"Would anyone like to explain this to me?!"

The sun filtered in through the window of Kousei's dining room as a sparrow tapped the glass of the window lightly. The cicadas chirped to one another, the distant sounds of children chattering away while walking down the street could be heard, and the very air itself felt energized with the warm essence of spring as the world welcomed in another beautiful day.

Except today was hardly any other day.

"Hello? Are you two going to talk?! Spill! How did this happen?! How is Kaori alive?! And why is she wearing your shirt, Kousei?! Huh?"

For today, one who was once among the dead walked among the living once more.

Granted, it seemed Tsubaki was slightly more concerned about Kaori's choice in clothing than her current state of being.

"Hey! Earth to Kousei! Hello?! Would one of you please explain just how Kaori's here?! Or why?!"

Kaori looked like a deer in headlights as she looked to her bespectacled partner for assistance, Tsubaki wildly gesticulating and pointing at her. This was almost certainly not part of the plan. None of this was going as she'd expected.

After all, not much longer than twenty-four hours ago, Kaori Miyazono was dead.

Twenty-four hours ago, she thought she had only been given a day to atone for her mistakes in life. Twenty-four hours ago, she'd woken up naked on an outdoor bench with no plan, no backup and not even the slightest clue as to how to make it up to the one person for whom she'd burned up her short life for, whom her entire life had been devoted to bringing back from the (metaphorical) dead and who, she was pretty sure, had played a part in bringing her back from the (literal) dead.

Of all the places she'd thought she'd be in those twenty-four hours, this wouldn't have been the last place, because that would imply she'd even thought she'd be in this exact position to begin with. She should have been gone by now; Kousei would be sad, again, but he'd be better prepared to lose her again, and nobody needed to know she was back and therefore nobody would have had any problems with anything. She wasn't supposed to leave a mess.

'You know, like last time.'

The last day had, if it had done anything, taught Kaori one thing. She was terrible at planning.

In hindsight, the lie had only worked because Kousei's self-esteem had been so utterly shot that there was no way in his mind that the cute girl who liked classical music and hung out with him more than the guy she was supposedly after was going after him instead. Everyone else on the planet seemed to have had her figured out more or less instantly, especially Watari.

A pang of guilt struck Kaori as she added one more thing to atone for to her list of sins.

Of course, her entire plan had hinged on her being dead afterwards. After all, there wasn't supposed to be a scenario where she got to live happily ever after with Kousei, playing music to their heart's content in a house they bought together with maybe a family of their own; she either died, on the surgery table (as she did, remembering every bit of it), breaking Kousei's heart into a thousand pieces, or she died, in a hospital bed, a month later, and broke his heart anyway and she had to die knowing Kousei would be destroyed by her death. By all rights, if the surgery had gone right, if Kaori was lucky, she'd have made it to right about today, probably dying after seeing the cherry blossoms or something equally appropriate.

Explaining the details of supernatural resurrection to her currently panicking best friend was, on Kaori's list of possible scenarios, so utterly out there she hadn't even remotely considered it. It would've been like expecting to be hit by a truck and waking up in another world where the goddesses were incompetent and the adventurers insane, like an anime. That just didn't happen in real life.

Not like I have any right to complain about stuff not happening in real life after what happened to me.

"Are you two deaf?! Come on, talk to me!"
Tsubaki looked as much upset as she was confused. She flailed ineffectually, powerless to really do much.

Which, in fairness, tended to happen when something unexpected like, say, seeing your deceased best friend be right in front of you, healthy and alive, a month after you were sure she was dead and buried.

"…I think you should explain first," Kousei meekly whispered, turning to Kaori.
"W-what?! Traitor! Why am I explaining first?!", she whispered back harshly.
"Well, you said we could tell Tsubaki the truth and it'd be fine!" he replied. "Wasn't that what you said? 'We'll tell her the truth, of course?'"
"I just woke up! I wasn't thinking straight!"
"D-don't give me that! That was like two minutes ago!"
"In my defense, I was hoping I'd have a little longer than the second I woke up to figure out how to explain it all to her!"
"Well, you had a little longer! Come up with something! Weren't you the one who said you always had a way with words?!"
"Okay, firstly, I'm really touched you still remember that, but secondly, flattering me won't get you anywhere!"
"Huh?!"

