Reassurance
She smiles, for once carefree, this blonde girl with big blue eyes who has known nothing but life on the road, evading the clutches of bounty hunters and pious citizens. This life, her new life, is very different. Very peaceful and secure. Now she lives in a little one room apartment by the river, with nothing weightier on her mind than the couple who quarrel next door or how to make tea without scalding herself.
Unfortunately, the full appreciation of this new quiet life is ever so slightly lost because she has no memory of the previous lifestyle, or the people who might have been an important part of that life. Amnesia is a troublesome thing.
"Oi, Pamela, you ready now?"
Her new name, given by the person who has made for her this quiet, peaceful new life jolts her out of her reverie.
With a playful scowl, the girl turns with a flounce from the small mirror hanging from a nail in the wall then sweeps aside the curtain which hangs between their sleeping places. Fulle is standing at the door, the look on his sun-tanned face hovering between boredom and exasperation. He raises an eyebrow – she is wearing the new dress he bought for her just yesterday.
"We're only going to the ramen stand you know."
She smacks him promptly on the head and he barely bothers to fend her off.
"Why can't you act a little more pleased that I'm wearing your gift!" She twirls for him coquettishly, the cream coloured skirt flaring out around her shapely calves. "Don't you think it looks nice?"
He grunts, then catches himself at her stormy countenance. "Er yeah, it looks good. Really suits you."
With a sunny smile she walks past him out the door and waits on the landing while he locks up after them. Down the stairs, across the little footbridge, and they have entered the town.
Usually she walks at Fulle's side, enjoying the unspoken companionship between them, comfortable in the belief that here is someone that she knows, someone she belongs to, when all the rest of the world and its people are an uncertain blur of faces.
This time, the path is congested and Fulle's long strides outstrip her and for a few moments, she falls back to walk behind him, keeping his back in sight. She looks at his back, his face hidden from her and his voice unheard. And as she looks, there is a slight jolt of pain in her temples, and her vision shifts and blurs, and for a moment, just a moment, it is not Fulle who walks before her, but someone else.
He is just as tall and broad, and the same long, dark ponytail hangs down his back. But his shoulders are clad in blue, and as Pamela looks at this vision, all she wants to do is run to the figure and throw her arms around the narrow waist and cling tightly, never letting go. The figure turns around to face her, and her voice catches in her throat; the beginning of a name, the first breath of a cry for this phantom who stirs such emotions in her.
"Pamela? Are you ok? Hurry up, they'll be closing soon." Fulle holds out his hand to the blonde girl, and after a moment's hesitation, she takes it.
In a moment, Pamela has forgotten the peculiar incident and the vision. The bright light of the ramen stand and the delicious smells wafting from behind its curtain drives out the ghosts.
But still, when she looks at Fulle's back, she sees the long dark ponytail, the broad shoulders, and she breathes a sigh of relief.