Keep in mind when reading this that "One Month" took place in the year 2005, so in order for this to be two years later, it would technically have to be 2007.
Thanks so much for the reviews...Nobody was completely correct, though.
P.S.: The names are the real names of Sora and Tai's parents. I looked it up and everything!
Chapter Twenty-Eight: Her Nineteenth Year……………………………………………………………
Sora Takenouchi came into the world on the twenty-fourth of April, 1988. She was born with bright blue eyes, like most babies, but they quickly turned crimson. She had a small amount of fuzz on the top of her head, as auburn as it came.
The doctor handed Sora to her father, Haruhiko and asked both him and his then-wife, Toshiko, "Do we have a name?"
The proud parents exchanged a look, confirming that they had not, in fact, decided on a name. Toshiko had fallen in love with the names Mika and Akemi during her eight and a half month pregnancy, insisting that they choose between them if they had a daughter. Her father wanted something more traditional, something common.
He knew the minute he looked at her that his daughter wasn't a Mika, or an Akemi. She wasn't traditional or common, either. She was special, magnificent, and her name was to reflect that, he decided.
"Sora," he whispered. His wife squealed and said she thought it was beautiful. It was the perfect name for their gorgeous little angel. Sora meant sky, and seemed to stir something inside of her father. Two days later, when they took her home from the hospital, he vowed that the sky was, and would always be, the limit for her. He wanted her to have the things he never did, he wanted her to be happy and healthy and full of life.
And she was.
Before their very eyes, she began crawling and walking and talking. She was always on the move, always ready to explore new things. She was a quiet baby, quieter than any that either parent had ever come across before. Baby Sora hardly ever cried, only when she was really hungry or really thirsty or really hurt herself when she fell down. And even then, the crying stopped almost as quickly as it started.
If they had to describe Sora in one word, she was a survivor.
This theory stood as she entered into the world of kindergarten. She was brave and gregarious, strong and independent. In fact, it often scared her mother how independent she could be. On her first day of school, she walked into the classroom and let go of her mother's hand. She waved goodbye to her parents, blew them a big, overdramatic kiss, and ran off to meet the new kids. The only other person there who shared Sora's qualities was a cute little girl named Mimi Tachikawa.
Together, the two ran around, introducing themselves to all the other kids. They were laughing, talking and twirling around the room. Reluctantly, the parents left their children and went their separate ways, almost unable to wait until the end of the day to pick them up.
At the end of the day, Mimi and Sora emerged from the classroom, arms linked and bright smiles plastered on their small faces. They didn't come running out of class and into their parents' arms, like the other kids. That made Mrs. Takenouchi terrified and proud, sad and joyful, all at once. Sora survived her first day of school, her first day of separation from her parents.
"Sora was wonderful today," the teacher told Mrs. Takenouchi. "She's very outgoing. All the children have taken a shine to her. She and Mimi were practically inseparable."
She and Mimi stayed 'practically inseparable' for many, many years after that. They went through everything, from first day of school to first boyfriends to first breakups, and beyond. They were rarely apart and, when they were, it was only temporary.
When the Takenouchi's marriage fell apart, Sora was forced to make a choice. She could stay where she was and live with her mother, or she could go with her father and move away. She went with her dad, and turned her back on her life in Odaiba for a brief lapse in time.
But, as always, she came back. Her absence was only temporary. She and Mimi were reunited. She caught up with Izzy and Joe, boys she had known since she was six. She met Tai and Matt, T.K. and Kari. And then, just like that, the group was complete.
Her life was just starting to fall into place.
Her parents were still divorced, and she would never be given any brothers or sisters to play with and be a role model to. Her father was living in America and she still had the occasional disagreement with her mom, but she could deal with it all. She survived the petty differences she and her mother had; she survived the geographical distance between her and her father. She missed the way things used to be, back when they were one big family, but she had many great people in her life to even everything out.
She had an amazing boyfriend, Tai, who loved her more than anything. She loved him more than anything, too. She had a best friend, Mimi, a girl who she would do anything for, and vice versa. They always knew what the other was thinking and feeling. It was because they had been together so long, because they had been together every step of the way. Beyond Mimi, she had a very tight circle of friends, all of whom were different and special, and she loved each of them in their own way. Sure, they fought from time to time, but they made it through. They survived.
