I'm sorry for such a long wait, but I've been debating whether or not it should be a chapter of Sunny or a chapter to going back in time on how her parents met. But since the story hasn't been going along as far as I thought, I'll save it for when it has. I've very recently got the wisdom tooth from my lower left quadrant taken out. It hurts like heck! I have a very low tolerance for pain so I'm on a lot of pain medication. Anyway, enough about me. I do not own OHSHC.

Sunny's POV

The sun has always my alarm clock. Abuela (A/N: means Grandmother in Spanish) stuck to calling me her Luz, saying that I always rose with the sun. I remember it well, the pinks, the baby blues, and the purples colored my nursery walls. From the moment I was born I was swaddled in these colors. It had already been raining long before my due date, hard, and my father swore that when I came into the world as did the sun, the both of us coming out of hiding.

And it was on this theory that A.J. knew that I wouldn't wake up that night or any other night while I was recovering from the accident. He was there that day when I was born, just five years old, he was the first person to hold me after my parents. And he was beside me every single day in that awful hospital room, waiting for my eyes to open. Jamie, Alex, and Ben were there with him, for as long as they were allowed. My relationship with their parents wasn't all that great, so they still tried to keep them from me, but like any teenager our age: they refused to listen.

I remember very little of what happened after the car crash. They said I was lucky that my ribs broke instead of bruised, because the task of breathing wouldn't be as painful. They picked my body clean of all the little glass shards in my face from the broken car windows. I was given a neck brace for whiplash, I still find myself feeling embarrassed about that from time to time about me wearing it, the thing was just as ugly as it was necessary.

A.J. was convinced that I would wake up one morning, always waiting before the sun rose, calming down little by little through the afternoon until the evening sun. He didn't loose faith that I would open my eyes, he knew that I would find my way back to them. He brushed my hair everyday, every four hours, paying special care of my highlights, knowing that I was especially proud of the blue. I begged my father for months to let me get them, I eventually broke him down and A.J. was the one to persuade me to get blue instead of red, saying that blue would bring out my eyes.

I only had the color in my hair for three days before everything I knew was taken away. I hung upside down in my car seat, the blood running upwards into my hair, mixing in with the glass fragments already there.

This was the reason why I no longer liked riding in cars, why I always felt like the seat belt was a cage, why I panicked that day on New Years. It was a complete an utter nightmare to have to get in a plane after the accident, I spent a majority of the flight trying not to hyperventilate and walking up and down the aisles. And I would have completely lost my sanity if it had not been for the fact that I had a window seat, perfect for seeing the sun rise. Calm was easier after that. That and the thought of being reunited with Haruhi and Uncle once more.

A.J. never faltered, always with me those long days, until the night called for his attention. Explaining the situation to his work, his teachers, his friends, and his family in Florida. School and work was trying to pull him back, but he wanted to be there for me. He was always like that.

The first thing I remember seeing that morning was A.J. slumped in a chair next to me, the top part of his body was on the bed with me, holding onto one of my hands. My mouth was too dry for me to swallow properly. I hated having to do this but I needed to wake him up. I whispered his name, but my voice failed me. With my free hand I shook him awake. His eyes slowly focused on my face, they widened with shock and relaxed, a tired smile spreading across his face.

"Welcome back, Sunshine," he said. I tried to smile back, but my lips were chapped and cracked, so instead I moved my hand to my throat and patted it. He understood and called for a nurse. "You've been asleep for quite some time now, it's good to see those eyes of yours open."

I gulped down as much water as I was able. "How long were they closed?"

"Almost three weeks. School's already been in session for over a month. Your friends sure are worried, they keep calling every hour, it's starting to get annoying." He smiled fondly at the mention of them and it was at that exact moment that I could hear the sound of his phone vibrating. "That should be them now," he chuckled. He answered and held my hand, bringing it to his face and tears forming in his eyes. At the sight of them, my own tears were triggered, and I let them be, but I would soon come to realize that those tears were only the first to come. It slowly dawned on my that the phone conversation had a heaviness in it. A.J. suddenly gripped my hand tightly and looked at me with sad eyes, the words on the other line upsetting him. "No, I haven't told her yet," he answered with a sigh. "No, I think it's best that I tell her myself and maybe give her a day to... recover."

