Attie quietly listened to Nui's tale and picked up one common theme in all of her stories. In every situation it seemed that Nui was taking responsibility for the "failed" dates. However there was one issue, those dates weren't failed at all. The point of dating, or at least how it was explained to Attie, was like a trial and error. It was like when one did an experiment to see if two chemicals worked together. If the chemicals didn't work together then the experiment wasn't failed, in fact the important part learned from the whole thing was that the chemicals didn't work together. That was how dating was explained to Attie, so she didn't see any of these dates a failure. If anything, it helped the girl dodge a few arrows when it came to romantic partners.

"Hmm it doesn't seem to me that the dates failed." Attie commented, "For the first one, that wasn't really your fault. And you learned an important lesson. On the second date, it also wasn't your fault. The guy was being a jerk and you shouldn't have to deal with that. If you had sat there and just remained non-confrontational then you might have end up in a unfulfilling relationship. If anything, they succeeded in the purpose of figuring out whether or not you would have worked. Now you have updated information so that you can have better luck with the next one."

Attie's view of love was very logical, though she did understand the cheery feelings of it all. Perhaps it was because love itself was very dangerous and she preferred keeping a logical point of view on it. 

"So why are you looking for love?" Attie asked, "I'm not trying to be critical, I've always been curious about why people look for love." 

Love was a fascinating thing to Attie, as it could never be placed in a little logical box. It was complicated. It involved both science and the complicated emotions of a person. Some say that everybody had a soulmate while others claimed that it was more of a deep friendship. Some said that romance was built by the people in the relationship while others say that love at first sight is how it goes. 

"Yeah…" Nui sighed. Attie wasn't wrong. Maybe she had been a bit too hard on herself for the first one, but the second date definitely wasn't her fault. Eventually she'd snap and bury the man's face into his food or throw it at him. "I still feel pretty bummed thinking about them though." In a way things probably weren't so bad, after all it could've been worse…not that she wanted to think about it. "Well I know it sounds cliche and you've probably hear this a million times, but I guess it all started when I saw my childhood friends find girlfriends." She leaned back in her chair and crossed her arms. Since she hadn't really done any 'soulmate searching', she might as well make herself comfortable. "Before it was just us, all the time. But eventually they'll get busy with their lives and get married, have kids…" And she'd just be by herself. Really she wanted somebody she could chat with in her free time, talk about personal stuff together, and maybe live with. She wasn't sure about having kids of her own, right now she wanted something more than a friend.

"I don't want to get married just for the sake of it–I guess I want somebody who I can spend my entire life with. I can't bother my friends or Gramps all the time. And maybe they'll move away in the future." The fox brought her knees to her chest and rested her chin on them. "I never knew my mom or dad. All I remember is living with Gramps and the other monks in Hachiuji Temple. My friends were like the brothers I never had, their mom and dad were kind of like that for me too. So you can say I never got to see what other girls did at my age, like dating and falling in love. Even though my friends and their parents are nice to me, it's not the same as growing up in a family of your own." She remembered how she had a crush on one of her friends again, and buried her face to hide her embarrassment. "…I felt sort of…surprised I think when one of my friends saved a girl from drowning one summer. I always thought he'd always be there, but all of a sudden he came back with someone. I didn't feel this way until a few months after it happened, but I knew it wasn't fair for me to think so. He found someone who made him happy, and I should be happy for him. And then his brother who we thought could never find a girlfriend found someone who didn't run after sitting with him for five minutes so…" 

It was a lot for Nui to unpack. Like she had said before, most of her friends were boys so she didn't have any girl friends to talk about this sort of stuff. Attie was the first person her age she'd said these things to. Even Mrs. Yukari didn't know everything. "So that's why I thought I'd try and find my special someone on my own. They say half of it's luck, half of it's hard work when it comes to finding opportunity. If he's not in the capital or back home, maybe he's out there somewhere else. There's plenty of fish in the sea–right? Maybe I just need to fish in a bigger pond."  

Attie continued to listen as Nui discussed her difficulties. What Nui said….surprised her. Despite all of Attie's traveling and making new friends, she still felt that loneliness that Nui seemed to be describing. It was one thing to be friends but it was another thing to spend time with each other. Then there was the space and time that it took to meet up. Nui didn't have many friends who were girls to talk to. The young fox girl had a lot of things to unpack but Attie felt it was good to let Nui talk about this, especially since she had been holding it in for so long. 

"There are plenty of fish in the sea." Attie agreed, "And you might find love where you least expect it. You can do it! You can find the love of your life. But I have one small suggestion. Ask yourself, am I in love with the idea of love? Or do I love him? Once you've figured out the answer, it will be a lot easier to find the person you want to spend your life with." 

Attie could understand the longing for companionship. It was difficult to have nobody to talk to or to have a lack of a connection. Finding that deep friendship, the kind of friendship where both people were entirely comfortable, open, and honest with each other was rare. To find somebody that was always there to listen or to hang out was a challenge that Attie knew all to well. A deep friendship could cover a thousand friends, or at least that was how she felt about it. Perhaps it was strange. Perhaps it wasn't normal. But that's really what Attie was looking for, besides knowledge. 

Suddenly an idea came to her mind. It seemed that Nui and Attie could both use somebody to talk to. The issue would be being able to talk once they were far away. However, she had recently gained an item that would make transportation significantly easier between two places. It didn't even need a spell and it was something that a person could carry. Attie reached into her satchel and searched around before finally finding the two mirrors. They were hand mirrors but they still had the ability to let people teleport through them, even if the person was larger than a mirror. 

"Here. Take this." Attie said, "These are traveling mirror things. I found them when I was shoved down a well. All you have to do is place your hand on the glass part of the mirror and you will teleport to the other mirror. If you ever need to talk again, this will be an easy way to visit each other without the issues of having to track each other down. So if you need to talk again or just want to hang out with somebody, I'll be right there with the other mirror." 

Nui's mirror was decorated with gold and metal red roses while Attie's was silver and decorated with metal blue roses. It was a way to know the difference between the two as they were identical in every other way. She had found it next to a skeleton body in a well when she was thrown down there. After cleaning it up, she learned of its powers but never really had the need to use it. Until now.