"I'm still here! One of you explain!" Tsubaki protested, before pausing, as if realizing something. Her eyes widened, before she glared at her neighbor, poking him in the chest with a quivering, accusatory finger.

"D-don't tell me…."
"What?"
"That's not actually Kaori, is it? That's….that's someone who looks a LOT like her!" the brunette concluded, not unreasonably. She closed her eyes, shaking her head. "Kousei, look, I know losing Kaori was hard, but-"
Kousei flailed, waving his hands and shaking his head. "W-wait! You've got it wrong! It's not like that!"
"Yes, um….let me stop you there," Kaori interjected. "…..I really am here, Tsubaki. This is Kaori in the flesh. I think, anyway. He hasn't…..gone after someone who looks a lot like me. I'm right here."
She whispered quickly to her partner. "….you wouldn't actually do that, right?"
He stared back at her, shocked. "W-what kind of person do you think I am?! Of course not!"
"That…that's not possible! You died! We've been visiting your grave, like, every week! We went to your funeral!" Tsubaki protested. "Kousei's been...n-never mind that! Where have you been?! Why didn't you tell us you survived the surgery?! How long have you known, Kousei?!"
"She didn't," Kousei flatly pointed out. "….she really didn't survive, Tsubaki. And I only found out yesterday."
"But that's….that's impossible. You don't just….that's not how….."

Tsubaki slowly slumped, her earlier energy leaving her like air let out of a balloon, her speech reduced to incoherent sputtering. Kousei immediately sprang to his feet, offering her one of the chairs for her to sit down into, which she proceeded to collapse into, attempting to gather her thoughts and figure out just what to say.

The air was heavy with awkward tension. Kousei was awkwardly avoiding Tsubaki's gaze, a hand rubbing the back of his head, Tsubaki herself was trying to not to look at Kaori again lest she remember she was wearing her neighbor's shirt, and the third occupant of the room was looking around for anything that might get her out of this situation.

A few minutes passed. The sparrow at the window continued peering into the dining room. The cicadas chirped outside. The distant sound of a child calling out for ice cream could be heard from the other end of the road.

Just as suddenly, Tsubaki's phone began vibrating in her pocket, shaking her out of her fugue. Whipping it out, she looked at it, her eyes widening. She stared at Kousei, before standing up.
"H-how many people knew before I did?"
"Huh?" Kousei and Kaori wondered in unison, confused. Tsubaki replied by showing them her phone screen, and a picture of what they very quickly realized was Kaori, yesterday, at Kousei's door, being welcomed inside.
"Someone from our old school sent me this photo today and asked me if I knew! How many people knew you were back?!"
"Nobody was supposed to know yet!" Kaori complained, all the while mentally beating herself up.

Of course someone saw her. That was her luck, really. She was hoping nobody would have seen her that didn't need to; the less people knew she was back, the less people would have been hurt by her disappearing again. Ideally, only Kousei and her parents knew; he needed to know, so she could apologize to him in person, and her parents needed to know, because they were her parents and deserved to know. Then again, she hadn't exactly taken pains to be stealthy; it really didn't help Kaori's case that her choice of clothing had been the exact same clothes she'd worn that day at the playground so long ago. A billowing white and pink dress, that she was very well-known for wearing, wasn't screaming 'stealth'.

'It was probably one of my old classmates who saw me,' she concluded. 'That'd explain why they had Tsubaki's number, and why they recognized me. But which one? Was it Ichimonji? Katou? Kushieda? Wait, why does that matter?'

"It was just supposed to be Kousei and my parents who knew," Kaori continued. "I….I wasn't sure how long I could stay for, so I didn't want to tell everyone in case I got everyone's hopes up."

"What do you mean how long?" Tsubaki inquired, suddenly concerned. "Where are you going? And you still haven't explained how you came back!"

"…..well, um….it's going to be a little hard to believe, but….Kousei. He brought me back."
The bespectacled boy's eyes widened, as all eyes in the room looked at him. "W-wait, wait, what?!"

The expression on Tsubaki's face just grew more and more flabbergasted by how absurd this whole situation was. It was something Kaori could quite relate to at this point in time.

