Felixfalck
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The sting
🕑 Added 2023-01-05 00:00:02 +0000 UTCPrevious chapter: https://www.patreon.com/posts/meet-ami-miura-76483505?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link
It's way too cold to be walking around in a skirt today. At least Ami has tall stockings on. She'd probably get some boy's jacket if she said she was cold, but it'd probably smell like sweat and Axe body spray. Yuck. It's not far though, she can easily endure it, though she hopes there wont be any more gusts of wind. The boys are probably praying for it so that they can catch a glimpse of her panties, they're so simple. The trees should at least provide some cover.
What's that? A cat! Must. Pet! Ami always wanted a pet, It would never work out with her dad though, He's allergic. Any pet that has fur is a no-go in their house. She's entertained the thought of getting one when she moves out. It's a lot of responsibility though, and with her ambition for traveling and becoming a diplomat there really isn't a way for her to keep pets.
There was however nothing preventing her from petting when she met them. With little regard for how the cat may feel she approached it with her arm outstretched. Once she got close she squatted and tried to pspspsps it into submission. The cat simply stared at her for just moment before hissing and jabbing her palm with it's fangs.
The sudden hostility caught Ami by surprise and she fell backwards on her butt. It didn't hurt when her cheeks met the asphalt but the sting to her right thigh hurt like hell. She let out a loud shriek which caused her orbiters to flock around her. Her palm was unscathed, but that wasn't where the pain was. The sting in her thigh was the real kicker. The shout had scared the cat off but Ami was still on her ass, shocked by what had just happened.
A girl she considered to be an actual friend, Asuna, offered her hand to help Ami up. The gesture did little to ease the pain in her thigh but was still appreciated. Now back on her feet Ami pretended to brush her skirt of any dirt it may have been exposed to from the ground. In truth she was brushing her hand over her thigh to scan for any foreign objects. To her surprise there was nothing embedded there. Looking back at the asphalt where she'd fallen she spotted a green thorn pointing up towards her.
What shitty luck, she thought. First she met the worst cat in the history of cats, and then she fell on a thorn which just so happened to lie pointing up.
The thorn may not be in her anymore, but the pain was still very much present.
"Are you okay, Ami?" Asuna was the only one to actually ask. None of the orbiters had bothered or dared to be the first one to speak up.
"I'm fine, the cat was probably just scared, hehe" She tried to brush it off and not make more of a scene than necessary.
Ami wanted nothing more than to move on and forget about the whole ordeal. It was embarrassing enough to have been shut down by a cat, let alone the shriek and falling on her ass. She had an image to preserve and moved on seemingly unphased. As she began moving again the sun peeked out from behind a cloud. The sun triggered Asuna to again speak up.
"You might want to roll your sleeves back down, don't want to get an uneven tan.." It was much more of a whisper than actual speech so it wouldn't be heard by the others. Ami looked at her quizzically before looking down at her very pale forearms. She inspected her arms in confusion for only a moment before understanding what her friend had meant.
Ami rolled her sleeves down and continued walking. Only two corners later she'd arrived at home. She waved her "friends" goodbye and went inside. Most of the group continued on in the same direction, but three desperate orbiters actually went back to where they came from as they actually lived in the opposite direction.
Finally home she could breathe a sigh of relief and properly inspect her thigh. To her amazement there didn't seem to be a wound at all. The only evidence of the thorn was the pain still she was still feeling, though it had subsided a lot.
Marking the end of every day of school was the near ceremonious act of taking off her commute shoes. Then came the highlight of the day, running up to her room and putting on some comfy home wear before getting on with her homework.
While deep in her math homework something unusual happened. She found herself getting bored. Her attention drifted away from the paper sheet before her and to the little vanity mirror on her desk.
She'd heard time and time again that her pale complexion made her look like a doll. She hated that comment. She was anything but a doll. She'd wanted to get a proper tan for the longest time now, but her strict schedule along with her indoor activities with the literature club made it borderline impossible.
That's why she was so careful with her skin to begin with. If she was going to be pale she might as well take it to the extreme. There was a form of beauty in a perfectly pale complexion. It'd look awful if she had clear tan lines or an uneven complexion in general. She'd already had this conversation with Asuna before which was precisely why she'd commented on the sleeves in the first place.
With her train of thought already derailed her mind kept drifting further and further away from the task at hand. It eventually landed on her physique. It, along with her tan, was one of her few insecurities. Her near complete lack of exercise further emphasized her doll-like appearance by giving her a lithe and dainty build with little to no muscles to speak of.
Ami's thoughts of self pity were interrupted by her mother announcing with a yell through the entire house that dinner was ready. She shook her head and tried to cheer up before meeting her parents in the kitchen to eat. The dinner went as it always does. Her mother yapped away at how polite and nice her English students were compared to back in the states. It was many MANY years since she'd been a teacher in her country of origin but she never hesitated to use the same exact examples of just how bad American pupils could be..
Ami's father was a stoic man of few words and tended to eat his food in utter silence apart from the occasional question directed at his daughter regarding her studies and grades. Their relationship pretty much consisted of short questions and answers. The love was still there though, they just ..communicated it differently. After dinner Ami went back up to her room and finished the math homework. Without being sidetracked this time. She later went to bed at her usual time, thigh still aching.
The next morning she went about her usual routine of showering, getting dressed and eating breakfast. Having a on suite bathroom really saved her a lot of time in the morning sparing her of the extra effort of putting on clothes before leaving the room to shower. She was happy to find that her thigh had quit hurting.
The usual crowd had already gathered at her front door waiting for her. She put on her fake smile and greeted them as friends, though the only actual person she wanted to see was Asuna.
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Going for a retroactive approach here where any effects are as if they've always been. I'm also not explicitly making any mention of the discontinuities occurring to better reflect how Ami herself is experiencing the situation. Basically you have to pay close attention to properly catch how the thorn affects her.
