[it's probably just cold meat and veggies with spread, something that could be made swiftly but is decidedly savory. not too heavy right now.]
Before the meeting. Something changed in you - like a switch turned.
[she laces her hands together on her lap, and decides it's best to be straightforward about it.]
I won't press you for details. Sometimes it's hard to speak, to put words in the correct order. But you can rely on others when things aren't fine, all right?
( something he'd normally find appetizing, but that he's having a hard time thinking much of, right now. something changed in you — like a switch turned.
natsume pulls some bread off the sandwich and squishes it between his fingers, rolling it and rolling it and rolling it... )
The last time I saw her aLIVE, she fulfilled my silly little wish of wanting to go on a date on Christmas EVE. ( his voice is quiet and slow to come, but he's talking. ) We went to her world—we took the elevaTOR.
( bad end. )
There wasn't anyone THERE. The worst possible outcome for Maya Arisu is a world where she's the only person that exISTS. How nice ( natusme continues with a little mirthless chuckle ) that I helped alleviate that Hell for her with my compaNY.
( isn't it sweet? isn't she? ...wasn't she? )
It was summer and unbearably HOT, but she still kept her jacket ON. ( dummy. ) It feels a little wrong that I know how many tallies she has now when she took such precautions to keep me or anyone else from learning it in LIFE.
( but how could he Not see, checking over her body? she matches with hiro. it's funny, but not in a way that makes him want to laugh. )
[a very, very small part of her is glad that he had that. her own Christmas Eve had been marked by tears, by raging into a blizzard about how much everything hurt, half freezing. at least Natsume was with someone he cared about, protecting her from emptiness, avoiding hell together, escaping cold into warmth.
she listens, lets him be as slow as he wants. there are pieces that fit into place, like a jigsaw made of glass. and Helena knows that him expressing this is entrusting her with a secret, with something she'll fold up and keep in the lockbox of her heart to protect it. not to Subaru, not to anyone else. Helena listens, and does not interrupt.
she wonders, vaguely, if Maya hid her tallies for the same reason Helena hides the scars she has. not exposed means you don't have to talk about them. you don't have to think about them. there's no way to spin this into some saying about giving her justice, about her returning, because they don't know. and even if someone returns, does it mean they remember?
there will be a time to say better to have loved and lost than never at all, but that's not now. there will be a time to savor what happiness is there, what they had for the brief time they did, but not today. Helena will not diminish his grief by telling him how to feel it.
instead, she extends her hand and leaves it between them. his choice, if he needs to hold it. if he says even a syllable more.]
( he doesn't take it, not yet. he's thinking about christmas eve, the weight of her hand in his, the summer sun beating down on them as they made their way down an empty, silent street, not talking at all because he promised not to say anything else. the hand-holding had just been the result of a trick, too, but she didn't have to take his hand when she "took" the imaginary key from his palm he'd locked his lips with.
natsume wonders if an empty chest is supposed to hurt this much; shouldn't the absence of something feel like nothing at all instead? )
There was a shopping mall we went to—there were a few interesting things to DO, like watching movies or window-shopping and SUCH, but there was also an ice RINK. She let me CHOOSE, so we went skating; I don't think she actually believed me when I said I'd never skated beFORE, but she still taught me HOW. ( his lips pull at the edges, tight, a headache slowly beginning behind his eyes. ) She was right not to believe me—I have SKATED, and I'm quite good at IT, but I wanted the excuse to stay close to HER.
( ye olde silly high school boy tricks. )
...She told me that magicians aren't the only people who want to make others hapPY, when I asked her why she decided to take me OUT. And she remembered that a few months aGO, on our first... She never wanted to call it a DATE, ( he swallows hard, a little breathless laugh, ) but the first time we spent the day alone togeTHER, I told her I had wanted to confess to her on a more romantic holiday like Christmas EVE, rather than when I ended up doing so: making tea in the Cooking Club's room for the two of US.
I did get my wish though—I did get to confess to her aGAIN.