She graduated from high school with academic honours and went on to pursue post-secondary education at Tokyo University, along with Izzy, Joe, Matt, Tai and Mimi. The first year there was pretty fun. The work was tougher, but Sora had expected as much. She shared a dormitory with Mimi, and it was like a constant sleepover with her best friend. Occasionally they switched out with Matt and Tai, further exploring the freedom and fun that came from unsupervised living. And, as the school year came to a close, Sora realized that she had successfully survived her first year of university. Life, for Sora Takenouchi, was good.
But that all changed.
She had one more exam to take, just one more, in order for her to officially pass her first year. The exam was held at Odaiba High, a place Sora knew quite well, as she and her friends had all attended it the previous year. She felt safe in that school, remembering the good times and allowing those memories to soothe her anxieties before her test. All of her friends from university, and Kari and T.K., who were still in high school, were present that day. They were all there, that day, when the world stopped. Gunshots filled the school and many people had been killed. Sora, however, survived, as did all of her friends, though some were worse off than others. T.K. had narrowly avoided being shot in the shoulder, but that paled in comparison to Tai, who was left in a coma.
After the shootings, Sora's life began to unravel. Unable to come to terms with everything, the vulnerable girl was caught in limbo. She eventually found where she belonged, or where she thought she did, at least. She entered a world of drinking and drugs.
The sky was falling. Sora, the happy, lovely girl whose name meant sky, was also falling. She was falling into a deep depression...she falling into a world that, once fully emerged in, she would never be able to leave. At least, that's what everybody else thought. They all assumed that Sora was beyond reason, and that she needed them to save her. But she didn't need their help. Sora was a stubborn girl, and their words only pushed her deeper into her new world.
She eventually came to her senses, and she had the strength left to get out. Everyone was pleasantly surprised, but it was nothing new. Sora had simply, once again, survived.
It was what she did.
But even so, Tai still hadn't woken up. She had quit the drugs and the wild, partying lifestyle, but that only made the pain all too real. Without anything to distract her, she was forced to face everything she had been hiding from. Every skeleton in her closet was coming out, and she couldn't deal with it. Perhaps she could have, if Tai had been around, but he showed no signs of coming to.
Sora could survive a lot, but she couldn't survive this.
Sora Takenouchi came into the world on the twenty-fourth of April, 1988...and she left it on the sixth of August, 2007. Sora was nineteen years old, the day she died.
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Sora convinced her mother that she needed to get out of the house. She said that life was too stressful, and all the hours she had been putting into the flower shop weren't making things any easier for her. She suggested that her mother go see a movie with some girlfriends. Her mother nodded, said that was a good idea, and called up a few of her friends. Mrs. Toshiko Takenouchi left the house at half past seven, because she was meeting the girls for a cup of coffee before the movie started.
Once she left, Sora ran to the window and watched her mother drive away. Her eyes filled with tears when she realized she would never again get to talk to her mom.
She would miss the little things most of all, like the hugs and the 'goodnight' exchange before bed. She would miss going for car rides, and the really good ice cream sundaes her mom used to make for her. She would even miss the arguments, the way her mother held her own and fought back, instead of being a big pushover, like her dad used to be. She would miss the way her mother cared for her, truly loved her, no matter what stupid thing she had done. From breaking her favourite vase in the fourth grade to getting mixed up in some really bad things nowadays, her mother always found a way to love her.
Sora walked over to the couch and sat down, turning on the TV. She wasn't nervous, she wasn't scared or apprehensive for what she was about to do. Perhaps it was because part of her didn't believe she'd really go through with it. Or maybe it was because she had been thinking about it for so long that the thought no longer held any shock appeal, and it had now become an accepted idea.
She wasn't sure why she chose that date, maybe it was because it was the day of their trip...the one they would never get to take. Throughout this whole ordeal, Sora told herself that everything would be okay because, by the time the sixth of August came around, Tai would be awake.
