AN: The premise of someone sleeping and not waking up for a long time in mysterious circumstances is inspired by Haruki Murakami's stories (I hope this doesn't sound too much like a rip-off). The main characters are Tomoki and Komiyama. Oneshot.

It was in the summer before Tomoki's third year in high school when his sister slept and didn't wake up.

He went about his usual routine for the day: woke up at 6, got ready for football practice in school at 7, then went home at 5. There was something quite lacking about his day, like he's forgotten something but he also can't recall what it was.

Then he realized it was because he had not seen Tomoko since he left home. She was usually awake in the mornings before he left - not because she woke up early, but because she had stayed up all night again doing whatever, maybe making the most out of vacation time by spending hours watching TV, playing video games, or being eternally online. And annoying him between all those things.

He went up his room instead, read the latest issue of a sports manga. Then went down for dinner when his mother called. She called out to Tomoko many times, but there was no answer, so she decided she must be sleeping and didn't bother to call her anymore. They all usually eat together, but now he was alone with his mother. After dinner, he went up again and peeked at her room and saw her still and sleeping in her bed. Not odd for her to sleep the whole day when she stayed up late last night. Maybe she'd wake up later to bother him with something.

The whole night, he couldn't sleep so instead of lying in bed, he sat on his desk instead to wait until he feels sleepy enough. The next room was so quiet. He could usually hear her in the next room but this silence was new and he wasn't used to it, he was almost jealous of her - he can't sleep unless the clock strikes past twelve. It was a miracle he can wake himself up early even, but that was because of energy drinks and too much coffee.

When he woke up the next day near noon, his sister still wasn't awake. He ate a late breakfast when his mother mentioned it.

"Your sister is asleep," she said.

"Yeah, she is?"

"I mean, she was asleep since yesterday morning."

"Its summer break anyway. She can sleep all she wants."

"But she hasn't eaten at all until now and I'm worried. I tried waking her this morning but she wouldn't."

"Hm."

"All you can say is 'Hm'?"

"Who knows, maybe she's just pretending? I mean she'd play sick when she doesn't want to go to school..."

"But that's when there was class. Summer break just begun. Did you hear or sense anything weird? Did she hit herself and pass out? Go check her yourself and try to wake her. If she's still asleep tomorrow, I'm calling a doctor."

"Okay," he said and went to her room, he didn't take it seriously, what his mother said.

It was as if a storm had passed yesterday with all the clutter in her room, but now everything was in order - his mother fixed it. Who knows what her room would look like if their mother wasn't there to clean up after her. Then she was there, sleeping, like a person in a coffin with her back straight. Beside her was the big purple stuffed-toy man and the round pillow with a vague cat face.

He sighed. Maybe she was only acting.

"Hey. Wake up," he said, and she didn't move. He tapped her face then slapped her lightly. It didn't have any effect. He walked near and pulled her eyelids open, her eyes white. If she's dreaming, then she was really asleep. If she had been like this since two nights ago, then it seemed normal to him. When he was tired from exams and games, he could sleep like that too.

It wasn't something to be worried about. His mother was being over-acting.

But then, she didn't wake up the next day at all.

#

He woke up with his mother's voice pleading to his sister in the next room to just wake up, but there was no answer from her. His mother opened his door.

"Get up and eat, Tomoki. Hurry up, we're taking her!"

He groaned and placed his pillow over his head and pretended to go back to sleep.

"Why me? Dad's home, right?"

"He said he isn't feeling very well."

"Okay," he said, getting up. He just used deodorant, changed clothes and got out. Her mother carried his sister. Tomoko was still in her clothes two days ago - fading lilac shirt with a strawberry printed on it, and she was wearing black shorts he recognized as his. Sometimes she just picks his clothes from the closet. They hired a cab to take her to the nearest hospital, his mother taking the front seat and Tomoki sat in the back with Tomoko to sit beside him.

She was limp but still breathing. The door closed and the car moved, and Tomoko fell headfirst into his lap. He had to hold her to keep her from falling, and they ended in an awkward position with her head on his chest and him holding her. If she was awake, even she would act disgusted and would probably push him away. Well, if she was awake she couldn't because Tomoki would have been faster and pushed her away first.

But he couldn't push her away, if he let her go, she'd fall. She was so small and thin. Then the whole ride, while holding her close and her warmth seeping through his clothes and to his skin, did he remember again (with a slight feeling of wanting to throw up)... themselves as children, so far away from how they were now. The cab stopped, and he was grateful it did, it halted the inevitable, cringe-worthy flashbacks of their childhood before it started.

