Had it happened just in dream or in reality?
Even when she thought about it for hours, she didn’t knew a single answer after all.
The dream had already become reality, which in turn was
already gone when just born - turned into scenting, fading-away memories.
so there is no reality in this world, isn't it?
The merciless sun burned painful, like a glowing fire on her emaciated face.
No.
All, but not fainting now.
Not... at this time.
Next step, ignoring the pain.
She staggered on, her sight got more and more dizzy every single second.
Stepping on… was the only way to survive.
No single being everywhere.
No water everywhere.
No hope everywhere.
The next step hurt the way more than the last….
But she tried not to realize that.
Go… on.
Don’t being weak.
How many days had elapsed like this?
Survive…
The heat was born to kill.
She believed.
She tried to.
Tried to believe, the next step would make her stronger.
But it did not.
She broke down…
She fell.
Unable to take a further step because of the nagging hunger and burning thirst in her throat, she came to lie on the caustic hard ground, not able to move her body anymore.
So this was it.
the end.
It came quickly, huh?
She closed her eyes while the sun ceaseless burned her skin.
She didn't feel it anymore.
She didn't even care.
Just waiting for the end now.
It's..
fine.
The goodbye to this world wasn’t much further away.
Headaches tortured her, every single fiber of her body burned like hell.
Was this how death really felt?
She met her final choice.
Her lack to cling only tenuously to life faded.
It had done so long before she broke down.
death.
That was her destination from the beginning since she arrived here with nothing except her sliced clothes, not even remembering where she came…
what her name was.
The dark came.
And she allowed the shadows to take her soul.
She was in peace.
The pain was gone.
And the last illusion came.
"Hey. Whats goin’ on with ya? Here… Eat up… "
An… What?
"Good. y‘arent dead after all, but…when yer arrivin’ in an area like this… ya must own spiritual pressure… the thing. It makes you alive. In here, you need it."
Spiritual… Pressure.
Out of her eyecorner, she noticed indistinct the silhouette of the person in front of her which held something strange looking in his arms.
"You… have spiritual… "
"Yup. Me too. But first lil' girl should take this, its food and yer seemin' well more than exhausted…"
The pale boy, may only a few years older than her, dressed in a worn-out, dark colored Yukata squatted down next to her… and she took a strained grasp of air when her eyes met his face.
His bright, silver hair made him looking strange, asolute out-of-place, like a being from another world, a ghost made out of human flesh.
An intriguingly smile rounded on his thin lips.
He was smirking.
A pale smirk.
"Nice to meet ya. My name is Gin."
The boys’ voice sounded calm and coeval, with a strange accent in it, like if he would be amused and at the verge to mock or laugh about something every passing moment.
"Gin… w….what a weird name."
He continued smiling.
To show him she was not completely unable to move, the girl tried at least so move her still shaking arms a whit.
"Ya don’t have to show me that. I would rather ask for your name…”
"Don't.. know. name."
"Ah, sure. Your memory of everything what bought you here is still blurry. Happened on me.
You will remember in time."
He scratched his head, looking arround as if in search for something particular.
"I still wonder how ya got into tha place… only people which own a strong nature are able to survive in this pithere more than a mere week… but now try to eat. I’ll help ya."
Still in pain, the boy helped her to sit upright and fed her one strange, orange and dried looking fruit.
When she took the first bit it felt like she never ate something ever before.
It tasted sweet like honey with a pinch of bitterness in it…
While she ate, she felt how the will of live returned on her haggard body again.
"Have another one."
She munched, and tears fell down her face.
"Another? I have plenty."
Don't feel ashamed. You've gone through too much to lose your faith when you are saved.
"You sure must me hungry.."
"Thanks… G…Gi…n."
she slurred the name while still chewing on the fruit, tears kept coming and coming.
"Ya don’t need to thank me. Do ya remember what brought ya here?"
She muttered something inwardly; sadly and wordless she kept gazing at the now cooled sand.
"N… No. I don’t remember…anything."
"Sometimes tha's much better than… when you just wanna forget your past life, but no matter how hard ya try, yer aren’t able to. That’s my line."
