This Thing A Quiet Madness Made

Chapter 37

"Eri, right?" Unknown blinked down at the girl.

Big red eyes stared back as she nodded.

Unknown remained still for a moment. She opened the door a bit wider, leaning out to glance up and down the hallway, but saw no one else. She leaned back, again looking down at the unaccompanied girl, and slowly crouched to meet her at eye level.

"Are you... lost?"

Eri shook her head.

"Ok... were you looking for me?"

Eri nodded, a small smile appearing on her face as she reached out to take Unknown's hand in hers. "Hi!" she greeted softly.

"...hi. Do you... want to come in?"

Receiving a quick nod, Unknown blinked once more before standing up and moving aside to let the girl in. Still a bit puzzled, she closed the door, turning to Eri who now stood a few steps in front of her. She noticed the girl looked quite different from the last time she saw her during the raid on Shie Hassaikai. She looked well, now wearing a red overall dress atop a collared shirt instead of the plain, ill-fitting cloth dress she remembered seeing her in during her time at the base. Her arms and legs were no longer bandaged, and the small smile she wore told her she was doing much better.

"Oh, sorry," Unknown shifted apologetically as she caught herself staring. "So... why were you looking for me?"

Eri played with her hands behind her back, smiling with a tinge of embarrassment. "I heard you were here and I wanted to see you," she uttered softly, cheeks flushing a light pink.

Unknown wasn't quite sure how to respond, instead simply nodding uncertainly. "Well... it's nice to see you again. I'm glad you're doing better." She hesitated, abruptly recalling how bad she was with children, "...do you want something to play with?"

Upon receiving an enthusiastic nod, Unknown shuffled over to pull the large cloth bag from underneath her bed. She remembered receiving a few stuffed animals for her supposed birthday that one time, quickly finding one and freeing it from the confines of the bag. It was a rather cute penguin plush, standing about a foot tall and cartoonishly plump with short little arms at its side. Eri instantly lit up as she saw the plush, stepping forward and carefully taking hold of it as the older girl held it out to her. She squeezed it experimentally, marveling at the soft material as she squished it a few more times, the penguin bouncing back to its original shape after each press.

Unknown soon found herself sat on the floor with Eri as the girl enthusiastically played with the stuffed animal along with two others she had brought out from the bag. With a bit of questioning, she eventually found out Eri was living at the school now, having been moved here following her own hospital release. She didn't speak all that much, it seemed, making it a bit difficult to glean any significant detail on the situation, but Unknown could tell she was quite happy. From what she could gather, the girl was very fond of Aizawa and the students, including a few who she guessed were from other classes, considering she didn't recognize their names: someone named Mirio who would often come play with her, someone named Nejire who would braid her hair, someone named Tamaki who brought her apples and had a "really cool" quirk.

"And we had lots of Christmas decorations too! The tree was big and pretty, and I got presents!"

"That's nice. What did you get?"

"A really big sword!"

"...is that so?"

"Mhm! Mr. Aizawa said you were in the hospital before- did you have Christmas in the hospital?"