"You brought her back? How?! When?!"
"Hey, I didn't do it on purpose!" Kousei protested once more. "I-I don't even know how I had anything to do with it! It's not like I learned some magic spell or something, snapped my fingers and made Kaori come back here! I don't know how this works either! She kinda just….showed up at my door yesterday!"

"I was only supposed to have one day, but…." Kaori explained. "…..I don't know, maybe whatever was supposed to happen just….didn't happen. So I guess I'm back for real. Maybe Heaven really didn't want me back."

Kousei snorted despite himself, holding in a laugh.

"So, let me get this straight," Tsubaki said, after breathing in deeply. "…..so, you actually died, then Kousei did….something….you came back for a day like some kind of fairy tale, decided to spend it with Kousei, then you didn't die after your one day was up because….maybe whoever it was who was supposed to bring you back up forgot?"
"Yep."
"….and you're not sick anymore, right? You're…..you're healthy now, right?"
"Well," the blonde girl looked at her arms, closing and opening her hands. She resisted the urge to revel in how easy it was, how strong she felt; months of slowly increasing weakness and advancing paralysis had made having even average strength feel like the strength of gods in comparison. "I….think I'm fine now. I almost drowned, but that's another story."
"Almost drowned? What exactly did you two do yesterday?"

Kaori and Kousei looked at each other, before looking back at Tsubaki. Kousei offered her the chair, gesturing for her to sit down.
"Huh? What's the deal with both of you?"
"It's a long story," Kaori explained, a slight frown on her lips. "And you might not like how it ends."

Looking between Kousei and Tsubaki, the memories of last night came back to her; their duet (which, in hindsight, was terrible; she hadn't practiced for months so her playing sounded like a cat scratching the strings and Kousei sounded like he couldn't see the keys through his tears, but it was their duet, so she was happy), the hug (that was also a miserable failure because she weighed almost nothing and thus had almost bounced off of him like a rubber ball off a concrete wall, but that was fine too) and…

'….and I kissed Kousei.'

Yes, that last one was probably going to get Tsubaki to kill them both, if she didn't die of frustration first.

It wasn't a particularly romantic kiss and it wasn't the scenario she'd really wanted to kiss him in; she'd only really done it because it was now or never and she didn't think she'd live to see the next hour, let alone the next day. She'd intended to let herself have something, a memory to carry with her into the afterlife; it was selfish, she knew, but she figured she was allowed to be selfish.

She was, after all, dying again. She hadn't intended on living and inadvertently claiming Kousei for her own.

'It's not like I don't want to be with him, but….I wasn't supposed to leave a mess. I wasn't meant to be with him. The world….wasn't supposed to work like that.'

The fact, of course, that she had in fact lived was something she couldn't have possibly predicted. And another thing she hadn't figured she'd be around to deal with was the consequences.

Consequences that were beginning to make themselves known in the form of an increasingly perturbed Tsubaki sitting right in front of them.

An increasingly perturbed Tsubaki who was still definitely in love with Kousei.

Kaori suppressed the urge to groan. This was definitely not the plan. She took one look at Kousei, who, judging from the suddenly queasy look on his face was thinking exactly what she was.

'This is going to be bad.'

Ten minutes later…..

The three of them were sitting outside, the spring morning air providing scant relief for the tension between them. Kousei clutched a box of Moo-Moo milk in his hand, sipping it quietly, trying to look anywhere but at Tsubaki, while it was Kaori's turn to sit around awkwardly, her hand rubbing the back of her head.

The explanation was very short and yet felt oh-so excruciatingly long.

The pair explained everything; how Kaori had popped up at Kousei's door yesterday morning, how they'd gone around Nerima, seeing the sights she missed dearly, how they'd had a serious argument about the others' failings, how they'd reconciled tearfully at the bridge they'd taken a leap off of so long and everything that came after.

The silence was overwhelming.

"So….you two…." Tsubaki uttered quietly after a while, looking quite intently at a pebble. "….kissed."
Kousei stopped sipping his drink. He looked timidly at Kaori.
"…..yes, yes we did," she replied, a light dusting of pink covering her cheeks. Her partner looked away, his cheeks equally pink.
"…..so you both…..like each other."
"Yes, yes we do."
"…you're together now, aren't you?"
At that, Kousei almost spat out his drink, and Kaori could honestly understand why.

