"Kotori...Kotori"
What good was writing down details about the landscape when she couldn't remember what she was supposed to do?
She spent the morning scrolling through hundreds of social media profiles, wondering if the name Kotori had always been so popular, and she was just now noticing it.
Oh, of course. She had to find a way to reach Kotori.
"Umi...is everything alright?"
Gentle fingers dancing across her back roused her from her concentration and she found Nozomi looking down at her.
"Sorry, I was just thinking about the Kotori situation again."
"We're listening if you need to talk, right Eli?"
The blonde's head popped up at that and she replied, "To be honest, I'm still really confused about what's happening, but yes, I'm listening."
Slowly, Umi slumped down over the table, saying, "I think...I'm pretty sure the thing I'm supposed to do is contact, or talk to, or somehow meet Kotori in real life. But how am I going to do that? All I have is her first name and a general idea of what she looks like, everything else is too hazy. How can I find her with so little to go on?"
The two student councils members looked at eachother and thought for a moment.
Finally, Eli replied, "It seems to me that you can only either get more information, or make an educated guess and go where you think she's most likely to be."
Nozomi nodded and added in, "Have your teachers ever told you about that study showing that if you're not sure about a multiple choice question, your first instinct is often right?"
Umi nodded.
"Well, you said the rest is hazy, but at least something is there. There's always a chance that you'll stumble across something that'll kickstart your intuition, so try not to get discouraged so soon."
There was a hole in the bridge where it had begun to separate from itself. Umi leapt across, vertigo washing up as she looked down into the expanse.
Shortly thereafter, she met up with Kotori and the two journeyed across the river and over the hill again, finding where the valley reached the edge of the island. A gray stone bridge connected it there to an imposing island of jagged, barren mountains. Padding across the unyielding stone led them though sheer drops and ascents in turn, and over smooth planes of stone, colliding like tectonic plates.
Despite a scraped knee or two, laughter abounded under that steel-gray sky. It was Umi's turn to expound on her life, discussing her life at Otonokizaka, her friends, her family and dojo. Kotori nodded along, working to memorize everything she could in hopes of retaining it when she woke up.
Umi wondered if this was how it felt to be an amnesiac, scribbling tidbits about Kotori in her journal, yet painting their relationship in broad strokes, unable to remember the conversations that developed it.
She sighed, putting down her pencil and getting ready for school.
Nozomi and Eli were chattering, while Umi kept her head down and worked. She had nothing to say today, only details to wrack her brain over.
For a feverish moment, she began conjuring up random topics and images in hopes that one would remind her of something about Kotori, but quickly realized how futile and unlikely it was.
Before she knew it, the council president was packing up to leave, and she began preparing as well.
Right before she left, she caught the eye of Nozomi, who simply said, "Good luck on your search!"
The navy haired girl gulped.
This was still safe, wasn't it? It had to be.
The center of the bridge had broken away and was floating, bobbing slightly, yet still in-line with the grounded ends.
Her head spun as the stone under her feet dipped a fraction and the wind seemed to pick up. With fists clenched, she forced herself to look only at her feet as she inched forward, until she was finally forced to leap to land once more.
Maintaining a brisk pace in spite of her trembling legs, she strode through the fruitful island, slowing only in the forest clearing when the memory of their first meeting replayed, as it always did. With the pleasant sensation of the tall grass tickling her legs and Kotori's snowcapped island gleaming in the distance, Umi managed to avoid ruminating on the weeping willow too much. This wasn't to say she entirely competent at climbing it now, merely that even without the other girl's help, she no longer panicked.
Following the river down, she broke into a jog as her excitement grew.
Breaking out over the crest of the emerald hill, she spied Kotori below, gently kicking her feet in the water from her seat on the bank. The navy haired girl trailed down behind her, stopping to make eye contact in the reflection from over her head. Kotori leaned back against her legs and looked up at her, saying, "Care to stay here with me for tonight? I didn't see anywhere else we could go to."
The other girl nodded and sat down beside her. As long as they were together, she wouldn't mind if-
She stopped herself; the sappy, embarrassing thoughts simply would not leave her alone.
"Staying like this is nice, too. This spot is as beautiful as ever."
That, she thought, was probably the least embarrassing of the things she had wanted to say at that moment.
The grass was cool against back and she wasn't quite sure at what sure point she and Kotori had fallen back together, staring at the sky. Distantly, she was aware of the other girl's hand tracing gentle patterns on her arm as she asked, "Umi, do you really believe all this is real?"
"...Yes," she thought further for a moment as Kotori hummed thoughtfully beside her, "I'm not one to remember my dreams very well, but I know they've always been boring. I've never dreamed anything like this, and I don't think I could manage to dream up someone like you."
Her eyes were still gliding over the sky's gradient, but she could feel Kotori smiling beside her.
"Then," the grey haired girl replied, "do you think these are really our souls out here?"
