Three weeks to the day after the accident, Haruka woke up.
It was an ordinary morning, the sun rose to a partly cloudy sky on a cold winter's morning. One of the nurses was checking the EKG for readings when she felt something on her shirt. When she looked down it was straight into the blue eyes of Haruka and she nearly jumped out of her skin. She ran out of the room to find the head nurse, who started making calls immediately.
The first of these calls went to Yukino, who jumped out of bed and threw on whatever clothes were at hand. Her head hurt from the previous night spent at a nearby bar, as usual she had returned home alone. Ignoring the pain she ran out to her car and slid out of the driveway, tearing down the street and towards the hospital.
The trip normally took her thirty minutes. She cleared the distance in eighteen, nearly getting pulled over twice on the highway before taking the exit that led her to the hospital. She found a parking space on the far side of the lot and ran to the lobby, hitting the elevator and waiting nervously during it's nerve wrackingly slow ascent.
She burst from the elevator as soon as the doors opened, the nurses pointed her on towards Haruka's room. They could see the excitement in her face and were happy for her. She ran into the room and fell against the wall to regain her breath. She could hear Haruka's voice, a sound that soothed her like nothing ever had. "I can feed myself, thank you." Their eyes met and relief could be seen in both of them. "Am I glad to see you, Yukino." She noticed that, not only was her voice weak, but it also sounded hoarse, a side effect of the feeding tube she was to understand.
"Hi." It was all she could think to say and Haruka laughed and coughed and laughed some more.
"You look like you've seen a ghost. Do I look that bad?"
"You look alive, and that's all that matters."
Yukino's smile lit up the room like a candle nearly snuffed that found a reason to burn again. She crossed the room and gently hugged Haruka, who lifted up and tried to return the embrace but her arms were weak and she could barely lift them. She fell back to the bed after Yukino released her and she sighed. "Why am I so weak? How long have I been in this bed?"
Yukino pulled a chair up next to the bed and sat down, the nurse who had been in the room pressed a few buttons on the tablet in her hand then excused herself leaving them alone. "It's been three weeks since the accident. They said you were thrown from the car and landed on your head."
Haruka tried to remember the day but it was foggy, she remembered the cold, she remembered telling Shizuru to watch for ice on the road. Shizuru. "And Shizuru? How is she doing since Natsuki..."
Yukino was confused. "Since Natsuki what?"
"Since Natsuki was..." Then it clicked. She was in the bed so it had to have been her in the accident and if Shizuru was driving then Natsuki couldn't have been dead. She clutched her head in both hands and pieced together what had happened. "We were having lunch with Shizuru when you had to leave, so Shizuru was taking me home when an eighteen wheeler skidded in front of us. We must have hit a patch of ice on the highway. So it wasn't Natsuki after all."
Yukino was even more confused. "Why did you think Natsuki was the one who died?"
"I guess it was a dream, but it felt so real. In my dream it wasn't Shizuru and I in the accident, it was Natsuki. She died and I remember watching Shizuru fall apart. It was awful, she blamed herself and became self-destructive, almost suicidal, before we managed to calm her down. She spent years in therapy trying to undo the damage it did to her. She eventually recovered, though I don't think the wound ever truly healed for her. They loved each other so deeply that it must have been like a piece of herself dying." Yukino listened carefully, surprised at the parallel between the story Haruka was telling and what she had watched Natsuki go through. "Years later she married a man, I forget his name, and had a daughter. She named her Natsuki and she was the most precious thing in the world to her, until the messages."
"Messages?"
"I learned about it after twenty years, but apparently it had been going on the whole time. She had been receiving gifts and letters from someone calling themselves Natsuki Kuga. It seemed suspicious to me so I looked into it. The letters came from nowhere, no one I talked to even remembered delivering them. It was strange, but now it makes more sense."
Haruka, through much effort, leaned up to sitting position on the bed, then promptly fell back down again. She tried it again, but Yukino pushed her back to the bed. "You're not strong enough to get up yet."
"I never will be if I don't start now." Haruka continued her sit-ups, willing her aching body to move, to strengthen. "So Shizuru is dead?" She was out of breath, but the sadness in her voice still bled through.
