Pride x Familiar Read Free Page A

as rain again. You’ll forget
all about me and start anew.”
    “Are you doing this to make me hate you? To make
it easier for me to leave? And why do we even have to do this?”
    “I’m doing this for me.”
    “What?”
    I smiled at her, and this time I meant it.
“Haruka, you know how much I hate the Prides.”
    She pressed her mouth into a thin bloodless
line.
    I added for good measure, “If I say goodbye now,
before you become an Aventis, I won’t hate you. If I do this
afterwards, it’ll be just that much harder for me.”
    I meant that too.
    Once the Haruka before me became one of them , I wouldn’t see her as Haruka anymore.
    I pushed away from the fence and swung my arms,
working the stiffness out of my shoulders.
    “So, Haruka. This is goodbye. I’ll miss you, but
I’ll get over you.”
    I bowed to her formally.
    “Thank you…for taking care of me all these
years.”
    When I straightened I saw the ashen look on her
face. She swallowed a number of times, before wiping away her tears
with the back of a hand.
    Then she laughed bitterly. “I see. You were
always like this. Always choosing to bear everything even if it
made you the villain. I really was right about you. Since there’s
no easy way for this to happen, you chose to make yourself the
bastard of the play.”
    “No. I just want to forget about you as soon as
possible.”
    Now she looked dismayed.
    I smiled nonchalantly, shoved my hands into my
school trouser pockets, then felt my palm-slate in one of them. An
idea came to mind so I pulled out the palm-slate. Calling up the
screen that listed my contacts, I held it up for her to see. I made
sure the voice command recognition was turned on.
    “Contact listing, Haruka Amiella…delete.”
    “Confirm delete,” my palm-slate requested.
    “Confirmed.”
    I heard a chime and knew the deed was done.
    Her horrified look deepened before her
expression turned hard and cold over the span of many seconds. Then
she took out her palm-slate and held it up for me to see.
    “Contact listing, Caelum Desanto…delete.”
    “Confirm delete,” her palm-slate requested.
    “Co…con…conf….”
    Her hand trembled so much the screen was leaving
afterimages in my eyes.
    I raised an eyebrow at her. “Go on. You can do
it.”
    “Shut up!” she screamed. “Just shut the Hell
up!”
    She gripped the palm-slate in both hands but her
fingers shook badly and wouldn’t go near the screen.
    “Haruka, you’re making this much harder than it
has to be.”
    “Go to Hell! I hate you!”
    She turned and ran away, squeezing through the
gap between rooftop structures that made this the secluded spot it
was.
    I stared at the empty space she left behind.
    “That’s my girl. You never disappoint. So easy
to manipulate.”
    I looked down at my palm-slate.
    “I wonder if I should delete all those photos
and videos of us together?”
    I was busy mulling that for a while when I
noticed the palm-slate’s screen was wet. I wiped it dry but more
drops landed on it.
    “Huh?”
    I looked up at the habitat’s sky. Still partly
sunny. No sign of rain. Hell, it never rains inside a habitat.
    Then I noticed it was hard to see. My vision was
blurred.
    I wiped at my eyes and my fingers came away
wet.
    I looked at them for a while.
    “Well I’ll be. I guess I haven’t forgotten how
to cry.” I laughed softly. “You hear that Celica, I guess I
couldn’t keep my promise to you after all.”
    A simple promise.
    To cry for our parents, to cry for family, and
no one else.
    Well, I had no one else to cry over now.
    Yet I was crying over Haruka.
    I shuffled over to the fence. It was getting
hard to see the school buildings ahead of me, and the habitat
skyline beyond it.
    I shoved the slate into my pocket before I could
accidentally drop it.
    I didn’t bother wiping my face.
    Big boys don’t cry, she used to say.
    Bloody smart thing to say to a ten year old
about to turn eleven.
    “Gods damn it…I miss you…Celica.”
    I bowed