OOM: This is the story of a girl

[herr_bookman]

Autor follows Kuriyama Mirai up the stairs, wondering if he really should be chasing after her. The door to her room slams in his face, and he dithers for a moment before softly knocking.

"Miss Kuriyama? Are you... Will you be all right?" he asks, thinking that's a stupid question, that of course she's not doing well--that's why he followed, after all. But it's all that comes to mind.

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[herr_bookman]

"Thus do I pine and surfeit day by day, or gluttoning on all, or all away,*" Autor says quietly, calling his food bag out of his sylladex. He rummages through it to find an apricot, and then returns the bag with the same couplet.

"That's not true at all," Autor says, watching the fruit in his hand. "You talk about your bonsai, or show me pictures, and study, and we eat together, and you smile when you ride on the carpet, and you shove yogurt in my face--none of that hurts me. You make me laugh and keep me accountable. You're a fine friend, Miss Kuriyama."

*Shakespeare, Sonnet 75

[halfemptyglasses]

Mirai looks towards her cinnamon rolls, dropped once she got inside, and then gives another sigh. "It... even if it didn't hurt now, it's just going to hurt later. What's the point?"

[herr_bookman]

Autor pauses, trying to think. "Are you--now I'm concerned," the boy says quietly. "Are you thinking of hurting yourself?"

He tries to keep a cool head as he asks, and braces himself not to sound shocked if she says yes, despite his heart shooting up into his throat.

[halfemptyglasses]

"I don't know," she answers, leaning her face against the door. "I just want the unpleasantness to go away..."

[herr_bookman]

Autor sighs, relieved, and rests his cheek against his side of the door, wishing again that he was with her. It doesn't sound like she has any sort of a plan. Small mercies.

"I understand," he says gently, pressing his fingertips on the whorls of the wood grain. "Well, sort of. I have no idea what that must feel like, Miss Kuriyama, and I'm sorry you're suffering. Would you like to do nothing again for a while?"

[halfemptyglasses]

"I don't know what I'd like..."

But at least her sniffling has subsided.

[herr_bookman]

"It's okay to not know what you'd like," Autor says, brushing his thumb against the door. "Just... Just do what you can to take care of yourself. And maybe let others help, too."

[halfemptyglasses]

She lets herself breathe, lets herself think about Autor's words.

"I don't know how..."

[herr_bookman]

"That's okay, too," Autor says, turning to his other cheek. He fishes his handkerchief out of his pocket, just in case she decides to open the door and needs it. "You can learn, if you want to. Just... eat and sleep and hang out with friends once in a while, and bathe, too, and then you can concentrate on other, more difficult things."

[halfemptyglasses]

"......Autor-senpai?"

[herr_bookman]

"Yes, Miss Kuriyama?" Autor asks, his thumb pausing as it brushes the door.

[halfemptyglasses]

"Is.... is that really enough? What if I can't even do those things?"

[herr_bookman]

Autor hesitates. "I don't know. I don't know if it's enough," he says, feeling like he's standing on the edge of a void. "But I suppose that's where you let others help? If you're hungry, I have an apricot."

[halfemptyglasses]

"I- I'm not really hungry right now. But I w-won't tell you to go away. And I'm sorry. That I slammed the door in your face."

[herr_bookman]

"Oh, no, that's okay," Autor says, thunking his head against the door once softly. "You were... probably trying to escape me. And I probably should have let you go rather than talk through the door. I'm sorry about that."

[halfemptyglasses]

"No," Mirai responds, turning to sit on her side, legs curling around her body. "I just... don't like seeing it. When something's bothering you."

Especially when it was her words doing it.

[herr_bookman]

Autor has no idea how to respond to that. He fiddles with the apricot and considers eating it, but then codes it away in his sylladex to give himself time to think.

"Oh," he says, and then kicks himself. Is that all I can come up with? Really? "I- I see. I'm sorry you had to see that, then." He wonders how she knew he was bothered, but chalks that up to his always being more expressive than he thinks he is. "For the record, I don't like it when things bother you, either."

[halfemptyglasses]

Mirai exhales and goes, "You must feel like that a lot, then."

It's too bad her jokes aren't funny.

[herr_bookman]

And now Autor's lost in thought again, clearly out of his depth. "I usually like how you say the words, 'how unpleasant!', but usually not the reasons you're provoked to say them," the boy says, resting his hand over his heart. "I... I think it's okay that... I mean, the feelings you have are..."

He clutches his fingers in his handkerchief. "I'm sorry. I don't know what to say again."

[halfemptyglasses]

"I don't, either," she admits.

She guesses she should go to bed, but she doesn't even want to get up right now. She turns and reclines on the floor.

[herr_bookman]

The boy swallows. He doesn't know what to say and he doesn't know what to do, and he seems to feel that way an awful lot around her. "Are you going to be all right now?" he asks her through the door.

She seems to have stopped sniffling at least...

[halfemptyglasses]

She takes a deep breath, but it doesn't dispel the ache.

"I don't know. I guess I just wanna sleep now. Like, just right here."

[herr_bookman]

"Sleep is all right, but you'll probably be more comfortable in your own bed," Autor murmurs, drumming his fingers against the wood. "But if you want to sleep there, then there is fine, I guess."

[halfemptyglasses]

"I'm just tired..." she admits, resting her head on her arm. "I'll go to bed when I'm not."

She doesn't even care whether the last part makes sense or not.

[herr_bookman]

It doesn't make sense, and now the boy's worried about her again.

"All right," he says resting his cheek on the door. "Good night, then." And then he dithers. Should he stay? Should he leave? If he stays and falls asleep himself--because he's exhausted, too, now, and sleep does sound good--then he might fall into her room when she opens the door. Would staying be a invasion of her privacy? Surely she'll be all right.

"Good night, Miss Kuriyama," Autor says again, softly, and pats the door with his fingertips before starting to withdraw to his own room.

[halfemptyglasses]

"Good night, Autor-senpai," she calls in return.

[herr_bookman]

Hearing her, the boy pauses in the hallway. I... can probably stay for a little while. Surely she won't mind that, he thinks, and turns on his heel, his step light. He calls a blanket out of his sylladex and leans against the trim, not the door itself, lest she open it and he falls in.

The boy cracks open Sheldon's The German Army on Vimy Ridge 1914–1917, occupying his brain with future history rather than thoughts on Kuriyama Mirai, and how helpless he is when it comes to dealing with her and her troubles. "Good night," he whispers.