"Not yet, but the doctors say it's only a matter of time. The car you were in hit a tree, you were thrown from the car but Shizuru hit the tree at full force. It did serious damage to her brain and she's been in a coma ever since."
Haruka fell back to the bed, exhausted. "How's Natsuki taking it?"
"She went crazy. She was convinced that it was her fault, nothing anybody said could convince her otherwise. She hardly slept or ate. I invited her out to lunch and she passed out in the car, when she woke up she mentioned something about killing herself so I called her mother. I don't know what happened after that, but she went berserk. She started breaking things, broke her own hand then ran off screaming. They finally caught up to her after she had fallen down the staircase, she was in tears. Her mother sent her to a therapist, where she was diagnosed with PTSD, but she seems to be doing better now." Yukino smiled hopefully. "You woke up, though. Maybe Shizuru will wake up soon too."
Haruka's father was next in the room, having received the call shortly after Yukino he rushed from work immediately to the hospital. Yukino knew of his arrival a full minute before he burst through the door. Robert Armitage was a loud, boisterous man, much like his daughter. "Haruka Armitage, how long are you going to lay in that bed?"
"Until I can do something about it, dad."
Robert Armitage ran a profitable ranch, raising cattle, sheep and horses on a few hundred acres of land far outside the city. He was a simple man of simple tastes, as could be told by the shirt and overalls he showed up in. Haruka looked a lot like her father, as big as Haruka was her father made her look small in comparison. Compared to Yukino, who sat in the chair between him and his daughter, he was a giant. "Nonsense, come on and give your father a hug." He spoke with a smile on his face and he reminded Yukino of Haruka.
Robert gave her daughter an awkward 'you can't get up from the bed' hug, where he leaned over and she patted him lightly on the back. Her grip was loose and he realized how weak she actually was. "How are you feeling, sweetheart?"
"Fine, except that I can't move too well and I can't sit up for more than a few seconds and, apparently, I'm incapable of feeding myself..."
Robert chuckled, his daughter had never been one to enjoy lying around for any length of time much less having someone feed her. He noticed Yukino was laughing too and decided now was the time for introductions. He turned to her and offered his hand. "I don't believe we've met before, I'm Robert Armitage."
"Yukino Kikukawa." She stood and shook Robert's hand. "I went to school with Haruka."
"School mates, eh? Come to think of it, I think Haruka mentioned you a few times. She said you two were close." Yukino stood up and motioned for him to sit, but he turned her down. "So what exactly happened, Haruka? Why were you on the road that day?" Haruka explained everything to her father, who didn't have the reaction that she thought. Rather than being upset, he was understanding. "How is the other girl?"
"Worse. The doctors are saying she might never wake up."
"Then I'm glad to be your father, I don't know how long I could stand seeing my daughter in a bed."
-IPR-
Natsuki heard the news second hand from one of the nurses that regularly attended Shizuru. "Did you know that Haruka girl woke up today?"
Natsuki had been in class all day, had gotten off and went immediately to the hospital. She had been sitting by Shizuru's bedside, a ritual for her these days, when the nurse had approached her and casually started up a conversation. "Really? Maybe I should go talk to her."
Haruka's room was right next to Shizuru's. When she walked in Yukino was sitting in a chair next to the bed and an older man who looked a lot like Haruka was talking to them. She reasoned that he was Haruka's dad. Yukino turned around when the door opened and Haruka looked over. Both of them smiled at her. "I was wondering when you would come visit."
"I just heard." She approached the bed and knelt down beside it. "How do you feel?"
"Tired, right now, but I've heard that you're feeling a lot worse." Haruka put a hand on Natsuki's shoulder. "It's going to be okay. She'll wake up."
"I don't know if I believe that. The doctors here seem to think..."
"They think, Natsuki, I know." Haruka's face was serious and her voice was authoritative. "She will wake up, she can't live without you, or you without her. I saw her when I was dreaming." The room's attention was on her. "In that world it was you who died, but she built a new world around you. Husband, kid, job everything was tied to you. She needs you, Natsuki, but you need to survive too."
