Author's Note: Hello all! I always like to start my notes by saying 'it's been a good while since…'. It is true that it's been some time since I last made a Tom Nook/Sable story (and anything Animal Crossing related in that case). However, as they have proved to be some of my most popular stories, I just had to write more. I love this pairing and believe there is so much potential for amazing stories to be written about the two, as has already been made evident by current existing stories of the two (excluding my attempts).
Much like Star Shirt, this is a long, single-chapter story. I was considering making it a multiple-chapter story but I felt it would break the narrative that runs through. Also, the song at the end of the story was written by me, so no need to worry about the Fanfiction rules being broken I wrote it about this pairing, which then inspired this story years later. In any case, I hope you enjoy this story and let me know what you think!
T-Shirts
The rain kept falling.
I looked past my sodden window down to the streets below. I saw people, umbrellas, moving across the grey sidewalks like ants.
Where were they going?
Was anyone going anywhere?
…Where am I going?
It had been two years since I'd moved to the city. A pursuit of big dreams and big money brought me to this small, modern, one-bedroom flat in the middle of a sprawling metropolis. From every window I looked out from, I saw towers, great mirrored obelisks. Some days they showed the sun. But most days…
All I saw was the rain.
At first, it was okay. Exciting, even. I remember when I first stepped off the train, my feet landing in a forming puddle from the drips that fell from the edge of the train shelter. I looked out to the needle-filled skyline in front of me and felt my heart rise. I felt so young and ready at that moment. With a suitcase in my hand and a CV full of promise, I felt like I was on the way to making it. This was the city! This was the place where things just happened, great things! Opportunities, hopes and dreams, they all were cultivated and realised in this great haven, and I was about to take my first steps into it. Nothing that had happened to me before could measure up to what was to happen in my future.
Or so I believed.
Two years on, and I suppose you could say I have made it. I've certainly made the money I thought I would make. I have a nice flat, big windows, big bed, big friends. I've everything to show for my success. I even have a sleek sports car, of which I earned every little atom myself with my own doing.
So why does it not feel like I thought it would?
Why doesn't it feel good?
I pressed my hand up against the window, as if to touch the dripping rain that snaked down on the other side. Perhaps somewhere in this building, someone was doing the same. Staring. Staring and wondering why the puzzle just didn't quite fit. As I closed my eyes, I started to think of home.
Home. Home is where the heart is. For me, home was where a lot of my first things came from.
My first Bell.
As a little child, my parents would always take me to the store on a Sunday and let me select one piece of candy. I used to love going into the shop on Sundays. As a child, I could remember how much the shelves towered above me as I walked in. I wondered about every little item that the store sold, and what would it do. I questioned so much. What does it do? Why is it there? Can I use it? How much does it cost?
I used to fill with such joy, as my curiosity would take me through numerous journeys in that shop. I don't remember much about the person who ran it, but I certainly do remember the painstaking process in which I would select my sweets. Would I go for the expensive one? Or take pity on my parents and alternate between the cheap and expensive selections? Could I get more of the cheap ones as a trade off for a single expensive piece of candy? Did the expensive candy even taste that much better?
Those thoughts intensified on the day my parents gave me five Bells and told me to help myself. Freed from the shackles of parental authority, I could select and choose tactically under my own jurisdiction. Even though I was only five, it sparked that little entrepreneur in me that still roars today.
My first shop.
Some years down the line, five Bells became fifty, and I started to run errands for my parents. Go to the store and get these items. If you have any money left over, you can buy what you want. These requests from my ageing, ailing mother and ever busy father were the opportunities that allowed me to grow my ideas and desires. At first, I would use the spare money to buy candy. I loved candy a lot as a child. What child doesn't? Sugar was a child's best friend in those days (and still is).
But as I started to get older, the spare money from my grocery runs started to mean something else. I started to realise things; I started putting two and two together. If I don't buy candy today, that means I can buy twice as more candy next week! And so I started to grapple with the idea of temptation and pay-off. I learned that as you go through life and earn your keep, you had the power to spend it on what you pleased, as long as you were tactical. The allocation and spending of money. It's very much like the energy of the human body, and the energy of all life forms, and how throughout a life total gained energy is allocated to performing the vital tasks of growth, reproduction and maintenance. Life History Theory, I believe it's called.
