Flowers to Transcend Time || Professor Membrane

20 // Asters

"Thank you."

"It's alright sweetheart. No matter what happens, you'll always have a home here, but before you leave, we'd like to know why."

You stared at Mr. and Mrs. Membrane as they sat with you at their dinner table. You'd forced your best friend to get to sleep early. After all, tomorrow was a big day! You'd both be graduating... and you'd be leaving. Just now you were breaking the news to his parents. You'd be leaving and taking most of your belongings with you.

You paused for a moment, choking up, and forcing yourself to bare the truth to them. "I... I need to find them." Your voice was breaking, your shoulders trembling. "My family - I need to know what happened to them. I can't keep pretending that I'm ok with them just disappearing." You shoved your face into your hands. "I keep having nightmares about it, and I know that they wouldn't just... Just up and leave - I - " You choked on your own tears, trying to push back the sob.

The two in front of you rubbed circles in your back and gently stroked your head. You were just as much their child as your beloved Goggles was.

After you'd collected yourself enough to begin talking again, you spoke desperately. "Please don't tell Goggles - I - I don't wanna drag him down and I don't want to be the reason he-" You let out a breathless gasp to keep yourself from sobbing again. "He doesn't need me anymore." You muttered under your breath.

It was heartbreaking for both parents to watch and see how wrong you were, but there was nothing they could say to convince you otherwise. They knew how stubborn you were, and for something like this, only their son could convince you otherwise. Which was even more of a shame because they knew he was going to confess tomorrow evening. Hopefully he wouldn't be too late.

"I... I love him, but I need to find them." You whispered at last. "They left this hole in me when they disappeared, and I need to fix it before I..."

"We know." His father said matter-of-factly. "You haven't exactly been hiding it." He chuckled, trying to lighten the mood a little bit. It worked.

His mother have a half-hearted chuckle as well. "Yes, and it's been quite adorable watching you two grow up. You'd both been in love for so long, we were waiting for years for something to happen. Which for the record, you two have our blessing, but..." She took a pause, the sad realization of what was happening coming back to her. "I suppose we just didn't expect something like this." She sighed. "I know he'll be waiting for you." She placed her hand on yours. "You've been too good for him not to."

You laughed bitterly. "I kind of wish he wouldn't." You knew he's been in love with you since your freshman year of high school, but you also knew by then that you'd have to leave eventually. You had to leave him behind eventually. You hoped through all those years that he wouldn't say anything. You didn't want to leave with a guiltier conscious than you needed to. Yet it was still painful to leave nonetheless.