"Your past… wasn’t a happy one?"
Gins smile don’t changed a mite.
He just stood up and glanced at the cloudless, dawning sky.
"It will become night soon. The clowns get out. I’ll think it’s time to leave."
At the first second, these words made her inner weakness growing again.
"l…leave… where… do you wanna go?"
He turned his head.
His smile still did not change.
"Back to where I came."
"Do you have a home?"
The was an utterly silence between the two.
"home?", he repeared.
He drew up some sand with his bare feet and watched it dissolve through his toes.
"I don't care neither about the living, nor life or death itself.
I'm kinda.. something like the 'waste of this world.' Like everyone here is.."
"But you saved me."
The boy did not stir, neither did his expressions.
She just saw his eyebrows twitching a little.
And the first time, she heard him laugh, and fear crept up her spines.
It was a frantic one.
She wen't on, ignoring the sudden unconfomtable feel,
"Don't you.. have anyone? Who cares about you? An aim, an.."
"..Somethin' to live for, ya mean?"
He cut in rather sharply, the corners of his mouth twitching like he couldn't decide to let his smile drop for once or not.
The girl was startled slightly when she murmured,
"Yeah. I think.. that is. What I am lacking."
Silence again.
"A reason to live. strength."
"stregth?" he repeated slightly, making it sound like a question which not expected an answer.
"You want.. strength?"
"I want to.. live. I need.. strength. I need to care about everyone. everything. You. Even if we're just alone in this world." She was not looking at him now, avoided his eyes, no - avoided his whole presence, because something made her suddenly tremble.
She wanted to show this boy something desperately, even now where she had been just on the verge of death.
He said he didn't care.
But he did save her.
He was lying.
And terribly bad he was.
It was a feel that strongly drew her to grab hold on him, but told her in the same mere second to push him away.
He stood just there, not moving.
If she didn't spoke to him seconds ago, One would assume the pale figure would just be made of some marble.
"You sure are some Interestin' girl."
He paused for another time, now turning at her directly.
A huff.
"Well. I have to, now. Someone."
"What?"
"At least I didn’t finish my sentence."
Gin, the boy - stretched out his lean hand to her, more bones than flesh-and-skin.
"Able to stand up?"
"Y…Yeah…"
Still a little shaking, she took his hand.
She did expect a cold grip.
She did experience warm hands.
"Welcome…to my life. Nameless girl."
"Thank you… Gin…."
"I told ya before that there is no need to thank me."
The bliss ran through her body like fine-grained sand through an hourglass.
She escaped death… because someone was now there to hold her hand.
"Gin?"
"Yeah"
"I remember my name now."
Everything what followed this encounter had happened so fast and blurry to even remember it properly.
The season suddenly decided to turn.
The insufferable hot summer that nearly killed her quickly became a rather surprisingly cold fall.
No single tree had signalized it because no one was able to hold leaf in this heat – but Rangiku felt the temperature falling every night.
Gin had brought her to a little shack, may built by himself – only made of collected woods and some straw, even very poor.
The movables were just simple and often-used, not anything high-quality.
But she realized, it was the first time in her memories, she felt at home.
So he had one.
A liar... he was.
The first time, she had a place to stay.
Even when the food wasn’t very changeable, everyday nothing except these strange sweet fruits,
(which she altough never found nasty.. They had saved her, so she was rather.. grateful when she ate one), some dry vegetables and may some mushroom soup with greens and herbs.
From where he got all this stuff, she didn't bother to ask.
In a strange way, she felt lucky.
Suddenly, her only and one desire, her only wish, became to stop time.
The rest of her life should be so peaceful…
just like now.
Someone was at her side, and that was the most precious thing.
Gin was there.
The little liar Gin.
And that made the world even brighter, his appearance chased the dark clouds away…
She always knew, beyond this clouds lied the sun somewhere.
When she got sad, he always knew a way to cheer her up, most with some unusual questions or odd puns… And at rare times just his impish smile complied to turn her mood happy again.
She also figured out that his laugh also could be gentle.
It was one late afternoon, the sunset already begun, and dawn wasn’t much as that far.
