Stories from the Heart
By Firenze
A/N: Thanks to everyone who helped me figure out names! Don't be offended or anything if I didn't use the ones you suggested, but hey, Sora's mom can't have 20 names. Oh yeah, Shadowmon, about that Sakura thing...yes, that is Japanese, and it means "cherry blossom." Ever heard of Cardcaptors by any chance? I didn't use all the Japanese names before when I wrote this out on paper, but if her mom and dad and aunt are going to have them, why not? However, I'm just too accustomed to first name, then last name, so I won't change that. Oh, and this is really Americanized too, but bear with me, all right?
The title is incredibly gay, I It's my first attempt at a non-Digimon romance. And a drama! *Everyone who has read my Harry Potter dramas runs away* Please, just read it, even though it's pretty long. It takes place after season 1 and about a year before season 02. But the narrating sort of parts are...I don't know. You decide. Sometime when they're in high school.
Disclaimer: No, Sora and Taichi are not mine. I wish they were...TK, Kari, and Izzy too...but Toei and Saban and them could keep Mimi, Matt, and Joe (or Sora, Taichi, Takeru, Hikari, Koushiro, Mimi, Yamato, and Jyou as I'm going to call them in the fic). Anything else I randomly mentioned put in '' these things that you recognize obviously isn't mine either.
Oh yeah, that's not really Sora's mom's name, and they never mentioned her dad, or her having an aunt, but I don't own those either! Thanks to Ishida Takeru for Natsumi as Sora's mom's name (it sounds pretty! Though Naoko sounded all right too), alphabet for Yuki as Sora's aunt, and especially to Aquarius for Tomio for Sora's dad and Tsuneko Senoue for the one-sentence police officer. Dr. Natomi is mine, as well this stupid plot and all, so if anyone stupid plans on imitating it, you better give me some credit for all my hard work.
* * *
There is a big tree right in the middle of Odaiba. A grand, towering oak with many large branches. It's very old and ancient, probably from before Odaiba was even populated by humans. Many animals and bugs make their homes in the tree, but for humans, it's just a wonderful place to hang out around or play on. Every day after school ends, two teenagers come to the tree, not to swing on its branches or carve initials into it's bark, but to sit on the largest branch and talk.
It was practically procedure now that they had done it so many times. The boy and girl would climb up the tree and complain about a math test or all the homework they would have to do. They talked about anything that was on their mind and were entirely open with one another. Then the girl would pull a notebook out of her backpack and start to read aloud. These notebooks were filled with her writing, but not her imagination, but her life experiences.
On a windy fall day, the two teenagers came to the tree, whose leaves were changing into brilliant autumn colors, and did just that.
"And so the seven children looked back upon the land, which had given them so many memories, good and bad. To their faithful friends and digimon who had stayed by their side the entire time. Thought about the ones who were no longer with them. They remembered the battles, the evil, and recalled all their experiences together there. How could they say goodbye to a place that was practically their second home? To digimon who seemed like a part of themselves? It all started with the summer camp, which they would be returning to soon. As they waved, but still tried to pretend it really wasn't over, they wondered what things would be like back at home. They knew they were definitely changed for the better, stronger than they had ever been, and realized that the Digiworld was a great thing. Good things could not last forever, they finally understood, as they flew off into the sky -- but they knew that someday, somehow, they would return."
Sora Takenouchi finished the last word and closed her notebook, looking expectantly at her best friend. "So, what do you think?"
Taichi Yagami had been resting against the back of the tree with his arms behind his neck. "That was really great! You captured our experiences in the digiworld perfectly. Hard to think it's over; I mean the reality and the story too. What do we read now from the great works of Sora Takenouchi?"
She blushed, apparently very flattered. "It's not hard to write about things that happened to me. Just remember what it had been like, what I was feeling, and transfer it all to paper...I don't think of that as writing, really. Writing is your imagination, in my opinion, but everything I write is what went on in my life, like documents. And my life isn't exactly over yet, if you haven't noticed. I have plenty more I can read."
"We have plenty of time," he said. "Do share."
"Well, what do you want to hear?"
He thought for a moment. "Depends. What happens after the wonderful Digiworld saga?"
"Back to the real world," she answered. "Not very interesting."
"How'd you decide you wanted to be a writer? I know that should be interesting. You don't just wake up one morning and think, 'I'm going to be a writer from now on'...but I wouldn't know," he said with a grin. "I'm the one who's getting pretty bad grades in language arts and grammar."
"You're right. You DON'T just suddenly say that. It's like soccer. You don't just say, 'I want to play soccer so I will.' There are reasons," she told him, "but it's quite a long story."
"And the Digiworld story WASN'T?" he asked sarcastically.
Sora rolled her eyes. "Okay, if you really want to hear it... I haven't told anyone this before."
"Your point is...?"
"Okay, okay, I'll read it already!" She placed the notebook she had been reading out of back in her backpack and replaced it with a new one that looked a lot less beaten up. She opened it to the first page, cleared her throat, and began to read.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Sweat dripped down the girls' faces as the sun beat its hot rays upon them, while they ran back and forth. Sora Takenouchi saw the soccer ball heading her way. Jaw set, she kicked out her right leg. The black and white ball soared through the air, past the goalie of the other team, and slammed into the net.
"We won!" her entire team cried, as the referees blew their whistles. They hoisted Sora up onto their shoulders and cheered as loud as they could. The other team looked very murderous.
Sora didn't have a care in the world as she yelled until her voice was hoarse. They had just won another game, giving them the longest winning streak a girls' soccer team had gotten in a long time, and they were heading for the play-offs.
She wiped the sweat from her foreheads and looked at all the happy people out in the stands. She saw Taichi, Mimi, Hikari, Yamato, Takeru, Jyou, Koushiro; everyone was there. She looked over the crowd again. Not everyone was there. Someone was definitely missing, she realized. Where was her mom?
* * *
Sora kicked off her muddy cleats, trudged into the apartment, and tossed her duffle bag onto the couch. "Mom, I'm home! We won!" she called. "I scored the winning goal!"
There was no reply, only an eerie silence. It gave her the impression that something was very wrong.
"Mom?" She traipsed down the hallway into her mother's bedroom. It was empty. "That's funny, Mom doesn't normally work on Sundays..." she said to herself.
Knock, knock, knock.
"That must be her!" She ran to the front door and flung it open, eager to tell her mother of her accomplishment.
"Sora!" a woman cried and gave her a suffocating hug. "Oh, Sora, I'm so sorry..."
"Aunt Yuki?" she asked in a muffled voice. "What are you doing here in Odaiba? Mama never told me you were coming."
"Oh my god...you haven't heard?"
"Heard what?" she asked, trying to gently pry her aunt off her, but she refused.
She began to cry. "Sora...your mom was killed in a car crash last night. I rushed over as soon as I could... You didn't know?"
"Mama....dead?" She asked blankly, not quite believing it. "That can't be...she was fine yesterday. She can't be dead...you're lying! This isn't funny!"
"No, I'm not. You don't joke about things like this," she said softly, hugging her closer.
Sora shoved her away furiously. "No, you don't! So stop it! This...this isn't true..." She began sobbing. "It's not true! She isn't dead! Don't lie to me!"
"I'm not--"
"Then why didn't anyone tell me about it?" she yelled, tears streaking down her face.
"They must have called you. You didn't get a call last night?" her aunt asked, trying to calm her down.
She forced herself to stop the tears and gulped. "I -- I was at Mimi's house last night," she began shakily, in a voice much quieter. "I slept over. Th -- then I had a soccer game just this morning... I - I just got home."
Yuki looked past her niece into the kitchen. On the counter, the answering machine was blinking. "You have a message. Go listen to it."
"I'll show you," Sora said defiantly. "It isn't true." She walked to the counter and pressed the button.
A male voice came on. "Hello, is this the Takenouchi residence? I'm Officer Tsuneko Senoue calling about a car accident involving Natsumi Takenouchi..." The two listened breathlessly to the message. Finally, it stopped.
Sora couldn't believe her ears. "Everyone is playing a trick on me. This isn't true."
"Sora, dear..."
"But she can't be dead," she said in anguish, the tears returning. "She just can't be. I should have stayed home last night. I could have made sure that she wasn't hurt. Why did I have to beg to go to Mimi's house? It's all my fault!"
"No, it isn't. You can't blame yourself. It was an accident, and you have nothing to do with it," Yuki said.
"But I do...we got into a big argument before that. She always goes driving around town when she's really angry, to calm herself down. I suppose she wasn't paying much attention..." She just broke off, crying uncontrollably.
"Shhh...shhh...it'll be all right..." She wrapped her arms around her niece.
"Why did this happen? It won't be all right..." Sora buried her face in her shoulder. "She wasn't supposed to..."
"Sora," her aunt said, tears painfully welling in her eyes, "everything happens for a reason."
"But it isn't fair!" she screamed, hot tears streaming down her face. "It just isn't fair..." And then she cried herself to sleep in her aunt's cozy arms.
* * *
Yuki Takenouchi draped her arm around her young niece and her to the cemetery.
