"We all love you."

Yet again I read Sayori's parting words before closing the game and shutting down my PC. I sigh. How is it possible that this game still influences me that much? It's been several weeks and I must have played it at least fifteen times by now. Images of Sayori hanging in her room flash in my mind and my stomach knots up. This needs to stop! But I don't know what to do. I look at fanart of a happy Sayori, the only thing that eases my mind a little bit, before going to bed.

I open my eyes, just to see a big, cute face filling my vision. I cry out in surprise. "Uwaa-! Who...?!" She's so close to me I instinctively pull back and nearly fall out of my chair. She jumps back and giggles.

"Ehehe, sorry~ Wait! Actually, I'm not sorry at all! It's your fault for sleeping like that! This isn't the napping club!"

"S-Sayori?" I mumble, still trying to comprehend what just happened. "Of course!" she says. "Who else would I be?"

"But...". This must be a dream. I'm dreaming about the literature club. No wonder, this game has occupied my mind forever. It happened before. The only thing that's unusual is that I am aware of being in a dream.

I run my hand down the side of Sayori's face, expecting to feel nothing or phasing through her. But the sensation of her soft, warm skin feels almost too real.

"Eh? What are you doing?" Sayori asks, looking surprised. But I ignore her question. This has to be a dream! Sayori is not real! And as much I would like to spend time with her right now I feel like it would be better for me to wake up if I don't want to lose my mind completely. I take a deep breath and bite my tongue as hard as I can to wake me up.

"F*CK!"

I scream out in pain. That really hurt! I feel my mouth filling up with the taste of blood. But nothing has changed. Sayori is still standing in front of me. She looks at me with a shocked expression.

"MC! Why did you do that?". I look at her. "Wait... so this isn't a dream? You are real?" I ask her. "Of course I am real!" she answers. "MC, you really worry me right now. Is everything- Ah!".

She doesn't get to finish that question. I pull her close to me and embrace her tightly. "Sayori..." I whisper, unable to form a complete sentence. I am just glad to have her with me right now, not dead.

"Did you have a nightmare?" she asks me. "Yes..." I answer quietly, making sure nobody else can hear me. "One where I had to see you die over and over again."

I am still a bit confused. That dream felt so real. I can still remember every single thing of the game. But I guess it doesn't matter. Sayori is alive and real.

"Everything is going to be alright, MC." she comforts me. "It was just a bad dream."

I slowly let her go. Still looking worried she asks, "Can you get nightmares from anime? You really should tone it down a little bit. That's why you fell asleep in the first place, isn't it? You stayed up late again, watching anime."

"Don't say that so loud..."! I glance over my shoulder to see if Monika overheard.

"It's true, though..."

"Yeah... I know, I know. You're always looking out for me Sayori."

"Ehehe~. It's what I do best!"

"...That's a problem! What about you?"

Suddenly I get a weird feeling of déjà vu. This conversation is exactly the same as in my dream. Aside from me freaking out and hugging Sayori everything today happened the exact same way. I swallow. What if it continues? What if the next days are going to be the same as well? What if Sayori-

I don't finish that thought. Mainly because I don't want to freak out again. I'll just have to see how it continues. But just to be sure, I try to be a little nicer to Sayori. She knows I don't mean it when I tease her. But if she really is depressed then a wrong word can screw up everything. I decide not to tease her about not having a boyfriend. Instead I try to let her know that it makes me happy caring about her.

"Okay, everyone! Why don't we share the poems we wrote now?"

Monika's voice fills the room. Everyone retrieves their poems and I do the same. Initially I have been anxious about this but right now I just want to know what the girls wrote. Will their poems be the same as in the game? Strangely enough, I remember every single word of them.

I start with Sayori. I couldn't find much inspiration by myself so I tried to think about her while writing my poem. So there might be a chance that she'll actually like it at least a little bit. Besides, I am way more comfortable sharing it with someone I have known for so long.

Sayori's eyes light up as she reads my poem. "...Oh my goodness! This is sooooo good, MC! I love it~! I had no idea you were such a good writer!"

Well, this is not the reaction I anticipated. And even though it's nice to see Sayori beam like that, I can't really be happy about it. Because once again, everything is the same. Every reaction of hers, every sentence she speaks... I've seen it all before in my dream. And surely enough, her poem is the same as well, every single word of it.

Seeing my worried expression Sayori asks me, "Don't you like it?" "Oh no, it's not that." I reassure her. "It's just... I didn't completely recover from my nightmare yet. But I really like your poem. It sounds just like you. Especially that last line..." I decide not to say anything about her writing it this morning. I just want to read the other poems.

With every poem I read my hope vanishes more. Yuri's and Natsuki's poems are the same as well. At least I can impress them a little bit by 'figuring out' their meaning. And while they don't like my poem as much as Sayori did, they didn't seem to hate it either. So I guess I didn't do too bad of a job. But at the moment I don't really care about that. There is still one poem I haven't read yet. And this one is the most important of them all.

Monika. Her poem was about her epiphany. She knew that she was trapped in a game and wrote about it. Through the 'hole in the wall' she looked at the player. And the player was looking at her. If she wrote the same poem that would mean that we're all trapped in a game. And even worse, she might tamper with the other girls' personalities again.

As I read Monika's poem it feels like someone is taking a massive weight off my heart. It's freeform, Monika's signature style, but it's not the same poem as in my dream. Instead it seems like she wrote about people seeing her as perfect and therefore unapproachable. It does make sense. After all I myself have seen her as way out of my league all the time. I am probably not the only one. I guess even if you're popular you can be pretty lonely.

I try to talk to Monika about her poem but she seems to be a little embarrassed to talk about it. It looks like I interpreted the poem right, but since we don't know each other that well yet, she doesn't want to go into detail. I guess I will talk to her about it again when we've become better friends.

I am relieved. We're not stuck inside a game and Monika doesn't mess with Sayori's mind. Everything is going to be all right. At least that's what I try to tell myself. But somehow I feel like it's not that easy. The Monika in my dream didn't create the other girl's problems, she just amplified them. I will have to watch out for them, especially for Sayori.

I almost casually break up the fight between Yuri and Natsuki. Even though we have only met yesterday I know exactly what to say to calm them down without hurting anyone. They even appear to be a bit happier after I talked to them. And with every minute I become more confident that I can turn everything around for the better.

As I walk home with Sayori I silently make a promise. I will do everything to help every one of the girls become happy. And I will start with the most important person in my life: my childhood friend Sayori.