The date had, at one time, seemed so far away, that she didn't thing twice when she marked it as her deadline, the day that Tai absolutely had to be out of his coma by. It felt like August sixth took forever to come, kind of the way a child feels about Christmas or their birthday.
Everything changed last month, when she had her 'epiphany'. One minute she was miserable, a lost soul, and then in a flash she was found, she knew that her time was up, and it was just the matter of sticking around to see if Tai would make his deadline before she ended it all.
Even though she had accepted everything and spent the past week preparing, it hit her hard that morning: Tai was not going to wake up. It was not merely that he wasn't going to wake up that specific day, and maybe in a week things would look better, or anything like that. She was certain that his condition was permanent. She had never been so sure about anything in her life.
She couldn't live without Tai. She didn't want to live without him. He was her world. He was the reason she had put up with everything and hung around as long as she did. She couldn't go on without him. She couldn't live another day, knowing Tai wouldn't get to share it with her. She would never find someone else to love, not the same way she loved him. He was it for her.
He would never again open his eyes, never again speak or see, hear or laugh. If Tai didn't get those privileges, why did she? Surely he deserved them more than she did.
Tai would never celebrate another Christmas or another birthday. He wouldn't get to see autumn or winter or spring. Did he even get to see this summer?
He was finished. His life was over. Sure, he could be kept alive by machines, be a vegetable all his life, but he wouldn't have wanted that. Sora knew that if his parents truly wanted to do the right thing, they would pull the plug and let him go.
She was going to pull her own plug, metaphorically speaking, of course.
She knew what she had to do. She didn't have to like it, but she had to do it. The hopelessness was swallowing her up and it was only a matter of time.
A month and a half ago, this day was envisioned as happy and carefree. Right now, Sora was supposed to be on her way to Tai's uncle's hotel, where she was supposed to have the time of her life. She was supposed to be surrounded by friends and smiling faces. They were supposed to be together. She wasn't supposed to be in her house, alone and angry with the world.
This wasn't how she should spend her last night.
She was supposed to go after she had lived a full life...'Old and grey,' to use Mimi's words. She should be surrounded by friends and family, with Tai by her side, holding her hand, whispering that he loved her.
She sat there, staring at the television but not taking anything in, for hours. Two hours, to be exact. She just gazed off into space, imagining all the things she'd never see. Kari and T.K.'s high school graduation, Matt and Mimi's wedding. She would never see Izzy invent some crazy computer thing, she'd never be there when Joe because a famous, world-renown surgeon.
Her heart ached because she knew she would miss them immensely, and that they would all be crushed by the loss as well, but it didn't hinder her. She was doing this for herself, and while she loved her friends, she loved herself a little more. It was selfish, she knew that, but it was true, nonetheless. Besides, they'd have each other to lean on. She was the one who would have nobody; she was the one who would be completely alone, if she stayed.
That's why she couldn't stay. She couldn't do it. She wasn't strong enough. She didn't want to be strong enough.
She looked at the clock, and saw that it was nearing ten o'clock. She had to act fast, or else her mother would be home soon, and she wouldn't be able to do what she needed to do.
Standing up from the couch, Sora took one last look around the house...the house she had grown up in, the house she had celebrated birthdays in, cried in, laughed in, met Tai in. She shut her eyes and forced the memories to the back of her mind, then ran up the stairs and into the bathroom.
Searching through the medicine cabinet for pills was harder than she had expected it to be. Which ones should she take? Did it matter? She wondered if she would get the same effect by taking twenty aspirin as she would by taking twenty Tylenol. Or perhaps she would need something stronger? She shook her head and decided that, provided she took enough, any of the pills could do what she needed them to do.
Grabbing both the Tylenol and aspirin bottles, she shut the medicine cabinet and went into her room. She grabbed a pen and a piece of paper, and scribbled down a note: Her goodbye message. It would be the last thing she wrote, the last impression she would leave on the world. It hardly did her justice, but she didn't want to say anything more than she needed to. She wasn't doing this for her anyway, she reminded herself. This was for them.
She went back downstairs, grabbed a large glass, and filled it with water. She brought it to her lips with a shaky hand and chugged, trying to calm her nerves.
