Have you gotten your chocolates for Valentine’s Day yet, Michiru?” Elsa Gray caught up with the green-haired girl outside the school gates.

“I was just going,” Michiru replied. “I don’t have much to get, just giri-choco. There’s my art teacher, my violin teacher, my swim coach…”

“Same here,” Elsa replied. “Coach, brothers, and my boss at my part-time. Who’s got time for a boyfriend?”

“Not me!” Michiru laughed. “Between school, music, swimming and art, I don’t have much room for a social life.” Not to mention saving the world from the Silence…

A red sportscar was parked in front of the candy store. Sure enough, a tall, boyish-looking blonde was inside, filling a bag with little gold boxes.

“Oh wow, Haruka’s getting a lot!” Elsa exclaimed. They walked into the store. “Hi, Haruka!”

The tall girl turned around.

“Who are all the chocolates for, Haruka?” Elsa teased. “You have that many boyfriends?”

“Boyfriends?” Haruka hooted. “No way – these are for the guys at the bike shop. If I don’t give them something good I won’t hear the end of it for the rest of the year!”

“If I had a boyfriend I’d want to give him something really special – like that.” Michiru gazed longingly at a sculpture of the Little Mermaid, painstakingly detailed in different shades of chocolate.

“Whew, look at her hair and scales!” Elsa marveled.

“She looks like you, Michiru,” Haruka remarked. “Did you model for her?”

“No way!” Michiru turned pink and waved her hands back and forth.

“Anyway, what would you do with it, even if you could afford it?” Elsa wondered. “It’s too pretty to eat, and too big for two people – it would just spoil.”

“We also have miniature versions,” the shopkeeper put in, “only 5000 yen each.”

Haruka whistled. “Too rich for me!”

“Me too,” agreed Elsa.

“I don’t know,” Michiru mused. “If I really liked someone…”

The girls paid for their chocolates and left the shop.

---

“What’s that, Haruka?” Elsa asked. “Don’t tell me someone gave you chocolates!”

The taller girl shrugged. “I get two or three every year. It’s kind of annoying, but I eat ’em anyway. Want one?”

“No thanks,” Elsa waved her hands in denial. “I already put on enough weight over the winter.”

“Yeah, like you have to worry.” Haruka reached inside her shoe locker. “Huh?” She pulled out a gold box, about twice the size of the ones she had bought for her crew.

“More chocolates?” Elsa giggled. “Wow, you’re popular! It looks like a really fancy one! Let me see!”

Haruka knew what the box would hold before she opened it. A miniature chocolate mermaid, every hair and scale engraved in exquisite detail.

“Oh!” Elsa exclaimed. “Who… who gave you something like that?”

“No clue – she must have been too shy to put a card in. Um… never mind. I’ve got to get going.” And Haruka was gone like the wind she was always trying to catch. A moment later, Elsa heard a squeal of tires as Haruka’s little red convertible peeled out of the school parking lot.

Chikusho! Haruka knew who the mermaid was from, even without a card. If I really liked someone…

---

Haruka pulled her cap down over her hair and glanced around to make sure there was no one around who might recognize her. Why am I so nervous? she wondered. I dress like a guy all the time, so… But she felt like she was crossing a line.

The shop had nothing to equal the exquisite beauty of the chocolate mermaid. There usually isn’t anything that fancy for White Day, Haruka reminded herself. Anyway, if I were going to give Michiru something that was as much me as that mermaid is her, what would it be?

Then she saw it: a miniature sportscar molded from white chocolate, its wheel spokes, door handles, and gear shift in what looked like marzipan, and a windshield made from a sheet of clear rock candy. It’s perfect…

“How much?” she asked the shopkeeper, and braced herself.

“Only 3500 yen, young Mr. Customer,” the shopkeeper replied.

Yeowch. It was within her price range – barely. Michiru…

There was a little gold box in Michiru’s shoe locker. White chocolate? She opened the box and her eyes widened. I didn’t think she’d… she wanted to laugh, she wanted to dance, she wanted to play mad, passionate gypsy airs on her violin. Instead, she put the little box into the compartment in her violin case where she kept rosin and spare strings.

Haruka’s convertible was parked outside the school gates. “Oi, Michiru!” the tall girl called out. “Want a ride?”

“Thank you.” Michiru slid gracefully into the passenger seat and fastened her seat belt.

“You up for a drive?” Haruka asked. “I thought we could take a run up the coast.”

“Yes, I’d like that very much.”

The convertible pulled out, its driver expertly threading her way through the Tokyo traffic toward open road.