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"Now you're shy, huh? Was I really that bad?"
Shinji said those words as he stared at his bedsheets. My face stared the other way, at the wall that the light of the moon that broke through the blinds of his dorm window couldn't reach. I hesitated to speak. I hesitated to say anything. They say that an afterglow comes after sex, a moment where everything feels like it moves in slow motion. I guess I'd been in an afterglow for all my life up until then.
Maybe that's why reality hit like a truck.
"Kotone," he said. "Earth to Kotone."
He felt good. Impossibly good. Peeled back the layers of my skin, loved me just as much as I desired. Before we did it, I couldn't stop telling him how much I loved him, how much I wanted to be with him, how much I couldn't exist in a world without him. Looking back at it, I think I guilted him into being with me that night. Terrible.
'I'm here," I said. "I think… No. I don't even know what to think...or how to feel..."
And then, it all came out. Like a pot flipped on its head, my fears, insecurities…everything spilled from my throat and lips to the air that surrounds us. Or so I thought was everything. I didn't tell him that I, too, felt the weight of the world crushing me to the point where I thought I'd be better off dead. He and I were more alike than we both ever knew up to that point.
Shinji was receptive. He loved hearing my school stories. Maybe he felt like he was vicariously living through me, completing his last year of school with me. Maybe our relationship would've stayed like that, and I would've continued to tell him stories about my day after work. Maybe I could've been a fresh start for him, a blank slate to which he would rebuild his life, return to school, get a degree, all sorts of things. Then, finally, he'd be able to find something he would've loved to do away from arguing with Akihiko about the past and cooking delicious meals. But the past can consume those who dare to continue living, and slay those who refuse to confront it.
Shinji was one of those people. He died two months ago.
And now I'm all alone.
Being alone on Christmas Eve feels like a curse more powerful than any silly spell a shadow can cast. The edges of my arms long for Shinji. His touch would warm me and bring comfort on this chilly night. I could've gone to see Ryoji, but he confuses me. My feelings for him are… complicated. It's hard to explain, but he feels too much like me. His desire for us to kill him, his longing for love, his passion to help others in the heat of the moment, and even his tendencies to be an omega pervert—all strangely feel like they come from me.
Physically, I'm not alone, though. Yukari's here, and so is Aigis, Mitsuru, Akihiko, and the others. In the evening, we decided to take Koromaru out for a while. We all wanted to get some fresh air, too. But the air's so cold and deathly, lifeless. The outside is lifeless. It does nothing to pick up my mood.
I walk behind the others as they take the lead. Junpei is a clown, as usual. Yukari always has a witty response to his dorky sense of humor that I love. Akihiko runs along with Koromaru, and Ken joins both of them. Mitsuru warns them to be careful not to run into anyone suffering from the Apathy Syndrome. That leaves me, the brown haired girl who can't seem to be happy.
I'll lie to them with a smile and a hug, with some words of encouragement and a pat on the back. It raises their moods, and it makes me feel better about myself. I'm capable of putting their needs above mine. It's the mark of being a good human. That's what my parents always said to me. So, why didn't they warn me about any blowback? Why do I feel so miserable after making so many people happy?
Surrounded by the shadows of people who were once alive and moving, the people who suffer from Apathy Syndrome, Yukari seems determined not to let me become one of them. As she walks towards me, her pink winter sweater dress bouncing like her bob, I can't help but feel a pit of warmth flush under my stomach. Occasionally, I'll feel that way with her. When I stand near her, I feel this weird heat that I shouldn't be feeling with another woman. Shinji made me feel the same way, especially when I told him I loved him, however many times before he was killed.
"What's wrong?" Yukari says. I try to shoo her concerns away with the typical Kotone special. I'm fine, Yukari-chan. Go hang out with the others. This evening, however, she's feeling extra stubborn, extra determined to drill into my brain to see what's wrong with it. I guess I'll go along with it.
"Hey, guys!" Yukari says. "Kotone-chan and I are gonna go walk around for a bit. You go on ahead."
She snatches her hand into mine and pulls me away from the shadows of the rest of the group. As we run through the dead of the night, snowflakes fall on our shoulders and over our hair. They twist and turn, blowing in the breeze that wasn't there moments ago. For some reason, it feels like Yukari's gesture of kindness has brought some life back to Tatsumi Port Island, a life that hasn't been around for weeks.
We stop at an alleyway in the middle of the Port Island Station, a little way away from the rest of the group. A blue and white neon light vending machine glares at us, the sole light amongst the shadows that surround us. We place our hands on our knees, panting, giggling, enjoying the brief burst of energy that captured us. Then, our eyes meet, and her cheeks burn red. Her eyes quickly dart towards the vending machine.