Eventually, I started to realise that money was a strange kind of energy. You didn't just earn and spend it like everyone else. There were ways to cheat the 'give in, pay out' system. If you used the money wisely, you could get out so much more than you could pay in. The moment my mind thought it, it started to become a reality.
I want a shop one day!
Knowing the power of the money I saved, I knew I could make that dream a reality. Looking back, it was very cute. I kept the saved Bells in a jar and when I felt I had enough, I went out, bought my sweets and set up at stall in the village. But there was a trick: the sweets were more expensive than they were in the shop. Only slightly, but still more expensive. Not that the kids noticed. The look of pride my parents had when I started coming back with the money I'd earned from my little sweet stall is a look I'll never forget.
Unlike energy, where the body has a capacity before it says 'enough', money has no realistic limits. Today, I know you can't get as full on money than you can on food. It's a dangerous thing.
A very dangerous thing.
My first friend.
My mother passed away when I was nine from illness. My dad changed. He got quieter. He worked harder. He wasn't as nice. He always got food on the table for me and smiled as much as he could. But I knew he changed. Whenever I asked where my mother had gone, he would never say.
I got sad. I was a sad kid, and I would go to the village tree and sit under it in gloomier moments. I stopped holding my sweet stall. My energy had hit a low. Eventually I accepted that my mother wasn't coming back, and in years to come, I would come to accept this.
Cancer, it seems.
One day, as I sat under the tree, just staring and feeling blue, a figure approached me.
"Are you okay?"
She was a young girl, same age as me. A hedgehog, with a gingham patterned dress. It was the summer and the winds blew the flowers petals around the village. I couldn't appreciate this beauty, but I remember this one gingham-patterned figure who came to me.
"No" I said. Kids have an honesty that I admire.
"Why?" the girl asked. She was the first girl who'd talked to me other than saying "I want that sweet" or "How much is it?"
"My mam died" I said bluntly. Some silence followed.
"…My mam died when I was born" the girl said with an ill-fitting, inquisitive voice. She played with her feet as she sat next to me.
"What's your name?" I asked.
"Sable" she replied. "What's yours?"
"…Tom Nook" I replied. "…Nice to meet you, hm?"
Sable and I hung out a lot that summer. I felt my happiness return pretty swiftly with her company; we became fast friends. I was introduced to all her friends as well, although I don't remember any of them now except her sisters, Mabel and Labelle. They were nice, although Mabel cried a lot during our games of baseball. She was super young that summer, just a toddler if I remember correctly. The games we all played and the time we all spent in the sun, having our fun; it makes me smile to think about it. It was the first time I had tasted true happiness.
It's different to the satisfaction of earning a Bell. It's not as exciting, granted, but that type of happiness fills your soul. You feel…filled. I can't put it any other way, I'm afraid. You feel content, full…
You fell that if you died the next day, then that would just be alright. A life being well lived.
It's a shame that happiness hasn't come to me in the last two years. I really hoped it would, what with the business friends I've made and the crazy, crazy nights out. But I don't feel as full as I thought I would. The only thing filled right now is my wallet.
It's not the same.
My first kiss.
My first kiss...
Sable…
Eleven years old. Sable and I were best friends. Things had become divine and I'd never felt so childishly happy, even though my voice was beginning to drop and I slept longer hours. I really think it had an effect on my dad as well; he seemed a lot happier in the days. He even found himself a new girlfriend. I don't remember her much, but she seemed alright. I don't think she was always around though.
It wasn't an important detail during that time for me. What was important was Sable. Mabel was growing up, getting more demanding, but crying less. In a strange way, Sable and I were like parents to that growing child. We were all very close.
I didn't know Labelle had gone to the city by this time. Sable told me many years later that her departure placed a lot of strain on her family. A daughter running away is never a pleasant thing.
We were sitting under the somewhat smaller village tree. The entire village actually seemed a little smaller then. As I grew, it shrunk.
I had gotten my first pimple, and I wasn't very happy about it. It was right on my nose. It was big. It was red. It was repulsive, or at least I thought so anyway. Sable had gotten quite a few pimples of her own by this point, dotting her cheeks and forehead. Her teeth were also bigger and a little crooked. So were mine. My jaws were hurting a lot during that time as new teeth pushed out the old. Ah, growing pains, those were the days.
"I hate this pimple" I complained in my cracking voice.
