Van watched Hitomi walk up the steps to her front door. She opened it up and gave him a last wave. A high pitched squeal came from the inside before the door closed. He stood there thinking about his friends' reaction when they had all found out about his newest girlfriend. Not to mention she was his best friend. In fact, she was everything he had ever wanted.
No one had confronted either of them on it besides Dilandau that morning but Van had seen their looks and heard their whispers. After twenty minutes of it at lunch time, neither him nor Hitomi could stand it anymore so they left to be alone.
Van was broken out of his reverie when he thought he heard a quiet thump from inside Hitomi's house. He shook his head and decided he needed to go home and do some homework for once. After he had taken several steps, Hitomi's mother opened the front door to her house and exited, jumping into her car and driving off quickly.
* * *
"Unnnngggghhh... "
"Hitomi?"
"Nnnnnyeah?"
"Talk to me 'Tomi! Please!"
Hitomi opened her eyes and immediately regretted it. Her headache seemed to quadruple when she did. Trying to move her arm to cover her eyes only resulted in a shooting pain through her whole body. An arm touched her shoulder and shook her lightly. Her eyes sprung back open and she gasped.
"OW!"
"I'm sorry Hitomi," a small voice said. After thinking for a moment she recognized it as Mamoru's. "You wouldn't wake up. Mommy left a long time ago and I didn't know what to do, oh, 'Tomi, what do I do?" Mamoru's eyes streamed and he wiped his nose on his sleeve.
The first thing Hitomi thought of was not to call the hospital or even her father, which would have been a close second.
"Van," she said. "Call Van, baby, he'll know what to do."
Mamoru ran off to get the phone. While he was gone, Hitomi shifted her focus to herself, trying to figure out what was wrong with her. Her head pounded and she felt very tired and slightly nauseous, which probably indicated she had a concussion. One of her wrists felt like it had been run over by a car several hundred times so she guessed it was broken. Gingerly, Hitomi tried to wiggle a foot. It hurt. Letting out a sigh of relief, Hitomi tried to think about other things while she waited for Mamoru to return.
He came back waving the phone in the air. Hitomi told him Van's number and listened to his side of the conversation.
"Hi, Van? This is Mamoru... I need to you come over right now... Hitomi needs you real bad. She fell down the stairs an- ... Yeah... I don't know... Okay, bye." He shut off the phone and turned to Hitomi. "He's coming."
"Thanks baby. You know what? You should call daddy okay? Tell him to come pick you up and that I'll call him later."
Mamoru nodded and wiped his nose on his sleeve again. He ran off to change, not even asking why. Hitomi struggled to keep her eyes open. After twenty seconds of that it got too challenging and she gave up. She'd just rest for a second because she was so tired.
"Hitomi?"
Her eyes flickered open. When they focussed she was staring into worried brown eyes. She barely felt his fingers gently touch the side of her face.
"Van," whispered Hitomi. "I'm sorry. I couldn't call you, I got Mamoru to and - and -"
"Shhh." Van tried to sooth her. She wasn't making much sense and he couldn't really blame her considering she had just "fallen" down the stairs. Picking up the phone, Van quickly called the emergency number and was put onto the line with an operator.
"Stay away, 'kay 'Tomi?" he said before starting to talk to the operator. When he finally shut off the phone, ambulance on it's way, Hitomi's eyes were closed. Van reached down and brushed his fingers across her cheek. Her eyes fluttered but didn't open.
Mamoru walked down the stairs, watching his sister's face. "Has Hitomi gone to sleep again Van?"
"Again?" Van asked, slightly panicked.
"Mmm hmmm... She was sleeping for a long time before. Is she going to sleep for that long again?"
"I hope not Mamoru. Is your dad on his way?" Mamoru nodded. "Okay, how about you stand at the front door and watch for him. When he comes here you go with him and me and Hitomi will talk to you later." Mamoru nodded again and ran to the door. After a couple minutes he called out a goodbye and ran out the door.
