43. Coincidence

43. Coincidence

Hospitals are impossibly boring, especially if you've been stuck in one for three weeks now.

"Your legs are healed now, but that does NOT mean you can just scamper off!" Head Nurse Fujimiya reprimanded angrily. "I swear, if you continue on like this, I WILL tell Amano-san about this!"

I pouted. "But if I can't even walk around, moss is gonna grow outta my head." I whine.

"Yes, we don't need your brain!" Nurse Fujimiya retorted, "We need less of your plans to escape from this hospital room!" she complained. "Christ, I will personally chain you down to your bed!"

"That's child abuse."

"I have full authority and permission to do so, with a signed letter from your father, sisters, and friends." Nurse Fujimiya explained.

"Wait, what?"

-----

Well, isn't that cruel? They're all teaming up to bully me!

Picking up the canned coffee from the vending machine, I popped it open and sipped on it.

Still not enough to make me stay in the room, though.

I wandered about the hospital room, my arm still in a cast. I wandered, shivering at the cold of the hospital air conditioners.

It was quiet.

Hospitals were always quiet, to my pleasure. It gave me time to relax. My Void Ring hung around my neck, and as I passed by the glass windows, it glinted as it reflected sunlight.

It's already been two weeks since I first woke up.

And since then, I haven't done a thing. No magic tricks, no pointless studies, no walking to school and no fighting Hibari. No naps in the school infirmary. No nothing.

Walking out of the hospital and into the courtyard, I sighed.

"Drew," I mumbled to myself, sitting down on the park bench, under a shady tree. "Drew."

Drew, are you there? I asked, as if I expected a reply.

I placed the can of coffee beside me and clutched the Void Ring in my fist, bringing it closer to my face.

"Drew," I spoke again, calling out to her.

I can still feel her, somewhere deep within. She's not gone. She's not gone-- but she wasn't going to show herself any time soon.

"[Your survival was an absolute miracle], huh." I quoted what Kuma told me yesterday, my voice laced in sarcastic amusement, "Drew, were you the one?"

Drew, were you the one that kept me alive?

How? With the Night Flames? Or-?

Night Flames.

I've tried over and over again the past days, but not a single time was I able to light it. I no longer had the deathperation to light a dying will Flame.

It hurt to know that I couldn't do what Drew did for me. It was as if those flames didn't belong to Rei-- but to Drew.

And deep down, I felt weak.

If not for those flames, I would probably be long dead. I would probably be unable to even reach the hospital; or to even leave Kokuyo Centre alive.

And now that I've lost those flames, I just felt powerless. I felt exposed, like a defenseless little lamb surrounded by a pack of hungry wolves.

I bit my lip.

I clutched the Void Ring tighter, closing my eyes as if in a prayer.

"Drew," I whispered, a chant I would, in the future, say as a chant for luck, an assurance I would give myself to ensure myself.

"Please watch over me, Drew."

------

"Hey, do you think I could sneak back in from here?" I asked the nurse at the counter of the ER Department, "Without Amano-sensei noticing?"

"I'm sure Amano-sensei would be simple to bypass, but Fujimiya-senpai would probably notice you, Ninomiya-kun." the nurse sighed in response.

"Fujimiya-san's easy to spot, so it's alright." I assured her, "Please, Fuse-san?"

I put on my best sweetheart face, smiling as innocently as I could as I pleaded with eyes of a puppy--

ER Nurse Fuse sighed. "Not like I'm not used to this already."

She opened the mechanically functioned doors of the ER room, and I cheered childishly. "Yay! Thanks, Fuse-san!"

As I entered and met her at the other side of the counter, she called out to me, "Be extra quiet, you hear? There's a serious emergency happening at the moment, and I trust you know proper manners in a hospital!"

"Yes, ma'am!" I respond with a salute.

To head back to the normal rooms from the emergency entrance of the ER, you would have to pass by the Intensive Care Unit.

I often went on this route in the many times I've sneaked in these past three weeks, so I trotted on the familliar way back.

First right, second left- I chanted casually, carefree and maybe even making up a random tune for these directions- Walk to the end and take the last left-

"You're got to be kidding me! cut up my own body for the sake of that child?!?" a woman's voice sharply cut into the quiet air as she shrieked.

My steps immediately ceased as I halted abruptly, pulling the brakes on all my senses as I stopped right before the turning, hoping I did not come into view of the people on the next turning.

The woman complained in irritation, bewildered at the ridiculous suggestion made by her husband. She sounded absolutely mortified and disgusted at even the thought of it.

I ducked behind the wall, peeking in carefully.

A man and a woman-- and they were talking about someone. Talking about a girl that was currently in the ICU.

"It isn't just me," the woman cried, sounding so desperate she sounded as if she was going to cry, "No one wished for that child to stay alive for this long." she spat in repulse.

Ah- I realized. This scene is... Wait a minute, this scene happened here? In this time frame? Noo way, really? Probably not but-

Here, of all places? That's just strange! Like, weirdest of all coincidences-

"Hey, don't," the man was slightly more considerate, "Nagi will hear you," he warned his wife. But his wife wasn't in the state of mind for this.

"That child is in the Intensive Care Unit!" she snapped, "She won't hear anything."

I gripped my fist, biting my lip in irritation. That child, huh. This woman isn't even acknowledging Nagi as her daughter.

What a pitiful excuse of a mother.

My face downcast, I listened to the end of their conversation.

I listened, stayed, and waited like a patient bystander as the father excused himself for a business call, walking past me as he went. Our eyes met for half a second, but both of us quickly dismissed each other's presence without a second thought. 

I turned around and continued on my route to the elevators. I passed by the sobbing woman, but she did not take notice of me.

Don't, Rei, I told myself. Calm yourself. Take deep breaths and don't-

My legs decided to stop moving. I had paused right by the woman, and I felt an uncharacteristically sinister smirk grace my face.

The woman lifted her head curiously.

I chuckled, eyeing the woman with a close-eyed, Cheshire cat smile.

"What a sad, sad girl she is." I joked.

My feet began moving again, so I turned away and continued walking. My expressions had dropped, my face now marred in a frown as my eyes were locked in a glower. My lips were bitten hard enough to nearly draw blood; my fists clenched tightly and painfully in a horrible, horrible mixture of raw anger and hatred-

And if the woman said anything, I was too spiteful to register it.