I really wanted to get this done by today, since tomorrow is a very, very important day for me: I'm moving out of the house. This was originally just a little something to get some ranting out, but it turned into something tangible, and so here we are. :3

I own nothing. Lyrics are "Soft Collared Neck" by Helios.

soundtrack: first dream called ocean - helios

prompt: 23. the morning after

.tomorrow and tomorrow

/

through the window in your room

rain is coming in

breath's in intervals of two

in the paling light

/

Shion's room is a dusty little nook of paper-thin walls and floorboards that creak and groan in protest when stepped on in certain places. Shion has always thought the floor could speak a language all its own, and if it had a human voice, it would be that of an old, grouchy man in suspenders and big glasses and pinstripe pants. (That thought used to make him laugh. It doesn't anymore.)

This room tucked above the bakery has always had a knack of gathering just as much sunlight as it does darkness. The window faces the rising sun, so in the morning hours, Shion feels as if he lives in a locket full of light that warms and illuminates everything in its grasp, from the bedsheets to the flour sacks lining the walls to his own pale toes that peek out from under the blanket; but at night, it's little more than a collection of shadows and inky nothingness, impenetrable and all-swallowing even when the sky is bloated with glimmering stars.

As it stands right now, though, the sky is overcast and dark, foretelling a thunderstorm, and Shion has never felt so anxious in his life – for with clouds comes rain, and with rain comes memory, and with memory comes Nezumi. Sitting by the open window, Shion raps his fingertips and waits for something beautiful to happen, one arm hanging out and gathering raindrops in his open palm. He wants it to rain harder, wants to winds to whip and thrash through this whole town until all the blood and dust of yesterday is washed away into the sewer grates. He wants it to rain until Nezumi's shape materializes out of the mist and ghosts up to his window, reaching out a watery hand and whispering, Come with me. It's okay. Everything's okay now.

Over the past sleepless night, Shion had counted hundreds of shadows flitting across the walls, every last one mistaken for Nezumi. They might as well have been him, what with their slippery, graceful darkness and sultry twists and turns as they bent from corner to corner, sometimes dancing up to the ceiling and taking on another form entirely. Sitting upright in his bed, sheet draped around his shoulders, Shion had watched them with a hungry sort of fascination, his eyes lidded and entranced as he vaguely wished for those very same shadows to lay their cool hands on him and take him wherever they were flitting off to so earnestly.

This, Shion realizes with a distant swell of grief in his chest, is what it's like to feel hungry, to feel hollow. He regards it with a furrow of his pale brow as he rests his cheek on the windowsill, blinking at the sudden wet chill of rain beneath his skin. It feels cool and soothing, like the hand of a ghost. A memory of Safu comes to mind, and Shion shivers, feeling ill.

What time is it? How long has he been awake? There's a strange sort of drowsy giddiness biting into his bones, his body horrendously heavy one moment before it floats on a wispy wind the next. Shion doesn't think he'd mind too much if he drifted out the window with the dewy breeze; perhaps it would take him to where he most desires, back to that corner of the world where the air smelled of little more than dusty books and coffee grounds.

It's a shame, really – he can't be happy for this moment, for this familiarity, not after having tasted the unknown and befriended the impossible. Not after Nezumi.

Downstairs, Shion can hear his mother's distant footfalls, then the start of the coffee machine, then the telltale hum-sigh that Karan gives whenever there's a rainy morning. Every sound seems heightened and too clear for comfort as Shion buries his face in the crook of his arm and waits for the room to stop spinning. He only lifts his head when he hears Karan coming up the stairs, likely to tell him good morning and to stroke his hair and to remind him that no amount of pain is permanent, even when it feels like everything but. And right now, it does.

Shion, of course, will believe her in time. Just not yet.