Interlude 4: Patrick
Patrick shoved Yumiella into her room, closed the door, and then let out a sigh of relief.
“Why was Yumiella walking around dressed like that...?” he mumbled to himself.
He could finally admit to himself that Yumiella, now safely hidden behind a door, was wearing quite the suggestive outfit. He had a fairly good picture of how she’d ended up in that situation. After being forced to return the black gothic lolita dress, she’d probably had nothing else to wear.
What he didn’t understand was how she could be so blasé about wandering around in nothing but an oversized dress shirt. Patrick was well aware that she lacked common sense, had no real understanding of social mores, and didn’t have a normal thought process, but despite all of that, she still had some feminine qualities befitting a girl of her age.
When it came to matters related to romantic relationships, she would often become lovably bashful and, compared to her general brash attitude, unusually embarrassed. Patrick generally found that side of Yumiella to be incredibly adorable, but...
“Oh, I guess that didn’t register as an embarrassing outfit for her...” After taking several deep breaths and calming himself down, he tried to follow Yumiella’s thought process.
It was just a guess, but he believed that Yumiella equated wearing nothing but a dress shirt to wearing an actual dress. It was true that the amount of skin exposed wasn’t very different, but... Patrick stopped that line of thought right in its tracks and shook his head in a panic, trying to banish the image of Yumiella in his dress shirt that popped up unbidden in his mind.
Patrick walked fast, heading towards the door out to the grounds. It was nearing winter, and the nights were getting chilly—it would be the perfect temperature to cool down his uncomfortably warm face.
He was standing in the yard, looking up at the starry night sky, when he heard a noise behind him. He flinched and turned around to find a black-haired girl behind him. Her face was one he was used to seeing, except that one eye was obscured by her hair. On top of that, the girl was wearing a gown that his Yumiella would never wear (under normal circumstances, anyway).
She was the Yumiella Dolkness from a parallel world. This world-destroying girl settled her lips into a mocking smile.
“Are you really okay being out here right now all alone?” she asked with a laugh. “Your dear girlfriend is waiting for you in her room.”
“Yumiella’s gone back to her room by herself. Also, she got something to wear on her own. She doesn’t need my help.”
“That’s strange. She didn’t have any clothes in your room... I made sure of it when I abandoned her there.”
After a moment of awkward silence, Patrick admitted, “There was a shirt of mine there...” He had debated whether or not he should mention this, but he decided that it would be better to have a frank conversation about the situation so that he had a chance to forbid this Yumiella from playing such annoying pranks in the future.
Instead of having a civil conversation, though, she became visibly upset and launched into a tirade of insults against her other self. “What?! I can’t believe it... Flirting with a guy and seducing him like that... I just hate her more and more.”
“I don’t think Yumiella had any intention of doing those things...” Patrick couldn’t connect the concept of “flirting” with his Yumiella at all. “Seducing” was a word that was even more difficult to put in the same sentence as her name.
I mean, maybe I just didn’t notice, and she was trying to seduce me, Patrick mused. There was one time she held up her hair and said, “Look, Patrick, it’s the nape of my neck. Come on, look,” before closing in on me with her back facing me, so maybe that was...?
“No, it definitely wasn’t,” he assured himself with a decisive nod.
“Who are you talking to?” she grumbled, sucking her teeth. She walked up beside Patrick and joined him in looking up at the night sky. “You really like her, huh...?” she observed quietly.
“Yeah, I fell for her hard.”
“She was probably alone in the Academy too. She probably didn’t have any friends, or anyone on her side at first. You approached her because...you felt sorry for her?”
“You think I felt sorry for Yumiella?” For a moment, Patrick was genuinely confused by Yumiella 2’s words.
He had to admit to himself that he might have felt a little sorry for her in the beginning, but the more time he’d spent with her, the more those feelings had disappeared.
Seeing his reaction, the other Yumiella seemed to understand.
“So you really did just naturally fall for her... You have terrible taste in women.”
“I won’t deny that.”
“You know, she seems pretty dense. I’m sure there are people who might try to use that to their benefit and take advantage of her.”
“It’s true that she’s a bit dense, but no one’s trying to do that...”
“Really? Weren’t you just ogling her, not ten minutes ago? It’s not hard to remove a men’s dress shirt.”
“I was thinking no such thing!” Patrick exclaimed without hesitation. Hearing those words from someone who looked identical to his fiancée packed an extra punch. He took a deep breath, apologized for raising his voice, and then tried to change the topic, but he found himself unsure of what to call her.
“Yumi— I mean, um, you...” he stammered.
“You can just call me 2 like she does.”
“Well, that’s kind of...” Patrick wasn’t comfortable with calling her “Yumiella 2.” It was a distinction made solely for practical purposes, but he didn’t like using numbers for people.
The girl beside him sighed. “Then plain Yumiella is fine, since the other one’s not here anyway.”
He winced. “That’s also kind of...”
“Fine, I get it. She’s the only ‘Yumiella’ for you, or something mushy like that, right? Sure, why not? I hope you two have a long, happy relationship.” She spat out her words so bitterly that they lacked any sense of the blessing they might have otherwise conveyed.
Patrick observed her once more. Her black hair was still slightly wet from her bath, and it appeared exactly the same as Yumiella’s, no matter how many times he looked at it. He wondered how they could be so different while also being this similar.
After spending a little time with this other Yumiella, Patrick was starting to feel that deep down, she wasn’t a bad person. Sure, she hurled insults, and she seemed to be constantly unhappy, but there was nothing outwardly malicious about her; she didn’t seem like someone who would kill for fun.
All it had taken were some very small factors in their lives that had been different; maybe if this Yumiella had been given some of the chances that his had, it could’ve sent her down a different path. If the people around her had just been kinder, then maybe... Patrick realized with a start that he would’ve been one of those people around her.
“Right, there was a me in your world too. My other self, he... I’m sorry. It’s useless for me to feel bad for how he treated you.”
“There’s no point in you getting depressed about it. In the same way that I’m a different person from her, the you back there was different from the you here.”
“The other me was a heartless bastard.”
I want to go to the parallel world and punch my other self, Patrick thought, finally understanding the jealousy that had caused things between the two Yumiellas to get so dicey so quickly.
Feeling bad for her made Patrick wonder about this other Yumiella’s future. She couldn’t go back to her former world, but it didn’t seem right for her to live in this world either. This world’s Yumiella was probably in agony right now, worrying about the same thing. Despite her claims that she didn’t like her, Patrick could tell that his Yumiella genuinely cared for this one.
Unable to find the right words, Patrick’s mind filled itself with anxious thoughts as time silently passed. The other Yumiella was the one to finally break the silence.
“Hey! Don’t just suddenly stop talking like that!” she snapped, glaring at him. “If you want to punish yourself, do it on your own time!” Just as he had thought, she had a kind heart. Patrick wanted to tell her that he was more worried about her than mad at himself, but she looked away from him and back up at the sky as she continued. “The other you reached out to me. I’m the one who dismissed him. Thank you for that... Although I guess thanking this version of you doesn’t accomplish anything.”
Patrick turned to her, shocked by her words, but she was already heading back inside.
“What do I do...?” he wondered aloud. Patrick had already felt like he wanted to save the other Yumiella if he could. Those feelings had grown, to the point that now he was determined to save her, no matter what it took. “My Yumiella probably won’t like that...” Patrick imagined that if she heard him say that, Yumiella would likely act upset, but it would only be for form’s sake. She, too, would do everything she could to save her other self.
Imagining that happening, Patrick couldn’t help but laugh.
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