It is noon when I finally stop writing. The sun is directly overhead and the icicles on the eaves of the veranda drip with water. The varied crashes of snow falling from branches somewhere in the forest add to the tempo of the steady dribble.

This is not what pulls me from Kokuchou's memories. It is the Cat pawing at my notebook. I push him away once, twice –the Cat meows both times. Apparently fed up, he bites my hand.

"Ow!" I hiss. "What?"

The Cat complains again, running into the hermitage. When I don't immediately follow he stops, looks back, and whines. Through the door, I see a bundle of blankets.

It is noon and Ikkyu is still not awake.

I can only stare.

What if?

What if?

What if?

The air is too thin. Ikkyu, the Cat, this hermitage, the notebooks; they are my life. Outside of them I have nothing else and if-

Shadows claw at the edges of my vision. I can't feel this body-

But then he shivers beneath the heavy futon and I know that he is, at least, alive. I gasp, rise slowly, and approach even more so. The Cat bounds ahead. I don't know what I will find and I don't know what I will do if-

Ikkyu coughs and the sound is deep, racking. The type that comes from his lungs and shakes his whole body. I kneel at his side and run a fingertip down his wrinkled cheek, more to know that this is real, to feel the give of his crepe paper skin beneath my own. It is so strangely cool.

"Ikkyu?" I whisper and it is reedy, as thin as I feel. As if Ikkyu's coughs, like a maelstrom, could blow me away.

The old man rolls onto his back; or tries to. The futon gets tangled in his limbs. I have to help him. Ikkyu is old, I know. However, this is the first time he has ever actually appeared his age. I can tell that he has never been tall, but there exists the ghost of strength in the way he moves through even the most menial of tasks. It is because his energy, the way he glows, makes it so that I barely notice the numerous scars that crisscross the visible swaths of skin.

Ikkyu's soul has always outshined his body.

Until now.

Kokuchou's medical training kicks in, her body moving through well-practiced steps. I prop him up, letting the memories guide me as I fold my own futon beneath his head to prop him up and run outside. The snow reddens my hands when I scoop it into the pot and blood burns beneath the skin as I stoke the fire. I make sure to close the door to ensure the steam fills the room.

I do everything I can with our limited resources and my half-lived recollections, but still Ikkyu's coughing does not cease. Not through the night, nor into the next morning and when dawn splits the dark horizon in two, he grabs my arm in a feeble grip.

"Doctor," he wheezes, eyes glassy.

I run.

I don't stop. Not once through the forest, or to catch my breath along the road. Not when Ikkyu is alone in the hermitage unable to catch his own. Not when his body is failing him.

I run all the way to Nashimura. The sun is too warm and the air, too cold. Villagers watch as I race by, perhaps recognizing me as the monk's ward; perhaps wondering if they should be afraid of what the small woman is running from, as well.

The infirmary door is jarred from its track when I slam it open and everyone looks up. A young man stands up, maybe a little older than I. "What's wrong?"

"My- my-" I struggle to get the word out; it is more than breathlessness. I don't know what to call him. I have never before had to label what he is to me. He has simply been mine and that was always enough. "Ikkyu."

I pull on his sleeve, try make him follow. My feet do not stop moving for even a moment. "Come! My guardian. He's sick!"

Maybe he hears it in my voice or the beating of my heart that I'm sure everyone can hear, because he does not hesitate. Neither does the small man who'd been standing off to the side of the room; he darts behind a curtain as the younger one goes to the entryway and slips on his boots. They look familiar-

"Sukuna-sensei! I'm going ahead!" He yells out. To me, he asks, "Where do you live?"

I barely know how to describe it. I point in the direction of the hermitage helplessly. "A ways down the road- I don't know how far. You might see my footprints coming from the forest on the left."

The Cat meows at our feet, rubs himself against the man's leg. I gasp. "The Cat! He can show you the way!"

To his credit, the younger man only looks a little confused but then nods and follows the Cat out the door.
"This way," the doctor pulls my hand. He is short, not much taller than my meager height. He leads me down a hallway and out the backdoor. There is a stable and a horse looks up from where it has been eating. Sukuna-sensei's movements are hasty, but he appears calm as he tacks the large animal.

"This is Saruta," he pats her large cheek. She whinnies. "And don't worry, I'm sure Yuuto-kun is nearly there. You don't live far, right?"

I shrug. I don't know. It had felt far the first time I came to Nashimura and another world away on this mad race to get Ikkyu help. The other times, however… "Yuuto-kun is a fast boy," he promises. "Let's go."

Sukuna-sensei moves to give me a boost so that I can more easily mount the horse, but I am already jumping. This body knows what to do, of what it is capable. My foot lands in the stirrup and I swing my leg over in a single, smooth motion.

The doctor pauses for only a moment. "Limber little thing, aren't you?" Then he mounts as well, and we are off.

"Tell me when," he shouts over the wind as we take a back road out of the village.

My hands tremble around his waist.

