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Unfortunately, contrary to Tadase's kind request to sleep well, Amu did not sleep well at all. It wasn't too long after drifting to sleep when she started her REM cycle and began dreaming. It was not a pleasant dream, either. It was a horrible nightmare.

In her dream, Amu was running for dear life from…well, she didn't actually know. Her legs felt like a limp noodle, her breathing was heavy, and she was so exhausted. Despite all this, she knew that she needed to run as fast as her body could carry her. She turned her head to the side slightly in an attempt to identify whatever it was that was chasing her, but all she could see in the darkness that surrounded her was the silhouette of a person. Something glinted slightly from some unknown light source, leading Amu to believe the stranger had a weapon.

In the time that Amu had slowed down to see what exactly was chasing her, the figure had managed to catch up to her. Before they were just a barely visible shadow. Now they were still a shadow but almost right on top of Amu. At this point, Amu had frozen in spot and was now unable to move. Now, she was only able to watch in horror as the figure rapidly approached her.

"N-no!" Amu shouted, her voice sounding tinny. Her legs gave way and she crumpled to the concrete below her. By now, the stranger was right on top of her. "S-stay away from me!"

Her voice sounded different than what she was used to hearing when she talked. It was almost an eerie difference. The person loomed in front of her, the weapon—which Amu finally identified to be a knife—jutted towards Amu's head, ready to give her an unwanted forehead piercing. Or worse, an unwanted and poorly done lobotomy.

"Please…stop!" Amu tried to command as calmly as possible, though it didn't help that her voice was shaking.

Amu was suddenly back on her feet, the stranger was now behind her, holding the knife to her neck much like Saaya had done. Amu was met with the familiar sharp, coldness of metal against the smooth skin of her throat.

"Stop!" She screamed once more, yelping as she felt the knife digging into her skin slightly. It felt like blood or some other liquid was dripping down her neck. She dared not to swallow.

This was it. She was going to die. This person was going to slit her throat and she would bleed out in a sad, brutal death. She closed her eyes, waiting for the pain of the knife cutting into her skin. Everything was moving in slow motion now, so it felt like an eternity before she felt anything. Then, after a flash of white, she woke up in a cold sweat, panting.

Amu's heart was racing. She touched her neck slightly just to make sure her throat was fine. Her head felt like someone was hammering it and her vision was blurred with tears. She looked around, slowly sitting up. When she looked over, to her surprise, Tadase was there. Had she woken him up?

"Amu-chan?" he said after noticing Amu was aware of him, letting her settle down. "Are you okay? Did you have a nightmare?"

Amu chewed her lip. She knew she'd woken up from a nightmare, but suddenly couldn't remember anything but the feeling of the cold, metal knife against her neck. She managed to nod. "I-I think so… D-did I wake you up?"

"You could've woken up the whole neighbourhood with your screaming." Tadase tried for a joke, but it fell flat and didn't quite match with the serious look on his face. "I heard you screaming 'stop' and stuff from my room. My father heard it too, so I told him I'd check on you. Can you remember the dream?"

Tadase squeezed Amu's hand, which she very much belatedly realized he had been holding. It took all of her willpower to not pull away forcefully. Instead, she just shook her head and looked down at her lap, trying to hide the blush creeping up to her cheeks. It also helped hide the tears which had started pooling in her tear ducts.

"That's okay," Tadase said softly. "If you can't remember it, then maybe it's for the better. But if you ever do remember, feel free to tell me about it."

Amu nodded slowly, trying for a smile but failed as the tears she'd been holding back fell. Tadase sighed and let go of Amu's hand to wipe away her tears. Amu shivered slightly when Tadase's thumb brushed across her cheek, as she wasn't used to having other people touch her face. Tadase pulled away when he saw the slightly uncomfortable expression on Amu's face. Tadase sighed again, playing with his hands.

"Say…" he paused for a long time, flexing his fingers awkwardly. "This might seem weird but…d-do you want to sleep in my bed?"

