20

"My sister-in-law has a similar disorder to me, so we can understand each other when we're painfully unreliable, say sorry too much, or sometimes go weeks at a time without touching or phones. We get the other's need to constantly be contributing to make us feel secure with our relationships with others, and the self-hatred that keeps us up at night.

And this morning, she surrounded me in fluffy blankets and let me sleep on her bed after her husband left. Then she played games with my boy and made sure I had food, told me she loved me, let me cuddle with her until I woke up, then drove me home.

There is a reason to keep living. There is happy and wonderful things nearby or even right next to you. The darkness of your own brain sucks out your will, your faith, your hope, but you have got to keep believing these words, because soon, the night will end, and the morning will come, and it will more than make up for the sleepless suffering you had to go through."

If I was expecting anything to change after Naru's confession of my adorableness, that was a mistake. He was even more back to normal the next day when I shuffled into the van, a little tipsy from pain meds, and got bundled up in a blanket by Ayako and Takigawa both. Their eyes shivered when they met mine, and their smiles had gone stiff.

I understood instantly. I had hurt them. Watching Lin dangle from the stairs had been bad enough. And now the poor guy couldn't be moved from this hospital until his neck bones healed, and even then he'd be irreparably damaged.

"I'm sorry," I said.

"Hey, you were possessed," said Takigawa, as though that happened to everyone. "All of us can agree on that."

"Yeah, you had this look," said Ayako. "Gave every possession video I've ever seen a run for their money."

"And you didn't even remember it when you woke up," added Takigawa.

That still didn't seem like enough. Because it had been my head, my stage, I could have changed my thoughts if I had just tried hard enough, but I hadn't. I had just let myself fall right into it.

And then I caught glimpse of Naru glancing back at me in the rearview mirror and looking away.

If I was going to accuse myself of that weakness, I'd have to accuse Naru of the same thing. And everyone would say he was anything but weak.

Besides…I think I had done enough jabbing at myself for the time being. Anymore, and I might fall to whatever had taken me into that attic again.

For the next week, I had to take baths with plastic bags around my arms. Professors gave me odd looks and students I didn't even know, ranging from my age to their forties, approached me to ask if the story was true—if I had been possessed by a ghost and peeled my skin from my arms with my bare fingers. After trying my hand at some quippy, sarcastic lies (No, I totally just had a sudden fetish for peeling off my skin—you should try it! It's great!), I ended up getting tired of it. I fell back to the good old "I don't remember" or, best yet, just looked at them. Yeah. Deadpanned stares are the best way to get out of a stupid question. I was so stupid pleased with myself whenever I gave that look that it made it hard not to smile and ruin it.

Then was my check up date at the hospital to get my wounds examined and general doctor looking over-ish. Frankly, I was fed up with the painkillers that made me fall asleep and the tingling, itching pain in my arms to not really care about the details.

It was only then, though, that I realized I hadn't received a single bill.

"Don't I owe you?" I asked the doctor who was…actually doing a pretty good job at getting my arm unbandaged without much pain.

"Uh, that's something that the financial office would know. I just leave that up to them so I can focus on the patients."

…Yeah, if I was a doctor and made tons of money, I'd probably not know what every single thing I did cost. Frick, to be that rich…wait, did I have a poor complex? Did I just hear bitterness? Oh, gall, whatever, shoot me.

But the ear-tasseled bitty at the office just pulled up my file on the computer and shook her head.

"It's not that you have nothing on there," she told me. "But rather it's on hold for payment from another party."

"'Another party'?" Like some Democrats? Nah, I'm just kidding, I knew what she meant. Like a sorority party, beer and all.

"Well, I imagine you signed a waiver of some sorts before you went in to wherever you injured your arms," she nodded to bundles of white on the counter that were said arms. "There was probably something in there about covering injuries you sustained while there."

"Aren't waivers usually to avoid paying for the injuries the idiots who are signing may get?" I asked.

She paused. Her long, gold tassel earrings never stopped wiggling, even then.

"You know what, I really don't know."