She was doing the right thing.
She repeated it to herself over and over, allowing the words to sink in and become true.
How had it come to this? How had that happy girl become the broken down, shell of a woman?
It didn't matter how; it didn't matter when or why. It still happened, and Sora still had to do something about it. She had to do something drastic about it.
She filled the glass to the top and went back into her room. She spilled some of the water on her way, but paid no attention.
What was a few drops of water, when she was about to end it all?
She got back into her room and shut the door behind her. Then she turned around and locked it, just incase her mother got home before she had the chance to finish what she was about to start.
She sat down on the floor, taking deep breaths to prepare herself for what was coming. She didn't get on the bed because the whole 'bed scene' was overdone, and Sora didn't want to go out the same way thousands of others had before. She wanted to be special, significant. All her life she never particularly wanted to stand out and be noticed—that was always Mimi's department—but she wanted the attention now, even if she wouldn't be around to enjoy the terrible irony of it all.
But wait—something was missing. She stood up one final time and grabbed a stuffed animal off her bed. It was a white and pink bunny, something Tai had won for her at a carnival last summer. It held memories of happier times, and if she could take one thing into the afterlife with her, she would have chosen that bunny. As she walked over to her spot on the plush carpet, she kept acknowledging everything that she would never do again. It was her last time walking, her last time standing on her bedroom floor. Could this really be the same floor on which she and Mimi once waxed Tai's face, two summers ago?
It seemed so far away, like it had been someone else's life. In many ways, it had been. She was not Sora, not anymore. She wasn't sure who she was, but in a few minutes, she would be nobody. She looked at herself in the mirror (it would be her last time looking at her reflection) and was happy to see that she looked semi-okay. She didn't want to look like a dirty slob when she was found. She wanted to look pretty and peaceful. Tucking a strand of hair behind her ear (she would never do that again), she sat down and opened the bottle of Tylenol. She dumped the small red pills on the floor, and counted them—there were only nine. She opened the bottle of aspirin next, and dumped them out, as well. She counted twenty-two white aspirins. She would just keep taking them, starting with the Tylenol, until she collapsed.
She hoped the thirty-one pills would be enough. She had never done this before, obviously, so she didn't really know what to expect. She hoped it wouldn't hurt, but nothing could be worse than the pain she was already feeling.
In a spur of the moment thing, she arranged the red and white pills to form the Japanese flag: A white background with a red dot in the middle. She laughed at herself, and grabbed a Tylenol. She put it in her mouth and chewed it (she had once heard that chewing pills helped get them into your system faster) and took a small sip of water. She wondered if water was a good idea. Was it flushing the pills from her system, or was it speeding the process? She'd never know. She repeated the process with another pill, then another, then another.
After swallowing all the Tylenols and about half of the aspirins, she stopped. She wondered how long it would take for her to start feeling the effects. If she took more, would it happen quicker? She really should have researched this. She had a few more and her stomach flipped. Fear gripped her and she had the fleeting thought of rushing to the bathroom and vomiting, of expelling the pills from her body and living to see another day.
She stared at the wall, clutching the glass of water in her hand. She didn't need a watch to know what time it was. The grandfather clock had just chimed, signalizing ten o'clock. A moment later, she started to feel strange. She was seeing trails, and felt an unfamiliar twinge in her stomach. It wasn't necessarily pain, but it wasn't comfortable, either. She figured out that it was her digestive system trying to make her throw up, trying to save her from meeting her fate in the coming moments. She fought the urge, chewing and swallowing two more aspirins before she became incredibly dizzy and the glass of water slid from her hands. Inside her head there was a loud ringing, kind of like a bell was going off in her brain. She felt like she was floating, as if she was hovering a few inches above the ground. She could feel herself fading away.
She grabbed the bunny with one hand, clutching it to herself, and grabbed the note in her other hand before everything went black.
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Toshiko Takenouchi waved goodbye to her friends, saying they should get together again soon. She walked through the parking lot of the movie theatre and got into her car.
Sora was right, she thought, a movie with friends was just what I needed.
