where you are, I am

1

a kimi no na wa very inspired AU. Had been thinking of a au where they can only meet in dreams and then i watched kimi no na wa. This is the gross product of me being uncreative.
unedited, unbetad, uneverythinged.

"You were really weird yesterday, Lucy." Juvia looked at her up and down, from shoe to the ribbon in her hair, and narrowed her deer eyes into snake slits. "That is, if you really are Lucy."

"What are you talking about?"

"What do you have to say for yourself, imposter?"

They always met here, Juvia and her, at the crossroads—a path branching into two, one up and one down the mountain that the town was built on. You'd go up if you wanted to reach the town: a temple, a square the shape of a rectangle, old-timey houses and the school at the highest ledge overlooking the plains that caught no civilisation apart from theirs in sight. The down path went to a tiny dirt road that doubled as a deer crossing. It went down to the freeway that led right into the heart of the big city. No cars went by there, the bus only once every two hours because it took one hour to drive to the nearest train station and an hour to get back to their small bus station.

People didn't really come and go, so everyone knew everyone here and Lucy was still accused of being someone else.

No wonder. Juvia wanted away from here as much as Lucy, or something exciting to come to her. Everyone who had a TV, a cellphone, any contact with the outside world whatsoever, wanted away—the only new faces they ever saw was on TV. Bad daytime shows and news channels that change anchor every week. An anomaly like this was hard to come by and Juvia wasn't going to let it slip that easy.

Lucy felt her face heat up.

"No way! I'm totally normal, just look at me!"

They took the path up. At least it was flat, you could even ride a bike on it. The town faced west and they would always go right during the sunrise. The pale sunlight filtered through the branches of the planted trees along the road and it was high summer.

Juvia swung her bag in big arches as they walked and only peered at her through the corner of her eye. "That was a totally not normal response." She grinned. "Okay then, 'Lucy.' Only the real you can answer this: what's the name of your first boyfriend?"

Lucy froze down and heated up even more and dropped her bookbag louder than it should have on the dirty road. "That's not a fair question!" As if she's any better!

"Huh. Maybe it really is you."

Throwing a fistful of grass at the Juvia who was already far from the splash zone, Lucy picked up her bag and rushed after.

She wouldn't believe it if she knew the truth.

Lucy dusted off her skirt and knee socks in motion, watching her feet instead of the elevated road that was railed by a low, knee-high fence before dropping at least a backbreaking height if you'd fall. But she could walk this road blindfolded, as many times as she had done it by now, and Juvia who seemed convinced enough that she was herself again wouldn't let her fall. Hopefully.

"You really got to tell me all about it," Juvia clarified. "I mean, you were really weird. Like, creepy weird."

"Creepy?"

Juvia shrugged. "Well… maybe not creepy, but it was like you weren't even yourself."

"What do you mean!?" Lucy clutched the strap of the bag, like she just needed something to hold on to.

"You have amnesia too? Oh boy."

When the town was busy, the main street—a paved road with at least three shops and a little diner—would be crowded. Late night grocery shopping and sunset walks fit on postcards was the best thing all day. But like this in the morning, the shops were closed and only cats snuck out to sunbathe on the stairs.

"Look," Juvia said and pointed to one of them. "You named that one yesterday, didn't you?"

"Er…"

"Happy, right?" Juvia crouched to scratch it behind the ears. "Even if it's not your real name, that's what we'll call you."

Lucy had never seen the cat before but it still looked familiar. She looked at it intently, trying to remember if she had.

"You don't remember that either?" Juvia was already on her way to the last climb to the school, waving for her to get a move on.

"Of course I do! Kind of… if you'll tell me."

"That's not remembering."

"well, maybe it'll trigger something?"

"Or maybe you should go to the doctor," Juvia suggested. "You're freaking me out," even though she was as calm as can be.

The school was the newest building in the whole town. Lucy wouldn't have thought anyone would take their kids here, the boonies in the middle of nowhere where the villagers still believed in ghosts. The temple was always smoky of incense in hopes of seeing one.

Then again, people didn't exactly move here. Lucy and her father did. Everyone else's parents parents parents had moved here and never left.

It had been after the death of her mother. Just within the time that Lucy could still remember how she looked and what she was like. She had been buried on this mountain—if it was her last wish, or if it was because Lucy's father wanted to see her again, rather a ghost than never at all. Or because this was where she was from, an odd thirty years ago, climbing the same hills and picking up the same late night groceries. Just because it wasn't exciting didn't mean it wasn't pretty. Like a painting.

At least they hadn't moved across the country, away from the memories instead of cherishing what they had.

Class was embarrassing.

She would never know exactly what happened—she trusted her friends but she was almost certain they left out things that she might not have wanted to hear anyway if she didn't want to die of shame. They might as well have, like how everyone had looked at her when she entered the classroom. what could she have done to get stared out like that!? Lucy groaned.

"It was like you were another person," Levy said and let her eyes fleet over the view. They had taken refuge on Lucy's behalf under the trees in the yard where you could almost see to the city; she imagined it being just beyond the horizon even if a thousand horizons was more likely. "You asked where your locker was."

"And what about Happy," Juvia added. "You hate cats."

"I don't hate cats! …I just prefer it when they stay away."

Levy looked amused. "Then you said, 'let's go to the ocean.' You even packed and everything."

The ocean laid a good couple of miles and hours away. Days away with a bad car. Lucy knew that, everyone knew that and no one could forget it, living with such a view of nothing but dry land and green pastures as far as you could see. Only a city person who had never been on the countryside before would think the sea is everywhere.

Levy frowned. "Don't you remember anything from yesterday?"

Lucy wasn't even sure herself.

Because she remembered the dream she had. It had been a strangely vivid dream, but she had heard of people having those kinds of dreams before, where the dreamer knows it's a dream but the dream is not necessarily that dream-like and—

"Yeah, sure I do!" Lucy tried to force memories beyond the dream, any at all.

No good. All she remember was a face of a boy that had been her.

an. I want this out before I lose inspiration, right. Kind of wanted to be longer but I have school and I dont really want to hold onto this forever. if there are any future chapters, they'll definitely be longer. it's hard enough leaving it like this as it is.