I find myself staring hard at the couch absolutely draped in blankets, pillows, and whatever else Eric had thought we might need for tonight. He himself was currently just gathering up the last of the snacks from his home’s kitchen that we’d need before we settled down for the rest of the night until we inevitably grew too tired to continue. We’d hung out like this a few times before and it was always a blast, but I can’t help but feel something essential to it all is still missing.

I frown while I ponder it. Why was I struggling to enjoy this? I should be excited for what we’re going to be doing tonight, figuring out my optimal lounging position, and setting up my den of blankets to cocoon myself in. Just like I had done the other times we did this with both my best friends. I shake my head in frustration before I resolve to try and clear my head. The last thing I wanted to do was inadvertently ruin Eric’s night with whatever was wrong with me right now.

“Hey Eric!” I call out towards where I know the kitchen is. “I’m going to use the bathroom for a moment, I’ll be back in a bit.”

“Cool!” I hear him answer back while the soft sound of a fridge closing comes from the kitchen.

Satisfied he wouldn’t be left wondering where I was if he finished before I was done, I made my way through the partially decorated hallways of his home with a familiarity borne of the many times I had wandered through it. It was a nice house that spoke well about his family with the variety of family photos strewn around the walls and the often used but well maintained furniture. It might not be my own home, but in many ways it felt far more like a home to me than my home had ever felt.

I wonder what exactly that said about my own home. I didn’t have long to contemplate that when I nearly accidentally bump into Eric’s sister, Isabella, when I’m rounding a corner.

In many ways her appearance is a reflection of Eric’s and she even shares his height, standing a smidge taller than me despite being a year younger. But where Eric’s brown eyes usually radiate energy and liveliness, hers barely seemed to move at all even when we nearly collided. Where Eric’s hair is messy despite his attempts to wrangle it into something passable and progressively becomes wilder and wilder throughout the day despite his efforts, her longer dark brown hair carelessly strewn about looks to be more the product of simply not trying in the first place. Even her clothing just about every time I had seen her and even at school had always been loose and baggy pajamas.

With how little she seemed to care a part of me couldn’t help but wonder how Eric had ever come to the conclusion she was perceptive in the first place. I certainly didn’t know her well but nothing about her had ever really screamed perceptive to me. My mind was quick to answer that though when the visage of her on that terrible day when she saved me seemingly overlays itself atop her. I don’t think I’d ever be able to forget the sheer fire that had seemed to burn within her amber gaze or how the broken reality of that Realm seemed to mend itself wherever she went.

How was it that Isabella managed to be so different from how she was when she became Magical Girl Surging Earth?

“Something wrong?” Her even voice snaps me out of thoughts. One of her eyebrows is ever so slightly raised upwards like that’s the most she cares to manage.

My cheeks flush slightly while I shake my head. “No, sorry, I just had a few things on my mind. I was just heading to the bathroom to freshen up.”

She stares at me for a moment longer. For a second I think I see that same spark that was in her eyes when she was Surging Earth. It’s gone just as quickly though and she just gives me a nod before shuffling out of my path and continuing on her way, meandering in the direction of the kitchen.

I linger for a moment longer before I push myself to get moving again. It doesn’t take long for me to push the door to the bathroom open, gently shutting it again once I’m inside. I take a deep breath before I head to the sink and twist the knob for cold water. It only takes a moment for the water to begin to pour out from the faucet.

For a moment, all I do is watch the water pour from it and into the basin where it splashes off the open drain. Some of the droplets end up escaping the confines of the sink, but most end up being pulled right back in by gravity, a force that they have no hope of fighting now. It doesn’t take long for them to be pooled back together where they ultimately end up flowing down the drain, never to be seen again. How nice it would be to be able to fall into the-

I gasp at the cold water that splashes against my face when my hands seemingly of their own accord rush forwards to grasp what falling droplets they can, launching them at myself before they slip through the cracks. I can only be thankful for the disruption to my spiraling thoughts. What was wrong with me that thoughts like these kept popping up?

