"All A Dream", Eri/Shiki, Rated K+, 1/2
All a Dream
Rating: K+.
Warnings: Spoilers for Week 1, shameless angst, shameless fluff, shipping of the Eri/Shiki persuasion. Again, Eri doesn't show up much in-game, so I might be writing her a bit OOC.
Disclaimer: I don't own The World Ends With You.
Summary: Eri can't shake the feeling that she really did lose her. Shiki's just glad to see her again. Part 1 of 2.
“I had a dream you died, Shiki,” Eri tells her, head lowered so nobody can see the circles under her eyes, voice whispering in Shiki’s ear so nobody can hear how shaky it is. It’s a great disguise, really-if anyone were to walk by, they’d probably just see Eri telling her friend a secret, nothing anyone would think strange. After all, she doesn’t have a reason to be upset, not at all, and she knows she won't be able to come up with an answer that makes any sense if anybody asks her what's wrong. She's got her Shiki back… no, that wasn’t it. Shiki never really went away in the first place, and maybe it was one of those vivid sorts of dreams where she’d woken up sobbing because she’d expected it to still be true, but Shiki's alive again. No. Shiki didn't die at all. It was all just a dream, nothing to it but Eri’s guilt and… everything else around and between the two of them piling up and warping until her mind got overwhelmed and killed off Shiki while Eri slept. Eri, there's no easy way to say this, but it's better you know... (and why was her mother crying?) Shiki's... there was an... accident at her house, after you came home, she... I'm so sorry, honey...
“It’s okay,” Shiki replies. “It was just a... I'm okay, don't worry about it.” There’s something about Shiki that isn’t shocked, that doesn't see this as anything new, and maybe it's no big deal that Eri had a nightmare, but there's usually a reaction. Her eyes get wider, or she gets flustered, or sometimes she breathes a little faster. They've known each other since they were kids, and Eri can tell when Shiki's heard it before.
Nevermind, there's something about Shiki that's just... different. It confuses Eri, but that’s okay, because a lot of things about her confuse Eri (the trick is to act like you know what you're doing, to remember to smile all the way through it), and she’s got her happy ending, right? They’d gotten their I-forgive-yous out of the way, and even though Eri still doesn’t really know what Shiki had to apologize for, she gets it that Shiki needed the chance to apologize. There wasn’t any harm in letting her, and there's no need to speculate about it now. It's not like the dream anymore, like something horrible that just couldn’t be but still was-no, Shiki's here, and there are still clothes to be designed and shopping trips to be taken and secrets to be shared. Eri had found them a different bench than usual, out of the way so nobody would see perky, bubbly Eri on the verge of tears, if it gets that far. Which maybe it won't, because she can't tell whether they'd be happy tears or sad tears, anyway. The sky had been overcast all day, but there probably won't be any rain, and even if there is, they'll have Eri’s pink plaid umbrella.
“There was a funeral and everything,” Eri continues, even though she probably should stop. There's nothing to be sad about anymore. It was all just a dream, like those stories where things get so bad there's no way for the hero to win, and then surprise! They wake up, and everything's nice again, or at least back to the way it started out. Eri's not the type to think for hours about people in stories, but now she’s wondering if those people had a hard time getting back to just fine all the way from awful, getting back to being happy when it still feels like Shiki had died three weeks ago (or was it two?). It all still feels real, and yes, Eri never got to see the body, there's room for a thousand conspiracy theories, but she’d been told there was a good reason the casket was closed. “They asked me to pick out your dress…” and of course nobody saw the dress anyway, but Eri’s not going into any details like that.
“One of your designs?” Shiki asks. It sounds like she's trying to make a joke, but Eri knows Shiki better than anybody, and this isn't the way her voice sounds when she thinks something's funny.
