Chapter Text
Sunny woke up to a sharp pain in his chest.
He woke up.
That wasn't meant to happen.
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Sunny believed he was a horrible person.
He knew that deep inside. He felt that everybody else knew it too.
He had killed his own sister and framed it as a suicide. He had lied about it to his sister's friends (he didn't feel like he could ever truly call them his friends, even before the accident. He always knew they liked her more) for 4 years, while rotting away from guilt in his own dreams.
And when he told them the truth, he simply left, not even giving any of them the satisfaction he believed they would get from ending him right there, right now.
He merely ran, hiding in his hospital room after telling a nurse he didn't want visitors. He hid like that for almost a week while his physical condition improved, until his mother took him to their new house. He knew she already knew the truth, she had known it for the past 4 years. He knew she hated him, and yet he continued to burden her with his existence.
After 3 weeks in the new house, Sunny was happy to say that was about to change. His mother was at work until early the next morning, so he had all the time in the world to get it done.
First, he wrote a note. He apologised for everything: Being a disappointment, being a murderer, and being too much of a coward to live with his mistakes. He said he was going back to Faraway in order to visit Mari one last time, and to make things right.
Then, he took only a few things from the house aside from whatever he planned to wear, most importantly a few dollars for the bus ride and a knife. It was far smaller than his favorite, which was taken from him by Kel after he hurt Aubrey with it, but it came from the same set. He figured it would do a similar job to how it had in his dreams, so he hid the knife fairly well on his person.
He left without his keys, locking the door behind him. He knew he wouldn't be coming back.
The bus journey to Faraway took a solid half an hour, which Sunny spent gazing out of the window and reflecting.
Why am I like this? It would've been easier to just not wake up. Why did I decide to go to Mari's grave to do this? He swore he could see the shadows outside the bus move, eyes appearing out of them at random intervals. As the bus rattled onwards, Omori's words echoed through Sunny's head.
" You tell yourself that you don't want to burden others… But the truth is that you're selfish. "
Those words felt appropriate now. They were the truth after all. Ending it all in Faraway is just him being selfish and forcing himself into everybody else's lives, even if in death.
He sighed, as the bus reached its stop at Faraway, a few minutes off from the plaza. It was evening, so the town was drenched in a pleasant orange glow. He put up the hood on his coat, a thin raincoat that wouldn't really do much to shield anybody from the weather and was mostly just to hide his face, and began walking to the graveyard.
On the way there, memories flashed through his head. Happy memories of him and Mari's friends, as well as the horrible memory of his crime. He took a deep breath. He felt a tear build up in his single eye, but he quickly brushed it away. He kept the knife hidden in a pocket in the coat, but he'd get it out soon enough.
He made it to the church, and he gently opened the doors. He had luckily avoided seeing anybody he had once known closely, so it wasn't much trouble to avoid confrontation until he got to the graveyard.
It was actually quite pretty. The rows upon rows of modest, polished graves, each gently layered with their own gifts. He ignored whatever they might have said, as he approached his sister's grave.
He looked at it, and pulled the knife out. He let himself cry, as he fell to his knees and apologised, over and over.
But soon, that was enough. He closed his eyes, grabbing the knife with both hands as he thrust it towards himself.
Sharp pain.
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So. He was awake. His chest hurt as if he had been stabbed, but he felt everything. He opened his single eye, and looked around.
He was still in the graveyard, collapsed onto a grave which he assumed to be Mari's. It was a bit later in the evening, but the sky still cast a pleasant orange glow on everything. He planted his palms flat on the ground, and pushed himself up.
He looked around once he noticed his knife was gone and there was no stab wound in his chest. He decided to look up at the grave to try and figure out what the hell was happening, and…
Oh.
That's nice.
Sunny gazed upon his own grave. It was in the same spot Mari's was, and it listed the year of death as being… the same as Mari's.
Is this… heaven? A world where Mari never died, and the only person lost was the weird burden of a kid she kept around only because he was family? I could get used to this.
He brought himself to his feet, and looked around. He didn't really know what was going on, but he felt strangely happy with it. Maybe this was just his last dream while he bled out on Mari's grave. Maybe this really was heaven. Maybe this was another world. He thought about it, but decided he'd figure that out in time.
