It had only been one day since the Student Council meeting had ended, and the glares shot from one president to the other had been nealy visible knives hurdled between the princes. Spica didn't hate Miator that much? Did it? Surely not because her best friend....she paused in thought to remember their kiss, her fluttering heart. Her face turned red and she looked at the pathway at her feet as she walked toward the very object of her thoughts.

She was frightened, but only for a moment, that Shoka walked this very campus somewhere, and hoped she would never find herself alone with the intimidating Prince. However, more driving than the need to stay away from Shoka, was the need to see Margeaux again. They...they had kissed after all, maybe they should talk about it? Though Rin almost felt as if the gesture didn't need an explanation, it had happened, the both felt something in the moment right? Should they act like it didn't happen? Or maybe do it again?

Now she was getting dizzy and paused to check her watch. Margeaux might be practicing at the archery range by now, and she turned to look for her there first. It was only a matter of time though before she spotted her red headed friend, and, instead of running right up to her, her heart started beating faster and her feet refused to move. She smiled, wanting to wave and get her attention, but for a just a moment, she realized she had quite the crush on her best friend and in her realization, couldn't bring herself to do anything but watch her and feel this wonderful buzzing inside.

News of that rather eventful Student Council meeting had even reached Margeaux, by this point. It seemed that the meeting had barely completed before the entire Hill began buzzing with rumors and speculation. As a student of St. Spica, she had heard a lot of the rivalry between her school and St. Miator. But, none of it had ever felt quite...real, until today. Jokes were being tossed around about Miator girls. Some of her classmates seemed to be intent on "Showing them who's boss!".

But, Margeaux kept silent. She wouldn't join in on any of that nonsense. Not when the Miator President was one of the first friends she had made here. And especially not when her best friend was a Miator. Although...best friend? Did that term even apply any more?

The arrow missed the mark quite spectacularly as she thought about the kiss she had shared with Rin and lost her concentration. Her cheeks flared red with a blush as she hastily notched another arrow and hoped no one had noticed. This was practice! She couldn't look like she was wasting everyone's time. Margeaux drew the arrow back and felt the tension in the bow.

As she focused on her breathing, she was unaware that the pinkette who she had just been thinking about was getting closer. Had it not been for the eye patch she wore she might have spotted her out of the corner of her eye. Had she been able to spot anything out of the corner of that particular eye. As it so happened, she was able to regain her focus and stare down range at her intended target. This time, she found much better success, as the arrow whistled it's way down and landed with a satisfying THUNK near the center.

Remnants of the blush still lingered on her face, as the redhead drew another arrow. This time, she was much more calm about notching it and pulling it back.

THUNK

The arrow hit it's mark once more, jutting out right next to her previous shot.

She watched her, like she had that say, the same fluttering in her belly as her eyes sparkled. Margeaux-kun was so cool! The pose she had to take in order to fire the arrow was so cool looking, she could only stare for a moment, from over here, she couldn't quite tell where she was hitting on the target, but was impressed none the less. Finally she gathered her courage and called out,

"Margeaux-kun!" A few other Spicans on the range looked over at her, and she shyed from them. Being a Miator on the Spica campus at a time like this was probably not the best idea, she feared they might even doing something to her, so she was eager to approach Margeaux. For yet another moment, she wondered if maybe her friend would be embarrassed to be seen with a Miator? But that was silly, right?

Now she was close enough to feel safe from the looks of the other white clad students, she had to stop. Had Margeaux gotten taller? She bit her lip, completely forgetting why she came.

"Uh...hi," was all she managed, smiling shyly, pink dusted cheeks giving away her feelings just then.

Things tended to be mostly quiet on the archery range. Most of the other students were focused on their own practice, but the ones who weren't active were hanging back and making idle chatter. This had always been easy to drown out. For the most part, each member of the Archery Club did their best to keep quiet. The occasional "fan" would stop by and offer her support to a particular archer. Some had more than others. And there would sometimes be some applause or cheers for successful attempts at hitting a target.

This, too, was something Margeaux had learned to block out. It wouldn't do any good to be thrown off by people cheering, especially when it came time to compete in official events when there would be many more people in attendance. To the American, this was just another form of practice. However, there was one thing she was not prepared to hear ring out, above the background noise of archery practice.

"Margeaux-kun!"

The familiar voice carried with it, it's familiar pink colors.

"Ri-Rinko-chan?" a puzzled mumble accompanied a stray shot. This one land in the ground just in front of her neighbor's target. "Er...s-sorry about that!"

She bowed, apologetically to the other archer, who gave hair a raised eyebrow and a rather cold look. Rin had approached and the other girl turned her attention back to her practice. Still, a few whispers were bubbling up here and there. Margeaux turned and found Rin had walked up, closer. She stepped out of her position to greet the pinkette, with blush streaking across her face.

"Ah...Rinko-chan...Hi." she answered, managing to offer up a smile to the Miator girl. There was still the question of what had brought Rin all the way out here, although it seemed like she was just looking to see Margeaux. Which only made the redhead blush more and her heart pound a little faster.

A silence passed between then, Rin wondered if she should have come.

"Ah..I hope I'm not bothering you, I could come back when you aren't busy.." she said, her tone was still friendly and was not sad in the slightest, but she couldn't look at her friend, lest she freeze up again.

"I just...wanted to...see you." Now she couldn't help the blue gaze that slipped up to her friend to see what she would say, how she might react.

