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“Err… Izzy?” Mimi snapped the man’s attention back to her. A bunch of pixels on a screen refocusing to be an actual image once more.
“S-orry!” He sucked in a breath, embarrassment increasing at the voice crack. He knew he had to answer.
“It’s fine.” Mimi waved him off, twirling a nearly empty nail polish bottle around in her hands. She had this pout on her face that Koushiro had long since filed away as a sign of annoyment or being disheartened, logically he could come to the conclusion it was disheartened in this case. “It doesn’t matter at the end of the day anyway… so—?”
“No!” Koushiro rushed out to state, “No, I… can you repeat your question? I don’t think I quite understand what you’re asking.” Koushiro slid his mouse, enlarging Mimi’s feed to fit the full size of his screen. His game of Terraria was no longer deemed important.
Mimi squinted at her own screen, searching for an ill will. She knew Koushiro wouldn’t do her wrong. She knew that. “We never really… discussed umm… certain aspects of our relationship.” She started eyes darting to the nail polish bottle in her hand to avoid the intently listening stare of her boyfriend.
“I mean when we started dating I already knew that, compared to my past relationships, since this was long distance, we really wouldn’t be all that physical.” She looked back up, raising a hand in a way of defending herself. “Which is completely okay!” Her grip of the nail polish tightened. “I also know you’re not interested in physical things… at least you’ve said you weren’t in the past, and I’m totally okay if that’s like the case point blank. I was just wondering if you perhaps were still willing? And you can say no, really! It’s not a relationship ender for me, while I like that stuff I’m not like, oh I must have it. I just want a solid answer on what to expect.” She ended with a nervous chuckle, biting her lip.
Koushiro stared at the screen with puffed up cheeks and a face Mimi had dictated to be his thinking face. Normally the appearance of said facial expression would have Mimi swooning fondly at her ‘dumb genius’ but now she couldn’t help but fear it.
The last thing she wanted was to sound pushy, but she knew she carried a demanding tone almost constantly, so much so Koushiro had so elegantly titled her bossy on occasion. It was never mean spirited, despite how blunt it was said, and was understood to largely be a joke. But the fact of her own tone made her especially nervous to ruin what they had.
A rhythm of peaceful, mundane, conversations, telling each other about the second half of their previous day and the first half of the current one as the other fell asleep to the sound of their partner rambling. She loved it, she was satisfied with it. Just as she was satisfied with the cuddles and movies when she was in Japan or when Koushiro came to visit her in America.
She’s been more than satisfied with the last three years of their relationship. It was the longest one she’s had. She’s curious what more they could do, sure, that’s why she’s asking at all, but if they’ve reached the max of what is on the table in the physical intimacy department then that’s completely fine. She’ll take her cuddles and she’ll enjoy them. If anything it just means she’ll either have to be transparent or sneaky when they eventually move in together and every once in a while needs a quick fix via a toy. She can live with that no problem.
Truthfully that was her plan in the beginning of all this, because Koushiro was asexual. She’d known that years before they started dating, years before she recognised she had a crush. So bringing up the idea of sex and discussing it seemed pointless. Then she was watching youtube and fell asleep, and when she woke up the video that was playing was an informative one on the asexual spectrum. She’d shut it off without thought. Then it briefly crossed her mind during her lunch break. And then next thing she knew she was watching it.
Still it seemed pointless to bring up, even if Koushiro was on the side of the spectrum that was willing to have sex despite not being interested, it didn’t change the fact he was disinterested.
And she really didn’t want to ruin their rhythm by making him uncomfortable.
She swallowed, looking down at her hands, dreading the unusual silence between them. Sure they went silent on calls plenty of times, just doing things while the phone was on, even if it wasn’t a video call, but those moments were so peaceful and domestic, like they were just existing in each other's space.
She was really regretting blurting out the question without much thought earlier. If she hadn’t then they wouldn’t be in this situation.
“I suppose it would really depend on what you have in mind…” Koushiro finally muttered out his response. Out of sight of the camera frame his thumb was tapping nervously.
“Nothing really,” Mimi willed herself to answer, looking at Koushiro again, his eyes still steady in the way they got when he was willing himself to look at someone, his way of showing that he cared about whatever the person had to say even if no other part of him seemed to express it. “I guess,” she started biting her lip, “I’m mostly just curious as to what it is you’re comfortable with, I’ve thought about it, but I’ve never really thought about it, considering I know you are uninterested and all. It is fine if you’re not—”
“I wouldn’t say I’m uninterested.” Koushiro cut off the brunette, unwilling to deal with processing another spiral of confession, even if it was just a reiteration of her previous one. “I don’t really have a craving for sexual intimacy but it’s more of a neutral outlook. It’s a lack of interest versus actively not wanting to. Though I am not particularly interested in, well,” Koushiro puffed out his cheeks, embarrassment creeping up his spine, “sticking my dick in… anything really. However, if say… “ He searched for something, something further than what they’ve done but not too far off the deep end it would be a huge leap, “during my visit in a month you’d like to properly make out, with fondling and the works” he cleared his throat, “I’d be more than okay with taking that to a point you’re satisfied with.”
“I don’t want to ask you to do anything that won’t feel nice for you too.” Mimi pouted. “I’m perfectly satisfied with my pecks, thank you very much.” She huffed, puffing out her chest.
Koushiro let out a soft laugh, a fond smile spreading, “It feels nice kissing you.”
Mimi paused at the confession, a smirk spreading across her face. “If I didn’t know better I’d say you’re flirting with me.”
Koushiro shrank a little, smile still present, “What’s that supposed to mean? I thought it was normal to flirt with your significant other.”
Mimi leaned forward, finally putting the bottle of nail polish down, “Izzy, darling, you flirt by info dumping about algorithms and probabilities or some new theory you have about the digital world.”
“I can flirt traditionally too.” Koushiro defended, not offended but still feeling the need to prove a point.
Mimi laughed, “Mhm, sure.” She leaned forward resting her chin on her hand, “Darling, the closest to regular flirting you’ve ever done was that time you ranted about the similarities you found between the constellations in the digital world and the real world.”
Koushiro rolled his eyes, minimizing Mimi’s screen once more to continue his game. “It wasn’t about the similarities, it was about the way the stars in the digital world represent many constellations that are described in fantasy books that are uploaded on the internet with real constellations mixed in, which is why the stars are different because they have extra information being filtered into creation….” He trailed off, consciously clocking that he was talking too much without being asked to.
Mimi tilted her head, smile softening, she grabbed her phone and opened to her notes app scrolling through it. “Hmmm, it’s been a while since that conversation, what was the deal with the north star again?” She looked at the random words she had typed into her notes, putting a colon next to “*N. Star*” so she could add any of the words she would actually pick up on. She wasn’t likely going to understand anything about to be spouted to her but at least she could look it up later or have something to ask about.
Koushiro lit up, starting his explanation on why they had never seen the North Star in the digital world but that the star did exist. Terraria was a secondary concern as he took fall damage while mining and not looking, his rant pausing to fret over the damage before starting right up.
Mimi had also moved on from the embarrassing conversation from earlier, now looking at a spreadsheet on her computer to log her week’s payments and to budget for the month. Every once in a while grabbing her phone to type in something that actually caught her interest, but knowing better than to interrupt.
Eventually the rant ended, and the subsequent rants from Mimi’s few questions, the two partners now sitting in silence while doing their own thing. Normal for them, and peaceful in every way.
Their previous awkward conversation forgotten in the background for now.