He wanted to explore this place a bit more, to be proven right that the world would move on just fine without him. He put his hand up to his right eye, only to realise it was still missing. Huh. Guess that rules out the afterlife theory. He shrugged, looking around. He decided that he wanted to go to the hangout spot for now. He didn't know how things went here, and he hoped that the spot would be fairly empty of people.
The church was still open at this time of day, so he slipped through the doors, keeping his hood up nonetheless. The building was entirely empty save for the pastor, who merely shot Sunny a confused glance, for he didn't remember seeing anybody enter the graveyard. However, he didn't really want to bother the young man, so he let Sunny go about his business.
Sunny wandered through the streets of Faraway, giving certain things a close look over. Everything looked practically the same as it did when he was last there; The houses he passed were the same colours, the same things were in the yards. It made him a bit happy to be perfectly honest, to see that no matter what his hometown would never change.
Eventually, he made it to the park. He always liked it there, but that's not the place he wanted anyways. He shoved through some of the bushes, and emerged at the hangout spot. It looked a bit as it did after Mari's death, if maybe a bit more… dishevelled? It looked like nobody had used it for years. He figured Aubrey never joined the hooligans, or that they just never used this place as their hangout. He shrugged to himself, and sat on the dirt where Mari always used to put her picnic basket. It was nicely padded with grass. He gave a gentle smile, and merely watched as the clouds rolled by.
He didn't know how much time passed like this, but he was startled out of his zoning out by somebody approaching.
He turned his head to the right, as his blind spot didn't let him see the bushes otherwise, and he saw a girl his age come through. She was wearing fairly casual clothes, and had long, bright pink hair.
Shit.
Aubrey.
Sunny almost stood up, but he tangled his legs together a bit, causing him to unceremoniously fall back down onto his ass.
He looked straight at her, and she was fairly surprised to see anybody in this spot. "Oh, sorry for that, did I scare you?" She spoke in a tone that didn't indicate any aggression, just surprise.
"It's okay." Sunny mumbled loud enough for her to hear. His voice was hoarse and scratchy from years of little to no use. Even before he killed his sister, Sunny rarely spoke. It wasn't exactly that he found it hard, he just didn't see the need to most of the time.
"So, uh, how did you find this place? It's a bit tucked away." Aubrey approached the hooded boy as he moved himself back into a seated position, rotating his whole body a bit to not have to crane his head to see her.
"Friend showed me. A few years back." He spoke, but noticed Aubrey straining to hear him a bit. He realised nobody would recognise him, if the grave really was to be trusted, so he let his hood fall down. He looked fairly thin and pale, his black hair getting a bit long and tangled. He didn't remember when he last combed it.
What most stood out, however, was the eyepatch over his right eye. It was of plain, black cloth, and was wrapped onto his head using a fairly thin, strong cord.
"Oh, huh, sam-" Aubrey only began to speak as he took his hood off. Two things struck her immediately. First, the eyepatch. It didn't look like a cheap, dollar store eyepatch some kid would wear to look cool, even to Aubrey.
And the second was the uncanny resemblance to her dead friend, or rather how she imagined he would have looked if he was her age. From the pale skin (although it looked a bit too pale to be healthy, even in the poor light of the evening), to the raven black hair, to the eye that was so dark it was like staring into the void.
Sunny looked at her, and tilted his head a bit. Aubrey realised she was staring, and cleared her throat. "Right, sorry about that, you just… looked like an old friend of mine." Sunny understood who she meant, but did not ask for elaboration from her. He was conflicted by the sheer fact she even remembered him, in the end.
"If I could ask… What's up with the eyepatch?" She spoke warily, to say the least, unsure if the stranger before her would be comfortable answering. If there's one thing from her childhood that she relearned once she moved into Mari's family's house, it was basic politeness.
"Lost the eye. Friend got upset with me." The way Sunny spoke was a bit awkward and stilted, as if he was forcing himself to speak but could only manage it in short sentences.
Who would've thought I'd met Aubrey here? If I've been dead, and Mari's grave is missing, that clearly means Mari's still alive. Seems the pair kept their promise to dye their hair? It looks nice on her, maybe even a bit nicer than after Mari died.
