After spending another nice Christmas with her parents, Sayori's mood seemed to be in the happy side at the moment.

Later during that week, she received a particular text from Erika, who now chatted with her very frequently.

Nevermore: So, I was thinking about coming over to your house some time, we can you now, we could draw, watch movies and stuff, I'm really bored at home!
Cinnamon roll: You can come whenever you want! (^o^)
Nevermore: really??
Cinnamon roll: yeah! If I'm gonna keep procrastinating all day I prefer to do it with someone else ＼(^o^)／ you should've asked sooner
Cinnamon roll: 🤔 maybe I should've asked now that I think about it
Nevermore: awesome! Can I come over tomorrow then?
Cinnamon roll: Yas!

And so, the next day Erika left her house very early, eager to go see her little ball of sunshine.

Sayori received her friend with a big hug and invited her to come inside, leading her to the living room where Sayori had been playing some video games. "Here, play with me!", Sayori handed one of her ps4 controllers to Erika. "Be gentle please, I don't play too much videogames", Erika said. "Relax, it's just Minecraft, we're playing cooperative basically, here I'll help you with some tools and armor", Sayori said cheerfully.

As Sayori gave her twintailed friend a quick tutorial of how to play Minecraft, Erika caught up pretty quick.

"Don't kill the cows!!", Sayori whined after Erika tried to kill a cow as she needed to recover some health. "Sorry!!", Erika said jumping back on her seat as Sayori practically yelled at her. "tH€y are precious, let's just go steal some bread from the villagers follow me", Sayori said now smiling sweetly again which as usual now, made Erika's heart skip a beat.

After a couple of hours of Minecraft, Sayori's stomach cried for food finally. Erika suggested to get a pizza and bought it herself. Around 30 minutes later, the door bell rang a the pizza delivery guy handed the pizza to an excited Sayori that practically slammed the door shut on his face as she ran back to the living room hungrier than an child eater cosmic being.

Erika had set a movie for them to watch meanwhile they enjoyed their food. Sayori ate 6 of the 8 slices of pizza without problem which made Erika both amused and giggle at the same time.

"What do we do now?", Sayori asked as the credits rolled marking the end of the movie. "Hmmm wanna keep practicing your drawing?", Erika suggested, due to her teaching Sayori how to draw in the last few weeks at school. "Okay!", Sayori exclaimed and then started cleaning up the coffee table.

Sayori wasn't a natural but wasn't bad either, she was now trying to draw a girl grabbing a bottle filled with stars but found herself with some trouble. "Eriiiiii!", Sayori whined. "What's up?", Erika left what she was drawing and got closer to see what bothered Sayori. "I can't draw hands!", Sayori whined again. "Well, it really is difficult so you need to keep practicing, here let me show you",, Erika unconsciously grabbed Sayori's hand and guided her to draw the hand she wanted, slowly and carefully, making sure the red bow girl got at least a grasp of how she did it. Needless to say Erika noticed how warm and soft Sayori's hand felt, which made her blush and sent chills down her spine, in a good sense. Sayori smiled happy and then hugged her friend thanking her for the help. Of course the twintailed girls heart began beating like crazy.

After their little drawing session, both girls returned to play some more Minecraft and some movies afterwards until the day was finally coming to an end. "it's getting late, I should go home now", Erika said as their last movie finished. "Aww, already?", Sayori said pouting. "Yeah, sorry", Erika said rubbing her cheek. "Hey, why don't you stay over the night?", Sayori said smiling expectantly as the idea came to her. "You mean like a sleepover?", Erika asked. "No, not like a sleepover, an actual sleepover silly!", Sayori said bouncing. "Is it okay though? What about your parents?", Erika asked trying to hide her excitement. "They should be coming back from work at any moment but I doubt they'd have any problem with that, they never had", Sayori said with a cheerful smile. "Alright, let me just text my parents to let them know", Erika said and with that, their next plans were settled.

Later that night, both girls w£R3 now in Sayori's room talking about all kinds of stuff. Sayori showed the black haired girl her Minecraft cow plushie recalling that time Ryona got it for her. Erika listened to her attentively although feeling quite jealous, but she knew very well the other two new members had the same goal as her so this was something she had to deal with for now.

Sayori then told Erika she felt tired already, to which the twintailed girl responded with a sweet smile at the sleepy looking Sayori.

