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“You’re reading that book again!” It’s a question that most people would say as a bored comment, but Maiye has never been most people, and she phrases it like a grand declaration, the way an eccentric scientist would announce his latest discovery.
“I can’t read as fast as Mai can,” Kochome says, looking up. Literally, since she’s leaning against a tree and Mai’s voice has come from above her. Maiye is dangling by her knees from a high branch directly above Kochome, and if she wasn’t so used to Mai’s oddities, Kochome would be worried about both of their safety. As it is, the book seems to be in the most danger.
“No one reads as fast as me,” Mai says. It’s not a brag, either – she’s always read so fast that people have dropped pop quizzes on her to see if she was lying about having read anything at all. It’s not something she’s overly proud of either, as far as Kochome can tell, just as simple fact about the general nature of the universe. The world spins on an axis. The sun rises in the east. Maiye Wakhet reads abnormally fast.
Really, it’s not even on the top ten list of “Strange Things About Maiye”.
“Did you want to read with me?” Kochome only asks out of instinctive politeness, although she regrets having asked at all. She doesn’t like the idea of reading a book with someone any more than Maiye does.
“No! I’d get bored right away. I’d get to the end of the page before you were done with a sentence or two!” From someone else, it would feel rude. From Maiye, it just feels like an acknowledgement of their shared reality. Maiye doesn’t bother to lie about such insignificant things – a strange quality coming from someone Hector insists is a liar. As much as she cares for her friend, Kochome thinks he’s probably right. If she had to guess, Maiye’s tendency to tell the truth where others would try to sugarcoat things probably makes it easier for her to hide the things she’d rather no one know.
“It’s romance, so I don’t think you’d like it anyway,” Kochome informs her.
“Romance can be alright! It’s just usually horrendously boring! Boy meets girl meets crisis meets happily ever after. How tiresome.”
“The world is evolving, though. It’s not always like that.”
“True! If it’s boy meets boy or girl meets girl, that’s generally a little more interesting. At the very least, it’s been done less. Which tired trope have you found your nose buried in with this tantalizingly treacherous tale, Choko-me?”
Kochome huffs out a laugh at her friend’s childish nickname. Every time she hears it, she thinks back to their first meeting.
Kochome, is it? I know! I’ll call you, Choko-me, okay? Chocolate eyes!
She hadn’t liked the nickname much at first – had thought it was a mean-spirited joke about her weight. But Maiye had never seen the world like that, and over time Kochome had grown fond of the name. Besides, she now knew that it was because her eyes had reminded Maiye of chocolate.
“It’s about two lovers overcoming obstacles to have a destined romance.”
“How cliché. Does that sort of thing really interest you?”
“Don’t you think it’s romantic? The idea of a destined love?”
“…To be fully honest, I find the idea beyond repulsive. It’s a soulmate thing, right? If such a thing were to occur in this world we live in, I don’t think I’d have one regardless, but if I did, I’d probably come to resent that person. Who is the universe to say who I should or shouldn’t love? I’d not let other people do it, so why would I make an exception for an ever-expanding void of space? Even if it weren’t romantic, I don’t think I’d let something such as “destiny” become an enjoyable concept.”
“But Mai likes fantasy, right? Doesn’t that genre frequently have a “chosen one”, destined to save the universe?” Kochome has closed her book, looking up at her friend with a fond smile on her face.
“I don’t read fantasy for destiny, Choko-me, I read it for the dragons!” Maiye beams down at her. “Thrilling tales of adventure, uncovering mysteries, the horrors lurking in the shadows out of the corner of your eyes! Dragons and characters and emotional twists and turns, that’s what I’m reading for. Especially the dragons. But you’re right that a lot of fantasy pulls on tired plot threads and culturally-centered concepts of morality and fate. The only interesting thing about that is if it tells me something about the author, but I’m not usually interested enough in other people to look into it.”
And that was the fundamental truth of Maiye. She could not be said to “love” or to “hate” humanity, and yet it still wouldn’t be accurate to say she was indifferent to humanity either. Maiye viewed the people around her with no connection to her life in a detached, almost scientific sense – that is, when she viewed them at all. A dull curiosity, almost akin to background noise. Maiye saw humanity not as the species she belonged to or even as a species at all, but as the occasional creators of things she enjoyed. Usually stories. But although she fit the stereotype of a book nerd lost in fictional worlds, uninterested in the reality she lived in, Kochome had realized that Maiye loved such fictions because of how she took interest in the reality of the world.
