Happy Ending ((TENYA IIDA X OC))

Chapter 34

"What?"

Karafuru and I stared at each other for a few moments before she uttered a word. At first, I thought I had misheard her, but the look on her face told me otherwise.

The way she clung to the soft orange case of her phone piqued my interests, and I found my attention flicking from Karafuru, to her mobile, and back again. She sighed gently and let her hands fall to her sides while she smiled.

"I know where you ran off to," she clarified again, and it felt as if my lungs were caving in all over again. "LA, right?"

I couldn't find it within myself to confirm it. I didn't even know why I was reacting like this; it's not like it would have been a secret for much longer.

But how did she know?

"You stayed with an old woman while you worked part time at a hero agency," Karafuru went on, tapping a fingernail against the case on her phone. "But did that old woman ever tell you what her last name was?"

I couldn't speak, so Karafuru lifted up her phone screen, showing me a contact photo of a familiarly wrinkled face and a name displayed on the bottom.

Grandma Chōri.

My eyes widened in disbelief, and it took me an extra second to realize that Karafuru was currently on a call with her grandmother... the same woman who took me in when I arrived in LA last year.

I could barely contain my bafflement as I looked back up to my classmate, who had an understanding expression on her face. I was expecting anger — or at the very least irritation — but she was smiling at me. Like she always did.

"How?" I managed to ask finally, breathless.

"Gram saw you on the news after the Dream Walker situation," Karafuru explained. "So she called me as soon as she saw it. I was confused at first on how she knew you, but after her explanation it all made sense. She wanted to talk to you right away, but couldn't cause you were in a coma."

She gestured to her phone again.

"So, yesterday, I called her again and told her that you had woken up," Karafuru continued, taking a small step forward. "And told her that it'd be best to call today, since we'd be in the same place."

I sucked in another cold breath of air and grabbed fistfuls of my dress' skirt. When I arrived in LA, I was stopped in the street by Karafuru's grandmother, who had claimed that her son was once good friends with my father. Something about her was familiar, I now knowing what because Karafuru looked just like her, and agreed to keep in touch with her. Though, soon after she discovered I was alone and insisted that I go and stay with her until I was old enough to get by on my own. It had been a steady year living under her roof, and eventually her daughter-in-law — Karafuru's mother whom was also a pro hero — interned me at her agency. The rest is history after that, and only when a news report on Dream Walker aired in LA did Chōri demand that I go back and fix everything.

I haven't spoken to her since I left, and the thought of doing so now was almost scary. I had no way of knowing what Karafuru told her about me after finding out about my staying there. I was incredibly rotten to Karafuru from the get-go. I wouldn't be surprised if her grandmother actually was furious.

I chanced a glance up to Karafuru's face again, and all the fear that suddenly came crashing down on me melted away. Her smile was still prominent on her face, and what stuck out the most was how soft it was; how kind. It was like looking at it reminded me on what kind of person Karafuru was, and she was definitely not one to hold a grudge; let alone someone to call me out.