[ In the interest of honesty, his gut reaction would have been "I wanted to make sure you weren't off dying alone with ice shards in your throat, and by the sound of your voice you haven't gone hoarse from suffering through more of them either, so honestly I could just leave you alone again now."

But Arden has a bit more sense than that. He doesn't want to lie, but previous efforts with Riku also proved that an overabundance of explanation did him no favors either. Still, he tries to not just snap back. If only he had good news to bring to Riku.

He doesn't walk behind Riku. ]

I just wanted to see for myself that you were still here and doing alright. Couldn't do that at the house, even though I tried.