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[It's late at night when the journal entry appears.]

Evening.

I suppose I am writing in this thing because I can't sleep. I haven't really figured out what to do about that. Any suggestions would be helpful.

[There's a pause, before he adds more.]

Is anyone else up at this hour? What are you doing with your time?

[Another pause, longer than the last.]

If anyone would like to talk right now, that would be fine.

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Those sound really cool, not even kidding. Shame there aren't any here...

Are there?

[And she pauses, not sure she knows that name?]

Who's Tohru?

I'm not sure technology would support it. I could make some inquiries though if you want. Miss Margie might have a way to make it viable.

[He has some money lying around after all.]

Ah, well, Tohru was my best friend.

Hey, if it's something you wanna do, I'll give it a shot.

[Uh oh Natsuno...she zeroes in on this one.]

Best friend huh? Tell me about him.

[He's shifting a little on his hammock and trying to think of what to say. It's been awhile because, well his focus had been elsewhere. He feels a little guilty about that now, considering how things turned out.]

Let me see, he was really friendly. Even when I told him to back off, he was still determined to be my friend. He was older than me, eighteen already and out of school, so he was learning to drive. He was pretty good at repairing broken bike tires, and he always won at video games. He had more time to play them I guess. Him and his siblings, his parents were all just really good people.

[He sounds like he's smiling, just a little bit.]

Even Masao liked him and Masao was terribly annoying. He was friends with Tohru's little brother Tamotsu. I stayed over there a lot because I didn't really get along with my parents. I never have. If it wasn't for Tohru, I would have been able to walk away from Sotoba, most likely.

So he was a nice guy, and he was persistent. Kind of a role model?

[Her voice is actually soft, no teasing edge to it this time.]

Sounds like he means a lot to you.

He was my best friend and he meant everything to me at the time. He was so ridiculous. There's this legend in the town - see there's a spring where the water comes into this little reservoir the town built and in there is this spider and for some reason he seemed to think drinking the water makes you smarter. I kind of rolled my eyes at him but he splashed me with the water and told me I needed it because I was...[A small intake of breath.] working so hard towards entrance exams.

[He stares at the ceiling. These memories, these were the best ones.]

He uh, died. Two months before I came here.

[Chandra follows along quietly until that last bit.]

Oh...uh...shit. I'm sorry, Yuuki.

I'm always up for a talk should you need it, you know.

Thank you.

[Most of his stories kind of end that way.]

I wish that was the end of it, but unfortunately he's become the star of many a nightmare.

I can't sleep so that would be nice, I think.

Oh?

[She...doesn't want to say it. But she's definitely thinking "Is he like you?"]

[Him and a good fifth of the population of Sotoba.]

Yeah, he came back after he died. He was more of a normal vampire. I'm a Jinrou which is somewhat different. When I became a problem for Tatsumi...no, when I made myself a problem, he dispatched Tohru to kill me. I thought I could save him, or help him or something I don't know. I couldn't leave him behind.

Back up a sec. What's the difference between you and a normal vampire, so I have context. And why's this Tatsumi trying to kill you?

[This is a somewhat surprisingly easier subject to discuss.]

A vampire like Tohru was, like most of them were, has to drink blood all the time or they die. Can't go out in the sunlight, afraid of religious symbols. A lot of the myths that I was researching before I died seemed to be close to the truth. They sleep all day and only prowl at night. No heartbeat, no warmth...probably what most people think when they think vampire.

[He hums a little bit.]

A Jinrou like myself or Tatsumi has a heart beat and can pass off as very much alive. Drinking blood isn't necessary for survival, however as I found out it is necessary to avoid a lot of excruciating pain. Unlike a normal vampire, I can't die from not drinking blood. I can wander around outside in the daylight, keep normal, human hours. I don't know about the religious stuff, it hasn't ever come up.

[He almost smiles a little, because whatever he thinks about himself, he at least did what he had to.]

I knew the vampires were there. Mostly that's Shimizu's fault. Akira, Kaori and myself were the offensive. We tried to trap one, to show everyone that there were vampires but that didn't work. When I became a threat, he felt the need to kill me.

And, clearly he failed. What happened to Tohru?

No, he didn't fail. Tohru did kill me.

[He grimaces, but she probably can't hear that. His death was unpleasant to say the least.]

Tohru was pretty broken after that. He'd come to my window every night, leave a flower and cry. No one knew I was lurking in the shadows, at least, not until just before I came. Tatsumi was pretty pissed I didn't join his little family of vampires.

And...here you are all the same?

Here I am, yeah.

[And how great is that?]

If only because it's pointless to kill myself here when I'd just come back to life. I made a promise to Riku not to die before he did. At least, not intentionally.

[The story, he needs to get back on track.]

I was dead, completely dead, but I woke up again. Everything was different, everything felt different. I didn't want to come back. I let everyone keep thinking I was dead, well aside from my father who was there. I feel really bad about that. That he's seen me like this.

Hold on, hold on. You were dead, and you woke back up? At home?

[You're kinda muddling details here, kiddo!]

[He should slow down instead of rambling, perhaps.]

Yes. I'm not entirely sure how long I had been dead. A few hours maybe. Tohru came late in the night and it was around ten in the morning when I came around. Long enough for my dad to find me and call the mortuary from the city. They were coming in to take my body.

Talking is always a good way to get things off ones mind. Especially if it's the reason you can't sleep in the first place.

There's a lot of reasons I can't sleep, it's just that my mind seems to be occupied lately. Something unpleasant happens and you can't help but think of everything else.

Yeah, tell me about it.

[Not that Codi can't shut off her own brain--just that she has someone else as loud as she is occupying the same space. Getting both of them to shut up is kind of tedious.]

[But Codi doubts her new friend here is suffering from similar problems.]

...I mean literally, tell me about it. What was going on in September?

I was being stalked. That wasn't that strange, because I had a stalker, except she died. She stalked me again after she became a vampire. It was hard to sleep with her watching me.

...I'm not sure I'd call that really...dead then. I mean, if you got back up and all.

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