'We kissed, we confessed our feelings like some kind of Hollywood movie, we left everything out in the open….but is that what we are? Boyfriend and girlfriend?'

She wasn't quite sure. She wanted a relationship like that with Kousei; she'd get to have him by her side, day in, day out, they could play all the duets and stay up all the late nights practicing and take a soaring leap off all the bridges they liked.

But most of all, it was normal.

A girl her age had those kinds of experiences; a girl her age was supposed to have her first awkward relationship with some boy who was equally out of his depth, supposed to have friends she went out with and slept over the houses of, supposed to spend her days pretending to study for high school entrance exams and actually gossiping about the latest rumors at school and the latest fashions out of Harajuku.

In a fair, just world, she wouldn't have spent that time in a hospital feeling her life drain from her until she could scarcely stand, trying to make herself walk even as her muscles screamed bloody murder at her trying to make even one measly step and undergoing a surgery she knew would almost certainly kill her for one last shot at playing a duet with the boy she loved with all her heart.

Kaori hadn't felt normal in a long time, not since the night she'd seen her parents sobbing in the hospital, not since the night she knew she wouldn't be alive for much longer. Normal was for people who weren't dying of terminal illness. Normal was for people who didn't intend to spend their short lives burning as bright as the stars in the night sky. She was content with that; if she could make even the slightest impression in Kousei's life, to live on in his heart and exist in every note he played, she'd have been happy with that.

But now, she had the chance to be normal. To indulge in that which she had been denied. To indulge in the trivial things others took for granted.

Whether or not she should, however, was a different question.

.I….I don't know," she finally answered, pursing her lips. "I guess….it's something we should talk about."
Kousei stared at her confusedly, the straw slipping out of his mouth. "Wait, what?"
"….you two have to talk about it?" Tsubaki's voice was barely a whisper now. She was still refusing to look at either of them.
"L-look, it's not as if….we are….I mean-"
"…..whatever you two decide, it's…..I'm okay with whatever you want to do."
Kaori suddenly found Tsubaki looking at her intently.
"Tsubaki, I-"
"It's not like I can….I can just change Kousei's mind," Tsubaki cut her off, her voice quiet, her tone firm. "If he that's what he wants, then….that's what he wants. I'll….I'll let you two talk and figure it out."

She stood up hastily, her eyes on her phone screen, going back to avoiding looking at either of them. Kousei stood up, his hand reaching towards Tsubaki to stop her from leaving.
"Hey, wait-", he called out, but it was no use. Tsubaki briskly strode away without another word, disappearing down the street and towards god-knows-where.

Another pang of guilt wracked Kaori. This was exactly what she was trying to avoid.

She breathed in deeply.
"Kousei, stay here. I'm going to go after her-" Kaori started, but she felt a hand grip her shoulder lightly.
"Don't."
Her eyes widened. She whipped around to face Kousei, a serious frown on his face.
"What do you mean don't? Kousei, I messed up again. Please, let me fix this-"
"Y-you shouldn't go after Tsubaki right now!", the young man answered, surprisingly forcefully. Kaori was taken aback; or at least, that's what she realized she must have looked like, because Kousei shrank back a little.
"….I'm sorry, I….I didn't mean to raise my voice," he clarified, shaking his head. "What I meant was, I know Tsubaki and she needs time to clear her head. She's not going to be in the mood to talk, not until she does, and she can't do that if you go after her right now."

Kaori felt the urge to reply, but stopped.

'He's probably right,' she admitted to herself. '….I knew this would hurt her, but…he's right, I need to let her come to terms with whatever you call what Kousei and I have right now. And….I don't really want to face this right now. Not yet.'

"…..okay," she uttered. "Okay, Kousei. You're right. I need to let her be. I'm just...I hope she'll be okay with whatever we decide."
"Yes, but….not right now. Not yet."

The tension still hung in the air. Kousei looked sad; a state of affairs Kaori hoped to amend.
'Okay, time to put my way with words into action! I hope.'

