Remember
Chapter Two: BFFs bring back the best memories
"I'm not a child."
That's all Davis could think to say. Something about the word child twisted his insides in a way that even Animamon couldn't. He could still hear Yolei screaming it at him before she left.
"I'm a grownup—adult," Davis stammered. "Adult of Miracles." He opened his fist after feeling the sharp stab of a diamond in his palm.
The digimon searched the room with blind, blank eyes. "Apologies."
Davis rounded on Ken, fury burning through his chest. "Trust you? I did not need this today. I'm outta here."
Ken caught him by the shoulder and Davis felt the prick of the diamond again.
"You don't want to hit me."
"I wanna hit something."
"Can you excuse us?" Ken asked and that monster actually nodded, like he was doing them a favor.
Once they were outside, Davis lost it. "What the hell is this? I knew you talked to him, but what are you now, BFFs?"
"Davis."
"I'm your BFF. Not that thing."
Ken nodded. "I'm doing this for you."
"Do you remember what he did to us?"
Davis knew he struck a nerve, but it was an obvious one that Ken obviously needed to be reminded hurt.
Ken took a long deep breath and fixed his dark blue eyes on him like he knew more than Davis understood. "He's changed."
"That doesn't matter," said Davis, shoving Yolei's ring deep into his pocket so it stopped pricking him. "I haven't."
"That's not true. Everyone changes."
"Then maybe that's my problem."
"Your problem is being stubborn," Ken said and Davis flinched a little at his tone. Ken hardly ever lost his temper, but he could hear it seeping through his voice (a little too Emperor-esque for comfort) and all directed at him. "Just give him a chance."
There was a fire in his eyes, some fierce determination that Davis knew was all friendship and good will, even if it creeped him out a little.
"Fine," he said. "But the second this gets weird, I'm out."
...
"Okay, this is beyond weird."
"I imagine that the years haven't softened your memory of me," said Animamon, sipping a cup of green tea. Veemon was sitting across from him, happily eating an array of biscuits that Wormmon had provided.
"Yeah, not really," said Davis. "Kinda had to go through some therapy because of your soul manipulating ass. Dying sorta sucks, you know."
"I'm aware," said Animamon.
"Yep, super weird. When can I bail?"
"Can I just explain why we're here?" said Ken.
"It wasn't just to have tea and cookies with this psycho?"
"I abused my power in my past life," said Animamon. "My lack of sight became an excuse to envy others and the digidestined in particular. It was a mistake I've had to come to terms with over time."
"And I'm so happy for you," Davis growled. He turned to Ken. "How long has this been going on?"
"Since he digivolved to Ruachmon," said Ken. "Wormmon and I stayed in touch with the elecmon in charge at the time to keep tabs on him."
"I knew that, but…" Davis gestured up and down the digimon with both hands, not sure how else to convey his disgust.
"He can help you remember," Ken said. He stopped to take a sip of tea and Davis felt his eyebrows turn in watching him.
"Remember what?"
"Why you married Yolei."
A muscle in his stomach clenched, tightening all the way up to his throat and his head started to shake before his voice came back. "No. No. I can't believe you'd—I'm not. You've got to be kidding me, Ken!"
"I know you're not happy."
"Of course I'm not!" Davis said. "This sucks, but if you think I'm letting this asshole turn into my therapist, you're nuts!"
"I just want you to remember what you're letting go."
"What I'm letting go?" Davis asked, jumping to his feet, angry with the way his voice cracked with emotion. He started to pace the hut, nearly running over the digimon in the process, including the big creepy one. "Do you think this is all me? She's, she—"
"What did you fight about?"
"I don't know!" Davis said. "We fight all the time. Our relationship sucks. You're the one who needs to let it go!"
And if it wasn't for Ken's stare and the way he saw through him and all his bullshit, Davis would have left right then and there. Instead he collapsed back in the chair across from the freakish digimon and poured himself another cup of scalding tea.
He tossed it down with a grimace and felt it burn the back of his throat.
"Fine," he coughed. "Once. Just so you can say you did something. And stop giving me those damn eyes."
...
...
"I'm right, right? Of course I'm right. I'm the right one. He goes left, I go right. I'm always right. I'm all right, ha ha I'm alright."
A round of giggles quickly melted into tears.
Matt gave a long sigh. "Why is she here again?"
Yolei buried her face in a throw pillow, pretending she hadn't noticed Sora silencing him with an elbow to the ribs. The glasses of wine she'd downed during her rant washed over her body in slow sad waves. Her arm flopped over the side of the couch and she brushed the dustless hardwood with her fingertips.
"Totally jussified," she mumbled into cotton.
"Maybe I should take you home," said Sora.
How was she not a mother already? Yolei was sure Sora had been practicing how to hover since she could stand.
"Hawkmon is probably worried about you."
