Abby and Violet (Yuri Light Novel)

My thoughts on how I’d start our first day free from school this winter weren’t exactly what had been going down. I got up and went to the kitchen to greet Abby, just as I had planned, thinking that I’d then give my hair a quick wash before joining her for breakfast, but Abby had different plans. Instead, I was led by her to the couch, made to sit there, had my legs covered with a blanket, and held in place by having Oliver deposited on my lap, our furball immediately adopting a sphynx position, staring at the morning cartoons that were playing on the TV, purring away. That’s when I noticed that Sophie was there too, strangely early in the morning. She sat by my side, having had Oliver on her lap until a moment ago, looking at some papers. I could see she was a bit embarrassed by my stare, so I looked away.

Abby popped up again, all cheery, handing me a plate with a jelly-filled doughnut with icing sugar on top, and a hot cup of camomile tea. She then skipped along, saying she still had something for me and that I should stay there and just relax.

“Erm, do I still look tired or something?” I whispered to Sophie.

She looked at me, smiling a bit mischievously, and told me that I didn’t look more tired than usual.

“She’s probably just happy that the Christmas holiday started,” she told me as I pouted at her. “You know how she gets around this time of the year.”

That was true, but this still felt a bit… extra. As if Abby was—

“Here!” Abby chirped, being back once again, holding a tiny glass bowl containing something golden and lightly dusted in white. “Candied ginger!”

“Oh, thanks.”

That was likely my favourite candied fruit. I liked the herbal flavour, the slight sweetness of it, and then, the warmth that filled my mouth. It wasn’t like the spice of a pepper, but an aromatic one, one that, as I exhaled through the nose, was felt inside it, similar to a mint. It lingered for a few minutes before fading away, leaving my palate feeling cleansed and refreshed.

“Do you want some?” I asked Sophie, as she was looking at me.

“No thanks, I’m just wondering how it is that you like that so much,” she told me. “I still find it a bit surprising.”

“Well, it is good,” I told her, not wanting to give her the full review of the flavour and how it worked for me that had gone through my mind as I had some of it, so as not to sound like a snob or something describing wine. “And it also helps with digestion, as long as you don’t eat too much of it. And speaking of surprising, I wasn’t expecting to see you here this early.”

She blushed a bit and shifted in her seat as she spoke.

“Your Dad asked for my help with something, and we agreed to meet during lunch to go over that, but I thought that maybe it’d be better to start a bit earlier to make sure we go over everything… and it’s been a bit since I got to play with Oliver too.”

“Just say that you want to be with him a bit longer, sis,” Abby interjected, popping up again, this time carrying what was going to be her breakfast. “You’re being way too cute acting like that.”

“S-shut up!” Sophie hushed. “He might hear you!”

Abby and I both knew that my Dad had already noticed Sophie’s crush on him, but Sophie still hadn’t caught up on that?

Not that you’re in any position to criticise.

I did miss very, very, painfully so even, obvious signals from Abby that she was in love with me back when we were still first years in high school. Then again, we are both girls, and I didn’t have any experience in terms of friendship and romance, so…

“Birdie!” Abby chirped, sounding exactly like one, just as she was about to sit on her special seat. I watched her rush to the window, leaving me sitting with my legs cold and open, waiting for her to sit in the middle, Oliver having been moved over to Sophie’s lap again, getting a lot of rubs behind his ears from her, making him shamelessly melt all over her legs.

Still, I got up and followed her. I was expecting to see a sparrow or even a pigeon since she acted so cutely and spoke of a “birdie”. What I saw outside, looking like it was staring back at us, was a raven, big and kinda ominous-looking, but still pretty.

“Do you think that, if we open the window, he’ll come inside with many a flirt and flutter, that stately raven of holy days of yore?”

“Pfft, fufu! You really liked that one, huh?” I laughed, immediately recognising the poem she was referencing. We had read it a few nights ago before bed. “I don’t know, we don’t have a bust of Pallas above our chamber door for it to perch with the mien of a lord or lady.”

“I still would like to know if he answers ‘nevermore’ if we ask him a question. It reminds me of you, you know?”

“How exactly does it remind you of me?”

“You two have the same plumage colour,” Abby laughed as she ran her fingers through my hair.

“Erm, what the hell are you two talking about?” Sophie asked, having no idea we were paraphrasing the lines of a poem to one another.