When she got home, she walked through the door and was greeted with silence and darkness. It was a dramatic contrast to the previous night, when she came home to find her daughter sitting at the island with all the lights on and the TV blaring in the background.
Toshiko was used to an empty, quiet home, as she experienced it ten months out of the year, when Sora was away at school, but it was different now. Something seemed...off. She checked the clock on the microwave, which said it was seventeen minutes past ten.
She figured Sora was upstairs watching TV, since it was too early for her to be in bed just yet.
"Sora!" she called, but received no answer.
Under different circumstances, Toshiko would have written it off, and thought that Sora couldn't hear her calling over the television. Tonight, however, she felt different, she felt strange. Something was going on, and it wasn't good. She could feel her heart beating faster as she climbed the stairs to her daughter's room. Nothing was wrong; she was only overreacting, right? She knocked on the door, and there was still no answer. She knocked a little louder.
"Sora?"
Maybe Sora fell asleep, she thought, she was up pretty late last night, after all...she's probably really tired.
She had to be sure. Call it mother's intuition. She turned the doorknob, but it didn't budge. Sora had locked her bedroom door, something she had rarely (if ever) done before. As her mind entertained all kinds of crazy ideas and scenarios, she prayed that Sora had just snuck out to meet that Summer girl. It wasn't a fun thought, but it was one of the better ones buzzing around in her head.
But why would she lock the door and go out her window? I was gone all night, she could have used the front door, she thought. The logical part of her brain was really sticking it to her.
"Sora? Sora!" she yelled, getting only silence in return. She remembered that she had a spare key to Sora's room on her dresser (it had been the one condition when she agreed to let her daughter install the lock), and ran to get it.
Her hand shook as she slid the extra key into the hole. Any mother would be concerned if she came home to an empty house when her child was supposed to be there. Was she kidnapped? No, Sora's door wouldn't be locked...
She turned the key desperately, finally hearing a click, and flung open the door.
At first, she thought Sora had simply fallen asleep. But then something struck her as odd: why would she be on the floor? Toshiko stepped into the room and saw the empty bottles of pills, and a small pile of aspirin spread out on the floor.
Toshiko fell to her knees and her hand flew to her daughter's face. She was so cold. Toshiko shook her, waiting for her to open her eyes and say that she was only playing a practical joke on her poor mother, but it never happened. She felt around for a pulse, but was unable to locate one. She choked back a sob as she stood and frantically ran down the stairs into the kitchen, where she proceeded to dial 911.
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Toshiko sat alone in the cold, empty waiting room at Odaiba Hospital. Her face was buried in her hands and she was crying so forcefully that she was trembling uncontrollably. She had called her ex-husband immediately upon hearing the news. She wished that he would be calm and comforting, like he always was in a crisis, but instead, he broke down crying and swearing, asking her where they went wrong as parents. He told her he would call the airport and make arrangements to be in Odaiba as soon as he possibly could, before he hung up.
According to the medical coroner, Sora has overdosed on prescription pills. Toshiko had assumed as much, after finding the bottles. She had no idea how many pills had been in each bottle, but she didn't ask any of the doctors how many Sora had swallowed. She couldn't handle it. She couldn't handle any of it. The doctors estimated that her time of death was just before ten o'clock.
If only she had stayed home, instead of going out to see that movie...
"Excuse me, miss?" Toshiko looked up to see a policeman approaching her. He sat down in the chair next to her, and offered her a sympathetic smile. "This was found clutched in your daughter's hand. We think it's for you." Toshiko nodded, unable to do anything more, as he placed the note into her hand and left her alone to read it.
Just as she went to unfold the small scrap piece of paper, she heard a ringing from deep inside her purse. She gave a small start, but didn't bother to answer it. She didn't care if it was her ex-husband, or anyone else. The only person whose voice she wanted to hear was Sora's, and she would never get that opportunity again.
The ringing didn't stop. Four, fix, six rings. When was her voicemail going to kick in? Frustrated and mentally cursing the person calling her, she reached into her purse and pulled out her cell phone. She wasn't supposed to use a cell phone in a hospital, as it could affect the equipment, but she didn't care. It was the least of her worries at the moment.
"What?" she snapped, though her voice sounded weak and exhausted.
