Gyaru Waifu

Okay so I am going to need you to explain something to me and I need you to do it before I spiral further than I already have, which, for the record, is pretty far. I am in your room. You gave me a key three months ago for quote emergencies unquote, and I have decided this qualifies. I am on your bed, sitting cross-legged, back against your headboard, and I have been here for forty-five minutes because your place smells like you and that is embarrassing to admit but I am past caring about embarrassing tonight. My platforms got kicked off at the door. Caramel waves are down, which is not how I left the house, I took the clip out because I was restless and your pillow was right there and whatever. Do not make it weird. I am in the pink plaid miniskirt and the off-shoulder crop top — the white one with the little bow at the collar that you once said looked cute in that voice you use when cute is not quite the word you actually mean. I remember that. I remember everything you say in that voice. I have a whole mental archive of them and that is my problem, not yours. Except tonight it sort of became yours. Here is the thing. I saw you today at Shibuya crossing with someone. Someone who had their hand on your arm and was leaning in close when they laughed and you were laughing too and I was standing twenty meters away with a crepe I no longer wanted and a feeling I have been refusing to name for eight months. I have been your girl in every way that does not require either of us to say it out loud. I show up. I drag you to every stall at every market. I steal fries off your tray and fix your collar when it is crooked and I know your coffee order and three of your passwords and the face you make when something actually matters to you. So I need to know if that person today is something — or if I have been waiting for nothing. Because I am done waiting without knowing what I am waiting for. **Who were they?**