Amu stared at Tadase incredulously. "What do you mean…?" she froze in realization. "A-ah…you mean…together? I-in the same bed?"

Tadase looked away, rubbing his nape, and nodding slowly."Yeah… I-I won't do anything! I promise. I just thought…maybe you'd feel more at ease with the warmth of someone else next to you…" he made a sidelong glance at Amu. "U-unless that makes you uncomfortable. I can see if we can take you home if you want."

Amu shook her head after a moment of recovery. "I-it's fine. I don't want to worry my parents any more than I probably already have, by coming home from a sleepover this early." she blew a strand of hair away from her face in an attempt to seem cool. "If you pull anything though, you're dead."

Tadase laughed slightly, glad to see Amu was back to 'normal'. He rose to his feet, lending down a hand to help Amu up. "Don't worry, I'm not that kind of person. No funny business for me. My father would probably disown me." he let out a mixture of a snort and a chuckle.

Amu pulled the blankets off of her and took Tadase's hand, who pulled her to her feet. She sent a playful glare to Tadase that she hoped said 'I'm watching you' as she followed him into his bedroom silently. The two stepped into Tadase's bedroom, and Tadase closed the door, leaving it slightly ajar.

Amu sat down on Tadase's bed, looking up at him warily. "Are you sure I can share your bed? I don't want to be evading your personal space or anything."

Tadase smiled, sitting next to her. "It's fine, don't worry. Take up as much space as you need. I'll be fine. In fact, if you're nervous, we can put something between us or something."

Amu nodded slowly, considering the offer. "Alright…a barrier would be nice. Sorry for waking you up by the way…"

She lowered herself down to a laying position and stared up at the ceiling. She felt Tadase stand back up to rummage through a closet to grab a few extra pillows to place between them. She heard Tadase chuckle as he tossed the pillows down into the bed but kept her gaze on the ceiling. Not explaining his chuckle or speaking at all, he arranged the pillows down the middle to make a barrier.

Tadase then lay down as well, shuffling a bit to look at Amu through the pillow barrier. Amu pursed her lips, only making a sidelong glance at Tadase, who assumed that meant he could speak if he wanted to.

"It's fine," Tadase said, finally addressing Amu's apology. "I was already up at the time anyway. I just happened to hear you."

Amu risked turning her head, giving Tadase a lopsided smirk. "Bathroom?"

Tadase snorted. "Why do you always bother me about that? Everyone uses the bathroom. But yes." he rolled onto his back, partially to hide his slight embarrassment at her bringing that up again. "A-anyways. Try to sleep okay? If you need anything, I'll be right beside you."

"O-okay…" Amu stammered, somehow suddenly embarrassed by Tadase's phrasing. "G'night Tadase-kun."

With that, she rolled over, her back facing Tadase, mainly so she didn't accidentally try to cling to him or the pillow like a teddy bear. Tadase also rolled over in the opposite direction, making sure he didn't accidentally stare or subconsciously do anything weird.

Tadase fell asleep pretty easily. This time, however, it was him who had a strange dream. His, however, wasn't a nightmare. It was strange in the aspect that, despite him being in the dream, he was seeing it through a third person type view. The subject matter was also quite perplexing.

In his dream, he and Amu were sitting under a cherry blossom tree. This was odd, as it wasn't even cherry blossom season yet, meaning it was a scene not from the current times. They both had ice cream in their hands, Amu with chocolate, and Tadase with vanilla. Amu was eating her ice cream happily, while Tadase was just watching her with a small, almost longing smile.

Tadase watched himself slide closer to Amu slightly and smoothly let his hand knock into Amu's. Amu turned to him with a confused expression, moving her hand away slightly as if marking it as an accident and letting him have that hand space. Surprisingly, dream Tadase didn't make a grab for her hand like what would happen in a drama or anime. Perhaps he was too embarrassed. He did try the same action again, though, a little more awkwardly.

