Authoress Note: I've been flipping through some amazing YYH stories/doujinshi and reading up on other people's OCs the past few days, and it inspired me to spice my story up a little more, as you'll soon see. I also had a very, very chirpy guinea pig on my lap as I re-wrote half of this, so I hope it's not too horrible. And thank you nevvy and Random~ You'll get to find out what happened to her soon. Hope I don't disappoint. ;hearts
Stuff actually happens this time.
Disclaimer: I don't own Yu Yu Hakusho, nor am I making any profit from this, blah blah. The only things I own are my original characters, and I'm doing this because writing is love.
Chapter Two;
"Saviour"
POV: Itori
Naturally, the following morning I received an angry phone call from mother, who chided me in that special motherly way of hers for leaving early without informing anyone, and for abandoning my sister during a "fragile" time in her life. Takeshi, being the only member of the family who actually cared about me, dropped by my apartment to make sure I was okay after the festivities and falsities had let up. My family's behaviour left a bitter taste in my mouth that would probably linger for a few days, as it usually did, but I refused to let it show. Baggage was something you left at home stuffed in the closet, not something you lugged around with you to work. I may not have been a lawyer or a super-professional anything as my parents had intended, but I prided myself in my job and my customers seemed to enjoy the company as well. I wasn't about to ruin my good reputation by being a grump.
The first half of the day was always relatively slow, with it picking up at around midday when most people poured into the mall to do their shopping, and working men eagerly started their lunch breaks. After lunch the customers became scarce again, only to mob once more in the afternoon when students were let out of school. I had it easy as a pharmacist, working only six hours a day and four days a week, because no one wanted me to be on my feet longer than necessary, though I would have liked for more hours. Even though my brother owned the apartment I lived in I still had to pay rent – albeit at a slightly reduced cost – and buy food for myself and my chubby little room mate. If anything, reduced work hours were doing more harm than good.
I'd been manning the counter for a majority of the day, occasionally stacking shelves and taking blood pressures when my co-workers were swamped under, and it was certainly the best part of my job. If there was no one else waiting in line I was able to chat up my customers, which most of them seemed to enjoy. The elderly were especially chatty, and they loved a good gossip almost as much as I did. I'd always considered myself a people-person, and I felt like that was the only thing about me that hadn't changed after my accident. My leg ached slightly in remembrance, and so did my bladder for a completely different reason.
I stepped out from behind the counter and waved my hand to catch the attention of one of my colleagues. "Hitomi, can you watch the counter for me again?"
"Gods, you're like a freaking fountain," the bespectacled woman mumbled at me, begrudgingly taking my place. "I swear you do this just to spite me."
Being the mischievous scamp I was, I blew her a kiss before bouncing out of the pharmacy and heading for the nearest restroom. As fun as tormenting her was, I didn't want her frightening away our patrons with her "doom aura", as I'd dubbed it, so I made sure not to dawdle. Unlike me, Hitomi hated being stuck behind the desk because it meant she had to eventually interact with other living beings, and she wasn't nearly as charismatic or talkative as I was. She preferred to avoid most human interaction where she could, and spent most of her time camped out in the back rooms. I could only imagine what kind of comical horror she was unleashing upon the next poor soul that dared to step up to the counter. Synced perfectly with my imaginary scenario, a mix of terrified screams from outside resounded within the restroom. I finished up in record time and poked my head out into the hallway to look for the cause. A small group of people had gathered around a body on the floor, and my heart stopped momentarily. What the hell had happened?
As I approached the scene I pieced together snippets of chatter.
"...she just..."
"...collapsed..."
"...so suddenly..."
"...call an ambulance...!"
My initial thought was that someone had had a heart attack, and I pushed through the thickening crowd of bystanders. I wasn't a take-charge kind of person, but I was being driven mostly by impulse. Work required that I be trained to handle all sorts of emergencies, and it was more than likely that I was the only person in the immediate area who had some inkling of what to do. I hurried over to the body, and my blood rapidly turned to ice when I identified the unconscious person's face.
"Shiori?!"
Shiori Minamino frequented the pharmacy once a week to refill a prescription, buy pain medication or just to have her blood pressure checked at the urging of her husband, who was currently bent over her and desperately trying to wake her up. I quickly crouched down on the other side of her body and he looked up at me, fear staining his glassy eyes. My heart broke with his next words.
"She's... not breathing," he stammered, "and I can't find her pulse anywhere."
Instinctively, I felt around the centre of her chest and layered my trembling hands one on top of the other in the appropriate spot. Everyone loved Shiori, myself included. I couldn't live with myself if anything were to happen to her in my presence. "It'll be okay, Kazuya," I said, trying to sound as confident and reassuring as possible, though I couldn't even fool myself. "Make sure someone does call for an ambulance."