Yolei's finger lifted from the ground, pointing in no particular direction. "'sin Digiworld."
"He's… wait." Sora clicked her tongue. "Does he know?"
Yolei's lips rubbed against the pillow when she shook her head and she could barely feel the ridges in the fabric. Was her face going numb?
"Yolei?"
"He—" Yolei gasped but the sob came anyway. "He's going to lecture me-eee-heeeee."
The pillow went wet, the fabric dampening with each muffled syllable while her back heaved up and down like it measured a 9.0 on the Richter scale.
Sora said, "Matt, call your brother. We're going to need a girl's night."
Girl's night started with a cup of coffee. Kari arrived juggling a tray of lattes, passing Matt on his way out. He took them from her hands and came back inside, setting them in front of the human blob on the couch.
"Take it easy on the caffeine," he said in a way that should have been vague, but was obviously directed at one person.
Kari must have frowned. "I can have one cup of coffee, Matt."
"Just looking out for my niece."
Yolei peeked from under her pillow to see Kari's hand rubbing her swollen stomach. She blew a loud raspberry into the sofa cushion. Matt's hands went up in defense when Sora scolded him and pushed him out the door.
Yolei sat up. "Do you need baby shoes?"
Kari and Sora stared.
Words seemed to run up Yolei's throat from the pit of her stomach. "I have a whole box in my closet," she confessed.
They'd been there for years now, stashed secretly on the top shelf. She had bought the first pair the week after her honeymoon: the tiniest pair of Adidas she'd ever seen with blue stripes not even the width of her pinky finger. She'd been collecting them ever since.
It was only a few months ago that Davis had uncovered them. They had been fighting (what was new?) about closet space (there wasn't any!) and in retribution to her comments about his sloppy organizational habits, he had decided to rearrange their stuff. Yolei had returned from a long day at the office to find him sitting in a pile of clothes and miniature footwear.
She immediately went on offense. "Why are you going through my stuff?!" Which was sort of a weird thing to say, since they shared everything anyway, including a bank account, which she had regretted on more than one occasion.
With red cheeks, she started scooping the tiny sneakers and sparkly slippers from the floor and waited for something bad: some teasing, insensitive remark.
Instead Davis laughed. Not his demeaning sarcastic laugh, but something more pure, the kind that warmed like sunshine. She looked at him and his eyes were already tearing up.
"Is there something you're not tellin me?"
She had felt terrible when she had to crush the excitement from his face.
"You mean the ones you—" Kari's voice went quiet. "Oh, Yolei, I thought they were for your nieces and nephews."
"I know, it's stupid." Yolei sat up and grabbed a latte from the coffee table. "It's not like I'm ever going to need them now." She wiped dried tears from her face, but that only ended up making more emerge, like her eyes were some old world miracle, a never ending well.
Yolei put her glasses back on to hide them, but it was too late.
Sora and Kari pressed on either side which only made it worse.
"That's not true, you're not even thirty yet. You might…" Sora trailed off, swallowing the words Yolei wasn't ready to hear.
It was still too soon to imagine starting a family with someone else. The thought made her reach for more wine, but there wasn't any.
So she drank a lot of coffee. When she had downed her latte, Kari offered the rest of hers and Sora made a pot, but the jitters didn't quell the sick feeling in her stomach. Yolei had said they needed to talk about something else, so they did, and then, when everything else seemed trivial, she wished she could change her mind.
Mimi came at just the right time.
She barged in the front door with an enormous basket consisting of a bottle of white wine, cookies, nail polish, a bottle of red, chips, chocolate chips, and (to top it off) a pink rosé, completing the colors of the wino rainbow. It was all packaged neatly in tulle with a hand-painted sign.
"Bad Breakup Basket," Sora read. "Did you just make that?"
Mimi gave a shrug. "I have a couple on reserve."
Yolei sniffed over the steam of her coffee.
"Mimi," Kari scolded, "She just started to sober up."
"Why?" Mimi asked. The basket was placed delicately on the coffee table. She pulled on the ornate ribbon and the tulle collapsed. A wine screw appeared out of nowhere and she was already working on the cork.
Yolei held out her glass. "Why indeed?"
Mimi filled it to the rim and wine splashed over Yolei's hand when she brought it to her mouth.
"Classy," muttered Sora, grabbing the bottle away and refilling her own glass to the curve.
Mimi clicked her tongue and Sora grabbed another glass from the kitchen. When it was filled, ("Properly," Sora insisted) Yolei had already drained hers by half.
"You poor thing," Mimi cooed. "Tell Mimi everything."
The wells of Yolei's eyes miraculously refilled, because for the life of her, as sure as she was that she and Davis were over, she couldn't even remember what there was to tell.
…
.~*~~**~~*~.
I'm not sure how long they've been there, but they're too absorbed in the computer screen to notice I'm home. I kick my sneakers off my aching feet and they hit the floor with a loud thump, but even that doesn't get their attention.