( ... )
I loved HER. ( a very small and quiet confession, one almost lost in his knees after he moves the plate, and he brings them up to his chest and presses his face into them. ) At least she knew before she DIED, for better or for WORSE.
( can she graduate on time now, dead? will they just miss one another, if they had ever had a chance? )
An unromantic and boRING, extremely pragmatic girl who did what she thought was best for the people she was responsible FOR, who never wanted to entertain for a moment the idea anyone could like her—that terribly, terribly frustrating young woman who didn't mind that I called her a WOLF, who liked the lavender perfume I made for HER, who'd eat character lunches in pieces to decuteify them instead of just eating them normalLY, who—
( he stops. to breathe, because his chest feels like it's squeezing too tight, his eyes squeezed shut and head aching from his attempt at keeping tears from coming, mouth drawn back in something like snarl, teeth grit.
a trembling exhale. natsume slowly looks up. )
Who told me it wouldn't and couldn't hapPEN, and it's a truth I acknowLEDGE. Here, that type of thing is nothing but trouBLE. I'm paying for my own mistake—my own selfish PRIDE, thinking nothing would happen to her even if she did have such a large target on her BACK. I knew betTER. I still DO, but I still could never say sorry for IT.
( ...
that's a lot. it's a lot, and he'd normally feel embarrassed, but there's nothing except the burning in the corners of his eyes and the hollowness in his chest and the twisting in his stomach he's not sure will ever leave. )
[her words come after a long, long moment, after his fade away into the space between them, and somewhere in her soul they've been all recorded down, typed and encrypted behind ciphers only she knows how to break. even if she cannot relate to this pain in a way that says I know, his agony is that of being wounded, and needing to still walk on, even as every breath aches. frankly, it's a wonder he's still standing.
she doesn't know love like that. but with how many people wrote about it, sang about it, made art for it, let it consume them, one gets an outline of how important it can be, and how much care to treat it with. Wwhat it can do, in both the most wonderful and most painful ways. Helena guesses, and often, her guesses hit the mark. if there was a blizzard right now, she'd take Natsume outside, and let him howl into it, so that the storm might protect him in his grief, as he bleeds out of the hole in his heart.]
Even if she was in danger, even if it was not made to last eternally, your love was never a mistake. She knew, and she still made time for you. She still wanted you in her life, by the sound of it.
[unromantic, he says, and yet she let him use a flimsy excuse to stay close. she still let him be near. she used the perfume he made, that it might surround her in the day. it doesn't take a genius to know that people simply express things differently, and that some facts creep up slowly before taking residence at your side instead of bursting through the door.
Maya wanted to make him happy. she was under no obligation to.
she wanted to.]
...I think that is enough to say she loved you as well.
( love is a strong word, for the way she might have felt about him, and yet no small part of him wants to believe it. maybe that's delirious grief, wanting to hold onto anything at all that will move his heart to skipping and twisting in a better way than sitting like an iron lump in the middle of his chest instead, making it hard to breathe and harder still to speak.
and yet
maya's face over his, the way she crouched beside him when he'd collapsed onto the pavement after letting his magic go, the mall echoing around them with the song of dying stars, her cheeks still red with embarrassment and frustration.
"you're impossible. you make me wish we met in another time, another life, another world. so tell me this again when we make that happen."
"do you like me back THEN, or will i have to wait until our next life to hear you say SO?"
"you have to wait until our next life."
the bed shakes a little, because he's shaking a little. it's either a laugh or a sob or it's both, but it's a sound that stutters out of his throat with him wanting it to. )
She didn't hate ME, ( he corrects, throat and voice thick; his cheeks feel wet and warm, and he wipes at them idly. they stay wet and warm. ) But she told me to confess to her again after graduation and a new LIFE, so at least she likes me enough to suffer through a third round of complete and total embarrassMENT.
She might have been worried how it would sound if she outright asked you to wait for her, even as she's willing to wait for you.
