Save You

Just a little one-shot I wrote some time ago, while listening to Save You by Simple Plan.

The rain falls, the rain sings.

Akari stands, black umbrella in one hand and cell phone in the other. The road is empty, save for the curtains of raindrops and the rolling storm clouds above. Except, Akari thinks as she turns her face upward, they don’t look very angry. Just very sad.

A drop of rain hits her square on the nose, and she flinches as if just pelted by stones. The cell phone in her hand stays quiet. Akari’s eyebrows pull into a crease. She doesn’t dare consider what she is feeling right now, consider why her stomach is knotted up as tight as a hangman’s noose.

The wind picks up at that point, and Akari’s sweat-slicked hand slips right off the umbrella handle. It tumbles down the empty Tokyo-suburb street at an alarmingly fast speed, but Akari only follows it with heavy grey eyes. Nothing compared to what I may be about to lose anyway.

She turns away from the abandoned umbrella, hunching her thin shoulders and pulling up her jacket hood. Akari curses this particular obscure bus stop. For goodness sake, can’t they afford to build a measly bus shelter? Her numb fingers touch the smooth, cold surface of her cell phone, daring it to ring.

Everything is silent, save for the curtains of singing rain.

Then...

“I’m here.”

The sudden voice behind her makes her jump. By instinct, Akari’s fingers inch for her phone’s speed dial. Whirling around, she finds herself facing a young man with a nondescript face and plain clothes only a few feet away. He looks foreign, with pale skin and golden hair that is soaked to its roots. But most of all, he looks lost, forlorn.

“I’m here,” the young man repeats again.

Akari blinks. “Excuse me?”

The young man blinks back. “I’m here to save you.”

Akari is already starting to find this tiring. She has no time to amuse some strange man, potentially mentally unbalanced. “I don’t need to be saved,” she dismisses, pulling up the collar of her jacket.

The man regards her curiously. “Of course you do,” he states, as if it is the most obvious thing in the whole world.

Akari returns the stare, only less friendly. “What makes you think I need saving?”

“What makes you think you don’t?”

At this, Akari is rendered speechless. She wonders who this young man is. An escaped patient from a mental institution? An escaped prisoner? Just plain weird?

Suddenly, her cell phone springs to life, belting out some song she could not even remember adding as a ring tone. Her fingers go slack for a moment before finally cooperating enough to pick up and flip open the cell phone. But the caller ID cannot identify the number, and there is no response on the other end when Akari answers tightly.

“Hello?”

There is a pause, a soft click, and then the line goes dead.

Around her, the rain falls, the rain sings.

Akari feels her stomach plummet. They’re not going to call. If they do, they will bring bad news. Oh god, when will the hospital call--

“I can save you.” The man’s interruption is earnest, almost desperate now, but Akari’s nerves are frayed too much to deal with this nonsense anymore. Rain splatters off her hood like tears as she screams with all her might at the young man.

“Leave me alone! I don’t need to be saved! Just leave me the hell alone!”

There is silence for a moment, and Akari almost feels bad. But then the man gives her an odd, patient smile. “Everyone needs a little saving.” He takes a step forward, then another. And another.

Normally, Akari would have bolted like a cornered animal. But this time, she couldn’t move. Maybe she didn’t want to move, and Akari wasn’t sure what to make of such a realization.

The young man stops, only a foot away now. “I think you want to be saved.” Then from behind his back, he draws out her umbrella, the one she had already thought was a lost cause. “How’s your sister?”

Akari’s eyes double in size. “How did you—”

With one swift move, the umbrella bloomed, and the young man hands it over. The downpour of rain above Akari’s head ceases immediately, and slowly, she reaches forward for the umbrella handle, forgetting thoughts of escaped lunatics, hospitals, phone calls, death.

The young man smiles warmly, his pale blue eyes shining. “Everyone needs a little saving, Akari. I’m just here to give you some help.” And then, with a brief raise of his hand as goodbye, he turnes and walkes away without a backward glance.

Akari stares after him, unmoving, for what seemed like an eternity. In her pocket, the cell phone springs to life. This time, her fingers are steady when they retrieve the device. But it is not the phone call that she has been waiting for; rather, it is a text message: Your sister is fine. Woke up few minutes ago. Come quickly; she asked to see you.

A single drop of rain lands on the display screen, or is it a teardrop? Akari doesn’t care. Her knees go weak from relief and her heart unravels with warmth.

The rain has ceased it’s drumming on her umbrella. Slowly, Akari lowers it and looks up at the cloudless sky in wonder. It is just then that she realizes that the umbrella is not the black one from before, but a pure sky blue of summer days and peaceful memories.

Akari smiles.

I'm safe.