~ Episode Twenty ~

Time Alone With Shinji?!:

Eri’s Anxious First Date

The stark white Izuma farmhouse stared Eri down atop a neatly-landscaped hill wedged between Libra Road’s smaller, newer, homes. They were all pressed together where wheat fields likely once stood a century before. Two front windows glared at her between black shutters, like vertical eyelashes. The stoop stood empty, a gaping mouth that warned passerby’s to keep on passing by.

Eri tied her hair back in a favorite red scrunchie and strode up the driveway on brave heels. She sighed through knots in her stomach as she approached the house. Ghosting memories of Mackenzie’s voice teased her: “It’s super adorable how you act when he’s around … It’s so obvious you like him.”

Truth be told, she didn’t know how to feel about Shinji Izuma.

Slight guilt hung in Eri’s heart – Her parents didn’t know she was here. Noah didn’t know she was here. As far as anyone was concerned, Eri was at Mackenzie’s house working on another school project. The knots in her stomach tightened around a dull wave of fresh cramps.

The Lexus she thought Shinji’s parents drove was nowhere to be found. Her gaze found the stoop – the curtain in one of the sidelights rustled as somebody peeked out. Moments later, the front door swung open to reveal Shinji within-frame.

Mackenzie’s pre-recorded obnoxiousness resumed playback: “You have a date? With Shinji?!”

Eri recalled how nervous he’d been after the encounter with Cloria and Zorfus. The way he shifted on his heels, rubbing his arm. The way he was too embarrassed to meet Eri’s gaze when he asked her, Wanna hang out Sunday?

“Hey,” he called out to her.

Eri swallowed hard, waved. “Hi.”

Was this a date?

Shinji stepped out onto the stoop and closed the door behind him, locking it with a set of keys from his pocket. There was a large plastic tote bag folded under one arm. He jogged down the steps to meet Eri along the drive.

“You feeling any better?” he asked. “I was worried about you after that fight with Eldrom.”

“Oh – I’m okay,” Eri said, doing her best to play everything off. It was nothing! Just a migraine, just bad cramps, just a giant magical wind-wielding beast that tore its way out of an oak tree from another world. The perfect recipe to make any weary teenager faint in the middle of the forest. “So, um – you wanted to talk to me about Child of Destiny stuff?”

Shinji flicked her a hesitant glance. “Uh, yeah. We gotta do something, first.” He headed past her, towards the end of the driveway.

Eri turned, watching him with the sound of an approaching car in her ears. A banana-colored taxi sporting Shorebrooke YELL-OH! signage pulled up next to the curb.

“…Where are we going?” she asked.

Shinji opened the rear passenger side door for her.

“Grocery shopping,” he said.

~

“Sorry about this,” he apologized during their ride to the store. “I wanted to have lunch prepared for when you came over, but didn’t have what I needed. Wednesday was going to be grocery night, but then—” he sent a wary look the driver’s way. “You know. Eldrom.”

Eri nodded. “Yeah.”

“Haven’t had another chance. Been pretty preoccupied with … a new lead. And patrolling. And homework. Anyway, this works out. I don’t have to guess what you can eat if we’re shopping together.” Shinji looked almost relieved about it. “Uh … so, how are your migraines? Thompson said you’re getting them a lot recently.”

“She’s not wrong.” Eri frowned. “They just started coming out of nowhere, like I wanna say maybe a few weeks ago? They last like anywhere from a few minutes to like an hour.”

“Really? I thought migraines lasted longer than that. Your headaches are just as intense?”

“Like I’m going to throw up sometimes. Real bad dizziness. The night with Eldrom, I thought my head was gonna split in half.”

“It almost did. You’re lucky you didn’t crack your skull open when you fainted.” Shinji’s hard-set gaze on her softened. “Are they always that bad?”

“Not really.” Eri thought back to how intense her cramps had been the previous Wednesday. Their worst so far. The pain would have obliterated her if not for Noah’s girlfriend swooping in to save the day. “The other night was different.”

“Different how? I don’t understand.”

Eri shook her head, looked out the window as the streets passed them by. How could he understand? “I dunno. Just worse.”

