♠ ♦ Alice in Borderland ♣ ♥

25

Earlier I didn't feel anything for the "nostalgic" gathering of the group, but when Reo also enters the hotel room, I really leave.

'Where are you going?' Although everyone seemed to be sucked into the emotional trap they've created, Soran looks up with concern when I try to move myself to the door. I'm not sure what to answer. Should I soften it, or should I honestly say I don't feel like being here? That I think it's hypocritical to be back together now just because someone from the former group died? Someone the others had broken with as well. Asami's death hadn't brought us together already. Neither did the realization of Yui's. Then why should we get back together now, just because someone is dead? Should I therefore forgive them for what they have done?

'To her sweetheart, of course,' Reo says with a shrug. I already had to do my best to keep calm, but now I can feel myself getting angrier and angrier. 'Sweetheart?' Yoshua mumbles. There was a certain tone in his voice that I don't like. He has absolutely no right to do this. 'Yeah,' Reo agrees, 'you know, the guy we wanted to poison.' He talks lightly, as if he's joking about a little thing that happened once that we argued about, and over time we've forgotten what exactly was so bad about it. It will never be like that for me. I can never forget that.

'Are you two together?' Yoshua asks again in the same tone. I look at Soran, who has a certain expression on his face that is slightly disapproving, as if he's hoping the answer is no. I really want to tell him who Yuki is and how much he has supported me. 'He saved my life,' I tell my cousin. 'I wouldn't be standing in front of you now without him.' At first I thought the shock of Eymi's death was the reason he didn't ask me how my game went in detail, but after a night's sleep and a day spent in gloom, he still hasn't asked me about it. I'm really not going to start talking about my parents in front of the others. I don't trust them at all. If only Chichiro had been here, it would have been different.

'So you're going to thank him for that,' Reo says with a grin. I look at him and see him raise a large bottle of booze to his mouth and take a sip. 'He's not like that,' I say a little too fiercely and defensively, to which he starts laughing. 'You do care for him, remarkably.' That's right. Even when he was still a stranger to me, Yuki always tried to save me from pain and help me. Of course I care about him.

'I want to talk to you soon,' I say to Soran, who looks away and nods. 'Looks like you could use one,' Reo says, pointing the bottle at my cousin. My first reaction is to knock his hand away, but Soran is in charge of his own body. He has to make his own choices. So even though I don't trust the others, I can't tell him what to do. If he wants to stay here with them, he will. The last I hear before walking down the hall is Soran turning down his offer.

I immediately feel the knot in my stomach and the tightness ease when I am no longer with them. I hardly slept last night because Chichiro and Yoshua stayed in the room the whole time. I should've left much earlier, I think as I get further and further away from them.

I look at my wrist and see the number "62" on it. Meanwhile, Soran's "75" makes quite a difference. I could change that if I take Ringo's offer, but Soran isn't exactly approachable to talk to. Hopefully I'll get that chance soon.

When I get to the quiet part of the resort that hardly anyone ever goes to, I breathe a sigh of relief. My intention is to read a book, but I suddenly feel so tired that I only just manage to pull down the door handle and enter the quiet room. I stop in the doorway when I see I'm not the only one there. When Yuki looks up and I look at him, I realize how badly I wanted to see him again. Despite going straight in earlier, he had actually come back out. He was actually by my side last night, ready to catch me if I got bad news about Soran. Since he had left so quickly when it turned out that my cousin is still alive, I had doubts. Yet I can see that it actually happened when he looks at me.