Number 7 koumi for the winter prompt :)
Hello! 🌠🌠 I am so glad you chose Koumi for this prompt because I immediately thought of them as soon as I read it! @wolfram-kun had also requested this so I hope you both enjoy! I also want to mention @noctisfishing because this is the prompt I shared a line from in the Fanfic asks.
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My list of Digimon drabbles ☺
Prompt #7: I love you to the Moon and Saturn
Featuring a fluffy Koumi during Christmastime, where they have been dating for roughly a year, set sometime after tri, and things are about to be confessed! I am so hype for Christmas after writing this! 🎅🎅
December arrived in Tokyo with a vengeance, and although snow had yet to fall, the winds were cold, snappy, and biting. Mimi had arrived at the Izumi apartment with rosy cheeks and an even redder nose, made all the more apparent by her Christmas tree inspired sweater, featuring rows of gaudy garland, silver sequin ornaments, and a sparkling gold star positioned under the neckline. The finishing touch was a Santa hat, the white pom-pom bouncing as she skipped inside and pulled a matching one over Koushiro's head, clearly ignoring his slightly dramatic groan. He was convinced that only she could wear something so ridiculous, so quirky, and wear it well. But that was Mimi. As the holiday season approached, she grew more and more festive, humming carols in between classes, organizing Secret Santa with the Chosen, and begging him to bake cookies together. He didn’t mind Christmas, but preferred winter as a whole to the singular day, wrapping up in blankets, drinking hot chocolate, and hibernating indoors until the first sunny, springtime day.
Still. The prospect of melt-in-your mouth cookies was too good to pass up so he agreed to the afternoon baking extravaganza planned by his girlfriend, and Mimi taught him and his mother how to make gingerbread, vanilla, and snickerdoodle cookies using old family recipes from a good friend back in America. It didn't take long for the apartment to bask in cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger, their warming scents lazily drifting from room to room and promising Christmas coziness.
Koushiro whisked frosting, and Palmon and Tentomon hovered beside him, "helping" by dipping vines and claws in the bowl to make sure the flavor was just right. The oven timer beeped, and Mimi and Kae jumped up from the kitchen table in unison, identical grins painted across their faces. They pulled out the last two sheets, filled with gingerbread men, stars, trees, and snowflakes. Koushiro had counted 64 cookies in total, and when he asked why in the world anyone needed so many, Mimi laughed like a songbird and explained that in the States, households arranged plates of cookies as gifts to their friends, coworkers, and neighbors, and that for their first holiday in New York, her family wound up with seven platters and four tins.
They weren't long into decorating when the lights flickered, once, twice, then fizzled off completely.
"Must be an outage from the wind storm?" Koushiro asked, frowning at the "Network Lost" message glaring back at him on his laptop.
Palmon motioned something to Tentomon and he shook his head as the pair bounded off in the dark while not so secretly smuggling cookies with them.
"At least we finished baking," Mimi said.
Kae wasted no time in lighting several candles around the apartment, enough to cast a faint glimmering glow. She handed one to Mimi and rummaged through the broom closet, tossing blankets into towers on the table and one onto Koushiro.
"In case it starts to get chilly in here," she said. "I'm going to check on Saito-san to make sure she's alright. A couple candles and cookies wouldn't hurt either. She's all alone upstairs and doesn't move about well anymore."
"How long will the power be out for?" Mimi asked when Kae left.
"It shouldn't be too long. Why, scared?" he teased, flicking her hat's pom-pom.
"No," she huffed too quickly.
“Mimi! Koushiro!" Palmon called from the living room.
"Come look," Tentomon buzzed.
The two Digimon were propped up on the window sill, their faces pressed tight up against the glass. Their partners knelt down behind them, and Koushiro lifted the curtain so he and Mimi could squeeze in behind.
"What did you find?" Mimi asked.
"There are so many stars out tonight," Tentomon said.
"Why aren't they always this bright?" Palmon asked.
"There's usually too much light pollution in Tokyo to see them properly," Koushiro explained. "But with part of the city losing power, the stars are easier to spot."
"Aren't they beautiful?" Mimi cooed, setting the candle down on the sill (among spilled cookie crumbs) and spreading her fingers across the window as if she wanted to pull one into her grasp. "It reminds me of New York."
Koushiro was about to open his mouth to ask for clarification, since he was almost certain that despite the population being smaller in New York City, there was a comparable level of skyglow between there and Tokyo, but when Mimi's eyes glazed over to a dreamy, faraway place that only she seemed aware of, his lips curled into a soft smile because he knew that the gleam in her expression meant she had drifted into a memory, and if he waited, she would tell him. Mimi was full of whimsical stories, and he never tired of hearing them, even the fictitious ones she made up on the spot for Palmon and Tentomon.
She sighed, still lost in her thoughts, and began to recount the tale in a lulling tone that reminded him of pastel evenings, when day and night blended together into creamy blues and purples.
"I travelled upstate with my parents after Christmas one year to visit a ski resort in the Catskill Mountains. The kaleidoscope of fluorescent lights from the city melted away in the rearview mirror, and it didn't take long for us to become plunged in quiet darkness. It was like we had fallen into a different world, driving up and down narrow roads through rolling hills, sleepy villages, and snow laden farm fields, almost always surrounded by gnarled trees whose branches stooped over us like voiceless monsters. I remember thinking that I had never seen the stars shine as brightly, twinkling and fluttering in the sky as if they were a city of their own, and it reminded me of going to the Digital World all those years ago, being so terrified of everything around us at first, but learning to appreciate its ethereal allure, like taking a deep breath of fresh air after being cooped up in a single place for too long."