It had been a white dress. Natural Puppy, if Eri remembers it right. She wanted it to be one of Shiki's designs-- maybe it would somehow mean that Eri really had respected Shiki as a designer all along, even if Eri couldn't say what exactly that would do-- but Shiki hadn't finished it, hadn't gotten any farther than cutting out the fabric, and Eri just knew she could never sew well enough to make the dress her Shiki would be buried in, couldn't make the clothes real like Shiki did even if nobody would see, even if the casket would be closed and it was better that way.
She'd wanted to see Shiki, and they told her that the girl in there wasn't really Shiki anymore, and they'd cleaned her up as best as possible, but that wasn't how Eri would want to remember her. They told her that Mr. Mew (although they hadn't called him that, it had been “her cat”, or “that thing”) was in there with her, to keep her company so she wouldn't be lonely or sad anymore. They're talking to me like I'm a little kid! she'd thought, but they'd known something she hadn't. Shiki hadn't been lonely. How dare they tell Shiki's Eri, the one that had been with her since forever and had stayed by her side through everything, that Shiki had been lonely! If she'd been sad and lonely enough for somebody to notice that hadn't even ever met her... and how did these people know how she felt? Why did they care? All they knew about her was how she died... and Eri stopped before she really proved it to herself, because she'd figured it out enough, but there wasn't any proof. Shiki could have just been distracted, not paying attention-- when she wasn't sewing, it was always easy to catch her attention, and after all, Eri knew Shiki so much better than these people did. She'd even wondered if they knew what was going on at all, looked under couch cushions and in the backs of closets for Mr. Mew. She'd keep him for herself, hold him when she slept at night. He'd been there since the beginning, and Eri needed something of Shiki's to keep with her almost as much as she needed Shiki back, but she couldn't find him anywhere. Those people at the funeral home had been right, but no, it was an accident, just like everybody said. Shiki would never have done that, and Eri had told herself it was a dream, tried to wake herself up, but of course she didn't wake up. Not then.
She'd asked to see Shiki, and it wasn't as if they'd given her a straight answer, but she could make a pretty good guess that Shiki didn't look like Shiki anymore.
But the Shiki here is still recognizable. Pretty, even. The Shiki here is alive and well, and Eri’s never going to take her for granted ever again. Just seeing her again for real, even after her mother had patiently reassured her that yes, it was all a dream, no, nothing had happened to Shiki (no more Mrs. Misaki said the doctors did all they could), just seeing her again made Eri happier than she thought anything could. Throwing her arms around Shiki again-yes, she's real, she's solid-while Shiki asked what was wrong, was she okay, but had hugged her back anyway just as hard, and there was Mr. Mew again, his head and one floppy arm sticking out of Shiki's bookbag, above ground (where else could he possibly be?)
It doesn't make sense for her to be upset, and she doesn't even know it's gotten this bad until her eyes hurt and everything's blurry and Shiki's looking at her, alarmed.
“Eri?” and she's full-out crying again (again? None of this had really happened, and she needed to remember that), sobbing because it was all so messed up, Shiki dead and then Shiki changed, and everything back to normal but herself, and she doesn't know what she'd do without her, doesn't know what she'd do if it happened for real. Shiki's never going to know how much it hurt her...“Please, don't cry, I...”
Shiki hesitates, although for what, Eri can't tell, but then there's Shiki's arm around her side, pulling her closer, Eri's head on Shiki's shoulder and their fingers laced together like stitches. “I mean, you'd miss me if I wasn't here, right? It's kind of nice to know that...”
No, this is not the usual Shiki. It's always been Eri who hugs her or hold her hand or plays with her hair or-- and anyway, it's always been Shiki that trembles in Eri's arms. (Lately, she'd been shying away altogether, and Eri doesn't want to think about what that means any more than the way people in her dream tended to pause before the word “accident”.) Shiki pulling her in? Shiki holding her? It's definitely a change... but it's not bad. Eri closes her eyes, leans into her friend. Shiki's hair tickles her forehead, but she's there, she's tangible, and it feels sort of nice. Her chest rises and falls, rises and falls. Shiki's breathing a little faster, and Eri can read her well enough to know this is something new.
