If it weren't for his kids, Rob had no idea how long he would stay in bed each morning. Even with them as motivation to get up, he would fight off the urge to go back to sleep for most of the morning, especially in the midst of a major depression episode like he was having now. He considered laying down in the bathtub during the shower and just nodding off while feeling the warm water. Surely he'd get at least ten minutes in before someone realized he had disappeared. Rob was able to resist the temptation and was now playing with Andrew and his toy cars. It was a welcome excuse to lay on the floor.

Andrew had a few train cars joined together by little magnetic buttons while Rob was driving a black semi truck.

"Stop, Daddy! The train is crossing."

Rob did as he was told and let the train pass. Then as he moved the truck forward, Andrew pushed another truck quickly into his path. The collision was inevitable.

"Daddy, you crashed me!"

"Well, you drove out right in front of me. I couldn't stop in time."

"Now the police are gonna come," he said, reaching for his little police car, complete with a siren. The people who made some of these toys were apparently determined to annoy parents as much as possible.

Once they were at school, Rob sat at his desk to relax for a few minutes before he had to head to the party store to buy decorations for the boys' birthday party. The store he was meant to visit was a few towns over. He could definitely find the stuff they needed somewhere closer, but Kate had a coupon for this particular place. Not taking advantage of reduced prices was a cardinal sin in her world, to the point where he wondered if it was in the Bible somewhere.

He glanced at the DDLC folder on his computer desktop and realized he hadn't actually read the letter Monika received from Sayori. He opened up the game looking for text files but didn't find any. Monika must have deleted them. Or maybe she made the whole thing up? No, she wouldn't do that. There was something else in there, though. It was a GIF file labeled "For Rob!"

After hesitating briefly, he double-clicked the file and was amazed at what he saw. In about two-dozen frames of animation, Sayori was blowing a kiss with the words "Stay strong! I love you!" situated above her head. He couldn't believe it. How could it be that women from a video game cared for him so much more than most people he had met in his own life?

Rob caught a whiff of coffee and realized he hadn't heard Monika come upstairs.

"Well, isn't she just the cutest thing." Acid dripped from her every word.

"She might be cute but she can't go with me to run errands, can she?"

Monika gave him a coy little grin. "Where are we going?"

"We've got to get some party decorations for the boys," he answered. "Balloons, paper ribbons, shit like that."

"How many people are coming to the party?"

"Let me think. My parents, Kate's parents, Kate's siblings and their kids, a few friends with kids the same age. My buddy Matt is actually in town from Maryland this weekend, so he'll be able to come. Oh, and my grandmother."

"The one from Poland?"

"That's right," he said, pleased that she remembered. "She actually likes to go by Babci, which is what we would call her if our family still lived there."

"That's a lot of people to meet," Monika said.

"Yeah," he agreed. "I would be scared as hell if I were you. But you're more outgoing than me, so I think you'll manage."

"I hope so."

The drive to the party store took them on the highway for a few exits. In a break from the usual routine, Rob granted Monika's request to listen to some of the classical pieces she was learning for her piano lessons. He also remembered why he didn't typically listen to this sort of stuff in the car. It was so relaxing he wondered if he would fall asleep at the wheel. On days like this, he wondered if he really had depression or narcolepsy.

Monika turned and noticed his rapidly blinking eyes. "Please be careful! Would it help if I yelled something at a really high pitch about war and corruption?"

He couldn't help but laugh. She talked to him enough to keep him awake until they reached the store.

"This is why you should drink coffee," she said. He should have known that was coming.

Once they got inside the store, Monika seemed to revert to a child herself. If it were up to her, they might have walked out with at least one of everything. She was carrying so many balloons in so many different colors that Rob wondered if she would float way once they stepped outside, like the house in Up.

The extra items they were leaving the store with likely canceled out whatever money he saved with Kate's coupon, but she didn't need to know that. After struggling to squeeze the balloons into the back seat of the car, Rob invited Monika for lunch at one of his favorite places.

Everyone who knew that Rob had depression had, at one point or another, told him to count his blessings. As far as advice goes, it was a little tone deaf. Depression didn't give a shit how many blessings you had, it still wanted you dead. Nevertheless, he would occasionally give it a try and high on that list was a good burger. They were at one of his favorite local places to get one, but Monika was looking at him with obvious disappointment.

"You eat a lot of meat," she said.

"Sure do."

She put on her sweetest little puppy dog face. "Do you think you could give it up? For me?"

Her beautiful eyes might have gotten her an expensive winter coat, but they weren't coming anywhere near his burgers. "No way."

She pouted hilariously and he continued. "Would you be willing to start eating meat if I asked you to?"

"No!"

"Well, there you go. Don't be a hypocrite."

"But haven't you ever had second thoughts about it?" Monika asked.

"Not really," he said. "This cow's already dead. I'm not doing it any favors by not eating it."

"Stop it," she said back. "That's not what I mean and you know it. It's horrible for the planet! I just got here and I want it to last."

