Weeaboo {Ereri}

VIII.

Two years ago

Sickening. Disgusting. Atrocious. I furrowed my eyebrows and sneered, holding the shirt by my fingertips. "It's time to really let go." The fingers loosened their grip, and the shirt dropped with a rustle into the box of unnameable objects. I folded the box quickly and neatly, and heaved it into my arms.

It was quite a large box. With my palms holding it up from the bottom, I had to steer my gaze around to the side to see, leaving my room. Mikasa watched from the bathroom as I staggered by, a toothbrush in her mouth and hands on her hips. "Finally getting rid of it all?"

"Not finally. There is simply no use for that shame anymore."  I put down the box, opened the living room closet, and slid it in there before slamming the door with a bang. My sister had followed. She raised her eyebrows as I stomped by again. "Why aren't you throwing it away? Still can't let go?"

I whirled around to glare up. She'd bent forward, lifting eyebrows with a smirk, and our faces were inches away from each other. "N-no! It might sell for something. One day." I spun around and stomped into my bedroom, shutting the door.

My room looked oddly empty now. The walls were white, devoid of the posters and commissioned art and cosplay pictures. The desk I did homework at was larger without the figurines. My shirt drawer was nearly empty, and my closet wasn't half as colorful as it had been.

Along with the initial relief that I had let go of formerly important things, I felt like a hole had been drilled into my stomach. I sat on my bare bed, slouching. This would take some getting used to.

With a sigh, I flung my upper half back, slumping wide-armed on the mattress. Even the ceiling looked different. "An unfamiliar ceiling," I recited aloud before chortling. I could no longer quote Neon Gen***s Evangelion, and I chuckled at that.

Rolling on my side and facing the wall, I clasped my hands to my mouth, snorting. My stomach cramped. I kept on convulsing with laughter, tears forming in my eyes. My legs pulled up to my chest, and I began crying.

After I had been reduced to burning eyes and a dripping nose, but silent, my door opened, and the springs on my bed creaked not long after as Mikasa perched on the edge. I ignored her, wrapping my arms around my legs. She sighed and whispered, "It's hard to let go of something important, huh."

My chin trembled. "I didn't need to hear that from you," I mustered.

She breathed a laugh out of her nose, and I could hear the smile in her voice. "You know what helps in situations like this?" Mikasa waited to see if I would take the bait. I didn't. She went on. "Hot tea."

"Tea?" I craned my neck around to her. She was watching the floor with a small smile. She'd begun smiling more often recently. Before lately, she hadn't smiled since our parents left. I dropped my head back to its former position. "We aren't English, idiot."

The bed made more noises, and I shifted along with the movement of the mattress as she stood. "It helps, I promise." A hand slinked up my back and tapped my side. "Come on."

"No."

A thumb and pointer finger danced on the skin between where my legs were hitched against. "You leave me no choice." She pinched there, lightly, over and over. I jerked up.

"Stop!" I shoved her hand away.

Mikasa straightened, closing her eyes. She brought her hands together above her chest as if she were praying. She inhaled deeply through her nostrils and then breathed out of her mouth slowly. I watched curiously, halfway into sitting up.

She bowed her head. "The ultimate punishment," she chanted. "Perpetual Pinching!" Her eyes opened in an angry flash, the grayish blues lit with a fire. She clenched a hand into a fist by her side, extending the other to me. "Invoke!" Mikasa yelled, and then she leaped forward, tickling me with all her might.