Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to Spirited Away including characters, etc…

Spirited Back

Chapter 1: Normal Life

Dear Chihiro,

It sounds like you are coping well so far with your new life in the Human World. All though only Kamaji knows what a school is (how he knows this is beyond us) we suppose that it would be fun. The friends that you spoke of, Kairi and Mai, sound just like normal humans. Lin says that even if men don't need friends, it doesn't mean women don't. We don't know what she's going on about but then again she's been a little odd lately because she's excited about getting her first train ticket soon. It's only a couple more days I believe and she will have been working here for ten years. I wish my ten years would hurry up so I can get out of here and see you…but even then I wouldn't be able to leave the Spirit World, unless I had a death wish of course.

Boh asks me to say "Hi" to you from him. He is two years old now and growing up nothing like his mother. Yu-ba-baa finally consented to letting Zeniba see Boh sometimes. Not that she wasn't already. I don't think Yu-ba-baa knows that Boh can still change back into a mouse.

Speaking of Yu-ba-baa she has started acting a little strangely lately. No one says anything but you can tell that they all notice a change. I wouldn't mind her changing for the better, perhaps she would let some of us out of here but I fear it's for worse. Ah well, time will reveal all.

No Face still lives with Zeniba. I think he is happy there, but you can never be quite sure with someone who wears a mask and can't talk.

Evening is coming; they are about to light the lamps. I'd better get to work or Kamaji will have my head. Everyone sends their usual greetings and inquiries of health. Lin says if you don't come back soon she's going to personally come and find you unless she dies of work over load first (they still haven't found her an assistant).

Love,

Haku

Chihiro read over the letter again and sighed. Her brown eyes stared out the window, seeing the golden sunset but never really watching it. Her mind was to far elsewhere. It had been a year since Chihiro was in the Spirit World. It was true that she didn't have any trouble fitting into her new school, or making friends but she still missed her friends from the Spirit World dearly.

Her parents were happy that the experience of "moving house" had taught Chihiro a couple of lessons like manners and working hard, as well as making her grow up. Chihiro had grown up, not only in her manners but in looks too. She never told them what had really happened and didn't plan to. She couldn't bear to think of what that might lead to. She was content with them thinking the letters were from friends from her old school.

If only I could go back to see them just once, she wished as she carefully put the letter in a draw with all the others, just once more.

'Chihiro! Are you coming to help with dinner?' her Mother's call from the kitchen broke her reverie.

'Yes Mother!' she said quickly closing the draw and locking it with a key.

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'Hey! Chihiro! Over here! I saved you a seat,' Kairi called out from the back of the school bus. Chihiro sat down next to her best friend, dumping her bag under the seat. She ran a hand through her hair trying to get out some of the water that had collected there while she had stood in the rain waiting for the bus.

'Thank goodness I finally have someone sensible to talk to!' her tomboyish friend said, heaving a sigh of relief, 'I've been stuck with most of the boys, Hikari and Asuka for fifteen minutes!'

'I pity you. Really, I do,' Chihiro did pity her friend. Being on a bus very early in the morning with a couple of immature boys and a pair of giggling girls wasn't her idea of fun.

'Fifteen minutes! And if damn Ayami throws one more thing at me I'm going to turn around and give him a piece of my min-' suddenly a scrunched up ball of paper hit Kairi in the back of her head. Both girls turned around to find Tenchi Ayami and his mates trying to look innocent while smothering laughter with their hands.

'Here's your chance to give him a piece of your mind,' Chihiro knew her friend was too level headed to explode.

'Nah, they're not even worth wasting breath on, let alone words,' Kairi said calmly, her short brown hair that flared out to the sides of her head, flying over her grey eyes as she shook her head.

'You know he only does it to get you attention because he likes you,' Chihiro said to her friend smiling.

'What? You can't be serious! Why does he even bother? Like I'd ever go out with him,' she pretended to shudder and they both laughed.

