Free Heart

Ch 36 - I am Asking You to Wait For Me

Loneliness was both new and familiar to Emmy. She had thought it was a common, natural feeling like how air felt in her lungs when she breathed and how her heart felt against her chest with every steady beat.

She didn't realize loneliness could go away. She didn't know what to call it until the time Luffy and Gramps went off into the mountains for a week of training.

She had gotten her chores done at a much slower pace. She kept looking out the window and found any excuse to do her chores on the front stoop so that she could be the first person to spot their return. It did not go unnoticed by the mountain bandits but they didn't say anything to her so she wasn't even aware of her actions.

When she finally spotted a straw hat making its way through the trees, she had bursted into tears, which almost caused Garp and Luffy to destroy the house and attack the innocent bandits that had looked after her while they were away.

"Dadan!" Garp roared, "What did you do?!"

"What? What? What happened?!" Luffy had demanded when he got to her. She had immediately ran into his arms and buried her face in his chest. The front of both their shirts were bunched in each of her hands out of pure fear that they would slip away and disappear for good. "Why are you crying?! Who hurt you? I'll beat them up!"

"Ahhhh! It wasn't us," Dadan had shrieked, "She's crying because of you two!"

"Eh? Because of me?!" Garp had asked, stumbling back as if Dadan had shot him in the chest, point blank.

"Ah! It's because of me?!" Luffy had exclaimed in horror.

Next to Dadan, Magra had flashed a grin at the girl. "Emmy-chan is just happy you two have returned. Isn't that right, Emmy-chan?"

Emmy had sniffled and she could only nod against Luffy's chest. She couldn't bring herself to just move even an inch away from either of them.

"Gahahaha," Garp had laughed, "Is that the case? Sorry, Emmy, I didn't realize you wanted to come with us. The woods up there are tough, you know."

Emmy had heard Luffy's grin in his voice as he patted her on the head, "Shishishishi. Sorry, Emmy. Must've been really boring and lonely without me here, huh?"

That took Emmy by surprise and she had lifted her head to blink her watery blue eyes up at her brother. "L...Lonely?"

Emmy learned two things that day. The first was that the feeling she had always had in the pit of her heart was called loneliness. The second was that it was so much worse when it was directed at specific people rather than just general company.

She sighed and kept her eyes on the whale as the Going Merry sailed out of the metal double doors that Crocus had built to help him gain access to all of Laboon's internal organs and self-inflicted injuries. They reached the open waters and still Emmy's gaze never left Laboon.

"It's the sky! Real sky!" Luffy cheered, despite having spent the least amount of time within the whale out of everyone present.

"Emmy, you okay?" Usopp asked, noticing how she was the only one facing the stern of the ship.

"Yeah," Emmy said quietly, "I was just thinking..."

"About what?"

"How lonely I'd feel if I had to wait for you all for 50 years."

Usopp sighed and he followed her gaze towards the whale. "Yeah...50 years," he sighed, "Those pirates sure are making him wait a long time..."

"Idiot! This is the Grand Line!" Sanji pointed out, "They're probably dead. No matter how long he waits, they won't come back."