The taxi pulled into the No Frills plaza at the edge of town. Shinji paid and got out, Eri following him across the seat. He shut the door behind her and together, they trekked across the parking lot towards the cart corral in front of the grocery store.

“What’s your doctor say about your migraines?”

“My doctor? You’re kidding, right?” Eri watched Shinji fumble around for a quarter to use in the coin-lock mechanism that kept the carts all chained together. “My parents would tie a leash around my waist if they knew something was wrong with me. I never get sick.”

“It could be serious, Seruma.” Shinji reflected on this with an almost distant look in his eyes. “Sounds like they really care about you.”

Eri snorted. “Care isn’t quite the word that comes to my mind. But, okay.”

When they entered the store, Shinji withdrew a small checklist and handed it to her. “I have everything memorized. If you spot anything before I do, just go for it.”

“Um, ‘kay.” Eri thoughtfully read over his graceful cursive. She remembered a time when Shinji’s penmanship was nearly impossible to read – just jerky squiggles on a page that instigated derogatory ire from their peers. The handwriting she read now – it was immaculate, so concise – so grownup. Like Shinji was a tiny adult of some kind.

The thought was an endearing one, and made Eri giggle.

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They maneuvered through a few narrow aisles, picking up items as they came by. At one point an icy shiver went through Eri, like someone was watching them – following them. She dared a peek over her shoulder and found only the notice of an old hunch-backed man on dual canes by a shelf of breakfast cereals. He watched the two kids shop together without supervision, a wild grin on his face.

Something familiar about him tickled at the back of Eri’s memories. Something lingering in the shadows there – something that had always been, yet never seen. She narrowed her eyes at him and turned away, barely aware of the headache that began to form.

“So, um, how are you doing? You know, beaten-up-by-Monsters not included.”

“…Me?” The question startled Shinji. “I’m, uh, I’m doing okay. Just stressed. You know.” He didn’t elaborate.

Eri tried to study his forward-set gaze. They offered her nothing except a hunt for packaged tofu, fresh celery and mushrooms, and garlic bread. For Shinji to be stressed out – probably about this whole Child of Destiny thing – made total sense.

A bump against Eri’s hand left her thoughts like ash on the wind. She looked down, taking in the unexpected jolt that came with the graze of Shinji’s knuckle against her flesh.

He flinched from her. “Sorry.”

It had just been a graze, but touching Shinji’s hand – it felt so cold, clammy. Was he … nervous? Did he mean to bump hands with her? Was he trying to maybe … reach for hers, and got scared?

Eri felt her face grow hot, the ghosting whispers of Mackenzie in her ear again.

“Maybe this is your lucky day.”

Eri’s chest tightened, fearful. Was this a date?

An even scarier question plagued her: did she like him? In the way Mackenzie assumed so obsessively? In the way other kids their age were just starting to experiment with liking each other? Eri struggled to find an answer when Shinji stopped midway down the aisle to inspect different flavors of pasta sauce.

“Which do you like?” he asked. “Spicy tomato and peppers, or zesty garlic pesto?”

Eri honestly didn’t know. She didn’t know if she liked anybody in that way. Being around Shinji brought on feelings of anxiety. Not the kind of butterfly feelings she’d come to expect from the daytime soaps her mom watched while cross-stitching – nor the angst-ridden romantic confessions from the bootlegged fansubs Mackenzie sobbed over after school. And not at all like how the characters in Eri’s favorite Regina Lepue book series felt about each other…

She had never really considered it until now. Wasn’t attraction supposed to feel warm? Wasn’t it supposed to make her heart swell and flutter and make her feel all light-headed, almost like she were floating?

Kind of like – maybe how it felt to be around Isa Keitel? The way Eri felt now, just thinking about her?

“I don’t need you to be my friend.” The sting of Isa’s words from Thursday still seared like fresh coals. “I can take care of myself. Got that, Red-eye?”

Eri sighed.

“Seruma, pass me that block of cheddar, will you? Oh – you’re not lactose, right?”

This other feeling though, about Shinji, however – this anxiety Eri always felt around him – was that supposed to signify attraction to another person? She massaged a tense shoulder with idle strokes, curious.

