Sonoko Suzuki knows, that most people don't like her. She knows it, knows how they talk behind her back, how they call her arrogant and a slut. The truth is she never cared much about them, because she had people that convinced her that she's alright. She had Ran. And against the public opinion, Sonoko cared a lot about her friends. She cared about when Ran hurt herself during karate training, started to tolerant the detective otaku in order to make Ran happy. So she could be a decent human being. Because she cared for Ran. Which doesn't mean that she really cared for the stupid guy.
She was the one that took the liberty to curse him to hell and back instead of Ran, because she would never do it herself. But what do you have friends for if not wishing dead above those that hurt you.
Ran was a safe harbor. It was save to care about her, it was easy to like her. Caring about Shinichi Kudo equals an emotional rollercoaster. So she doesn't. She really does not care about him. And if she does, it's for Ran sake.
And if she once considered hunting him down with a private detective, who cares? She has the money after all. And you could only go into a shopping marathon a specific number before you have the urge to burn everything down.
But now, Ran isn't a safe harbor anymore. Caring about her became a dangerous thing too, starting with the first day she didn't went to school. Or maybe it started the first day Shinichi dropped out of school and didn't come back with his tail between his legs and a excuse that was related to blood and a crime scene. But whatever, it's Shinichi who drops out of school occasionally without a care in the world, but never Ran. So Sonoko beats herself through Math, Chemistry and History without sparing the empty seat one glance. Because this means nothing. This doesn't mean she will have to deal with another empty seat.
Because Ran isn't Shinichi, Ran is Ran and Ran wouldn't do that. She's not him and so Sonoko tries to beat the small clenches her heart makes from time to time.
She calls later, not because she's worried or thinks that something isn't right but because she wanted to, waiting until Kogoro picks up the phone, telling her in a surprisingly sober voice that Ran doesn't feel well. It's a lie. She doesn't know how she knows it, but it isn't the truth. Maybe she really spend to much time around detectives or police officers, or maybe it was her new intention that seems to kick in now and then, even when she can't remember a damn thing afterwards, but something's wrong.
The next day Ran is back, just with purple shadows under her eyes and something awfully tired about her whole appearance. When Sonoko asks, Ran just forces a smile and than ignores her in favor of the teacher.
It's a feeling that makes the little hairs on her neck stand up. Because suddenly Ran didn't just missed a day. Suddenly Ran had lied to her.
She doesn't even pretend to believe her the next time she makes an excuse, just walks away with her head high and her nose even higher. She walks exactly 30 steps before locking herself inside a toilet cabin and crying her eyes out. But a Suzuki doesn't cry. High society never cries, just for photos and in the right moment. And especially not in a school toilet. Sometimes she hates her family.
They are both hurt, but they don't talk. Ran's busy with something, something that she doesn't tell Sonoko and Sonoko is busy being angry and hurt. And then the media steps in. Suddenly it's everywhere, Shinichi's face with various headlines.
Genius shot. Detective dead. Guy stuck his nose into the wrong business.
After that Ran doesn't come to school a whole week. And after two days at school which she haunted like a ghost, she leaves again. For another week. She doesn't answer her phone, no matter how many times Sonoko talks, screams and insults the voice mail. When she nearly kills the door bell, she's only met with a stern face of her father. He tells her, voice low and smooth, that Ran wasn't there at the moment and then pushes her down the stairs before she realizes that he just locked her out again.
The man inside the café throws a glance at her that makes her crossing of the option of waiting for Ran inside the cozy room. Instead she walks alongside the class front, blinking against the memory of them sitting inside, drinking hot chocolate and eating cake. She misses that, she even misses the brat dancing between her legs.
Sonoko nearly walks against street lamp when she realizes that she didn't heard anything from Conan since a very long time.
When she comes back she avoids the suspicious eyes of her mother and moves straight to her room. Inside she sits down onto the ground and starts to think. Just thinking, not letting anything fogging her mind. Just moving through every memory she has, making connections between them and tying all the lose ends together. Shinichi really had a bad influence on her.
When she's done, the clock shows an unholy hour and her head swims. Her eyes burn and she knows that she isn't even close to the answer. But she isn't a detective, she's just a rich brat. It hurts more than ever before. So she passes out on the bed, dreaming about dead bodies that aren't big enough to pass as a teenager and Ran walking away of her and no matter how fast Sonoko ran, she wasn't able to reach her.
The next day her eyelashes are sticking together, making it almost impossible to open them at all. Her head hurts and she rather feels like she passed one of Ran's karate lessons than just sleeping bad. She passes out for about half an hour in English, which leaves her with a detention to deal with and an enormous headache. Ran`s seat is still empty but Sonoko barely registers anything at that day. What she does register is the new heist notice inside the newspaper before she decides to use it as a improvise pillow.
Later she halfheartly listens to her uncle ramping about KID and how he would catch him this time. Normally she would have jumped with glee, because KID-sama would appear again and she was allowed to sit in the front row again but it wouldn't be the same without Ran. Hell, she would even miss the brat. So she silently pokes at her dinner and then excuses herself.
Beside, as great and hot and overall perfect the thief may be, she had a bigger issue than her crush on him. She had a friendship which was about to go to hell.
After Ran broke the record of missing for 18 days ( no, Sonoko was not counting is was simple math because you could work with all the sheets that started to flow her desk), Sonoko did something stupid. And maybe a bit reckless. And maybe it was also a really desperate action which was normally under her. But she was one step away from going crazy and so she threw all her pride overboard and made herself comfortable in front of Ran`s doorway.
