4. Concede

"Kawaru, you're already eight. Isn't it about time you stopped cooping yourself up, get out and attend school?" Nurse Chiryou sighed.

"Ms Oshie can't teach me anything I don't know," I insisted, "I'm better off learning what I need from the library and Grandpa Ken next door."

Nurse Chiryou seemed to be taken aback at that blunt statement, nearly dropping the cup of water she was about to hand me. 

I wasn't allowed to leave the hospital-- and although the hospital had a small school for other children like me, the teacher was not a professional educator-- but rather, she was a daycare teacher who specializes in babysitting. There was no provision of learning for anyone older.

I've learned enough to prepare for college in my previous life.

I didn't need to get the basic baby math down again.

"Education is important, but isn't it about time you get some friends?" she tried, "I mean, Mineta-kun hasn't been coming around lately, shouldn't you try to get some other people to be with?"

I clicked my tongue. "If you want me to go to school, let me go somewhere outside of the hospital," I argued.

Nurse Chiryou faltered, "you know we can't do that for you, Kawaru... your father is much too busy on a daily basis and we have the condition of your body to consider."

I gritted my teeth, not liking the sound of it at all, "enough. Get out."

Her organs work, but not fully, I once overheard a conversation between my father and the other doctors, most of your organs only wish to wish to half of what it should be functioning with. 

I had just roused, fresh out of a surgery-- but I kept my eyes closed when I heard them speak in hushed tones by my side.

Science won't work on her, Sei, a doctor urged, his voice flooded with concern, Fortunately, as of the moment, it has not give her any lasting, serious issues... but we can't say the same for the years to come.

I couldn't see my father's face at the time-- but I knew just what expression he showed. It must have been the same indifferent facade he always wore. 

My father never let his emotions get the better of him. 

We need to ask for help from the world, Sei. Quirks can save her, someone suggested hopefully, that's right-- what about Recovery Girl? 

Recovery Girl can only aid in healing capabilities, my father cut in sharply, bluntly, humans can't regenerate their own organs. 

I stayed in the hospital my entire life, and each year I get supposedly fixed up by surgeries and organ transplants that either reject me or never work as well as they're expected to.

Since Mom died, Dad has kept me here. 

I was without hope, and many deduced it was a quirk that caused my condition. Perhaps it was when Mom fought against a villain during her pregnancy. Maybe.

I was a child with a curse in my veins.

Leaning my head against the window, watching the rain pour in a shower of a transparent veil-- 

  ー  

"Waru!" Mineta leaped into my bosom like the advantageous brat he was.

Taking him in my arms happily, I cuddled against the soft, small boy, enjoying the warmth. "Hi, Minoru, it's been a while!"

The sight of a tin boy burying his face into a girl's chest was not a pleasing one to many of the nurses, and within seconds Nurse Kango was ripping us away from each other like a fierce mommy bear.

"Hey, Mineta-kun, no!" she snapped, "Kawaru, don't encourage him!"

I pouted. Mineta whined back dejectedly.

"That's right," I realized, clapping my hands together and folding my fingers across like a prayer. "I'll change into a boy, then."

I wore baggy pants today instead of my usual white dress, after all. Might as well take the chance.

My body gleamed, a holo light flowing through my skin like a wave, interrupted by ripples like quicksilver breaking into the flow. 

It seamed across my hair, brushed past my fingers, and fluttered to my toes.

"Waru's boobs are gone!" Mineta shrieked.

Nurse Kango sighed, holding Mineta by the scruff, "Kawaru's quirk makes her gender change, Mineta-kun. Is this your first time seeing it?"

Mineta nodded furiously, "so is Waru a girl or guy?"

I laughed. Noting the fact that my hair length didn't change in line with my gender, I brushed it aside and stretched out my arms in Mineta's direction.

"What, do you not want my hugs anymore because I'm a guy now?" I teased, "I'm really hurt!"

Muttering complaints under his breath, Mineta folded his arms and puffed up his cheeks in rebellion. "Waru is Waru but..." he murmured.

"My arms are getting tired, Minoru!" I chuckle, "if you reject me now, I'm gonna cry!"

Almost immediately, he leaped into my arms.

Settling down on my lap, he leaned back contentedly. "Waru, you're the only exception, okay?" he seemed like he was bargaining, insisting defensively about something, "because Waru's different."

"I'm honoured to receive that seat of pride, Minoru," I wrapped my arms around him to get comfortable again. 

Turning back toward Nurse Kango, I found her with a resigned expression, absolutely giving up on the situation there forth. 