After a moment, Kaori flashed an easy smile, poking Kousei playfully in the arm. "Hey, cheer up. You've really grown up, you know?"
"Huh?"
"A year ago, you wouldn't even have thought of doing something like that," she explained, with not a small hint of nostalgia. "And now look at you, Friend A. Taking charge and making me follow your lead."
"I….I guess so…." Kousei looked awkwardly away, rubbing the back of his head. "…hey."
"Hm?"
"…..what did you mean by that earlier? It's something we should talk about?"
"…..well, I mean," she began to explain. "Aren't we a little young to act so serious about love? We should be taking it easy. Kids like us shouldn't get so serious with relationships so early. You never know if this is just a high school crush, after all."
"I'm being serious," Kousei answered. "….you and I both know, there's a little more between us now than before. We can't just go back to what we were before. We need to figure this out, for Tsubaki's sake if nothing else."

'A little more' was an understatement. They knew full well what the real state of things was; that their feelings were reciprocated, that they wanted to be together, that they were happy being given a second chance, a do-over to get things right this time.

"Well, why not?" Kaori replied. "Why can't we just go back to how it was before? I mean, aside from us pretending we don't know how it is. But….why do we need to do something different just because you and I are open with our feelings now?"
"Well, aren't a boyfriend and girlfriend supposed to, you know…." the young man began gesticulating, trying and failing to articulate his point. "Do things differently?"
"What? What haven't we done that a couple does?"
"Do you know what a couple does?"

Kaori paused. She realized that for the second time that day, Kousei had a point.

She really hadn't a clue what a couple really was supposed to do, neither of them did. Kaori knew Kousei definitely hadn't been in a relationship before, and as much as she knew about music, she hadn't been either. True, all those comics, books and anime she'd consumed said the same thing; you had a meet cute, danced around your feelings, engaged in awkward but funny totally-not-dates and repeated until marriage.

But this was real life. That wasn't how things worked.

'….except if it hadn't been for the whole 'me being terminally ill' thing, that's exactly how you'd describe our relationship,' Kaori conceded, thinking back over the last year.

"…..maybe we just….take it one day at a time," she suggested finally, with a smile. "…..we'll figure this out together, step by step."
Pointing to the sky, a hand on her hip, she continued. "After all, Kousei, in the book of life, the answers aren't in the back!"
"Charlie Brown, right?"
Kaori's smile simply grew at him finally getting one of her references. "You're catching on, Friend A! I didn't realize you'd started reading Peanuts."
"I've been reading up on them, asking my dad to send me some of the collected volumes," Kousei sheepishly admitted. "You're a bad influence."
"You know, if you really wanted to read them, I could lend you my copies. I have all twenty-six volumes of the full set," Kaori said, no small amount of pride in her voice; her knowledge of the exploits of Charlie Brown was almost as encyclopedic as her knowledge of music. "My parents bought them all for me for my birthday a couple of years ago…..and a bad influence? Really?"
"Weren't you the one who said Heaven didn't want you because you were too noisy?"
Kaori frowned, folding her arms. "Quit using my own words against me!"
Kousei simply smiled, before turning to face the sky, stretching his arms. "….I really missed this, you know?"
"Huh? What do you mean?"
"Just…..being able to talk with you," Kousei continued. "Not constantly having you breathe down my neck to practice, or…..seeing you in the hospital. Just being with you."

Kaori thought back over the last year she'd been with Kousei. A lot of her time had been devoted to getting him back to music, or struggling with her illness, or keeping up the deception that she had feelings for Watari. In all that time, Kaori realized, she'd barely had the time to spend getting to really know the boy she'd spent her whole life chasing after.

She knew he'd had a hard past; that his mother had died, that whatever she'd put him through (she wanted to know what, but she already had a feeling it wasn't good) had ruined him as a person and that he had effectively become a shell of himself before she'd come to him. Most people, however, weren't governed by their trauma; Kaori had made sure that it was true for Kousei, even if it took everything she had left.

'And I'd do it again. He deserves to smile, no matter what. Even if it takes everything I have again, he'll never look down again.'

But who was Kousei Arima beyond the piano? He was an ordinary boy, when it came to it, with other interests; she wanted to know what kind of anime he watched, what kind of food he liked, what countries he wanted to visit when he was older.

