Love on the Wheelchair

-2013-

"Ah, that! I still remember where we first met. We met at one of the school exit gates and I said 'hi' to him."

"She approached me with a warm smile... and I was only eight years old at that time so I found her smile silly. I mean, who would be so happy to go to school on a Monday morning?"

"Let me tell you, the way he stared coldly at me at the corner of his eyes made my insides cringe... He totally destroyed my Pink Monday mood!"

"Who cares about Pink Monday? It's Monday Blues!"

"Guess what he said to me after I greeted him?"

"Guess what I said to her?"

"Move. You're blocking my way, silly girl."

Disclaimer: I don't own either Gakuen Alice or its characters, except for this story plot.


1st Wheel

-2003-

He planted a kiss on her cheek and whispered, "Love you, Mikan."

She shifted her gaze away from him and looked at her knees as she felt the warmth on the spot where he had kissed spread like ripples across her cheek and to her ears. She put her knees together and let out a soft and sweet giggle to hide her awkwardness.

"Thank you."

Young love.

She felt so blessed to be loved by everyone. She had great friends around her and even had an affectionate boyfriend who vowed to love and treasure her forever. She knew she was neither the most pretty girl nor the most intelligent student in her school. She had decent looks and average grades which consisted of minimal 'A's and mostly 'B's but her boyfriend, nevertheless, assured her that she would only be the one for him. She believed him, just like how he believed her when she had told him the same thing multiple times.

"Mikan, no matter what happens to you, I will continue to be with you."

"Thank you."

Childish love.

Ever since she had started to go out with her first boyfriend, he had become very special to her. He had become her morale support and she had became his. In her eyes, he was good looking. His grade were much better than hers. She thought he would throw her aside one day if he had found another girl who had better looks and grades, but his words of love assured her that he would never betray her. She trusted his love for her.

Crippled love.

She had desires. However, because she had her own principles to abide, she had told her boyfriend once that she would never want to go beyond the kissing stage with him before marriage and hoped that he would understand her. He had replied her with an 'okay' and she had assumed that he had understood her concerns.

Blind love.

Furthermore, they were only thirteen.

-:-:-:-

"Goodbye, Mikan. See you tomorrow!"

"See you, Mikan!"

"Mikan, remember to call me when you reach home! Let's have girls' talk."

"Bye, Mikan!"

She smiled at her four friends and bade them goodbye. She had many friends, mostly from the Fencing Club. Her fencing skills were good, not as great as a professional but could earn her the title of a champion in two competitions within the span of eight months ever since she had joined the club as a freshman. Thus, many people tried to befriend her to learn a special move or two from her. She knew that those people were not serious in befriending her but she did not mind them at all.

False friendship.

"Goodbye!" she said to her four friends. "I will call you girls tonight."

The girls grinned and said their final goodbyes to her before walking away at different directions. These four girls were different from those 'fake' friends from the Fencing Club. Like her boyfriend, they supported her and helped her whenever she needed them. She loved them and believed that they felt the way as she did for them. As she stared at the backs of her four friends, her smile slowly faded and her heart started to weigh down her chest. It was only a few minutes and she was already starting to miss their presence. She wondered if they felt the same way too.

Pure friendship.

"Excuse me."

Startled by a soft voice, she turned around and gasped without thinking. It was a small and skinny boy on a wheelchair. She recognised him as her schoolmate with physical disability, though she had no idea what the specific name of his condition was. They had been studying in the same elementary school and middle school for years but were never classmates so she did not really speak much to him. Being an extremely cheerful and polite person, she would always greet him with a smile whenever she saw him.

"Hyuuga! Good evening!"

He remained still and quiet as his eyes moved upwards, staring intensely at her. Her lips curled upwards once more and she bent her body forward so that she could be within his eye level. She knew he had extremely weak body muscles so he could not move his head and look up at her easily.

"How's your day, Hyuuga?" she asked with a huge grin.

Blooming friendship.

He continued to stare at her silently before tilting the controller on his right armrest backwards, causing his wheelchair to reverse a little. The gap between them widened.

"Excuse me."

"Ah..." She immediately straightened herself and stood aside. "I'm sorry."