That gave Umi pause as she considered it.
"I...suppose I do. I can't even begin to explain any of this, and I don't know of any other explanations...Why do you ask?"
No response came for a time, then she heard Kotori say, "Umi, look here for a second."
Umi let her head roll to the side and-
The other girl's lips were pressing softly against her own.
She was frozen, awash in a sea of light. Distantly, she could feel Kotori's fingers threading themselves through her hair. Only the most basal of thoughts floated to the top of her mind.
Warmth.
Then, after precious few seconds had passed, it was over once more and Kotori pulled away, offering her a tender look, as if it had been the most natural thing in the world.
And for a part of Umi, it had been. She had wanted it; she knew not when the desire had first come to be, but it was there nevertheless.
"I asked because I was wondering if we've broken into heaven," Kotori said.
She awoke in the grip of an indelible, simultaneous warmth and longing. Her pen lay untouched at her side as she tried to piece together the fading images. They were close, had been close, and clearer than any sight was an deep impression of tenderness in her memory.
There was nothing to assuage the niggling question at the back of her mind, however.
"How am I supposed to find her?"
Umi offered a vague reply to the murmuring at the edge of her awareness and completed another form.
It might have been relaxing, the scratching of pencils, the quiet conversation with Nozomi and Eli, had she not not been thinking about Kotori again.
Suddenly, an idea struck her.
"Nozomi, who did you learn to project from?"
"My grandma. Even as a kid, I was skeptical at first, but once I got it to work myself, it opened up the world of spirituality to me," the Vice President relied.
"So you don't know any other people who do it? Or some sort of network?" Umi asked.
"Nope, sorry. I think you'll have to look online in hopes of forums or something."
Well, it had been worth a try.
Nozomi cleared her throat and looked up at Umi before adding, "By the way, I know you seem to have your heart set on it, but if you can't find Kotori, don't worry about it. Try to appreciate what you had. There's always more fish in the sea, you know?"
Eli also looked up at that, adding, "Don't let this get you down."
Umi thanked them and kept her head down thereafter.
With the blankets kicked off, she had retreated into a chilly, strained-looking fetal position. Unfortunately, her astral form found the fabric too heavy to move back into position and she was forced to leave.
She kept a brisk pace though her house, anticipating the warmth of the sand beneath her feet. When she found it however, something else quickly stole her attention.
In the opposite direction from the signs and her usual path, a massive shape loomed over the horizon. Her foot were moving of their own volition to the crest of the dune to reveal the other end of the island. There, she found the sand slowly coalescing into arenite, stretching a tendril towards a new landmass. The towering redwoods of the other island swayed slightly as it continued a glacial approach towards her own.
She turned back as the smile played across her features and set out on her path.
Neptune was particularly spastic that day, and the window was gone once again. Ahead, the sand-flow had slowed considerably, and she let it gently carry her down to the bridge's edge
Or at least, what little of it remained.
Entire chunks had fallen away, and the jagged shapes remaining hung gently in space, bobbing slightly. Umi felt as though the ground had fallen out beneath her.
She wasn't ready to leave.
"This can't kill me. This can't kill me. This can't kill me."
With the image of the weeping willow in her mind, she inhaled sharply and leapt. The sky cavorted in nervous anticipation in tandem with her stomach as her arms pinwheeled through the open air.
All at once, she was aching, gasping, and clinging on for dear life as the chunk she landed on flew forwards. When the impact came, she let it roll her forward and seized two fistfuls of the thick grass to anchor herself until the world stopped whirling. Once it had, she broke into a run, the pastels of the world around her blurring into impressionism.
The clearing was empty. She ran faster.
Over the prairie, straight past the weeping willow.
Into a wave of crushing numbness as she saw the melted bridge.
A majority of it in the centre was gone entirely, while the grounded ends rapidly tapered down to nothing.
She stood there in disbelief as time blurred, staring into the falling snow on the other side, but no figure emerged from it. Finally, having seen all she needed, she dragged herself back to the weeping willow and threw herself down. Distantly, the great drop below called to her, but she could only regard it dispassionately. Finally, she arrived at the bottom, hands raw and feet heavy.
Her eyes followed the water down, and when she emerged over the crest of the hill, the riverbank was empty. Stumbling down the incline, she found herself slowly approaching the entrance to the cabin.
It only took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the darkness inside and confirm the worst. No objects left behind, no scrawlings, no final message carved with the others into the doorframe.
Umi dragged herself back into the light and slumped down at the water's edge.
The wind had calmed almost entirely, and the only sounds came from the water and her own breathing. She cleared her throat and noticed how the vastness didn't allow for even an echo.
And for the first time, she slowly looked around and noticed just how empty the other world was.
Kotori never came.
A/N: I find it really difficult to really do justice to the climactic moments of romances, but I hope you all enjoyed it here. Stay tuned.