Next time, he thinks, he'll try to just stay here. Bodhi drifts through almost incidentally, and assuming the place doesn't try to fall down around them, it isn't the worst thing in the world to feel him drift equally after his own thoughts. Low level anxiety can at least be acclimated to, and if he isn't used to Bodhi after all this time, who is he used to?

People long gone, probably.

Aurora eventually accepts that Bodhi isn't as enthusiastic about her existence as she is about his, and gives up with a lick to the side of his hand. "She helps," he says, nodding at the dog as he follows Bodhi toward the kitchen. "Singing helped, I guess--acting like you're not alone. And there's a game, shiritori, you say a word and the other person has to say a word that starts with the syllable yours ended in." Well, not quite, but his grasp of kana had never gotten to a point that he could reliably play by the proper rules. "Between the kanji on the peach tree and the foxes, I figured the old tricks might work on them."