Hi, everyone!

Second chapter already! I can hardly believe myself... Ok, first of all thanks to berettaboy for your review and support... This chapter doesn't contain any japanese words or expressions.

Warning: shounen ai in later chapters. Spoilers, lot of spoilers

Disclaimer: I wanted Shinji and Kaworu for Christmas, but, alas...I still don't own them...

In cold nights I recall your memory

"You hold the imprints deep within your own mind

Consciously, you've forgotten it, that's the way the human mind works

Whenever something is too unpleasant, too shameful for us to entertain,

We reject it, we erase it from our memories. But the imprint is always there…"

It was a beautiful morning, Shinji decided. And that was what made his nightmares more repulsive. The fact that he couldn't forget he almost killed Toji, that Asuka had had a mental breakdown and she couldn't pilot anymore, that Rei…that Rei was only a clone of the original Rei and even that Rei wasn't real, that Misato was so lost in her own grief that she couldn't help him anymore. And that his father…his own father was guilty of all that. His father and NERV.

But he knew there was more than what he actually could remember.

He got up from his bed, listening to the singing birds outside his window. Why there were so many blank spaces in his mind? Had something happen that didn't let him found out the truth?

He didn't know anymore. Not that he care either. Every time he had tried to search the depths of his memory for those blank spaces, his eyes were overflowed by tears and a voice in his head had told him to stop. Then he felt almost as his head would explode with an unimaginable pain. His heart-beat increased and he began panting. And he knew what he was feeling, for he had felt it so many times in the past. Fear. An uncontrollable, unspeakable, uncalculated fear.

No wonder he had decided to block away the thought.

Shinji went to the kitchen. He prepared some breakfast for himself and, after he ate it, he went out of the building to make his way to school.

Playground school bell rings…again

Rain clouds come to play…again

He used school as an escape to his loneliness now. He had run away from Tokyo-3 and he was alone. It is weird, the difference between the past and the present. When living in Tokyo-3, he had been alone, but at the same time surrounded by people. He knew it was him who blocked away others, he knew that it was his choice. But now, away from everyone, he was really alone. Now it wasn't like he could get out of his room and attempt to have a nice chat with someone. He was too far now. It was too late.

Shinji knew that if he would have felt like it, he could have abandoned school. But he didn't. Not that he had a particular interest in learning, but he found that going to school was a great way to concentrate on other things than his own pain. Of course, there were those days were he was feeling so depressed that he could hardly manage to get out of bed. When he couldn't stop himself from crying and crying again. Initially he had skipped school when he wasn't feeling alright, for he didn't want to cry in front of his classmates and teachers. He wasn't worried that they would mock him, he didn't care. He was scared that they would try to comfort him and act friendly towards him. Most of all, he was terrified that they would ask him what was so wrong. And he knew he couldn't have answered that, because he himself didn't know what was wrong.

Even if he didn't have any friends at school, he just felt it was like having a second home, a home where one could forget, even if just for a moment, that one was alone, that one was sad, that one was different.

Has no one told you she's not breathing?

Hello, I'm your mind, giving you someone to talk to

Hello

Shinji had gotten himself a part-time job also. On his first days, he had been going from here to there with his things. While being in Misato's apartment he had thought that running away was his only option. So he had just packed his things, got all of his money and simply left. He hadn't thought for a minute that he didn't have any place to go, anyone who could help him, or anything. He had not considered that, until he was on the train that should take him away from Tokyo-3. So when he had run out of money, he carried his things to a nearby park and sat on a bench until he could no longer hold it and began crying helplessly like the child he partially was.

If I smile and don't believe

Soon I know I'll wake from this dream

But then, destiny had smiled to him, for the first time. An old lady had seen him and felt sorry for this crying little child that was getting all wet on that cold evening's rain. She had asked him where his home was, where his parents were, why was he all alone, and another thousand unanswered questions. Shinji had just sobbed harder and harder anytime she asked anything. The woman had then handled him a coat and brought him to her house, two blocks away from the park. Shinji had spent the night at her place, as she couldn't manage to get anything but tears from him. Shinji had cried all his pain out that night. The next morning, the old woman, whose name was Kawashi Asami, had assumed he was a runaway teenager, and when Shinji told her both his parents were dead, she only stated that no one would like to end up in foster care at his age. She had given him a piece of paper with the address of a person, she thought, that could give Shinji a job. Next thing Shinji knew, he had a new job, and he was living in Asami-san's house, where he insisted on renting her a room, rather than staying as a guest.

A difficult part had been explaining his situation to his new school's authorities; the headmistress had listened to his 'story' carefully, like measuring the character of this blue-eyed teenager through her glasses. The headmistress was a blonde sweet woman. Shinji had first thought she must be in her fifties, but when he started talking to her, he corrected himself and gave her forty years old, to say the most. Her name, as Shinji remembered, was Miss Sasaki. Shinji had told her how both his parents were dead and that he hadn't got anyone in the world besides Asami-san and that he truly wished to resume his studies, and the headmistress had understood his situation and had told him that if Mrs. Asami was willing to sign as his legal guardian, she will admit him in her school. And so Shinji had started his new life, far away from Tokyo-3 and the world he used to call his own.

After some months passed by, he had grown a special bond to the woman that had saved him. She often referred to Shinji as an 'adopted grandson' and that made Shinji smile as though he had not experienced pain in his entire life. She had also told him that her only son had died in the Second Impact and that she believed she had approached Shinji because he reminded her to him. 'Same eyes, you know? ' she had said. Shinji had found that statement very encouraging, even if it meant that Asami-san (like he liked to call her) had first liked him only because of his resemblance to her dead son.

The fact that this tender-hearted woman had trusted his home to a complete stranger had just won Shinji's heart. Now, his new 'granny' had left him all alone in the house, since she wanted to pay a visit to her sister for two weeks. She told Shinji that she felt relieved that someone will be at the house to watch after it, and that she trusted him completely. He was overwhelmed, to say the least, but managed to mumble something that sounded like an 'arigato' and, after recovering his voice, he affirmed that he would take good care of the house.

Don't try to fix me, I'm not broken

Hello, I'm the lie living for you so you can hide

Don't cry

But now, after six months living with Asami-san, he was all alone again, even if he didn't have to worry about the money, even if he knew that Asami-san would comeback in only twelve days, he felt as if he were alone again, he felt depressed and terrified of what may happen. He had told her the truth about his past only three weeks ago, when she had woke him up from a nightmare. He had told her everything about the Evangelions, about his mother, about his father, about Rei, about Asuka, about Misato, about the Angels…everything.

So the now left alone Shinji wandered in the streets on his way to school pondering on everything that had happened since he had left NERV's headquarters, but most of all, he was trying to remember what he felt was missing. No, what he knew was missing. He was sure something had been wiped out in his mind. And so he began digging in his mind, despite the reverberating headache he was starting to feel.

Suddenly I know I'm not sleeping

Hello? And I'm still here

All that's left of yesterday