Veemon seems unconcerned. He's already face planted on our couch, digging for the remote.
"Yolei said you're late." It's Wormmon who makes the remark, smiling as Veemon headbutts his side. He looks bleary eyed, like he's been snoozing.
"Davis is home," says Hawkmon. He's perched between Ken and Yolei like the watchful, loyal bird he is. I give him a sharp salute then immediately realize how stupid I look and feel guilty for being jealous.
"You're late," says Yolei, not bothering to turn around.
"So I heard."
Ken turns and gives me a friendly wave. "We're trying to figure out how to debug her client's website."
"Fun," I grumble.
"How was your night?"
"Long." I trudge over and lean my forehead on Ken's back. "Hold me."
Yolei finally gives me attention, but she's rolling her eyes. "You said you'd be home for dinner tonight."
"Too busy makin everyone else dinner," I say, not bothering to lift my head from Ken's back. He's gotten more muscley since he started the police academy.
I frown at the pudge around my middle. You'd think pulling a noodle cart around all day would negate eating them, but my metabolism decided it was gonna slow down the day I hit 21.
"Well I made soba," says Yolei.
"Oh, soba!" chirps Veemon and he's already headed to the fridge.
I'm making a face and Yolei catches it out of the corner of her eye. She's gone into full glare mode.
"Ken said it was good."
I lift my head off his back and raise a brow at him. "Liar."
"Oh boy," says Hawkmon and he's looking at me like he knows what's coming and I should too.
I do, but for some reason that never stops me.
"I changed it like you told me to," Yolei snaps, sounding more irritated than usual. "For you."
"Fine," I groan. "I'll try it."
"Forget it."
"You just—"
"I don't even know why I bother trying. You hate everything I make."
"Just the food."
"I think I found the problem," says Ken suddenly, pointing at the screen. Yolei huffs and squints at the code and he uses the distraction to give me the look.
I glare at him, but talk to her. "How come you didn't ask Izzy for help?"
Yolei answers, "Because he's giving a lecture in Kyoto and you invited Ken over, remember?"
"Oh." I immediately feel like an idiot. "Yeah. Sorry. There was this weird late lunch rush and then it turned into the dinner rush." I suddenly feel a little burst of pride, curling my frown into a smile. "I think I found a new hot spot for the cart."
"That's great, Davis," Ken says.
"Maybe we can get out of the red this month," says Yolei, still typing to fix whatever Ken pointed out.
I cross my arms, feeling the sting of her backhanded comment. "What are you even doing?"
"The embedded video keeps going wonky," she replies, still clicking away. "This client's entire website has been a giant headache. Whoever put it together the first time was a moron. I mean, this goes beyond simple errors. It's repetitive nonsense, assigning variables twice, mixing up true and false, forgetting to close their tags."
"How dare they," I say.
She huffs. "You know, if you don't care why are you even asking?"
"I care. I just don't get why it takes so long," I say, bristling at her tone. "You were sitting in the same place when I left. Is that all you've been doing?"
"Do you even know what coding is?" she asks, all sarcasm, so I take the challenge.
"It's that stuff with all the letters and symbols that makes computer programs work." She looks at me over her shoulder like I'm stupid. "Hey, just because I don't get it doesn't make me an idiot. My brain just doesn't work that way."
"You're right," she snaps, and her desk chair turns around completely, her feet almost whipping Ken's legs. He takes a step backward and looks like he's trying to shrink into the wall.
"You're not an idiot," she says. "You choose to be stupid."
I sort of stare at her, even though I shouldn't be shocked. She's made enough comments over the years for me to know she considers me to be the dumb one of the relationship. She's just sugarcoating it because Ken is here.
We glare at each other for a minute and for a second I think she might apologize, but then she turns back to the computer, typing so angrily that I have a feeling she's screwing up whatever she's working on.
"Wow," I say.
"You should taste the soba, Davish," says Veemon. His mouth is full of it so I grab his chopsticks and shove a pile of noodles in my lips, slurping it up as loud as possible.
"S'great!" I say through an angry mouthful. "Perfect!"
Ken has to wipe a piece of noodle from his face.
"They're fighting again," explains Hawkmon when Veemon cocks his head in surprise.
Ken collects Wormmon from the sofa. "We should probably get going. I'm pretty positive that line is the problem. Thanks for having me over," he tells Yolei before turning to me. "I'm glad you found a lucrative spot for that cart."
He puts a hand on my shoulder and gives it a firm squeeze. I don't want to be mad at him, but I am for some dumb reason.
Yolei makes me mad at everyone.
When he's gone, I turn on her and she's turned her attention back to that dumb machine.
"You know what?" I say, taking another mouthful of soba. All my words come out with pieces of noodle. "I'm not stupid. I own my own business!"