“You have no idea how scared I was,” Eri tells her.
“Wait, I didn't mean I wanted you to feel bad!” Shiki says, and there's that awkward, skittish, cute little face she makes when she thinks she's said something the wrong way. Not everything's different, apparently, and she starts giggling in spite of herself. “I'm sorry!”
“'S okay,” Eri says, smiling now. “It's not your fault I had a weird dream, silly.” This won't drag her down. She's with Shiki, and they've got the rest of the day ahead of them. 104 was only a couple blocks walking distance and a subway ride away. That always cheered Eri up. Hachiko was there, too, and seeing him always cheered Shiki up. Forget it, Eri. It was just a dream. Just a dream! But still... “Shiki?”
“Huh?”
“Don't die on me for real, okay?” For a second, Shiki says nothing, doesn't seem to know what to say, and then she squeezes Eri's hand, held her a little tighter.
“I'll try not to,” she says, more quietly. Eri's stopped crying, but something wet falls on her cheek (Shiki couldn't be crying now, could she?). Another drop lands on her knee, and of course, it's started to rain, just like she'd been sure wouldn't happen.
“Dammit!” she mutters. Her bag's somewhere under the bench, and without her umbrella, they'll be stuck out in the rain, but man, she doesn't want to move-- it's not exactly cold out, but Shiki's warm, and Eri hasn't been cuddled up with her like this for what feels like weeks. Still, there's no way she'd let either of them show up to the most fashionable store in all Shibuya looking like a drowned rat. She detaches herself (maybe it was colder out than she'd thought), and starts fishing underneath the bench. It's really uncomfortable to reach for her bag without getting off the bench (it really had been better just a couple seconds ago, and if that sigh was any indication, Shiki thought so, too), but she's almost got the handle, she just needs to reach a little more, and they'll be dry.
“Hey, let me...” There's a whoosh, and Shiki's umbrella opens, light blue with white polka dots. Eri pulls herself back up, nestling back into Shiki. The umbrella covers the both of them easily, and when Shiki tugs her bag underneath the umbrella to keep it from getting soaked, Mr. Mew's head and arm fall across her lap. Eri's bag is going to get positively soaked, and Mr. Mew looks completely ridiculous, half out of the bag, half in, like he's trying to escape. Still, it's just the three of them, Eri, Shiki, and Mr. Mew, like it had been from the start (as soon as Eri's thought it, she realizes how cheesy it sounds) and it doesn't matter how strangely realistic her dream had seemed, it doesn't matter that there had to be something more to what happened than waking up with everything fixed. It matters that she could, just barely, hear Shiki's heart beating over the sound of the rain hitting the blue umbrella, and it matters that Shiki's heart is beating a little faster than usual, and Eri's is, too. It doesn't matter how much of last night had been real. Shiki's alive right now. Everything's okay, and Eri's perfectly happy to let herself be confused if so far, being confused has left her underneath Shiki's umbrella.
“Now that you've agreed not to die on me, let's go to 104!” because she needs to break the silence somehow, and because there's the chance to be happy again, now that nothing's really wrong. She wonders if she sounds a little too happy, if the suggestion is a little forced, if Shiki hears the nervousness in the way she's making whatever this thing was into almost a joke. But Eri doesn't know how to deal with it other than by being Eri, and she does it to the best of her ability.
“Sure... maybe a little later?”
“Yeah,” Eri says, nodding into her friend's cardigan. She knows they'll want to get out of the rain soon, but for now, she's too comfortable to get up and head for the subway. “I think they've finally got the new D+B line in. Have you seen the pictures online?” Shiki has, and soon they're chattering about blouses and miniskirts and whether the new hats would go with the shoes they bought last week-- last week, not three (two?) weeks ago. Yeah, thinks Eri, smiling and giggling, and seeing her Shiki smile. It's really okay.
Part 2