"I was weak when I found out she was in a coma, I didn't know what to do. But now I'm stronger, and I will be here when she wakes up."
Haruka smirked. "That's good to hear."
Natsuki stood to leave. "It's good to see you awake, Haruka, and for what it's worth I'm sorry."
"You've got nothing to be sorry for."
Natsuki turned to leave when Yukino took her arm, "It's good to see you doing better. I was worried about you."
"Thanks for worrying, but I feel a lot better now."
When she got back to Shizuru's room her mom was sitting in the chair waiting for her. "I thought you'd be here." She got up to greet her daughter, a look of concern etched on her face. "How are you doing, Natsuki? You're friend Yukino called me to tell me she was worried about you."
"I know, I was in a bad place, but I feel better now."
"And the shrink I sent you to, how is that helping?"
"A lot. She's really good at her job." The Kugas stood awkwardly facing each other, neither good at showing their emotions. Saeko finally broke the tension and reached out to her daughter, pulling her into a hug. Natsuki returned it and Saeko started to sing a nursery rhyme that she had sang to Natsuki when she was a baby. It brought tears to both their eyes.
When she was done, Saeko pulled out her car keys. "Are you hungry? Let's go out to eat."
"Okay."
Natsuki said goodbye and "I love you" to Shizuru before she left. She always did, as if to keep the hope alive in her that Shizuru could still wake up. They got on the elevator just as Masahiro Viola left the stairs and walked somberly towards her daughter's room. He opened the door and noticed that Natsuki wasn't there, unusual considering she had been by her daughter's side every day since the accident. He respected her for it, not many in her situation would have stuck by his daughter like she had. He knelt by his daughter's bedside and took her hand, now thin and pale, holding it up to his cheek, feeling how cold it was. He tried to speak but words failed him, only the overbearing feeling of loss as he held his daughter's hand and silently wept into the bed sheets.
-IPR-
Natsuki sat across from Saeko at a nearby restaurant, neither talking much but enjoying each other's company. Natsuki had ordered a steak and was tearing into it with a fervor. She didn't want to mention it, but it had been a couple of days since she had eaten. She cleaned the plate and ordered a slice of pie for desert. "Thanks mom, I guess I didn't know how hungry I was."
"That's because you don't eat, Natsuki." Natsuki looked away from her, a sign Saeko knew to mean she had hit a nerve. "You need to take better care of yourself." She smirked at her daughter. "Don't make me get a babysitter for you, now. I will if I have to."
Natsuki pouted and crossed her arms. "I'm almost twenty now, mom, I can take care of myself. It's just been hard without Shizuru, that's all."
"I understand." Saeko's face turned serious. "I never told you about your father, Natsuki. I thought it better that you didn't know, but I think this is a good time to tell you about him." Natsuki's full attention was turned to her mother, she didn't even notice when her pie arrived. "Your father was a soldier, and a good man. I loved him from the moment I laid eyes on him, but one day he left to fight overseas and he never came back. I waited for him, for long months I waited for him until I started getting sick in the mornings. My stomach grew and I realized that I was pregnant with his child, you. He died in that country, Natsuki, and it broke me down. That's why I never told you." Saeko reached across the table and took her daughter's hand. "Life goes on, Natsuki. Don't lose faith, but don't have any illusions. If she doesn't come back, you're going to have to live with it."
Natsuki nodded. She could always count on her mother to tell her the hard truth, other people would sugarcoat things but never Saeko Kuga. "She'll come back, mom. I need her."
"I just want you to be ready, Natsuki. That's one hell of a fall."
They finished eating and Saeko paid, against Natsuki's wishes, and drove her back to the hospital. Saeko rolled down the car window as her daughter started to walk away. "Go home tonight, Natsuki. Get some sleep." Natsuki nodded to her mother and continued on into the hospital.
When she got to the room she noticed the door was open. She rushed forward in time to see an older man studying Shizuru's face with a small penlight. "Hey, what are you doing?" The man looked up, startled, as Natsuki came barreling into the room. "You're not her regular doctor. Who are you?"
