Rising Shards

I didn’t want to move. I didn’t want to exist, even. I stayed face down in bed, covering my head with my pillow. I could barely sleep the first night after the Falling Shards incident and my breakup with Nikki, my mind replaying everything over and over and over, nothing wrenching myself away from the already painful memories. I blew up at some idiot boy and beat him until he was bloodied, all because of some inane power that turned my own thoughts against me. I didn’t want to believe all of that came from me, I could barely stand to think about it. I told myself he was just lying, but that didn’t make me feel better.

I was single again. Not that Nikki and I ever had a grand, romantic relationship, but it was fun at the start. We had fun playing music together, and we could still play together. Once I stopped feeling like I’d been hit by a bus maybe I could think about finding someone else to date.

But any time I had that thought, pangs of immense sadness hit like additional buses, running me over again and again. I didn’t want someone else, I wanted to make it work with Nikki. Didn’t I? Why did I give in so easily when she said we should be done?

Deep down, I knew the answer, but that answer hurt too.

Some of the other devils tried to check on me in the days after, but they mostly gave up when it was clear I didn’t want to speak to anyone. I told Mother I wasn’t feeling well, and it was true. It wasn’t One was more persistent though.

”Hey, Ana, come on, open up,” Sai said.

I dragged myself out and unlocked the door, rushing back to my bed because I couldn’t meet anyone’s eyes after all that, especially not Sai. They stood in front of my bed.

”I’m not doing any training today, or any missions,” I said, effectively hiding under my pillow. ”Mother’s meeting with them, anyway.”

Why my mother would bother to meet with the Faleur sisters, I didn’t know. The only reason I’d want to meet with them in private would be to humiliate them or defeat them in some kind of combat, preferably both.

”I’m not mad, you know,” Sai said. ”We’re all just worried about you.”

”Tch,” I scoffed.

”And personally, I think you should do something other than wallowing in your bed,” Sai said.

I begrudgingly moved my pillow away from my face. ”What else is there to do?”

”Like...anything?” Sai said. ”That’s so broad it’s hard to answer. Just think of anything that you’d get out of bed for.”

”Maybe...do you want to watch Tower with me?”

The sigh my friend let out was painful, but fair.

”I mean, I’m not going to stop you if you watch that on your own,” Sai said.

”I can watch it in bed,” I said.

”Still, you’d feel better if you got up,” Sai said.

Sai left me alone then, but as soon as they were gone I felt another wave of emptiness. I managed to drag myself out of bed, shower, and get dressed in loose and comfy clothes, which was immensely more difficult than it would have been practically any other day. I made it to the couch in our dorm’s lounge and decided that was a good starter amount of movement as I slowly started to feel like a person again. Sai hung around, not making a big scene about me being up and about. I wish the others were the same.

”Whoa, the dead walk again,” Charmaine said when she saw me. ”Or...the dead sit on the couch and watch that Tower show.”

Charmaine and the Althea sisters were hanging out in the lounge as well.

”If I was a zombie, I’d probably do something other than watch TV right away,” Myles said. ”But now that I say that out loud, it’s probably exactly what I’d do.”

”Be nice, Ana’s been through a lot,” Ash said. ”You need anything? Or do you want to be left alone?”

”I...” I struggled to respond. I spent a lot of my trapped in bed time thinking about how in my vision the other devils hated me. So even the teasing had me a bit emotional, but the genuine care really hit me. Not hit me like the hit by a bus feeling, more like hit by a pile of warm blankets.

The three sat with me as I watched some comfort food episodes of Tower of Hate and Love, and Sai didn’t even make fun of the show that much, which I’m sure required a lot of mental fortitude for them. I hoped that maybe they could see Tower in a brighter light when not viewing it negatively, but we had time to work on that.

”Thanks,” I muttered after we finished watching a few episodes.

”Huh?” Ash asked. ”Didn’t catch that.”

”I just...it means a lot,” I said.

”Not too hard to sit around watching a show,” Myles said.

”I know...” I said. ”Does anyone...want to do something else?” My voice felt so sheepish and pathetic, but my friends didn’t judge me.

”I obviously will welcome anything else,” Sai said.

”Obviously,” I said. ”I think I could use some fresh air. But I also don’t want to suck up all the attention, so. Whatever you three want to do today, let’s do that.”

”Well, I was gonna say I found this huge laser ray cannon and I thought we could fire it at Zeta and see what happens.” Myles said.

”What?” I said.

”Yeah, we went out scouting together,” Ash said. ”Found this big-ass laser, apparently it only works on Faleurs, so you could fire it at Zeta or the other one and it’ll make them itchy for weeks.”

”...you’re making fun of me,” I said.

”Yeah, but you did respond very eagerly to the Zeta laser so, kinda have it coming,” Ash said.

”Do you really think we’d be able to find a giant laser? And that we’d fire it at Zeta?” Myles asked.

”I...” I growled.

”No, but thanks, we were actually gonna go somewhere with Sai,” Myles said.

”You are?” I asked.

”I wanna hit up the art store,” Sai said. ”If you’re in a giving mood, maybe I can make you carry everything.”

”I would, I mean, that’d be the least I could do after...” I gestured around, not really at anything, hoping that’d convey well enough that I meant all my recent business.

”I get it, I get it,” Sai said. ”If you’re free right now we can go.”

”Sure,” I said, unable to hide how emotional I was getting about going to a store with friends.