The emotion train is flying off the rails for the next couple of chapters so buckle up kiddos you're in for a bumpy ride

Reagan had to pull out her phone to find her way home. As she was using her map app to pinpoint her location, her fingers froze. She looked at the skyline of the city as the sun set over the horizon, the orange swirling with the blue and purple of the sky. It was like something was speaking to her, something she couldn't figure out. It wasn't like trying to stumble over her basic Japanese as she maneuvered the city. No. It was in a language all of its own. The breeze whispering to her along with the waves crashing against bridge below her. Without thinking about it, she backed out of her maps app and clicked the phonebook.

She scrolled through her phone list, her finger resting on Naoki's name. She had saved his number in her phone after the first day at the hospital, when she found out that the man with the desperate eyes hanging over the bridge was actually a doctor, just like her. If she called, who would say that he would pick up? Did he want to talk to her after what she did to him? I will get to you. She vowed to herself. But first…

She continued to scroll and found Thomas' name and hit the dial button. He picked up on the third ring. "'ello?"

"Thomas." She could feel her mouth go dry, like it was stuffed with a whole cotton field. "I'm so glad you picked up."

"This isn't really a good time." He said. "I'm on Nate's yacht and-,"
She watched the sun slowly fade behind the horizon of skyscrapers, the purple that lit up the sky turned into a cool blue. The song was changing. Like the colors of the sky. Like the winds of fate. Like the deepest parts inside of her. She no longer wished she could turn back time. If she had never agreed to come to Tokyo. If she didn't get lost that day, everything would've been so different.

She wouldn't have met Naoki. She wouldn't know what it meant to feel so hard.

"Hello? Reagan? Hun, is there a reason why you called?"

"I'm calling because…"

I'm drowning and I can't find which way is up.

Her breath caught in her throat. Naoki's word echoed around her. It was in the stars that forced their way past the city lights. It was in the breeze that caught her hair and blew it into her face. It was in the waves below her. He was drowning and he needed her to find the way up.

"Babe?"

"Thomas," She inhaled a deep breath. "I'm breaking up with you."

"What?"

She gripped the railing, watching her skin glow in the moonlight. Despite the wind that blew around her, despite the cool spring night air, felt her skin come alive with fire. "I've fallen in love with someone else."

Kotoko and Naoki stood over their toilet. She thought it was odd, how much everything had changed in six months. In a year. In five years. In five years she went from an infatuated teenager to a nurse to a mother. In five years she managed to feel every type of pain that was possible. In five years she found her voice and watched Naoki lose his.

She held the divorce pamphlets in her fists. They were a crumpled mess, the colors running together from the heat of her hand. Irie-kun held two half-filled bottles of pills. They were a crutch, she realized. They were a Band-Aid that was trying to cover a gunshot wound. Divorce. Pills. They were a Band-Aid covering a gunshot wound. The solution wasn't in any of these things. The solution was in them. They needed each other to get through this.

If only they had realized it sooner.

Kotoko began by ripping up the pamphlets and tossing them in the toilet water. She looked up at Irie-kun nodded, who pushed the flush-button and watched them disappear down the little toilet hole. "Let's save our marriage." She whispered. "For Kotomi. For us."

Irie-kun twisted the caps of the pill bottles and poured the yellow and blue pills into the water. She watched some float to the top, her stomach turning as she thought about all the heartache that was brought on by those little pills.. She looked up at Irie-kun, who stared back down at her, emotion in his soft brown eyes and nodded slightly. She leaned down and pressed the flush-button and the blue and yellow disappeared.

"I'll get sober." He said quietly, almost to himself. "For Kotomi. And for you, Kotoko. And for us."

Kotoko moved to take Irie-kun's hand. She looked back down at the now empty toilet. It was odd, but calming. Everything, all their pain, gone with the push of a button. She felt renewed, but more than that. Improved, somehow. "Let's take a trip." She suggested suddenly. "Let's get out of Japan for awhile."

"Okay." Irie-kun agreed. "Where?"

"I don't know. Somewhere exotic? Kobe?"

"Kobe isn't exotic."

"What do you suggest, then?"

"I've always wanted to go to India." He said.

"India." She repeated, her eyes still trained on the emptiness of the toilet. On the beginning of her new life with Irie-kun. "Okay, let's go to India."

She knew that healing would take time for the both of them, but it was a start.

It was a start.

Reagan dialed Naoki's number again, watching the screen of her phone go from roaming, and then connect and then ring, only to have a very polite Japanese lady come on to tell her that there was no one there at the moment or something.

She made a frustrated noise as she walked down the bridge back into the guts of the city. The clouds above the buildings were starting to swirl, threatening to storm. The breeze whipped her blonde curls into her face and she tried dialing again, only to come to the disconnected message again.

Come on, Naoki. She pleaded and dialed again. Please, pick up.

Something hit her like a sock to the gut. I feel like I'm drowning and I can't find which way is up. She stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, making the person walking behind her bump into her. "Sumimasen." They said and sidestepped her. What if Naoki was in trouble? What if he tried something?

Panic seized hard in her chest and she tried dialing his phone again. It was like her nightmares. She was always a moment too late, a word too late. And then, just like that, he was gone. And it was her fault, because she wasn't there.

She wasn't there to save him.

"No." She breathed, holding the phone to her ear as she looked around, trying to grasp her surroundings. The streets were starting to fill up with people: old people with umbrellas and mothers pushing strollers and businessmen with their ties slung over their shoulder. They streamed around her on the sidewalk, all going different places. "Naoki, please pick up." She begged, feeling tears prick her eyes. "Please, pick up."

"Gommenasai. Denwa ga tsunagarimasen."

She squeezed her eyes shut, feeling anxiety twist up her guts into knots. She couldn't be too late. She couldn't. She started jogging down the sidewalk in the general direction of his apartment. Her jogging picked up once she started recognizing the landmarks that made up the Yoyogi district, retracing her steps she took when she left the other morning. She ran as fast as she could go, until her lungs felt like burst and until her eyes stung hard with tears.

Reagan slowed only when she had to at an intersection. Using the opportunity to trying calling again. Please, pick up. She pushed her hair out of her face and tried to calm the hurricane inside of her. Please, pick up.

"Hai?"

She could've screamed. She could've broke down in tears. She could've shouted for joy at the sound of Naoki's voice. But mostly she froze. She froze even after the light went green and the pedestrians around her started crossing the street. "Naoki," She choked, forcing out the only words she could manage. "I'm sorry."

"Sorry?" His voice slurred on the end and Reagan started moving. "It's too late for sorry."

"What did you do, Naoki?" She asked, ducking down a street, trying to find Naoki's apartment complex. There were so many, and they all held the same gray industrious look that she was unsure which one was his. There was a hard moment of silence on the other end of the phone. "Naoki?" She asked, hearing the panic in her own voice. "Naoki?"

"I'm ending it." He said finally, his words blurring together and then he said something that Reagan couldn't comprehend in Japanese.

"I don't know what that means." She said. "You said it in Japanese. Please, stay with me, Naoki. I'm almost there."

"It's my fault." His voice grew faint and far away. "I'm drowning, Reagan. And it's all my fault."

"Naoki!" She cried, tears making the streetlights grow brighter and her surroundings go soft. "Naoki, stay with me. Stay with me, okay. I won't let you drown."

I love you.