Sora kept her head down, biting her lip to stop the tears from flowing. It didn't work very well. Her aunt patted her on the back.
"Sora," Taichi softly, coming up to them. It was funny to see him in a suit. It was gloomy and black like everyone around them. Except Sora had to admit that he looked quite handsome anyway.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"Hey, you think I'm handsome?" Taichi asked, laughing out loud. "Do you have a crush on me, Sora?"
She was blushing furiously. "Not that way...you're my friend. I just meant, that even with everything sad and depressing and dark, you still managed to make me feel sort of happier. I've just never seen you in a formal suit for the whole time I've known you. It was an interesting sight, but you didn't look so goofy as I thought you would, all right?"
He looked very cocky still. "Sure, sure, of course I believe you," he said, obviously not meaning it.
"I don't love you that way," she said, but he wasn't convinced.
"Ooh, so how DO you love me? Just admit it!" he said, grinning widely. "You ARE in love with me!"
Sora hit him over the head repeatedly with her notebook. "I'm not in love with you, all right? We're FRIENDS, nothing more."
"Okay, okay, I'm sorry," he said apologetically, but probably because he didn't want to be hit over the head anymore. "Friends, right. The way you kept hitting me proves you aren't in love with me. Keep going."
"Thank you," Sora said indignantly, pulling her notebook away. She began to read again. "Back to where I was..."
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Taichi looked rather timid as he approached Sora. Her mother had never liked him very much, because she seemed convinced that he would hurt Sora somehow, and he wondered if her aunt would feel the same. "Are you all right?" he asked her cautiously.
She collapsed right into his arms and mumbled, "No. Why did she have to die?"
He held onto her tightly, and was relieved to see her aunt Yuki give him a thankful smile. "Come on, let's go," he said, leading her to the casket and the group of people.
"We are gathered here today to mourn the loss of Natsumi Takenouchi..." the priest began, as the song 'Amazing Grace' played in the background.
Sora couldn't bring herself to listen or look at the old man, or notice anything but the grass for that matter. She knew that everyone looked concerned for her, and they were listening to the priest trying to hold back tears. No one but Sora and Yuki knew Natsumi very well anyway, as they were her only family left. A few people gave eulogies and spoke some words anyway. But Sora still didn't see or hear a single thing that was going on, as she pretended it really wasn't happening.
Taichi was whispering something to her, but she was dazed out... "Go up there," he said, removing his arm from her and giving her a light push. "It's your last chance..."
"But I can't even see her," she said tearfully. "They said she was too -- too mangled and bloody and gruesome for an open -- open casket."
"Just...just go." He gave her another push.
Finally, she nodded. "My last chance..." she kept repeating.
She felt everyone's eyes on her, as she dragged her feet forward to the closed coffin. She couldn't believe that inside was her mother, a dead, ruined wreck. *Why couldn't she have died peacefully? I could at least get one more glimpse of her...* Sora imagined what it would have been like if things had been different.
Her mother would be wearing a deep burgundy dress, her favorite, and her dark brown hair would be up in her elegant looking, twisty hairstyle. Her face would be pale and her eyelids closed, but she'd looking like she was merely asleep. She would be framed by all her favorite flowers from her own garden and shop, with one behind her ear.
The only thing the same was the flowers, which were on top of the casket. They were cheery colors, yellow, pink, violet -- they didn't belong in such a terrible event. Sora bit her lip to hold back the tears and dug inside the pocket of her skirt. It was a purple rose, very rare, but her mother's favorite. Only that one, miraculously, had bloomed that morning after being planted years ago, on the day that Natsumi needed it the most.
Sora tried speaking, pretending she was the only one there. But the people watching weren't the problem. She didn't know what she should say. There WAS nothing to say. So, hands trembling, she simply placed the rose atop the coffin and broke away, crying the tears she had tried to stop from coming. "Goodbye, Mama," she whispered.
She bumped into a man in a long, black trench coat, whom she couldn't recognize. Time seemed to freeze for that one second, but at the moment, she couldn't figure out what was so significant about that man. "Sorry," she said weakly, and went back into her aunt Yuki's arms, shaking and sobbing.
Finally, the terrible ordeal was ending. The priest said a few more words, and then a sad melody began to play as the coffin was lowered underground.
Sora couldn't stand watching it anymore, she couldn't even stand being there. As fast as her legs could carry her, she ran off, Taichi shouting her name for her to come back. But she couldn't. Her mother was gone forever.
* * *
Sora stared at the window as Flight 188, Tokyo to New York flew away into the sky, until it was a tiny dot, and then it disappeared. She had just said a very depressing goodbye to her best friend, Mimi Tachikawa, and the rest of her family.
"I'll come visit all the time," Mimi had said tearfully, trying her best to sound positive, but failing. "I promise. And I'll e-mail you and call you the rest of the time."
Sora only nodded blankly, disbelieving that another important person in her life was leaving. *Why does everything happen to me?*
"You'll all be fine without me," she said, wiping her eyes. "I'll come back someday. And I won't forget you."
"Last call for passengers on Flight 188," the loudspeaker said. "Please board now."
"Well, I better go," Mimi said, hoisting her bag onto her shoulders. Her parents walked away to give her time to say her individual goodbyes.
She gave everyone a brief hug, and Yamato blushed when she gave him a kiss on the cheek. Finally, she came to Sora, and they stood there for a while, not believing that this was actually happening.
"Even though we were always completely different, you're my best friend," Sora said. "I suppose you always will be, even if you're thousands of miles away."
Mimi nodded and they hugged until the loudspeaker said one more time that she needed to board the plane. "I'll miss you guys! Bye!" she called. And then she walked away.
"Awww...Sora, stop moping around like this. It isn't good for you," Jyou said.
"Hello, you were the pessimistic one," Yamato replied, his cheeks still bright pink from when Mimi had kissed him. Jyou gave him an angry look, either from the comment, the kiss, or both.
"Guys, don't argue," Taichi said, walking in between them. "Can't you see Sora's depressed?"
"And why shouldn't she be? Her mother died and her best friend moved away. Does that sound like a drama or what?"
"Koushiro, you're not helping," the other three boys said, glaring at the younger boy.
Sora turned away from the window to look at all of them. "If you all don't mind, I kind of want to be alone."
So they left, but Taichi still stayed there. "Hey, it'll be all right," he said reassuringly, standing next to her and putting a comforting hand on her shoulder.
"How would you know?" she asked bitterly, brushing his hand off like it was an insect. "YOUR mom isn't dead, Yamato didn't move. You wouldn't understand."
He shoved his hands in his pockets. "So I don't...so I can only imagine these things, but I know enough to see that it hurts, and I think you shouldn't push others away. That only makes it worse."
"Why are you being so nice to me?" she asked suddenly.
Her question seemed to startle him. "What does that mean? When was I ever mean to you?"
"Lots of times," she mumbled.
"Such as...?" he prompted, trying to get her to face him, but she still stayed staring out the window.
"Fine, a FEW times. Still, you're the only one who's staying by my side through all this. At the funeral, none of the rest of them could even look at me, and now, they're not exactly cheering me up either," Sora said, glancing at them, who had already forgotten that Mimi had just moved to New York and they were in an airport, and started hitting each other on the head with rolled up magazines from the shop.
"She is NOT in love with you!" Jyou said, slapping Yamato in the face with an issue of 'Reader's Digest.'
Yamato rolled up a thick traveling magazine and struck Joe on top of the head. "Then why did she kiss me?"
Koushiro jumped up and down, attempting to reach the magazine in Matt's hands. "You guys, this is highly inappropriate--"
"SHUT UP AND STAY OUT OF OLDER KIDS' BUSINESS!" the two roared, and started dueling with their rolled up magazines.
Sora and Taichi looked back at each other, sweat-dropping.
Sora returned to what she had been talking about earlier. "I mean, Yamato and Takeru understand how it feels to have parents split up and leave and that kind of thing. Koushiro's parents are dead. But you still have everything I've lost, and you still care. You don't understand, but you want to help anyway."
"Well, maybe because I'm your best friend. Believe it or not, I actually care when you're sad and lonely. All this time, you've been crying that your best friend is leaving, but what about me? Did you forget that I'm an important part of your life too, and I still haven't left?" Taichi asked her.
"I don't know..."
"Look, you can't think the entire world is against you just because two really horrible things happened. Life will get better eventually. Trust me."
"I want to..." Sora replied sadly, "but I can't. We don't live in some fiction world with happy endings, Taichi. This is real life. And I really don't like it."
"Don't do anything stupid, all right?" he asked, looking at the distant look on her face. "If you try to commit suicide, I don't think I'll be able to go on living either--"
"Why add another death?" she asked quietly. "Excuse me, but this time I really need to be alone to think about some things. Thanks anyway." Taichi shrugged and walked away, to try and help Koushiro in his mediator role. Hopefully, his gut feeling was correct, and Sora's life would get a whole lot better in no time.