[the words are soft, not a contradiction or a rebuttal but a possibility to believe in. she makes no pretense to know the mind of Maya Arisu, but a girl who asks to hear it again and again - it means more than tolerance. it means she walks on unsteady ground, and wants to find stability, someone afraid who needs to be sure. it was a subtle way of asking, of wanting to see if he'd hold on for her until they can reunite without fear.
her eyes close, but her hand is still extended. and she'll stay like this for as long as Natsume needs, a veil drawn around him. as if this room would protect him should he need to reassemble his pieces.
I'm so sorry for your loss. words that don't need to be spoken to be felt in every tone, every action.]
( helena paints a more promising and sweet future than what natsume is sure maya had in mind—but, that is what she followed up with when he said he was sure he'd fall for her again in another one of any of those, so maybe not.
if they could find each other and meet again, maybe they would. if they didn't, there's no helping that.
natsume's hand finds helena's after a good seven minutes of his shaking and trying to calm down, palm wiped dry so not to sully hers when he unsteadily grips it. )
...It was a loss I knew I had the chance of faCING, so I'll be FINE. ( one way or another, he has to be. it isn't a matter of what he wants or needs: he has to be. there are people here who count on him; there are people here who think he's made of sterner stuff; there are people here who don't know he's held a flame for the student council president at all. ) I still have to look after Hiro-kun and Sato-chan, for starTERS. She'd never forgive me if I let something happen to either of them after THIS.
( she wouldn't have before, but doubly this. he breathes in deep and slowly, and breathes out much the same; he does this until he feels a little better. not by much, but it's fine. )
Thank you for listeNING. ( please forget— he won't ask that of her. she won't bring it up anyway; she's polite and kind. that'll have to be good enough. ) And thank you for your condolenCES. I'll be fine eventually; time waits for no ONE. And I...
( ... )
We have to ensure that everyone passes ON. ( he looks up, then over at helena. ) That everyone has a chance to reincarnate in another time, another life, another WORLD.
( not just for maya, and not just for him, and not just for their silly little exchange. people deserve something else than this; some people deserve better than what they had in the last life, too. there are exceptions, but he's petty, not heartless, and maybe they won't be terrible in the next life either.
they can suffer in this one first though, just as soon as— )
[she holds his hand back, secure and sure. even if it had been wet with tears, she would have held on just the same. her hands are warm, and she hopes somehow, a little of the strength she has today can flow to him.
eventually. that's the word she was looking for. not that he is fine, not that he's going to be fine. but that he'll let it ache and patch itself over time, even if the wound is an ugly one, even if the scar will hurt when it rains. he'll keep breathing.
she nods, to the end of his words, but the expression on her face is solemn, even as she turns her head towards him. that's what she wants too - the chance. there are people like her, who were dead in places they'd never return to by choice, and reincarnating without their memories is only restoring half themselves. she has to believe in an option of a better life for everyone, without the patchwork of scars that criss cross their souls, so that it might be a source of drive.]
I know. And we will, I'm sure of it. But right now, it's alright to let yourself miss her.
[he doesn't have to be strong right now. in the morning, or when Subaru comes back, or when he wants to be the great magician he is. he can be what he is, a young man who feels everything and nothing at once.]
( he'll have plenty of time to miss her; grief sticks to his insides like taffy already. but he understands what she means: he can still take some time for it now.
natsume shakes his head knowing she won't see his refusal, and aloud he says-- )
I'll do THAT. ( after certain things. he'll do that. ) I'm sorry for worrying YOU, Little Bat. It's unfitting of a magician of happiness such as mySELF.
...You're forgiVEN. It's nothing I want to talk about anyWAY.
( and yet he does. he wants to talk about maya, about how much it sucks; he caved so easily, and it feels so weak. it was easier with helena than anyone else though, because she's blind. she can't see the way his expressions change, and she can't see him look splotchy and ugly and tear-stained. she can hear him, but appearances have always meant more to him than most things.
it's all he has, some days. )
I've been more impressed that Baru-kun hasn't harassed me about it yet; he's been tiptoeing around me more like a dog who doesn't know what to do about a new fixture in their life inSTEAD. ( which is kind of annoying, but a little preferable. this won't last. ) I'm not made of GLASS.