Kaori was hoping she'd have the rest of her life, however long it was now, to find out.

"Yeah," she said finally. "I guess…..we have all the time in the world now, huh?"

Suddenly, Kousei's phone vibrated. Fishing it out of his pocket, he flipped it open, checking his messages. He hissed sharply, before making to head inside.
"What's wrong?" Kaori inquired, worried.
"I need to go tutor someone in half an hour!" He replied, running back inside. "They're halfway across town, I need to get changed and go! Sorry!"
"E-eh?! What am I supposed to do?!"
"W-what do you mean, what are you supposed to do?! You can go back home! Your parents….wait. Do they still think you're….?"

Kaori froze. He didn't need to finish the question to figure out where he was going with that.

'Oh no.'

"I'll see you when I'm done, okay?" Kousei reassured her. "….meet you at the bakery?"

Kaori swallowed nervously. Once her parents got past the initial shock of her not being dead for the second time, the next part was going to be having to explain to them why she spent the night at Kousei's house.

As in, the boy they knew full well Kaori had feelings for. As in, the boy that they knew full well that if Kaori had longer to live, she would've likely asked out, gone out with, and done far more with. As in, the boy that they were so okay with that they'd shown him her baby pictures and practically treated him like he already was family.

As such, Kaori could see this going one of two ways, and neither of them was particularly desirable.

'They're either going to kill me, or they're going to want details. I don't know which is worse.'

"….sure," she answered, not quite sure of herself. "That sounds…good."

'And if they don't kill me, then Mom and Dad showing Kousei naked baby pictures of me is going to be the least of my worries.'

The next hour or so passed in a blur for Kaori.

After reclaiming her dried clothing, she'd taken the scenic route back home, somewhat to enjoy the scenery but mostly to delay her inevitable meeting with her parents a little longer. Nerima really was beautiful this time of year, or perhaps it was her being sentimental after having been away so long. Either way, everything looked so much more colorful than before. Judging from the leaves, the time for sakura blooms was coming.

A hanami sounded nice. Maybe she and Kousei could hold one, invite everybody they knew. Then Kaori remembered Tsubaki, and scrapped the plans for the moment.

'I'm still not sure she's okay, but….I'll trust Kousei on this. He's known her longer, and maybe he's right.'

Her parents were overjoyed, of course. The minute she walked in, they'd discarded all pretenses of composure and propriety to descend upon Kaori in a pile of hugs and a deluge of tears. After all, they'd been given the blessing of a lifetime; their daughter, doomed to die, had been returned to them anew and she wasn't going anywhere any time soon. Propriety be damned, the world would know – no, needed to know - how much the Miyazono family loved their only daughter.

Kaori wasn't ashamed to admit that she'd cried too. Her parents really were the best anyone could ever ask for – or so she believed for all of the ten minutes before-

"So, Kaori, where were you last night?," Ryouko asked, quite innocently, dabbing away at her eyes to wipe away the vestiges of tears. "Since you didn't come back home, we assumed…..the worst, but….."

"Did you stay over at Tsubaki's house?", Yoshiyuki inquired. "I'll have to thank her parents for being nice enough to-"

"A-actually…I…um…."

Her parents immediately caught onto her hesitation. Kaori had already learned that she was a terrible liar; her parents were even less easily fooled.

"…wait," her mother spoke. "…..you stayed at Kousei's, didn't you?"

"…..yes," Kaori admitted, her voice as low and as quiet as possible.

What followed were the most awkward few minutes of Kaori's life thus far, in a day that hadn't exactly been devoid of awkward minutes.

"So, you stayed at Arima's house, did you?" her father calmly remarked. "….well, it's good to see that he treated you well. We'll have to thank him for watching over you."

"He's such a gentleman," her mother chimed in. "His father must be proud of him."

Kaori let out a sigh of relief.

'I expected them to freak out or give me the talk, but this is-'

"Say, we should invite him over for dinner as thanks," her father suggested.