He titled the controller forward and moved past her, keeping his silence as usual. He kept moving forward, totally ignoring her presence. She knew that he was not trying to be rude. After all, he was a shy person since he rarely talked to anyone. He was very different from everyone else so it was not surprising to see many 'immature' students shunning him as if his disability was infectious. Though she did not know the name of his condition, she knew that he was just like any other child... including her. He was human just like everyone, not a centre of disease which every student was thinking of.

She crossed her arms. Teachers should really educate typical children about atypical ones if they wanted to support the idea of inclusion. If not, it was unfair.

He did not deserve to be shunned!

Suddenly, the wheelchair stopped. Tilting her head a little, she wondered if he had left something behind or there was an obstacle in his path. Be it the former or the latter, she had to help him since she was the only student there with him near the school gate. She took a step forward, preparing to call out to him but before a sound could escape from her mouth, the wheelchair started moving again. She stopped and stared at the diminishing figure before her.

"Oh..." she let out a soft sigh and smiled brightly again. "Hyuuga, goodbye! Have a safe trip back home!"

Again, there was no response from him. With that, she turned around and walked away.

Golden friendship.

"Hmm..." She looked up to the sky while her smile did not cease. "What should I have for dinner later?"

-:-:-:-

Her head hurt.

"Sakura? Can you hear me?"

Her surrounding was so noisy that her ears began to hurt.

"Mikan Sakura?"

Her shoulders were heavy.

"Can you hear me?"

Her tongue felt rough, as if sand had been applied over it.

"How are you feeling?"

She slowly opened her eyes but immediately squinted at the bright light above her.

"She's awakening."

Her eyes hurt.

Everything seemed to hurt. But she needed to smile... like always.

"Ah... I... f... fine," her voice came out hoarse and cracking due to her dry throat as she forced her chapped lips to curl upwards as usual. "Wh... Who..."

"Sakura, I'm your doctor."

This time, her eyes snapped open but she shut them close again. Her eyes were so dry and she was not used to the glaring light. It seemed as though she had not been in the light for days.

For days...

"I'm sure you've realised it by now, Sakura. You're in..."

"Hos... pital."

"That's right," the doctor said as he took a bottle of plain water and placed the connecting tube on her lips. "Have a drink. Your throat must be feeling dry."

Nodding slightly, she wrapped her lips around the tube and began sucking the water. As the water filled her mouth, she felt like she had not been drinking for days.

Again, for days...

"Do you still remember what had happened?" the doctor asked.

She slowly opened her eyes once more and stared at the doctor with furrowed eyebrows. Of course, she did. She remembered saying goodbye to her friends and schoolmates on the way back home. Then, she had gone to buy rice balls from the convenience store. Whatever had happened after that became hazy.

She spoke softly, "I was walking home from school and I don't remember what happened after I bought my rice balls."

"Where did you buy your rice balls, Sakura?"

"Erin Convenience Store."

"Time?"

"Not sure. Evening?" Her answer became a question instead.

"What happened after you bought the rice balls?"

Her eyes closed again. "I can't remember. Sorry."

"It's okay. Actually... you've met with an accident," the doctor stated as he began to look at her seriously. "Does this ring a bell?"

"No..." Her mind was still trying to piece everything together after knowing that she had met with an accident but she was still confused as to how she had even met it in the first place. "Tell me more about it, Doctor."

She could hear the doctor inhale deeply, which she could tell that whatever he was going to say to her would be bad news. She clenched her fists and waited for him to spill the truth that had taken place...

For days.

"Two weeks ago, while you were crossing the road, you were hit by a truck," explained the doctor.

Unfazed by his statement, she quietly nodded as she had kind of predicted it. A road accident was not uncommon and feeling how painful her whole body was, the possibility of having met with a road accident was likely, although she did not think that it was a truck that hit her. If it was really a truck that had hit her, then she was lucky.

She felt so blessed to be alive. Feeling pain all over her body was probably a good sign that she was still in a piece.

Or so she thought.

"The truck ran over you..."

"What?" she interrupted him, shocked by his further explanation.

"I mean, to be specific, it ran over your legs."

"What..." her voice quivered.

She felt strange when he had said that. Her body was in pain but she could not move her legs. It felt as if her legs were immobilised or gone. She could not feel them any longer, no pain or numbness. Her nerves must be playing tricks on her. It had to be, she thought to herself, since it was obviously damaged by the impact.

"We couldn't save them."

No...

"Because they were badly crushed."

Stop it...

"We had no choice but to..."

Please don't say it!