Gin noticed that something was off with her while preparing wood for lighting the fire.
There she sat between the old patched, stuffed blankets and mixed some herbs.
"Uhm… Rangiku? Somethin'wrong?"
"Uh.. what?"
It startled her that she was suddenly adressed by her name, which was like being called from somewhere far away.
It was not linked with her yet.
"Actually… Well, when is yer birthday? Y' never told me about that."
"Don't.. remember. I hardly know my own name."
She took an abashed gaze aside.
"Means..Rangiku don’t knows her birthday?"
"Uhm." She nodded silently.
"Well then… why we couldn’t set it on the day we met? It will always, every year, resemble us both on this day… That’s a good thing, isn’t it, Rangiku?"
"Y…Yea…. That’s right."
And again it happened.
The grieving was gone.
"Uhm… Rangiku? You can handle me the greens, I think they are powder by now."
After that, she suddenly realized that the name a person owned was actually more than just a reference to get the called one's attention.
And she felt some more time pass, her slowly becoming a different person.
She didn't know if she should appreciate this change.
Because, there are some things in this world you can’t hold with your hands.
They are running, like the bright day changes into dark night.
water.
time.
the feel of being safe.
Your inner conficence.
This goes spirales on, goes further and further, until the world eclipses.
Night changes into day.
Day changes into night.
And fall becomes winter.
The nights got even colder.
The little girl shaking and trembling of frostiness under her thin blanket.
Yet she refu was gushing through the wooden pank-made door, what made a constant noise that kept her awake.
She pulled the raspy blanket closer to her body.
While she spinned some thoughts, a terrible one came up to her mind.
What if
He wouldn't come back one day.
Just dissapear like he never was.
Trying to banish it, the thought just became stronger.
It became a fear that made her weep in silence.
Minutes passed and hours, when there was the noise she waited for.
The door cracked open silently.
His arms were full of lumbers and branches - so much he barely wasn't to carry it all by himself.
"I’m sorry, Rangiku…it lasted… too long."
He huffed when he put the wood down, the impact of the words still frightening her.
She deciced to laugh it off.
"Welcome back," and then, "I was worried."
"We're expecting a snow storm. I won't be able to get any wood for a few days."
His voice sounded different than else.
Might the cold has been the cause.
It sounded like he began to sort it to stacks, in the darkness she couldn't make out if he had his back or face turned to her.
Silence fell.
And then she noticed something.
"Gin…"
She felt him staring at her through the dark.
Now she clearly could sense it.
Something was off.
"Gin… is… something wrong?"
"But something is with ya, too… Rangiku…something is on yer heart, too… something like… anguish?”
"No… its just cold without you… So cold… I wasn’t able to sleep any…"
"Before ya crossed my way, I felt tha many times more than ya think… and it exists only one single way out."
He smiled wordless and sat quietly down next to her.
"Rangiku… I have to tell ya something. May…"
A break followed, the whispering noises of breathing were the only audible things in the frozen air…
"May I have… to go soon."
The terrible memory reached up her mind again and stretched painful sting trough her hart like a blade.
"Please…n…no… Gin… please not…why…"
But before she was able to end the sentence, Gin looped his arms around her.
And then he pinched her forehead.
"Just joooooooking. You are so easy to be fooled." he cooed gently.
And pressed his head into her neck, arms clasped arround her body a way that almost hurt.
An embrace, so tight it was difficult to breathe anymore.
"Do ya… feel just a little warmer now?"
"Y…Your arms… are cold as ice."
She was in fear.
Fear that something bad was to come.
"And you... are warm, Rangiku… just so warm…"
And yet relieved and yet heated and odd and..
No one said a further word.
Outside nearly everything was frozen, as cold as the ice-like skin she cried all her tears onto.
There was, deeply hidden, a reassure when he run a hand through her hair and shushed her.
Belonging.
Pain and bliss.
It blended all together at some point when she finally fell asleep.
The cold was gone when the morning came.
But just outside.
One pair of shoes in the entry was missing.
"Liar," she whispered.
And her cry broke the cruel and seemingly sainty silence of the dawning daybreak.
