itbomm

chapter 13: realization, remembrance, reunion

He is numb, but he feels warmth in his core that slowly repels the shivers in his chest. From what he remembers, he collapsed, but it feels almost as if he's laying down on his back, his head laying on something uncomfortable. It felt much like the sheer layer over a skirt part of a poofy dress, with bumps for where the decorations were placed.

An inconvenient pillow, he first thinks.

Wind brushes against his cheek, and oddly enough, the cold instead burns him at the balls of his feet as if he's walked for hours on end every day. His body feels numb — the slightest twitch sends a prickling pain to his body like pins and needles.

Strangely enough, it feels familiar.

"I'll agree to that deal," a voice had spoken, voice muffled in the midst of his steadily drifting consciousness. "Please... save His Imperial Highness."

He thinks that was Verena's voice, but it felt nothing like the girl he's somewhat befriended. She made a deal with someone in order to save him? Why would she do that? Is it to make him feel indebted to her?

Strangely enough, he can't find it in himself to care anymore.

Because Verena is here.

.

(She was here for him when no one else was.)

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

He falls asleep to a warm caress of his cheek.

——————————

It was a calm day in spring, as they had a picnic outside. She was fidgeting and nervous, and it was kind of getting on his nerves that she would be beating around the bush like this when she was normally very blunt.

"What is it?" he asks, trying not to snap at her.

"Autumn," his best friend tells him. "Can you... call me Autumn instead of [][][][][][]?"

"That's kind of sudden," he notes, observing her for a moment. "Why Autumn?"

"I hate my name," she admits, and that was fair.

Sometimes, he hated his name, too.

"Autumn suits you."

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

He never realized how much a name could mean to a person, if it's a name they chose.

At least, not back then.

——————————

"How pretty," his companion murmurs in awe, a look of wonder in her eyes as she stares up at the starlit skies.

"It's only shooting stars," he dryly states, his gaze following her line of sight, seeing the twinkle of stars moving across the sky. He didn't see the appeal of it, but the sight was — oddly enough — aesthetically pleasing.

"Yeah, but it's still amazing," she softly states. "Do you ever wonder if it's true, though?"

"Wonder about what?" he asked, laying down on the patch of grass as his passive stare remained on the night sky.

"You know, wishing on a shooting star!" she sounded almost excited about the prospects of wishes coming true. "Don't you ever wonder if wishes would come true, if we wish on a shooting star?"

"I don't know about that..." he frowned, "Isn't that just a romanticized view of stars written in all those trashy romance novels you read all the time? It's always used as a cliché where someone wishes that they'd get together or something."