A/N: Thanks to everyone for the follows and feedback on this story! It still baffles me in a good way that I'm no longer the only one invested (or at least interested) in this thing. "Stop hoarding fics" was the best New Years resolution I ever made. Hayashinkage17, I sure hope so too! Yurippe is stubborn, though. A big question is... does she even want their help in the first place?
It's been a tiresome week, starting a summer course and already having trouble accessing a very important program (still waiting on an email from my prof), but I always look forward to Saturdays because of Heartbreak Cure.
Happy July, and happy reading!
[Chapter 08]: Chaos and Contemplation
Since Naoi's dramatic exit, Yuri had taken to getting her remaining three guests back on track. They'd converged in her TV room, Hinata sprawled out lazily across one couch and Otonashi and Kanade sitting close together on the other. Yuri left for a minute but returned with a smirk and an extra accessory.
"So," she said, plopping down in her armchair, "let's get back to that operation you mentioned earlier."
"I can't believe she has the beret," Hinata muttered.
"I saw it at the first department store I went to when I moved here and I just couldn't resist." She shrugged, leaning back comfortably and crossing her arms. "I figured it would come in handy someday… Anyway, now that we have the graduating group of four back together—"
"Five," said Kanade.
Yuri frowned, but Otonashi and even Hinata were giving her the same matter-of-fact stare-down.
"Fine. Whatever. Five. But… Naoi," she said, and she honestly wasn't totally being sarcastic as much as she was trying the name out on her tongue, "isn't here right now, so it's just the four of us. And as I was saying, now that we've had our little reunion..."
"…we should decide who we're going to look for next," Otonashi finished for her. "Honestly we hadn't even considered it yet. Any ideas?"
Yuri mulled over their choices for a moment. "Dunno… Noda?"
Hinata and Otonashi made razzing noises and thumbs down gestures in unison.
"Not that idiot," said Hinata. "I think I want to find Shiina."
"Seconded," Yuri said with a nod.
"Thirded," said Otonashi, and he grinned at Hinata, "but I'm telling Yui."
"We'll find Shiina then, if that's what you all want." Kanade smiled softly. "And Yuzuru, I'm sure Yui won't mind."
"The question is, just how do we go about doing this?" asked Hinata. "With Naoi and Yurippe, we knew where to look. And we really didn't have to look too far. But with Shiina, she's pretty good at staying hidden unless she wants to be found."
Otonashi rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Yeah, but I'm getting the feeling that, all along, fate's been leading us to the people we're meant to meet." Looking toward Kanade, he gave her hand an affectionate squeeze. "Let's do what we did when we wanted to find Naoi and Yuri. Remember what we know of their past lives, check in our hometowns and the cities around them, and work our way out from there."
"Not very professional," Yuri tsked, raising an eyebrow. "This sounds less like an operation and more like randomly tracking down old friends."
"Yeah, but collectively it's an operation."
Yuri scoffed, but Otonashi vouched for him. "Hinata's right. Besides, it's no more amateur than going on a picnic and killing everyone in the hopes that we might get possessed by a demon."
"And it worked, didn't it?!"
"Too well," Hinata grunted, putting a hand to his mouth at the gruesome memory.
"Though seeing as you guys are all here, I guess your operation worked too," Yuri mused. She waved a hand dismissively. "I'm still taking over it."
Kanade's eyes twinkled with mirth. "I knew you would."
"And as leader, since I can tell this operation might take a while, I say in the meantime we should catch up. You know, hang out a little. Just as the graduation group," Yuri said, fondly looking over the lovable bunch of misfits who were taking up her TV room. "You guys can stay here for a little while if you want. I've only lived here for a few months, and it kind of sucks because my only visitors are a couple of work friends sometimes and my best friend from my old town."
When Kanade straightened up and gave her a surprised look, Yuri corrected herself.
"Best friend in this life, Kanade. Not in general."
This seemed to appease Kanade, who fell back against Otonashi's shoulder with a contented hum.