'Okay, not so bad. I expected them to say something-'

"That sounds good," her mother replied. "Kaori, dear, do you know where we put the pictures of you from Christmas when you were three?"
"The ones with her in her cute little Santa dress?"
'Oh no.'
"Oh, maybe the pictures of her first ever violin recital! She had the cutest pink dress with the frills…"
'I was wrong. This. This is worse.'
"Can we….not embarrass me in front of Kousei?" Kaori meekly suggested.
"Nonsense! He's like family! He should know what you were like when you were younger," Yoshiyuki proudly noted, all but oblivious to his daughter's look of increasing horror. "He won't like you less if he knows, after all, if he's such a gentleman."
Ryouko tapped her chin with her finger. "Hm, maybe I could dig up the videos of her recitals!"

The last thing Kaori needed was for Kousei to see her earliest attempts at playing the violin. Switching from the piano wasn't the easiest transition and unlike Kousei on the piano, she wasn't some sort of instant master of the violin.

She really, really didn't want Kousei to see that.

'Elohim, essaim, most humbly do I implore you, please help me out of this.'

Suddenly, the doorbell rang. Her father turned towards the door.

"I'll get that," he said, striding towards the door. "If it's him, maybe we can even arrange a dinner! We should celebrate that you're back."

Kaori swallowed nervously.

Dinner with Kousei? Great idea. Dinner with Kousei while her parents were showing him every single embarrassing memory they had of her? The prospect of that had Kaori wishing she could disappear into the darkest, deepest hole she could find.

"Mom," Kaori bashfully asked. "If we, uh, do invite him over for dinner, can we please not show him all of those?"
"Are you afraid he'll laugh at you?"
"Well…." she awkwardly shifted, trying to banish the image of Kousei looking at her embarrassing baby pictures. "….yes, kinda."
Ryouko tapped her chin thoughtfully. "…..do you know that your father's family did that to him when we first went out at your age? I'm pretty sure your grandparents still have his baby pictures with them."
"I thought he said he got rid of them?" the young woman replied, recalling a conversation they'd had one rather interesting summer night so long ago.
"He thinks he did," her mother answered. "They kept copies. When you're a parent-"

She paused suddenly.

Kaori looked at her, confused. "Huh? What?"

Her mother simply smiled.

"I'm sorry," she continued, closing her eyes. "I…..well. I never thought I'd be giving you advice on what would happen if you ever became a parent. I always thought that that kind of conversation…."

She sniffled, and Kaori suddenly became aware that her mother's eyes were welling with tears. She'd seen this before, but these weren't for a dying girl; these were tears for knowing your child had a future.

Her mother and father likely never thought they'd have many conversations with Kaori that other parents ought to have had with their children; how to deal with relationships, how to deal with buying their first house, how to deal with their own children, when or if that time came. Kaori's illness had robbed them of those moments.

'After all, no point talking about a wedding I'll never have, or a house I'll never buy.'

Just as Kaori's second chance had given her the opportunity to be a normal teenager, so too did it give her parents the chance to be normal parents.

"Mom, look-"
"No, it's just…." she inhaled deeply. "….I'm just happy to have you back, Kaori, and your father too. It just means we get you a little longer."
"A little? Mom, I'm not going anywhere."
"Now that you're back, you're growing up, and while I'm happy that I get to say that," her mother continued. "It also means we won't keep you forever. One day, in the not so distant future, you'll grow up and leave, and start your own family….well, if it's with Kousei, I have faith you'll be in good hands."
"Mom!" Kaori yelped, her cheeks reddened.

While she'd be lying if the idea hadn't crossed her mind, being a proper family with Kousei hadn't exactly been on her list of priorities. Now, however, now it was a possibility, even if it was far in the future.

After all, Kaori had to get through high school and then university or whatever musical academy she'd be going to first and then get her jobs and then-

'…..this is going to be surprisingly difficult.'

The future was wide open for her for the first time in fifteen years, but it only began to hit Kaori then that that came with a responsibility she had yet to shoulder.

"Kaori!"

Her father's voice called from downstairs, disrupting her thoughts.

"Yes?"
"Kaori, one of your friends is here! We'll let them up! They said they want to talk to you in private!"

It wasn't Kousei; it was too early for him to be back from his tutoring session, and in any case her parents would have practically embraced him.

'Is it Tsubaki? I….I still need to figure out what to say to her.'

She slowly made for the stairs, walking down to meet whoever it was that showed up.