Compressions first. My whole body surged with adrenaline. I'd never administered CPR on an actual person before, just practise dummies, and having to use it for the first time on someone I cared for cruelly reminded me of my inexperience. I kept my compressions firm, hoping her ribs could withstand the pressure. It was a horrible thing to admit, but I would have had an easier time keeping a clear head if it had been a complete stranger laying before me. It wouldn't have hurt nearly as much if I'd lost them.
...twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty.
Still no response. The basics from class had been branded into the back of my mind: tilt head back, close nostrils, breathe into mouth twice, follow up with more compressions. I was beginning to feel light-headed and dizzy myself, but I kept my efforts up.
A lady slowly stepped up beside us, a phone to her ear. "A-an ambulance will be here in a couple of minutes..." she said shakily.
"Okay." I shut everything else out while I concentrated. The only things I were aware of were a frantic Kazuya, a motionless Shiori, my panicking heartbeat, and how godawful I would feel if I messed up and killed the woman beneath me. The ever growing flock of terrified bystanders didn't exist in my focused world. I knew all too well that there was a hospital close by, merely a couple of blocks away from the mall, but the close proximity didn't reassure me. Even though professional help was so close, I couldn't let my guard down. I couldn't give saving Shiori anything less than my all.
...twenty-seven, twenty-eight, twenty-
A sound rumbled deep in Shiori's throat, and I stopped pushing down on her chest. Her eyes cracked open.
"She's barely conscious!" the lady next to me exclaimed, partly to the operator on the line and partly to the people circled around us.
Without a second thought, I unbuttoned my white uniform coat and gently laid it on top of Shiori to keep her warm, if only for a few minutes. "You'll be okay, Shiori," I told her gently. "An ambulance is on its way here."
The dark-haired woman exhaled sharply and tilted her head to the side, taking notice of the strangers gathered around her and the panicked husband by her side. She smiled weakly. "My... it seems I've caused a commotion."
The adrenaline slowly drained from my veins, leaving my whole body feeling nauseous and shaky. I watched as Shiori's husband grabbed her hands and squeezed them, and I listened to his half-coherent prayers to the divine Gods above, begging them to have mercy on his wife. The outside world slowly blossomed back into existence and I could vaguely make out the sound of sirens chirping outside. Someone rubbed my back gently, and I was surprised to see Hitomi leaning over me. I had no idea how long she'd been standing there, and I didn't have the voice to ask. Shiori's condition seemed to stabilise a little, at least, but she was still incredibly weak and faint. It didn't take much longer for the paramedics to arrive on the scene. Hitomi helped me to my feet so I could give them room to work.
"That was an incredibly brave thing you just did," she said, jabbing me in the stomach. "I probably would have fainted."
"I feel like I'm going to," I muttered, holding my head. "I didn't think she was going to regain consciousness."
"Well, Shiori's a fighter," she replied, wrapping her arm around mine and tugging me away. "There's not much else we can do for her right now, though. You can visit her after your shift ends. Even heroes don't get to leave work early."
I scrunched my face up at her. "You just don't want to be stuck at the desk any longer."
I was a mess for the remainder of my shift. People came up to me after Shiori had been taken away to compliment me on handling the emergency so well, but I didn't feel worthy of their words and I brushed the praise aside. If anything, I felt like I could have handled the situation a whole lot better, had I not been a nervous wreck. I wasn't cut out to be a hero – a saviour – and if by some cruel twist of fate something similar were to happen again, I could only hope that someone more experienced and confident would be close by to take the lead. The attention my "heroics" had garnered was beginning to make me feel very awkward.
The bus ride hadn't been much kinder to me either, and not because it was so crowded that a random stranger had to spoon me so I'd fit. That happened on an almost daily basis. The bus I caught home passed by the hospital, so my usual rendezvous with some young man's front end was cut pleasantly short. I stumbled off the vehicle and headed towards the hospital entrance. At the same time, I pulled my clunky mobile from my bag and punched in a few numbers. It rang three times before someone answered.
"Hey, sparrow. What's up?" Hideo sounded as cheerful as ever.
"Can you pick me up from the hospital?" I asked, entering the lobby.
His voice dropped a little. "What happened? Are you okay?"
"Oh, no, I'm fine," I hastily responded. "A friend of mine had a heart attack and I'm just checking up on her."
The man perked up again. "All right, good samaritan. I'll be there in twenty."
I'd walked the halls of this hospital many times before, but never to visit another person. The sterile air stirred up a few unpleasant memories in my mind, but I pushed them back quickly enough and stashed them in the darker recesses of my mind. I was here to visit Shiori, not indulge my masochism and re-visit the past. A young woman smiled at me as I approached the reception desk and signalled that she'd only be a moment. After typing a few things into her computer, she turned to me.
"How can I help?"
"I'm looking for a woman who was admitted this afternoon... Shiori Minamino."