"Aww, Yurippe's lonely!" Hinata cooed. Ignoring her growls and adamant snarls of the contrary, he continued, "Well, we were going to crash on your couch and eat all your food anyway—"
"I expected as such." Smirking, she threw her hat at him, then got up from her seat and started towards the kitchen. "I'm starving. And I'm gonna make some coffee. You guys want anything?"
Hinata stood up too, sending the hat tumbling to the floor in his haste. "I will literally eat anything you make. I haven't eaten since this morning, all because Naoi refused to make any stops."
Kanade glanced up at him, bemused. "It's like he said, it was only a two hour drive. You could have packed something or eaten before we left."
"But getting fast food is part of the road trip experience!" Hinata argued, stomping his foot.
"…You are so strange."
Hinata attempted to maintain a look of indignation, but the faint traces of a grin tugged even more stubbornly at his lips. "Fair enough."
By this time, Otonashi had wandered into the kitchen toward Yuri, who was currently attending to a coffee pot. "Hey," he said hopefully, earning a curious glance from her, "any chance that's Key coffee you're making?"
Yuri held up the bag with the telltale logo, quirking a brow. "Of course. Is there any other kind?"
"Uh oh, don't tell Naoi," said Hinata, still grinning as he and Kanade entered the kitchen. "Any mention of Key coffee and he looks like he's seen a ghost."
"Okay, are you in love with this guy or something?" Yuri asked, squinting at him as she turned her back to the counter.
Hinata reddened furiously, a cherry tomato shade that Yuri interpreted to her amusement as a crush blush rather than irritation—even though he was showing his telltale temple throb.
"Hell no!" he snapped, jabbing a finger in her face. "Look who's talking!"
"May I remind you, that comeback means nothing to me," Yuri said coolly, before making her way to the fridge. "All I can say is I'm not the one going like 'Naoi this, Naoi that' every five seconds."
"Because you don't remember him." Coming up behind her, Kanade put a hand on her shoulder, and Yuri spun around at the touch. "Does that bother you?"
Kanade had a certain way of looking at people that made them wonder if she could read the truth in their eyes before they even tried to form a lie on their lips. Most people, Otonashi in particular, always caved.
Yuri was no exception, so she didn't even try to fight it for longer than a two-second hesitation. Even though she realized after a moment that the chill she was feeling had come from the fridge door she'd left open.
"Honestly, yeah," she said with a small, frustrated sigh. "You guys keep bringing him up like it's no big deal, and it just keeps reminding me that something's wrong with me. Not only that I'm out of the loop, but that somewhere along the line my brain screwed up." She nodded toward the one person here who could possibly understand even a little. "Otonashi, you remember how fun it is to have amnesia."
"So then why don't we just cure you the way Naoi cured Otonashi?" Hinata asked.
When Yuri gave the boys a blank look, Otonashi cleared his throat.
"Um. Hypnosis."
Yuri tensed, clenching her jaw and shaking her head vehemently. "Oh no. Absolutely not." She whirled back around and grabbed some ingredients out of the fridge, then slammed the door shut for emphasis.
Otonashi tilted his head in confusion, which eerily reminded Yuri of Kanade. "Why not? It worked on me then. We saw him hypnotize some guy into thinking he was a dango so we know at least one trick works in this life. We were going to try using it on the other members of Battlefront anyway."
"Then why don't you just save his powers for them?" Yuri turned her focus and her aggression to chopping food instead of body parts. "Sorry, but I can't just trust a guy I don't know to pull some sort of hypnosis crap on me. These are my memories we're talking about. I don't want to be his test run."
Hinata scratched his hair. "I don't get it—do you want to remember Naoi or not?"
"I don't know, okay?" Yuri slammed another door—the pots and pans cabinet this time. "Can we just drop it?"
"Alright. Geez." Holding up his hands in surrender, Hinata backed away until he could use Kanade as a barrier between him and Yuri. "Anyway, I guess a lot of people would kill to forget their exes entirely."
"Lucky me. Change the subject."
