Forced to Grow Up

Part 10

A few days after Masato had told his family about his relationship with Suno, Michiko had decided it was time to re-meet her.

After school, she found her walking with Masato. "Hey Sato, let me borrow Suno for a little bit." She grabbed Suno's arm and pulled her away from Masato.

"Michiko, I'm so glad we're able to talk again." Suno smiled.

"Look, I don't know if you've really changed. Honestly I'm a little skeptical of it. But I'll wipe this slate clean, and we can start over just this once." Michiko told her.

Suno gave her a kind smile, "Okay. Clean slate."

"Hi," Michiko smiled, "I'm Michiko Dragneel, Masato's sister."

"Nice to meet you, Michiko. I'm Suno Grace, Masato's girlfriend." She introduced herself.

"Well, Suno Grace, I hope to get along well."

Suno smiled happily, but it soon turned into a frown. "What's the problem?" Michiko questioned.

"I know we started over, but I can't help but still feel bad about how things went over the first time we met. I need to apologize." Suno sighed.

"No, it's fine." Michiko tried to let her know she didn't need to apologize, even though deep down (or maybe not so deep down) she wanted anwouldn't apology from her.

"No! I have to! Just hear me out..." Suno seemed as if she let it go if she didn't. Michiko slightly nodded her head, signalling Suno to go ahead and speak.

"The way I acted the first time... it was truly unacceptable. I guess I felt I had this horrible, ugly reputation I needed to maintain. As I've told Masato, as a little girl I went through some pretty bad things... and so as I got older I always wanted to stay on top. It made me feel... safe, in charge. I felt like if I treated people the way I treated you,  there'd be no possible way for me to get hurt. But your brother broke up with me and suddenly all if meant nothing because now I was hurting and I missed him. I didn't want to be mean and ugly anymore. I just wanted to be me. So please, Michiko. Believe me when I say I've changed." Tears began to pour out of Suno's crystal blue eyes.

Michiko brought her into a hug, "I believe you, Suno." Suno cried into Michiko's shoulder as she continued to hug her.

Masato walked over noticing the situation. "Are you guys-" He stopped speaking when he realized Suno was crying. "Woah what happened?"

Suno slowly pulled away from the guy and wiped away her tears. "Nothing, Michiko is amazing, just as you told me." Suno smiled.

"You're not trying to steal my girlfriend, right Michiko." Masato jokingly glared.

"My heart belongs to someone else. As pretty as Suno is, she's all yours, brother." Michiko giggled.

"You like girls?" Suno asked.

"Yeah, I hope that's not a problem for you." Michiko rubbed the back of her heard giving a awkward laugh.

"No, no! It's not a problem at all, I actually think that's pretty awesome. You're not afraid to be who you truly are." Suno said with an admiring tone.

"Well thank you, it's a pretty recent thing. Pretty sure I've always liked girls but I always supressed it. But I started feeling something towards this girl that I've known all of my life. But I kinda screwed things up with her and I don't believe she's into girls, so now I'm pretty sure I have zero chance of getting with her." Michiko laughed sadly.

"If there's any way I can help, just let me know. I've been told I'm very persuasive." Suno told her.

"Thank you, I'll keep that in mind." Michiko smiled.

"Well Michiko, does she have your approval?" Masato asked, hoping Michiko would say yes.

"Duh! Suno why don't you come over, I'm sure Masato would love to have you over." Michiko suggested.

"M-Michiko." Masato stuttered.

"Sure! If that's okay with you, Masato." Suno said excitedly.

"Yeah, we can watch movies or something." Masato answered.

With that, the three of them headed back to their house. When they arrived, Michiko gave them their alone time and disappeared into her room.

"So what do you wanna watch?" Masato asked.

"I'm fine with anything. I more just want to talk and hang out with you." Suno said sweetly.

"Okay cutie." Masato turned on some random movie and they sat on the couch together. "Anything you want to talk about?" He asked.

"Mmm... Tell me more about you. What's your life been like up to this point?" Suno questioned.

"I'd like to say I led a normal life until this point, but my life was pretty much anything but normal." Masato told Suno the story of how as babies, Michiko and him were kidnapped by that psycho melody.

"Wait, really. I've heard this story before." Suno told him.

"We were in the papers for awhile after that." Masato told her, figuring that's where she heard it.

"No no, where have I heard it..." Suno went into a deep thought, trying to find the source of this memory.

"If you can't remember-"

"AH! I REMEMBER!" She exclaimed excitedly, cutting Masato off in the process.

"So?"

"In middle school, I had this bestfriend named Beth, don't ask why she isn't in the picture anymore, things got ugly. Anyways! She told me this story about how her mom was super crazy and kidnapped some babies and was put in a psych ward when Beth was really young. But her mom was the lady who kidnapped you guys." Suno explained.

"Your ex-bestfriend's mom was Melody? Small world, huh?"

"Really small world." Suno giggled.

"Your little giggle is cute." Masato mentioned. She blushed a bright red and then nuzzled into him as he wrapped his arms around her.

"I'm glad we're back together, Masato."

"Me too, Suno." He kissed her forehead and they sat there like that until Suno said it was time for her to go.

Masato walked Suno to the front door, "I'll see you tomorrow, yeah?" Suno asked before she would start heading out the door.

"Of course." Masato answered.

"Good." They then shared a kiss and she began to walk down the walk way.

Before Masato could close the door, without turning around she said, "Hey, Masato?"

"Yes?" He wondered.

She then turned around with a sweet smile on her face, "I love you."

Masato's heart began pounding. Thump. Thump thump. Thump thump.

"I love you too." He replied. She ran up to him and hugged him.

She kissed him on the cheek and then said, "See you tomorrow." And left.

Masato shut the front door with a big, cheesy smile plastered on his face.

"What's that smile for, huh?" Natsu asked as he happened to be walking by.

"Things are just good." He replied, his goofy smile still present.

"That's good."

"Oh but dad, you'll never guess what Suno told me." Masato said, remembering the whole Melody thing.

"What did she tell you?" Lucy asked as she walked into the room.

"Welll. In middle school she had this friend named Beth. And the crazy part is Beth was Melody's daughter." Masato told them.

At the slight mention of her name, Lucy became angry. "Psychotic..." Lucy mumbled the rest, probably saying some unsavory words. 

Natsu shivered in disgust. "How could anyone have a child with... That?"

"Well she's in the loonie bin, so thats fun." Masato gave a laugh and then headed to his room to go to bed for the night.