My grey eyes find themselves meeting those of my reflection which has silently mimicked each and every one of my actions within its glass stage. My short black hair has multiple stubborn strands unevenly jutting outwards from it, with nothing I’ve tried being able to bring it to order. Just the same as the stubble seemingly brushed across my face that seems determined to one day fully blanket it no matter how much I fight it. My shoulders are tense and my hands hurt a little from just how hard I’m gripping the edges of the sink.

I tear my eyes away from my reflection, unable to bear the haunted stare of its eyes any longer, much less the rest of my appearance. I had always hated seeing myself, but just like everything other peculiarity this week, it had gotten worse since that fateful day last week.

I force myself to clear my mind the best I can before any other intrusive thoughts can jump forwards, slowly taking deep breaths. For a minute it begins to work. My hands loosen their grasp, my shoulders begin to relax, and I feel my pounding heart that I hadn’t even realized was acting up alongside everything else begin to slow. For a single solitary moment, I manage to feel more at peace with myself than I have this entire week. I had to thank the person who had taught me this the next time I saw them.

Then it’s all ripped away in an instant when the chilling thought slams into me that I can’t even remember who had taught me how to calm myself like this. I knew someone had, someone close to me. But no matter how hard I try to remember who they were or how close I get to picturing their face, it all fades away before I have a chance to comprehend anything else.

“Why!? Why can’t I…” I yell for a moment, rage filling me before it’s just as swiftly replaced by a quiet despair when my voice trails off.

A gentle triplet of knocks interrupts my thoughts, keeping them from spiraling anymore than they already had. I quietly gulp, taking one last deep breath and shoving everything within my head to the side.

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“What’s up?” I say, my voice far calmer than the tempest within me would suggest.

“The ceiling.” I hear the even voice of Isabella cut through the door. I can only find myself blinking at her answer and she plows onwards not giving me a chance to figure out how to respond to that. “Are you doing anything private there I need to be aware of?”

“Well, uh, I don’t think so?” Why was she asking me that?

“Eh, that’s good enough for me.” The reason for her strange words is answered shortly when she opens the door, coming inside without a care in the world. My eyes widen while I stare at her. Her eyes now hold a slight glint of something I can’t identify now in her eyes within them and held within one of her hands lies a glass of milk. Why had she come inside?

It seems she takes my silence as permission to silently peer into my own. I’m not entirely sure what she’s searching for, my throat suddenly feeling drier and drier the longer it goes on. Eventually, I push myself to speak while my throat isn’t feeling completely dry.

“Isabella? I… Why are you here?” I manage.

She snorts. “To make my dreams a reality. Though it’s quite hard to manage that when you’re having a breakdown within the bathroom and my brother is pestering me about if I’m noticing anything off specifically about you. By the way, mind turning off the faucet?”

I reach out and twist the knob to stop the water while I process the rest of what she said. My eyes then narrow slightly when the realization about everything else she had said hits me. “Hey, I wasn’t having a breakdown in the bathroom, I was… I was just clearing my head.”

“And that involves you yelling to yourself, quite loudly I might add, about not being able to do something?”

“I-” My mind struggles to come up with an excuse about that part.

Isabella lightly sighs. “Look, I know I don’t know you that well. But you’re my brother’s friend and-” She pauses for a moment before a tiny frown colors her mouth. “And that means I’d really rather you not be having this breakdown, doubly so if it’s partially because of that Upheaval you got caught up in. So instead, why don’t you talk about it. Might not seem it, but it helps.”

Man, I must’ve really been in a state if she felt she had to talk to me. I could really see what Eric had meant now when he said she was perceptive. But I couldn’t shake the image of her status as a Magical Girl still within my head. I didn’t deserve her doing more than she already had when she saved my life. Especially when the root of it all seemed like it was something that everybody else that I knew that had been caught in an Upheaval was able to deal with without having anything more than a bad memory.

She heaves another sigh at my momentary silence, before she suddenly offers her glass of milk to me. “Look, just drink this at least if you don’t want to talk about it. Warm milk always helps me settle down and frankly you need it right now. And don’t tell me you don’t. We’d both know that’s a lie.”

I don’t take it, instead opting to just stare at the offered glass. “I… You’re not wrong there but…” I awkwardly grasp around for something to decline her. “Well, I wouldn’t want to take something you were going to drink yourself.”

