Harem of Side Characters [Rewrite]

Nanami Yabu - Solace

Here I stand in front of a closed door, beyond which lies a girl on the brink of madness. I am unsure if anything I will do or say will actually help, but what I am certain of is that the world will go on. The world is cruel and unforgiving, and suffering will always be a crucial part of it. It is pointless to try and stop it.

But even then, I knock on the door. Hoping that perhaps I can make the world just a bit brighter.

"Yabu? It's me." I call out.

"Sorry, but I'm not accepting visitors right now. Please go away." Yabu says in a voice far too cold for her.

"Your friends will be here soon. Do you really want to turn all of them away?" I say.

"It doesn't matter who comes. I said I'm not accepting visitors."

I reach towards the doorknob and turn... and as I suspected the door opened. Yabu couldn't be bothered to lock the door in the state that she's in. As I approach her, she doesn't move away. I sit beside her, close enough but not too close.

"Get out."

"Is that what you really want? To wallow in misery completely alone in your room?"

"And how would you know what I want? What do you know about me?"

"Not a lot. Out of your group of friends, I feel like I know you the least. You're more closed off than the other three." I shrug.

"If you're expecting my story to be even 1/10th as dark as theirs, I'm sorry to dissapoint. I'm far more boring than you think."

"That's not what I-"

"Did I get abandoned? No. Did I have neglectful parents? No. Did I get abused? No." She turned to look at me. "...You see now? I have nothing to be sad about. Even if I did, I'd just need to get the fuck ofer it and deal with it on my own because my friends are going through something so much worse, right!?"

"..." This is probably the most I've heard her speak at once after her meltdown.

"...Do you want to know what my childhood was actually like? Why I loathe myself so damn much?"

—————

Memory Fragment - A Good Person

Let me tell you a story about me.

I was a very blessed child. If you were to ask me how my childhood went, I would say it was a contentful and bountiful childhood.

I came from a rich family, and my parents were extremely supportive of whatever I wanted to do. Music, poetry, sports...it didn't matter. They would always say yes with a smile on their face. I was their little Angel.

I could have lived the rest of my life as a happy and rich idiot.

If I had just been a little bit more cowardly...I could have lived a great life, ignorant to everything that was going on around me.

There were two sides to the town I lived in. One where all the wealthy people lived, and where I lived. One where all the poor and unfortunate people lived, called the slums. My parents always advised me to stay away from the slums, as the people there weren't exactly friendly. If a rich person entered the slums, they would be attacked, and have all their money stolen.