Haruka has always classified herself as unlovable. With her
mother she was alternately an asset and a burden, but never a beloved child.
(She was absolutely the kid who dreamed her father was a good man who loved
her, but was kept away and one day would swoop in and make up for everything he’d
missed. Her mother was absolutely the woman who squashed that out of her.) Growing
up she never had friends that stuck around, both because many were fair-weather
friends and Haruka’s life rarely had fair weather for long, and because by
nature Haruka felt she had to hide things—her financial situation, her budding
lesbianism, the way girls’ clothes felt so wrong on her body. By the time she
meets Michiru, she can’t believe anyone would love her.

And Michiru doesn’t break that in her. Even as Haruka begins
to believe Michiru loves her, it’s so big and intense that sometimes Haruka
doesn’t feel like it’s about her. There’s desire and attraction and high stakes
and who wouldn’t fall in love when it
might be their last chance to.

It’s years later, in a bar with Mina, that Haruka gets the
tiniest inkling that she’s really worth something. The friendship between them
has developed into something comfortable and constant, and Haruka’s sure any
day now Mina will lose interest. But then she says something that makes Mina
laugh, and Mina sets down her drink and says “God, I love you buddy.” And
Haruka feels it down to her toes. She wants to ask if she means it, but doesn’t,
but it’s not the last time Mina says it and it’s not the last time Mina shows
it, and Haruka comes to the slow and quiet realization that if two people love
her, in two very different ways, that maybe it’s at least a little to do with
her, and she’s maybe not as broken as she’s always believed.