It feels like I can hear her eyes roll. “I’d just get another glass of milk and heat it up. And before you try to say it too, no I haven’t drank from this one just yet so you don’t have to worry about it being unsanitary or anything like that. Any other excuses you want to throw at me?”

For a moment I consider saying I don’t like milk or wasn’t thirsty, though both really would be blatant lies at this point. In the end, I acquiesced and took her offered drink. The warmth of the milk within gently spilling forth from the glass and into my hand. I stare at it for another moment before I raise it to my mouth and take a gulp of it. The warmth of it now beginning to suffuse into my body and slowly relaxing my stomach and a few of my muscles. I really had needed that at least.

Isabella’s mouth now curves up slightly. “Thank you for not denying yourself that much. Just try and have a good night with my brother to relax, okay?. Averitta knows you need it. Now if you excuse me, I need to get myself a new glass of warm milk.”

I stare at her retreating figure for a moment and before I can stop myself I call out to her. “Hey Isabella? I, thanks again for this. I shouldn’t need you to talk to me like this after you already saved me once, but thanks. I needed this, even if I didn’t want to take up more of your time.”

For a moment she pauses in the doorway. It seems like she’s about to continue on before she abruptly spins around to face me again, a wary look now in her normally lazy seeming eyes. “What do you mean exactly by ‘already saved me once’?” She says slowly, a slight edge to her voice now.

I find myself gulping at her gaze. What was it about that line I said that caused this? “I, well, you're Surging Earth, aren’t you?”

She stiffens for a second before her gaze turns into a glare now, taking a step towards me now. “And how exactly do you know that?” She all but growls, the edge to her voice clearly coming through now.

I hold up my free hand in a placating gesture towards her, taking a step back when she stepped towards me. Why was she reacting like that? I was only properly saying thank you for when she had saved me instead of the mess I had said to her originally. Then it hit me, was I not supposed to have known that she wasn’t just Isabella, but Magical Girl Surging Earth too? It didn’t make much sense to me, but it was the only idea I had.

“Well, you told me yourself when you were in costume that you were Isabella. I, sorry if I wasn’t supposed to mention that to you or really talk about it with you at all. I didn’t realize-”

The edge to her features disappears in an instant while she holds a hand up, stopping me from rambling on any further. She’s no longer glaring at me, instead that spark in her eyes returning full force and this time to stay. “You remember?”

Thrown off by her sudden shifts in emotions, I confusedly nod. Was I not supposed to remember?

She looks at me like she’s only just truly seen me for the first time now. “How much?”

“I remember, well everything about our conversation after you saved me. And I, well, I remember far too much about that day. I don’t think I’ve been the same since that day if I’m being honest.”

Isabella stares at me in silence only to break it a moment later when she laughs. “Oh shit. Leave it to me to get blindsided by this and not notice. No wonder you were having that breakdown if you actually remembered that day.”

It takes me a moment to stop gaping at her to ask the question now on my mind. “Is it a bad thing I remember?”

She shakes her head while she steps towards me, closing the distance. “No. At worst it’s just different and I’m going to have to ask you to never mention that I’m Surging Earth to anyone, ever. But if you’re able to remember for the reason I think you are…” She places a hand against my shoulder for a second and I nearly jump at the strange feeling that runs throughout my body when she does so. “Well, we’ll be talking again very soon.”

I find myself gingerly rubbing the spot she touched with my free hand. What was that? “How will I know if we’re going to be talking again soon?”

She grins at me, an expression I had seldom seen on her before today. “You’ll know. It’ll be very hard to miss. Now, like I said earlier, relax and enjoy the night with Eric.” With that said, she makes her way out, pointedly in the direction of the kitchen, and this time I don’t stop her.

I find myself standing there for a minute trying to process whatever had just happened in the conversation before I eventually just take a deep breath and a deep gulp of the warm milk within my hand. Whatever it was, she seemed confident that we’d be speaking about it more if it really did matter.

The thought of taking her advice to just enjoy hanging out with Eric flashes through me again and I find myself liking the idea. At the very least, all those strange thoughts were out of my system for now and my head was cleared enough that I didn’t think I’d be worrying him anymore.

I could be glad for that at least.