It's late summer, the border toward autumn approaching at an alarming speed and despite the fact that she had the feeling of roasting in the morning, it's getting colder by every passing minute. Or maybe it was her imagination because suddenly she feels very, very alone and lost. Stubbornly she tucks her knees under her chin and buries her head in her arms. She doesn't want to be alone again, she wants them back, both of them. She wants to argue with Shinichi and wants to drag Ran to the city. She wants Shinichi to crack riddles and she wants him to tell them about it. She wants Conan back.
She just wants her friends not to disappear.
The first sob wrecks through her body. It's cold and it's late and everybody has someone to go to beside her and she's going to sit on that damn stairs until Ran decided to drag her ass from wherever she had been. Crying was even more impropriated than inside a toilet cabin but she doesn't give a damn about what people may thing about her.
She just wants Ran to come and hug her like she always does. With her warm and protective hugs that made you believe that the world could go to hell and that you were save there. She wants to hug Shinichi. She wants them back.
There's a sound, like somebody dropped glass or cans inside a bag. "S-sonoko?" Sonoko nearly falls down the damn stairs while trying to reach Ran as fast as she could. It's like in the dream again, no matter how fast her feets move, she will never ever reach her again, she will be forced to watch her disappear. But this time she's able to grab something solide, something that smells like Ran. Like warmth, like summer and like home.
"I-I'm sorry." she sobbs into her shoulder, she's totally running that piece of clothing with her tears and all the other things that stream down her face. "I-I-I don't want to lose you too." I should have hired that damn private detective back then.
"Sssh, ssh, Sonoko." There's something weird about Ran's hands. They could break things with so much ease, could punch through objects within a second but they could also pat you one the back with so much care if you had an emotional breakdown. "Gosh, you're freezing, how long did you were out here?"
"W-waited for you." Sonoko hiccups, burying herself deep inside the memories that came with Ran's smell. They were good. Good and save.
"Let's go inside." Ran takes her by the hand like a small child and Sonoko walks behind her with small, unsure steps. Her whole body seemed to be a bit unsure about her surrounding.
And then suddenly she's on a couch with something warm and sweet between her hands and god, she didn't realized how cold it had been outside until now. A shiver runs down her spine. But now isn't the right moment to get lost, she reminds herself. Now was the moment for truth and some honest conversation.
"Conan isn't here, is he?" She has a suspicion about all of this. It's hazy, there are more pieces who don't fit inside the picture and she really couldn't wrap her mind about any of this but something was wrong and all the leads pointed at Conan with a huge, red arrow.
"No, he isn't here Sonoko." "Shinichi is also not back." Ran inhales the smell of her own cup like it's the most precious thing on earth. She's avoiding eye contact by the way, not even Sonoko would miss that. It makes the hairs of her neck standing up.
"Oi Ran, you can stop beating about the bush you know?" She's bluffing, trying to convince her friend to tell her wants exactly behind the bush. Because she doesn't have a clue about it.
Ran chuckles, a low and soft sound that sounds somehow wrong and a bit broken. "It's unfair Sonoko, I wished I had the courage to tell him the exact same thing back then." "So, something happened to Shinichi." Who do I need to pay to tidy up this mess Ran? "You read the newspaper? All the stories about him being dead? It's funny how they never acted that way when he was still just missing?" Well basically, he wasn't missing. Nobody filled out a report or informed the school. It had been just normal for him to disappear for a longer period of time. "We had been so reckless. So carefree. How could we believe that everything was okay?"
"Shinichi's death?" Her voice cracks way too much for her liking and even after she clears her throat it won't come out as strong as she wishes. "No Sonoko, just really badly hurt." She puts an arm around her friend, which is a bit awkward because they both try not to spill any of their hot liquid and the couch isn't such a great place for cuddling. Ran's elbow pocks uncomfortable into her rips but Sonoko doesn't care. "And Conan? He's also badly hurt?" "They're the same Sonoko. He had been always there."
It's logical. It's the most logical answer in this puzzle. Shinichi disappears, Conan appears. No backstory, perfect timing. They're were so stupid. Sonoko tries not to curse loudly.
"All the time?" "All the time. He listened to everything. To everything we said, watched over everything we did." Sonoko shallows dryly. She suddenly remembers crystal clear that she hadn't been very discrete about her opinion of Shinichi. And he heard it all. Like, she would have told him everything straight to his face when he decided to come back from his oh so big and mysterious case, but he literally had been here the whole time.
Most of her angered rooted inside the fact that he left.
"What happened?" And so Ran tells her. About bad people, about a criminal organization, about being at the wrong place, about the wrong time, about a bunch of coincidences, about the warehouse, about the fact that there are now a bunch of very angry people, about the fact that she was angry. Deciding that this was her time to sit still and listen, Sonoko draws little circles in Ran's back.
"You know, I should simply have hired that private detective in the first place." she says after the hot chocolate is empty and they both ran out of conversation material. "But I didn't, means I have still a bunch of money left." Ran looks at her and her eyes say, no, you're normal, you're not going to say what I think you will say.
But Sonoko had been wrong. Big time wrong. And she knows that she will need to pay her debts. It's one step into the direction of bringing Shinichi back. Of bringing her friend back. So she just let's her lips curve into a smirk and finishes: " I mean, a revenge always needs a sponsor doesn't it?"
The heist note? Remember that? Hah, I'm such a geniuse and totally don't try to despratly tie that all together.
Sincerely Anemonenfisch