Futaba had a small problem. Occasionally, her mind would wander(specifically, to thoughts of a certain attic dweller), and she would misclick and accidentally open an app(specifically, the bug on the attic dweller’s phone that gave her free reign of his data) instead of her internet browser. Usually, this wasn’t a problem. She would do her best not to parse any of the contents and just close the app, feeling a little guilty for the intrusion of privacy. After justifying to herself that she needs to keep an eye on him--”This could save his life one day, after all!”--she would continue about her day as if nothing had happened.

It was after a visit to Akira’s room that this accident happened again. After reconnecting with Kana, Futaba had asked him to pat her on the head… even after returning home, she couldn’t stop herself from fixating on the memory. How gentle his touch was, the warmth from his hand, the way his fingers got caught in her hair as she jumped away… The memory replayed itself over and over, causing no small amount of distress to her racing heart.

She tried not to look as the app flashed open, quickly showing her a feed of Akira’s recent texts. Futaba raced her mouse over the X, but before she could click, something caught her eye. And once she saw something, no matter how brief the glimpse, she could never forget it.

It was a text conversation with Ryuji, on the date of the school festival. The message was a question with no context: “What’re ya gonna say?!” Futaba recalled Ryuji mentioning that Akira got shoved onto the stage at the school festival… this message must have been from then. Though that detail was irrelevant to Akira’s reply, and the source of Futaba’s quickening pulse.

“I love Futaba!”

Her face ignited and her mind buzzed with so many thoughts, it was like the white noise of an old disconnected TV. Love? He loved her? Did she love him? With all the Phantom Thieves work, she hadn’t had much chance to think about it, but the growing urge to scream in joy seemed indicate yes. She loved him! And he loved her! Wait! Did he?! Why did he send that message in the first place? She tried to collect her thoughts and rebuild the scenario in her mind.

Ryuji said that Akira got called onto the stage, right? So, Akira must have been asked a question, which prompted the text… probably a “share-a-secret” kind of thing, right?! And then Akira responded… with… in front of all those people… D-Did he really intend to say that in front of a crowd of people?! Oh! Could it have been one of those “I have to tell the world!” kind of scenarios? Did he really feel that strongly about her?!

The rapid pounding in her chest and the heat from her cheeks intensified to the point of drowning out her thoughts. Reality gave way to fantasy as her mind filled with image after image… holding hands… going on a romantic dinner date… cuddling as they watch a movie… a tender kiss in the moonlight… and... and then…! Futaba, moving for the first time in several minutes, covered her face with her hands. Just a few months ago, she couldn’t even leave her house… and now, she was face to face with a romantic encounter! It made her so happy that she felt like she was going to cry!

Hold on, Futaba, she told herself. You don’t even know for sure. Don’t get ahead of yourself. She took a deep breath, and though it did little to calm her beating heart, she was able to clear her mind ever so slightly. Tomorrow, she decided. Tomorrow, she’d go to Leblanc and talk to him about it--he should be around since it was a Sunday. The hour was late enough that she could sleep, if she really wanted to. Best to get to tomorrow as fast as possible, she surmised as she climbed into her bed. Just… conk out and move on to tomorrow.

After much time and effort, Futaba arrived at her destination of “tomorrow”, if not quite a bit late. Her sleepless night had been consumed by 97 different fantasies(and a rapid expenditure of energy so her body would finally go to sleep). Of those, half of them were things she couldn’t bear to recall in a place as public and G-rated as the streets of Yongen. Most of the remaining half were elaborate date ideas--many of which lead into the first half. Those that remained were the ones that plagued her as she stared down the door to Leblanc. What if she was wrong, and he rejected her?

Her shaking hand reached for the door. Even if that was the case… she still had to know. There’s no way she could pretend to act normal after seeing that message…! A familiar rush of spice filled her nose as she walked through the doorway into the nearly empty cafe. Sojiro was sitting at the bar, peering over his newspaper at her. “Ah…” He let the paper fall slack, peering over the top and smiling at her. “Finally awake, huh?”

