"Will we meet again sometime?"
"I'm sure we will."
"Promise?"
"Promise. Now go and don't look back."
Chihiro pushed a long silver spoon clockwise around her dark mug of cocoa; she wasn't particularly hungry, leaving a strawberry danish half-eaten on some pastel pink name-brand napkin, glaze shimmering incandescently under the fluorescent lighting. Her mother didn't bother to ask why she didn't finish it, probing her on various subjects from school to boys , shoes to acrylics- it was moments later that her father snatched the discarded pastry, chomping it to bits between yellowing teeth (he was a "recovering" smoker with lots of lapses), chasing the dulcet desert with a gulp of tepid beer.
Her mother was in the midst of raving about their next 'mother-daughter' spa trip, words pouring forth like a gushing stream, when she realized Chihiro wasn't listening (as per usual) and went back to patting her husband's arm and sipping a slushy cocktail hued with the colors of the setting sun.
Chihiro was far too busy watching clouds puff past, chin in hand, wisps of hair from her low bun draping against the bare nape of her neck. IHOP wasn't in her list of top-ten-eateries, and by the time her cocoa had gone cold she was already enraptured in another world completely; a swirling puff of white swam in the night-air overhead and Chihiro thought it looked like a river, like a dragon- like the umpteenth time the young girl relived the memories that swarmed her mind and deemed her medically unstable. Visions of parent-turned-pigs and faceless monsters, a tall bathhouse with billowing smoke stacks and sweet dumplings eaten beside blushing pink hydrangeas. It had taken Chihiro years to admit what she had gone through, years that she spent with thousands of questions bubbling and broiling beneath her tawny skin, and when she finally did decide to speak out she was met with a thousand more inquiries.
She lived in a hospital room in the Psych. ward for two months, poked with needles and interrogated on a daily basis, fed mediocre hospital food and given dedicated hours of the day to leave her room; her mother and father visited every other week. The only upside to the entire experience was her roommate, a Chinese girl with intermediate Japanese speaking skills and a thick mandarin accent who insisted on being called Shānyào (山藥*), which roughly translated into yam. Chihiro didn't understand why Shānyào requested she call her that until she really dissected that day a few months later- she had been eating sweet, sautéed yams. Chihiro did eventually ask Shānyào (nicknamed Shan-Shan, or Shan-Chan) why she chose yam, of all things, but she refused to answer; the late-night nurse told her through hushed whispers that it was because Shānyào didn't have a name, born illegitimately on the boat between Taizhou and Kagoshima. Shānyào was a good roommate, always polite and thoughtful, quick to offer help with anything she could manage; when Chihiro explained her experience to her, Shānyào said the one thing that helped Chihiro get through the questions and the prodding and the starchy hospital sheets: I believe you. Because, even if others called her crazy, that meant there was one person who had faith in her. That's all she ever needed.
In the distance, the cloud named Haku drifted behind a multi-floor building with thousands of shimmering window panes, plotted on a parking lot that swallowed up and spat out cars faster than she could count; As she watched, Chihiro's mind churned, eyes fluttering over the landscape like a pair of house flies. That building was familiar- she'd definitely seen it before. "Chichi**," she turned towards her father, smiling sheepishly. "I've seen that building before. Where are we?"
Her father grunted, gulped another bout of beer and wiped his greasy mouth with the back of his hand. "That one over there?" he asked, pointing a thick finger at the thee joined buildings, grimy fingernail staring directly at the aluminum tower in the center. She nodded and he did too, her mother's hands wrapping around his thick shoulders.
"Sweety," she began, lips pressed into a hard line, wavy brown hair bobbing over her scalp lazily. "That's the hospital we brought you to when you nearly drowned in the Kohaku Nushi river; you remember it?" she sipped her frosty drink, Chihiro's father beginning to babble about children's memories and how traumatizing things are often engraved in a brain's archive, hidden beneath the jibble-jabble of daily life. Chihiro simply nodded in agreement and turned back to stare at the hospital, fingers drumming over her chin, a faint smile ghosting over her thin lips. This meant the river was close-by- and if the river was close-by, so would Haku.
She'd find a way to see him. Tomorrow, the day after, a week later; Chihiro would finally find her Nigihayami Kohaku Nushi***.
*山藥 = 山芋 = yam.
**Chichi = 父 = father
***Nigihayami Kohaku Nushi = god of the amber river~
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A/N: It feels so good to be back ;^; I'll update it as soon as I can. /loves you all.