"Mi-na-mi-no," she mumbled to herself, her fingers dancing gracefully across the keyboard. "Minamino. Here we go. Your friend is on the fifth floor, room 501."
I thanked the receptionist quickly and headed for the elevator. Every time I was admitted, the doctors had me staying in the same room on the same floor – floor four, room eleven. The morbidly curious part of me wanted to visit room 411, but I pushed onwards to the floor Shiori was being kept on. She was my priority. As the elevator doors opened, the first things to hit me were the blips of heart monitors and IV machines, and that itself was enough to fill my nostalgia quota. I side-stepped a couple of nurses and stopped outside of Shiori's room. Peeking through the blurry door window, I barely made out the figure of her husband and two non-uniformed men, who I could only assume were the two sons she often gushed about. I almost felt a little rude intruding on them, but I wanted to make sure she was all right. I cracked open the door and knocked gently, catching the attention of everyone but Shiori, who was sleeping in her hospital bed. At least, I hoped she was only sleeping.
"May I come in?" I asked meekly through the crack. Kazuya looked a little surprised to see me, and then relieved. The corners of his eyes crinkled when he smiled and beckoned me in. I opened the door further and slid inside, shutting it quietly behind me. "I hope I'm not interrupting anything. How is she?"
"She's resting now, but the doctors said she's going to make a full recovery. They're letting her out tomorrow morning," he said, before standing from his seat and placing his hands on my shoulders. "Thank you, Itori. Thank you for saving my wife. If there's anything I can ever do to repay you..."
His voice cracked suddenly, and the two strange-looking men turned their undivided attention towards us. I suddenly felt very small beneath their collective gazes. It wasn't me who had saved her life, I wanted desperately to say. The hospital staff did all of the hard work - I only warmed Shiori up for them. Before my nervous brain could muster up a decently humble response, Kazuya hugged me. I felt the blood rush to my face. The intense feelings of gratitude from Shiori's husband made me feel slightly more awkward than the admiration I'd received from complete strangers, and I could only chalk that up to my deep-seated parent issues. I patted the man's back slowly, unsure of what else to do. Eventually he pulled away, but my face hadn't had enough time to match the colour of the rest of my body. The brown-haired son chuckled quietly, finding my reaction either hilarious or endearing, and hugged me as well, though not as long as his father had. He pushed something white into my hands.
"I believe this is yours, Miss Itori. We really appreciate you sparing it for the day."
My coat. I'd almost completely forgotten about it. "Thanks," I said, sliding it on over my orange work blouse.
Being confined in a small room with Shiori's family was a strange thing, and not just because her scarlet-haired son hadn't uttered a single word, content to just stare me down when he wasn't watching his mother for signs of consciousness. The way they patiently waited by her side, stroking her hair and occasionally leaning down to whisper something into her ear as if she could hear them felt... intimate. The familial connection they shared with one another was something I was not a part of, something I was an outsider to, even within my own family. My bag suddenly vibrated and I fished out my buzzing phone.
One unread text from Hideo.
Be outside in a few.
I dropped it back into the depths of my bag and readjusted the strap on my shoulder. I didn't want to feel like an intruder any longer. "I'm glad to hear she'll be okay. Can you tell her I dropped by when she wakes up?"
Kazuya smiled and nodded again before returning his attention to his sleeping wife. I bowed quickly to the other two men before slipping out of the room. When I shut the door behind me I felt a huge weight lift itself from my chest, making it easier for me to breathe again. My insides bubbled with glee. Shiori was going to be all right. My feeble attempts hadn't condemned her. The door to her room opened again, and her red-haired son stepped outside. His face brightened ever so slightly when he saw I was still nearby.
"Thank you," he said, "for saving her. If we can repay you in any way, please, don't hesitate to let us know."
"Just take care of her. She means a lot to me, too."
The corner of his lips turned up a little and he gave me what could have been described as a hug, but also not at the same time – his front ghosted mine and he tilted his head down, gently placing his hand on my shoulder. He smelt... nice. It was a strange thing to notice, but then again any scent that wasn't "hospitalised" was immediately welcome. I would have appreciated the strange gesture for more than just a few seconds, had his knee not somehow grazed against my right leg. I stiffened immediately at the contact, a motion that didn't seem to go unnoticed by him. He didn't comment on it, however, and only smiled.
"Take care, Itori. I imagine we'll be meeting again soon," he said mysteriously before disappearing back into his mother's hospital room.
I stood there for a minute, dumbfounded and paralysed. Was his brushing against my leg really just an accident, or had he done it on purpose? There was no way he could have known; I was being paranoid. I shook my head and made my way back to the elevator.
What a weird man.
Next chapter: "Legs"
Additional note: Apparently when Shiori was first seen in the anime, she was in hospital room 501.