"Stop complaining!" Sable repeated to me, becoming sick of the fact that I kept complaining about the pimple. I complained a lot during my puberty years.
"But it's so big, and it aches" I grumbled.
"I have lots of pimples" she replied to me in her 'I told you so' voice. "You don't hear me complaining, do you?"
"Fine" I replied. Defeats were pretty easy to come by when you tried to argue with Sable at this time. She was one smart girl. Smartest girl in the class, actually. It drew her a few negative vibes from the 'hip' kids, but I didn't care. She was my friend. She could have as many pimples as she wanted and I wouldn't have thought differently of her.
School was a constant topic of our conversations during those days. Everything revolved around school. What classes we were going to sign up for when we were older. What kids we liked, what kids we didn't. Favourite teachers. Least favourite teachers. We spoke about the times they treated us well and the times they smote us. We talked about those hidden feelings of rebellion that never surfaced in time to come.
"Have you got a date for the ball yet?" she asked me. The school's annual end of year ball was fast approaching, and so was my supposed deadline to find a date. I never had before, so why would it bother me now?
"No" I replied. "Have you, hm?"
"…No" she replied, somewhat gingerly. We were both staring out towards the horizon at the end of the village. The sun had set and the dusk was slowly becoming darker.
"Have you asked anyone?" I asked, rubbing the pimple on my nose.
"Yeah…I asked Redd" she said. Redd was one of our classmates. He was a strange one who Sable seemed to fancy. Normally I would have been jealous, but having known Sable for so long, it didn't seem to any effect on me.
"Did he say no?" I asked, turning to look at her. Through the pimples and the growing brown hair, I saw a figure of sadness. She sighed.
"Yeah" she sighed.
It hurt me to see my friend like this. Her first chance at romance, shot down by a simple word. Though I never understood the ins and outs of love at that point, I did know liking someone very much formed the basis of it all. The awkward dates, the kisses, the hugs, all that stuff.
I had never asked anyone out to the school ball before.
"…Do you want to go to the school ball with me?" I asked her. I didn't know why at the time those words came out, but the feeling of guilt at seeing my friend sad, as well as the fondness that I held for her, must have been accountable. Whatever it was, I watched as her saddened eyes opened up a little. She turned to look at me, shocked but trying to suppress a smile.
"…Really, Tom?" she asked, almost whispering. "You really mean it?"
"…Yeah, of course" I replied. "It'll be nice to go together, hm? Besides, forget Redd. He can be an idiot, he doesn't know what he's missing out on"
I was ambushed by a strong hug, my head thrust into Sable's thin shoulder and deceptively strong arms. Amidst the squeeze, I tried to hug back.
"Oh, thank you, thank, you, thank you!" she spoke loudly, digging her face onto my shoulder. "This means so much! Thank you, Tom!" She then let go and looked at me, all signs of sadness completely wiped. "I swear you won't forget it"
I realised then that my face was flushed completely red. Never had Sable hugged me like that before. We'd had our childish hugs before, but this one had purpose. It had meaning.
It started to break down barriers. Evidently, as soon as she noticed the flushed nature of my complexion, she too started to blush. For some time, we sat together, humming and wondering, our faces still flushed, completely oblivious to the growing cold of the night. It took the loss of the light to instigate some ending to our conversation.
"Okay, I have to go now" Sable said, preparing her small little satchel she always carried. The darkness had made it hard to see, and only her pimples stood out from the dark. "I'll see you at school, okay?"
"Okay, see you tomorrow in class, hm?" I said to her as we stood up.
She hesitated for a bit, a first for us. Usually we parted much quicker than this, but tonight, she just stood there, hands clasped tightly together, eyes to the ground.
She then suddenly advanced towards me, mouth aiming for my cheek. Caught completely off guard, I made the beautiful accident of turning my head as she approached.
For a split second, out lips came into contact. Soft, slightly wet, quivering and not quite on target. Like everyone's typical first kiss.
Sable yelped and jumped back a little bit, completely thrown by what she had done. Myself, surged by the electric shock of her accidental kiss, felt my muscles jolted frozen. Our hearts beat wildly.
We just kissed.
Shy and full of fear, Sable fired one quick, awkward smile before she ran off into the night. I felt her kiss cooling rapidly against the wind of the night, quickly disappearing.