'What's so hilarious!' Chihiro's other friend Mai demanded as she got onto the bus and walked up to them.

'Oh, we were just thinking what it might be like if Kairi went out with Ayami,' Chihiro said lightly.

'Ew!' Mai said putting up one hand to ward off the thought as she threw her bag onto the seat in front of them. Sitting down to face them she smiled to herself.

'What's so amusing, Mai? Ayami's not that bad. He's not ugly or evil or anything. Perhaps a little rough around the edges…' Kairi said seriously, thinking of his strange accent.

'You forgot annoying,' Chihiro mumbled. All though she agreed with Kairi he was still annoying, sometimes. Make that most times actually.

'Oh, I wasn't thinking of that,' Mai said absent-mindedly staring at the raindrops running down the window.

'Okay... What have you got planned for the holidays, Chihiro?' Kairi said turning back to her.

'Come to think of it nothing at all. What about you?' Chihiro replied still eyeing Mai off suspiciously.

'Same. Hey Mai, aren't you going to go to Europe?' another paper ball hit Kairi in the head as she spoke.

'Nah, my parents decided not to in the end but I can't wait to get pink streaks in my hair. Mum's so stingy! She won't let me dye my hair when school's on but holidays is another story,' she said pulling a nail file out of her bag, her long, black plaits falling over her shoulders as she did.

'That's too bad. Are you sure pink will suit you?' Kairi said carelessly as she collected the paper from under the chair, to scrunch it up into a small ball again.

'Are you plannin' to thro' that us ar what, Isoda?' Tenchi called out from the back of the bus, his strange accent easy to pick out. With a sudden movement Kairi turned around and threw the paper at him as hard as she could. He ducked but too late; it bounced off his head to Kairi's great delight.

'You damned cr'zy woman! Con't evan thro' stra'ght!' Tenchi muttered off a string of curses in his usual fashion.

'Ah well, don't worry. Only today, and then we won't have to be on the bus any more!' Chihiro said happily to her friend who was trying very hard to look straight forward and conceal the large smile that was breaking out across her face.

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Chihiro walked over the moss covered cobblestones. Since she had last been here someone or something had cut all the knee-high grass away. I wonder who or possibly what did, she asked herself.

The dark tunnel in front of her no longer seemed threatening. The wind still pulled the leaves around her feet in but the main pulling feeling from the tunnel came and tugged at her heart instead. She cast a glance at the small statue, which still stood outside the tunnel grinning mischievously to itself, before walking in.

She sat down without a sound on one of the benches near the door to the open field. The rain still drizzled outside in a soft yet consistent flow. Chihiro stared out the door wistfully, watching the grey clouds drift past overhead. Although she wished more than anything to go out into the field and cross the stream to see her friends, she dare not try. She had considered it but finally decided it was too risky.

'Will I ever see them again?' she asked the silence that surrounded her.

If she stared long enough at the open door, Chihiro would swear she could almost see Haku through the rain. For just a second, she could see him looking back at her with his caring green eyes.

'Haku! Wait!' she cried out, getting quickly to her feet and running to the doorway. Yet as soon as she came closer he faded and she was left holding the edge of an archway, and looking out into the cold rain.

'It's only four in the afternoon. Everyone would be asleep. And if he wasn't why would he be here?' she tried to convince herself out loud that what she had seen wasn't true. But he had looked so real, her heart cried out.

'Why w'uldn't who be 'ere?' a familiar voice echoed through the room.

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A/N:

All the names of OC's are completely made up and I have no idea what they mean.

Sorry about any references to the story that I get wrong. Please feel free to correct me, it would be much appreciated.

I'm sorry if Tenchi's accent makes his speech difficult to understand but I am trying to make it so that he does have a strange accent but it's still understandable.

And just to apologise in advance about anything in the story to do with school. I know absolutely nothing about how the Japanese school system works as I'm from Australia where we have a very different system so yes, sorry.

Read, Review and Enjoy!