A/N: You like? Aw, garsh, yur awl jus' sayin' that. =^_^=
Disclaimer: I do NOT own. Got that? Get that? Yeah? Yeah.
POV Three
RIGHT AFTER THE LAST CHAPTER starting from the very next second.
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Of course, one can assume one is alone and be far from alone. One would just need the exception to being alone a soft breather and half asleep, is all.
In other words, Our Hero finally mustered up enough strength and courage to turn her head slightly.
She was laying in a bed (Dur) in a room that was only vaguely familiar, partly on her side (keyword partly) looking at the wall and window. The blankets around her were heavy and soft, and she felt like she would sink right into the bottom of the bed and fall into a blissful sleep.
Then she'd probably wake up in a cold sweat from more nightmares.
Her back was up against something warm - not another wall? Small bed? Room?
After a deep breath and a slight grimace, she shifted slightly, then rolled over. A moment of silent praise for one's self, open one's eyes... stifle a scream.
She was NOT the only one in the bed.
After a moment of rightly dished-out panic, she relaxed a little bit (keyword little) when her eyes got used to the dark and moonlight.
Originally, she composed, she had most likely been sleeping with her back nestled up against Haku's chest.
Go figure.
Her movements hadn't awoken him, and he continued to breath lightly, eyes closed, eyebrows knitted together softly.
This must have been his room. She remembered it now.
Chihiro took in his appearance carefully, trying to figure out how she had gotten there at the same time.
He was curled slightly, around her, and one arm was still drooped lightly over her waist. The other hand was bent up and balled into a fist, pressing against his mouth. Hair askew.
A moment of nothing ensued. Had she come here, or had he brought her here? Would Rin have allowed that? Then again, everybody was pretty certain that Chihiro was completely Haku's responsibility.
He shifted slightly and she froze, muscles tensing to an almost uncomfortable rate. There was a sudden scream somewhere in the bathhouse, a woman's scream, and it echoed off the walls, shattered glass, it was a scream!
Chihiro jerked with a muffled scream herself and Haku's eyes snapped open. This, as expected, freaked Chihiro out as well, and she was on her feet in an instant.
Then again, so was Haku.
And the rest of the bathhouse for that matter.
Except Chihiro's head started pounding immediately and she literally collapsed with a groan of pain.
"Stay," Haku said, voice slightly thick as though he didn't seem to like being awake. He grabbed his white over-shirt thing (and the girls have those pink over shirt things too, right?) and threw it on, tying the blue sash around it as he pushed his door open (along with every other door) and stepped out, just finishing the knot.
Chihiro could hear him shouting not to worry and to get back to bed, and eventually silence came after that.
'Curiosity killed the cat,' Chihiro thought after some time for clutching her head. She slowly sat up a moment later, though, and cautiously dragged herself to her feet. She spent a moment looking around for a shirt that was hers, AND clean, but ended up settling for a small blanket anyway. She didn't plan on being caught, and anyway, she had her apron on.
Each step she took was slow and carefully placed, thus, her going was slow. Her head stayed bowed, and she was slightly bent because her stomach certainly wasn't doing well either. One hand alternated between massaging a temple and clutching her stomach, and the other guided her along a wall, stairs, pretty far until she saw a small light and heard voices.
It was in one of the tubs, the Big One (which was clean as of last week) and the flickering of a candle stained the wooden floor with the dancing flame light, three voices seemingly magnified in the dark silence of night.
The first was Yubaba. Had to be.
The second was the guy that hadn't wanted to let Chihiro in that part of the bathhouse.
The third was unmistakably Haku.
Chihiro didn't dare peering around the corner for fear of getting caught, but she crouched against one of the wall things next to it and listened in on the conversation.
"... Sure? It could have been anything else, ah, ahb, Kaonashi or a shadow dancer..." The man was saying.
"Are you questioning my authority?" Yubaba's voice cut in shrill and sent shivers down Chihiro's spine.
"N- No ma'am! I was just questioning the possibilities of it being something else, was all!"
"Shut up," came the growled reply. Then her voice changed dramatically from an ordering, scary one to a firm, almost angry one. "Haku, I want you to scout this place out and report to me in the morning, first sun rise, got that? Anybody that's out, the slightest foot print in the dust, you tell me."
"Hai."
"Good. And YOU, my fine friend, YOU will go around and make sure that nobody is awake or out walking around, you hear?"