Wasn't it her job to know? I mean, she looked old enough to know. Like…grandma age. Grandma's in the workforce didn't generally not know, right?

And since I was never the type to throw the matter away once someone told me it was taken care of, especially when thousands of dollars of hospital care could be on the line, I went to my next source of answers.

Professor Davis's expression didn't twitch in the least when I came to class early and leaned on the whiteboard, aiming for a sort of casual, but intimidating, pose.

"So, Naru," I said, wincing a moment later when I realized I had used that weird nickname without thinking. So much for intimidating. "Who is paying for my hospital bills? I reread the waiver. They says if we get boo-boos, we pay for our own band-aids."

The corner of his mouth twitched ever so slightly. "Did you get a sucker for being a good girl?"

"On topic, Prof. Am I going to be swimming in soul-crushing debt a month from now or do you have a name?"

"I guess you would worry about that," he grasped his chin with forefinger and thumb. "No parents to catch your fall and all that. Sucker indeed."

I slapped my hand on his little lecture podium and tried out the stare that had gotten the annoying question askers to leave me alone. Hey, maybe it was dual purpose. I didn't know how well it did, though, as it hurt my arms like a mother and that had to show on my face.

Another mouth twitch, but he sighed. "They're being paid. What more do you need to know?"

"I need evidence, not just your word."

"Look, if I'm lying, I'll personally take responsibility."

"Do I have that in print?"

He muttered something under his breath before saying, "Sit down. I will not have this conversation in front of students."

"Only three have come in, and one of them is Takigawa."

Said Takigawa must have had his ears perked like a rabbit's, for he smiled and happily waved his hand at us.

Naru pinched his nose and closed his eyes. "Mother of…"

"…charitable donaters paying off strangers' medical bills?"

He glared at me. "I'm paying your bills. And it's 'donor' not 'donater.'"

My mouth dropped. "Excuse me—"

"You say that too often. Get a word calendar."

"You can't…that's got to be thousands upon—you're just a college professor!"

"And you're just a college student with no family who more or less saved my life," and he made it all sound rather dull and 'no duh.'

Heat burbled to my cheeks. "I wouldn't say saved your life…"

"Oy!" called Takigawa, very maturely, mind you. "No flirting like ten-year-olds now!"

I threw my poor stinging arms to my sides and looked to the ceiling.

"Shut up!" I yelled. Lecture halls were pretty big, after all.

"He's never going to let me live that down," said the Prof, now massaging where he had pinched his nose. "Children. All of you. I'm a god-damn, bloody babysitter."

"Prof, look, I can't just let you pay them without doing anything—"

"Yes, you can, and you will sit down or I'm flunking you, here and now."

I recoiled back. Oh yeah, he was mad. And not the cool, slice like anger he usually wielded in class with all the grace of a professional fencer. This was raw, hot, and abrasive.

I jerked to go to my seat. At the last second, I caught sight of the pink coloring his ears and turned to hide the stupid smile spreading across my face as I went to sit down next to the smirking Takigawa.

"So, what were you talking about?" he asked.

"About how my arms cost a lot of money."

Takigawa blanched at that. "Oh, crap, I haven't even thought of that. You just clean boilers, right? And you don't have any family to help—"

"It's fine." I said, cutting him off before he could attract the attention of the growing number of students. "That's why we were talking about it. Kapeesh?"

It took him a second, but then his eyebrows rose and dropped and he nodded.

"Kapeesh." He gave me a half-sided smile. "So, lunch?"

"Only if you're paying. I am such a poor, impoverished soul after all."

He laughed, and I did my best not to eye the poor Professors ears as he went into his lecture.

I lied. I totally watched them like a hawk. They were still red when class ended. :3

End

Author here! I think if enough people like this story I'll write a sequel, but I'm really not suppose to. I should be trying to publish all my books and stuff in the real world and blah blah, even if it is stupid encouraging. But I hope you all liked this story. I wrote it to climb my way out of a suicidal depression and back into writing. I'm doing pretty good now. ^.^ Actually happy and yay me! I hope it helps others like it helped me.