Chapter Text
January 1st 2017
-Evening-
It wasn’t very often Marie found herself making the trek towards the Dojima household, even though she's known Yu for years at this point.
Regardless, there wasn’t any way she was waiting until tomorrow to talk to him. She was seeing him NOW- even if that meant trudging through the streets at night, snow clinging to her boots.
Most residents had enjoyed the mild weather for the season during New Year's Day, but Marie could only be irritated by it.
She'd felt something weird ramping up the past few days, but this sudden lack of control was absolutely infuriating. It seemed like it'd been one thing after another since the beginning of last year, and Marie was absolutely sick of it.
Not even her poetry has been helping lately. She was struggling to find any sort of pathos. “Just one more thing I don’t have any control over” Marie, mused as she pushed onward to her destination.
Soon Marie found herself on the doorstep. After taking a moment to compose herself, she knocked on the door.
A total stranger is the one who answers the door. She has long, braided hair and kind eyes.
"Uh, I-is Yu-kun home?”
Why was she being thrown off so badly by this woman?
“Yes, let me grab him for you.”
“A little late for a visit, don't you think?” Yu greets
“Alwaysactinglikethisstupidjerk.” Marie huffed in return. "Anyways, I need to talk to you…. about… things.”
“Let’s go in. It’s cold out.”
Marie removes her boots and follows Narukami up the stairs up to his bedroom. It’s mostly the same as the last time she visited, with a notable exception.
“What’s with all these boxes?” Marie asks, gazing around at the numerous cardboard boxes currently scattered around the room, most firmly sealed with packing tape.
“It seems my short vacation here turned into me moving back in at some point.” Yu replied.
“What about your internship in the city?” She asked.
Yu had been working in the city for the past several months as part of a journalism internship. He’d been really excited to work in the field, but Marie could tell he was missing Inaba.
“Apparently I’m doing it from here now.”
“So things have been weird for you too then?”
“I guess you could say that.” Yu exhaled, dropping the somewhat playful attitude he'd carried until now.
“Marie, do you have any idea about what's been going on?”
Marie wrung her hands together nervously. “Everything's all different now, and I don't know why- and I haven't been able to see Margaret or that room since like the beginning of last year.”
“I haven't been able to visit either, but I assumed they were busy with someone else; if you're not able to visit either, though, that's troubling.” Yu shifted into his thinking face. As much as this current situation sucked, Marie started to feel more at ease knowing Yu was here to back her up.
“I'm sorry for keeping this from you for so long.” Marie stamers. “I should have realized how important this was. I wanted to be strong so you didn't have to worry, but I just made things worse.” Marie feels the beginning of tears forming in her eyes and strains to maintain her composure.
“It's ok,” Yu approached and wrapped his arms around her. “I understand what it's like, wanting to be strong for other people." Marie returns the embrace, and finds herself crying into Yu's shoulder.
As the two continue to hold each other, Marie begins to feel her pathos again.
Powdered snow dusts my shoulders
The cold frost chills me to the bone
Time after time you come to once again warm my side
We face the world! No longer alone!