[and so, he's probably using tact right now. he's giving Natsume space, the same way Helena has been doing - she just acted first, when it was clear that Natsume needed that reminder that they're there for him to collapse against. really, Subaru knows Natsume better than she ever will by virtue of their past. it must make it a balancing act, preserving his pride when one naturally wants to come and help.]
I have a feeling he'll come sooner or later. When he senses the right moment for it.
[and if that comes, and she's in the room, she'll find an excuse to leave - that she needs to see Shin, or she needs to get something, and let them alone for a while.]
...And if you change your mind, if you do want to talk about it...I want to listen to you.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Before the meeting. Something changed in you - like a switch turned.
[she laces her hands together on her lap, and decides it's best to be straightforward about it.]
I won't press you for details. Sometimes it's hard to speak, to put words in the correct order. But you can rely on others when things aren't fine, all right?
no subject
natsume pulls some bread off the sandwich and squishes it between his fingers, rolling it and rolling it and rolling it... )
The last time I saw her aLIVE, she fulfilled my silly little wish of wanting to go on a date on Christmas EVE. ( his voice is quiet and slow to come, but he's talking. ) We went to her world—we took the elevaTOR.
( bad end. )
There wasn't anyone THERE. The worst possible outcome for Maya Arisu is a world where she's the only person that exISTS. How nice ( natusme continues with a little mirthless chuckle ) that I helped alleviate that Hell for her with my compaNY.
( isn't it sweet? isn't she? ...wasn't she? )
It was summer and unbearably HOT, but she still kept her jacket ON. ( dummy. ) It feels a little wrong that I know how many tallies she has now when she took such precautions to keep me or anyone else from learning it in LIFE.
( but how could he Not see, checking over her body? she matches with hiro. it's funny, but not in a way that makes him want to laugh. )
no subject
she listens, lets him be as slow as he wants. there are pieces that fit into place, like a jigsaw made of glass. and Helena knows that him expressing this is entrusting her with a secret, with something she'll fold up and keep in the lockbox of her heart to protect it. not to Subaru, not to anyone else. Helena listens, and does not interrupt.
she wonders, vaguely, if Maya hid her tallies for the same reason Helena hides the scars she has. not exposed means you don't have to talk about them. you don't have to think about them. there's no way to spin this into some saying about giving her justice, about her returning, because they don't know. and even if someone returns, does it mean they remember?
there will be a time to say better to have loved and lost than never at all, but that's not now. there will be a time to savor what happiness is there, what they had for the brief time they did, but not today. Helena will not diminish his grief by telling him how to feel it.
instead, she extends her hand and leaves it between them. his choice, if he needs to hold it. if he says even a syllable more.]
no subject
natsume wonders if an empty chest is supposed to hurt this much; shouldn't the absence of something feel like nothing at all instead? )
There was a shopping mall we went to—there were a few interesting things to DO, like watching movies or window-shopping and SUCH, but there was also an ice RINK. She let me CHOOSE, so we went skating; I don't think she actually believed me when I said I'd never skated beFORE, but she still taught me HOW. ( his lips pull at the edges, tight, a headache slowly beginning behind his eyes. ) She was right not to believe me—I have SKATED, and I'm quite good at IT, but I wanted the excuse to stay close to HER.
( ye olde silly high school boy tricks. )
...She told me that magicians aren't the only people who want to make others hapPY, when I asked her why she decided to take me OUT. And she remembered that a few months aGO, on our first... She never wanted to call it a DATE, ( he swallows hard, a little breathless laugh, ) but the first time we spent the day alone togeTHER, I told her I had wanted to confess to her on a more romantic holiday like Christmas EVE, rather than when I ended up doing so: making tea in the Cooking Club's room for the two of US.
I did get my wish though—I did get to confess to her aGAIN.