"... amputate them."

Ah...

A tear rolled down from the corner of her eye as the realisation of her loss hit her really hard. She was not a whole which she had thought she was. She was not lucky after all.

"No wonder..." she mumbled softly, lips shivering as she controlled herself from crying out loud. "I can't feel my legs at all."

"Sakura..."

Plastering her usual smile on her face, she interrupted the doctor again with a request, "I'm sorry, but can I have a short moment to myself? Please give me five minutes to clear my head."

The doctor looked worriedly at her and did not say anything. After a few seconds of silence, he just nodded and told her that he would drop by again in fifteen minutes to check on her condition. Then, he left the ward, giving her some time alone.

As soon as the doctor left, her smile ceased. She bit her upper lip and held her breath. She could not cry. No, she couldn't. If she did, that would not be Mikan Sakura. Mikan Sakura would never cry...

Not even when she lost two limbs forever.

In moments of adversity, she would continue to smile, keeping her promise to herself, her late parents and everyone whom she called friends and loves ones.

-:-:-:-

Her boyfriend had visit her only once and that was hours after she had regained conscious. Her four friends did not come to see her at all. After six days since she had woken up, she realised that she was actually alone. Where were they when she really needed them?

Knowing that she looked hideous without her legs, she would cover the lower part of her body with a blanket whenever people entered her ward, especially when her boyfriend had come to pay her a visit.

His first and last visit.

When he had entered the ward, she had expected him to look worried and ask her how she was feeling. However, his reaction was unexpected.

"Mikan... you look different."

She remembered looking away from his stoic face and down at where her legs were supposed to be. Although she had tried to hide the fact they were no longer there with the thick blanket, it was so obvious...

So obvious that they were gone.

She had tried very hard to control her tears, especially in front of her boyfriend. Even if she had cried at that moment, it would not do her any good. Crying could neither bring back her legs nor help her to regenerate new ones.

She was not perfect to be begin with, yet her boyfriend had always stayed by her side. She had thought that he would continue to love her for who she was despite being crippled. But she was wrong.

All those while, she had always been wrong.

"I'm sorry, Mikan. I can't... I mean, I don't want to feel... burdened. Burdened by you..."

She remembered turning to him and gave him a final smile, telling him that she had understood what he had meant. After that, he had bidden his farewell to her and left the room without saying his favourite 'love you, Mikan' line to her.

She sighed. This love was so childish and so crippled at the same time. Just because she was so different from others, she was rejected. Not only by him, but also by her friends.

She did not mind giving up fencing but she could not live without love. Her friends were so important to her and she thought that all these while she had been smiling for them. But then again, it was all in her head. So, who exactly was she smiling for?

No one.

No one cared about her to begin with. The love and friendships were all lies. She should have known better than to delude herself thinking that she was actually blessed with all the attention which she had been receiving.

She wondered...

"Sakura, how are feeling today?" asked her doctor who had just entered her ward and he placed a tray of gauze and cotton wool on the small table next to the bed.

"Fine," she replied monotonously.

"Where's your smile, Mikan? You look gloomy these days."

... what their response would be...

"I don't know, Doctor. I think I've lost it."

The doctor chuckled. "Cheer up, alright? You will be discharged next week when your body has stabilised. I think it is something every child will look forward to."

"That's not true, Doctor." She looked away and lifted her arm towards the doctor, allowing him to clean her huge wound on her elbow. "Not every child will look forward to a new life with two less limbs."

... if she died.


Author's Note(s):

Hi guys, I'm back with a new fanfic 'Love on the Wheelchair', breaking my promise with my old readers that I would concentrate on my old fanfics before making new ones (as shown on Chapter 40 of 'I Like You, Natsume-oniisan'). After realising that I didn't contribute any new fanfic to the GA forum in 2014, I feel the need to write something before 2014 ends to fill up this 'missing' gap in my heart by writing a brand new story which I have been planning for quite some time. This story may not be the best among the other nine fanfics which I have written for the past two years but to me, this story plot has a personal touch which I can't explain here in words. Like 'Love at Last Sign', this story may carry some meaning which some readers can relate to.

Please take note that this fanfiction is purely fictional. Any familiar or similar events in this story are not related to any real life people or events at all. They are purely coincidental.

Anyway, a simple review is more than welcomed! I don't mind criticisms but they have to be constructive. Thank you for reading! :)