Spirited Away: The Wait [ORIGINAL]

Suspension

      “Run out of tears already, I see,” Shou commented thoughtfully as he looked at the poor girl who’d been curled up in a ball on his bed bawling her eyes out like a little kid for the past 35 minutes.  

     She sniffled a couple more times, head peeking up from its hiding spot under her arms. Her eyes were all bleary and puffy from her uncontrollable sobbing. She looked at Shou who was sitting beside her on the bed, looking at her with the same concerned expression as he had on from before.

     She nodded glumly in response. How much time had she spent crying? It felt like she’d aged a few years. Sooner or later silvery hair would sprout on her head from all this drama.

     “Ready to tell me anything yet?”

     Chihiro shook her head. Her mouth was dry, and she simply didn’t feel like talking at the moment. The wound from Haku was still fresh, and she needed time to herself to sort things out internally.

     He sighed. “Are you ever going to be ready to tell me?”

     She chose not to respond, closing her eyes.

     “You know you can’t keep all this bottled up, or you’ll explode.”

     I feel like exploding now.

     “Come on, talk to me. I’m starting to get really worried.” When she still refused to answer, he added, “If you won’t tell me I’m going to interrogate that dragon myself.”

     “Do what you want.” Her voice came out raspy and hoarse, evidently from the lack of water. She licked her parched lips and sighed.

     “Good, you’re finally talking,” he said, sounding slightly more relieved. “Do you want me to beat him up for you, just to make you feel better?”

     The ghost of a smile played on her lips. Violence was never the answer to anything, but the idea of letting Haku get punished for all the hurt he was causing her stirred a pleasant and childish happiness. Yet, she didn’t want him to get hurt either.

     An image of the injured, bloody dragon popped up in her mind. He had been wildly flying in all directions in the boiler room, wrecking nearly everything in sight and causing a huge fuss. The worst part had been feeding him his medicine though; she had nearly gotten chewed in the process.

     “Earth to Chihiro,” Shou waved his hand in front of her face, “what are you thinking about? 101 ways to kill Haku?”

     Now that got a real smile out of her. Shou’s sense of humor was definitely a force to be reckoned with. Seeing her smile made him grin with relief. His shoulders sagged and he ruffled her hair. “There you go, all better.”

     Chihiro nodded and said softly, “Thanks, Shou.”

     “You can thank me by telling me what happened now.”

     She paused uncertainly. “I don’t really want to talk about it just yet though…”

     “But I need to know so I can decide what to do with that dragon! It might finally give me a good reason to beat him up real good!”

     She couldn’t help but roll her eyes at his childishness. “No.”

     “Oh come on! Please?” He gave her his best puppy-dog eyes, hoping to work on the soft side of her.

     It was working.

     “But…” Her eyes flickered as she hesitated, debating internally whether to talk or not.