Little, growing me didn't know what to do, but I got no sleep that night.
My first dance.
It wasn't spectacular, to be honest. Still struggling to make sense of what had just transpired between us, when Sable and I met at the dance, it was awkward. More awkward you could ever imagine. As soon as we acknowledged that we were 'dates' we avoided each other for most of the night, as if we had fulfilled some sort of contractual obligation.
Thankfully by the end of the night, I had gathered some courage and had made more sense of the situation. What would my dear mother think if I left my date on her own all night? Near the end of the night, I took myself across the dance floor to her and took her arm. I didn't even ask her to come and dance, but she followed anyway. As soon as we were on the floor, with only few other confused, puberty-assaulted children dancing with each other in a hormonal battle, we tried to dance ourselves.
Well, if you can call holding hands and swinging them around 'dancing'. I swore it looked like I was driving a massive lorry wheel instead of dancing. Still, the bare minimums had been met. My first dance.
She kissed me on the cheek as we bade farewell that night. She didn't kiss me again for years.
My first T-shirt.
This doesn't mean to say I never wore T-shirts before. I always did. But the reason I mention T-shirts is because they are, as of a certain period of my life, very special to me.
Sable dropped out of school at around 15. She was a very smart girl, top of the class in every year. But she decided when she was 15 that she was going to drop out. Her family business needed somebody to run it in place of her parents, who had decided to retire. Mabel was too young. So a year before she dropped out, Sable taught herself to become a seamstress. And then she dropped out of school.
She had told me in private that she was going to do this about a few months before she dropped out. I was very scared; I thought I would never see her again.
"Tom, I don't ever want to forget you. I'm not leaving and I want to keep seeing you"
We still hadn't kissed since that awkward school ball some years back. But with the two of us in the iron grip of puberty at fifteen years old, the prospect of kissing again always hovered in the air. Unfortunately, every opportunity to do so seemed to fizzle away as soon as the thought was entertained. We just weren't ready. By the time we were fifteen, the never-coming kiss had become something of an in-joke between us. We relaxed and settled as the firmest of friends. Even if in the back of my mind, I was becoming more and more ready for that kiss.
The day after she left school, we met again at the village tree, smaller than ever before. I used to think that even the lowest braches were a sky away when I was a small boy. At the peak of my growth, I could grab the bottom branch with nothing but a light hop.
She gave me a T-shirt.
"What's this?" I asked. Sable smiled at me, her face still pimpled, but more developed. As a biologist would tell you, the skull develops to near full size around this period, filling out all the features of the face and the head as it does. The childish, cutesy Sable had long gone, and in her place was a stronger, more beautiful (yet still pimply) lady. She was taller and more woman-like than ever before. She bounced with a fizzling energy as if the social trauma of leaving school didn't mean a thing when she was with me.
Meanwhile I was in Pimple City with a house on Wonky Teeth Lane. It was crazy.
The garment I had been handed was plain red with no designs. It was light, and at first, confusing. I hadn't cracked it was a T-shirt until she told me: "It's a T-shirt! I made it"
"You made this?" I asked, unfurling the fabric to reveal the T-shirt's shape. It was just my size, although the stitching patterns around the armpits and down the sides weren't the tightest. Still, the fact that she had produced this garment was impressive.
"I did!" Sable replied, smiling strongly. "It's my first T-shirt. What do you think of it?"
"Depends, hm?" I said. "How long have you been learning to be a seamstress for now?"
"Three months" she replied. "I did finish it a couple of days before I left school, but I wanted to wait until after to show you"
"Sabe, it's great!" I heralded. "No way you've only been learning for three months!"
Sable took her hands and looked to the ground, a coy smile on her face. I could always tell she was flattered/shy/embarrassed when she pulled that pose.
"Aw, thanks Tom…" she hummed. "…I want you to have it"
"…Sabe, you mean this is for me?" I asked, the request breaking the feel of our usual, half-flirtatious conversations. I looked at her as her shyness continued to reign. I loved her little smile when she was like this.
"I do" she hummed. "I made it for you. I wanted to give it to you as a way of saying thanks, I guess"
"Hm?" I hummed. "Thanks? But what did I do?"
She giggled a little before sighing, her smile retreating. "Well…it's not for anything specific, but it's just that with everything that's happened lately…"
She took a step closer to me and took my hand. I started to feel nervous, but tried hard to listen to what she had to say and understand it.