"Ever since, I've been convinced that the stars sing to each other when they twinkle. Don't you think so?" she asked, turning to Koushiro. His immediate thought was the absurdity of such a notion because a star's luminosity was caused by gravitational pull to its center, not song notes, but the swirl of honey caramel in Mimi's own eyes glistened like Sirius, and he was caught off guard by their luster. He mumbled incoherent words, but Mimi's head was lost in space, and she mused on, explaining how the stars were sopranos and countertenors, their high-pitched sparkle contrasting with the moons' baritone and the comets' alto, all combining to create a symphony of astronomical melodies, and if humans listened close enough in the dead of night, they could hear the faint, whispered caroling of the heavenly bodies declaring their love for each other.
Koushiro gazed at Mimi with an adoring smile that grew larger as she continued to talk, her arms flailing haphazardly in excitement and nearly striking him at one point because she had inched closer to him so that their legs were entwined together. Personal space was beyond the realm of her understanding, and while it had been unusual, even unwelcome, at first, to brace himself for her oversized embraces, to summon the courage to hold her hand, to weave his fingers through her hair after she had fallen asleep watching movies, he had grown to lean on her presence and the comfort she delivered. With confidence oozing from her every word, his logic faltered, and Koushiro found himself wondering if the stars and planets and asteroids really did sing to each other.
"You are so great," Koushiro said. "I love you."
Mimi was staring at him, and if her eyes were stars before, now they were galaxies, dazzling with moonbeams that reflected off the flickering candle between them. Koushiro stared back, his head tilting slightly because he couldn't decipher her meaning, why her demeanor was fraught with celestial electricity threatening to detonate, why her eyes narrowed in playful knowingness. It took several seconds for Koushiro's brain to catch up with his mouth, and when he realized what he had said, in front of Mimi, out loud, with his actual voice, his heart pounded, his muscles tensed, and his instincts told him to fight and flight.
"You said you love me," Mimi accused.
"No...no I didn't," he countered, holding up a wobbly finger. "I said 'you are so great,' and then, well, I don't remember, I either stopped talking or it all kind of garbled together towards the end there, didn't it?"
His voice cracked at the end, and Mimi stifled a giggle, pushing his hand back down and placing hers inside. Tentomon squeezed around the two teenagers, pushing Palmon back into the kitchen and muttering something about frosting more cookies.
"You love me!" Mimi crooned, poking his chest with her free hand.
"I -" The 'don't' was on the tip of his tongue, ready to emerge and deny it all. But. That would be a lie, right? He had said it. Did he love her? Koushiro was known to dwell on all the facts, to conduct test after test after test before drawing conclusions. And yet... it had slipped from him without any effort or thought, as if it were the most obvious truth. He didn’t do that. That wasn’t part of the process. He raked his memory for specifics, but there was nothing, no previous notion of love that he could deduce. Unless. It had always been present, lying dormant with the potential to spread. But why wouldn't he have noticed it? He had always been more comfortable de-coding computer programs as opposed to interpreting emotions, and assumed that love was a grandiose entity that flashed and roared and suffocated. But Koushiro's breath was soft, the rapid beating in his chest subsided to a gentle ebb and flow, and images flashed across his head: Mimi reading their literature homework out loud while he worked on stabilizing a portal to the Digital World; her face in determined concentration as she tried to follow the explanation of his latest breakthrough; dropping off small snacks to his office and texting him reminders to eat and drink (water, not tea); the morning he brought her a grande peppermint mocha with whipped cream and dark chocolate curls to school for no other reason besides he knew it was her favorite this time of year; Tuesday evenings when he logged off early to watch American Idol with her, her parents, and a giant bowl of popcorn.
Of course. Of course. The everyday.
“I love you,” he said with conviction, though too nervous to meet her stare.
“Relax,” she said, pulling his chin back up so the two were eye to eye. “Don’t you know that I love you, too? I thought you knew everything, Koushiro.”
What was he supposed to say now? Thankfully, he didn't have to yet.
“I didn’t want to pressure you, or make things awkward,” she said in a more timid voice, and this time, it was her eyes that darted to the side. “But in fact, I love you to the Moon and to Saturn.”
Despite the thickness in the back of his throat, and the tingling warmness spreading across his cheeks, logic prevailed once again, and Koushiro’s brows furrowed as he calculated the distance. 934.3 million miles, a sizable, albeit odd, length to declare one’s love.
“Isn’t the expression ‘to the Moon and back?’” he asked.
“Boring," she said, feigning a yawn. "Wouldn’t you rather go to Saturn instead of coming back to Earth?”
Koushiro couldn’t help it, he laughed. “I'll admit, I hadn't thought about it that way before.”
"That's what I'm here for."
Mimi rested her head in the nook of his shoulder, grazing her lips against his neck, and a familiar tingling sensation crept down to his fingertips. He draped the blanket over them both and craned his head against hers, watching the night sky with a newfound appreciation.
