Daddy's Little Girl

[UndergroundGod]

While Shinra took Erika to another room, Izaya laid back and exhaled slowly. It was barely late afternoon, but he suddenly felt like he could fall asleep right then and maybe stay asleep for a couple of days… To be fair, he hadn't slept well all week, getting even less sleep than he usually got. He hoped that maybe tonight he'd just pass out instantly, maybe even sleep in late tomorrow. That would be nice.

He tried not to let his mind wander to the conversation that Shinra and Erika were having in another room, but found that it was hard to distract himself from such things when he was only lying around. He looked over to Mairu briefly… when he suddenly remembered that Kururi was probably waiting to hear from him after seeing her sister get abducted like that. Quickly, Izaya pulled out his phone and sent Kururi a text explaining that her sister was fine and that everything was taken care of. He told her that he'd drop Mairu off at home in an hour or so.

Just as he finished send the text, Erika entered the room and Izaya slipped his phone back into his pocket. The room was cold without his shirt on, but the thing was bloody and ripped and he didn't want to put the dirty thing back on over his clean bandages.

Mairu didn't seemed to respond well to Erika's attention, but, though she was waking up, she was too drowsy to fight it, and Izaya couldn't help but smile just a little at the displeased look on her face.

He nodded a little in reply to Erika, and added, "Sure."

At least, everything was going to be as fine as it usually would be, however fine that was.

Shinra came back into the room a short minute later, his eyes falling on Izaya, looking dissatisfied… before claiming that he was going to grab the man a shirt to put on.

[unicornhunter]

Erika . . . Erika didn't want to go home just yet. And yet home was the only place she really wanted to be right then. Her dress was torn, she wasn't wearing any underwear right then - as much as she didn't want to think about the reason for that - she felt dirty and in desperate need of a shower, she felt exhausted and wanted nothing more than to sleep, as Mairu and Izaya probably felt as well.... But she was remembering where she was supposed to be right then.

She was late. Walker was waiting for her.

But she couldn't show up like this.

Even if she did go home, get changed and freshened up, she just didn't have it in her to actually go and show up and pretend like nothing happened.

And she had been the one to suggest they go out tonight.

She stood Walker up on the date that she had asked him for.

She started laughing quietly, thinking about how ridiculous it was. But that laughter turned into tears and sobs, and she hunched over and cried. Her tears were big and fat and they rolled down her cheeks like tiny waterfalls, the trails they left evaporating from warm, reddening cheeks.

She was a horrible girlfriend.

[UndergroundGod]

It was only a moment before Shinra brought him back a plain white t-shirt and tossed it at him. Izaya eased it on over his head (he didn't want to move for a while, as he was exhausted and of course there was the fact that he could tear his stitches if he wasn't careful), before once again settling back against the couch as Shinra teased him about not needing the shirt back.

Shinra had just got back up to help Celty prepare the tea when… Erika broke down. It started with a quiet, humorless laughter, one that was immediately foreboding to Izaya, and when that terrible laughter turned to sobs, Izaya was hardly surprised. He wasn't surprised that the laughter turned to tears and he wasn't surprised that Erika was crying. She'd been so strong in the past few days, considering everything that had happened and everything that was happening, Izaya's only surprise was in that she'd made it this far.

Izaya wasn't sure what to do though. He was never particularly good when it came to… handling emotions with any sort of sensitivity, his own emotions or those of others. It was probably because he hardly had enough exposure to outbursts to know what he was supposed to do with him. The panic he'd felt earlier was the closest he'd gotten to actually losing it in years.

Of course, Shinra just sort of stared for a moment with that sad look on his face before he finally turned his head and headed into the kitchen with Celty, leaving Izaya and Erika alone… giving Izaya no choice but to be the one to do something.

Awkwardly doing the only thing he could think of, he reached his hand over and placed it gently over Erika's.

[unicornhunter]

When Erika felt Izaya's hand come on top of hers, she turned her hand over and gripped it tightly, as though it was her only life line. She leaned into Izaya and buried her face into the crook of Izaya's shoulder, sobbing into the shirt Shinra had given him. With her other hand, she clung to the front of his shirt. She was still careful not to hurt Izaya, though. Even though she was in so much pain and felt so much guilt, she avoided hurting him. It was all her fault, so why cause him any more pain than she had to?

"I'm - I'm sorry," she cried.

The apology was for Izaya, and yet it wasn't. It was for Mairu, yet it wasn't. It was for Walker, though it wasn't. It was for every little girl Mamoru had hurt and killed, and yet it wasn't. But she definitely wasn't apologizing to herself.... She wasn't sure who she was apologizing to specifically. But she felt so terrible that she felt like she had to apologize to someone....

Maybe she was looking for comfort from the wrong person. But she wanted Izaya to somehow tell her that it was all okay now.... That Walker wasn't going to be upset - even though she knew he would be. Just . . . .

She just so desperately wanted Izaya to make the pain go away. Because she didn't want to face Walker with it still looming over her. She couldn't let him see her like this. She just couldn't.

[UndergroundGod]

When Erika's hand turned over in his and squeezed, he at least felt like he'd done something right. At least she hadn't… freaked out that he had touched her or anything. Though what came next was almost enough to make him jump. Only a second later, Erika was… touching him, pressed her face against him, holding onto his shirt, and crying and Izaya was yet again at a loss. He'd never been a shoulder to cry on, not for anyone older than six, anyway.

Damn, he'd nearly forgotten how he was supposed to comfort someone… he hoped vaguely it was one of those things that came back to a person, as the last thing he needed was to fall on his face at this, to leave Erika floundering in all this pain when it was obviously him that she wanted to turn to for comfort. After all, he was the only one that really knew exactly what she'd just been through, so he was probably the only one whose comfort would really mean anything.

She sobbed out an apology and Izaya felt his heart sink, wondering vaguely, who she was apologizing to, or if the apology was even for a specific person.

After a moment, he raised his hand across his chest and placed it gently on her shoulder, rubbing lightly. Exhaling softly, his cheek leaned against her head and he told her in a soft and sincere voice, "You're going to be okay."

And he meant it. After everything she'd been through, after all that had happened, there was nowhere to go but up. Her father was now very permanently removed from her life. She at least had some sort of closure now, she could move on. There were things that would need fixed and wounds that would need healing, but after this point, things were going to get better, and Izaya knew Erika needed to believe that.

[Walker Yumasaki]

He stood there all night. From 8 pm until 11:45, he waited diligently. At first he was smiling, his heart pounding happily in his chest. He was dressed in a nice casual suit, unusual garments for him to be seen in as he was always in just a hoodie. Excited and shifting back and forth from heel to toe in his dress shoes, he clutched a bouquet of freshly cut pink roses, Erika's favorites. But as people walked past and the streets became darker and darker, his hope faded. The smile on his face began to slowly curve downward into a frown, his legs grew tired and eventually he had to sit down beneath the window. His head slowly drooped into his lap and he fought back the urge to let tears slip down his cheeks. He had been stood up. For the first time in years… he had been betrayed by the woman he loved.

When he was politely asked to be excused from the area, he nodded and stood slowly. The bouquet fell from his hand and onto the street. As he walked away and various unsuspecting pedestrians stepped upon the flowers, the petals began to fall daintily into the gutter and washed away into the run-off. Walker Yumasaki walked home a heartbroken and defeated man. His relationship would never be the same again… the dying roses a perfectly painful analogy for what the future had in store.