"I know you're not okay," Yukari says. "That's why I wanted to speak to you. You haven't been okay for a few weeks now."
I smile and cover my lips with my scarf, lowering my lips to match the timbre of a particular pervert we've come to view as a friend. "Perceptive. Stalking me?"
Her laugh cuts through the dull colors of the alleyway, matching the neon lights of the vending machine. "Ew, that sounded so much like Ryoji-kun."
Snow manages to make its way into the alleyway. It accumulates very quickly. There wasn't anyone around who bothered putting out salt to delay the accumulation. Yukari and I bundle up together, using the warmth of our breath and bodies to shield us from the elements of nature. Now and then, I'll ask if she wants to go back to the others, and she shakes her head. I missed the time we used to spend together, alone. It's been a while.
"I've been preoccupied babysitting the avatar of Nyx or whatever he is."
"You really like him, don't you?"
"Some days it feels like we're one in the same. I feel like a narcissist when I stare at him."
"With the way you turned all our lives around, I think you earned at least a day of being a narcissist." She looks out into the distance, beyond the empty streets. "I wish you'd look at me like you look at him."
My fingers wrap around hers. "You don't want to be with me. Everyone who dates me ends up dying."
"Kotone, you've only dated Shinji. That's no way to speak to yourself…"
"Ryoji's gonna die, too."
"H-Hey! I thought we all decided we were gonna face this together."
"I know, but…"
"You really thought about taking Ryoji's offer? You, of all people? I'm…shocked…"
"Yukari, I'm scared! Don't you see? I'm scared all the time! I just try to hide it because I know you all need me. I try to hide my depression, my anxiety, my grief because I know you all need me. I…I don't know how much longer I can hold it in. I lost Shinji, and now I feel like I'm gonna lose Ryoji, too! No matter what choice I make, he's gonna disappear. What if I lose the rest of you to Nyx? What if I make the wrong choice? Can't I be sad for one day?"
I try not to scream her head off, but the words flow out from my lips. They feel so right, perfectly attuned to my pent-up emotions.
"We won't hate you if you have one day you spend being sad," she says. "I think you know that."
"I can't…I don't even know how to mope and be depressed anymore."
She wraps her fingers around mine. "It's not something I'd like to teach anyone, but if you want to be mopey and you can't be around the others, I'll allow it as long as you keep being you."
"This is me."
"No, it's not. What you showed us wasn't fake, Kotone-chan. The bubbly, cheerful girl we've all come to love wasn't some weird personality you came up with or whatever. That's just how you are."
A cold breeze bursts through the alleyway, and the two of us naturally move closer, into one another. Our breath is mere centimeters apart, shaky, warm, trembling with fear, yet excitable, yearning.
Her eyes shine with the glow from the vending machine. Her glossy makeup creates a blue sheen that traces the curve of her cheek, with a light pink blush covering her high cheeks. When I touch it, her body flinches slightly, as if she didn't expect me to react that way.
Our eyes don't look away. She draws me in.
My lips part. So do hers.
The second our bodies press against each other, the warmth of our heat replaces the cold of the night. Her kiss sends me. My vision flutters into a daze of passion. What was small and sweet turns into a festering heat, a desire to become one. Lips become tongues, words become moans and mewls that snap across the hollow alleyway. Our fingers twitch as they cling to whatever skin they can touch. Her nails dig into my stockings, piercing through the opaque fabric with excitement and yearning.
I sigh and tremble from her touch. "Yukari…" I say in between kisses.
No one can escape time; it delivers us all to the same end. Those words are the knight that aims the cold lance of winter through my sweater, quickly replacing the warmth of our passion. I break the connection. Our eyes drift away from one another until they find each other again. She holds my glance, like a jewel that glistens within nothing but darkness.
"I'm…sorry," she says. "We should go back."
"Yukari...I want more…"
"No. I feel like I'm taking advantage of your grief, acting like this. It feels…wrong."
As I open my lips, I stop myself from admitting that I didn't think of Shinji or Ryoji when we kissed. Much like she feels like she's taking advantage of me, I feel the same. But, when she turns around to face the alleyway exit, towards the road that leads to the others, she looks like a painting as the halo of light from the vending machine blooms over her dress.
She drifts away from the vending machine and into the snowstorm that reigns over the skies above us, disappearing into a gray fog that swirls and festers.
Had I the strength and drive, I would chase after her, but not tonight. I need to let all my emotions run wild and free.
I need to mourn.