Things move on.

And so do I.

before.

OIKAWA IS NOT HER FIRST KISS. Mana has forgotten who it is. She's kissed a lot of boys before, a lot of hearts have beaten with her before. But truly, Oikawa is the one she loves the most.

Kissing is just a matter of human perception. According to statistics, 90% of a child's first kiss is her mother/father. So really, it's not a matter of how you love someone so much, how you want to save it for a special someone, it's already been taken. Humans crave absolutes. That's why we dismiss the parental first kisses and label the ones with the boyfriends/girlfriends are first.

Mana hates the messy business of kissing. She just wants to get this over with.

Truth be told, she didn't expect for them to last this long. For Oikawa to take such a prominent portion of her heart.

She didn't expect it; she didn't expect him.

To be the most caring person ever, to hold her so lovingly and shower her with kisses that taste sweet every single time.

And she feels like vomiting when those same treacherous mouths kiss different treacherous girls.

Crack. Crack. Crack.

That's her glass heart breaking.

In the span of five months and a couple of weeks, Mana has transformed from lioness to pussycat. In a matter of fifteen seconds, she's become idiotic, heartbroken girl.

The most logical course of action is to ask for an explanation, but worms and insects crawl on her brain and make her vision go as dark as crow's feathers.

She wants to break up with him. She has a nasty habit of being too attached and she knows she can't get attached to a boy who's practically siphoning another girl's throat on the same day of their monthly dates.

Mana wants to rip them apart each other and tell them they're disgusting, but her knees quake when she dares make a move.

She hates this weakness.

But what she hates more is the fact that she can't make it go away. She's breaking apart- no, she's broken apart and it's too late when she realizes how awful she's become, how hopeless she's become. She's irreparable now. And all she can do is sob on her knees.

What a useless doll.

Oikawa takes her to a new venue later that day, no traces of infidelity in his features. It's a karaoke place. They order cold ramune, pocari sweat and strawberry juice. Oikawa is carrying a gargantuan amount of milk bread and Mana settles with her yakisoba bread.

She plans to confront him and after minutes of sipping the rehydrating pocari sweat, she finally gathers enough courage. But then he picks up the microphone, sings some anime theme about frogs from outer space and she bursts out laughing.

Mana decides to postpone the impending confrontation. She picks up the bowl of peanuts, nibbles on some and takes another sip of the ramune. She'd get it out eventually, right?

The time limit for the karaoke box trickles past and nears. Mana decides to get in some songs and she wonders why it's her choice of love ballads and sad songs that feels out of place. Heck, it's Oikawa who's singing about space frogs and mutated turtles, why are her cheeks flaming red?

They sing the chorus together, his hand on her shoulder, his arms encircling her petite visage. The direct skin contact flusters her but she continues singing.

She didn't notice it earlier, because she was too focused on the hilarious lyrics, but Oikawa's singing voice is definitely a cross breed of a chortling pig ready for butcher and a duck whose feathers are being ripped one by one.

Long story short, it's terrible.

Mana almost forgets the fog of sorrow that surrounds this train wreck of a relationship, but she carries on, clenches her fist, opens her mouth and then, "Tooru, there's-"

And his lips meld into hers, so perfectly and he's cupped her cheeks with his left hand and rubs her wrist with the other. He tastes so sweet and special. Something made just for her.

She's taken aback by the kiss, but it's his words that make her believe again. Believe that this relationship of fake smiles and deceptive words can be fixed.

"I'm glad I made you happy," he said. "I hate it when you feel sad. I hate it when you look hurt. I hate it when there's something wrong with you. I love you, Mana. Always believe that. I hope that alone paints a smile on your face."

now.

Mana is a self loathing creature; she hates her inability to fight, her resistance to letting go, her continuous submission to tragic events that are long past. But she hates herself the most for staying.

For clinging unto threads that are bound to snap in mere seconds.

The game is over. Not the game of tug and war, and push and pull Mana is playing with Oikawa, but the literal game of volleyball. Aoba Johsai wins, of course. Oikawa's sets are as perfect as ever, at least in her eyes. They're fast, but precise things that maximize the spiking ability of their spiker.

It's not the same for Oikawa though. Almost everybody, save for Mana and Oikawa has departed the gymnasium. The latter continously serving and each time the ball lands, she hopes he would stop because his arms are going to break.

"Tooru," she whispers, solemn she tries to take a volleyball away from him. "That's enough."