"Yes ma'am!"
"Very good. What obedient little boys I have. And *I* will be going out. Get to work!"
"Hai."
"Yes, ma'am!"
There was a momentary silence, then the man's voice slowly breathed out in a semi-sigh in relief.
"Whew, scary woman, isn't she?" he asked, starting to come out. The candle light's circle came closer, and Chihiro panicked for a moment, then dived around behind into a different bath as the man left, continuing.
"Need a candle?" he asked.
"No. I'm fine."
"Suit yourself." The man left, and she listened carefully to the sound of his feet, making sure that they were completely gone from that floor of the bathhouse completely. She closed her eyes, listening carefully. When everything was dark and silent again, she opened them once more and began to feel her way out, around the corner - and smack into somebody.
"What are you doing?" a voice demanded. It took a moment for the words to trickle in one ear and filter out the other.
"A, um, I, I was, uh, I came down, to, to get..." think Chihiro, think! "To get a glass of water!" she blurted out finally, voice higher than usual.
She didn't think even a worm would have accepted or believed that answer.
Haku didn't buy it either.
Both hands gripped her shoulders tightly, and she flinched.
"I told you to *stay*!" he hissed.
"Oh, now I feel bad, bad girl!" she hissed right back, angry all of a sudden, and figuring that the blood circulation to her brain was being cut off by his death grip on her shoulders. His fingers tightened and began to hurt.
She bit her lip, then wondered if it was her imagination that she was beginning to feel dizzy once more - more dizzier than usual, meant.
"Sen, don't," he said, voice dropping to a dangerous notch two levels lower then before. "Push it. do you *have* a death wish? Or was leaving your parents here part of your master plan!"
"Shut up!" she growled through her teeth. "None of this is my fault! And I want to know how I got in your room, and your bed!"
"I took you there," he growled right back through his own teeth. His fingers felt as though they had punctured the thin blanket around her and she could feel their tips on her bare shoulders.
"Why?"
"Because you're very sick, and though the symptoms obviously aren't showing up at the moment you aren't any better."
"So? I could've stayed with Rin-san!"
"You're contagious, I have only just discovered - already two other slugs and a frog are being affected. They were easily enough cured with some medicine and recommended rest, when what happened but Rin came up and demanded to know what was wrong with you."
"So give me the medicine and rest so I can find a way to save my parents."
"It doesn't work that way, Chihiro. You humans are so weak, and you're frail enough in particular. The medicine is a drink, and it would poison and kill you, not make you any better. It works on spirits because they rarely if ever get sick, and there certainly hasn't been anything as bad as this."
"Then make me better! Rin-san said it was probably that red berry I ate and YOU fed me! just what was it?"
"The berry probably upset your stomach, but you already had a slight fever when you came, I'm guessing."
"Then how do I get better? I have to save my parents!"
"You're parents aren't going to drop dead any minute!" suddenly, his facial expression changed to a slightly more relaxed state, almost pity really, and his eyes softened. He jerked his hands away from her shoulders, which had gone numb without Chihiro noticing it, and she thought she saw out of the corner of her eye blood on his finger tips. This observation was proved true when sharp stings snapped at her brain, and she looked from one shoulder to the other, biting her lower lip as she (and Haku) realized his nails had cut all the way into her skin.
Haku shook his head slightly and took her hand, giving her a gentle look, and carefully led her back to his room.
He peeled off the blanket and put a burning sort of clover-smelling lotion thing on her shoulders, and she let him rub it in.
"Just rest," He said softly, pushing her down. "And try not to piss me off again." His expression flickered. "Sometimes I don't know what I do when that happens, and I don't want to hurt you. just rest."
"When you get angry you can't control yourself?"
"When some sort of major emotion shows up I guess I lose track..." he seemed to snap, literally, back into neutrality. "Sleep. You'll feel even worse in the morning, I'm going to have to tell you that now." He drew the covers over her before she could resist and kissed her forehead before leaving, closing the door firmly behind him.
Chihiro just laid there for a moment.
'Did he just kiss me?' she thought, somewhat in a daze.
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When she woke up the next morning, Haku's warning about her feeling worse proved true, and she ended up in her usual position of curled up in a tiny ball, clutching her pounding head.
"What have I got? Some sort of Flu virus?" she asked softly, voice squeaking softly into the silent, empty room.