Immediately at the sound of those words, I knew that everything in the world was somehow out of alignment. A.J., under normal circumstances would have wanted my friends to come visit and to have all of us together after me being unconscious for such a long time. I wanted so badly to think that the only thing that was wrong was that I missed a few tests for school and that I missed a few weeks of work, but the look in his eyes said that things were a thousand times worse than that. He hung up a minute afterwards, saying that I needed to recuperate at my own pace and that I would push myself even if my body wasn't up for it. Which was probably true.

A.J. kept trying to open his mouth but all the sound that came out was a choking sound. It then occurred to me that my parents weren't here. "Where's Mom and Dad," I asked, innocently looking around the room, hoping to find them sleeping in chairs. A.J. still didn't say anything, or rather he didn't know what to say. When he was like for too long, I swallowed. "Are they... not here?"

"I don't know how to tell you this, Sunlight..." his voice trailed off. Something so bad must have happened for him to call my that, he only ever called my Sunlight whenever he was overtaken by strong emotions. It finally seemed to click and I found myself shaking my head in denial.

"No," I whimpered. I ripped my hand out of his hand and covered my head with the thing blanket. A.J. gave me the time and space for me to calm down, knowing fully well that I didn't like crying in front of others. The tighter I curled in on myself, the more of a tug I felt on my back and ribs, I then loosed myself from my ball and continued my cry. I don't know how long it took for me to calm down but when I lift the cover my head I saw that A.J. was still gone. I sighed then reached out for the button to incline my bed, but the I.V. didn't let me reach that far. After a few more seconds I managed to scoot myself close enough that the tip of my nail was able to make contact. When the bed was inclined enough I sat back with a sigh of defeat, I can't believe that it's got to the point where I need help pushing a button. How weak I've become.

I leaned forward a bit and reached through the opening of my hospital gown, brushing my fingers along my spinal cord. I felt the fine threads of the stitches, feeling them where it was sewn in through my skin. It went from my tip to tip it would be about a foot or so in length. I took away my hand I tugged at the collar of my gown, peeking down. I saw that my ribs were taped up and that there was a little bit of bruising. My bent my head over and my hair waterfalled in either side of my face.

"They picked a lot of shards from body when they brought you in," said A.J. I peeked in between my hair and saw that he was standing in the door. How long was he standing there? I sat up straighter and straightened my gown. "You broke a few ribs and you needed a few stitches."

I nodded. "My body will heal, it's just a few scars that I'll live with," I muttered. My shock was still in effect but what more was expected when you find out your parents are dead, but you somehow ended up surviving. I didn't think I could say anything anything but for their sake I needed to know more. "H-how did it... happen?" My voice broke and I waited.

"They found high levels of alcohol in the other driver's system," he said. "They said his car took a lot of damage and died before the ambulance even made it to the scene. Your parents died on the way here. A big glass shard went through your father's lungs were severely injured and your mother lost too much blood." Flashes went through my mind: Dad's shallow breathing and Mom's blood. I put a hand over my mouth, taking deep breaths through my nose. I felt as if I was going to be sick. I clenched my right hand hard, the sting bringing me back to the present.

I heard A.J. moving towards me and sat down in the chair again. I felt him take my clenched hand in both of his. As gently as he could, he loosened each one of my fingers. We both looked down at my palm and saw four pink crescent marks, if I had applied a little more force it would have bleed. A.J. covered my palm and brought it to his face, looking like he was praying, he opened his eyes and stared at me.

"Please," he begged, "don't blame yourself."

But we both already knew that it was already too late for that.

There was a herd of eight deer, each one a different color. The six stags that were: white, purple, a big dark blue one, a small pink one, orange, and a powder blue one. But there was a pair of deer that didn't have antlers. A red doe with big brown eyes stood with a yellow doe that towered over her.

The strangest thing about it was, that when the yellow doe strayed from the herd, each deer would stop grazing or stand up and follow after her. She would stand next to the red one, then blue, then purple, then back, moving about between the three of those.

They came upon a stream and the yellow doe drank with the smaller red doe. Suddenly there was a clicking sound and the yellow one stopped drinking. She moved her dead side to side, and at this point the other deer were notified that something was wrong. A sparkling glint came from the other side of the river, hiding in the bushes. The yellow doe grunted to warned the others of the danger.

She head butted the red one in the side to get her to start running. But it was too late, the sound of an explosion resounded around them, the birds in the trees panicking and flying off. Her nostrils flared in fear and her legs were too slow to get out of the way. But before the bullet made contact, there was a blue speck that jumped in front of her.

My eyes bolted open. Making me frantically sit up in my futon and feverishly look around. No one was there. It was nothing but a dream. I turned my head and saw that the sun wasn't even up yet, and the clock read that school didn't start for another eight hours. It must have been quite a nightmare to have woken up at such an hour. With a thankful sigh I fell back against the cushion.