* * *
Yuki dragged all her suitcases and boxes into the Takenouchi apartment. She was coming to live with Sora, to be her legal guardian. She was now Sora's only family member left, on her mother's side at least, since she had never known her father; and without a husband, children on her own, and the fact that she was self-employed, it wasn't hard for her to pack up and leave her home.
She cast an eye around the apartment. "I like things this way. I don't want to change anything at all, because I don't ever want to forget," she said.
Sora disagreed. "It hurts to remember."
Yuki sighed. "But you HAVE to remember all the good times, or else, what was the point of living them at all?" She pulled a large cardboard box to her and opened it. It was filled with photo albums, trophies, and lots of other items. "Like these, for example. These were all of Natsumi's prized possessions as a child."
Sora peeked inside and a big gold trophy caught her eye. She carefully picked it up and blew the dust off it and the plaque. "What's this from?" It had a figure of a girl on it, holding a racket and swinging it at a ball.
"Natsumi got those from playing tennis. She was really good."
"She never told me she played tennis," she said in surprise.
"Oh, she was one of the best in Japan!" Yuki said excitedly, happy just from remembering. "In fact," she dug deep in the box and pulled out a framed photo, "here's a picture from the day she won that."
Sora took it from her. Her mother was about her age or fourteen or so, her dark hair tied back in a ponytail, her eyes shining, a bright smile on her lips. She wore a white tennis outfit and held a shiny purple racket and the trophy in her hands. "Did you play tennis, Aunt Yuki?"
"Oh sure. But I was nothing compared to Natsumi. Why?"
"Just curious," she said, carefully putting the trophy back in the box. She hesitated. "Ummm...do you think you could teach me sometime?"
"I'd love to," Yuki answered with a misty-eyed smile. "You mother would be so happy to hear you say that."
"I know. Which is why I plan to take up flower arranging," Sora replied. "I -- I want to be more like her. She was really great, but I never realized that. I wish we had gotten along better."
"Don't have regrets. You didn't know. You can only live life for today, not dwell on the past or spend your life imagining what things can be like."
"You're right," she said, "but I feel like I owe it to her."
"Just don't give up the things you love too," Yuki said.
"I don't plan to. Because I think I can live my life...and still have a bit of my mom in it too, even if she's gone," she told her. "Did she do anything else? Can you tell me what she was like as a child, Aunt Yuki?"
"Okay," she agreed. "That's a good idea, and I was thinking you'd never ask." She emptied the contents of the box onto the floor. She picked one up one at a time and explained the story behind them. Then she showed all the pictures and talked about those too. Until, about an hour later, Sora knew much more about her mom than she had ever known while she alive.
They were up to the late teen years. "She met your father at one of his games. She was a cheerleader--"
"Don't even think it," Sora said. "Tennis and flower arranging is enough. The day you see me in a skimpy outfit mindlessly waving around pompoms is the end of the world."
Yuki laughed. "Well, about your father..." She seemed bitter every time she said the word, and she seemed to be rushing to move onto another subject, but there wasn't much left. "This is them at their prom," she explained, finally taking out a framed picture. It seemed like the only photo of her father left. Sora's mother was wearing a deep scarlet gown, clinging to the arm of a man. He was tall, with light tan colored hair and green eyes.
Sora stared at the picture. "I don't remember him. That's the only picture I've seen of him."
"Natsumi and I sort of burned them when--you know."
"Oh." She continued to stare at the picture. Her father...
Ding-dong! Knock, knock, knock.
"I wonder who that could be," Sora said, dropping the picture and getting up. She rushed to the door, wiping any traces of tears from her eyes, and opened it.
A tall man was standing outside the door. By his height and build, Sora recognized him as the man she had bumped into at the funeral, the one wearing the black trench coat. But by his hair and eye color, and the fact that she had been staring at a picture for so long, she knew it was...
"Dad?" she asked in utter shock.
"Sora, you've grown so much..." he said.
"It happens in thirteen years, Tomio," a hard voice said.
He looked past Sora and into the apartment. "Yuki," he said expressionlessly.
"You have no right suddenly showing up like this!" she burst out furiously, with her hands on her hips. "If you leave a Takenouchi the way you left Natsumi and Sora, you can't come back like this."
"After the funeral, I felt I should at least stop by--" Yuki tried to close the door on him, but he pushed it open. "Yuki, I--"
She gave up, but her expression was cold and firm towards him. "Just leave."
"Dammit, if you'd let me explain!" he shouted.
"You watch your language around Sora!" she cried, pulling Sora to her protectively, but nearly suffocating her. "You're a horrible example--!"
His eyes blazed. "I just want to talk to my daughter! Is that so wrong?"
Sora squeezed out of her aunt's grasp. "Aunt Yuki, can I?" she asked timidly.
"But, Sora, he abandoned you!" Yuki said in disbelief. "You want to talk to him?"
"I grew up thinking my father had died when I was very young. Mama never spoke about him at all, and I knew I shouldn't try to ask. When I finally found out the truth one day, that he had left us, she still wouldn't tell me anything at all." She sighed. "I just, for once in my life, would like to meet my own father," she said softly. "Listen to that. A kid shouldn't have to say that. And now, he wants to talk to me too. IS that so wrong? Can I talk to him for just a while -- alone?"
She thought for a while, Sora's explanation finally getting her to somewhat understand. "Oh, all right." She turned to Tomio. "But if you break her heart again, you better never come back."
"Aunt Yuki!" Sora said with a gasp.
"All right," he agreed. "I don't want to hurt her. I never wanted to."
"Then why did you leave?" Yuki asked finally, carrying her suitcases to unpack, obviously not caring for an answer at the present moment. The question hung in the air; it would be answered before he left.
Sora finally let him in, and they sat down on the couches in the living room. "Would you like some coffee? Anything?" she asked, to break the awkward silence.
"No, it's all right... You've got manners, I see," Tomio said approvingly. "Guess you didn't get them from me."
"Dad?"
He laughed. "You hear that?" he asked, speaking to no one in particular. "She calls me dad. I wasn't here to watch her grow up, help her out like a father should. What kind of dad is that?" Sora, transfixed, didn't know how to answer, but his attention was diverted to the framed pictures on the table and wall. "You play soccer?" he asked, looking at a picture of her team, and then back to her.
"I did," she answered quietly.
"So you don't anymore?"
"I don't want to," she replied truthfully.
"I take it your mother told you then," he said thoughtfully, his hand under his chin.
"Told me what?" she asked, her curiosity overtaking her doubts.
He stared at her. "Didn't you ever wonder why she didn't want you to play?"
"How'd you know? She said I should be arranging flowers for the family business."
"So she told you that. Actually, the real reason is, Sora, soccer was my life. That's how we met. After I left, your mom didn't want you to be anything like me, I suppose."
Finally, Sora gathered all the guts she had in her to ask him the question that had been left hanging, one she had wanted to know ever since she found out he had not died when she was little. "Why did you leave?"
"I wasn't ready to be a father," he said angrily, the hate and rage directed at himself. "Hell, Natsumi and I weren't even married. We just dated, and one night, we got really drunk... Hate to say that's how you were conceived. After that, I couldn't handle it. I had a life! I was going places... I couldn't be a dad."
Tears streamed down her cheeks, as she finally realized why her aunt had hated him so much. "I bet -- I KNOW she had a life too. For you to do that--"
"I understand if you hate me. But I'm ready now. I missed thirteen years of your life...I won't miss the rest."
Sora felt as if her mother was speaking through her. "You can't do that! You can't come back into my life when the hardest part of parenting is over. I grew up fine without you. I never needed you at all. I learned everything without your help, including sports. I didn't even need a father to become the tomboy I was. You never talked to me at all in my entire life. You didn't visit, you didn't call, send letters, you couldn't even send me a measly soccer ball for my birthday. Frankly, you seemed like a better father when I thought you were dead."
"If you feel that way, I can leave," he said hurtfully.
"Maybe you should," she said unsympathetically, standing back up and guiding him to the door.
Tomio paused in front of the open doorway. "I'm so sorry, Sora. You don't know what it's like..."
"No, YOU have no idea what it's like growing up wondering when your dad is coming back, and then when he does, all he can say is, 'I wasn't ready to be your father'," she said harshly. "It was nice meeting you, Tomio. Goodbye."
"Bye." And with that final word, he left and was out of her life again, forever this time.
Sora slammed the door with all her might and crumpled against it, sobbing tears of anguished pain and rage. "Why? Why does everyone in my life leave me?"
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"Come on, not everyone in your life has left you," Taichi argued.
"All the important ones!" Sora said, flustered at the untimely distraction.
"I'm not important?"
She thought for a while. How could she explain? "I mean, the really important people."
"I'm offended," he said, crossing his arms, trying to act angrier than he really was.
She sighed. "Yes, you're really important to me too. You and my aunt Yuki are probably the only people left. There, satisfied?"
"Sort of," he said, smiling and becoming himself again. "But all that stuff...that's why you picked up tennis and flower arranging and quit soccer? It wasn't because you were trying to avoid me?"
"Of course not!" she said, surprised that he would even think such a thing. "I wanted to be like my mother, and I accidentally started shutting out the people she disliked. She wasn't too fond of you because you reminded her of my dad. Only thinking of soccer. She thought you would hurt me or something."