He clings unto the volleyball as if his life depends on it, his fingers red and probably aching. Since coaxing him into stopping is futile, she grabs his hands and covers his palms with hers. They're throbhing because of pain.

"It's not enough," he says. "I can be so much better, faster, stronger. That way Ushiwaka can't beat us, that way Tobio-chan won't surpass me."

Mana reaches for his cheek, cups it and looks at him. "This is your last game, Tooru," she says. "Don't you want it to be fun?"

He shakes his head, but she persists. Because she loves this boy who loves volleyball more than anything. She realizes that he truly needs her and the mere reason he's staying is because he needs her comfort too.

She comforts him, buries his head unto her collarbone and plays with the strands of his brown hair. His breathing is rasp, swift. She continues ruffling his hair until they've fallen to the floor and he's lying and she's sitting.

"Aren't you tired?" she asks softly, feeling nothing but compassion for this boy. Who has his own demons, ones he's refused to fight and ones he's conquered.

"You need to rest, Tooru," she says.

"Save me, Mana," he breathes, voice breaking. "I can't push forward anymore. I'm exhausted."

She is about to say, yes, yes she will but then she remembers her own heart breaks and despairs, the toxic thoughts that drowned her mind. The strength, weakness, everything.

"I can't," it is the only thing she says as a form of reply. He trembles on her touch, whimpering and she feels the dampness in her collarbones. The squelching sounds he's making and she holds him tighter. As if she can keep him from breaking apart.

"You have to save yourself," she says, I wouldn't be drowning now if I did.

He shakes his head and she continues to rub circles on her back. Because it's the only thing she can do. Oikawa is breaking but Mana is already broken. Glass shards that surround her will just wound him and she doesn't want that.

In the battle of loneliness, revenge is a sign of losing. It is those who help and raise others that truly win.

So Mana takes the baby steps into moving forward and doesn't hurt his vulnerable self.

"I'm not strong like you," he says looking up, eyes rimmed with red and lack of sleep weighing in on his eyes. "I'm weak."

Mana refuses to see how exactly she's strong.

"You're so strong," he says again. "And I'm so sorry for breaking you."

She freezes. He knows, he knows how her heart is shattering into a million fragments because of his infidelity. He's not blind to his wrongdoings and the pain that coats every fiber of her body.

So why did he continue to hurt her?

"Tooru... what did you say?" she asks and by then her hands have frozen on her sides and she looks certainly empty. Compassion has fleet from her body and ice cubes are the only thing that float in the river of veins.

He looks at her eyes now, a mixture of confusion and that mortification.

"What did you say?" she elucidates, hoping for an answer. This is the strong Mana he's talking about, the one that will not look back and will continue to push forward. The one who will ask the necessary questions, the one who will break free.

"I-I'm not strong," he replies. And that hope that's begin crackling inside her has diminished. They cannot let go of this if only she is willing. A coin had two sides, both were as important as the other.

She just smiles at him, at their predicament. It's not yet time but she can feel that something has changed within her. She's gathering courage. She'll well it up inside her until she's ready to let it all out. To break free.

"You're strong," she tells him, both for him and herself. Because they are and they are going to battle this together. Leave separated but moving forward.

"I believe in you," she says, kisses him.

And when they break apart for oxygen, Oikawa grins at her. She looks at him with bewilderment, to those lips and her actions make mortification rain down on her petite form.

She is about to look away when he gently cups her cheek and kisses her. This time with more passion and longing. And tongue.

"You look like you needed more," he says, conceited and she doesn't even realize that she's encircled her palms on her nape.

He brushes his nose with her, all confident and smiles. As if he wasn't breaking apart earlier. "You give me strength," he says and she likes the scent of everything about him.

She loosens her grip and moves to sit properly. She holds both his hands parallel to hers and she begins tracing the knuckles and lines and the veins. The calloused palms and the sweaty wrists, Mana holds them daintily.

"You're strong enough on your own," she says. But I'm not.

Kissing him feels like the sweetest fruits. The flavors all melded together, juicy and supple. And delicious.

But even though the taste lingers for a few fleeting seconds, it is ultimately forgotten. Left behind.

She has always carried this delusion of mending things with him, but with adrenaline pumping on her veins, Mana knows what she needs to do- what she always wanted to do. Fear has left her, no, she's left fear behind.

* * *

e n d.
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[ Supermarket Flowers ]

'sometimes, it's just better to let go.'