DnM: Farewell Reunion

Too early, I told myself. It was still too early to try and message her. I glance at my clock constantly; 1:15pm it read. I was convinced that she may still be asleep and didn't want to risk that chance. I wanted a reply from her; I needed a reply from her. What if she missed my message? What if she ignored the message? These thoughts were abuzz in my head, the shower before didn't help calm me but had led me to think even more. My heart was fluttering like crazy. I began taking in air through my mouth, feeling my diaphragm fill up and holding it for a few seconds before slowly releasing it all out. I did this a few more time until the fluttering subsided. I glanced once more at my clock; 2.00pm? No, 2.30pm; I will send her a message at 2.30pm.

...

The dread building up within me escalated as the minute hand got closer to the half an hour mark. In the end, I threw caution to the wind and send her a message at 2.20pm. Seeing my phone confirmed that the message was send, I prayed that things would go as planned. Less than two minutes later she replied and I was more surprise than anything at the swift reply. I didn't plan this far so I was now fumbling in my mind on how to put my thoughts into words.

'When are you free? I would like to give you your birthday present…' Spending around five minutes, I came up with this short and straight to the point message. I prayed even more, the fluttering within me reaches new heights. Her birthday was next week and I wanted to give her present early; I didn't want to cut in to her precious time spending her birthday with her previous and plentiful newly-acquired friends. What if she didn't want the present? What if she threw it away?

...

It's been almost an hour, no reply at all. The anticipation was driving me crazy. Did I scare her off? What if she thought that I haven't given up on her?

Summoning up the courage, I wrote another text back:

""Erm, did I do something wrong? I just want to give you your present and then I'll leave. That's it."

Hopefully that this would make things clearer; I just wanted to give away the present.

I prayed even more.

...

She replied after 16 minutes of prayer, setting a date and time; tomorrow at 1pm, my lunch break would have just started but she would be leaving the tuition center that she was teaching part-time in. She only started her shift in the hospital at 2pm but I had to remind myself that this was a quick give and go, nothing else. A few more messages were sent between us and I decided that I would go to her to save her the trouble and she agreed. I thanked her at my final message, leaving out that I thanked her for finally allowing me to feel release.

... ... ...

The sky above was pitched black with the moon missing from my view; reflecting the mood I was in. It was quarter before eleven. The present was ready. Everything was made by hand; starting with the carrier bag, a simple white paper folded with four holes near the top; I tried popping holes to thread strings through the bag but later decided against it for fear that the paper carrier would break from the weight of the present. The present was wrapped in yet another plain white paper, hugging the present so that the cover would not just fall out if it was accidentally dropped and the contents of it spilling carelessly onto the ground. Removing the wrapper, the present was a box made with a sturdier piece of paper compared to the carrier or wrapper with one each for the container and cover. The monotone white of the box is contrast with a purple paper ribbon stapled on to the top of the box. On closer inspection the ribbon had been attached dangerously loose to the cover of the box; a misstep when making the ribbon had caused to it have a smaller area to connect it to the cover, making it much easier to come off had it been done correctly. I can only just hope that the worse doesn't happen.

The real prize however, lies within the box. Lifting the cover up, the sides of the container were slightly concaved; a result of the cover and the container to be roughly around the same dimension meant that one had to be smaller than the other. Inside the container, a thousand multi-colored stars filled up half the box, on top of them sat a letter with an aptly titled 'Twinker twinker little stars, how many stars are there?', within it laid my final words to the birthday girl. Hidden within the sea of stars, I tied a Pikachu in a bowl keychain that she had given me with what felt like a long time ago to a paper-made pink heart, 'My bowl broke ' was written on the heart; the faded words 'Hokkaido' was still faintly visible on the bowl. Lastly, I took one final look at the bunch of hidden messages that I had concealed before putting everything back together and looking at my clock again; it was coming to half past eleven. This was what I wanted, I reassured myself once more before I turn in for the night; this had been a long time coming. In the last minute, I decided to take out the present, held the bottom over my head, and wrote 'Nothing to read here. :P' complete with a tongue sticking face just for laughs. Yet once again, another thought entered me; something that I had said to one of her friends before and decided to get out of bed to pen it down inside the letter.

... ... ...

