#freedreaminghope

“Yup, cozy right?” Yoshi replies easily enough. He had been shocked and then angry to see her poke her head into the room. But now he’s slipped behind that neutral mask, the one with a smile that’s stiffer than he probably would like. As adept as he is at hiding emotions, May can still hear the coarse sarcastic thread running under his words.

He’s angry. It’s not really a wonder. He had worked so hard to keep his location hidden from her when they talked over the phone, outright lying, saying he was hiking around Mt. Pyre. Except she was also around Mt. Pyre at the time, and with a bit of nosy sleuthing, she found out he had collapsed at the mountain’s base. From there, it wasn’t hard to find which hospital, which room he was in.

Despite the fact that she’s known him for some years now, she’s still not sure why he keeps guarding himself from her, why he keeps her at an arm’s length. She’ll take one step forward, only for him to take three steps back. She’s not sure if it’s fear, pride, stubbornness, or a mixture of all three.

But if he takes three steps back, she’ll double it. She’ll take six, seven, a million steps forward until she finally catches him.

“Not exactly the way I would put it,” May says as she places her care package of fruit down on his bedside table. She sits at the chair set next to him, but he refuses to meet her eyes, something she can sense even behind his glasses. “You should have told me you were in the hospital,” She’s not as good as he is at hiding emotions; her irritation is clear in her tone.

“Why?” Yoshi plucks an apple from the basket with the hand that’s not tied to down to the IV drip. He’s still playing carefree and nonchalant. “I don’t remember signing a contract that I had to tell you where I am at all times.”

May sighs though his words bring an ironic smile to her face, “You need a contract? Should I write up one for you?”

“No need. I like independence. I’m a free roaming spirit and all that.” He laughs, turning the apple over in his hand, “The way you’re talking you make it sound like we’re dating or something.”

May holds her breath, trying to disguise her surprise by taking a pear out of the basket. There are days when she doesn’t mind the idea of dating him.

“It’s not that,” She says quickly, nibbling into the pear. It’s unusually bitter on her tongue. “It’s just – friends do that, you know? Tell each other if they have to stay overnight at a hospital. Otherwise, I’m just going to worry all the time about what’s going on with you.”

“What does it matter?” His mask slips a little, and his exhaustion and exasperation seep through. “You’re worried now. Does it make you feel better to see me in this room wrapped in hospital sheets? Want me to get into a coughing fit, so you can see how bad it is?”

May knows that it’s his sickness talking, that he would never let these words slip if he was completely healthy. She’s a strange mix of emotions; two parts annoyed and one part elated that he isn’t hiding behind smiles. But it’s her irritation that wins out at the end.

“You know that’s not what I meant. Just for that, you get to have this,” She switches her pear out for his apple and takes a gigantic bite out of the apple so that he can’t take it back. Call her immature or whatever, but she feels gratified that he has to deal with a bitter pear while she handles his bitter words. “I’m saying these things because I’m your friend, even if it’s one-sided or whatever. I care about you. I want to know what’s going on with you. If you’re happy, I want to be happy with you. If you’re having the worst day of your life, I want to be there to cheer you up. And if you’re sick, I want to be there so I can fluff up your pillows and steal your apples. But if you don’t tell me… then I can’t do any of that…”

They both fall into silence; hers cathartic, his pensive and thoughtful. They quietly bite into their respective fruits, and it’s not until Yoshi finishes that awful bitter pear that he speaks again.

“It wasn’t a serious case.” He says quietly, sincerely, no paper-thin cheeriness coloring his voice. “They’re just keeping me to monitor me because they’re afraid of a real relapse. I’ll probably be out tomorrow.”

“Okay.”

“I didn’t want to worry you.”

“I know.”

“I… it’s not like overnight  I’m just going to start sharing things with you. I’m still going to have my moments… but I’ll try.”

She smiles into her apple. “Okay.”

He sighs, slumping so his head tilts back. “You’re just impossible.”

May laughs openly at that, digging through the basket to find a sweet apple for him. “It’s not the first time I’ve heard that. Here.”

“Thanks,” but his words are for more than just the offered apple. May traces the tube of IV down to his wrist and lightly covers his hand with hers.

“I’m happy to do it. Really.”

And he smiles at her, a real genuine smile.

“You’re thinking too much,” Yoshi admonishes her as he cocks the gun. It sounds dangerous in her ears, and her body stiffens up of its own accord. May immediately regrets it as Yoshi edges the gun an inch away from her, his shaking hand speaking volumes about his reservations with this plan.

May chuckles as though laughter could cut through the tension they’re drowning in. “This is new. You usually tell me I don’t think enough.” The teasing doesn’t help his nerves, and if not for the ropes around her wrists, she would have held his hand to ease his trembling. “It’s a good plan. Really.”

He scowls, reflexively rubbing his wrists to loosen them. He had been doing that a lot recently. It’s something she’ll tease him about later when this is all over. She’ll call him old, practically ancient. God, she’s never looked forward to teasing him so much before.  “No. A good plan would make sure all three of us survived. A good plan wouldn’t force me to shoot you. Don’t bullshit me, May, into thinking that this is a good plan.”

He’s angry, and she’s positively relieved. She doesn’t think she could handle it if he was afraid. Anger, she can take. His fear? It would have broken her.

“It’s fine,” May tries to instill some of her confidence in him. Perhaps baseless confidence, but confidence nonetheless. “Hiroki already has Verre. She’ll teleport him to us while everyone’s distracted by the gun shot, and then she’ll get us to the nearest hospital. I’ll be fine.”

“And if I kill you in one shot?” His knuckles are white around the handle of the gun. He tips his head in that way that hides his eyes perfectly behind shades, that makes him - what he thinks is -  unreadable. Under different circumstances, she might have laughed because she doesn’t need to look him in the eye to tell what he’s thinking. Arceus, he wears shades every waking moment. She’s versed in other things: the way he stands, the tiny fidgets of his fingers, the cock of his head as he speaks, and most of all she’s a decipher of his smiles, the brittle bitter ones, the warm ones.

But he’s not smiling now. Though the gun is in his hands, she might be the one who’s killing him.

“You won’t kill me.” May says with utter conviction that dares him to say otherwise, that dares the rest of the world to defy her prediction. She’ll fight Death to the tooth and nail because there are people waiting for her. Because she has a son to kiss good night and a husband to console. Because she has to grow gray hair and wrinkles. Because she has to laugh at this crazy story years down the line.

A voice comes over an intercom. “Hey mister. You’re dragging your feet too much. Should we give an example with the kid?”

It’s their cue to start, and May tries not to shudder as the barrel of the gun digs into her chest, angled a little too to the right to do extreme damage to her vital organs. Yoshi’s shades are a comforting sight to her because she knows – in the same way she knows she’ll survive, knows that they’ll all escape – that he has the most pained violet eyes behind those glasses.

“Yoshi…” May says one last thing, so softly that the words barely make it past her lips. “I’m sor-“ But she’s cut off by a chaste kiss and a whisper.

“Tell me the rest when you wake up in the hospital.”

"Oh yes, I remember you," Elise said, her blue eyes flickering up to meet Yoshi’s as she sat on the edge of her bed shining her sword. "It seems like you’ve been preparing yourself quite nicely…maybe one day your body will be as strong as your spirit."

"But also remember this…" Elise continued, narrowing her eyes at Yoshi as she examined her sword closely. "…you should always knock before you enter my room. Got it?”

As Yoshi exited with sorrys spilling from his mouth, Elise leaned back on her bed with a sigh. That weakling…well, he won’t be a weakling for much longer if he keeps this up, she thought, a rare, proud grin flitting across her face.