It was usual, the waiting in line for the doctor. Then after around two hours they were called. Again there was another hour of waiting, they took her to a room where they did some tests.

"As far as we can see, this is very strange. She's not in comatose, she's just asleep. And we tried to make loud noises, startle her, use an injection, but... nothing worked."

"How can you not know?"

"Maam, we haven't had a case like this before, but research says that the longest someone has slept is five days straight... we can wait, and if she still doesn't wake up, you can go back here."

They brought her back to her bed and waited until the fifth day of sleep came. Still no sign of waking.

#

The second time they went back to said doctor, the waiting was longer, and after some hours some lunatic in a lab coat (who was not the doctor) emerged from the room where Tomoko was being tested and inspected.

"Maam! This will help us tremendously in the field of interplanetary travel research! To make astronauts sleep in stasis over millions of light years! Do you know how valuable this is..."

"I'm not allowing it! Whatever you want to do with my daughter, stop it, we're taking her home!"

"But maam! She's still sleeping, with no visible signs of a comatose, with no signs of losing weight! We're now trying to see what she had eaten before this..."

"Help me out here, Tomoki! I'm not going to leave Tomoko to these madmen!"

"Maam, we can pay..."

"No!"

They both took the electrode stickers off Tomoko, disconnect the weird wires from the computers, and carried her off to get out the hospital quick.

A week later, they are still boggled by the unsolvable problem: she's still asleep.

#

The fifteenth day she didn't wake up, he went to her room. His mother had even gone as far as asking spiritualists and religious people for help, but then she also stopped since the scientist incident might repeat again and they might try doing something crazy.

Tomoko is still asleep. After two weeks, he noticed a change - strange as it was, but she looked better than ever before. Her eyebags were gone, her skin looked clearer, she was almost pretty. Their mother combed and braided her hair, it didn't cover her face like it used to. He wasn't even used to seeing her face this way, Tomoko's face always looked so dishevelled and distorted (like, always crying or screaming or rattling with anxiety) but now, this is new. She looked calm and contented. Words he wouldn't even use to describe her before.

"Hey... you better wake up soon. We're all stressed about this, you know," he said to her, in a little caring tone he didn't expect from himself. It was just wrong for someone to sleep that long.

The longer Tomoko slept, the worse his insomnia gets. He's read everything about sleep he could find, but nothing helped. Then he tried to think of all Tomoko's friends from school, but he can't remember anyone. He decided to do a little investigation on his own and will try to find out: what was she doing the day before she fell asleep? Who was she with, what did she eat, where did she go?

A familiar face came to mind: the girl with glasses in the library.

Well, Tomoko had embarassed her in front of him many times, but those incidents he had forgotten, his sister's stupid antics. What was her name again? Oh, Kotomi Komiyama.

There still was daily football practice, and he was sure the library was open as they usually rearrange books during summer breaks. That's it, he'll go there and ask her tomorrow.

#

"Can I ask if you have books on sleep?" a boy's voice said, disturbing Kotomi out of the romance pocketbook she was reading. She was about to act annoyed but she paused with her mouth open when she saw that it was Tomoki. Talking. To. Her.

Okay, girl, compose yourself and don't be too obvious and blush like a tomato like before! You'll blow your chances on him if he sees that you're so nervous! Kotomi's inner confident-self said.

"B-boo-books, on sleep, do you mean?" she asked him, feeling her cheeks go red.

"Yes. Sleep. Please."

"Um, do you need them right away? We're still fixing the shelves and I'm not sure if I can find it."

"I can wait."

Kotomi typed something on the computer and went off to some corner in the shelves, picked out a couple of books fast.

"B-but here are the only books we have. One on health, the other a very short book on sleep."

"Thanks," Tomoki said, oblivious to the girl in front of him who was trying hard not to hyperventilate. He scanned the books, one a health textbook that says the generic things about sleep. The short, older pamphlet said that sleep was a rest for the body. Nothing that could help him, he already knows this.

This girl was Tomoko's friend. Well he wasn't sure if Tomoko had friends, but he did see them talking so maybe that counts. Maybe she knew even something. So he decided to ask her.

"Something's weird with my sister lately... So I'll just ask, when was the last time you saw her?"

Kotomi didn't understand Tomoki's new behavior when he didn't even know her before. Oh well, it had something to do with his sister, after all.

"I... I can't remember, I'm sorry," she said, or maybe her heart was beating so fast in that moment that she couldn't think clearly. Was it in the library, where Tomoko usually annoyed her? When was the last time Yuu and her met?