After a while, she felt a little better, better enough to roll over and sit up enough to take the cup of water next to the bed and drink something. For a while she just lay there, miserable.
It felt around mid afternoon when anything happened. Haku came in, closing the door lightly behind him.
"Hay," he said gently. He came over, a sort of bag thing - like a small delivery bag, slung around his shoulder. He helped Chihiro sit up, then dug around in his bag thing until he had a couple of leaves, a bluish purplish greenish grayish in color.
"Burn these, the fumes will help," Haku told her, showing her how to use a candle to burn them and not burn anything else at the same time.
"Is that all ya got in the bag?" Chihiro asked, voice still slightly squeaky, small, weak.
"No. I just got back from something, I need to give to Yubaba," he frowned slightly, reaching out and putting a hand against her forehead. He shook his head, sighing, perplexed. "I can't figure out what you have."
"Fells kind of like the bad case of the Flu," Chihiro said helpfully.
He smiled a little. "May be." He said quietly. The burning leaves didn't give off a smell, but the invisible smoke made Haku dizzy - he wasn't contagiously ill, and too much of this stuff would get him just as bad as Chihiro, maybe even worse. They were poison to spirits. Chihiro was slightly aware of how she could breathe easier, but that was it.
Suddenly, she thought of something.
"Hey, Haku-sama?" she asked, "last night you said I was contagious. What's to stop you from getting what I've got?"
"I've already got it," he said. "I've built up a slight immunity, so I'm not contagious myself."
"But you still suffer the symptoms!"
"Not really."
She frowned. Her symptoms were... Stomach ache, dizziness, headache... was he suffering from those things right now? She watched him carefully as he stood up again and stretched. He was moving carefully - did that point out anything? She was feeling better - and the thick smell of the leaves was very comforting, and made her feel even better. She tested her strength, then slowly got to her feet.
He watched her with an expression close to a mix of amusement and anger at her continuing defiance of his orders.
"I think that YOU are the one that should be laid down and doctored," Chihiro said carefully. Now that all the blood had rushed from her head, she realized that she was very dizzy indeed.. slowly, her head began thumping in her temples again, and her stomach fluttered. She closed her eyes, grabbing the bedpost, and inhaled deeply through her nose and mouth. It helped. Those leaves really were a province.
"Go back to sleep," he urged quietly. His voice seemed a little bit stuffy, as though he wasn't breathing through his nose. She opened then narrowed her eyes, squinting at him. His lips were parted slightly, and the rise and fall of his chest was much more audible.
"You ARE sick!" she cried triumphantly, then immediately regretted it. her own voice echoed around her head, feeling shrill and gaining pitch in her ears. It took Chihiro a moment to realize she was back in his bed, with Haku pulling the covers over her.
"I'm fine," he told her firmly yet gently, voice soft (BUT NOW she decided it seemed a bit croaky as well as stuffy, too). "Don't worry about me, worry about yourself. I can't wait on you for very long and you have a contract as well as job. We certainly don't want you getting eaten, right? Then everybody would be sick." He stood up fuller, and Chihiro saw he had been laying slightly on the bed post.
"I need to go," he said, voice low. "Go back to sleep."
"I can't sleep!" came the reply. Chihiro frowned. "And you aren't breathing the right way! Your voice sounds like you're holding your breath and talking at the same time, or at least trying to!"
"Then you have sharp ears." Seeing as she wouldn't do anything he said until she got an explanation, he said, "The fumes from the leaves are poisonous, didn't I mention that before? To spirits, they could get one dead in a matter of a month. I'm no exception - They're supposed to be helping you breathe easier and get rid of anything contagious sooner. Seeing as I've already told you I'm not contagious, their poison is just washing through my veins right now and if I stay here any longer I might end up passing out and I'd rather not do that at the moment." As he said all of this without taking a breath, he grabbed his messenger bag thing and backed away toward the door. "Sayonara, Chihiro," he said softly, because he really hadn't been breathing in. he slipped out as quickly as he could, and Chihiro was suddenly aware that there was something blocking the cracks of the door and window.
He had just risked poisoning himself for her own comfort. How sweet of him!
Chihiro sighed, head resting in the smothering softness of the pillow. She hoped he was okay.
Eventually, the burning leaves made her drowsy, and she joyfully welcomed the blackness of a nice heavy sleep.
