow she had felt in her dream when Maya had rejected her. She didn't know for sure whether she could cope with that in the real world. She would doubtlessly be able to put a brave face on it and carry on as usual, but when it came down to it she loved Maya more intensely than she had ever cared for anyone in her thirty years of life so far. It was then that it clicked. This was her shot at happiness, and she couldn't throw it away. She placed the key firmly in the lock and opened the door, still unsure of how she was going to act.
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