"People have been eating meat since the Stone Age," Rob said. "But it's only been a danger to the Earth for the last century or so, if that. So the problem is obviously not what we eat. The problem is that we have these corporate interests that developed a factory-style approach to agriculture that tries to squeeze every last penny out of the process regardless of the harm it does."

"But you're just using that as an excuse not to do anything!" She was getting pissed now.

"Says who?" he asked. "We've got a recycling bin. We use florescent light bulbs. We've got Energy Star appliances and all that other shit. I'd like solar panels but we can't afford them, and that's actually a key point. I don't know why the burden for saving the planet always gets put on the back of your average person without much money and with no influence on the government's environmental policy. We make regular people feel ashamed for not taking short enough showers, but meanwhile these companies are always dumping toxic shit into the water and pay off the government so they can keep doing it. Depriving myself of one of my favorite foods is not going to fix the real problems."

Monika shook her head in disbelief. "You come up with the most elaborate justifications for being stubborn."

"I'll take that as an admission of defeat."

"No! Look, I know those companies suck too-"

"They suck too?! You mean they suck in addition to me?"

She laughed out loud. "Yes!"

He suppressed his own laughter but a little smile got through. "Eat your fuckin' salad."

The animated discussion had done wonders to perk him up and he suspected the drive home would be no problem. At one point towards the end of their meal, they locked eyes and for a moment, all of Rob's insecurities and doubts faded away. For that instant, he truly believed that she cared about him. It wouldn't sound like much to most people, but for him that was no small thing.

Back on the highway, they were having another pleasant conversation when one car's unusual motion in the rear view mirror caught Rob's attention.

"Look at this shit-faced cockmaster behind us."

Monika turned her head around. There was a yellow Ferrari weaving back and forth across the highway in an effort to get ahead of as many other cars as possible.
"That really doesn't look safe," she said.

"I can't stand it when people do that," Rob replied. "He's putting everyone else at risk for what? To shave a few seconds off his commute?"

"Well, he'll be ahead of us soon at this rate. Then we won't have to worry."

"Maybe not," he said. "I think I need to teach him a lesson."

She turned towards him. "Rob, what are you talking about?"

"I'll need some Eurobeat if I'm going to pull this off." He reached for the stereo and found a familiar playlist. Ever since his teenage years, Rob found he could draw power from whatever music he was listening to. If he needed to cry, the right sad song could help him get the tears out. If he felt like his anger was getting out of control, heavy metal made him like he had been heard. If he needed to be inspired, the right epic song could bring him a brief burst of confidence. If he wanted to spite some asshat in a sports car, Eurobeat was the only way to go.

As soon as the song started, Monika seemed to realize there was trouble coming.

"Here we go!" the singer called out shortly before the main riff kicked in. Rob sped forward in the right lane and began to drive parallel to the car in the left lane.

"Please tell me what you're doing," Monika said.

"This is a two-lane highway," he explained. "In order for him to keep getting ahead of everyone, he needs space in one of the lanes. But if I drive perfectly parallel with the car over there, he's got no way to pass us. I'm basically forcing him to drive like a civilized human being."

"What if he hits us?!"

"Nah, he's not gonna bang up his Ferrari." With the music in full swing, Rob felt like a god. The Ferrari came closer and closer, weaving back and forth behind the two cars looking for a gap big enough to squeeze through. The driver to Rob's left seemed to catch on to what he was up to and held her position.

"You are crazy," Monika said. "You're out of your mind."

"Look at this clown trying to intimidate me," Rob said as the Ferrari came within what looked like inches of hitting them. "There is definitely some compensation going on here. The guy's probably got a dick the size of a grain of rice."

Monika turned her head around again. "He looks really mad. Don't you think the point has been made by now?"

"Please," Rob said dismissively. "I've survived terrorist attacks. I'm not afraid of this dipshit."

Monika's eyes practically bugged out of her head. "WHAT?!"

"No time to go into details," he said. "Gotta keep my concentration. Start the song over again, will ya?"

Reluctantly, she did. After another few minutes of basking in the frustration of the jerk behind them, Monika noticed a large sign ahead of them.

"Road work ahead," she read aloud. "Expect delays."

Rob chuckled. This would work out even better than he expected. The exit closest to his house was probably right in the middle of the upcoming traffic jam, but he knew the area well enough to get there via the back roads.

"We're going to get off early," he said as an exit drew closer. As soon as the car moved far enough to the right, the Ferarri roared past them. "Enjoy the traffic, asshole."

Monika breathed a heavy sigh of relief once they were off the highway. "No. More. Eurobeat. Ever."

Rob laughed mischievously. "That was awesome."

"It was NOT awesome," Monika said. "You may not value your life, but I do."

His smile disappeared. What a buzzkill.

"But…" she added. "It was kinda righteous."

For the rest of the ride home, she badgered him about his reference to terrorism. Although Rob now trusted Monika with details of his past, those were dark memories and he wasn't quite ready to delve into them. Maybe in September, when it would be more appropriate.