"She's sick, I think. Would you like to visit her?"

"What?!" she asked, surprised. Was she dreaming? Tomoki inviting her to his home?

"Okay, I'll see if I can help..."

#

Tomoki led the way while she followed. They didn't talk, Tomoki was quiet and deep in thought.

In the house, she met Tomoko's mother who smiled at her, but it looked like she was tired and lacked sleep from worrying.

"Oh, thank you, you are Tomoko's friend, right?"

"Yes."

"Something's wrong with her, we just can't figure it out. Please see her."

#

Kotomi was still trying to control her breathing as they both climbed the stairs to Tomoko's room.

"Please don't tell anyone about this," he said, and Kotomi's breath hitched as Tomoki faced her with his hand on the door to Tomoko's room. She nodded.

"You promise?" he said, eyebrows furrowing, face uncertain.

"I... I promise." Jeez, stop stuttering! she told herself again. She really can't believe that she's here and they're talking, and speaking words out of her fantasies (stories she made up about him and her inside his head). Then he opened the door and they got it.

Tomoko was asleep. She doesn't look so haggard like she usually was at school, but she looks oddly rested. He mouth was slightly open, and even Kotomi felt weirded out by the subtle change in Tomoko.

"She's been like that for two weeks now."

"What?"

"Asleep."

"Sleeping? You mean she didn't wake up at all?"

She looked at Tomoko, who was still sound asleep despite them talking. She sensed something weird with Tomoko, and found that the reason was even more inexplicable.

"Are you sure? Could it be that she's waking at night when you just don't see?" Kotomi asked.

Tomoki sighed.

"I'm hardly sleeping at night and we've watched her. She just doesn't wake up."

"Have you taken her to a doctor?"

"Yeah, my mother's asked everyone. They don't have the answer. They said she's not in a coma or something. She's just asleep."

"Then... shouldn't she have died from not eating or something?"

"That's what boggles us too. She doesn't even look like she lost weight."

"Oh. This is like something out of the Twilight Zone."

Tomoki frowned, and looked down. After ten minutes of silence, Kotomi said, "I'm sorry. I really can't remember anything."

"Its okay. Just... if you have any other ideas, if you know someone else, please let me know."

Tomoki walked with her out to the street.

Kotomi felt a slight tinge of sadness. She did hope, inside, that Tomoko would wake up.

#

The day before Tomoko fell asleep, she was walking home when she smelled something sweet and strong, like fresh flowers and oranges and the smell of grass after a rain. She sees a small stall selling herbs and there was an old woman selling plants and teas.

"Would you like to buy something, young girl?" she asked Tomoko.

"I just went here to take a look. These smell good," she replied.

"Do you have any small problems, miss? Maybe I can get you something from here."

Tomoko said, "Sometimes I can't sleep very well."

"Oh here, try this! Just a tiny bit is enough, though, because you might sleep for a hundred years if you take it all in one drink!" the old woman said, handing her a tiny paper bag that smelled of lavender and roses. Tomoko opened it and saw lilac and baby pink petals.

She took off, forgetting to say thank you, and as she walked home the old woman and the wooden stall with all the flowers disappeared into thin air.

There was no one home when she got back. She heated some water and made tea for herself. When she poured some of the flowers on the boiling water, they dissolved and turned the water into something sparkling and smelled like heaven. She was hooked on the first sip, and didn't notice that she was heaping more and more of the fragrant leaves into the teapot.

Oh, the smell and the wonderful taste that can reach her dreams! She climbed up the stairs in a daze, collapsed into her bed, and smiled while she fell deeper and deeper into the deepest sleep in all the world.

In the outside world, Tomoko is asleep. In her sleep, she is still dreaming of a colorless world that she's asleep, somewhere up a tower, and everyone in the castle is sleeping. It would take another hundred years before everyone will wake, and dust is settling on the faces of the king and queen still sitting on their thrones.

The briers would grow, and the vines would become so thick, that in a hundred years any prince trying to get through the gate must get through the deadly tangles. Many a kingdom has lost their heirs when princes decided to have an adventure and try to save the sleeping princess in the castle. Now there are corpses line the way as warning. Wild roses would grow and slither, filling everything until there will be nothing to be seen of the castle.

Someone outside is trying to cut through...

#

Kotomi went to the library early, eager to find anything. Encyclopedias, textbooks, there was nothing she could find. She found something old and hardbound, and gasped. Well, it was just an idea.

"Find anything useful?" Tomoki asked as he entered the library. Kotomi was hunched over a table with a heap of books.

