"On the next day, I went on a cleaning trip through the whole house. I never had anyone come over to our place, I didn't even know how I should act." It hadn't exactly been the whole house, the room they were currently in had been ignored. As always.

"My thoughts only consisted of questions that morning. 'Is there something expected from me? Do I need to clean the windows? Should I have any snacks or drinks? Heavens, I only have coffee and cocoa!' and things like that." Dawn giggled. Looking back, she could laugh at her nervousness.

"As always, I had spent the prior evening studying, trying not to think about the next day. Even though I had slept as little as any other night, I did not feel tired on Saturday. I don't recall ever feeling as excited as then."

"Aside from not having prepared what I'd let Cindy read as practice, I worried about mainly two things: how do I look and how clean is the house?"

"Since I wouldn't be leaving home, I could dress as cutesily as I wanted, not having to worry about the cold. Obviously, I wanted to impress my crush." Dawn considered for a moment, then continued, "I'm not sure when I had started to label her like that but at this point of my little love story that wasn't yet the case."

"Anyways, since I knew that my own wardrobe was neither cute nor daring enough for what I had in mind, I ventured to your belongings again. I remembered a short pastel purple dress you used to wear back when... D-Dad... was still here." Dawn took a breath. No matter how often she brought him up, she didn't feel comfortable mentioning him. Any time she did that in the past, her mother would go crazy.

Dawn made a few steps through the room when she suddenly stumbled over a loosened board in the floor. Great, now she broke the floor. Or had that happened before?

"So, once I had found that dress, I was sure that was appropriate. It had adorable frills but also showed enough legs and cleavage to get Cindy's heart racing. That's what I had hoped, anyway." She continued speaking as she inspected the wooden floor, gently pushing the broken board back in place.

"After I had prepared my clothes, I started vacuuming the whole house, something I hadn't found time for in... ever. I made sure to clean the bathrooms and kitchen, and reorganized my room. All of this wouldn't be worth mentioning if it weren't for a discovery I made."

Dawn unzipped her sports bag again and took out another box. It had a Pokémon print on it. When she opened it, various small items and many polaroids were revealed for her to see.

"I wasn't planning on letting you know I had this, let alone showing it to you. But now that I've mentioned him a few times already, I might as well." Dawn turned the box and presented the contents to the closed eyes. "I had forgotten that this existed. When he disappeared, and you made me get rid of all things that reminded you of him, I hid this."

With her hands shaking in fear, she brushed away a tear from her face. Even now she was expecting a household item to be thrown at her for daring to remind her mother of the man she had been together with for a decade.

"This was the box where Dad and I kept our Pokémon cards in. We always took it with us to the café to play." She couldn't stop the tears from flowing. Sobbing, she continued, "When you told me to throw them away, I was devastated. The cards, the locket with a photo of us three, and a handful of the small figurines Dad used to collect and let me play with - wanting to at least keep those fondest of memories, I stashed them in a small notch on the backside of my closet."

She grabbed the pendant that was hanging around her neck, nestled in her cleavage. Opening the triangular locket revealed a photo of Dawn as a child, both of her parents hugging her happily. Where had those smiles gone? What had stifled them?

"Since the moment I had found the box, I've been carrying it with me. The locket around my neck, the box in my bag." She closed the locket and let it fall back between her breasts. Drying the tears on her face, she continued, "I really don't understand what could have happened. Why did everything go to shit like that?"

"One day everyone is happy, playing with cards as always. Suddenly, on the next, we come home from the café and Dad and you start screaming at each other, breaking things. Over the course of twenty-four hours, he was gone."

Her sadness was slowly taken over by anger. "You know, I got an 'I'll always love you' as parting words, but then never a single message from him. Even if you two hated each other, why didn't he send me a single letter? Why didn't he call me, asked me to meet him? Didn't he love me?" Dawn yelled into the room, her hands pressed into fists.

"And you! What he had done, I don't know. Maybe he cheated on you or whatever, but you had no right to just shut down and stop caring about me," Dawn let her built-up anger flow, but only for a moment, "I did so much to make you happy, to make you smile again. Didn't you love me either?"

A few minutes passed in silence, Dawn standing still and taking deep breaths. Why had she only now noticed the stains on the walls? "Still, I couldn't get myself to hate either one of you. I have so many memories with both of you, so many that I hold dear. And while you both had broken and shut down, I don't think you ever meant to hurt me."

"The first few years after Dad left, I always had the hope he'd call me sometime, or just come back. Sure, when that didn't happen, I was mad at him. And I was mad at you too, for not giving a damn about me, for not telling me what had happened. But..." Her mother's face looked just as weak as back then.

"But I came to realize that you were a wreck. You always seemed so indifferent, and I thought you hated me. However, you really just had lost passion for life itself. Seeing that... helped me a lot. I couldn't be mad at you, nor Dad. Not when your mental health was so low." Dawn stepped closer.

"So I had made it my mission to make you happy again. I tried and tried, and yes, it got very frustrating, and anger built up over all this time. Even when logic told me your behavior was okay, I sometimes can't function on logic alone. Still, I wanted to see you overjoyed and proud, because I loved and still love you." How could Dawn tell that her mother still loved her?

"I have no idea what I'd do if I couldn't talk to you. Ever since you fell into this coma, it's been hard on me. I need this time to talk to you, tell you about my recent extraordinary discoveries. Then lately, it's all been falling apart."

"The two weeks I had with Cindy were amazing, and the world never looked as colorful as then - even if it was all snowy and white. Since she disappeared, everything is so... dark. Even this room, while it was always clinically clean, it seems so... musty to me now."

"So, I'd rather keep on living in my colorful memories, even if only until my story catches up with me."