Futaba nodded and leaned to her left, trying to get a look into the kitchen. “I-Is Akira here?”

Sojiro frowned and pulled the paper taut, trying to hide a dejected look. “Headed out a little while ago. Said he was gonna return some DVDs.”

Futaba let loose a frustrated groan as she stared a hole through Sojiro’s newspaper. “Fine,” she grumbled, striding past him. “I’ll just go play games upstairs while I wait.” Futaba ascended the stairs with heavy steps, grabbed a chair, and plopped herself in front of the small CRT TV. For a moment, she stared at her reflection in the black screen. What if he didn’t come home until night? There’s no way Sojiro would let her stay past closing… and more importantly, could she last that long? Disaster scenarios began to sprout in her mind, one at a time. As soon as she convinced herself of one scenario’s impossibility, three more had formulated. Her hand plunged into her pocket and retrieved her phone, its light sparking to life as she unlocked it.

“Hey.” She forced herself to text before fear and doubt could stop her. “Are you free today? I want to talk about something important.” She had resolved to play a game instead of staring anxiously at her phone, but it buzzed before she even had the chance to put it away.

“Okay. I’ll be home soon.”

Futaba breathed a sigh of relief. “Alright!” She replied. “I’ll be waiting in your room, then!” She returned the phone to her pocket. She just had to make it until Akira got home, then ask him about what she saw. Easy. She nodded to herself, her hands shaking as she shoved Star Forneus into the cartridge slot. Totally easy.

The first stage of the game was simple. Far too simple to keep her mind from drifting away, thinking of what she should say to Akira and every possible way it could go wrong. Thankfully, Futaba was not without recourse--in particularly troubling times, whenever a video game wasn’t enough to take her mind off of things, she had developed a technique to keep her mind preoccupied: program the game she was playing in her head.

Old games like this were usually done in assembly code, right? Programming at the lowest level was always a daunting task. She reduced the images on the screen to values in her mind, loading and unloading their numbers as she blasted her way through pixelated space. How did they handle animations, she wondered. She assigned values to each pixel to represent color, and rapidly changed their values as objects moved across the screen. Each time she pressed a button, she could feel the multitude of shifting numbers spread across the screen. Load and unload, load and unload, load and unload… She hadn’t even notice how the world around her had changed.

“You’re pretty good,” came a familiar voice, deep and smooth.

Futaba shrieked, the control falling from her fingers as she shot out of the chair and jumped away from the voice, roughly colliding with the desk in the corner of the room. “D-Don’t scare me like that!” Her heart had been started by surprise, but as she looked at him, it showed no signs of slowing down. If the situation had been a bit different, she would have asked him if that reference was intentional.

“Sorry.” Akira’s smile was full of worry. “You said you wanted to talk about something?”

“Oh!” Futaba’s face lit up as her throat constricted. “Y-Yeah,” she squeaked out. Seeing him now, all of her prepared lines vanished from memory. Admiration sprang from her heart as her eyes ran over his fluffy hair, across his defined jawline, and settled into staring into the dark pools of his eyes. Fear crept up from her stomach, its cold fingers twisting past the heat of her heart and wrapping around her neck.

“Futaba?” Akira’s worry shone more plainly on his face. “Are you okay?”

“I…” Futaba swallowed. She reached for the words to tell him, but “I’m sorry” was all she could manage.

Akira took a step closer to her. “Sorry for what?”

Futaba closed her eyes and took a deep breath. All of a sudden, she found herself on the streets of her hometown again, staring at the pages of Kana’s scattered notebook. Kana’s watery eyes bore through her, full of fear and betrayal. Futaba shook the memories away. Everything with Kana worked out, she told herself, so this will be okay, too. She opened her eyes and forced herself to maintain eye contact with Akira, no matter how much it made her heart race or throat constrict. “I-I…” Her voice was shaking as much as her hands. “I saw your texts.” Akira opened his mouth to speak, but she cut him off. “I didn’t mean to! I just opened the app accidentally, and--!”