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A/N: ya, so, beat me up, flame me, whatever.
Disclaimer: I do NOT own. Got that? Get that? Yeah? Yeah.
POV Three
RIGHT AFTER THE LAST CHAPTER starting from the very next second.
.
.
.
Of course, one can assume one is alone and be far from alone. One would just need the exception to being alone a soft breather and half asleep, is all.
In other words, Our Hero finally mustered up enough strength and courage to turn her head slightly.
She was laying in a bed (Dur) in a room that was only vaguely familiar, partly on her side (keyword partly) looking at the wall and window. The blankets around her were heavy and soft, and she felt like she would sink right into the bottom of the bed and fall into a blissful sleep.
Then she'd probably wake up in a cold sweat from more nightmares.
Her back was up against something warm - not another wall? Small bed? Room?
After a deep breath and a slight grimace, she shifted slightly, then rolled over. A moment of silent praise for one's self, open one's eyes... stifle a scream.
She was NOT the only one in the bed.
After a moment of rightly dished-out panic, she relaxed a little bit (keyword little) when her eyes got used to the dark and moonlight.
Originally, she composed, she had most likely been sleeping with her back nestled up against Haku's chest.
Go figure.
Her movements hadn't awoken him, and he continued to breath lightly, eyes closed, eyebrows knitted together softly.
This must have been his room. She remembered it now.
Chihiro took in his appearance carefully, trying to figure out how she had gotten there at the same time.
He was curled slightly, around her, and one arm was still drooped lightly over her waist. The other hand was bent up and balled into a fist, pressing against his mouth. Hair askew.
A moment of nothing ensued. Had she come here, or had he brought her here? Would Rin have allowed that? Then again, everybody was pretty certain that Chihiro was completely Haku's responsibility.
He shifted slightly and she froze, muscles tensing to an almost uncomfortable rate. There was a sudden scream somewhere in the bathhouse, a woman's scream, and it echoed off the walls, shattered glass, it was a scream!
Chihiro jerked with a muffled scream herself and Haku's eyes snapped open. This, as expected, freaked Chihiro out as well, and she was on her feet in an instant.
Then again, so was Haku.
And the rest of the bathhouse for that matter.
Except Chihiro's head started pounding immediately and she literally collapsed with a groan of pain.
"Stay," Haku said, voice slightly thick as though he didn't seem to like being awake. He grabbed his white over-shirt thing (and the girls have those pink over shirt things too, right?) and threw it on, tying the blue sash around it as he pushed his door open (along with every other door) and stepped out, just finishing the knot.
Chihiro could hear him shouting not to worry and to get back to bed, and eventually silence came after that.
'Curiosity killed the cat,' Chihiro thought after some time for clutching her head. She slowly sat up a moment later, though, and cautiously dragged herself to her feet. She spent a moment looking around for a shirt that was hers, AND clean, but ended up settling for a small blanket anyway. She didn't plan on being caught, and anyway, she had her apron on.
Each step she took was slow and carefully placed, thus, her going was slow. Her head stayed bowed, and she was slightly bent because her stomach certainly wasn't doing well either. One hand alternated between massaging a temple and clutching her stomach, and the other guided her along a wall, stairs, pretty far until she saw a small light and heard voices.
It was in one of the tubs, the Big One (which was clean as of last week) and the flickering of a candle stained the wooden floor with the dancing flame light, three voices seemingly magnified in the dark silence of night.
The first was Yubaba. Had to be.
The second was the guy that hadn't wanted to let Chihiro in that part of the bathhouse.
The third was unmistakably Haku.
Chihiro didn't dare peering around the corner for fear of getting caught, but she crouched against one of the wall things next to it and listened in on the conversation.
"... Sure? It could have been anything else, ah, ahb, Kaonashi or a shadow dancer..." The man was saying.
"Are you questioning my authority?" Yubaba's voice cut in shrill and sent shivers down Chihiro's spine.
"N- No ma'am! I was just questioning the possibilities of it being something else, was all!"
"Shut up," came the growled reply. Then her voice changed dramatically from an ordering, scary one to a firm, almost angry one. "Haku, I want you to scout this place out and report to me in the morning, first sun rise, got that? Anybody that's out, the slightest foot print in the dust, you tell me."
"Hai."
"Good. And YOU, my fine friend, YOU will go around and make sure that nobody is awake or out walking around, you hear?"
