spring will come once more

[expiatrice]

Who: Ciel and headedforhope
When: Backdated to Sunday the 14th, before noon
Where: 1127 Taylor Road
What: Sakura has been permanently droned and Zelos has already been replaced. Now that Mami's snapped out of it, Ciel has something to give her before she loses the chance again.
Warnings: N/A, just famiry fluff

Comments

[headedforhope]

[There's a distant and vaguely displeased expression on her face before Ciel hails her over, lingering into the few private moments as she rounds the hallway corner and begins her descent. She had been droned for the first time, and for some time as well- stuck in that strange state where her body was not her own, like her mind was far away in some limbo of a dream. It bothers her deeply to be so vulnerable, all her precious control robbed in an instant with neither warning nor reason.

But then Ciel's voice breaks through the rift within her mind and Mami snaps back to reality, smiling automatically. It doesn't fade when she takes in how Ciel is standing, almost waiting there....just grows a touch tighter.]

Ah....good morning to you as well, Miss Ciel. [She reaches the bottom of the stairs, looking up into the older woman's face; Mami has always been small, for all that her maturity gave her something of a presence.] I slept just fine.

[headedforhope]

[She drops her gaze, looks at the keychain rather than Ciel. A quiet, noncommittal hum under her breath as she thinks.]

...no, I don't think I was in the house that day. I would've heard her scream, and investigated.

[She had liked Sakura, in her own way, and even if there had been an utter neutrality in regards to those feelings, well.....Mami wasn't the sort to ignore such a sound.]

[expiatrice]

Aha, that's okay. It's been a while, so I don't remember who was there that day very well. She got from the mail... a really questionable piece of clothing that she never remembered having back home.

[a beat.] Saying it like this sounds a bit silly, doesn't it? [She sheepishly chuckles a bit.] But the shock was enough to have made me believe it was something terrible. It was a relief though, to know that no harm came to her when I got there. But after having seen that garment myself... It's true that she would never have any use for it, even if it supposedly came from her home world. Throwing it away would be a waste however, so Matou-san had the idea to trade it in for something else at the Post Office. I told her that another set of clothing would be fine, it doesn't have to be something useful to benefit everyone, just getting something for herself is okay too. And that's how in the end, she decided to trade that piece in, for the key to the house of the boy that she visited often and [...present tense shift.] loves.

[She'll

[headedforhope]

[Something tightens in her face, briefly, a twitch of muscle that is here and then gone. So, Sakura had a boy she liked.....there's the faint burn of jealousy at the thought, old and bitter and not a little guilty. Boyfriends, or even the hope of one, belonged to a world of normalcy that existed just beyond Mami's straining fingertips.]

It makes plenty of sense, I think.

[Her idealism is bruised. It's a smothered, weakened, tired thing. But it's not broken - it's not gone. She can understand and appreciate gestures like these....the problem is that Mami's cynical mind can rarely stop there. It whirls along on a train of less pleasant thoughts, concerning itself with the disappointment and hurt that will come of it.]

You're right, there's nothing we can do in regards to people arriving and vanishing; we're given no control, not even a warning. But if we take our chances when we can.....perhaps we can minimize our regrets.

[Madoka might be gone tomorrow. Or she might be killed in some unique and awful way. Or perhaps both, one