After lunch, while Hinata was in the TV room eagerly doing online research and Kanade was skimming through a phonebook, Otonashi joined Yuri in the kitchen to help her clean up and put away the dishes. His sudden presence made her smile to herself. It was almost like they were up on the roof of the administration building again and nothing had changed, save for their coming to grips with their lives.
She'd had only two siblings in this life and she'd lost them too, in a car crash that killed their grandparents as well. There was nothing she could have done, and she'd accepted that. Granted, it had taken a while, but one day she didn't feel so alone anymore. Maybe the same thing had happened to Otonashi.
"Is there anything interesting going on out there, or are you just completely out of it?"
Yuri snapped her gaze to Otonashi, who was regarding her with a look of amused interest. She'd been zoning out, staring straight ahead through the kitchen window above the sink but seeing nothing, only thinking.
"Completely out of it," she admitted, resuming her dish scrubbing. "Thinking about this life, what I've gone through… Did the universe screw you over again too?"
By the understanding glint in his eyes, he knew who she was indirectly asking about. "Yeah. It sure did." He flicked his stare over her shoulder in the direction of the TV room, then it returned to her. "But it gave me something back."
It was physically impossible for her to hold back a smile. "It's really good to see you guys again."
"Same here," Otonashi said warmly, over the clink of clean dishes he was stacking in the cupboard above his head. "I think this may be our best operation yet."
Well, that wasn't saying much, considering their past operations often involved gore and death. But still, she had to agree with him. It was nice that it wasn't about war anymore. It was about being together with everyone. Everyone who had mattered so much to her, who she'd fought to protect.
She still couldn't believe they'd really come for her. Hinata, Otonashi, Kanade… and…
"You know…" Otonashi faltered, looking as if he was silently chewing a thought as she handed him another dish. Arching an eyebrow, Yuri coaxed him on. Otonashi put the dish away, then turned to face her, rubbing the back of his head. "He didn't say much because he was too busy trying to convince you that you know each other, but…"
As if not naming any names wasn't breaking the "let's not talk about it" rule. Yuri tried not to huff in his face impatiently, but she did make sure to blatantly return her attention to the sink.
"He missed you, Yuri." She opened her mouth to speak, but Otonashi shook his head. "I know that doesn't mean anything to you. And believe me, he knows too. Just… keep that in mind, will you?"
In the TV room, Hinata was yelling something about a city called Kyuuya. Elsewhere, a door clicked shut—to the bathroom, maybe. So much going on. So much to think about. Yuri turned on the faucet and let the lukewarm water flow steadily down the drain.
If only the water would take all the chaos with it.
He'd been here. He'd been right here when he did it. On this bridge, in this exact spot.
Under any other circumstances, he would feel like an idiot. A week before, he wouldn't have even set foot on this bridge if Otonashi paid him a million yen to do it (well, perhaps he would, but he was trying to prove a point with this thought).
And now here he was, at the exact same time of night, leaning against the same side of the bridge and resting his arm in the same way as he had nearly four years ago. He even had the engagement ring pinched between his fingers for crying out loud! The déjà vu was undeniable. It had happened. Exactly like this.
When he'd come home and opened the box to see the photos and rings again, the relief had been overwhelming. So he wasn't losing his mind. But for some awful reason, almost as if being under his own hypnotism, he'd driven to the bridge later that evening with the engagement ring in his jacket pocket.
There was a reason he'd never wanted to come back here, and it was for that same reason he was standing here now. The fear that being here would make all the things he'd denied about them feel real. For the second time in six months, that fear had been validated.
The first time he'd gone, it was to prove to himself that the place held no sentimental value, and that he was capable of crossing the bridge without his mind wandering and yearning. Ultimately he failed that test; halfway across the bridge, he saw a familiar dark blue car out of the corner of his eye and whipped around sharply to see if it was hers.
Scolding himself viciously—he wasn't supposed to care about something like that!—he'd abruptly turned back to the path and forced himself to cross more quickly. And that had been the end of his solo trips to the bridge.
Until tonight.
Tonight, he needed that sentimental value. For the sake of his own sanity, he needed to feel it.
And God, did he feel it.