"Yes ma'am!"
"Very good. What obedient little boys I have. And *I* will be going out. Get to work!"
"Hai."
"Yes, ma'am!"
There was a momentary silence, then the man's voice slowly breathed out in a semi-sigh in relief.
"Whew, scary woman, isn't she?" he asked, starting to come out. The candle light's circle came closer, and Chihiro panicked for a moment, then dived around behind into a different bath as the man left, continuing.
"Need a candle?" he asked.
"No. I'm fine."
"Suit yourself." The man left, and she listened carefully to the sound of his feet, making sure that they were completely gone from that floor of the bathhouse completely. She closed her eyes, listening carefully. When everything was dark and silent again, she opened them once more and began to feel her way out, around the corner - and smack into somebody.
"What are you doing?" a voice demanded. It took a moment for the words to trickle in one ear and filter out the other.
"A, um, I, I was, uh, I came down, to, to get..." think Chihiro, think! "To get a glass of water!" she blurted out finally, voice higher than usual.
She didn't think even a worm would have accepted or believed that answer.
Haku didn't buy it either.
Both hands gripped her shoulders tightly, and she flinched.
"I told you to *stay*!" he hissed.
"Oh, now I feel bad, bad girl!" she hissed right back, angry all of a sudden, and figuring that the blood circulation to her brain was being cut off by his death grip on her shoulders. His fingers tightened and began to hurt.
She bit her lip, then wondered if it was her imagination that she was beginning to feel dizzy once more - more dizzier than usual, meant.
"Sen, don't," he said, voice dropping to a dangerous notch two levels lower then before. "Push it. do you *have* a death wish? Or was leaving your parents here part of your master plan!"
"Shut up!" she growled through her teeth. "None of this is my fault! And I want to know how I got in your room, and your bed!"
"I took you there," he growled right back through his own teeth. His fingers felt as though they had punctured the thin blanket around her and she could feel their tips on her bare shoulders.
"Why?"
"Because you're very sick, and though the symptoms obviously aren't showing up at the moment you aren't any better."
"So? I could've stayed with Rin-san!"
"You're contagious, I have only just discovered - already two other slugs and a frog are being affected. They were easily enough cured with some medicine and recommended rest, when what happened but Rin came up and demanded to know what was wrong with you."
"So give me the medicine and rest so I can find a way to save my parents."
"It doesn't work that way, Chihiro. You humans are so weak, and you're frail enough in particular. The medicine is a drink, and it would poison and kill you, not make you any better. It works on spirits because they rarely if ever get sick, and there certainly hasn't been anything as bad as this."
"Then make me better! Rin-san said it was probably that red berry I ate and YOU fed me! just what was it?"
"The berry probably upset your stomach, but you already had a slight fever when you came, I'm guessing."
"Then how do I get better? I have to save my parents!"
"You're parents aren't going to drop dead any minute!" suddenly, his facial expression changed to a slightly more relaxed state, almost pity really, and his eyes softened. He jerked his hands away from her shoulders, which had gone numb without Chihiro noticing it, and she thought she saw out of the corner of her eye blood on his finger tips. This observation was proved true when sharp stings snapped at her brain, and she looked from one shoulder to the other, biting her lower lip as she (and Haku) realized his nails had cut all the way into her skin.
Haku shook his head slightly and took her hand, giving her a gentle look, and carefully led her back to his room.
He peeled off the blanket and put a burning sort of clover-smelling lotion thing on her shoulders, and she let him rub it in.
"Just rest," He said softly, pushing her down. "And try not to piss me off again." His expression flickered. "Sometimes I don't know what I do when that happens, and I don't want to hurt you. just rest."
"When you get angry you can't control yourself?"
"When some sort of major emotion shows up I guess I lose track..." he seemed to snap, literally, back into neutrality. "Sleep. You'll feel even worse in the morning, I'm going to have to tell you that now." He drew the covers over her before she could resist and kissed her forehead before leaving, closing the door firmly behind him.
Chihiro just laid there for a moment.
'Did he just kiss me?' she thought, somewhat in a daze.
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.
When she woke up the next morning, Haku's warning about her feeling worse proved true, and she ended up in her usual position of curled up in a tiny ball, clutching her pounding head.
"What have I got? Some sort of Flu virus?" she asked softly, voice squeaking softly into the silent, empty room.
