Editing Maria-sama ga Miteru:Volume8 Chapter9 4 (section)

===<noinclude>Autumn Bonds. </noinclude>Part 4===

With the bells for the beginning of class still ringing, I was taken from my classroom by Rosa Gigantea.

"Ah, umm … !?"

"Come on."

Rosa Gigantea paid no heed to my bewilderment. We continued down the corridor, flowing against the current of classmates hurriedly returning to the classroom. While I found abandoning class to be unthinkable, I didn't hate the way Rosa Gigantea was pulling me along by my arm. It's just that my heart was throbbing uncomfortably fast.

"Where to? I won't run away."

I asked, in front of the emergency exit. The bells had already stopped ringing.

"Ah, sorry."

Rosa Gigantea let go of my arm, as though she'd just remembered she was holding it.

Since my teacher was usually punctual, I wouldn't be able to make it even if I started back now. But even if I could have made it, I wouldn't have left Rosa Gigantea alone here just to get back to class. 

With both our weights pushing on it, the heavy door opened and the gust of wind that blew in ruffled my hair.

Rosa Gigantea and I stepped out of the school building together.

Had she meant to come here from the beginning, or had it been the end result of aimless wandering?  We were standing beneath the cherry trees where we had first met. 

"Although there's a finite time limit to it."

Rosa Gigantea said, looking straight at me.

"Please be my petit soeur."

Were those the words that I'd been expecting? No, although somewhere in my heart they may have been the words I was hoping for.

"I can't say I'll be a typical onee-sama, but I definitely think I'll be perfect for you. I won't restrain you, you'll still be able to do whatever you like. Besides."

"Umm … "

I interrupted Rosa Gigantea's speech.

Rosa Gigantea didn't know about my circumstances. If she knew, would she still want me as her petit soeur?

But I didn't know how to communicate that to her. With Rosa Gigantea, I could tell her anything. But how to do it without making her carry half of my burdens. Whether she rejected me or accepted me, I didn't want to burden Rosa Gigantea.

"You don't want to?"

"Not at all!"

I vigorously shook my head.

"But."

"No buts. All I want to hear is yes or no."

Rosa Gigantea looked straight at me. Her eyes were stern, showing she wasn't going to accept any other words than those.

"I – "

I stopped mid-sentence and, with a sense of relief, realized that there was no value to what I had been intending to say. My distress was because I had been underestimating this person called Satou Sei.

She wasn't interested in what I was carrying or being burdened by. She didn't know the reason. But what she was saying was that she was willing to accept me the person exactly as I was.

So I could temporarily set down my burdens, and stand before her stripped of my tough armor as I was now.

Like two people who had chosen to rest in the shade of the same tree in the middle of their long journeys. We could probably be together even if we didn't talk about ourselves. While knowing that at some point we would have to resume our separate paths, our souls could still gain some respite from feeling the others presence.

Without words.

We ought to be close to each other.

"Please make me your petit soeur."

I took the hand she offered me.

"Alright."

"I look forward to our time together."

Although it took the form of a handshake, it couldn't be dismissed as merely a handshake. It felt as though our fingers were embracing and I felt completely at ease.

"Ah, right. The rosary."

Rosa Gigantea unfastened the rosary that was wound around her right wrist like a bracelet, and moved to place it around my neck. Then, as though reconsidering, she wrapped it around my wrist.

"This way's simpler."

[[Image:MM_v08_213.jpg|thumb]] 

As though I could take it off at any time. Although she didn't say it, I thought that Rosa Gigantea had chosen the wrist to lessen the burden on me.

Faint traces of her body heat remained in the rosary.

"Um."

I said, as Rosa Gigantea smiled with apparent satisfaction that the rosary had been safely conferred to my wrist.

"Hmm?"

"Shouldn't we go back to class?"

"Huh?"

"Class. If we go now, we'll only be about 15 minutes late."

"Shimako, you're way too serious."

"Onee-sama, you're not serious enough."

Onee-sama.

It was a little bit embarrassing and surprising to both the one saying it and the one being called it.

"What can you do? Come on, let's go."

My onee-sama grabbed my right hand and took off.

"Such extremes."

With my arm being pulled, I started running. The rosary around my right arm bounced. Hanging from my wrist, it swayed around where we were joined by the fingertips.

How comforting it was. 

Running like this, hand-in-hand with someone.

In my heart, I apologized to Sachiko-sama and Rosa Gigantea's fans.

I'm sorry. But she is definitely someone that I need.

Just six months.

With two years separating us, that was all the time that we would have together.

The day of our inevitable parting was six months away.

But until then, I wasn't going to let go of this hand.

"Run, Shimako!"

Because the rosary that swayed between us had made this place my own.