My alarm clock rang; I opened my eyes to see that it rang exactly when I rigged it to chime: 5.55am. I could feel the left side of my neck aching and my eyes still tired; I didn't slept well. I had only less than five hours of sleep, my mind was filled with anticipation, not of her but of giving away the present; months of preparation ending in less than seven hours. I was ready.

... ... ...

I was not ready; my heart was constantly pounding away at my chest as I made my way to our designated meeting point. The crowd of people became completely background in my eyes; all I focused on was the emotions that I was feeling in that moment. Fear, heart pounding fear coursed through my whole being, like I was being sent for an execution. Yet I had this strange sense of glee, like a nightmarish level of happiness, like I was finally being rid of what would be the equivalent of AIDs. As I got closer, my thoughts begun to overwhelm me: What if she didn't want the present? What if her boyfriend was with her? What if she wasn't waiting for me? I failed to calm myself by the breathing technique that I had learned but I was in full blown panic at that point.

And there she was; her back was facing towards me, dressed in a simple white T-shirt with a pair of jeans which what must have been the attire for the teachers seeing that the other staffs were wearing the same. Aki had kept her hair long, letting it flow down all the way to her elbows. She was packing the bag I last saw her with, her doctor's coat lazily lying on beside it; had it already been five months? I stood silently behind her, didn't want to interrupt what she was doing, but really I didn't know how to approach her at all. As she finished packing, her phone rang and she picked it up turning around as in a force of habit. Before she could finish her sentence she was shocked by my sudden appearance, as was I when she shocked me with being shocked herself. I was so scared shitless that I didn't even manage to catch what she said to the person on the phone.

"Finish your call first." I said politely, I didn't mean to interrupt her but she insisted not too. In hindsight, I guess I had subconsciously wanted to talk to her for a while despite already deciding not to. I was guilty of still hoping for a miracle.

I offered her presents with two unsure hands; 'happy birthday' was all I could dare to say. She took it with her right hand, her left still clutching on to her phone while replying with a thank you to me. I darted my eyes at her a few times, unsure what to do now that the deed was done. A few more awkward looks and she initiated the good bye, putting down her present and waving at me, I obliged as well, waving and saying 'bye bye' to her before she continued her conversation with the person on the phone.

...

That was it; it was less than half a minute, nothing dramatic like in an anime or heart breaking like in an overly long serial drama; that was it. I had initially wanted to inform her how to open the present and mentioning some of the conditions that I wanted her to open the present in; I even wanted to say 'good bye' instead of some other causal way to say farewell, I wanted something formal. But all that got discarded to the wind when I met her, all of that just didn't matter. I walked away, feeling no different at all before what had transpired. I kept trying to calm myself down by applying the technique I was taught, totally oblivious to the fact that I was once again doing this it all wrong. As I made my way to the parking lot and rode out with my D-Wheel to my next destination, I was still doing it.

Halfway through my journey, I had received a text from her, I was caught off guard; I had thought that it was all over with her, that the story had ended; this chapter in my life had come to an end. 'Thanks for the present 'she wrote. I contemplated a few moments and just decided to mirror her message. 'Thanks for accepting the present :]'. In recalling that moment, I realize that it was so her to message me; Aki was the type to say thank you, especially through a phone message when she couldn't do so properly just now. She hasn't changed, I haven't changed.

Arriving at my destination early, I dismounted from my D-Wheel and for some reason I looked up at the sky; it's been five months since I even noticed the sky. Again, no dramatic crimson skyline with a beautiful sunset; it was 2.01pm. It was just a plain blue sky with some passing white clouds but it was such a simple realization. I could feel the heat emitting from the sun rays; was this how freedom felt like?

I settled down at one of the sofas in the holding area, took out my laptop and begun to create a new document, typing out my last entry on my farewell reunion with Miss Izayoi.

As I let my fingers work on the keyboard, I glanced at the clock on my computer: 2.16pm. I mused to myself; this was going to be an interesting meeting with my counselor.

Author's note:

Happy Belated Birthday, Birthday Girl

I dedicate this story not only to a Birthday Girl, but also to Edward, Nemo, Shepard, Alfred, Shido, Alan and Legion. All your journeys has come to an end, it is my turn to walk this path alone.

I don't own 5D's or any of its characters. If you could, please leave a review or favorite the story if you enjoyed it. If you identified a spelling or grammatical error feel free to just point it out.

This is the end of the DnM series. Thank you for taking the time to have read this story/series.