"I'd never do that."
"I know, but she does-- I mean, she didn't." She got depressed again. "Reading this story is making me feel horrible, remembering at this."
"Come on, you only have a bit left," Taichi pointed out. "And it still doesn't explain why you became a writer."
"Okay, okay. There's only one mort part, and if you don't distract me anymore, I'll be done soon."
He nodded enthusiastically. "How you went through all those changes from those things, I understand now. But the writing part doesn't fit into the puzzle yet."
"It will," she assured him, shifting into a comfortable sitting position on the branch and beginning to read again.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"Takenouchi, Sora," the receptionist called.
"I don't want to do this, Aunt Yuki," Sora said, getting up from her chair. "I'm not 'emotionally damaged and traumatized' or whatever. I'm fine. I don't have problems, and I don't need therapy."
"Just give it a chance, will you? You've had a hard few days. Your mother dying, your best friend moving away, your good-for-nothing dad coming back and then breaking your heart again...we can only take so much. I think it'll do you some good," Yuki urged, deeply absorbed in a magazine.
"Okay then..." Sora followed the lady through the doorway and down a long corridor of doors.
"Right in here," the lady said, leading her into a room. "The psychologist will be joining you shortly. Please have a seat."
Sora sat down on the red lounge chair and waited. She imagined what things would be like.
'Look at these pictures and tell me what you see,' the old psychologist would say.
'Two blots of ink on a piece of paper.'
'Oh dear, let's try another one...'
She shook her head. Any sign of ink blots, and she was ready to run. She really didn't want psychologists prying into her mind anyway. To be honest, she was scared of them. Why did they know things about her that she didn't know about herself? This was her own business; she was not blabbing to a stranger about her mother's death.
The door opened. The psychologist was not the old, wrinkled, balding man she had had in mind, but a slim, young, tidy looking woman with her chestnut hair in a bun and we. She wore regular clothes, not the white lab coat. Sora had been very wrong, and it was clear this woman didn't care at all about ink blots or making a story about them.
"I'm Dr. Natomi," she said, putting a pair of thin eyeglasses on. "So what brings you here, Sora?" she asked, checking her clipboard and taking a seat in the armchair.
"Traumatic losses and a pushy aunt," she replied rather darkly. "Mostly the latter. I don't have problems, just so you know."
"No one said you did," she said patiently. "But that doesn't mean I can't help anyway."
"Before we start, what am I here for? No ink blots, right?" she asked, cutting right to it.
"Do you have a problem with ink blots?" Dr. Natomi asked. "If you do, it's all right, we won't be doing any of that kind of stuff. Don't think of me as a doctor."
"You did introduce yourself as DR. Natomi."
She sighed a little sadly, and took her glasses off and put them in the breast pocket of her jacket. "I bet you don't normally act this way. Am I right?"
Sora involuntarily nodded.
"Thought so. I think those 'traumatic losses' have affected you more than you think, or more than you're willing to realize." She looked at Sora, her hazel eyes looking gentle, and yet calculating.
"Go on," she said, not really interested. She leaned back on the couch, figuring she might as well get some shut-eye. She hadn't been sleeping well since... It finally occurred to her that she HAD been affected.
"No, Sora. You misunderstand. When we say 'therapy session,' I'm not here to talk or lecture. I'm here to listen."
"Therapy sessions must be awfully quiet," she remarked.
Dr. Natomi shook her head slightly. "You're doing all the talking. Tell me about your life, past experiences, your thoughts, dreams, hopes, wishes, feelings."
"You expect me to reveal all that is Sora Takenouchi in under an hour?" she asked, peering at her watch.
"I bet you were always a nice girl, always caring about other people. Friends are a very big part of your life. So tell me about things with your friends or your family. I don't need to know your favorite color or what you ate for breakfast."
"That would be yellow and nothing," she said breezily. "Okay, life experiences. My whole childhood, I had thought my father had died. Turns out he left my mother and I. After my mother died, he came back. That was three days ago."
Dr. Natomi looked very interested, leaning forward in her seat. "See, that's what I need to know. Please go into a bit more depth about this. I bet this is the cause of your problems -- which you supposedly don't have." All the time, she was furiously jotting down things on her clipboard.
So in the end, Sora ended up explaining everything about her life that she could cram into the amount of time -- which, as far as she was concerned, wasn't nearly enough. She told how she had never gotten along with her mother, a slightly edited version about how she learned about love and wanting to protect those you loved, and how she never realized how strongly she had loved her mother until she was gone. She talked about the father she didn't know much of, the one her mother had tried to hide. She told of Mimi and their experiences, of course excluding the Digiworld, and how she was one of her best friends. And she realized that this had actually helped to get all those things off her chest.
"Well, torture's over, Sora!" Dr. Natomi said, standing up and quickly skimming her clipboard and what she had written. "Luckily, I have everything I need."
"When do I come back?" she asked, also getting up.
Dr. Natomi looked surprised. "Come back? Oh, that won't be necessary. You ARE all right. You're stronger, possibly stronger than you or anyone really realizes. Things will be fine again. But for now, you have to keep sharing your problems -- realizing it's there. It's not good to keep emotions bottled up inside like that, until you finally explode...not literally, but it is pretty bad."
"I thought you said I didn't have to come back." Sora realized that it actually wouldn't be so bad.
"Oh, you don't. Have you ever kept a diary or journal of your feelings?"
"No."
Dr. Natomi looked at her, putting her glasses back on finally. "You should. It doesn't even have to be a journal. You could write stories based on your experiences. They should come from your heart, explain how you're feeling, what you went through. This kind of thing will help you more than you see right now."
Sora sighed. "I'm no writer."
"You could be. And it isn't so much the writing as it is the sharing. Find one person in your life. Just one. They have to be very close, someone you can trust completely with your secrets. Write everything down for yourself, and then tell them to someone else. That's the best kind of therapy."
"All right, Dr. Natomi. I'll try that. Thanks for listening."
Dr. Natomi stood up and let her out of the office. "It's what I'm here for."
Sora felt as if an immense weight had been lifted off her shoulders, as she walked away. She hoped Dr. Natomi had been right. Things would be fine again.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"That's it?" Taichi asked, blinking a few times and giving her a blank look.
'Yup," Sora replied, closing the notebook.
"Sure there's nothing else?" he inquired.
"Positive, Taichi." She put the notebook in her backpack and zipped it up. "Why?"
"Well, what happens next? How did it all end? Who's that special person?" Question after question was thrown at her.
"It's all still going," Sora replied. "It's not over yet. As for that special person...don't you know?" She turned to face him and looked into his chocolate brown eyes.
Taichi looked back. "Who?" He eagerly scooted closer, anxious to find out who she felt was a special person in her life.
"Who do I get together with every day after school with? Who do I hang out with, talk to, read to? Isn't it obvious?" She was pretty much whispering right now.
Taichi was amazed. By simply looking at her, he could tell exactly what she was feeling. "Me? I'm your special person?"
She smiled warmly. "Of course. You've been by my side practically my whole life. With a friend like you, I never needed a fatherly influence to learn sports and boyish things. And with you, I don't miss Mimi -- or my mom quite so much, especially because I know you're looking out for me. You're my best friend, not Mimi, and you actually seem like the older brother I've never had."
"I can't believe you actually feel that way." He stared at the sun sinking below the horizon and then back to her. "I never knew that..."
"Can't keep emotions bottled up," she said with a shrug.
"Hey, you're here to talk, I'm here to listen."
"I like it this way, just you and me, while I spill all the secrets I couldn't tell anyone else," she admitted.
"So do I," Taichi agreed. He rested his back against the tree trunk again, his most comfortable position when he listened to Sora share with him. "Can you read me another story, Sora?" He felt so happy that she trusted him and was so close to him that she could practically pour her heart out to him like that. It created a strong bond between them that couldn't be broken.
Sora pulled out another notebook. "I'd love to."
The sun began to slowly set as the two friends relaxed on the tree, while one shared and one listened to another story from the heart.
THE (Cheesy & Sappy) END
(You finally got to it! How long was this fic? Around 22 pages, I think.)
* * *
2nd A/N: Stories from the Heart, from the creators of Chicken Soup for the Soul. Seriously, this was seriously sappy. I suppose this is what happens from watching 'Forrest Gump' for the billionth time in a long while. Hey, at least it cleared my writer's block! After I got the idea from the movie, I entwined some things I got from 'Flowers for Algernon,' an episode of 'The Fresh Prince of Bel Air,' other sources I can't remember at the moment, and my own imagination. I'm really disappointed with it, because it was just so much better in my head. It's my first non-romance in a long time and the first for Digimon, but I snuck some things in. I almost couldn't resist making them kiss, but the point is to show their friendship and all that stuff. Really different from what I normally write, could you tell? Does this even count as drama? If anyone cried, tell me, because I'd have a big laugh over that. Anyway, of course you know I think it sucked, and this time I feel that with a passion (why does it sound funny when I hear people say that?), but I want to know what you people think. Please, please review!