Regardless, she couldn’t deny that the attention Shinji showered over her this past week did, indeed, feel nice…

Not to mention their time spent fighting Monsters together. The way Shinji came to her aid in the library when Nagamani tore through Borrower’s Services. The way Shinji tackled her out of the way when Kyupo’s speedball struck their path in Grover’s Mill with the blast radius of a landmine. The way Shinji risked his life leaping onto Zorfus’s back, all to give her a chance to Seal it into a Mon-Orb...

The way Shinji believed in her wholeheartedly. Doubtless.

“You can do this, Seruma. I know you can.”

At one point in time, Shinji had been Eri’s best friend. They’d known each other since preschool – inseparable until the summer of 1996, when Eri’s dad moved her family to Base Borden on the off-chance he might serve in Kosovo. When that didn’t happen, and the Serumas returned to Shorebrooke in 1998, things were different.

Shinji was different.

He was cold. Distant. Devoid of the laughter and the wide toothy grin Eri always remembered him wearing.

It was like Shinji Izuma had become a completely different person in the two years she was away.

A tiny adult trapped in a child’s body.

It wasn’t until this whole Monster stuff happened that he’d started warming up to Eri again. Noticing her again. Talking to her again. It was almost funny in a way – the conservation grounds where they’d first met as children had since become home to the Monsters they fought now as teenagers. The giant god of Grover’s Mill had brought them together again.

Did this mean they were best friends again?

If so, why did Shinji keep acting like Eri was more than that? She had her own magic, her own elemental weapon to wield against the Kenah’dai. She didn’t need Shinji’s protection. They were teammates, tasked to find the Child of Destiny together, with Macks and Evan.

The psychic friction between their unhooked hands intensified, dared her to ponder this louder and longer with every aisle they wandered through.

Was Mackenzie right? Was Shinji into her more than just as friends? And was Eri attracted to Shinji this whole time, and just didn’t know it?

And, if this was supposed to be a date with Shinji, wasn’t holding hands a thing people on dates were supposed to do?

With those thoughts came an almost unconscious pull that drew Eri’s slender artist fingers towards Shinji’s stubby labor fingers – all nicked by paper cuts that marked his voracious reading habits.

Despite her irrational fear of Shinji, she wondered if holding his hand might feel nice, too…

With a sharp breath caught in her lungs, Eri nudged her fingers against his thumb. A static charge emitted between them.

“Hang on, I need milk.” Shinji pulled away and made a sudden beeline for a wall of refrigerators by the back corner of the store.

Eri blinked, confused. She wheeled the cart after him.

“Hand me a couple cans of orange juice. The concentrate stuff.” Shinji reached into one of the refrigerators for a couple of bags of two per-cent. He dumped them into the cart when Eri pulled up beside him, and started to inspect nearby egg cartons. “Couple more things and we’re done here. There’s a lot to go over when we get back.”

“W-we’re going back to your place to make lunch, right?”

“Yeah. You getting hungry?”

Lunch with Shinji. At his place.

Eri’s stomach growled around what felt like a thousand more knots tying together. She remembered there hadn’t been any cars in Shinji’s driveway. His parents worked at the Magna plant just outside of town. From what she remembered, weekend shifts were a thing that existed for them.

Eri would be alone with Shinji at his house. No parental supervision. No older brothers walking in, taking over, ordering her around. No one to hover about like police helicopters with all-encompassing spotlights.

Just the two of them. Alone.

Her mouth felt cotton-dry with the realization. Surely, partaking in such a risk would put her before The Seruma Court. She’d be found guilty without trial, sentenced to carry out her days shackled to the dungeon walls of her bedroom until the age of thirty-five, at least.

But, still. What Shinji offered her today was a kind of freedom Eri didn’t know of.

A kind of freedom that in many ways felt – so wrong. And yet felt so equally right in all of its intuitive wrongness.

Alone with Shinji. A boy.

Making lunch together – alone.

Eating lunch together – alone.

A date.

The thought of it was paralyzing.

“Seruma?” He called her back, concern in his eyes. “Is … is that a problem?”

Eri forced a weak smile at him, but then shook her head with a confident defiance she’d never felt before in her life. “N – no! No problem.”

The thrill of it rushed through her like nothing else.

Like bliss.