The red bow girl then opened one of her drawers to get her pijamas and began stripping off her clothes to get changed. Erika glanced at the girl and quickly looked away with her face red as Sayori's bow. The bubbly girl noticed and giggled before speaking, "it's fine! We're both girls". Erika continued looking away. "No, it's not!", the twintailed girl exclaimed embarrassed. Sayori only tilted her head curious and puzzled.
(Big thanks to brother MorganWolf09 for allowing me to use her daily life experience to recreate this part)

After getting both changed, with Erika heading to the bathroom to do so. Sayori asked the twintailed girl to let her brush her long dark hair. Erika's face flushed a little at the request but accepted with no problem. "Your hair is really pretty, you should try more hairstyles since it's long. Like.... This!", Sayori said tying Erika's hair in a bun. "You think so? Well, it should be interesting to try other hairstyles", Erika smiled as she looked at herself in the mirror and the cute girl behind girl playing with her hair. The Black haired girl then turned around to face Sayori, getting up from the chair. Sayori tilted her head curious and Erika then brushed some of Sayori's nice peach colored short hair behind her ear with her fingers.

Despite knowing well what she wanted to do, she couldn't gather the courage for some reason and simply smiled at the bubbly girl who smiled back at her. "Y-Your hair is pretty too, here let me brush it", Erika said trying to not sound awkward and switched positions with Sayori, now running her fingers across her soft short hair. "Why don't you use the brush?", Sayori asked puzzled. "I don't know Erika said too distracted while she kept tracing her fingers across Sayori's peach hair.

As the girls finally called it a night, Sayori told Erika she could sleep in her bed with her. Despite Erika's strong as Hercules desires of doing so, she didn't want to risk having a heart attack and insisted on using a sleep bag Sayori had and sleep on the floor.

The night progressed and Erika easily fell asleep listening to the cute and relaxing soft breaths of Sayori, that made her heart flutter. However, for the cheerful girl, the night had other plans.

Even though Sayori had some good days without her depression bothering her too much, she suffered from recurrent nightmares that didn't care if she was feeling happy or sad. Some were about her finally "leaving" this world as her family and friends celebrated it, others about a monster that chased her tirelessly and reminded her how worthless she was, among some others, all always provoking her some panic attacks during the night but was never able to ask for help as everytime she would deal with them.

Tonight was one of those nights. Sayori saw herself hanging lifeless from some ceiling with a rope tied around her neck. She then saw Natsuki and Yuri laughing at her lifeless body. Monika passed by a gave a disgusted look at the body and kept walking away. The three newest club members appeared from out of nowhere and surrounded the body, staring blankly at it before bursting out a loud maniac laugh that echoed throughout Sayori's head. 

Sayori then began crying unconsciously on her sleep, shivering even though she was all covered with warm blankets, her body convulsing slightly as she kept hearing those insane laughs.

Erika's sleep was interrumpted as the sounds of sobbing coming from the bed next to her woke her up. Worried as anyone would be, the black haired girl then rubbed her eyes and got up quietly, tapping Sayori's shoulder gently. "Sayori, are you okay?", Erika whispered but Sayori continued sobbing. Erika noticed she was trembling and started feeling more worried about her crush. Erika quickly tried to think of something and finally removed the blankets from Sayori a little touching her forehead. The girl was sweating and still shivering and appeared to be still asleep.

Erika then realized it should be a nightmare or something of the sort and decided to wake her up. "Sayori, Sayori, wake up!", the black haired girl shook her friend gently but trying to add some force to free her from her bad dream. Sayori finally woke up almost jumping on her bed switching to sitting position and quickly glanced around the room confused. "Shh, shh, it's okay it was just a dream", Erika said sweetly. Sayori didn't say a word as she sobbed again holding one of her cow plushies tight. Despite being dark, Erika could see well the puffy eyes and red cheeks of Sayori which made her heart shrink. The black haired girl then sat down next to her friend and wrapped her arms around her pulling her head close to her chest, caressing her hair lovingly, hoping to calm her down. "It's okay, I'm here", Erika said in a sweet yet quiet voice. Sayori's sobs continued for a little longer until she seemed to calm down and started to fall asleep again.

Erika laid Sayori's head on her pillow carefully and wrapped her up again as her breaths returned to that soft and calm rhythm.

Erika was now back on the floor and was about to close her eyes again until she saw a hand popping out of the blankets, waiting for a response. The twintailed girl then blushed lightly and held Sayori's hand intertwining her fingers with hers. "I'm here for you", Erika said in a sweet voice and felt Sayori gripping her hand tighter. They then stayed like that throughout the night, until Sayori's heart finally calmed down.