By Firenze
A/N: Thanks to everyone who helped me figure out names! Don't be offended or anything if I didn't use the ones you suggested, but hey, Sora's mom can't have 20 names. Oh yeah, Shadowmon, about that Sakura thing...yes, that is Japanese, and it means "cherry blossom." Ever heard of Cardcaptors by any chance? I didn't use all the Japanese names before when I wrote this out on paper, but if her mom and dad and aunt are going to have them, why not? However, I'm just too accustomed to first name, then last name, so I won't change that. Oh, and this is really Americanized too, but bear with me, all right?
The title is incredibly gay, I It's my first attempt at a non-Digimon romance. And a drama! *Everyone who has read my Harry Potter dramas runs away* Please, just read it, even though it's pretty long. It takes place after season 1 and about a year before season 02. But the narrating sort of parts are...I don't know. You decide. Sometime when they're in high school.
Disclaimer: No, Sora and Taichi are not mine. I wish they were...TK, Kari, and Izzy too...but Toei and Saban and them could keep Mimi, Matt, and Joe (or Sora, Taichi, Takeru, Hikari, Koushiro, Mimi, Yamato, and Jyou as I'm going to call them in the fic). Anything else I randomly mentioned put in '' these things that you recognize obviously isn't mine either.
Oh yeah, that's not really Sora's mom's name, and they never mentioned her dad, or her having an aunt, but I don't own those either! Thanks to Ishida Takeru for Natsumi as Sora's mom's name (it sounds pretty! Though Naoko sounded all right too), alphabet for Yuki as Sora's aunt, and especially to Aquarius for Tomio for Sora's dad and Tsuneko Senoue for the one-sentence police officer. Dr. Natomi is mine, as well this stupid plot and all, so if anyone stupid plans on imitating it, you better give me some credit for all my hard work.
* * *
There is a big tree right in the middle of Odaiba. A grand, towering oak with many large branches. It's very old and ancient, probably from before Odaiba was even populated by humans. Many animals and bugs make their homes in the tree, but for humans, it's just a wonderful place to hang out around or play on. Every day after school ends, two teenagers come to the tree, not to swing on its branches or carve initials into it's bark, but to sit on the largest branch and talk.
It was practically procedure now that they had done it so many times. The boy and girl would climb up the tree and complain about a math test or all the homework they would have to do. They talked about anything that was on their mind and were entirely open with one another. Then the girl would pull a notebook out of her backpack and start to read aloud. These notebooks were filled with her writing, but not her imagination, but her life experiences.
On a windy fall day, the two teenagers came to the tree, whose leaves were changing into brilliant autumn colors, and did just that.
"And so the seven children looked back upon the land, which had given them so many memories, good and bad. To their faithful friends and digimon who had stayed by their side the entire time. Thought about the ones who were no longer with them. They remembered the battles, the evil, and recalled all their experiences together there. How could they say goodbye to a place that was practically their second home? To digimon who seemed like a part of themselves? It all started with the summer camp, which they would be returning to soon. As they waved, but still tried to pretend it really wasn't over, they wondered what things would be like back at home. They knew they were definitely changed for the better, stronger than they had ever been, and realized that the Digiworld was a great thing. Good things could not last forever, they finally understood, as they flew off into the sky -- but they knew that someday, somehow, they would return."
Sora Takenouchi finished the last word and closed her notebook, looking expectantly at her best friend. "So, what do you think?"
Taichi Yagami had been resting against the back of the tree with his arms behind his neck. "That was really great! You captured our experiences in the digiworld perfectly. Hard to think it's over; I mean the reality and the story too. What do we read now from the great works of Sora Takenouchi?"
She blushed, apparently very flattered. "It's not hard to write about things that happened to me. Just remember what it had been like, what I was feeling, and transfer it all to paper...I don't think of that as writing, really. Writing is your imagination, in my opinion, but everything I write is what went on in my life, like documents. And my life isn't exactly over yet, if you haven't noticed. I have plenty more I can read."
"We have plenty of time," he said. "Do share."
"Well, what do you want to hear?"
He thought for a moment. "Depends. What happens after the wonderful Digiworld saga?"
"Back to the real world," she answered. "Not very interesting."
"How'd you decide you wanted to be a writer? I know that should be interesting. You don't just wake up one morning and think, 'I'm going to be a writer from now on'...but I wouldn't know," he said with a grin. "I'm the one who's getting pretty bad grades in language arts and grammar."
"You're right. You DON'T just suddenly say that. It's like soccer. You don't just say, 'I want to play soccer so I will.' There are reasons," she told him, "but it's quite a long story."
"And the Digiworld story WASN'T?" he asked sarcastically.
Sora rolled her eyes. "Okay, if you really want to hear it... I haven't told anyone this before."
"Your point is...?"
"Okay, okay, I'll read it already!" She placed the notebook she had been reading out of back in her backpack and replaced it with a new one that looked a lot less beaten up. She opened it to the first page, cleared her throat, and began to read.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Sweat dripped down the girls' faces as the sun beat its hot rays upon them, while they ran back and forth. Sora Takenouchi saw the soccer ball heading her way. Jaw set, she kicked out her right leg. The black and white ball soared through the air, past the goalie of the other team, and slammed into the net.
"We won!" her entire team cried, as the referees blew their whistles. They hoisted Sora up onto their shoulders and cheered as loud as they could. The other team looked very murderous.
Sora didn't have a care in the world as she yelled until her voice was hoarse. They had just won another game, giving them the longest winning streak a girls' soccer team had gotten in a long time, and they were heading for the play-offs.
She wiped the sweat from her foreheads and looked at all the happy people out in the stands. She saw Taichi, Mimi, Hikari, Yamato, Takeru, Jyou, Koushiro; everyone was there. She looked over the crowd again. Not everyone was there. Someone was definitely missing, she realized. Where was her mom?
* * *
Sora kicked off her muddy cleats, trudged into the apartment, and tossed her duffle bag onto the couch. "Mom, I'm home! We won!" she called. "I scored the winning goal!"
There was no reply, only an eerie silence. It gave her the impression that something was very wrong.
"Mom?" She traipsed down the hallway into her mother's bedroom. It was empty. "That's funny, Mom doesn't normally work on Sundays..." she said to herself.
Knock, knock, knock.
"That must be her!" She ran to the front door and flung it open, eager to tell her mother of her accomplishment.
"Sora!" a woman cried and gave her a suffocating hug. "Oh, Sora, I'm so sorry..."
"Aunt Yuki?" she asked in a muffled voice. "What are you doing here in Odaiba? Mama never told me you were coming."
"Oh my god...you haven't heard?"
"Heard what?" she asked, trying to gently pry her aunt off her, but she refused.
She began to cry. "Sora...your mom was killed in a car crash last night. I rushed over as soon as I could... You didn't know?"
"Mama....dead?" She asked blankly, not quite believing it. "That can't be...she was fine yesterday. She can't be dead...you're lying! This isn't funny!"
"No, I'm not. You don't joke about things like this," she said softly, hugging her closer.
Sora shoved her away furiously. "No, you don't! So stop it! This...this isn't true..." She began sobbing. "It's not true! She isn't dead! Don't lie to me!"
"I'm not--"
"Then why didn't anyone tell me about it?" she yelled, tears streaking down her face.
"They must have called you. You didn't get a call last night?" her aunt asked, trying to calm her down.
She forced herself to stop the tears and gulped. "I -- I was at Mimi's house last night," she began shakily, in a voice much quieter. "I slept over. Th -- then I had a soccer game just this morning... I - I just got home."
Yuki looked past her niece into the kitchen. On the counter, the answering machine was blinking. "You have a message. Go listen to it."
"I'll show you," Sora said defiantly. "It isn't true." She walked to the counter and pressed the button.
A male voice came on. "Hello, is this the Takenouchi residence? I'm Officer Tsuneko Senoue calling about a car accident involving Natsumi Takenouchi..." The two listened breathlessly to the message. Finally, it stopped.
Sora couldn't believe her ears. "Everyone is playing a trick on me. This isn't true."
"Sora, dear..."
"But she can't be dead," she said in anguish, the tears returning. "She just can't be. I should have stayed home last night. I could have made sure that she wasn't hurt. Why did I have to beg to go to Mimi's house? It's all my fault!"
"No, it isn't. You can't blame yourself. It was an accident, and you have nothing to do with it," Yuki said.
"But I do...we got into a big argument before that. She always goes driving around town when she's really angry, to calm herself down. I suppose she wasn't paying much attention..." She just broke off, crying uncontrollably.
"Shhh...shhh...it'll be all right..." She wrapped her arms around her niece.
"Why did this happen? It won't be all right..." Sora buried her face in her shoulder. "She wasn't supposed to..."
"Sora," her aunt said, tears painfully welling in her eyes, "everything happens for a reason."
"But it isn't fair!" she screamed, hot tears streaming down her face. "It just isn't fair..." And then she cried herself to sleep in her aunt's cozy arms.
* * *
Yuki Takenouchi draped her arm around her young niece and her to the cemetery.