“It’s alright.” He interrupted her, twisting his bangs in between his fingers. “To be honest, I forgot you bugged it.”

“You don’t…” Relief bubbled in her heart. “...hate me?”

Akira’s eyebrows shot up in alarm. “Hate?! No, I--!” He broke Futaba’s gaze for a fleeting moment. A panicked understanding shot through his eyes. “Which message did you see?”

Futaba’s voice caught in her throat. “From the school festival…”

“I see.” Akira’s face twisted in an emotion she couldn’t recognize. The bubbles of relief hardened into iron weights, sinking her heart deep into her stomach.

“Did you…” Futaba tried to keep her voice even, and keep the tears stinging at her eyes from falling. “Mean it?”

The look on Akira’s face became recognizable to her. It was the same look that flashed across his face whenever they were about to engage strong Shadows. A face that knew the weight and responsibility behind his actions. However, the usual transformation into an arrogant smirk hadn’t happened. He merely wore a look of quiet resolution, which made his reply suprise her all the more. “Yes.”

The relief Futaba expected did not come. Emboldened by his answer, she pressed further, her voice nothing more than a breathy whisper. “I want to hear you say it.”

As she spoke, a weight seemed to disappear from his shoulders. A light flickered behind his eyes, and a small twist played upon his lips as he closed the distance between them until he was just a step away. He looked more like the Joker she knew. He spoke softly, as if his words were not meant for anyone else but her. “I love you.”

Futaba’s fear and anxiety melted away as she exhaled for what felt like the first time in minutes. “Ah…” Her face burned and her heart pounded so fiercely that she felt compelled to place a hand over her chest to keep it from escaping. “I’m gonna die…”

Concern flooded Akira’s eyes again. “Are you okay, Futaba?”

She nodded. “Whenever I’ve been with you, my heart has been racing…” She clutched at her chest for a moment before letting her hand fall to her side. “When we’re apart, I feel like I can’t stop thinking about you. It hurt… but I felt happy, too. I didn’t know why I felt that way until I saw your text… Then I knew that…” She brought her shimmering eyes to meet his, smiling so brightly that it hurt her cheeks. “That I love you, too.”

Akira had no response, save for a charming smile of his own, the earlier apprehension he had shown having disappeared entirely.

“Um…” Futaba’s gaze was shy, but her smile was full of eagerness. “Does this mean… you’re my boyfriend? And.. I’m your girlfriend?”

“I would like that.” Akira affirmed with a small nod.

A single, small laugh escaped Futaba’s lips. “I had always heard that love was the greatest joy you could feel…” She stared deep into his eyes, her heart freely flying in her chest. “I’m not sure if I could ever feel happier than I do right now…”

Akira inched closer, an impish smirk gracing his lips. He was so close, she could study them in full detail. Every crease and contour, their smooth texture… She realized that, if she wanted, all she had to do was lean forward and she could claim those lips. The thought made her pulse burn in her throat, rapid and throbbing, bringing even more heat to her already flushed cheeks

Futaba, with a devilish grin of her own, took her weight off of the desk and immediately felt a rush of lightheadedness. “Whoa…” She muttered, drawing a hand to her head and pulling backward. “I should probably call it quits here. I don’t think my heart could take much more.”

Akira nodded, though the disappointment in his eyes was clear. “Would you like me to walk you home?”

Futaba nodded. The two of them left Leblanc and took a short walk through Yongen, in silence, enjoying each other’s company. At the gate of the Sakura household, Futaba stopped and turned. Before Akira could speak, she grabbed his shirt and pulled him down, standing on her tiptoes to kiss him on the cheek. “N-night good, b-boyfriend!”

Ignoring her bungled words, she turned and with a whip of her hair, entered her home. As she cast a glance outside as she closed the door behind her, she saw Akira, still standing at the gate, touching the spot of his cheek that she had kissed.

He was so cute.