"Sorry, none. The only useless thing I found was Sleeping Beauty."

"The fairytale, yeah?"

"At first I couldn't find it, like in Grimm's or Andersen's or Perrault, standard fairy tale sources but then I just found out that Sleeping Beauty is not the original title but Brier Rose. Named after the vines of wild roses."

"And?"

"I know it might sound weird... but I wonder if someone casted a spell on your sister or something?"

Tomoki smiled, amused (Kotomi almost died inside and she still can't erase the blush on her cheeks but her nervousness around him disappeared too somehow).

"Tell me about it."

"Well its... a princess was born, then a curse was placed on her by a witch that when she turns 16 she'll be pricked by a spindle needle and fall into a hundred-year sleep. Everyone in the palace was affected too."

"So if that's the case then she might wake in the year 2116?"

"I have absolutely no idea."

"Like all innocent fairy tales, here's the weird part - the earliest version, the prince rapes the princess in her coma, and she gives birth... still asleep."

Tomoki visibly cringed. "Er... thanks for the effort? But I really didn't need to hear that..."

"You don't remember anything that happened before with her? Did she prick herself on something?"

Tomoki laughed and Kotomi blushed even harder. How could she say such stupid things?

"Oh, sorry. Its just that this was so weird that we might even consider that."

"Thank you. I need to go, though, practice is starting," Tomoki said and went out.

Kotomi sighed.

#

Yeah, the fairytale theory was kind of wacky but there was no harm in trying. They have tried everything except that, wake the sleeping princess from the evil spell with true love's kiss!

His mother was quiet most of the time. Seventeen days now.

He went up quietly to her room.

He cleared his throat. She looked beautiful. A part of him wanted her to be like this: asleep forever, quiet, perfect. He didn't know if he missed it, her teasing, the jokes... but it would be better for her to be awake and not asleep like this. Seventeen days was a long time.

His heart beat faster, though he knows it was nothing to be nervous about. He used to kiss his sister all the time, on the lips even, but the last time he did that was when he was seven years old.

He touched her face. He felt her cheeks with his palms, he traced her lips softly with his thumb. He brushed off the stray hair on her forehead. He took a closer look: she did look prettier. If she wakes, things would go back to normal.

"Neechan, wake up, okay?" he whispered to her ear. He pressed his own lips over her white ear, then breathed deep once and closed his eyes.

He placed his lips over hers. He's forgotten how this felt: the softness of another's lips. As a kid he looked forward to kisses like this, like sweet candy or chocolate. Tomoko was still unmoving under him. It felt like he only pressed his lips over still water.

He still closed his eyes, counted until three breaths. No change. He moved his lips, forming a kiss, slightly tasting her warm mouth. Weird, he imagined that she would taste stale, but isn't this... the taste of roses?

He let the kiss linger, to feel deeper, until there was movement underneath him. A sound escaped Tomoko's lips, but he continued. He felt her kiss him back, in the same gentle, exploring manner.

He let go, and after so many days he saw her green eyes open. Tomoko looked at him.

"What happened, Tomoki?" she asked with a faint, shaking voice.

He didn't think about it, he just embraced and kissed her again. Tomoko did not complain, she was just confused.

"You were... asleep for 17 days, nee-chan, we were so worried."

"What? 17 days... I've forgotten," she said.

"Er. Please try to wake up. Don't sleep again, just for now." he said.

He helped her down the stairs.

"Tomoko! What the hell happened to you?" their mother asked when she saw them.

"Tomoki, how?" his mother asked him. They only looked at each other, never mentioning the kiss.

"She just woke up, Mom."

"Then thank god. I just hope you don't make us worry like that again. Can you remember anything?"

"I... can't."

She sighed, then only said: "Just eat then. You must be starving from being out for too long."

#

"We couldn't figure it out either, but Tomoko just woke up. Yesterday morning."

"Oh? Then that's good! Is she okay?" Kotomi said, and she can't help but feel the small tinge of sadness that since Tomoko has woken up, Tomoki didn't need her help anymore.

"Want to get drinks some time? Just to thank you for the help," Tomoki asked.

"Ah, when?"

"I mean now. We're just so relieved she's fine. There's a cheap side stall down the block that sells the best coffee."

Was this real?

"Okay, let's go!" Kotomi exclaimed, Tomoki already steps away from her. She'll forget her apprehensions and just go, because she knows it might not happen again if Tomoko was around. Well, things were weird, but then they went back to normal and maybe now she can call Tomoki a new friend.

-end-

AN: I know it makes no sense!