remedial

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no matter what you know, I'll, I'll fix you with my love,

and if you say you're okay, I'm gonna heal you anyway,
promise I'll always be there, promise I'll be the cure

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— the cure, lady gaga

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When Ikuto wakes up in his dingy hotel room in a cold sweat — heart hammering; chest tight; head dizzy — he isn't even surprised anymore.

He isn't surprised because, for a moment, his nightmares are just all so real that he truly believes he is back again. He truly believes that he is seventeen, stood on the roof of the carousel, his violin in his hand, and darkness swirling from his soul. He believes that he is out of his mind — he sees pink, but his vision is foggy and he panics because he can't stop it, he can't save her from himself…

When Ikuto wakes up hyperventilating, forcibly tugged back to reality with his stepfather's voice and the twang of the tuning fork still embedded deep in his mind, he can't even bring himself to be upset.

No, not upset. Just anger. Just resentment.

Just despair.

It happens every few nights or so. Even now — even when his chains had been shed and his spirit set free, untethered. Even half a world world away they followed him. He had travelled far and wide, through town and city, country to country and yet still the gloom pursued him.

Ikuto's in Belgium now. He's shacked up in some tiny apartment outside Antwerp for the night. And still he wakes in the dead of night clawing for breath.

Ikuto wonders how he ever survived nearly eight years of his life under the watchful eye of Easter. He wonders how he truly kept his sanity, how he just somehow (barely) managed to keep from delving into the never-ending depths of insanity — from the void that always seemed to open up just a step ahead of him on that long, ruinous path…

Blue hair. Golden eyes. Fuzzy little kitten ears and big, clumsy paws.

Ikuto instinctively glances over to his side and reaches for the bedside table where last he'd left—

His fingers meet thin air.

Of course, he thinks, Yoru's not there anymore.

The lock screen on his phone flashes beside him. Ikuto smiles softly, laughs drily in the darkness at the faces staring back at him. He and Utau and Tadase stand beneath a clear blue sky, sun shining, illuminating their faces as they stand in the middle of the old amusement park back at home…

But then there's that face there beside them that seems to shine all on it's own, bright and warm and bubbly, amazingly and blissfully unaware of the sense of joy and positivity that seems to radiate from her very being…

Ikuto looks back at Amu's face. When he closes his eyes again, he still sees it. He still sees pastel pink and pale skin and eyes like the setting sun and he feels its warmth glowing inside his chest. It's warm, it's cleansing — it's that spark of light in a darkened room that drives away all evil. It pushes back the fell things that lurk in the shadows of his heart, calms his head, sets his soul free — light as a feather, unburdened.

He can't remember when he first made the connection. He can't seem to pinpoint just when it was that he realised that her presence made him feel at peace again. He can't recall when he began to rely on her memory to help drag him through the seemingly never-ending night… But Ikuto does. He still clings to it. And he is still grateful beyond words.

And Amu may have driven away the Director and broken all his chains, but sometimes, at times like this in the dead of night when he lay a world away from home, Ikuto couldn't deny that still deep in his mind there crept dark shadows. Foul beings that dragged up his worst nightmares from the endless well of sorrow inside him, from wounds that would never fully heal — demons with undefined faces that seemed insistent on making sure he knew that no matter how far he ran, no matter how hard he tried…

There were some things that he could not ever forget.

And now not even Yoru was there to guide him through until the dawn.

Ikuto sighs impatiently, sat upright on the side of his bed now, his head in his hands. He tries to breathe, slow and steady… But his chest feels tight and his breathing is shallow and, he notes faintly in the back of his mind, that the nightmares are still creeping away at the borderlines of his thought, crawling away, trying to find a space to slip back in to torment him…

Ikuto growls to himself, frustrated. There would be no hope of further sleep tonight. No respite. No escape…

Again.

And then his eyes land on hers again. And in an instant Ikuto thinks the answer becomes obvious.