"Okay Hitomi, wake up," Van said, rubbing her cheek with his hand. "Wake up now." Her eyes flickered again and this time opened .
"Van," she breathed.
Letting out a sigh of relief, Van bent and kissed Hitomi's lips for a couple seconds. There was a knock on the door before it opened and Van sat back up. A couple paramedics surrounded Hitomi and lifted her up onto a stretcher. Van followed them and they let him get into the ambulance with her.
* * *
When Van saw Hitomi again it had been well over an hour since they had arrived at the hospital. There hadn't been anything too serious wrong with her but they wanted to keep her overnight for observation. Lacking anything to do, Van had called Hitomi's father, who brought Mamoru along, Merle, Dryden, Allen, Millerna, and Dilandau. The eight of them entered her room together. As soon as Millerna got a glimpse of her friend she let out a cry and covered her mouth.
Hitomi looked smaller than normal and there was an IV in her arm. Her left wrist was already in a cast and there were numerous machines hooked up to her to monitor her heart rate and other things. Merle turned around and buried her face in Van's chest. He wrapped his arms around her and lowered his eyes. This wasn't how he wanted to see Hitomi.
Allen had approached her bed and was now holding her right hand and stroking it softly. Hitomi's dad was sitting on a chair whispering to Mamoru.
"It was entirely accidental, she just fell down the stairs. Don't worry, Hitomi will be okay." Mamoru yawned, still watching his sister's face. Hitomi's father turned to Allen. "I'm going to take him home, will guys still be here for a while?"
Allen nodded. "We'll stay overnight too if we can," Merle said.
Hitomi's father smiled. "Good luck with that," he laughed. Taking Mamoru by the hand, he left the room.
"What happened to her Van?" Dilandau asked.
"Her - her mom," he choked out.
"What?" Allen sounded angry. "Her mom, Van?"
Van only nodded, while Millerna let out another choked sob. Dryden rocked her back and forth and whispered in her ear. She clung to him like a child would hold onto a precious toy and he ran his fingers through her blonde hair in an attempt to sooth her. Allen shot a quick jealous look in their direction but quickly masked his face.
"What do you mean?" Merle questioned.
"Aaaauuunnnngghhh..."
All of them turned to look at Hitomi and Allen bent down so his face was on a level with hers.
"Hitomi? Are you awake?"
"Ggnnnnyeah... Allen?"
"I'm here 'Tomi. We all are. How do you feel?" His big hands held her littler one
"My head hurts like a bitch," she complained.
"That'll happen sometimes," Dilandau joked.
"Dilly," Hitomi mumbled, smiling. "You're here too!"
"Yeah I am," he said. "Everyone's here." He was slightly worried how she didn't seem to grasp that Allen had said the same thing only moments before.
"Mmmm... Van too?"
"Yeah," Millerna said, having finally released Dryden. "He's here."
Van perched on the edge of her bed and leaned over and kissed her high on her cheekbone. "Hey baby, are you alright?" he asked soothingly.
Laughing slightly Hitomi said, "Yep. I'm fine. Thing's are just great."
Dryden tapped Van's arm and pointed to Hitomi's IV bag. Morphine. A slight smile appeared on Van's face then. He knew Hitomi would be alright.
"We're gonna head out, okay Hitomi? We'll see you in the morning." He squeezed her hand and walked to the door, letting everyone say their own goodbye.
Merle came up beside him and leaned on his shoulder. "You really love her, don't you?" she asked.
Van nodded. "Yeah, I guess I do."
"I'm happy for you guys," she said and hugged him before they all left the room.
(A/N: Wow, took me quite a while to update. I'm just to busy to update every week, sorry guys! A couple people have asked what Amicitia means. I think this is the best chapter to answer that as it's the best example of it's meaning. Amicitia means friendship in Latin. I looked it up on the internet and found a lot of different words I could have used for the title. This, by far, seemed to be the best one. Now go Review and I'll try to update sooner. You guys are the best!)