I thought giving up was the right choice. I thought if I left her alone, it'd be easier on her. I thought it'd be easier on me. I was wrong on both sides. It nearly killed me, and it just hurt her. She didn't want to be alone, and now the one whose alone is me.

Part of me didn't think I'd be able to let her go. It told me that all this pushing and shoving would be pointless. It said that after a few minutes, hours, days, I'd eventually run back to her. I don't know if I could've stayed away because she never let me go. She kept dragging me back to her, kicking and screaming. Is that kind of relationship healthy? Can anyone live on a relationship full of death and fear? I sure as hell tried.

Setember 28

I'd made up my mind. It had been two days since that night in the alley. I couldn't do this with her anymore. It was wrong. I was a walking corpse and she was the embodiment of life. I'd started to go to school again so I could see who she spent time with. I know it sounds like I'm a stalker, but it wasn't really like that. I just wanted to know more about her. I wanted to know what she was like without me. Fuuka had been right. She had a lot of friends, some female; some male.

She deserved someone better than me, but I just wasn't ready to let her go. I always told myself one more night or one more conversation and that would be the end. On this night, I meant it.

She came up to me as usual. I made her sit down at the bar, away from the lounge and prying eyes. I wanted that night to belong to just the two of us. No one else.

"C'mon, say something." I didn't want to hear myself talk. Tonight, all I wanted was to hear her voice.

"What do you want to talk about?" She sounded cheerful. She had that smile that I loathed and loved.

"Anything. Tell me something fun."

"Hmm..." She tapped her lips, her eyebrows knitted together in thought. She was probably just pretending to think. "Did you know the cameras are busted in the building? I saw you and Koromaru watching Family Cooking the other night. Why were you pretending to be asleep?"

All I wanted was to hear her talk, and the first thing she chose to talk about was me. It was this sort of shit that killed me. "I just wasn't in the mood to talk."

"I see..." Her little smile grew a little bigger in knowing. "But you were talking to Koromaru. You like him a lot."

"He's a good dog."

"He's very cute. He likes you too. More than the others, I think. Right after me, you're probably his favorite." She giggled lightly, placing her elbow on the bar so she could hold up her head with her hand.

"Tell me a story about you and Koromaru."

"Mmm... The other day, we were at the shrine, and some jerks were trying to steal something. Koromaru was really brave. Scared them off all by himself. He didn't even need to bite them. He looks really scary when he wants to." She looked a little sad, as she smiled up at me. It was a short story. It wasn't enough. I didn't want her to stop. I never wanted her to stop.

"C'mon, tell me more. You've gotta have more stories."

"Umm...I sleep a lot in school. Junpei's always asking me to give him answers. I've got Fuuka in cooking club. We make a lot of sweets and I keep them in the fridge in my room. You can have some if you want. In student council, I got to know a lot of people, but Hidetoshi most of all. He's head of the disciplinary committee. He defended me when a teacher tried to frame me. Rio's captain of the Volleyball team. She's a tougher one. A tomboy. Saori was part of the library committee with me, but she was getting bullied. She's gone now but we still talk on the phone when she's feeling lonely. She tells me she's made a few new friends but she still misses me. I met a monk in a bar. I think he thought of me as his daughter, but he's gone now too. He's trying to get his family back after he messed up his relationship with them. Then there's Theo. He's a...secretary kind of. He teaches me a lot about... cards." Her eyes seemed to wander as she listed the people that she knew. Names and activities that I would never be able to match or see. I wonder if she would miss me with all these people who loved her.

"Sounds like you're enjoying your days." I smiled, and I wished she'd laughed for me, just once. " You look best when you smile. So never cry, got that?"

"I...Senpai, what're you trying to say?" The smile was gone. Her face was a mask, devoid of any emotion but worry. She knew. She's a smart girl. Could probably feel it.

"...Just what I said." I couldn't look at her, and she didn't have anything left to say to me. Maybe, she'd felt that she'd used up all her words when she was telling me about her friends. "You're...something else, okay? I don't ever want to see you cry. I don't want to think I'm leaving you behind."