"Toshiko, he's g-gone," sobbed a voice on the other end. It was Yuuko Kamiya. "My son is d-dead."
Tai was dead. The boy she'd taken into her house and loved like a son. The one she'd imagined as one day marrying Sora. In her dreams, they had always lived happily ever after.
They were both dead.
"Oh God, I am so sorry," she whispered. She paused and took a deep breath, trying to collect herself. "How's everyone taking it?"
"Kari...poor Kari is a m-mess. T.K. is with her, he tried to calm her down, but nothing was working so the doctors had to give her a s-sedative," Yuuko sighed. "Susumu is trying to be strong, but he's destroyed. I'm not doing t-too well either." She sighed. "I – I was g-going to call everyone t-tomorrow, but I thought S-Sora should know immediately," she explained. Toshiko winced at the mentioning of her daughter. "I called your house and n-nobody answered. I tried her cell phone and th-there was st-still no answer, so I called y-yours."
"Oh, yes, thank you," Toshiko mumbled. She realized that Yuuko must be a few floors above her, where Tai's room had been. She considered going up there, to grieve for both Sora and Tai, but she couldn't bring herself to do it. She couldn't face the death of Tai, who had grown to be like a son to her over the past few years, on top of Sora's.
"If y-you'll excuse me, I – I need to go. Please tell Sora f-for me, though. I'd appreciate it."
Toshiko sniffed and brushed some tears out of her eyes. The poor woman had just lost her son, she couldn't add to that by telling her about Sora. Even during a painful time when all she wanted to do was curl up and die, Toshiko still tried to be respectful of other people's feelings. The news about Sora would have to wait until later. "Yes, yes, I'll tell her." As she was about to mumble a goodbye, a thought occurred to her. She needed to know what happened. "Yuuko," she said delicately, "do you know what caused it?"
"They d-don't know," Yuuko said dejectedly. "There was n-nothing physically wrong w-with him that could h-have done it. All the d-doctor could do was guess. He s-said Taichi just stopped f-fighting."
"When did it happen?"
"I'm not t-too sure...I was s-sitting there with Kari and the monitor started b-beeping, but it was a while before anyone would t-tell me anything. I think it was a few m-minutes after ten o'clock."
"Oh, I see. Well, if you need anything, I'm here," Toshiko said comfortingly.
"Th-thank you. Goodbye." The line went dead, and Toshiko returned the phone to her purse.
Remembering the note that was still scrunched up in her hand, she unfolded it and smiled softly at the sight of her daughter's large, neat handwriting. She read the nine words over quite a few times before she truly understood.
'Don't worry Mama, I'm with him now. I'm sorry.'
It's amazing how things don't work out, but it's amazing how they do.
Sora had said it herself: she would be waiting for him. Wherever she was now, she was waiting for him.
And he was on his way.
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I'm so, so, so sorry! What can I say? I'm a sucker for tragic ending, and even though I've probably just broken a few hearts, I love this ending to pieces. I've planned this from day one, and if I had chickened out and given everyone a happy ending, I would've tainted the entire thing for me. It wouldn't have felt real.
And I definitely think that, in some respects, it is a happy ending. Let's face it ...they were probably doomed anyway. But they're together this way.
Many of you who reviewed on chapter 27 said that Sora finally picked up the pieces and got her life back on track. On the contrary, actually...She was making peace and, as the chapter was entitled, she was "tying up the loose ends" before she died.
REMEMBER:
There's another part. I can't promise that it will be a happy story, because there's so much baggage for the characters, but it's a lot happier than this one was. I'll say it right now...IT WILL BE A HAPPY ENDING. You have my word on that. There truly is a light at the end of this long, depressing tunnel.
The story will be called "Ever After" and I have no idea when I'll start posting. I want to finish my Harry Potter fic before getting into it. "Ever After" won't be anywhere near as long as this one. It will be found under the TK/Kari, Angst/Romance category. There are equal amounts for every character and storyline in the story, but I'm going to have the most fun with Kari and TK...
See you soon, hopefully. Thanks so, so much for reading. Please, don't forget to review.
-Pinkdigi