The anxiety, the way he'd licked his lips and wondered how even after a few drinks at the restaurant his throat was desert dry. The nerves, how he'd gripped the ring so tightly after taking it out of his pocket when she was looking the other way that he worried it would sink into his skin. And the love...
God, how he'd loved…
There was a sudden difference of texture, flesh meeting flesh where there was once metal separating them, and Ayato felt his heart leap just as the ring did. Out from between his pinched fingertips and into the air.
"Shit—NO!"
He lunged for it, reaching his hand out over the edge, but missed the golden band by mere inches just as the tiny trinket plunged into the river below. It didn't even make a splash, or a small plunk. The only sound he heard was the gentle flow of the water beneath the bridge, mixed with his own rapid breaths as he tried to make sense of everything that had just happened.
Her ring. Over their bridge.
Unbelievable.
But he hadn't heard a splash. Maybe it had dropped onto a spot of land below. And even if it had silently landed in the water, he would scour the river for it if he had to. The only thing on his mind, the only thing that mattered at the moment was there's no way I'm losing that fucking ring.
At the end of the bridge was a small staircase that led down under the bridge. More often than not, he and Yuri spent precious moments on top of that bridge. But it was underneath another, seeking shelter from the rain that had already drenched them anyway, that they'd…
Ayato absentmindedly grazed his lower lip at the memory, with the fingers that had recently betrayed him. It took him a few seconds to notice what he was doing.
He really wasn't trying anymore, was he…?
Sighing, he flicked open his cell phone to use the screen as a light, and scrutinized every inch of land for a green or purple twinkle. When nothing turned up but a yellow twist-tie, he moved his search to the water, not really giving a damn that his pant legs were getting soaked.
Ugh, he really should have checked the water first. Who knew how far it would have floated downstream by now?
"Looking for this?"
Ayato whipped around in the middle of the river with a sharp intake of breath, the water sloshing at his knees. At the edge of the river, a small leather-vested man with an obvious skin condition was grinning broadly at him and holding out his hand as if beckoning him back to land. He held out the object in his palm at just the right spot that the moonlight made the gold sparkle brighter than his skin.
Relief rested his heart for all of two seconds as he trudged out of the water, breathing a barely audible "thank you." If not to this strange man, then to whatever power in this twisted universe that had finally made one thing go his way. And then that vanished when he reached for it and the man instantly retracted his hand.
"Ah-ah-ah!" the man said, and waggled a finger at him with his free hand. When Ayato stopped in his tracks, the older man examined the jewelry in his grasp. "What were you doing throwing away such a lovely ring?"
"I didn't mean to," Ayato shot back in defense, more harshly than he'd intended. "I was clumsy with it and it slipped through my fingers."
The man grinned again, showing all his yellowed teeth. "You ought to be more careful. You might end up losing it again." He held out the ring for him to take, but as Ayato reached for it again, he changed his mind and recoiled once more. "That is… if you earn it back."
What little gratitude he had left for this man evaporated with a sharp hiss of anger, burned up by indignation. "Earn it back? How dare you take it away from me!"
"I," the man said coolly, leaning in close enough that Ayato could smell his foul breath, "saved it."
"Good for you. Now return it to its rightful owner."
The man burst into hoots and cackles, his raised eyebrows suggesting an amused sense of astonishment at Ayato's gall. "Rightful owner! Do my ears deceive me? I hardly think you deserve the ring back after you treated it so poorly, tossing it away like that."
Ayato growled, clenching and unclenching his fists. "I told you, I didn't mean to. It was an accident."
"Was it…?" the man sneered. "Or maybe you just didn't want it anymore."
"That's not it at all!" This man was absolutely ridiculous, and Ayato was steadily growing more and more impatient with him. "If I didn't want it anymore, why would I be fighting so hard to get it back?"
The man smiled coldly, considering his words for a moment. "Well, then someone so clumsy with a ring shouldn't be handling it in the first place. I think it would be safer with me."
Ayato was one "last straw" away from calling the police or punching this man's face in, though he really did not want to make this more complicated than it needed to be. As it was, this man was almost as bad as his father, or at least a version of him with a weird sense of humor.
