Remilia Bonheur.

“So uh, this is kind of a bit odd. I've never done this before.”

“Yes yes, it's a bit different than what you're used to.” she said.

“Are we really doing this?”

“Take it slow, it's not like anything can really go wrong.” The author was fidgeting as he sat on the bench. It was an early March weekday, a rare occurrence of the sun managing to fight its way through the Oregon clouds in a fruitless attempt to bring some heat. The chipper young girl next to him wasn't much for the cold weather despite her Nebraskan heritage, but nobody noticed due to her convincing impression of a Valley girl. Her vibrant blonde hair was messily pulled back into a ponytail, with tufts and bangs hanging forward to cover her gaunt, pale face being illuminated by small cheeks dabbed with blotches of color.

“...Remilia?”

“Yes, oh dear father of mine~?” Her voice had a bit of dramatization to it. The author couldn't look at her. He sighed a bit as he wondered what to say.

“I. I don't really know what to say. I don't really know what to say.”

“Take your time.” she had a patient tone to her voice.

“I'm... really sorry.” was all he said. “I'm just... sorry for this.” She smirked a bit and looked at her dainty legs swinging back and forth underneath the bench.

“I know you are. You are for a lot of things, Pa.” The author's face grimaced.

“Don't call me 'Pa'.” he muttered.

“Hmm? Why not?”

“It's what I call my old man.”

“Well, you're more of a father to me than my actual one. I'm here because of you, aren't I?”

“...This is going to get really weird, isn't it?”

“Yep, probably~!” The author turned to look at Remilia. She had a wide, dumb smile on her face. It was pure and honest, the construct didn't matter. She was born without a belligerent bone in her body.

“I guess,” the author mulled over his words. “I guess, I don't like letting this happen to you. I don't think it's your responsibility anymore.” She turned away and looked down.

“I had a feeling it would be about this.” There was a bit of resolution in her voice. “The thought of putting someone through the same awful things you grew up with. It hurts a lot when you get attached enough, doesn't it?”

“Yeah. Yeah, it does. I just... why am I doing this to you?” There was a moment of silence. The ambient noise of cars, a few stray birds, and some rustling branches were all that were filling the air. The girl broke the silence.

“I'm okay with it, you know?”

“Why?”

“Well... you made me that way, didn't you?”

“You shouldn't be okay with this.” The author was getting frustrated. “Nobody would be okay with this.”

“I'm a nobody, so I'm okay with it.” she responded. “Listen, Pa, I know what you're doing here. You're thinking about giving up again, aren't you?” The author sighed. He was read like a book. Not a book he'd write, because he had yet to finish any.

“Well, yeah. I guess I have been.” There was another pause. The girl's face scrunched and she looked at the author.

“No, I don't mean on me. Or on this. I mean GIVING UP.”
“Eh, fuck.” The author's tone would've been familiar to a shoplifter who just got caught. Remilia's face turned and it looked like she muttered under her breath.

“This again, huh?” she let out a deep breath as her voice became subdued. “It's this monster again.”

“Oh for the love of God, don't act so exasperated. You have no fucking idea what this is like.”

“You know that's a lie~.” And the author did. He knew that he was full of shit when he said that.

“Okay so you do.”

“THAT'S HOW YOU RAISED ME. SURPRISE.” She had a smug cartoonish grin on her face when the author looked over.

“Shit.”

“Oh why are you so bent out of shape over that? How could I not know? You make it so darn obvious, not even just to me, but to EVERYBODY.” she proclaimed to the park, standing up and spreading her arms. People in the park started looking over at the two.

“Like that guy.” she pointed. “And that woman over there. That dog sure as heck knows. All those people know how much of a debbie-downer you are!”

“Oh for the love of God sit down, you're making a scene you stupid child.”

“RUDE.” And with a 'hmph' she situated herself back on the bench. He placed his hand over his eyes irritated.

“Good God I forgot that you're a tactless bint.”

“Hey now. No need for that kind of talk.”

“Why do you always do this?” he asked. “Did you ever consider I don't talk to you about this because of how you treat it?”

“You mean like a big joke?”

“Yes.”

“That's your own fault and you know that too~.” As dimwitted and tactless as the girl was, she knew exactly what the author was thinking. She grew up with him, and often knew him better than himself.

“And stop calling me 'dimwitted', it's not nice.” she interjected into the narration.

“You are dimwitted.” he replied.

“And why are you writing about this? We talk a lot, so why choose to do it now?”

“It's... to maybe give me something to mull over later with. Something concrete.” Remilia smiled.

“So you're at least getting better about talking about it, right? That's a good first step.”

“It is, I guess.” At least he thought it was. He believed it with his heart that it was. The soul was absent though, and Remilia knew that, too.

“Of course I do, how wouldn't I?” she interjected again. The author sneered.

“You think you're cute.”

“I know I'm cute~.” she smugly admitted.

