The morning sunlight filtered through the window, casting soft patterns across my bedroom wall. I stared at the ceiling, listening to the faint sounds of the city outside—bikes zipping past, a dog barking somewhere down the street, the low hum of life continuing as usual. Shinobu was probably already up, most likely making a mess in the kitchen again.
I sat up slowly, rubbing the sleep from my eyes. My body ached in that subtle way that comes from emotional exhaustion more than physical fatigue. But even through that heaviness, there was a strange sense of calm settling over me.
Maybe because, for once, I hadn't woken up feeling completely alone.
By the time I got to the kitchen, Shinobu was finishing up her coffee, hair slightly tousled and eyes half-lidded from sleep. She looked up when I entered, blinking once.
"You look like you just lost a fight with your dreams," she said.
I grunted. "At least I didn't lose a fight with a hairbrush."
She snorted into her mug. "Touche."
We didn't say much after that, and weirdly, it wasn't awkward. Just… quiet. Peaceful. The kind of silence that doesn't beg to be filled.
After breakfast, I left for school alone, Shinobu waving lazily at me from the doorway. Her half-smile lingered in my mind the entire walk, tucked in the corner of my thoughts like a photo I wasn't ready to put away.
The day passed slower than usual—lectures blurring together, the ticking of the clock louder than my thoughts. Sayoko and Kane kept me grounded in the present, though.
"So," Kane said as we sat on the rooftop during lunch, "I've been thinking."
"That's never good," Sayoko murmured.
Kane ignored her. "We should do something. You know, like… go somewhere. Just us."
"Like a date?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.
Sayoko choked on her rice. Kane blinked, then shrugged. "Not unless you're into group dating now."
"Definitely not," I muttered.
Sayoko cleared her throat. "But she's right. Maybe it'd be good for us. A break. Something normal."
Normal. The word felt foreign on my tongue. But tempting, too.
"I'll think about it," I said quietly.
Kane gave me a look. "Yuki. You don't have to always be strong, you know. Let people pull you sometimes."
I didn't respond right away. Because part of me didn't know how.
That night, back home, I found myself standing outside Shinobu's door. I wasn't sure why I was there, or what I wanted to say—only that I needed to be near her, just for a second.
Before I could knock, the door creaked open. Shinobu stood there, wearing an oversized hoodie and raising an eyebrow.
"You okay?" she asked.
"I…" I hesitated. "Can I just… sit in here? For a bit?"
She didn't say anything. Just stepped aside and let me in.
I sat on the floor by her bed while she resumed whatever she'd been doing—reading, maybe, or scrolling through her phone.
Neither of us spoke. And again, the silence didn't hurt.
Eventually, Shinobu said softly, "You don't have to say anything. Just… don't keep everything inside, alright?"
I nodded.
Trying. That was the word again.
And right now, trying meant allowing myself to sit here. To exist in someone else's space and let that be okay.
Maybe tomorrow I'd tell her more. Maybe I wouldn't.
But tonight, I wasn't alone.
And maybe, that was enough.
The days blurred into each other after that. Each morning, I woke to the same view—the sky lightening over the horizon, the steady pulse of my own heartbeat. The weight of the world hadn't shifted, but it felt lighter, somehow. Shinobu, always unpredictable, had an unspoken way of easing the tension that had been building for so long. We didn't talk about it. We didn't have to. The spaces between us, the ones I used to avoid, had begun to feel a little more familiar, a little more like home.
At school, it wasn't much different. Kane and Sayoko kept their usual banter going, throwing off the weight of the atmosphere with their jokes and teasing. They still asked about Shinobu, about me, about where we were headed. I answered as honestly as I could—"We're trying," still the easiest answer to give.
But the question that kept tugging at the edges of my mind was whether I was trying hard enough. Whether I was giving enough of myself to this, to her.
And then, on a rare afternoon when the clouds rolled in and rain began to fall in steady sheets, everything changed.
