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“Wait… Shan, can we talk?” May grimaced for the conversation ahead, but there was something she needed to do.
Shan stopped abruptly, the robot came to a halt so suddenly that May's outstretched hand brushed against Shan's shoulder. She turned suddenly to face May, a cheery smile on her face. “Yeah! Walk with me?”
May followed Shan for a handful of paces, stomach churning in discomfort, before Shan stopped abruptly once more and turned to May, looking expectantly at her.
“Shan…” May started, more nervous than she'd hoped she'd be. “Do you remember that conversation we had? The one about gender and sexuality and-”
“And yaowee?” Shan said, eyes bright with excitement. “Yes, I remember! I learned about yaowee and oh. You don't look happy.”
May gritted her teeth, Shan having seen her face and recognizing that she was, in fact, not happy. “I… shouldn’t have taught you that word. Not like that. I shouldn't have said it at all. I got a text from my sister-”
“Your sister said you should say yaowee?” Shan asked, face forming into a frown.
“No, Shan.” May smiled sadly. “I don't think she's seen the footage yet. She texted me that she loves me. And… I love her too.”
“Okay…?” Shan trailed off, not understanding what May wasn't saying, which, May figured, was fair enough.
“My sister, she's my half sister, technically, she's Japanese.” May explained. “‘Yaowee’, it's not a real word, it's a mispronunciation of a Japanese word, yaoi, and it doesn't mean what I said it means.”
“Yaoi…” Shan tested out the word slowly in her mouth. “It doesn't mean there are two men who love each other?”
“Its a word for a genre of Japanese media, that does often contain men kissing, yes.” May said slowly, trying to get her words right. “But it doesn't mean just any two men kissing, like I said before.”
Shan's face fell. “You lied to me?”
“Yes.” May said after a pause, eyes darting to a nearby drone. “I did. I'm sorry.”
“Apology accepted.” Shan said after a second pause, though she didn't look certain. It wasn’t like May could hold that against her.
“I've… look, Shan, this isn’t my first time messing up.” May bit her lip and glanced at anywhere that wasn't Shan. “It took a long time for my sister to trust me again, after I messed up last time.”
“What did you do?” Shan asked hesitantly.
“I played this game.” May sighed. “The money from the game, it goes to hurting people, people like my sister. And when I tried to apologize, I laughed it off, I didn't take it seriously at all. And I think my sister is still hurt, but she's looking past it because she loves me. And I hate that, I hate that I hurt her and she can't say that she's still hurt because she thinks I don't care.”
“Why are you telling me this?” Shan frowned, before shaking her head and smiling at May. “Actually, nevermind. It's okay. There'll be oil in the water soon!”
May smiled back. “Yeah. Okay.”
Shan left, walking quickly through the quiet city. May listened to her footsteps until she couldn't hear them anymore. She sunk onto a bench nearby and stared at her phone, which hadn't had service since she had arrived. She wasn't sure how the text from her sister had gotten through, but however she'd managed to do it, May was grateful. She missed her sister.
May groaned, putting her head in her hands. Perhaps she'd overstepped by telling all of that to Shan. Maybe she should have just left it at “this is how you say yaoi, this is what it means” but… May missed her sister, she wanted to talk about her. It wasn’t fair to put that on Shan, though. And it probably was a shitty move to imply that her sister was trans, even if she didn't say it outright, especially with the cameras everywhere. And who knew how many people had seen that, May thought to herself, growing more frustrated with how she handled things.
At least it was better than the apology for the game, May thought bitterly, though, that was setting the bar pretty damn low.
Sighing, May took her head out of her hands. Caring about people was hard, but it was worth it, May figured, at least for her sister.