“Yeah well, I'm not sure what's happening either. I don't know how to feel about this.” Remilia was a bit confused by the author.

“Like you don't know what to do, or...?”

“No, I don't know how to feel.” he paused to figure out how to articulate his thoughts. “I can't react the way I want to, or the way I know I should. All this shit happens and all these people talk to me and there's just—”

“Nothing.” she said. The author sighed.

“...yeah. Not a damn thing.” His eyes glazed over a bit as they looked around. “I know I should care about this. About these people. But it just doesn't mean really anything to me, anymore. Nothing is there.” Remilia had a bit of a grimace as her head followed some children walking by.

“Well.” She paused. Her motormouth contrasted her contemplative thoughts. She understood the importance of each word she spoke and chose them carefully. “People go numb after seeing enough, going through enough.” Words rolled out more slowly than before. “You detach and stop feeling everything, you can't really pick and choose what. That's why it's scary when it happens.”

“Yeah.”

“And you know I don't like it when you get like this.” she said. “The monster's coming again, isn't it?”

“...yeah.”

“I know what the monster does to people.” her voice rang with a slight dullness and exhaustion. “I know what it was doing to me. And I know what it's doing to you.”

“Just be blunt with it. I want to kill myself again.” The author's bluntness was a weapon. He was tired of coming up with workarounds.

“Yeah, that thing.” she meekly replied.

“Look, the best I could hope for is to die while leaving as little of an impact on other people as possible. The less they care, the easier it is for me not to be guilt-tripped into putting up with this any longer for their sake. They'll be in shock day one, grieve through day three, be bitter at the end of the week, and come the following month I won't even be brought up. That is what I want to mean to people.” Remilia was unamused by the author's nihilistic rantings.

“Is it really.” Exasperation was oozing from her lips.

“Meh.”

“You're just tired.”

“You think?”

“I mean, I don't blame you.” She stretched and leaned back against the bench. “You have no self-worth. If you're no good to people, then what good are you, right? It's that logic.”

“...yeah, a bit.”

“It hurts a lot just being alive. BEING ALIVE FEELS TERRIBLE.”

“Well, for us.” he nodded.

“So we want to live through other people and avoid ourselves as muuuuuuuuuuuch as possible. If other people are happy because of us, then we're happy! Yaaaaay, everybody's happy!”

“Right.”

“Buuuuuuuuuut...” Her mood soured a bit. “We can try as much as we want, but we might be around people who won't ever be happy. You've been around some bad people most of your life, Pa. They're no good and you know it.”

“...right.”

“If we can't make other people smile, other people happy, then we're just stuck with our miserable selves. We're stuck with that hurt that comes from just being alive. We try our best to get past it, but it's still always gonna be there. And when it goes on long enough—”

“You become numb.”

“You start having conversations with yourself.” she added.

“I couldn't begin to imagine.”

“Without the company of friends you get stuck inside your own head and pull yourself apart. Like, I know I'm a good one. I met the other people in your head, they're jerks.”

“They're fucking pricks.”

“Right, so.” she readjusted her top straps underneath her coat. “You don't know what to do with people anymore, huh?”

“That's a way to put it, yes.”

“And you're tired of trying to figure something else out that might work this time.”

“Pretty much.” he bluntly stated. Remilia let out a sigh.

“But... this time it was bad.” she looked down. “Otherwise we wouldn't be here talking.”

“This time it got bad.” he said.

“This time it might be donezo for good, is what you're feeling.”

“I don't know what I feel at this point, honestly.” The indifference in his voice hid his anxiety poorly.

“Usually you just regress for a bit and then it's back to normal later.” Her bubbly disposition was becoming gradually subdued as the conversation continued. “Just like we always talk it out.”

“This time it seems like something finally broke. I don't know how to come back from this. Or if I want to.”

“If you can't connect with people anymore, you're isolated, and you're stuck with us.” she shrugged. “And you know they'll eventually find a way to shut me up for a bit.”

“Yeah.”

“Then you'll be stuck in here with just them, and that's—”

“When I'll probably call it quits.” She didn't really say anything in response. She just looked at the people in the park.

“We'll find a way to fix this, we always do.” she nodded reassuringly. “I'll get you out of here.”

“...hopefully.”

"You still mean something to somebody. I wouldn't be here telling you this if you still didn't believe it yourself, right?"

“...I suppose that's how that works.”

“You know that they can't keep me quiet for good. I'm too stubborn for that.”

“Far, far too stubborn.”

* * *

“Hey, I have a question.” he looked over at Remilia.

“Hmm~?”

“Do you think everybody can be forgiven? Deserves to be forgiven?” Her expression widened a bit at the question.

“...that's awfully progressive of you to ask, ain't it?”

“Yeah.” The author seemed a bit surprised at himself as well. “I suppose I've done a bit of growing up over the years.”

“Just a decade ago you'd be just like the rest of your family, unable to let a grudge go. I'm proud of you!”