"Leaving school wasn't easy" she said to me, her gaze flitting between the scenery and my own, unmoving eyes. "If I could have things my way, I would still be in school right now, studying, doing my exams, and then maybe going to university after that. But because my parents retired, I couldn't bear to see their business get swallowed up into the ground and vanish. The Able name…I want to carry it on, even if my stupid teenage mind is telling me otherwise. When I'm ready to take over the shop, I'll make more than T-shirts…"
"But Sabe…" I interrupted. "…Why me? Why give me your first t-shirt?"
"…Because I-I love you Tom"
Teenagers throw such strong words about so idly, I've discovered. All my classmates and friends would always talk about the girls they fancied. 'I love her' was a phrase often used. The two-month boyfriends and girlfriends would also be throwing those words about. I never did, but it was so easy to think of them. Young hearts flutter strongly, and it takes getting to grips with words such as 'love' before one can fully understand the immeasurable depth of its meaning.
But to be at the receiving end of the words when spoken with such sincerity was something else. I looked at Sable, and the tears that had started to form in her eyes told me that she wasn't like all my friends. She, unlike anyone else and even myself, knew the weight to which those sacred words should be attached.
I knew she meant it.
She took me into her embrace and we held each other for long time. I resisted saying it, trying to give to those words the same deserving weight as Sable did. I did not last long.
"…I love you too, Sabe" I whispered into her ear. I felt her push me slightly apart from her, her chest still tight against mine. Amidst the whirlwind of hormonal confusion that we both felt in those moments, we were able to get our senses together just long enough.
We leant in and kissed each other, injecting all the meaning and sentiment we could. The feeling of our lips was just as electric as the first time, if not even more than before. Passionate, somewhat uncontrolled, maybe. But meaningful and loving? I think it was.
This time, the kiss was no accident.
My first real struggle.
Eighteen years old. I had just received my school diploma, which exceptional results in most of my exams. The most exceptional, though, was business.
I was always going to be a businessman. From my first shop to running the school store, to pricing the apples and organs sold at the school's fruit stall, always being first in line to the business and finance stalls at Topics Night. My teachers said it, my friends said it, my dad always said it. I was a born business man. I had the acumen, you could say. I passed my A Levels in Business with an A star and was the only one in the school to ever achieve the accolade. Some people even went as far to say that business, an abstract, non-physical concept, was in my blood.
And with that accolade came my life's biggest opportunity: to go to the city and kick-start a career in business and finance. To start a fond relationship with Bells, my second best friend at that point after Sable herself. To gain my first taste of independence. To venture out of the village a teenager and become a man.
My father left the village, a lone man, a year before my eighteenth birthday. I was heartbroken that my dad could abandon me like this. It was entirely out of the blue, completely unexpected and completely crushing. A love was blossoming between Sable and I, but the disappearance of my father almost broke me. He left a note saying that he was proud of me, but he couldn't continue to etch out his existence in the village where his wife had brought him so much joy. In a sense, he escaped.
And when he did, I felt the need to escape grow inside me as well.
By this point, Sable and I were a couple. Every month, she brought me a T-shirt that she had sown herself. The family business she now owned, the newly named Able Sisters store, was starting to flourish as a business. Sable, in turn, flourished as a woman. Her acne faded and her abilities in social and practical applications soared. She started to become more and more perfect, and I became luckier and luckier that I had such a lady on my arm.
That luck came coupled with dread. As I realised my own potential for making money, I also realised how much I loved it. Money was claim; with more money, you could have more. More things to own. More things to do. Things that were previously out of bounds suddenly became within easy reach. I envisioned gold watches, great houses. I envisioned happiness. As I touched each Bell throughout my life, learning about them, their theories and their realities, I fell in love.
I'm the only person who can say they've fallen in love twice. Simultaneously. In one love laid Sable. In the other was money. So when I say dread was coupled with luck, it as all because I knew what was coming.
A dreaded choice.
There wasn't much money in the village. The big boys and the bigger paychecks were all to be found elsewhere…in the city. And so as my time in school started to draw to a close, it dawned upon me that I had to make a choice between my two loves.
I was torn, but I decided eventually.
