Chapter Text
Saiki stopped walking abruptly, and turned to face Teruhashi. He cocked his head to one side, before gently lowering himself to the sand, one leg stretched out horizontally in front of himself, and the other bent to let him rest his arm on his knee at a comfortable height. With his other hand, he patted the sand next to him twice, wordlessly encouraging Teruhashi to take a seat next to him.
Teruhashi pauses for a moment to evaluate him, their eyes locked, before she gracefully acquiesces and sinks to her knees, hands folded in her lap. She turns her head precisely in a practiced manner, letting the afternoon sunlight catch her face in the most flattering way. Saiki's ring stops him from reading her thoughts in that moment, but he knows her well enough to be aware that Teruhashi often masks her emotions with a perfectly serene expression. 'She's like a frozen lake', he observes, 'with a placid mirror-still surface concealing a turbulence beneath'. He cannot tell if she's truly satisfied in that moment, but he knows that if she is, he's about to shatter that peace.
As he opens his mouth to speak, to bring an end to their relationship, there's a chorus of shouts from the middle distance -
"Isn't that THE Teruhashi?"
"What's the number one streamer doing at the beach?"
"Let's go get an autograph!"
Saiki feels it when involuntarily, his lip can't help but curl in distaste at the intrusion, at the attention. Saiki loves how observant Teruhashi is, but when she clocks his irritation her face falls. He wants to talk about it, starts to open his mouth, but her smile is already taking on an almost rictus quality as she prepares to turn and bask in the attention of her fans instead. Saiki's eyes catch on something behind her, building out in the distance. It's just a wave, but something about it screams danger to his instincts. He stands for a better view - how far out is it? How big? It's maybe a meter or two above sea level in the depths, but by the time it reaches the shallows… He performs some mental calculations, and curses himself internally. By the time it reaches the beach, it could easily be twenty meters high, if not more - that can only be classified as a damn Tsunami!
Why hasn't one of his clones taken care of it? He curses him self internally again when he realises - the Germanium Ring. He'd been blocking telepathic access to his mind, but that didn't stop the clones from sensing his presence and presumably they had assumed he'd handle it. Fuck. And now, with a legion of Teruhashi's fans already close, he couldn't slip away to put on his helmet. If he acts, he'll be acting in full view of her fans. Even turning invisible won't save him now, since they've already seen him here and there's no cover nearby to duck behind and vanish.
He takes off the ring, hoping he can telepathically commune with one of his clones to call for aid, but after sifting through the mental noise, it became clear that none are in range. Saiki was struck by the realisation that he would be forced to choose - save Teruhashi and her fans, or save his secret.
Teruhashi has always prided herself on her intimate and thorough understanding of social dynamics. It's always been her interest, understanding how people see themselves and each other. To some degree, it was what she needed to know in order to be the ideal perfect pretty girl, the woman who knows everyone and their relationships. It was never effortless for her, but the binders full of meticulous research had always allowed her to navigate her social environment, with a complete understanding of the people she met.
If pressed, Teruhashi would perhaps admit that Saiki had initially defied her ability to understand people. Her subtler manipulations that would typically get someone fawning over her had proved entirely ineffective in winning him over, and even her more overt invitations to bond had been rebuffed by the taciturn young man. Oh, she'd come to understand him far better over the course of their relationship - indeed, she'd filled half a notebook on the particular inferences she could safely draw based on the exact angle of his brow, the level of tension in his jaw, or the various ways his feigned disinterest was betrayed by his eyes.
She didn't need those pages to figure out what it meant when your partner says "we need to talk".
And whilst she strove to project that same perfect image to her fanbase, her patience was sorely tested when she was preparing to get her heart broken and saw a group of them approaching her. Sat on the sand with Saiki, she raised a hand to keep the sun out of her eyes as she glanced up at the incoming horde. They were maintaining a respectful distance of a few metres, but she knew it would be only a matter of moments before one or two of the bolder fans plucked up their courage and broke that barrier. Based on her brief look at them, she'd have bet on the man in the white hat or the woman with the pink sunglasses.
However, before the first fan could step up, Saiki pointed. Following her boyfriend's outstretched finger, Teruhashi and her fans turned, and saw the building wave. Instantly, their attention was captured by the wave, cameras whipping upwards to center the frame around the sea rather than Teruhashi's perfect face, although undoubtedly she remained in shot. A celebrity in a crisis was a valuable image.
"Wow! Get ready for the Miracle everyone! He'll save us before the wave hits!", the woman in the sunglasses cried out.
Whilst Teruhashi was pleased to note she'd been correct about which fan was the most willing to speak up, she couldn't help a twinge of jealousy. 'The Miracle. ugh. Obviously what that person does is a good thing, but they're not exactly outgoing and charismatic. I don't understand what kind of person would avoid attention so desperately, he could have them eating out of the palm of his hand if he wanted. Why never speak? Who could resist that kind of attention… if only I had the power, or knew who did…'. Next to her, Saiki shifted uncomfortably.