There was one person who knew much more about the incident and the next day, Rob walked into her familiar office. He had been seeing his therapist Lilly for almost ten years and planned to keep at it until she retired (or he died, whichever came first). He had been through enough bad therapists to know that when you find a good one, you stick with them. There were male therapists out there and some that were undoubtedly good, but for him there was never any question he would work with a woman. Not because he was looking for romance, obviously, but because the idea of opening up about his problem to another man was incomprehensible. If Monika thought she was having a hard time getting details out of him about his life now, imagine if she had been a dude.

Sometimes he would show up for the weekly appointment feeling too scatterbrained or tired to start talking right away. Lilly would have to pry it out of him a little but eventually there was always something worthwhile to get into. Today was different. Rob had mentioned Monika in his sessions before but there was one lingering issue he hadn't discussed. In fact, he had never talked about this subject.

"How are things with your houseguest?" Lilly asked after a few minutes of more generic chatting.

"Mostly good. Monika's good company. There's one thing, though."

"Oh?"

"Well...she hugs me a lot. And I hug back, it's sweet. But I don't ever hug her first. I know that bothers her, but…I have issues with that stuff."

"What sort of issues?"

Rob sighed. "I'm…I feel like something bad will happen."

Lilly raised her eyebrow. "Oh, is this because of what happened with Colleen?"

"No, not that kind of bad. Bad like…rejection."

"Oh, I see. How old is that feeling?"

"I think it goes back to high school." Rob began. "I did some youth theater stuff back then."

"Was that fun?" Lilly asked.

"Yeah. I was never really meant to be an actor, but it was fun. When you're in a play or something like that, the cast tends to get pretty close by the end. When we did Romeo and Juliet-"

Lilly was very excited to hear that. "Were you Romeo?"

He laughed. "No way. I was Friar Laurence."

"That's not a bad part. But anyway, keep going."

"Right before one of the shows, one girl went around and hugged every single person in the cast. I thought that was really nice so I tried it the next time. Well, there was one girl who really didn't want my hug and I was too fuckin' oblivious to realize it."

"But everyone else was okay with it?"

"As far as I knew. But this one girl was going around school saying that I forced her into a hug she didn't want and that I was stalking her and everything else. I got all pissed off and defensive and it just escalated from there. Thank God social media wasn't around back then or it would have been all over that shit too."

"How does that story end?"

"I just left her alone like she wanted. Since then, I figured it was always much safer to assume that nobody ever wanted to hug me."

"Not even Kate?"

"She did something not many people have managed to do."

"What was that?"

"She made me totally believe that she cared about me. That's difficult. Kate's had some of her family and friends ask her if I don't like them. I like them just fine, but I don't go for the hugs."

"What about Monika? Do you think of her as a friend? Or as family?"

"I think…she's becoming my best friend."

Lilly smiled gently and took a moment to digest all the information he had just given her. "You know, I go to these conferences for mental health professionals. There's this group of therapist friends I have that are always there and whenever we see each other, we're hugging constantly. Everyone's saying stuff like 'Oh, I just love you' and it might sound silly, but nobody ever gets offended or rejected."

Rob didn't say anything, so Lilly kept talking. "We all need loving friendships in our lives. We might have our spouses and our children but that shouldn't be all there is. Hugging a stranger or someone you don't know very well is risky, but I think it's a little sad that you're afraid to hug your best friend, don't you?"

Her words sat with him for the entire drive home. There was no Eurobeat this time. He played the kind of stuff that could hardly be called driving music, mostly slow and acoustic songs. There was one song in particular that made him think of Monika and all she had gone through.

Rob opened the door to his house and saw her walking away from the movie collection. She must have just finished watching something. Fighting hard against his doubts and fears, he pulled her close to him. Monika made a small surprised noise but happily stayed in his arms.

"Is everything okay?" she asked.

"I think so," he replied. "Sorry I'm such a…basket case."

"I wish you could see yourself the way that the Literature Club sees you."

"That would be interesting."

"I'm being serious," Monika said. "You made Natsuki and Yuri happier than they had ever been. And Sayori, she was dead and you still didn't give up until she was safe. No wonder she's sending you stupid love notes."

Rob chuckled. He had almost forgotten about that.

"And as for me…" she said, her voice trailing off. Monika backed away a bit and stared into his eyes. Her lips parted slightly and a little alarm bell went off in Rob's head. He gently kissed her forehead and let her go.

"So, what did you watch?"

Author's Note: Sorry for another long wait. I have two fanfics going at once and I felt like I was neglecting the other one. But now we're back in Doki Doki land and I had an idea for this one. A lot of songs get referenced in this story so I figured every few chapters I would list a "soundtrack" in case anyone's interested in what Rob and Monika have been listening to. Here's the first batch.

Iron Maiden - Stranger in a Strange Land (Chapter 3)
Victoria - Stay (Chapter 6)
Within Temptation - Sinead (Chapter 6)
Anathema - Harmonium (Chapter 10)
GO 2 - Power (Chapter 11)
Katatonia - Pale Flag (Chapter 11)