Sable was always oblivious to my love of money. She saw me only as the savvy business acolyte and not the ruthless businessman I wished and thought I could become. When I was with Sable...it was hard to think of money. I was in the deepest love; her hair, her eyes, her soft cheeks, the subtle scars left behind from her pimples, that shy smile, that gorgeous body, the confidence: I fell in love with it all. I was in Heaven when I was with her.
But could it last? We were still so young, and knowing what the future could have held for me, my love of money became harder to hide. As such a love became harder to hide, Sable started to notice it. In some ways, it felt like I was cheating on her with these ideas of granduer. It would have had to come out at some time, most likely in a very ugly fashion.
We had tough conversations. We had the shouts and the tears. And when it was all done, it al clear.
I was going to the city.
I loved Sable and she loved me, but money at the time seemed such an eternal and beautiful thing. It seemed above love itself; ever lasting and granting happiness and joy and opportunity to those who wielded it.
Once my train ticket had been ordered on Sable's work computer in her store, I turned to her and promised that I would never forget her. I didn't. Sable was my sun and my joy. I promised that one day I would come back, a richer, stronger man. We would get married; we would have kids, grandkids, great-grandkids even. We'd watch them upon our rocking chairs and laugh. We'd create memories and treasure them. We would love each other forever more.
The night before I was to leave for the city, I came to the Able Sisters in my city-ready suit and my heavy bags. The rain poured. My heart pounded wildly. Sable let me into the store and took me up to her room. Mabel was out, sleeping over a friends' house as kids do.
We lost our virginities together that night. I'll never, ever, ever forget that night. The way we cried as we held each other. The curiosity that soon exploded into sheer pleasure. The feel of her mouth against mine, the warmth of the sheets and the sound of plummeting rain like bullets striking against her bedroom window. We had the lights out, but I could still see the love in her eyes. When it was all over, we laid in each other's arms and slept upon the same bed and pillow for the first, and only time, in our lives.
The next day, I left the village.
Tears streamed down my face. I was now reduced to sitting on the floor of my apartment, looking up to the white, muggy skies above. I sobbed quietly and felt my tears trickle down my face.
The T-shirts were in my room. Every single one; all handmade with the love and adoration of a girl who I considered my soul mate.
Yes, my soul mate. Even though it had been two years since I had last seen her. Her picture, with me holding her close to me some months before I left the village, always sat by my bedside. Some nights I failed to notice it. Other nights, I found myself drawn to it, unable to tear my eyes away.
…
…
…
Sable, if you can hear me now, then I love you. God knows I love you more than anything else in the world. Through all this pain and all this sorrow I feel when I think of the times we had…
Damn it. I can't stop crying.
Sable, why did I leave? Why did I do this to us? I loved you and I chose money. I was wrong, okay? I was so wrong to make that decision! I thought money would open up to me the things that I desired most in life. I thought the city was the land of hope, reality and the truthful becoming of dreams!
But I lost sight. Instead, the city took away from me the one thing that really mattered, and it was you.
I receive your letters every week. I write back as fast as I can. Judging by the lipstick kiss print you leave at the bottom of every letter, you still think of me physically. And judging by the T-shirts that you send me every month, with their ever-increasing intricacy in their design, you still think of me emotionally. I hope you still love me. Even as I wear one of your T-shirts now, sitting on my floor in a flood of tears, I hope you still love me.
I love you, Sabe. My little honey-bear.
I don't know if I can ever face you again after the mistake that I've done. You may never want to speak to me again. But I wrote this little song for you, if you ever want to hear it. I can't sing, or play any instruments; I admit that they are only lyrics at this stage. But if you can hear me right now Sabe…then please, just listen to me.
…
…
Once upon a time, a long time ago,
We were the people that we could share,
Everything we know.
Change started coming, I started to sing,
"Why sit around when I could gain everything?"
/
Stereo surrounded by granite towers,
The walks are coloured grey,
No longer filled with flowers.
We could have won, it's such a shame,
Now your lips only touch,
The image in the picture frame.
/
So I wear the T-shirts,
That were made for me,
By your caring hands,
Ever so tenderly.
/
My breath condenses against the pane,
Of the window that only shows me,
The torrential rain.
You brought color to those days,
Now memories left unpacked in boxes,
Is all that remains.
/
How can I sleep when you're so far away?
Submit to fatigue and brace myself,
For another day.