‘Yurue Nyan~’

Suzuki Airi ended up laughing at her own imitation of the short, self-proclaimed mascot of the Café Buono! trio, Tsugunaga Momoko.  Well, not quite laughing but, rather, guffawing, as Momoko regarded her with great disdain, her lips pouted. Airi repeated Momoko’s new catchphrase, this time putting a mocking emphasis on the ‘nyan’ before bursting into another fit of maddened laughter, clapping her hands together in glee. Noticing that Momoko’s expression was now that of someone who would quite like to smash Airi’s face through the class counter on which she was currently sitting, kicking her legs giddily, Miyabi butted in and ordered Airi to go do the dishes she had been trying to avoid all evening anyway. Sure, Momoko was the oldest and, therefore, leader but Miyabi was really quite sure that right now was a terrible time to entrust her with any form of responsibility, especially if they didn’t want the café floors to get a nice red paint-job – wouldn’t that clash horrendously with the cute, harmonious mood they were trying to establish here? Airi nodded and skipped off to the kitchen, giggling as she went, which certainly did make Momoko any calmer and, rather, had her watching Airi and shooting daggers after her.

‘Calm it, Momo’ sighed Miyabi, wiping the counter clean of Airi’s sticky handprints. Miyabi heard Momoko groan to herself, the sound of her pacing feet  resounding against the café walls.

‘I know, I know, I’m not mad’, Momoko said in a tone that gave Miyabi all reason to assume otherwise, ‘I’m just annoyed. Why’s she gotta laugh at everything I come up with?’

Miyabi stopped cleaning and turned to get a good look at the agitated girl, ‘That’s just Airi, though, isn’t it? She laughs at everything, you know. She’s easily amused’

Momoko slumped down on the nearest chair, leant her arms on the table it was sat by and rested her chin in her palms, ‘You say that so casually’

‘Think about it, though’, Miyabi replied, getting back to what she had been doing originally, ‘She laughs at you, but it’s not like she wants to upset you’. Miyabi paused for a moment, before adding, ‘Hell, I bully you more than she does’

Airi was a sweet girl after all, Miyabi told herself. Though, it wasn’t like she needed to reassure herself of the fact. Everyone knew it was true, even Momoko.

Momoko wasn’t actually mad at Airi, she was just cranky after a whole day of work and couldn’t be bothered with Airi’s hyperactivity right now. And, even if Airi did think Momoko’s acts were stupid, it didn’t bother Momoko herself in anyway. The customers ate her ‘Momochi’ act right up and she was quite often complimented on it. She figured it was all part of being a good waitress and she saw no reason to drop the whole thing, when it made the customers happy, just because one person thought it was silly. Momoko loved seeing the customers’ smiles; it gave her the best feeling. She loved spreading positivity. That was the main reason as to why she had begged her grandparents to let her use their shop building as a Café after they decided it was time to retire. They had agreed to let her run it since it meant they could still have a business running without them having to deal with as much of the stress. The money brought in by the three girls was split between the trio and Momoko’s grandparents, with the trio’s share being further split into thirds. It worked out well for everyone and the three girls had learned many things from the experience. It was a cheesy way of looking at it all, Momoko admitted, but she couldn’t help it; her passion for the café was too great. Stupid as she thought it sounded, Café Buono! was her life and she wouldn’t give it up for the world, even when Airi managed to annoy her. It was, quite simply, everything.

Airi, however, saw the whole thing more as a bit of fun. She appreciated the obvious benefits she gained from it, of course, and it was excellent work experience. Yet, the thing was, Airi couldn’t see herself working in a little streetside café for the rest of her days. She loved Momoko and Miyabi; they were hugely important to her and there was no denying it, but she was the kind of person who would sit in class, cheek rested against the palm of her hand as she stared, wide-eyed, out of the window, dreaming of bigger and more exciting things – a daydreamer of the highest order. Airi had a passion that in no way involved cakes and pastries – to be able to sing in front of crowds of millions was her desire. Every evening, she would dash home from the café and spend the night in her room, singing loudly to herself with her eyes closed and, then, in the mirror so that she could focus on voice and image separately, strengthening both areas. The amount of focus on image had eluded Airi somewhat, but she would do anything to make it big as a singer. The day she signed a contract with a major recording label would be the best day of Airi’s entire life. Baking cute cakes, wearing cool outfits and serving beaming customers was just a part-time job for Airi until she could afford singing lessons on her own, as her parents weren’t prepared to help out – they insisted that she had to focus on her studies instead. However, they didn’t see the café as anything threatening to her education because, well, work was work, wasn’t it?

Miyabi was fully aware of both her co-workers’ motivations yet had none of her own – at least, none so ambitious. As to why she was actually working there, the answer was quite simple. It wasn’t about far-fetched dreams as she hadn’t quite chosen what to do with her life yet; it wasn’t about earning money. The plain truth was that Miyabi cared about her two friends and wanted to support them. She wanted to support Momoko’s dream by joining in with all this. Even though Miyabi didn’t really know the other girls all that well when they decided to do this, she could tell almost immediately that they were people she could befriend. Miyabi, though having been a Saitama-born girl, decided to make the decision to travel to the more central parts of the Tokyo Metropolis in order to attend school each day and it had seemed that Momoko had done just the same, only she was travelling from Chiba instead.  The two girls had been put in the same class and this common factor was what drew them together and got them talking to each other. Miyabi had been more than happy to be of service when Momoko had confessed her dream to her newfound friend. The addition of Airi to the team had been somewhat last minute, after they had come out empty-handed when trying to get people in their school to help out – Momoko had remembered that her neighbour deom when she had been younger had moved to this part of Tokyo and that she would be in Middle School. And, so, they had hunted Airi down and the younger girl had readily accepted the offer, practically bursting with giddy excitement. These two girls had some history yet Miyabi didn’t feel awkward trying to fit in with them.  It just worked. And, now, here they were, watching Momoko’s dream become reality which Miyabi couldn’t help but feel, on the days where she was down for whatever reason and decided to look at the entire world with a sharply cynical eye, was a tad self-indulgent on Momoko’s part. However, regardless of whether it was Momoko telling Airi that she had to focus more on her dream or Airi trying to get out of work to focus on her own dream, Miyabi wanted to support them both. Despite all the selfish demands and petty squabbles between those two, Miyabi still loved them and would do anything to help them. She was the neutral force of the trio and she took some pride in that being the case. To her, the desires of your friends came before your own and she believed that she could never be truly happy, even if she had everything she wanted, if her closest friends were miserable.

Author's Notes:

First off, it's worth clearing up that, on the off-chance you didn't already know, 'Yurue Nyan' is Momo's catchphrase. It literally means 'Forgive Me, meow' but it's also much more fun, I find, to translate it as 'Forgive Me-ow'.

I apologise for the horrendous graphic - this is clearly what trying to make graphics at 1AM results in. A mess.

And the chapter name is kind of cheesy, I agree. Feel free to cringe~

Nothing really happens in this chapter, it's really a character development chapter above all else. I'm finding that, out of all the narrative voices I have assigned the girls, Miyabi's in my favourite, hence how huge her parapgraph is compared to the rest.

Hopefully, the 3rd chapter should be up soon enough and I wont be a lazy asshat.

This whole chapter was self-beta'd~

Thanks for reading!