Sora kept her head down, biting her lip to stop the tears from flowing. It didn't work very well. Her aunt patted her on the back.
"Sora," Taichi softly, coming up to them. It was funny to see him in a suit. It was gloomy and black like everyone around them. Except Sora had to admit that he looked quite handsome anyway.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"Hey, you think I'm handsome?" Taichi asked, laughing out loud. "Do you have a crush on me, Sora?"
She was blushing furiously. "Not that way...you're my friend. I just meant, that even with everything sad and depressing and dark, you still managed to make me feel sort of happier. I've just never seen you in a formal suit for the whole time I've known you. It was an interesting sight, but you didn't look so goofy as I thought you would, all right?"
He looked very cocky still. "Sure, sure, of course I believe you," he said, obviously not meaning it.
"I don't love you that way," she said, but he wasn't convinced.
"Ooh, so how DO you love me? Just admit it!" he said, grinning widely. "You ARE in love with me!"
Sora hit him over the head repeatedly with her notebook. "I'm not in love with you, all right? We're FRIENDS, nothing more."
"Okay, okay, I'm sorry," he said apologetically, but probably because he didn't want to be hit over the head anymore. "Friends, right. The way you kept hitting me proves you aren't in love with me. Keep going."
"Thank you," Sora said indignantly, pulling her notebook away. She began to read again. "Back to where I was..."
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Taichi looked rather timid as he approached Sora. Her mother had never liked him very much, because she seemed convinced that he would hurt Sora somehow, and he wondered if her aunt would feel the same. "Are you all right?" he asked her cautiously.
She collapsed right into his arms and mumbled, "No. Why did she have to die?"
He held onto her tightly, and was relieved to see her aunt Yuki give him a thankful smile. "Come on, let's go," he said, leading her to the casket and the group of people.
"We are gathered here today to mourn the loss of Natsumi Takenouchi..." the priest began, as the song 'Amazing Grace' played in the background.
Sora couldn't bring herself to listen or look at the old man, or notice anything but the grass for that matter. She knew that everyone looked concerned for her, and they were listening to the priest trying to hold back tears. No one but Sora and Yuki knew Natsumi very well anyway, as they were her only family left. A few people gave eulogies and spoke some words anyway. But Sora still didn't see or hear a single thing that was going on, as she pretended it really wasn't happening.
Taichi was whispering something to her, but she was dazed out... "Go up there," he said, removing his arm from her and giving her a light push. "It's your last chance..."
"But I can't even see her," she said tearfully. "They said she was too -- too mangled and bloody and gruesome for an open -- open casket."
"Just...just go." He gave her another push.
Finally, she nodded. "My last chance..." she kept repeating.
She felt everyone's eyes on her, as she dragged her feet forward to the closed coffin. She couldn't believe that inside was her mother, a dead, ruined wreck. *Why couldn't she have died peacefully? I could at least get one more glimpse of her...* Sora imagined what it would have been like if things had been different.
Her mother would be wearing a deep burgundy dress, her favorite, and her dark brown hair would be up in her elegant looking, twisty hairstyle. Her face would be pale and her eyelids closed, but she'd looking like she was merely asleep. She would be framed by all her favorite flowers from her own garden and shop, with one behind her ear.
The only thing the same was the flowers, which were on top of the casket. They were cheery colors, yellow, pink, violet -- they didn't belong in such a terrible event. Sora bit her lip to hold back the tears and dug inside the pocket of her skirt. It was a purple rose, very rare, but her mother's favorite. Only that one, miraculously, had bloomed that morning after being planted years ago, on the day that Natsumi needed it the most.
Sora tried speaking, pretending she was the only one there. But the people watching weren't the problem. She didn't know what she should say. There WAS nothing to say. So, hands trembling, she simply placed the rose atop the coffin and broke away, crying the tears she had tried to stop from coming. "Goodbye, Mama," she whispered.
She bumped into a man in a long, black trench coat, whom she couldn't recognize. Time seemed to freeze for that one second, but at the moment, she couldn't figure out what was so significant about that man. "Sorry," she said weakly, and went back into her aunt Yuki's arms, shaking and sobbing.
Finally, the terrible ordeal was ending. The priest said a few more words, and then a sad melody began to play as the coffin was lowered underground.
Sora couldn't stand watching it anymore, she couldn't even stand being there. As fast as her legs could carry her, she ran off, Taichi shouting her name for her to come back. But she couldn't. Her mother was gone forever.
* * *
Sora stared at the window as Flight 188, Tokyo to New York flew away into the sky, until it was a tiny dot, and then it disappeared. She had just said a very depressing goodbye to her best friend, Mimi Tachikawa, and the rest of her family.
"I'll come visit all the time," Mimi had said tearfully, trying her best to sound positive, but failing. "I promise. And I'll e-mail you and call you the rest of the time."
Sora only nodded blankly, disbelieving that another important person in her life was leaving. *Why does everything happen to me?*
"You'll all be fine without me," she said, wiping her eyes. "I'll come back someday. And I won't forget you."
"Last call for passengers on Flight 188," the loudspeaker said. "Please board now."
"Well, I better go," Mimi said, hoisting her bag onto her shoulders. Her parents walked away to give her time to say her individual goodbyes.
She gave everyone a brief hug, and Yamato blushed when she gave him a kiss on the cheek. Finally, she came to Sora, and they stood there for a while, not believing that this was actually happening.
"Even though we were always completely different, you're my best friend," Sora said. "I suppose you always will be, even if you're thousands of miles away."
Mimi nodded and they hugged until the loudspeaker said one more time that she needed to board the plane. "I'll miss you guys! Bye!" she called. And then she walked away.
"Awww...Sora, stop moping around like this. It isn't good for you," Jyou said.
"Hello, you were the pessimistic one," Yamato replied, his cheeks still bright pink from when Mimi had kissed him. Jyou gave him an angry look, either from the comment, the kiss, or both.
"Guys, don't argue," Taichi said, walking in between them. "Can't you see Sora's depressed?"
"And why shouldn't she be? Her mother died and her best friend moved away. Does that sound like a drama or what?"
"Koushiro, you're not helping," the other three boys said, glaring at the younger boy.
Sora turned away from the window to look at all of them. "If you all don't mind, I kind of want to be alone."
So they left, but Taichi still stayed there. "Hey, it'll be all right," he said reassuringly, standing next to her and putting a comforting hand on her shoulder.
"How would you know?" she asked bitterly, brushing his hand off like it was an insect. "YOUR mom isn't dead, Yamato didn't move. You wouldn't understand."
He shoved his hands in his pockets. "So I don't...so I can only imagine these things, but I know enough to see that it hurts, and I think you shouldn't push others away. That only makes it worse."
"Why are you being so nice to me?" she asked suddenly.
Her question seemed to startle him. "What does that mean? When was I ever mean to you?"
"Lots of times," she mumbled.
"Such as...?" he prompted, trying to get her to face him, but she still stayed staring out the window.
"Fine, a FEW times. Still, you're the only one who's staying by my side through all this. At the funeral, none of the rest of them could even look at me, and now, they're not exactly cheering me up either," Sora said, glancing at them, who had already forgotten that Mimi had just moved to New York and they were in an airport, and started hitting each other on the head with rolled up magazines from the shop.
"She is NOT in love with you!" Jyou said, slapping Yamato in the face with an issue of 'Reader's Digest.'
Yamato rolled up a thick traveling magazine and struck Joe on top of the head. "Then why did she kiss me?"
Koushiro jumped up and down, attempting to reach the magazine in Matt's hands. "You guys, this is highly inappropriate--"
"SHUT UP AND STAY OUT OF OLDER KIDS' BUSINESS!" the two roared, and started dueling with their rolled up magazines.
Sora and Taichi looked back at each other, sweat-dropping.
Sora returned to what she had been talking about earlier. "I mean, Yamato and Takeru understand how it feels to have parents split up and leave and that kind of thing. Koushiro's parents are dead. But you still have everything I've lost, and you still care. You don't understand, but you want to help anyway."
"Well, maybe because I'm your best friend. Believe it or not, I actually care when you're sad and lonely. All this time, you've been crying that your best friend is leaving, but what about me? Did you forget that I'm an important part of your life too, and I still haven't left?" Taichi asked her.
"I don't know..."
"Look, you can't think the entire world is against you just because two really horrible things happened. Life will get better eventually. Trust me."
"I want to..." Sora replied sadly, "but I can't. We don't live in some fiction world with happy endings, Taichi. This is real life. And I really don't like it."
"Don't do anything stupid, all right?" he asked, looking at the distant look on her face. "If you try to commit suicide, I don't think I'll be able to go on living either--"
"Why add another death?" she asked quietly. "Excuse me, but this time I really need to be alone to think about some things. Thanks anyway." Taichi shrugged and walked away, to try and help Koushiro in his mediator role. Hopefully, his gut feeling was correct, and Sora's life would get a whole lot better in no time.