"Oh, you mean the one that put us in debt?"
She's poking where it stings again.
I go red. "You have to take risks to be successful."
"You have to know how to count too."
"What the, I can, why are you—" I fluster and pretty much toss the bowl of soba on her desk, earning her full attention again. "You're the one who told me I should go ahead and get the cart! Why are you being such a—"
"Why don't you both start with 'I feel' statements?" says Hawkmon.
"Stop trying to fix us!" Yolei yells and he shrinks back.
"Don't yell at Hawkmon," I say.
"You know what's funny?" She starts rubbing her eyes and her glasses balance on her knuckles. "You think I think you're stupid, but that's not it at all." The glasses clench in her fist and she reaches to the mouse to save her work and shut the computer down. "The thing is, if you cared at all about what I did, you'd at least try to understand it. And you could. I swear you could. You just put up this dumb persona so you don't have to deal with things you don't like."
"I don't put up…" My teeth clench. "That's bullshit."
"I'm going to bed," she says and she does.
I don't follow.
.~*~~**~~*~.
Davis nearly smacked Animamon's hand out of his hair.
The digimon pulled back, seeming unoffended, but it was hard to tell with those creepy eyes of his.
"Well, thanks for reminding me why my marriage sucked. That was fun." Davis tried to ignore the way his chest clenched at the memory, the way it felt to sleep on the couch alone. "I'm out."
He stood from his chair, ignoring Ken telling him to wait, and stepped outside of the dark hut back into Primary Village. A mass of punimon collected at his feet; they had probably followed him there. He scooped one up and let it nuzzle his cheek, trying to distract himself from remembering what had happened next.
For some reason that part hurt more: the way he'd slinked back to their bed after a particular gruesome nightmare and scooped her into his arms, still shaking; how he had let her roll on top of him the moment her lips pressed against his jaw, with only her tears as an apology.
"Not good, huh?" Veemon asked, slipping out of the hut after him.
"Not much was," said Davis.
"Ken's right then." Veemon gave one of the punimon a noogie, not even looking when Davis raised a brow at him. "You do need to remember."
"Ken's...ugh." Davis squatted down and let the punimon climb all over him, defeated. "Fine, it wasn't all bad. I know that. This is just… too much right now, okay? I don't want to think about it."
Then, just when he had finished speaking, Ken's voice raised through the hut, sharp and angry.
"I told you why we were coming. What did you show him?"
Davis frowned, looking at the door behind them and heard Animamon's calm creepy voice speak back.
"My power is great, but limited," the digimon said. "I have never had control over which memories you experience. They are brought to the surface through strong emotion, by what your subconscious wants to see. Those are the easiest for me to grasp."
"I thought," Ken started, but he stopped and it grew very quiet inside.
The punimon on Davis's shoulders started hopping, anxious for him to move, but he found himself entranced, waiting to hear them speak again.
It was Wormmon who broke the silence. "He wasn't ready, Ken. You have to give him some time to heal."
"I hate this."
Davis felt his stomach drop at the sound of Ken's voice: the emotion choking through his throat. When he and Wormmon came out of the hut, he chucked a punimon at them. It giggled in the air like it hadn't just been thrown like a baseball.
Ken caught it, staring at him with wide eyes.
Davis frowned back. "You're a bastard."
"Davis, I'm—"
"Thanks."
There was a twitch in Ken's lips, the sort of smile that wasn't really happy. He tossed the punimon back and it laughed with delight.
...
...
Her fingertips were still numb, the alcohol having yet to recede completely. The wine Mimi had brought had done it, bringing Yolei to a level of sloppy crying she had yet to achieve. Maybe it was because it was the first time she'd truly mourned for what she'd lost.
Even if it wasn't.
Yolei stared at the wavering wall of Sora's bedroom where she'd retreated when her body had finally had enough. The pillow was wet under her cheek and her eyes kept drifting to the picture on the nightstand: the one of all of them, taken sometime after Cody had graduated high school, making them all officially adults. Yolei's own face stared back at her, looking too happy.
Why did memories return so tangled when she drank? The good and bad wound together until she wasn't sure which one had happened when or if they had ever been separated at all.
All she knew was the pain gripping her chest, making it hard to breathe.
She remembered the blood on his face, the way her heart hurt when he left. Or had she left? Was she thinking about his dead eyes as she stormed out the door or the ones that stared into the abyss, resting inside a corpse?
Her D-terminal was still tucked into her purse, never far even all these years later. Yolei tugged it out and let her numb fingers drift over the keys, not sure if her sentences were coherent, just knowing that if he didn't answer she might not breathe again.
His reply came almost immediately, despite the time.
FROM: Davis Motomiya
TO: Yolei Inoue-Motomiya
DATE: Today 1:13 AM
SUBJECT: RE: Are you ok?
I'm alive.