( ... )
I loved HER. ( a very small and quiet confession, one almost lost in his knees after he moves the plate, and he brings them up to his chest and presses his face into them. ) At least she knew before she DIED, for better or for WORSE.
( can she graduate on time now, dead? will they just miss one another, if they had ever had a chance? )
An unromantic and boRING, extremely pragmatic girl who did what she thought was best for the people she was responsible FOR, who never wanted to entertain for a moment the idea anyone could like her—that terribly, terribly frustrating young woman who didn't mind that I called her a WOLF, who liked the lavender perfume I made for HER, who'd eat character lunches in pieces to decuteify them instead of just eating them normalLY, who—
( he stops. to breathe, because his chest feels like it's squeezing too tight, his eyes squeezed shut and head aching from his attempt at keeping tears from coming, mouth drawn back in something like snarl, teeth grit.
a trembling exhale. natsume slowly looks up. )
Who told me it wouldn't and couldn't hapPEN, and it's a truth I acknowLEDGE. Here, that type of thing is nothing but trouBLE. I'm paying for my own mistake—my own selfish PRIDE, thinking nothing would happen to her even if she did have such a large target on her BACK. I knew betTER. I still DO, but I still could never say sorry for IT.
( ...
that's a lot. it's a lot, and he'd normally feel embarrassed, but there's nothing except the burning in the corners of his eyes and the hollowness in his chest and the twisting in his stomach he's not sure will ever leave. )
no subject
[her words come after a long, long moment, after his fade away into the space between them, and somewhere in her soul they've been all recorded down, typed and encrypted behind ciphers only she knows how to break. even if she cannot relate to this pain in a way that says I know, his agony is that of being wounded, and needing to still walk on, even as every breath aches. frankly, it's a wonder he's still standing.
she doesn't know love like that. but with how many people wrote about it, sang about it, made art for it, let it consume them, one gets an outline of how important it can be, and how much care to treat it with. Wwhat it can do, in both the most wonderful and most painful ways. Helena guesses, and often, her guesses hit the mark. if there was a blizzard right now, she'd take Natsume outside, and let him howl into it, so that the storm might protect him in his grief, as he bleeds out of the hole in his heart.]
Even if she was in danger, even if it was not made to last eternally, your love was never a mistake. She knew, and she still made time for you. She still wanted you in her life, by the sound of it.
[unromantic, he says, and yet she let him use a flimsy excuse to stay close. she still let him be near. she used the perfume he made, that it might surround her in the day. it doesn't take a genius to know that people simply express things differently, and that some facts creep up slowly before taking residence at your side instead of bursting through the door.
Maya wanted to make him happy. she was under no obligation to.
she wanted to.]
...I think that is enough to say she loved you as well.
no subject
and yet
maya's face over his, the way she crouched beside him when he'd collapsed onto the pavement after letting his magic go, the mall echoing around them with the song of dying stars, her cheeks still red with embarrassment and frustration.
"you're impossible.
you make me wish we met in another time, another life, another world.
so tell me this again when we make that happen."
"do you like me back THEN, or will i have to wait until our next life to hear you say SO?"
"you have to wait until our next life."
the bed shakes a little, because he's shaking a little. it's either a laugh or a sob or it's both, but it's a sound that stutters out of his throat with him wanting it to. )
She didn't hate ME, ( he corrects, throat and voice thick; his cheeks feel wet and warm, and he wipes at them idly. they stay wet and warm. ) But she told me to confess to her again after graduation and a new LIFE, so at least she likes me enough to suffer through a third round of complete and total embarrassMENT.
no subject
[the words are soft, not a contradiction or a rebuttal but a possibility to believe in. she makes no pretense to know the mind of Maya Arisu, but a girl who asks to hear it again and again - it means more than tolerance. it means she walks on unsteady ground, and wants to find stability, someone afraid who needs to be sure. it was a subtle way of asking, of wanting to see if he'd hold on for her until they can reunite without fear.
her eyes close, but her hand is still extended. and she'll stay like this for as long as Natsume needs, a veil drawn around him. as if this room would protect him should he need to reassemble his pieces.