Ikuto grabs his phone, scrolling through his contact list until he finds her. Amu Hinamori. Her name has that little strawberry emoji beside it that makes him so amused. He remembers the way she'd puffed up in protest — her cheeks so pink and lips pouted so adorably — when she'd seen it. He chuckles to himself, hovers over the call button…

And then he stops. Ikuto hesitates. The clock beside him reads 3am, but it's almost midday in Japan and he's sure that, somehow, she probably wouldn't appreciate it. He's sure she started her first semester at university only a week ago. She doesn't need him now, he thinks.

But a draught creeps up on him in the darkness and a cold chill sweeps its way up his spine. The shadows… The shadows were still there.

(Just when was it that he began to rely on her..?)

So he sends her a text instead. Something sweet, something simple.

In the end he just ends up sending her that strawberry emoji, followed by a winking face.

It's not the first time he's done this either.

She's never minded before.

Ikuto chuckles away to himself, setting the phone down and laying back in bed. He won't get to talk to her, but it doesn't matter. He imagines her reaction — imagines the way her cheeks flare and the way her brows narrow; he thinks about the way Amu folds her arms tightly together whenever she's trying to make a stand and the way her hair flies about her face as she shakes her head furiously at him…

But then there's also that sparkle in her eyes and that twitch at the side of her mouth that belie her angry front. And then there's that way she holds herself as she battles to maintain that outer character that Ikuto knows so well and he knows then that it's all an act — that she could easily bite back at all his little teases… And he thinks that she knows. There's something there, hidden away in her tone, that makes him think that maybe she enjoys that banter just as much as he does.

Ikuto pictures it all in his mind and he smiles. It doesn't matter that he cannot talk to her or stand beside her or sneak up unexpectedly on her whilst he's still so far away from home. But, in that moment, he feels just a little bit closer to her. Just a little bit more connected. Just a little bit calmer and his head a little clearer as, reluctantly, the demons begin to slink back into the shadows, out of sight and out of mind.

He can't tell how long has passed as he begins to finally — blissfully! — drift into an unhindered sleep, his soul feeding off that ray sunshine that permeates every thought—

BZZT!

His phone vibrates loudly on the table beside him, effectively snapping him back to earth.

Ikuto frowns, bleary-eyed, and reaches for it. He doesn't bother speaking.

"Ikuto?"

If he wasn't awake before, he certainly is now. His heart skips in his chest, breath catching at the sound of Amu's voice. It's like a gently-flowing stream; like birdsong; like the highest, smoothest of notes he could ever hope to produce on his father's violin.

"Strawberry..." he drawls, grinning dumbly in his bed where he knows she cannot see it. "Afternoon, Amu,"

"Ikuto—" she cuts in on the other end of the line, but he can hear that oh-so slight waver in her tone.

He's sure she's blushing. He grins wider. "Flustered?"

"Not in the slightest!" she protests. "What are you up to, anyway?" Amu asks. "Are you okay?"

"Hmm," Ikuto hums in response. "Someone missing me?"

"A-As if!"

His laughter rings through the tiny apartment — loud and clear and stark in contrast to the darkness that plagues his room. He feels it now. It's piercing, cutting through like a blade of light; it's bright and pure and comforting and it's all because of the sound of her voice. It's all because of her. Because he feels so unburdened when he can hear her voice; because he feels so close to home; because he feels so connected.

Because he loves her beyond words. And he loves that she can cure him so.

"Ikuto." Amu says and there's suddenly an edge to her voice. It's tentative, yet forward. It's caring, concerned.

"Mm?"

"Ikuto, you know…" she trails off, struggling to find the words. Ikuto waits patiently. "You know you can call me. Whenever."

In the darkness of his room, Ikuto raises a single eyebrow. His heart quickens.

"Whenever you need…" she goes on and he wonders briefly if she can truly feel his torment simply in the tone of his voice. He wonders, fleetingly, how she just always seems to know.

"Whatever you need… J-Just call me, idiot…"

"Amu…"

"N-N-Not like I'm concerned about you or anything—!"

Whether she can feel his emotions or not, he can certainly sense her blush.

Ikuto laughs again and barely cares for the darkness outside.

Because there's light enough in his heart now. So long as she is here.

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I will be right by your side

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