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It takes him some time before Ryo realizes there’s someone there with him.
He wants to turn and see, but if he’d do so – he’d have to take his eyes off of Akira.
Something might happen to him, if he does.
That wouldn’t do.
Akira isn’t feeling well. Ryo reached his hand out to him, but Akira didn’t come back to him, like he usually did.
So he should keep him safe.
Then she’s there.
He must’ve turned at some point, without realizing.
She seems so out of place with her pure-white dress and pink hair.
“You love him.” She states, simply.
It must be a dream, Ryo thinks. The earth under him is scalding and the air around him is frozen, like the moment in time in which he’s stuck.
“Maybe,” the girl sighs, looking at him with deep amber eyes.
They look wrong on her face.
They look
wrong.
“Do you want a better dream, then?” She asks.
Better? He thinks.
‘Better’ implies there’s something good to be had.
But Akira is already–
Akira is–
With a snap of panic Ryo turns back to Akira, grabbing him to make sure he’s still there – that he’s not another hallucination, like the girl.
One of Akira’s arms breaks under the pressure.
But Akira’s bones have been drying up for
drying up for
for
how long has it–
“Why?” He asks, and doesn’t recognize his own voice. It’s the voice of scream that’s released as one falls into a bottomless pit; of the tears of parents who buried their own children; of a planet split into two.
Of a demon that’s –
(There’s a rabbit.)
“Love is a beautiful thing,” the girl’s mouth twitches. “Everyone should have it.”
“Love doesn’t exist.” Ryo tells her.
“Maybe not here.” The girl nods. “Would you like to go search for it?”
“Search?” Ryo asks, looking down to the weight in his hands. “I don’t need to.”
Akira might have lost his voice, his sight, his skin, his flesh, his laugh – but he’s here with him.
He doesn’t need to look any further.
“I’ll be back, later.” The girl says.
And after the air gets colder and the stars die out, Ryo forgets she was ever there.
One last star sparkles in the sky.
It’s bright, like Akira’s earring.
He remembers, standing and waiting until Akira came stumbling towards him, stepping over desolation and ruin. He looked beautiful, cradling death to his chest like something precious.
And Ryo doesn’t want to look away from the star.
If he’d look away–
When he’d look away–
But the star is gone, anyway.
A voice speaks.
What’s a voice? He asks himself.
Above him is a bottomless pit, and he’s falling.
(He's been there before.)
(He's been here before.)
(He's been screaming.)
“You’re still here.”
Where?
The word pieces itself slowly together from the smithereens of his mind.
Where’s Akira?
“Would you like to go someplace else?” It asks.
Go? He thinks. But Akira is here.
(but that’s not true.)
What’s truth?
(That kitten really was dying.)
(They both knew it.)
“You need to wish for it.” It says. “That’s part of the contract.”
“To wish?” The word seems to singe his throat from the inside, each vowel burning like thousands of coals. He’s not sure where the words are even coming from. “What for?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
So he tells her, instead.
“I’m a bit selfish,” the girl shyly admits into her cup. Her order smells burnt. They sit in a quiet corner within the small café; but Ryo still hears an occasional car honking too loud.
It should be coming from-
Somewhere?
There are colours all around them.
Ryo thinks they’re colours; they should be. But they look all wrong.
Colours shouldn’t be wrong.
Sounds, too.
Ryo is sure it’s not a dream; but it can’t be real, either.
(In the corner of his eye, there’s a white rabbit, with whiskers so soft they fade along with the illusion as soon as Ryo tries to catch it.)
Ryo thinks he can be sure-
- of nothing, really.
The girl’s fingers are thin as they rip open a pack of sugar, pouring it into the cup. Then, setting the hollow pack aside to pick the spoon up, delicately swirling it around the cup until the sugar dissolves underneath and between the currents.
“I wasn’t always like that.” The girl says, staring at the cup. “But love changes you, I guess. In one way or another.”
Ryo flexes his fingers.
“There’s a girl I love,” she avoids eye-contact, still mixing whatever is in her cup. Ryo’s mind is still trying to identify what is it. “She used to love me too. I want that back, but I couldn’t do it on my own. I can’t, still.”
“Where are we?” Ryo asks. His voice doesn't sound right.
Behind her, there are headless marionettes dancing as one, endless lines of them twitching.
“In a dream.”
“What happens when I wake up?”
The girl smiles.
The spoon continues.
“I’ve never said it’s your dream.”
The phone is ringing.
Ryo looks down at his breast pocket.
“You should answer it.”
“Ryo?”
Akira asks from the other side.
“Are you okay?”
Then it’s all gone.
He’s on the top of the hill, with the girl stands next to him in the pouring rain.
The dead kitten doesn’t move.
“I think,” she says, “that you can never really know.”
The kitten mewls, and rubs his head against Ryo’s shin.
When Ryo opens his eyes, there’s nothing again.
No clouds for Akira to stare at.
No stars for any of them.
Everything is fixated.
(He isn’t going to look.)
There’s marching cotton-balls now where the headless marionettes had been.
“You said something-" Ryo tries to remember.
It was important.
“About a contract.” She answers, after a time.
Ryo haven't even noticed it passed. The cotton-balls are a different colour.
(He's not sure which.)
“What am I paying with?” Ryo asks, looking at his own empty cup.
“Misfortune.” Her answer is plain. “I’ve never encountered anything such as yours.”
“Misfortune?” He repeats after her. It should cause something, he thinks, something within him.
(It was long gone.)
He flexes his fingers.
“The misfortune tied to you. I can use it for your wish.”
“What wish?” Ryo asks.
The cotton-balls frazzle, then freeze in place.
“I can’t tell you that.” The girl says, with the spoon still twirling around.
“Is this Hell?” Ryo asks. He feels like he should have known if it was.
“It’s not like you to doubt yourself.” Not answering, she finally sets the spoon aside, on an available napkin that wasn’t there. “You’ve lost something of yours. You should go get it back.”
Her dainty fingers pick the cup for her to sip.
“What happens if I mess it up?” He asks. “What if it all goes wrong, again?”
The phone is ringing, again.
It sounds louder.
“You should answer it.” She says.
“I already did.”
“Not yet.”
(“It’s okay.” Akira smiles down at him. “There’s nothing to be afraid of.”)
He never grabbed the baton.
It always fell.
It was red and filthy and too many hands touched it.
He didn’t want the baton, anyway.
He didn’t want–
(It never was okay.)
He didn’t want–
“What do you want?” the girl asks.
(There’s only one answer for that, and they both know it.)
The café is bustling and busy with people, all flushed and happy. A doorbell chimes whenever someone opens the door, with cold winds sipping at the warmth of the place, smelling fresh and empty like the conversations held around them both.
“Love does exist, you know,” Madoka tells him, smiling at a girl that stands right outside the café. “I’ve made it myself.”
(It’s a one-way glass.)
When the phone rings again, she doesn’t say anything.
“Akira?” Ryo asks.
“Yeah?” Akira’s voice comes from very far away.
“Could you stay where you are? Please?” Ryo speaks from that very same place, the one that’s so distant you can never reach it. “I’m coming to get you.”
“Is something wrong?” Akira asks, sounding worried. “You’ve been acting strange, lately. Is everything alright?”
“Everything’s great.” Ryo says. “See you soon.”
It’s a short eternity, for Ryo.
But he could wait.