"What do you mean leaving me behind? Where are you going? What do you think is going to happen?" I could hear this chill in her voice, utterly devoid of life. It was like being stuffed into a coffin.

"I want you to forget about me, Minako." Her face didn't change but she looked away from me and just stared at the floor so I took my chance to keep going. "Forget about me, and move on. There's a bunch of other people waiting for you out there."

"Stop."

"I keep telling you what to forget and what to remember...What to want and to not want...I'm selfish, aren't I?"

"Yes...Yes, you are, so stop it." She was glaring at me. She knew what I was trying to say. "Stop telling me to do things that I don't want to do."

"As long as I'm already being selfish, I want you to do one more thing for me." I was rushing now, ignoring more of her words. I was running out of time. I was losing her.

"What is it?" She wouldn't look at me. She was staring at the table, speaking to an object that couldn't hurt her, trying to ignore the one that could. Tears were pooling in her eyes, but she refused to let them fall. She refused to wipe them away.

"You don't have to forgive me... But forgive everything else..."

"What are you talking about?" There was the smallest tinge of anger in her voice. "What are you going to do?" She was whispering, trying to keep herself under control. She was a machine, maybe even more than the actual robot standing in the living room. "What am I not going to forgive?"

"You'll understand later. It should be like this for a little while longer. I just want everything to be...normal..."

"Normal, huh..." She gritted her teeth, still refusing to look at me.

She watched the table. I watched the top of her head. My hand twitched uneasily. Part of me wanted to pet her but I knew it would be a bad move now. The air was heavy. She didn't say anything more to me, but the anger was gone. She just watched the table, as if the fire in her eyes could burn a hole through it.

"...Is it getting late? I forgot that I don't have my watch."

She sighed. "Did you lose it?"

"Yeah, I lost it somewhere. It was a shabby old pocket watch. I got it from a girl at the orphanage a long time ago...

"Oh? What was she like?"

"Hey, not tonight. I want to hear what you've got to say. You've got more stories up your sleeve right? Anything's fine."

"How about you tell me the story about the girl at the orphanage and I'll tell you any story you want to hear?" She seemed tired, but she didn't look like she wanted to leave either.

"Damn it...I don't know how you can always get what you want..." She didn't smile. She didn't answer. Maybe she was angry again. "Her name was Haruka Asahi. She was just another girl at the orphanage. Aki had Miki and I had Haruka. That orphanage was a shit hole. Kids would disappear all the time, and no one gave a shit when we were bullied. All the other kids were afraid of her because of some story, saying she was cursed. She got sick before the fire and gave me the pocket watch. Soon after, a lot of other kids got sick and died saying it was her fault. Even the nurses and caretakers were saying it. The fire happened the day she died, and you know the rest. Me and Aki never looked back."

"I'm sorry...I didn't know that the two of you had to go through all that..." She looked like she wanted to do something to make me feel better, but she didn't move. She just watched me with sad, tired eyes. She was digging her nails into her wrist.

"It's okay. So you'll tell me a story now?" I asked her. I was doing it too. That fake smile. I could see why she did it so often. It was so easy to fake it. Too easy.

Her whole body was tense but she was still smiling that fake smile. "What do you want to know?"

"Tell me about Minato."

The smile slid right off her face. "How do you know about him?"

"When you were sick, you were calling for him in your dreams." I'd waited for a week. His name had been circling around my head for days. This was my last chance. I had to know. "Who is he?"

"No." She'd almost yelled. Almost. She was keeping her voice under control. A machine fixing her gears.

"...What?" I didn't register her answer. Not for a full three seconds. "Why not? You said you'd tell me."

"Consider it a lie. You said you were being selfish tonight. Now, it's my turn. You can call me a liar too if you want." She slid off the stool, walking to the opening that led to the stairs. I couldn't do anything. She was going to leave, and this would be it for us. I didn't know the words that would stop her. I wasn't even sure if I was supposed to stop her. It was over. "Good night, Shinjiro-san."

A/N: The story from the orphanage isn't mine. I stole it from Rewrite and Haruka Asahi belongs to the wonderful writers over at Key. Congrats to anyone who got the reference without reading this little note.