"Tsubaki, I-" Kaori started to speak.

"Hey, Kaori."

Kaori stopped.

That wasn't Tsubaki's voice. She knew that voice anywhere.

She froze as the other boy she'd lied to for an entire year came up to greet her.

Ryota Watari stood before Kaori, a small smile on his face, one hand in his pocket and another clutching his phone. His usual confident air was about him, but Kaori could sense something….off.

Kaori stared at him, trying to hide her emotions to the best of her abilities. Today was stacking up to be unpredictable. At this point, throwing out all her expectations of how this would work was beginning to seem more and more appealing.

'Watari….I hadn't even thought about what I'd say to him. I didn't even think he'd find out so quickly.'

"…..Watari," she uttered quietly. "I….how did you know to look for me?"
"You'd be surprised how fast word gets around when someone, say, comes back from the dead," he remarked, before showing her, for the second time that day, the picture of her at Kousei's doorstep yesterday. "So, when were you going to tell us the good news?"
'When WAS I going to tell him?'
"….I was actually going to call you guys later," she explained, thinking quickly. "Just needed to get stuff in order, you know?"
"And to get some quality alone time with Kousei, hm?"
"….so you know."
"Relax, Kao-chan. I already knew about you and Kousei," he reassured her with a shrug. "What, did you really think you got one over on me? I've known for a long time."
"I'm so sorry, I-"
"Don't sweat it. It's not what I'm here for."
"Then why?"
"…..well, I had to see for myself if it was really you," Watari explained. "There were always a few rumors of people thinking they saw you around even after you….left….but when Katou put that picture up of you at Kousei's place, I had to see for myself."

'So it WAS Katou who saw me.'

"….I see," she calmly replied. "Well….it's nice to you see again, Watari."
"….I am, however, here for something else."

His face suddenly turned serious. Kaori's heart sank.

"What is it?" she asked cautiously. There was something weird about Watari and she wanted to get to the bottom of this, before something bad happened.

"It's about Kousei," Watari answered. "There's…..something you need to know. And you need to know for his sake."

Renewed Color

A/N: Hello and welcome to Odyssey, the sequel that nobody asked for to Eurydice, my previous Your Lie in April fanfic. I feel like I should explain why I did this real quick.

You see, right after finishing work on Eurydice, I had a few ideas that I wanted to write to expand it. Those ideas included a chapter each on Tsubaki and Watari and one for the side characters, seeing what they were up to while Kaori and Kousei were having their moments and maybe covering a little bit of the period directly after the series' end. However, at the time, I didn't feel like those ideas had enough substance to be worth spending time writing about, but I kept them in the back of my head, tinkering with them a little bit from time to time.

However, after finishing Eurydice, I promised myself that I would not indulge myself in writing Kousei/Kaori fics unless I was very sure I had a good idea for a story that would be able to continue off what I'd already done. After all, this fandom's got a LOT of good fics for that pairing for both canon-compliant and happy ending sensibilities; I personally recommend PandaDawgBE's Our Symphony, ithaswhatitisnt's Further Than Freedom, Sagashiteru's Five Stages of Grief and over on AO3, eunoise's lilacs out of the dead land and sunsetsundae's The Truth Came in the Summer as some of my favorites.

Cut to three years later, a worldwide pandemic keeping me caged in a house like a badger in his sett, and five rewatches of Your Lie in April later, I finally had a concrete idea as to how I could, in fact, do exactly that, and set to work. I had intended to release this in April, but editing work, a few massive pieces of coursework, and more anime I went to watch got in the way. Of course, May works too, symbolically; after all, what comes after April….

Now, I'm not sure how I'm going to pull this off, or if this is going to work; I'm rusty as all hell and I haven't written any fanfic since Eurydice. However, this is all for fun and whether or not this goes off well, I'll have a little fun indulging myself. Also, full disclosure, this will retcon some of the elements of the ending of Eurydice. If I had known I'd be writing some sequel, I would've written a few things differently originally, and those elements will likely be changed. Not that it should affect the overall ending of that too much, but you'll just have to see.

So, I hope you enjoyed that and we'll see you for the next chapter, Passing Days, whenever I post that. Which hopefully will be in the next month. See you all then!