After a while, she felt a little better, better enough to roll over and sit up enough to take the cup of water next to the bed and drink something. For a while she just lay there, miserable.
It felt around mid afternoon when anything happened. Haku came in, closing the door lightly behind him.
"Hay," he said gently. He came over, a sort of bag thing - like a small delivery bag, slung around his shoulder. He helped Chihiro sit up, then dug around in his bag thing until he had a couple of leaves, a bluish purplish greenish grayish in color.
"Burn these, the fumes will help," Haku told her, showing her how to use a candle to burn them and not burn anything else at the same time.
"Is that all ya got in the bag?" Chihiro asked, voice still slightly squeaky, small, weak.
"No. I just got back from something, I need to give to Yubaba," he frowned slightly, reaching out and putting a hand against her forehead. He shook his head, sighing, perplexed. "I can't figure out what you have."
"Fells kind of like the bad case of the Flu," Chihiro said helpfully.
He smiled a little. "May be." He said quietly. The burning leaves didn't give off a smell, but the invisible smoke made Haku dizzy - he wasn't contagiously ill, and too much of this stuff would get him just as bad as Chihiro, maybe even worse. They were poison to spirits. Chihiro was slightly aware of how she could breathe easier, but that was it.
Suddenly, she thought of something.
"Hey, Haku-sama?" she asked, "last night you said I was contagious. What's to stop you from getting what I've got?"
"I've already got it," he said. "I've built up a slight immunity, so I'm not contagious myself."
"But you still suffer the symptoms!"
"Not really."
She frowned. Her symptoms were... Stomach ache, dizziness, headache... was he suffering from those things right now? She watched him carefully as he stood up again and stretched. He was moving carefully - did that point out anything? She was feeling better - and the thick smell of the leaves was very comforting, and made her feel even better. She tested her strength, then slowly got to her feet.
He watched her with an expression close to a mix of amusement and anger at her continuing defiance of his orders.
"I think that YOU are the one that should be laid down and doctored," Chihiro said carefully. Now that all the blood had rushed from her head, she realized that she was very dizzy indeed.. slowly, her head began thumping in her temples again, and her stomach fluttered. She closed her eyes, grabbing the bedpost, and inhaled deeply through her nose and mouth. It helped. Those leaves really were a province.
"Go back to sleep," he urged quietly. His voice seemed a little bit stuffy, as though he wasn't breathing through his nose. She opened then narrowed her eyes, squinting at him. His lips were parted slightly, and the rise and fall of his chest was much more audible.
"You ARE sick!" she cried triumphantly, then immediately regretted it. her own voice echoed around her head, feeling shrill and gaining pitch in her ears. It took Chihiro a moment to realize she was back in his bed, with Haku pulling the covers over her.
"I'm fine," he told her firmly yet gently, voice soft (BUT NOW she decided it seemed a bit croaky as well as stuffy, too). "Don't worry about me, worry about yourself. I can't wait on you for very long and you have a contract as well as job. We certainly don't want you getting eaten, right? Then everybody would be sick." He stood up fuller, and Chihiro saw he had been laying slightly on the bed post.
"I need to go," he said, voice low. "Go back to sleep."
"I can't sleep!" came the reply. Chihiro frowned. "And you aren't breathing the right way! Your voice sounds like you're holding your breath and talking at the same time, or at least trying to!"
"Then you have sharp ears." Seeing as she wouldn't do anything he said until she got an explanation, he said, "The fumes from the leaves are poisonous, didn't I mention that before? To spirits, they could get one dead in a matter of a month. I'm no exception - They're supposed to be helping you breathe easier and get rid of anything contagious sooner. Seeing as I've already told you I'm not contagious, their poison is just washing through my veins right now and if I stay here any longer I might end up passing out and I'd rather not do that at the moment." As he said all of this without taking a breath, he grabbed his messenger bag thing and backed away toward the door. "Sayonara, Chihiro," he said softly, because he really hadn't been breathing in. he slipped out as quickly as he could, and Chihiro was suddenly aware that there was something blocking the cracks of the door and window.
He had just risked poisoning himself for her own comfort. How sweet of him!
Chihiro sighed, head resting in the smothering softness of the pillow. She hoped he was okay.
Eventually, the burning leaves made her drowsy, and she joyfully welcomed the blackness of a nice heavy sleep.
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A/N: ya, so, beat me up, flame me, whatever.