As the seconds ticked by, the wave grew. It got closer and closer to the shoreline, building higher and higher. The Miracle still did not appear. Uneasy murmurs spread throughout the crowd.
The man in the white hat said what they were all surely thinking when he said "Where's the Miracle?", inhaling sharply, "he ought to be here by now!".
'He ought to be, but he isn't', she thought. Then Teruhashi frowned. 'It was almost as if…. the sort of person who wouldn't capitalise on the attention… the sort of person who'd wear a helmet and keep their face a secret, who wouldn't want to give up their privacy but still had a steadfast desire to do the right thing anyway…' She couldn't quite finish the train of thought. And then she could.
Saiki watched her, his eyes blown wide. As if in slow motion, Teruhashi turned to look at him, silhouetted against the flashing cameras and panicked crowd. In her mind's eye, the Miracle's helmet was superimposing itself over his head.
She knew exactly what he needed. A distraction. And with her perfect knowledge of people, Teruhashi could give him precisely that. All she would have to do was compromise her perfect image in front of all those watching eyes. Sacrifice her desperately held together reputation. She felt frustrated just thinking about it, and then angry with herself for that. Saiki was looking at her like he knew what she would do next. Maybe he did, if her deduction was correct.
The crowd reached a fever pitch, cries of "where's the miracle?!" almost as prayers, begging that powerful being to aid them. He couldn't, not as long as the cameras lingered on them, framing them in front of the wave threatening to crash down.
She understood it now, the fact that this could only go one of two ways. She could get the attention of the world by outing his secret, elevating her career from mere variety streamer and entertainer to a serious voice in the mainstream. He would never forgive her. Or she could pass it up, sacrifice the audience she had fought to build, and keep him in her life. It was between her reputation and his privacy.
To Teruhashi, it was not a choice.
She turned her face to the cameras, eyes brimming full of angelic tears, and wailed in anger and sorrow. She let loose every dark, selfish thought she had kept beneath her social mask for the past lifetime, the kinds of things the Perfect Pretty Girl could never say. It was surely a vitriolic screed, but whilst it came so easily in the heat of the moment, she would later struggle to recall more than a few words. The viral clips would seem alien to her, as though the words were spoken by some other woman.
Nobody but Teruhashi noticed as Saiki slipped out of frame. They were all too entranced by Teruhashi's performance to care about that man moving to the side. Except he stopped. She saw him, on his feet behind the crowd, swapping something from his bag for his helmet and in the same fluid motion raising it towards his head. But as it reached the apex of the motion, instead of bringing it back down to put it on, he stopped.
He walked back into the shot, and cut Teruhashi's rant off by leaning in.
"You hate PDA" she said with a confused tone, hesitating.
His expression was flat as he responded, "I'll survive".
She closed her eyes and kissed him. He discarded the helmet on the sand, and it fell with a soft 'thud'. After a moment, she felt him gradually pull away - upwards. The crowd gasped, and Teruhashi opened her eyes to see her boyfriend levitating towards the wave. He raised his hands, palms flashing with psionic power, and then, right as the wave broke upon the shore and threatened to crash down upon them, it burst into a harmless spray of mist.
Light refracted through the droplets of water, perfectly framing the levitating form of Saiki Kusuo in a rainbow. It was an image that would go on to eclipse the term virality. It was one for the history books. Finally, after such a long period of waiting, the people knew the face of the Miracle. They knew his name.
Teruhashi wondered if he cared. Wondered why he'd done it. She was most concerned however, about finding out if he still planned on breaking up with her. Was that selfish? She didn't really care.
He lowered himself through the air towards the crowd gracefully, landing on one knee with perfect precision. The crowd clamoured for his attention. But when he spoke, he spoke only to Teruhashi.
"I'm sorry I didn't tell you before", gesturing awkwardly at the air and the discarded helmet as he spoke, "about all of… that. I'm sorry I didn't trust you. I was too focused on what it might mean for me if it got out."
She winced a little as she replied, "Don't be sorry. I'm sorry for not making myself someone you felt safe being vulnerable with."
He stood up and took her hand, shaking his head softly.
"Maybe we both made mistakes. I already forgive you for yours, and with my abilities, I can make up for mine if you'll let me. I'll take you on the perfect date, suiting the perfect woman. Anywhere in the world, anywhere you want to go, and I'll teleport us there in an instant. Just tell me where to go."
She smiled
"Home. I want to go home, and have a quiet night in with you."
She blinked, and they were stood in her kitchen. Kusuo reached past, and opened the fridge. He extracted two pots of Tiramasu, and handed one to her as he lazily flicked his wrist and floated two spoons out of the drawer with telekinesis.
Teruhashi Kokomi laughed, and felt content.