* * *
Yuki dragged all her suitcases and boxes into the Takenouchi apartment. She was coming to live with Sora, to be her legal guardian. She was now Sora's only family member left, on her mother's side at least, since she had never known her father; and without a husband, children on her own, and the fact that she was self-employed, it wasn't hard for her to pack up and leave her home.
She cast an eye around the apartment. "I like things this way. I don't want to change anything at all, because I don't ever want to forget," she said.
Sora disagreed. "It hurts to remember."
Yuki sighed. "But you HAVE to remember all the good times, or else, what was the point of living them at all?" She pulled a large cardboard box to her and opened it. It was filled with photo albums, trophies, and lots of other items. "Like these, for example. These were all of Natsumi's prized possessions as a child."
Sora peeked inside and a big gold trophy caught her eye. She carefully picked it up and blew the dust off it and the plaque. "What's this from?" It had a figure of a girl on it, holding a racket and swinging it at a ball.
"Natsumi got those from playing tennis. She was really good."
"She never told me she played tennis," she said in surprise.
"Oh, she was one of the best in Japan!" Yuki said excitedly, happy just from remembering. "In fact," she dug deep in the box and pulled out a framed photo, "here's a picture from the day she won that."
Sora took it from her. Her mother was about her age or fourteen or so, her dark hair tied back in a ponytail, her eyes shining, a bright smile on her lips. She wore a white tennis outfit and held a shiny purple racket and the trophy in her hands. "Did you play tennis, Aunt Yuki?"
"Oh sure. But I was nothing compared to Natsumi. Why?"
"Just curious," she said, carefully putting the trophy back in the box. She hesitated. "Ummm...do you think you could teach me sometime?"
"I'd love to," Yuki answered with a misty-eyed smile. "You mother would be so happy to hear you say that."
"I know. Which is why I plan to take up flower arranging," Sora replied. "I -- I want to be more like her. She was really great, but I never realized that. I wish we had gotten along better."
"Don't have regrets. You didn't know. You can only live life for today, not dwell on the past or spend your life imagining what things can be like."
"You're right," she said, "but I feel like I owe it to her."
"Just don't give up the things you love too," Yuki said.
"I don't plan to. Because I think I can live my life...and still have a bit of my mom in it too, even if she's gone," she told her. "Did she do anything else? Can you tell me what she was like as a child, Aunt Yuki?"
"Okay," she agreed. "That's a good idea, and I was thinking you'd never ask." She emptied the contents of the box onto the floor. She picked one up one at a time and explained the story behind them. Then she showed all the pictures and talked about those too. Until, about an hour later, Sora knew much more about her mom than she had ever known while she alive.
They were up to the late teen years. "She met your father at one of his games. She was a cheerleader--"
"Don't even think it," Sora said. "Tennis and flower arranging is enough. The day you see me in a skimpy outfit mindlessly waving around pompoms is the end of the world."
Yuki laughed. "Well, about your father..." She seemed bitter every time she said the word, and she seemed to be rushing to move onto another subject, but there wasn't much left. "This is them at their prom," she explained, finally taking out a framed picture. It seemed like the only photo of her father left. Sora's mother was wearing a deep scarlet gown, clinging to the arm of a man. He was tall, with light tan colored hair and green eyes.
Sora stared at the picture. "I don't remember him. That's the only picture I've seen of him."
"Natsumi and I sort of burned them when--you know."
"Oh." She continued to stare at the picture. Her father...
Ding-dong! Knock, knock, knock.
"I wonder who that could be," Sora said, dropping the picture and getting up. She rushed to the door, wiping any traces of tears from her eyes, and opened it.
A tall man was standing outside the door. By his height and build, Sora recognized him as the man she had bumped into at the funeral, the one wearing the black trench coat. But by his hair and eye color, and the fact that she had been staring at a picture for so long, she knew it was...
"Dad?" she asked in utter shock.
"Sora, you've grown so much..." he said.
"It happens in thirteen years, Tomio," a hard voice said.
He looked past Sora and into the apartment. "Yuki," he said expressionlessly.
"You have no right suddenly showing up like this!" she burst out furiously, with her hands on her hips. "If you leave a Takenouchi the way you left Natsumi and Sora, you can't come back like this."
"After the funeral, I felt I should at least stop by--" Yuki tried to close the door on him, but he pushed it open. "Yuki, I--"
She gave up, but her expression was cold and firm towards him. "Just leave."
"Dammit, if you'd let me explain!" he shouted.
"You watch your language around Sora!" she cried, pulling Sora to her protectively, but nearly suffocating her. "You're a horrible example--!"
His eyes blazed. "I just want to talk to my daughter! Is that so wrong?"
Sora squeezed out of her aunt's grasp. "Aunt Yuki, can I?" she asked timidly.
"But, Sora, he abandoned you!" Yuki said in disbelief. "You want to talk to him?"
"I grew up thinking my father had died when I was very young. Mama never spoke about him at all, and I knew I shouldn't try to ask. When I finally found out the truth one day, that he had left us, she still wouldn't tell me anything at all." She sighed. "I just, for once in my life, would like to meet my own father," she said softly. "Listen to that. A kid shouldn't have to say that. And now, he wants to talk to me too. IS that so wrong? Can I talk to him for just a while -- alone?"
She thought for a while, Sora's explanation finally getting her to somewhat understand. "Oh, all right." She turned to Tomio. "But if you break her heart again, you better never come back."
"Aunt Yuki!" Sora said with a gasp.
"All right," he agreed. "I don't want to hurt her. I never wanted to."
"Then why did you leave?" Yuki asked finally, carrying her suitcases to unpack, obviously not caring for an answer at the present moment. The question hung in the air; it would be answered before he left.
Sora finally let him in, and they sat down on the couches in the living room. "Would you like some coffee? Anything?" she asked, to break the awkward silence.
"No, it's all right... You've got manners, I see," Tomio said approvingly. "Guess you didn't get them from me."
"Dad?"
He laughed. "You hear that?" he asked, speaking to no one in particular. "She calls me dad. I wasn't here to watch her grow up, help her out like a father should. What kind of dad is that?" Sora, transfixed, didn't know how to answer, but his attention was diverted to the framed pictures on the table and wall. "You play soccer?" he asked, looking at a picture of her team, and then back to her.
"I did," she answered quietly.
"So you don't anymore?"
"I don't want to," she replied truthfully.
"I take it your mother told you then," he said thoughtfully, his hand under his chin.
"Told me what?" she asked, her curiosity overtaking her doubts.
He stared at her. "Didn't you ever wonder why she didn't want you to play?"
"How'd you know? She said I should be arranging flowers for the family business."
"So she told you that. Actually, the real reason is, Sora, soccer was my life. That's how we met. After I left, your mom didn't want you to be anything like me, I suppose."
Finally, Sora gathered all the guts she had in her to ask him the question that had been left hanging, one she had wanted to know ever since she found out he had not died when she was little. "Why did you leave?"
"I wasn't ready to be a father," he said angrily, the hate and rage directed at himself. "Hell, Natsumi and I weren't even married. We just dated, and one night, we got really drunk... Hate to say that's how you were conceived. After that, I couldn't handle it. I had a life! I was going places... I couldn't be a dad."
Tears streamed down her cheeks, as she finally realized why her aunt had hated him so much. "I bet -- I KNOW she had a life too. For you to do that--"
"I understand if you hate me. But I'm ready now. I missed thirteen years of your life...I won't miss the rest."
Sora felt as if her mother was speaking through her. "You can't do that! You can't come back into my life when the hardest part of parenting is over. I grew up fine without you. I never needed you at all. I learned everything without your help, including sports. I didn't even need a father to become the tomboy I was. You never talked to me at all in my entire life. You didn't visit, you didn't call, send letters, you couldn't even send me a measly soccer ball for my birthday. Frankly, you seemed like a better father when I thought you were dead."
"If you feel that way, I can leave," he said hurtfully.
"Maybe you should," she said unsympathetically, standing back up and guiding him to the door.
Tomio paused in front of the open doorway. "I'm so sorry, Sora. You don't know what it's like..."
"No, YOU have no idea what it's like growing up wondering when your dad is coming back, and then when he does, all he can say is, 'I wasn't ready to be your father'," she said harshly. "It was nice meeting you, Tomio. Goodbye."
"Bye." And with that final word, he left and was out of her life again, forever this time.
Sora slammed the door with all her might and crumpled against it, sobbing tears of anguished pain and rage. "Why? Why does everyone in my life leave me?"
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"Come on, not everyone in your life has left you," Taichi argued.
"All the important ones!" Sora said, flustered at the untimely distraction.
"I'm not important?"
She thought for a while. How could she explain? "I mean, the really important people."
"I'm offended," he said, crossing his arms, trying to act angrier than he really was.
She sighed. "Yes, you're really important to me too. You and my aunt Yuki are probably the only people left. There, satisfied?"
"Sort of," he said, smiling and becoming himself again. "But all that stuff...that's why you picked up tennis and flower arranging and quit soccer? It wasn't because you were trying to avoid me?"
"Of course not!" she said, surprised that he would even think such a thing. "I wanted to be like my mother, and I accidentally started shutting out the people she disliked. She wasn't too fond of you because you reminded her of my dad. Only thinking of soccer. She thought you would hurt me or something."