"Uh, Tadase…?" Amu questioned, again with that confused expression. The fact that Amu didn't use an honorific threw Tadase off slightly. "What are you doing? Do you need that much hand space?"

Tadase bit his lip and shook his head, shocked at Amu's question. "I- No. The reason I called you out here today was so that you could…hear me out. C-could you lend me your ear for a minute or so?"

Amu tilted her head, obviously still confused, but nodded. "Sure. Talk away, Tadase." she snorted, getting distracted by the fact that what she said had rhymed slightly.

Dream Tadase took a breath. "Well, …you see… When I first saw you, I knew you were…different. From the other girls, I've met. At first…I just wanted to be friends with you. I wanted to try and help you open up since you were new and probably afraid. The more I learned about you, though, the more I started feeling…different. My feelings for you grew into something more. Seeing you smile and laugh started becoming my goal."

Amu nodded slowly, seemingly trying to take in Tadase's words and make sense of them. "Okay…continue."

"Right now…as I am…" Tadase continued cautiously. "I'm not sure if you'll accept me or my feelings."

Amu blinked, now looking even more confused by Tadase's words. "I don't understand why you're telling me this. What are you saying?"

Dream Tadase looked a little hurt at the fact that Amu didn't understand what he was saying despite it being blatantly obvious to him. "Don't you get it? I'm trying to confess to you. I like you, Amu."

Again, no honorifics. Dream Amu stared at Tadase for a long time, examining his face curiously, as if trying to figure out whether he was being serious or not. Abruptly, she burst into laughter. Dream Tadase frowned slightly at these actions. Even from afar, Tadase could almost feel his dream self's heart sinking.

"O-oh wow, Tadase!" she stammered between laughs. "You…you really do know me well. H-how did you know I had a small crush on you?"

Tadase stared at Amu incredulously as if this was news to him. "I-I di-"

"Seriously though, w-what would a popular preppy boy like you get out of liking an intimidating, infamously rumoured as 'violent' girl like me?" Amu laughed more, cutting Tadase off.

Tadase was caught off guard. He lowered his gaze. "I… I'm serious, Amu… And you're neither of those things, I know for a fact!"

Amu rubbed tears of laughter out of her eyes. "Oh, man, you should be an actor, Tadase. Who put you up to this? Was it Rima? I bet it was. I'm gonna have to get her for that!"

Tadase shook his head sharply, his voice and eyes pleading. "N-no, Amu…It wasn't Mashiro-san… No one put me up to this. I swear, I'm not lying!"

"You're so funny, Tadase!" Amu slapped Tadase's shoulder playfully, before looking at her watch, her grin melting into a frown. "Oh, shoot. I gotta go. I promised mama I'd do her a favour. Call me when you actually want to tell me what you wanted."

Without waiting for Tadase's response, she quickly finished her now melting ice cream cone and rose to her feet. She faced Tadase and bowed to him politely, probably jokingly considering they'd lost the honorifics so were clearly close enough to not need to do that. With that, she jogged off, backwards at first so she could wave.

"See you, Tadase!" she called before turning back around and running properly.

"B-bye-bye, Amu…" Tadase mumbled to himself dejectedly.

He watched Amu disappear on the walkway of cherry blossom trees with a disheartened expression. It slowly dawned on him that he had technically been rejected, despite Amu saying she did, in fact, have a crush on him. Normally that would mean he at least had a chance. Instead, Amu just laughed in his face. The dream faded to black. By the time Tadase woke up, it was already morning, and he was thoroughly confused.

A/N: Hi. I'm alive! I've been very distracted lately. I still dont know why I cant just throw these out randomly when i have a lot of the chapters already written. I mean- I could put them all out at once but where's the fun in that?

Is anyone even reading these? I hope so because its fun re-working stuff I wrote ages ago. I hope people still like Tadamu out there, even though the anime is like 8 years old.