“The things people come up with are more interesting than the people themselves, wouldn’t you say?” Maiye had said once, back when they were in CETMUD together, and Kochome had nodded in agreement. “But, in order for such things to be created, there needs to be a creator. That creator, in order to create, needs to pull ideas from somewhere. People are inspired by the world around them and the works that came before their own. But even still, whatever it is that makes that creation “interesting” can only come from the form given to it by the creator. So in that sense, wouldn’t the creator be just as interesting as the creation? And if you think about it, the creator is the entirety of the creation, but the creation is not the entirety of the creator. The creator is, therefore, even more interesting than the creation, right? And yet, it’s very hard to be interested in real people, regardless of what they’ve created. Why do you think that is?”
“I don’t know,” Kochome had said, and Maiye had laughed.
“Me either! But it’s certainly fun to think about.”
Maiye had not changed all that much from their childhood, on the surface. Mainly, she had become simultaneously more open and more secretive, in a way that Kochome found difficult to describe. Kochome herself had probably changed somewhat, but she didn’t think she’d be able to explain how. Physically, they had both changed a great deal – they’d met in CETMUD when Maiye was 10 and Kochome was almost 10, and then they’d met again almost a decade later at CAMA. Of course, they’d written to one another every now and then during that time, but the main thing Kochome had learned during their time as estranged pen pals was that Maiye was very good at using lots of words to say absolutely nothing. At the time, Kochome had assumed that Maiye was just looking for things to say to fill up space, but now she thinks it might have been more than that. Their bond of friendship had remained at a standstill, neither growing nor diminishing, and Kochome is fairly certain that Maiye had kept it that way deliberately. It might have bothered her, being manipulated in such a manner, but she couldn’t bring herself to feel any resentment over it.
Things had stayed the same between them, except they were both taller and wider (more so in Kochome’s case, but Maiye wasn’t the bean sprout she’d been as a child). That childish friendship that they’d maintained with letters had somehow managed to mature once they’d met again in person. Yet it still felt the same. Really, the biggest difference was that the future felt more open – they had more time now that the expiration date inked into Maiye’s life since birth had been erased.
“Do you hate destiny because of what happened at CETMUD?” Kochome wonders aloud, before realizing what she’d said and freezing in place. “I– Mai, I didn’t mean–”
“That’s a good guess, but I don’t think so,” Mai rubbed her chin, knees tightening on the branch. “I mean, there’s no way to know for sure, I guess, but now that you mention it, I suppose the idea of the explosion being “predestined” would annoy me somewhat. But I think I would be against the idea regardless. Maybe I just don’t like being told what to do. But actually, I don’t see how such a thing as “soulmates” or whatever could be romantic at all. I’m not the sort to fall in love, but from what I’ve seen, romantic love is something you have to put effort into, just like any other kind of love. If the universe is doing all the work for you, how can you call that “love”? I mean, I don’t like effort much anyway, but I don’t see the point in calling it “love” if it isn’t. But I also don’t really like romance, so maybe a world that didn’t have any would work for me? I’d get annoyed by pretending that it did, though.”
“…Maiye is a very confusing person.” In part, of course, because Kochome has always been a romantic at heart, and understanding Maiye’s disinterest in anything to do with romance was nearly impossible to her. She can’t understand not wanting at least one person to spend your entire life with. It’s also true, though, that Maiye has a tendency to just say whatever was on her mind without really stopping to think how understandable it would be to anyone listening. Maiye was the sort of person who could go on and on about nothing, but she was also the sort of person who could talk herself into realize entirely new ideas – putting things into words that she’d already known but hadn’t actually realized quite yet.
“Well sure, but who isn’t? I’ve never met a single person who made a lick of sense to me, Choko-me, and it had better stay that way!” Maiye laughs and laughs right up until her knees become loose on the tree and the laughter turns into a yelp as she falls. The wind stirs around her as her magic kicks into gear, and Kochome calmly holds down her things so they don’t get blown away while Maiye’s out-of-control magic buffets her this way and that until she tumbles safely to the ground. It’s a very amusing performance, but that’s all it is. Still, Kochome doesn’t bother to point out that Maiye could have simply said out loud that she no longer wanted to have this conversation, something she was usually fine with. “Enjoy your horrible cliché mush-fest!” Maiye calls from where she landed, before trotting off.
Kochome smiles to herself as she returns to her book. It really isn’t written very well, or she might have been more annoyed by Maiye’s casual insults towards her taste in literature, but at least it’s easier to read than Maiye is.