"I'd never do that."
"I know, but she does-- I mean, she didn't." She got depressed again. "Reading this story is making me feel horrible, remembering at this."
"Come on, you only have a bit left," Taichi pointed out. "And it still doesn't explain why you became a writer."
"Okay, okay. There's only one mort part, and if you don't distract me anymore, I'll be done soon."
He nodded enthusiastically. "How you went through all those changes from those things, I understand now. But the writing part doesn't fit into the puzzle yet."
"It will," she assured him, shifting into a comfortable sitting position on the branch and beginning to read again.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"Takenouchi, Sora," the receptionist called.
"I don't want to do this, Aunt Yuki," Sora said, getting up from her chair. "I'm not 'emotionally damaged and traumatized' or whatever. I'm fine. I don't have problems, and I don't need therapy."
"Just give it a chance, will you? You've had a hard few days. Your mother dying, your best friend moving away, your good-for-nothing dad coming back and then breaking your heart again...we can only take so much. I think it'll do you some good," Yuki urged, deeply absorbed in a magazine.
"Okay then..." Sora followed the lady through the doorway and down a long corridor of doors.
"Right in here," the lady said, leading her into a room. "The psychologist will be joining you shortly. Please have a seat."
Sora sat down on the red lounge chair and waited. She imagined what things would be like.
'Look at these pictures and tell me what you see,' the old psychologist would say.
'Two blots of ink on a piece of paper.'
'Oh dear, let's try another one...'
She shook her head. Any sign of ink blots, and she was ready to run. She really didn't want psychologists prying into her mind anyway. To be honest, she was scared of them. Why did they know things about her that she didn't know about herself? This was her own business; she was not blabbing to a stranger about her mother's death.
The door opened. The psychologist was not the old, wrinkled, balding man she had had in mind, but a slim, young, tidy looking woman with her chestnut hair in a bun and we. She wore regular clothes, not the white lab coat. Sora had been very wrong, and it was clear this woman didn't care at all about ink blots or making a story about them.
"I'm Dr. Natomi," she said, putting a pair of thin eyeglasses on. "So what brings you here, Sora?" she asked, checking her clipboard and taking a seat in the armchair.
"Traumatic losses and a pushy aunt," she replied rather darkly. "Mostly the latter. I don't have problems, just so you know."
"No one said you did," she said patiently. "But that doesn't mean I can't help anyway."
"Before we start, what am I here for? No ink blots, right?" she asked, cutting right to it.
"Do you have a problem with ink blots?" Dr. Natomi asked. "If you do, it's all right, we won't be doing any of that kind of stuff. Don't think of me as a doctor."
"You did introduce yourself as DR. Natomi."
She sighed a little sadly, and took her glasses off and put them in the breast pocket of her jacket. "I bet you don't normally act this way. Am I right?"
Sora involuntarily nodded.
"Thought so. I think those 'traumatic losses' have affected you more than you think, or more than you're willing to realize." She looked at Sora, her hazel eyes looking gentle, and yet calculating.
"Go on," she said, not really interested. She leaned back on the couch, figuring she might as well get some shut-eye. She hadn't been sleeping well since... It finally occurred to her that she HAD been affected.
"No, Sora. You misunderstand. When we say 'therapy session,' I'm not here to talk or lecture. I'm here to listen."
"Therapy sessions must be awfully quiet," she remarked.
Dr. Natomi shook her head slightly. "You're doing all the talking. Tell me about your life, past experiences, your thoughts, dreams, hopes, wishes, feelings."
"You expect me to reveal all that is Sora Takenouchi in under an hour?" she asked, peering at her watch.
"I bet you were always a nice girl, always caring about other people. Friends are a very big part of your life. So tell me about things with your friends or your family. I don't need to know your favorite color or what you ate for breakfast."
"That would be yellow and nothing," she said breezily. "Okay, life experiences. My whole childhood, I had thought my father had died. Turns out he left my mother and I. After my mother died, he came back. That was three days ago."
Dr. Natomi looked very interested, leaning forward in her seat. "See, that's what I need to know. Please go into a bit more depth about this. I bet this is the cause of your problems -- which you supposedly don't have." All the time, she was furiously jotting down things on her clipboard.
So in the end, Sora ended up explaining everything about her life that she could cram into the amount of time -- which, as far as she was concerned, wasn't nearly enough. She told how she had never gotten along with her mother, a slightly edited version about how she learned about love and wanting to protect those you loved, and how she never realized how strongly she had loved her mother until she was gone. She talked about the father she didn't know much of, the one her mother had tried to hide. She told of Mimi and their experiences, of course excluding the Digiworld, and how she was one of her best friends. And she realized that this had actually helped to get all those things off her chest.
"Well, torture's over, Sora!" Dr. Natomi said, standing up and quickly skimming her clipboard and what she had written. "Luckily, I have everything I need."
"When do I come back?" she asked, also getting up.
Dr. Natomi looked surprised. "Come back? Oh, that won't be necessary. You ARE all right. You're stronger, possibly stronger than you or anyone really realizes. Things will be fine again. But for now, you have to keep sharing your problems -- realizing it's there. It's not good to keep emotions bottled up inside like that, until you finally explode...not literally, but it is pretty bad."
"I thought you said I didn't have to come back." Sora realized that it actually wouldn't be so bad.
"Oh, you don't. Have you ever kept a diary or journal of your feelings?"
"No."
Dr. Natomi looked at her, putting her glasses back on finally. "You should. It doesn't even have to be a journal. You could write stories based on your experiences. They should come from your heart, explain how you're feeling, what you went through. This kind of thing will help you more than you see right now."
Sora sighed. "I'm no writer."
"You could be. And it isn't so much the writing as it is the sharing. Find one person in your life. Just one. They have to be very close, someone you can trust completely with your secrets. Write everything down for yourself, and then tell them to someone else. That's the best kind of therapy."
"All right, Dr. Natomi. I'll try that. Thanks for listening."
Dr. Natomi stood up and let her out of the office. "It's what I'm here for."
Sora felt as if an immense weight had been lifted off her shoulders, as she walked away. She hoped Dr. Natomi had been right. Things would be fine again.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"That's it?" Taichi asked, blinking a few times and giving her a blank look.
'Yup," Sora replied, closing the notebook.
"Sure there's nothing else?" he inquired.
"Positive, Taichi." She put the notebook in her backpack and zipped it up. "Why?"
"Well, what happens next? How did it all end? Who's that special person?" Question after question was thrown at her.
"It's all still going," Sora replied. "It's not over yet. As for that special person...don't you know?" She turned to face him and looked into his chocolate brown eyes.
Taichi looked back. "Who?" He eagerly scooted closer, anxious to find out who she felt was a special person in her life.
"Who do I get together with every day after school with? Who do I hang out with, talk to, read to? Isn't it obvious?" She was pretty much whispering right now.
Taichi was amazed. By simply looking at her, he could tell exactly what she was feeling. "Me? I'm your special person?"
She smiled warmly. "Of course. You've been by my side practically my whole life. With a friend like you, I never needed a fatherly influence to learn sports and boyish things. And with you, I don't miss Mimi -- or my mom quite so much, especially because I know you're looking out for me. You're my best friend, not Mimi, and you actually seem like the older brother I've never had."
"I can't believe you actually feel that way." He stared at the sun sinking below the horizon and then back to her. "I never knew that..."
"Can't keep emotions bottled up," she said with a shrug.
"Hey, you're here to talk, I'm here to listen."
"I like it this way, just you and me, while I spill all the secrets I couldn't tell anyone else," she admitted.
"So do I," Taichi agreed. He rested his back against the tree trunk again, his most comfortable position when he listened to Sora share with him. "Can you read me another story, Sora?" He felt so happy that she trusted him and was so close to him that she could practically pour her heart out to him like that. It created a strong bond between them that couldn't be broken.
Sora pulled out another notebook. "I'd love to."
The sun began to slowly set as the two friends relaxed on the tree, while one shared and one listened to another story from the heart.
THE (Cheesy & Sappy) END
(You finally got to it! How long was this fic? Around 22 pages, I think.)
* * *
2nd A/N: Stories from the Heart, from the creators of Chicken Soup for the Soul. Seriously, this was seriously sappy. I suppose this is what happens from watching 'Forrest Gump' for the billionth time in a long while. Hey, at least it cleared my writer's block! After I got the idea from the movie, I entwined some things I got from 'Flowers for Algernon,' an episode of 'The Fresh Prince of Bel Air,' other sources I can't remember at the moment, and my own imagination. I'm really disappointed with it, because it was just so much better in my head. It's my first non-romance in a long time and the first for Digimon, but I snuck some things in. I almost couldn't resist making them kiss, but the point is to show their friendship and all that stuff. Really different from what I normally write, could you tell? Does this even count as drama? If anyone cried, tell me, because I'd have a big laugh over that. Anyway, of course you know I think it sucked, and this time I feel that with a passion (why does it sound funny when I hear people say that?), but I want to know what you people think. Please, please review!