"Don't be too rowdy, the both of you," she warned sternly, "Mineta-kun, you're a strong boy so I'll leave Kawaru with you. She's your responsibility now, so if anything happens to her, I'm telling your mother about this."

"Yes, ma'am!" Mineta saluted with an exaggeratedly serious demeanor.

  ー  

  ー  

We've been friends for seven years now, and we've only gotten closer since.

I would turn fourteen this year, which meant I would be well into junior high if I went into school normally. But I didn't-- and I was nearing the age I had died in my past life.

"Kawaru, we're putting you in for another surgery tomorrow," Dr Isha told me just the morning before, describing incomprehensibly about the previous asthma attack I had and how it was caused by a sudden rejection of oxygen in my alveoli.

Could we not just leave it be? I resisted the urge to say, it wouldn't make much of a difference either way. Perhaps it would allude me into thinking I was any healthier for a while. After a while, I'd be stuck with another lecture on another organ failing to meet some expectations. 

Fourteen years in this body made me figure that fourteen years seemed long enough for a peaceful, uneventful second life.

Mineta clicked on the button for a can of hot chocolate. I had lifted him up toward the vending machine because the button was placed too high for me to reach. 

He jumped to the ground to grab the can and the change. Taking it gratefully, popping the can open, I took a careful sip.

Mineta jumped to the bench beside the vending machine, enjoying his own drink in silence.

"Hey, Minoru," I spoke up, "have you decided on your Junior High?"

Mineta looked down, in deep thought. "Well, I'll probably be going to a normal local Junior High..." he didn't seem to spirited about it. "What about you, Waru? Are you going to enroll into High School?" 

That made my face fall. I died before high school in my previous life.

Maybe I won't make it to high school in this one too.

"I'm weak, so I've never left the hospital," I told him, rubbing the can with my fingers, an act of nervous self conscious-- "I think I'm fine with staying here even through high school, Minoru."

Mineta was silent.

"To tell the truth, in the years I've been here, I've only gone in and out of surgeries, I don't even have time to start on physical therapy or anything of the sort," I admitted with a bit of difficulty, "I don't think I'll be able to handle the heat and weather outside. After all, I've never held anything heavier than you, Minoru!"

I've never touched the sunlight from anywhere aside from the hospital garden-- even so, it was through the shade of the leaves, or from the delicate sunspot between the crevices of the hospital greenery.

I knew from past experience alone that I was incredibly prone to heat strokes and exhaustion from exercise. Even if I were sitting on a wheelchair, the outside took a toll on me because of how little I was exposed to it.

I wouldn't survive out there. Not easily, as least.

It was unbeknownst to me at the time-- but my depressing words struck a nerve in Mineta Minoru. He seemed irritated by how sullen I was acting, how demotivated I was in just even going outside-- 

And it stemmed from my disability and weakness.

"I'm gonna aim for Soumei!" he suddenly declared, spirit suddenly filling his tone with a sort of determination, "Soumei Jr High! I'm gonna study!"

I was baffled, absolutely bewildered by the sudden change in demeanor. What gives?

"I'm gonna become a doctor!" he decided, "then, I'll find a cure for you, Waru! I'm gonna heal you and I'm gonna bring you outside the hospital!"

I stopped.

A doctor, he said, someone that saves lives.

For me?

As cheesy as Mineta was acting, I felt the tears coming in as my gaze softened in simply gratitude. Mineta was being honest, determined and absolutely serious bout this new dream of his. My heart only bloomed in joy and yearned to support him with all my heart.

"You're so cool, Minoru," I told him, "you're true to your own desires and so, so sincere. I really admire that part of you."

I knew it wouldn't come true. In the future, somehow, Mineta would turn to the path of a hero. But that wasn't my role here-- I wasn't placed in this world as someone that would butt in unnecessarily and alter the world for reasons incomprehensible and melodramatic.

I was placed in here to live, I realized. That was all.

I'm in this world to find the calling and reason I lost in my last world, to find the peace and completion in my life that I couldn't find in my previous life.

Perhaps, for now, Mineta Minoru was the one I've been looking for.

Someone I could share my feelings with, even in a world of ostracism and solitude; someone that would see hope and accept me, even if I held a body of nothing but weakness and deformities within.

My heart was warm.

"Thank you, Minoru," I told him, a sarcasm rising in my tone as a joked, "then, I'll wait for the day you come and take me away on your lovely white horse."

Mineta smirked at the wording. He pumped a fist, laughing."I'll be your Prince Charming, Waru! It's a promise!"