Aubrey winced a bit at this. "Ah crap, sorry for bringing that up then." She finally reached Sunny, and decided to sit down next to him on the side he could still see from, though a bit distanced just in case. For all she knew, this stranger could stab her in the next five seconds, so she made sure to keep her distance. "Why uh, why are you even here so late? And alone, to boot."
Sunny saw her in his peripheral vision now that she sat on the side of his good eye. He sighed. "Ran away from home. Dad left. Mom hates me. Staying here." He gave her a shrug. He was telling the truth, if maybe a bit of an abridged version of it. He felt that, since this wasn't the Aubrey that hated him, he could be a bit more open.
Aubrey gave a bit of an awkward chuckle. "Huh. I'm in a bit of a similar boat I guess, but I managed to move in with a friend's family. You got anybody you could stay with?" Aubrey wasn't sure why she was suddenly so concerned for this stranger's wellbeing. It could've been his resemblance to her long gone friend, or just the similarity to her own situation. He looked a bit younger than her, so she felt a bit of pity for him too.
Sunny spoke how he felt regarding the matter. "Friends never liked me." He said this with a slightly bitter laugh, before growing quiet again. "For the better, I think."
Aubrey frowned at this. "I get that sometimes it can feel like nobody's there for you, but I mean… It gets better, you know?" She tried her best to reassure him, because god knows she would've found it useful when she was going through something like this. "Huh, I just realised I haven't asked. What's your name?" Sunny looked a bit pained at this question, and frowned a bit.
Well… Only one thing comes to mind.
"It's not my real name, but you can call me Omori." He muttered, giving a shrug to the pink girl beside him. "Like… the piano brand?" She asked, curious. Sunny chuckled. "Yeah, exactly. My sister had one. I was always around it. So a friend called me Omori." The two of them shared a bit of an awkward laugh over the unexpected shared knowledge.
Was it too far to mention Mari's piano? Shit. He thought, but didn't let his internal panic be known outside.
"Well, I'm Aubrey, in any case." She gave him a bit of a cautious smile, somehow feeling better than she did before just by being with this runaway for a mere moment. She checked her watch, and realised it was a bit later than she planned.
"Oh damn, I just realised I gotta go. Would you want me to come by tomorrow?" She offered, and Sunny hesitated for a moment, before giving her a nod. "Sure."
Aubrey stood up, and began to briskly walk away, giving him a small wave. "See you, then." He waved back, and let himself fall onto his back.
Was it a bad idea to force myself into their lives? She seems so much better without me there, even if she did remember me.
He took a deep breath, as he felt sleep overtaking him.
What a selfish bastard I am.
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Aubrey walked briskly away from the old hangout spot, and soon enough made her way to the home she had been staying at for just over a year now.
She knocked on the door rapidly. Soon enough, it was opened, and Mari and Sunny's mom greeted her.
"Ah, hi there Aubrey! You're a bit late, is everything okay?" She gave her a gentle look over, noticing how she looked slightly shook up.
"Uh, yeah, everything's good. I just met someone a bit… interesting at the park." She reassured her current guardian everything was fine, before she quickly retreated to her room.
It was a nicely converted storage closet that really just felt cozy to be in. The walls were nicely plastered with wallpaper, and there was more than enough space for everything she needed.
However, instead of going straight to sleep, she recovered an old notebook, and started writing something on a page.
Over the past 4 years, she had never let go of the memory of Sunny, the one person who mattered to her above all. Thus, this encounter fueled her mind, if just for a bit.
Reasons Omori might be Sunny:
- Talks similarly.
- Same hair.
- Same eye.
- Sister had an Omori piano, just like Mari.
- Nobody but our group knows about the hideout.
Reasons Omori can't be Sunny:
- Sunny had both eyes.
- Omori seems almost my age.
- Dead people don't come back.
She tried to think about it logically, but eventually gave up, choosing to retire to bed rather than logic her way through this situation.
Maybe she still wasn't dealing with the grief healthily, if she assumed some random kid might be Sunny, back from the grave.
She sighed, and drifted off to sleep.