"Thank goodness," I exhaled. I raised a hand to my forehead and realized that I was sweating. I sat up once again and felt that my tank top underneath was plastered to my skin. I unbuttoned my pajama top and shrugged it off. I undid my my hair tie and let it splay itself around me, not moving until my breathing had gone back to normal. I felt too gross to just go back to bed after this so I left my bedroom and went to the bathroom.

I didn't feel like sitting in the bath so I just stuck to the overhead showerhead. I stripped and threw my night clothes into the hamper. I felt... strange. Somehow unable to face myself today. It reminded me vaguely of that fight A.J. and I had five years ago. After his father died, Joshua, he was in mourning. When I tried to comfort him in front of his parents' graves, he shrugged me off. The motion was cold and indifferent. His eyes held great pain and were glazed over. He was fifteen at the time and even back then he towered over the eleven-year-old me.

"This is your fault," he uttered. We were both shocked by his words, as if he said them before he was able to process what he was saying. "Wait," he pleaded, but I didn't listen. All I could do at that tender age was deeply bow my head and run away, feeling like the biggest traitor in the world. Even after he moved into out house, I didn't go near him, believing his words to be true. Not once the first five months did I look him in the eyes.

Even now, I had the mindset that if I betrayed someone in any way then I didn't deserve to look them in the eye. The fear of seeing what I would find, more hurt and betrayal, keeps me from looking at one's face. A.J. kept insisting that he didn't mean it, but it was far too late to take them back. He eventually was able to convince me that I shouldn't feel guilty.

This incident taught me to be cautious and conscious of those around me. I never wanted someone to feel that way because of me. My curse was the worst thing that could happen to those that I loved. I licked my lips and tasted salt. My eyes widened and brushed my fingertips over my cheeks. I wasn't able to tell the difference between the tears and the water, but I felt as if they were still noticeable. I took the soap from my tray and scrubbed myself clean, making sure that there were no traces of my nightmare sweat or my pitiful crying.

I laid my head against the tile of the wall and turned off the facet with a squeak. I inhaled, the water vapor weighing down on my skin and entering my lungs. I scooted away from the wall and raised my arms to my head. I took my hair in my hands and rinsed off as much water as I could before I dried it with a towel. I quickly wrapped myself in the towel and ran off to my room. I looked at the hook near the door and saw the bathrobe I took from the twins' room in Okinawa that Nekozawa-senpai let me keep was there. I grabbed it and tucked myself into it, tying the blue velvet rope around my waist.

I picked up the brush from my vanity and ran it through my hair, getting rid of the tangles. As a set it down I saw the picture of the last time mine and A.J.'s family were together, that was a little over eleven years now, the first time I saw snow. I was on my father's shoulders, digging my tiny fingers in his head, my mother looking at us both with such love in her eyes. A.J. was at the age when it was uncool to show such emotions in front of others, but for this picture he didn't hold back. He held one hand of each of his parent's as they swung him in between them both.

I sat down on the little stool in front, gazing at the picture in my hands. I thought back at the time this picture was taken. I've changed so much since then. I'm not as innocent as I was back then, my eyes don't have the same joyful luster as before, and there was never such heaviness over my heart as there is now. Bottom line was: I wasn't a child anymore. The girl in this picture never thought that such destruction and havoc would occur around her, that her parents would die in a matter a eleven years, that she would start over in a place she hasn't been in more than ten years. Never thinking that in order to protect the ones she loves she would need to keep them at arms-length.

I set the picture frame down and opened up the vanity drawer. Inside the little velvet box, was the necklace that Hikaru gave to me, with my parent's rings proudly displayed on either side of the crescent medallion.

"Mom, Dad," I said in English, holding up the necklace, "I don't know if you can hear me, but I wish you were here with me. I want you to meet this new family that I've made here in Japan. They're a great bunch of people, even though Haruhi and Uncle pretend that they're a nuisance at times, we care about each other." I took a deep breath, preparing myself to continue. "Mom, was it this hard to get along with Dad when you first met? I'm a little afraid of getting close to this guy. What if he doesn't like me later on? It's my first time feeling this way and I wonder if I'll be able to make it through without you here to guide me." I paused again, taking an even shakier breath. "I think I've found someone worth breaking this curse for."

Don't laugh about her waking up from a nightmare sweaty, because I've had more than enough night terrors to verify that that can happen.