Chapter Text
The morning light coming from the window felt like an attack on Arin’s eyes. He hadn’t slept at all, spending most of the night staring at the wall trying not to think about his nightmare or – whatever else happened that night. He couldn’t help but still feel a little sad and embarrassed, feelings he does not feel enough effort to parse through.
Arin begrudgingly got up from his bed and headed towards the door. He hopes Lloyd wont be bothered if he skips out on training today to take a nap. He needs to wake Sora up, without her it would just be him and Lloyd for a while, which he does not want right now. Thankfully, Sora’s room is right next to his, and he is more than happy to annoy her.
“Noooo…go away.” Sora groans immediately upon hearing her door open, which gives Arin a giggle. Her presence is almost enough to drive out any negative thoughts away from him. “Get up!” He playfully shakes her until she finally swats him away sits up on her bed.
“I did not sleep at all.” Arin moves to sit on her bed with her. “So, I was thinking of asking Lloyd if we could take the day off training, since leaving you to train alone isn’t fair.”
Sora kind of just.. stares with slight confusion on her face. He understands she needs a minute to get the gears in her head working, but the silence immediately makes him nervous, as if he had just been caught doing something. “Wha-, why couldn’t you sleep?” She finally says, rubbing off the sleepiness from her eyes.
“I had another nightmare, and uh,”..He could tell her, right? They tell each other everything, and Sora is really smart so maybe she can help him. It might be a little too early for her to hear about his problems, but what are friends for if not to just randomly drop emotional bombs on each other?
“Something weird happened too.” He says, looking away from her in case it really is weird. “So, I had a nightmare, right.”
“Right.” Sora lays back down and closes her eyes like shes ready to go right back to sleep.
“So I was up and I couldn’t go back to sleep. Then I heard Lloyd scream, so I went to check on him. And it was fine, he was fine.” He continues. “I was still really tired though. He asked me if I was okay too and we hugged it out, but the weird thing was that I started really freaking out.”
“What, did he give you a scary hug or something?”
“No it was weird it was like,” Arin turns to face Sora, who is trying not to fall back asleep. “He didn’t do anything, I just got really sweaty, and my heart felt like it was gonna explode, and my face was burning-”
“...Are you sick?”
“No, I don’t feel like I am at least? It felt like I was.” Arin turned away again, but could feel that Sora is looking at him now. “I’m a little afraid to see him again, what if I freak out again? What if I freaked him out?”
“Dude, do you have a crush on Lloyd?” Sora responded immediately. The question takes Arin by surprise, making him lean away slightly as if she just attacked him.
“Do I?” Why would it happen that night then? Why didn’t he feel this way before? “Do crushes just.. randomly happen like that? I didn’t like him like that before… at least I don’t think so?”
“I have no idea, I never had a crush.” Sora gets up from her attempted rest to sit next to Arin again.
“Okay, so how do you know it’s a crush if you never had one.”
“I watched a lot of dramas back in Imperium, well, the ones that were approved for television. There was one with a girl who got so shy from being next to her crush that she ran away and jumped out of a window.”
“I did want to run away too, I guess…” Arin looks lost, what does this mean for him? He doesn’t want to freak out every time he sees Lloyd. He also doesn’t want him to think that he hurt him just with a hug. “What do I do now? Do I tell him?” He turns to Sora as if she knows all the answers.
“What would he even say?”
“I don’t know!”
“He’s gonna say ‘I love you too Arin lets get married’-”
Arin immediately pushes her away to stop her teasing. “Stop, he can’t even date me!” His own words sting him. Maybe this means he really does like him, but that doesn’t mean anything when he can’t do anything about it. “He’s way older than me, and he definitely wouldn’t like me. It would be so weird. I still like action figures, and he likes… whatever old people like.”
“That is true…” Sora crosses her legs and appears to be seriously thinking of solutions to this mess. “Maybe when you’re older?”
“I think that might be equally as weird.”
“I don’t know then. Maybe just don’t tell him?”
“I guess…” He looks to the floor, defeated. “But now that I know this, it feels like I’m lying to him, or hiding some horrible secret. Plus, what am I going to tell him about what happened last night? He probably feels bad about it…”
“Tell him you were sick. You remembered you were sick and didn’t want to make him sick too. Simple.”
“See, I knew you always know how to fix everything!” Arin smiles.
Sora’s face lights up with pride. “Well, I don’t know about everything, but- Ah! Did you already tell Lloyd about taking the day off?”
Arin’s face drops. “Oh no. He hasn’t even come looking for us, he must actually be so disappointed in us that he didn’t even bother!”
“What are you waiting for? Lets go!” Arin watches Sora practically bolt out of the room. Upon getting up, he feels anxiety creep up on him. He takes a deep breath. There’s no reason to be scared, he has it all under control now.
Everything is going to be okay.