We explained as we sat that there was a big raven in front of the house and that it reminded us of a poem we read recently from Edgar Allen Poe, Sophie finally understanding that we were being “literary sillies”, not just “sillies”. She also admitted that she found it nice that we read together and to one another, and how she never thought Abby would be able to sit down and focus long enough for that, but then again, I seemed to have a grounding effect on her sister.

“Yup, I agree,” Abby nodded, making it hard for me to clean up the bits of jam and powdered sugar from the corner of her mouth. “I only seem to really sink my feet on the ground when Violet is with me, otherwise, my mind is quite scattered, and my body even more restless than that.”

I laughed, remembering how Abby and Mathilda had started a flash mob not that long ago, the moment I had to leave for a few minutes to use the bathroom. It did feel like that sometimes.

“Hey, honey? Could you look my way for a bit?” I asked after checking that Abby had finished eating.

She looked at me, her eyes glistening and a smile starting to beam, my wife already knowing what was in my mind, as usual.

Having tidied up her face from the mess of her doughnut had called to my attention her cheeks and got me in the mood to play with them. Abby fully leaned into it, giggling and letting out one of her happy sounds. She even shifted her position, from sitting between my legs with her back turned to me. She was now facing me, kneeling over my lap with one leg on each side of my lap and both of her hands on my shoulders for balance. It made it a lot easier for me to fondle and rub her cheeks and for her to make eye contact with me as I did so.

“You’re such a granny sometimes,” she chirped, hearts floating over her head being almost visible.

“Oh, am I?” I asked, suddenly feeling mischievous.

I moved my hands to behind her ears and started rubbing, Abby shutting her eyes and melting into a mess as I began. Not done with that, I moved on to the rest of her head, giving her scalp a nice rub and tussling her hair, completely undoing Abby, who was giggling and making happy noises nonstop.

“I’m really happy that you two are in a lot better mood now, especially you, Violet,” Sophie said, her face and voice dripping exasperation. “But you two were behaving so well before.”

“Ah, leave them be,” the voice of my Dad laughed, startling Sophie a bit. “I for one love seeing them like that.”

“It’s not that I don’t either,” Sophie told him as she composed herself. “But you’ve got to admit, they are acting sickeningly sweet, aren’t they? Just look at how they are sat.”

“You’re just jelly, sis,” Abby jabbed, some of her—now messed up—hair looking like horns, matching the smile she had on as she looked at her sister.

“I beg your pardon!?” Sophie barked, but Abby just stuck her tongue out at her sister before hugging me and burying her face in my hair while Sophie huffed and puffed at her, only stopping when my Dad asked if she had had breakfast already, and if she’d join him. She mumbled a bit as she said that maybe she’d just have some coffee with him.

Abby and I watched them go to the dining table, Sophie setting things up while he got his breakfast and the coffee done.

“Things look like they are going well between them, don’t you think?” Abby hushed into my ear.

I glanced at those two, thinking about how they behaved around one another. Sophie was the more obvious one in terms of how she felt and her thought process. She was clearly trying her best to close the gap, but not to become a nuisance or be too obvious about it. The part of not being a nuisance… well, my Dad was super easy-going, so that wasn’t any trouble. As for the discreet part… that’s not exactly open for debate in terms of failure if I, of all people, could notice her intentions. Still, it was charming and honest, so I don’t think it was a bad thing in the slightest.

Now, as for my Dad… no idea what was going on in his head. I think he was trying to be respectful of Sophie’s feelings, letting her explore them, but also trying not to lead her on, although sometimes… sometimes it looked like he faltered a bit. Ever since she gave him the scarf, to be exact. She had been the first person of the opposite gender who made it clear as day that they were interested in him, and in such a thoughtful way that it was hard for me to believe that he, a man who has been alone and solely focused on me for more than ten years, wouldn’t be touched, and even charmed, by that show of affection and genuine care.

Maybe he is fighting a losing battle?

Trying to keep the distance while at the same time getting pulled in… yeah, I could see that happen. It happened to me too when I tried to keep my feelings aside and just be a friend when Abby was fighting all those demons inside her, telling myself that what Abby needed was support, not a girlfriend for her to also worry about being a good partner or some other nonsense I was using as an excuse at the time.

“Babe?”

“Sorry, got a bit lost in thought there,” I chuckled. “Yeah, I’d say things between them might be getting along well, even if painfully slowly.”