"and I wanted to tell you about the Student Council meeting, it was really...tense."

She remembered Shoka's eyes on her, that was really what she wanted to talk about, to tell her how scary those eyes had been, and to see if any part of her friend agreed with the Prince's rivalry.

"So...Donomoto-sama, really seems to hate Ubu-chan, but she looked at me...eh, well, she looked at me." Rin hugged herself as if she'd been violated in some way, it wasn't like the president had been indecent, but those eyes. They were the type to haunt a person. "She's scary..."

To break herself out of the memory of that gaze, she reached for Margeaux's hand but looked away as she held it, "You..don't, um...want me to go away because I'm a Miator student do you?" She knew she was being ridiculous, but the rivalry seemed really fierce and she didn't want to embarrass her friend by coming around in front of so many other Spicans.

In the moments that passed, Margeaux could see the various colors of the whispers all around her. She looked at Rin and ignored them, although she was still attempting to keep her cool and not turn any redder in the face. If that was possible for her to do. "A-ah, no!" she said, quickly waving a hand in front of her as she attempted to reassure Rin, "Not at all!"

Of course the admission to her purpose shouldn't have come as any big surprise. She had just been thinking about that, herself. And yet, it still made the red haired Spican almost giddy with you to hear that Rin just wanted to swing by and see her. Since the beginning of the school year, Rin had been busy on the Student Council. And that had placed her right in the middle of the whole thing.

As she told it, the rivalry between the two Presidents seemed to be quite real. And the President of her own St. Spica had given a look towards Rin that had sent shivers down her spine. That was unacceptable! She clenched a fist, even though she knew there really wasn't much she could do. Shoka Donomoto was the Student Council President. And Margeaux was an ordinary student. She supposed she could always try slugging it out with the older girl, but that probably wouldn't accomplish anything.

When Rin sought out her hand, Margeaux released the tension and wrapped her fingers gently around the pinkette's. She looked at the other girl and smiled, "Of course not!" she said, "I'm always happy to see you, Rinko-chan. And I don't care what school you go to. You can come and visit me ANY time you like!"

She pulled Rin in close and wrapped her arms around the pink haired girl in a tight hug.

Of course her friend wouldn't care! She was about to show her a sheepsh smile and admit she was just being silly, but then something amazing happened, she was pulled close! Of course she had hugged her friend before, but this time something was different, even more wonderful. And somewhere inside, she felt as if Margeaux had pulled her heart a little closer too.

She smiled and closed her eyes, turning her face into Margeaux's chest/neck(depending on how tall she is), she smelled like sun and something sweet. "and Ubu-chan sure has...changed. She's so elegant now, she puts me to shame," that was her parents talking, "no wonder she won student President."

She paused, her parents words suddenly weighing on her, "I missed you..." she said. If anyone could make her feel better no matter what, it was Margeaux. Never mind she was also going to ask if her friend would be participating in Shoka's sport event, whatever it ended up being. That red head at the meeting sure had been excited about a swim meet. She wondered if Margeaux did anything like that.

As Rin turned her face into her neck, she heard the pink haired Miator speak more of the nonsense that had appeared in the letter. Boy did she want to give those parents of her's a piece of her mind. It seemed that Rin had fallen into that category of person she could not stand hearing anything bad about. Just like saying anything about her family, such things were typically fighting words for the redhead.

"I missed you, too." she said. Wrapping Rin up in the hug was quite the public display of her affection towards the Miator girl. And that was a move that was not likely to win her many friends, here at St. Spica. But, as far Margeaux was concerned, as long she had Rin by her side, what did any of that matter? Her true friends would not question who she spent her time with.

And she certainly wanted to spend more of it with Rin. The furthest things from her mind, right now, were anything pertaining to the competitions that St. Spica seemed to be eager to engage in. Whether or not it would actually be against Miator was another thing that was low on her list of concerns.

"So, umm..." the quiet moment did have to get broken, at some point, "Do you...want to go anywhere after practice?"

Hearing her sentiment returned made Rin feel warm. All these new emotions made her giddy and a little nervous, but each time she let them guide her, Margeaux was right beside her. She was further comforted by the arms around her, she wanted to stay in them, it didn't matter that people were whispering about them. Margeaux's arms just made her feel so safe.

Then, Margeaux wanted to go somewhere with her? Rin hadn't thought of that, "H-hai!" She chirped, but where? To get food? Like...a date? Why would she think of it like that? She was blushing again, not wanting to back away, but deciding their embrace had lasted too long in front of everyone. She fidgeted with her skirt, "I-I want to go wherever you want to go..." She said shyly.

Did she really just ask Rin out on a date? And was this really any different from any of the other times they had arranged to meet up for some other thing. It certainly did feel a lot more date-y. Perhaps it was because she had just been hugging the girl for all that time. Or it had something to do with that kiss of theirs.

The most important thing, though, was that Rin had agreed to it. This made Margeaux positively beam. So, they would go out! The only question, was where. And this answer was left up to Margeaux who gripped her bow in both hands as she tried to think up something on the spot.

"Um, then how about we go into town..." she said, "And grab some dinner? Someplace?"

There was still a lot of work left to do on that front. The important thing to consider, was that she was going to get to spend some more time with Rin. And going out into the town seemed like it could be a fun little adventure, even if there was no definitive destination just yet.