“Grudges are too heavy to carry around for so long.” There was a bit of a tired resolution to his voice. “This shit gets exhausting after a while.”

“That's good, that's good~.”

“So answer the question.” Remilia rested her tilted head on her hand looking at the author, then turned forward.

“...I think I know what this is about.”

“Just answer it.”

“I think,” she rolled her words around in her mouth a bit. “I think, an important part of becoming a better person is learning that you aren't always going to be forgiven, and that you shouldn't always deserve it.” The author's vacant stare remained locked forward.

“I figured you of all people would be qualified to answer this.”

“Sometimes it's too much to ask of the person who was hurt to forgive somebody. It's not fair to them to expect that, even if you think you fixed the problem or that things are cool between you now.”

“Sometimes you got to take the L and move on.” he responded.

“And it's not always because the person you hurt is holding a grudge, but you know, you gotta just ask sometimes if it's... well...”

“If it's worth the effort.” Monotone punctuated the brevity of the sentence.

“Yeah.” she nodded in somewhat solemn approval. “It doesn't make you a mean-spirited or a spiteful guy if you think it isn't, too.”

“Just have to... move on.” he quietly said.

“Sometimes people just suck and they won't change~.” There was a fermenting bitterness underneath her chipper attitude. “I don't think everybody can be forgiven just because the lousy person became a decent one, ya know? Sometimes the people hurt or burned can't... what are the words...?”

“Develop the capacity or desire to forgive the people that hurt them.”

“Yeah, that.” She let a bit of silence settle before speaking again. “Sometimes even if you want to forgive somebody, you just, can't. Just because you became a decent person doesn't make things hunky dory. That doesn't undo what ya did, it wasn't something that happened fast enough.”

“That's probably where reality sets in a bit, I guess.”

“I think,” she paused. “I think if you can't get that person to forgive you, then you gotta forgive yourself. You know, for your sake. And, yeah, move on. I guess. I dunno.”

“I don't, either.”

“So it IS about this.” She sighed and turned to look at him, grabbing his shoulders to make him look at her. His dead eyes had a shutter of life in them as they avoided contact with hers. Her chipper disposition was set aside.

“Listen, you know I'm repeating myself when I say this, but you gotta let this go. You gotta stop beating yourself up over this.”

“...over what?”

“Pa.”

“...” The author remained silent.

“Lucas.”

“Oh fucking Hell call me anything else but that.”

“PROMISE ME.”

“You know my promises are no good.”

“PROMISE. ME.” She remained stubborn and resolute.

“I... can't.”

“Lucas. You gotta let them go, let her go.”

“I know.”

“But you can't.” she said.

“But I can't.” he said.

“Pa.”

“But I got to.”

“But you gotta.”

“I...” his once-monotone and lifeless voice started trembling into bitter unfortunate life. “I... I've got to let this go.” A strung-out sigh shook his throat. “Fuck. Fucking shit.” She shifted her hands from his shoulders to his face. Her soft palms rode his jawline while her thumbs roamed across his cheeks. Her own mask was managing to slip off, too.

“You know I can't watch you keep doing this to yourself. I know how much this is killing you.”

“Some baggage is too heavy to just leave somewhere.” he shakily replied.

“Sometimes closure is too much to expect. You know that.”

“I'm never going to know how any of it would've panned out, will I?”

“It's gone. They're gone. She's gone.” she said. He had a coughing fit, attempting to stifle himself. Her damp thumbs skirted across the surface of his face.

“You can tell yourself that eventually, right?” she asked. “It doesn't have to be now.”

“Eventually.”

* * *

“...so for a while there, you lost yourself, didn't you?” Remilia asked as they walked. The author groaned. “You started this conversation in March.”

“...that I did.”

“I told you they couldn't shut me up forever.”

“You really are incredibly stubborn.” he chuckled.

“...You almost did it though.”

“I did.”

“But you didn't. That's good at least.”

“Still can't bet on it if I will or not.”

“Well, good thing you're lazy~.” there was a slight hint of mockery in her solemn tone. “When you're tired you can't even put in the effort to give up.”

“Yet.”

“And I'll be there waiting like always~.”

“Because you're a meddler.” The the park was empty at this point as they strolled through it side by side.

"Hey, Pa." she looked over as she spoke.

"I told you to stop calling me that. And what?"

“...do you think I would've been a good daughter?” He was taken aback by the question. It made him uncomfortable.

“...yeah, I think you would've been a good girl. A good girl with awful, awful parents.”

“Well, you turned out—“

“Terrible.”

“Okayish.” she replied.

“Still a stretch.”

“Not your dad.”

“Okay I'll take it.” There was a bit more of silence between them.

"Hey, Pa." she said.

"I literally just told you to stop calling me that."

“You're Pa to me, that's all.”

“What is it?”

“Thank you for creating me.” she said as she smiled.

“You're welcome.”

"I love you."

"I know."

"And it means something?"

"Yeah." He stared at his scuffed-up boots as they walked.