I was sitting at my desk when the message pinged on my phone. It was from Shinobu:
[Shinobu: Are you coming home today? Or do I need to send a search party?]
I stared at the message for a while before typing back:
[Yuki: I'll be there soon. Don't get too comfortable without me.]
The usual back-and-forth followed, but something felt different. There was a shift in the air. Maybe it was the way the rain seemed to wash everything around me, or maybe it was the weight of the words I hadn't yet said. Either way, I couldn't ignore the tug in my chest.
By the time I reached the house, the rain had softened to a gentle drizzle. I stepped inside, expecting the usual quiet. Instead, there was music playing softly from the living room, an unfamiliar tune that felt both comforting and distant.
Shinobu sat on the couch, legs curled beneath her, the same soft smile on her lips that I hadn't seen in a while. She didn't look up as I entered. Instead, she reached for the remote, turning the volume down.
"You're late," she said, but there was no bite to her words, no impatience.
I let out a small laugh, the sound strange in the quiet room. "I told you not to get too comfortable."
Shinobu gave me a sidelong glance. "I didn't. Just thought I'd start the music in case you were in a mood."
I raised an eyebrow. "What, you think I'm in a mood now?"
She just shrugged, not answering directly, and gestured for me to sit. I did, slowly, as though the space between us had grown more significant, heavier. I had spent so much time pretending that I could keep everything at arm's length, that I could hide the parts of myself that were afraid, unsure, vulnerable. But right now, in this moment, with the sound of soft music and the faint smell of food in the air, I felt it all come rushing to the surface.
Shinobu didn't speak, but her eyes were on me, watching closely. It wasn't invasive, though. It felt more like she was waiting for me to say something. To open up.
I stared down at my hands, feeling the warmth of the room press against me, and for the first time, I let myself feel the weight of it all. The silence wasn't just the absence of sound—it was the absence of the barriers I'd built around myself. I had been so focused on pushing people away that I hadn't realized how much I wanted someone to pull me in.
"I'm… trying," I said quietly. It felt like the beginning of something important, something bigger than just the words. I looked up at Shinobu, meeting her gaze. "But I don't know if it's enough. I don't know if I'm enough."
Shinobu didn't say anything at first. She didn't rush to reassure me, didn't offer some neat answer. She just looked at me, her expression unreadable for a moment, and then she did something that caught me off guard. She flicked my forehead, just like before, but this time, it wasn't playful. It wasn't teasing.
"Stupid," she muttered, though there was no real heat in the word. "Of course you're enough."
My breath caught in my throat. It was a simple thing, so simple. But it meant everything.
I smiled, the weight in my chest lightening just a little. "Yeah, well, you're stuck with me now."
Her lips twitched upward in a smile, and she leaned back against the couch, eyes closing for a moment as she hummed. "Good. I'm tired of dealing with all the idiots in this house alone."
I laughed, feeling that familiar pull of warmth spread through me. For the first time, the walls between us seemed a little less daunting, the distance between us shrinking with each passing second.
"Hey," she said after a pause, her voice softer now, almost contemplative. "You ever think about what happens after we're done trying?"
I blinked, caught off guard by the question. "What do you mean?"
She met my eyes again, her gaze steady and unflinching. "Like… when you've finally made it through the mess. When you're not just trying anymore. What then?"
I paused, unsure how to answer. I hadn't really thought about the endgame. I'd been so caught up in the process, in figuring out how to rebuild everything, that I hadn't dared to imagine what life would be like once it was fixed—or if it ever could be. But as I looked at her, sitting there, so calm and steady, I realized that maybe I didn't have to know the answers. Maybe just being here, right now, was enough.
"I guess… I'll figure that out when I get there."
Shinobu nodded slowly, a small smile tugging at her lips. "Yeah. Me too."
The evening stretched on quietly, but it didn't feel heavy anymore. For the first time, I allowed myself to believe that maybe everything wasn't just about surviving. Maybe it was about living too.
And for the first time in a long time, I felt like I could breathe again.