"Excuse me," Sukuna-sensei appears behind me on the veranda. I do not turn. "You do not look well. May I? I want to make sure you have not caught it, as well…"

My hair stands on end at the feel of chakra at my back. I nod, do not fight the intrusion of his chakra into my own. I hear him gasp and withdraw. My gaze is on a point in the sky, like I am looking in Ikkyu's eyes.

A moment later, the doctor returns to his task. The silence is broken by Ikkyu's coughs and the melting snow.

"Has she contracted it, too?" Yuuto asks.

Sukuna-sensei doesn't answer aloud and I cannot see him move as he kneels behind me. "What is your name?"

I smell autumn leaves even though it is that strange between-time, the period that is not yet spring but has moved on from winter. The Cat meows and I remember when he was just a kitten and how Hibashi always used to see cats around the village and Kushina runs towards me and there is Shou and we are eating dinner together and he is making me laugh and my soul doesn't fi-

"Miss?" Sukuna-sensei does something with his chakra and I snap back into focus. The soul-ache is creeping up between the gaps of Kokuchou and I, fast. I hold onto the moment the way Ikkyu taught me.

I touch the boards, feel their texture. I feel the way they go up and down over the bumps and ridges. The doctor is kneeling at my side now, and he appears very concerned. So like Ikkyu looks at me. Ikkyu who continues to cough behind us.

He needs me.

Needs me to be here, in the moment. I have to hold on and help him the way he has helped me every day since he pulled me from the rubble.

"Hokku." The doctor tilts his head. "My name is Hokku."

Yuuto speaks, then. "That's a nice name."

"Thank you," I pet the Cat.

"And his?"

I shrug. I haven't gotten to him yet. "This is the Cat."

Sukuna-sensei nods. "Are you ready to hear about your guardian? Ikkyu? That's his name, correct?"

"Yes," my voice is hoarse from disuse. Ikkyu and I rarely speak. We don't have to.

"How long has he been coughing?"

"I'm not sure…" Because I have been so absorbed by Kokuchou's memories. The past several weeks are a blur, almost as if I didn't live them at all.

"It's pneumonia. A rather advanced case of it. It developed as a result of an untreated case of the flu. Do you know his age?" Again, I can only shake my head. "In that case, I believe we should take him to Nashimura for-"

"No." The sound is so weak that I almost don't hear it. Inside the hermitage, Ikkyu is sitting up. He begins coughing in earnest and I nearly knock the doctor over in my haste to get to him.

"You need to lay down."

"No," he says again, but does not resist my gently pushing hands. He lays back, grabs my hand. "No- I don-"

"You don't want to lay down?"

He shakes his head.

"The village? You don't want to go there?"

He nods and he looks so small as his body shakes with the coughs.

"Here," Sukuna-sensei hands me a cup of tea. "He needs to drink a lot of fluids. Preferably warm fluids to keep him warm. You did the right thing by humidifying the room and laying him up. If he'd been left on his side, he could have cracked a rib-"

"If- if I am to die of this," Ikkyu wheezes. He looks at me with glassy eyes. "I want it to be here. In this place. With you."

If-

If-

"But Ikkyu-"

"Here," Ikkyu coughs.

My face crumples. The tears are hot on my cheeks. "But I don't want you go."

I let my head fall onto his chest. I can hear the coughs better now, the infection in his lungs. How he struggles to breath. Ikkyu pats my head and I understand what he cannot tell me. 'I will try. I am here with you.'

I take a deep breath. Wipe my face.

Ikkyu is still here. And unless I don't pull it together, force myself to be the caretaker for once, then he soon may not be.

The doctor and his apprentice have been silent during our interaction, moving to the side of the hermitage to give us a sense of privacy. Sukuna-sensei stands up from his medical kit, vials in hand. "These are antibiotics, cough medicine, and this will help with his temperature."

Ikkyu shakes his head. Gestures to the wallet he keeps under the floorboards. I know how much is in it and almost start sobbing again. "We- uh, we can't afford medicine."

Sukuna-sensei kneels beside us. He pats our clasped hands with a smile. "Not to worry. I wouldn't charge a monk, Ikkyu-sama. You have dedicated your life to others. I suppose this is my way of giving back to the universe."

Ikkyu smiles and coughs. He glances to the side.

"Thank you," I say for him even though, for some reason, Ikkyu's gratitude felt strained.

"I'm happy to help," the chatty doctor rises. "You're lucky you caught me when you did, Hokku-san. This has been a slow day in terms of emergencies."

I cannot imagine what I would have done had he been elsewhere. I don't know that there is even another doctor in the small village. I don't even know where the next village is because my whole world exists in this hermitage and within the pages of my notebooks.

"I'm afraid I must be off, but Yuuto-kun will return to check on you tomorrow." He claps the tall young man on the shoulder and winks. "I told you he was a fast boy."

Yuuto blushes.

The doctor and his apprentice leave with instructions for treatment and a promise from Yuuto to visit tomorrow.

I give Ikkyu his medicine and make him some soup, and in the solitude of the night, I meditate to keep myself grounded.

I cannot slip away. I will not slip away.

Ikkyu needs me.