“No, that’s not the answer I want now,” she laughed as she gave a tiny hop on my lap to close the gap between our bodies, still straddling my lap and facing me, her arms now wrapping around my neck. “I already knew that answer by the faces you were making. I asked if you’ll take the red coatdress you got from Josephine for tonight’s class dinner.”

“Aah, so, that’s why you’ve been pampering me so much!” I beamed, all the pieces falling in place. “You’re trying to get me in as much of a happy and relaxed mood as possible so that I have an easier time during dinner, aren’t you?”

“Hehe! Guilty as charged!” she said, pointing the tongue out before giving the tip of my nose a tiny lick. “So, I was thinking… the dark blue tight jeans, those black boots you have that reach your knees, the pearly-white turtleneck, and the red coatdress. Ah! And the red knit cap with the white pompom I got you!”

“Pfft, fufu! And what is my wife going to wear, hmm?”

“You pick that for me!” she whined as she gave a few more hops on my lap. “I did it for you, didn’t I?”

Hmm, now that’s an amusing conundrum to have. Something cute and a bit mature, like Abby seems to enjoy dressing up when outside of school, but still with that hint of playfulness that is so her…

“Hmm… tights or one of those cable-knit socks I got you… no, the cable-knit black socks, and that forest-green dress that you haven’t worn yet… and my pearly-white knit cardigan.”

She gave me a very pleased smile and got her face closer to mine, only stopping once our noses were touching. She asked me if I picked that specific cardigan so we’d be matching at least one piece of clothing. I neither confirmed nor denied it, giving her waist a few tickles just to hear her giggles and see her squirming. I then went for a second round of messing with her hair, Abby sounding like an otter as she asked me to stop, even though she very clearly didn’t want me to ever do so, as she buried her face on my shoulder to muffle her sounds.

“Before I forget,” Sophie said, her voice cutting through our noise, clearly calling out to us and catching our attention. “Have the results of your exams and final grades come out yet?”

“They should come out between today and tomorrow,” Abby told her. “If not, ask again when January starts.”

Sophie clicked her tongue as she told us she couldn’t wait to see our grades, as she was dying of curiosity. Abby didn’t skip a beat, asking her sister if she was planning on rewarding us if we excelled. She got a very deadpan answer as Sophie told her that she already knew we did excel, she just wanted to see by how much we did so. I’m not going to lie, my chest got a bit warmer hearing that, something that got Abby giggling as she saw right through me.

“Sis, praise Violet more!” Abby chirped. “She loves it when you do!”

“I-I don’t!” I squeaked. “Shut up!”

I heard giggling coming not just from Abby, but also from Dad and Sophie. I hid my face in the crook of Abby’s neck, thinking that the moment they catch me in a good mood, they get to teasing me mercilessly right away.

“And regarding your dinner, just be sure to be back home before midnight,” her sister told us before she turned her attention solely to my Dad.

“Hear that, babe? We have until eleven fifty-nine to be back home!”

“Let’s try for eleven at the latest, ok?” I told her. “I really don’t think I’ll be able to last that long, and I also really want to know what happens next in the book you picked.”

Abby used that as fodder to further tease me, claiming that we were the popular girls in class, her being the class mascot, me the cool model-beauty, and, for that matter, Mathilda being the social butterfly beauty with the bubble-gum pink hair.

I argued back that, if we were the popular ones, we needed to set an example, and a good one at that.

She laughed at my arguments and for me to have fallen for her teasing again, giving her a serious answer when she was only goofing around, something that hasn’t changed at all between us, even after three years of being attached at the hip. Her expression then softened into deep adoration and happiness, this being one of the few moments I could clearly see what was in her mind.

“I’m so happy that Violet is back to normal,” she was thinking, along with “I really love her! I love her to bits!”

With that, and not caring that the other two might see us, I pulled her in for a long, sweet kiss, to let her know that I also love her to bits.

“Right, let’s get ourselves a warm shower, shall we?” I told her after.

“Hehe! You just want to keep on giving me head rubs, don’t you?” Abby hummed, clinging to my arm with a smile so bright it was blinding as she had one of her lovely giggling fits from the kiss I gave her.

The start of the holiday wasn’t going as I had planned; it was going way, way better, all thanks to the lovely pest that is my wife.

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