I'm so sorry for your loss. words that don't need to be spoken to be felt in every tone, every action.]
no subject
if they could find each other and meet again, maybe they would. if they didn't, there's no helping that.
natsume's hand finds helena's after a good seven minutes of his shaking and trying to calm down, palm wiped dry so not to sully hers when he unsteadily grips it. )
...It was a loss I knew I had the chance of faCING, so I'll be FINE. ( one way or another, he has to be. it isn't a matter of what he wants or needs: he has to be. there are people here who count on him; there are people here who think he's made of sterner stuff; there are people here who don't know he's held a flame for the student council president at all. ) I still have to look after Hiro-kun and Sato-chan, for starTERS. She'd never forgive me if I let something happen to either of them after THIS.
( she wouldn't have before, but doubly this. he breathes in deep and slowly, and breathes out much the same; he does this until he feels a little better. not by much, but it's fine. )
Thank you for listeNING. ( please forget— he won't ask that of her. she won't bring it up anyway; she's polite and kind. that'll have to be good enough. ) And thank you for your condolenCES. I'll be fine eventually; time waits for no ONE. And I...
( ... )
We have to ensure that everyone passes ON. ( he looks up, then over at helena. ) That everyone has a chance to reincarnate in another time, another life, another WORLD.
( not just for maya, and not just for him, and not just for their silly little exchange. people deserve something else than this; some people deserve better than what they had in the last life, too. there are exceptions, but he's petty, not heartless, and maybe they won't be terrible in the next life either.
they can suffer in this one first though, just as soon as— )
no subject
eventually. that's the word she was looking for. not that he is fine, not that he's going to be fine. but that he'll let it ache and patch itself over time, even if the wound is an ugly one, even if the scar will hurt when it rains. he'll keep breathing.
she nods, to the end of his words, but the expression on her face is solemn, even as she turns her head towards him. that's what she wants too - the chance. there are people like her, who were dead in places they'd never return to by choice, and reincarnating without their memories is only restoring half themselves. she has to believe in an option of a better life for everyone, without the patchwork of scars that criss cross their souls, so that it might be a source of drive.]
I know. And we will, I'm sure of it. But right now, it's alright to let yourself miss her.
[he doesn't have to be strong right now. in the morning, or when Subaru comes back, or when he wants to be the great magician he is. he can be what he is, a young man who feels everything and nothing at once.]
no subject
natsume shakes his head knowing she won't see his refusal, and aloud he says-- )
I'll do THAT. ( after certain things. he'll do that. ) I'm sorry for worrying YOU, Little Bat. It's unfitting of a magician of happiness such as mySELF.
no subject
You're a magician of happiness, but you're also my friend. Worrying about you comes with that.
[she cares, and it means she'll show it when she can.]
I'm just sorry I didn't say anything sooner.
no subject
( and yet he does. he wants to talk about maya, about how much it sucks; he caved so easily, and it feels so weak. it was easier with helena than anyone else though, because she's blind. she can't see the way his expressions change, and she can't see him look splotchy and ugly and tear-stained. she can hear him, but appearances have always meant more to him than most things.
it's all he has, some days. )
I've been more impressed that Baru-kun hasn't harassed me about it yet; he's been tiptoeing around me more like a dog who doesn't know what to do about a new fixture in their life inSTEAD. ( which is kind of annoying, but a little preferable. this won't last. ) I'm not made of GLASS.
no subject
[and so, he's probably using tact right now. he's giving Natsume space, the same way Helena has been doing - she just acted first, when it was clear that Natsume needed that reminder that they're there for him to collapse against. really, Subaru knows Natsume better than she ever will by virtue of their past. it must make it a balancing act, preserving his pride when one naturally wants to come and help.]
I have a feeling he'll come sooner or later. When he senses the right moment for it.
[and if that comes, and she's in the room, she'll find an excuse to leave - that she needs to see Shin, or she needs to get something, and let them alone for a while.]
...And if you change your mind, if you do want to talk about it...I want to listen to you.