His fingers twitched in his fists. Punching him might feel like punching his father. And as of late, he'd deeply wanted to hit or kick things.
"Why are you being so difficult?" he rasped, rage singeing his throat.
The man chuckled. "Why should I give it back to you?"
"Because it's mine!"
"Mine!" the man echoed dubiously. "My, my, my, what an incredibly childish response. Absolutely juvenile, like a toddler. I almost believe you only want it back because it's in my possession."
Ayato had had about enough of this man's assumptions. He was acting like this was a game of finders-keepers. They weren't children fighting over an interesting rock or a coin they found on the street. "This isn't just some trinket you can steal away from me," he muttered. "It's not just a possession."
Interest flickered on the man's discolored face.
"Is that so?" He glanced at Ayato, then at the ring he was twisting between his fingers. His sneer returned as quickly as it had gone. "Does it mean anything to you?"
Frowning and cutting his eyes to the side, Ayato nodded slightly. "It's an engagement ring."
The man made a small "ah" of understanding. "And you're planning to ask someone special to marry you with it."
"I already did," Ayato said dryly. "We're divorced."
"You're asking her to remarry you, then," the man amended with a grin.
Ayato's mouth fell open in surprise, and disgruntled embarrassment burned his cheeks. Ridiculous, and utterly impossible. He couldn't even if he wanted to. As if Yuri would accept the proposal of a complete stranger.
"I want it back," he said lowly, meeting the man's beady stare, "because it's a symbol of our relationship."
"I beg your pardon?"
"What I mean is," Ayato twisted restlessly at his wristwatch until it nipped at his skin, "it's evidence of what we had together."
An odd sort of smile twitched at the man's mouth. "Oh, but aren't your memories enough?"
Ayato scoffed.
"Memories," he said. "She doesn't have hers. She doesn't have anything of me."
He eyed the ring in the man's hand.
"And I admit, I spent a long time hiding that ring away, along with so much else. But I can't do that anymore." His arms falling to his sides, he clenched his fingernails in his quaking palms. "I can't forget like she did. I never fully could."
He met the man's mischievous gaze firmly, squaring his shoulders. It didn't matter what this ring-napper thought of him anymore. He was just another obstacle in the way, and there was one surefire way of getting rid of obstacles.
"I need that ring back," Ayato said, taking a step forward, "and you're going to give it to me."
The strange man's eyes glittered, almost like a shark's, but his resulting grin was more like a crocodile's. So the thief wasn't afraid of him?
Ayato harrumphed, narrowing his eyes in preparation.
He should be.
Heat and concentration pooled at the back of his head, along with an all-too-familiar keening sound that seared through his brain. The red was there, reflected in the man's swamp-colored eyes. He had him now.
"Look into my eyes," he said sharply. The man stiffened like a board, which almost startled Ayato out of focus. Strange. His mind was surprisingly less stubborn than Yuri's, or even Ryou's. "Now, give the engagement ring to me."
The hand that held the ring began to twitch and tremble, as if it was fighting much harder than the mind. One by one, the fingers began to unfold…
And then Ayato inhaled sharply as the man's free hand grasped his collar, his breath cut off when his hand wrapped around his throat. As his antagonist's eyes darkened dangerously, his grip tightened. Squeezing mercilessly, cutting off every gasp for air.
"That," he snarled in Ayato's ear, "is not going to work."
He released him without warning, throwing him roughly to the ground. Ayato felt the back of his head smash against something hard, and then everything around him began to blur together as if it were all one big hallucination.
In fact, he could have sworn he saw the man vanish into thin air—before the April night disappeared into darkness.
Preview:
"What… are you… doing here?"
"Do you think you're well enough to tell us who did this to you?"
"Well, today's just full of surprises, isn't it?"
"Did you turn into an entirely different person?"
"Yuri wouldn't have had anything to do with me."
"Please don't give up on her the way she gave up on you."
"It's not like Yuri would have come along and woken you up with true love's kiss."
"I'll see what I can do."
[Chapter 09]: Ayame's Advice.
