Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Music was something that Akito always enjoyed. Even before he started seriously making it, he always loved listening to genres of music that were considered popular.

He never had a certain goal in his life. He tried playing soccer, but his lack of motivation to rise above a natural ability stripped him from his chances at actually being something in it. His grades meant nothing in the grand scheme of this world— who cared about a percentage on his papers when he was the only person in the world with his unique name? There were a million things to share about his mind, and he knew that was the only thing he could devote himself to. His father had influenced him to try art, and while talent coursed through his veins like he needed it to live, art felt like he was being ripped away from everything that made him human. Nothing seemed to sway him, and everything felt like nothing.

Music was where everything changed for Akito. If only his heart could keep up.

|

When he had his first performance with Vivid BAD SQUAD, Akito felt that there was no point in trying anymore. Kohane, the newbie to music, proved to have a beginner’s talent far greater than his own. An, someone who had worked solo nearly her whole life, meshed so well with everybody else that she didn’t really need to push herself any harder. And Toya. Toya had started in a completely different realm to the music that Akito created, but his understanding of composition and sound made him bump up in so many leagues.

But Akito. Oh, no matter how hard he tried– no matter how hard he worked, he always knew he’d be nothing in the face of truly skilled human beings. His only friends— the people shackled down to himself, possessed talents incomparable to his own.

He knew it all for so long, and it was even more selfish to act as if he didn’t. It didn’t stop it from hurting any less. In every performance, he lost control of his actions and his body felt numb. He’d felt this before. Millions of times, drowned in the dark of his home, words flung at him faster than his brain could keep up with. The same mantra was repeated in his head over and over. This is my own doing.

His execution was utterly awful, especially for someone who had already caused so much anguish. He knew that his life was not his anymore because he already stripped everyone else’s chances of a happy one. Music was the only thing he lived for, because he had already taken so much from other people that the only thing he could stomach was something of his own creation. Creation was what tore them all apart. Akito Shinonome did not exist to create something good.

Everything in his life was dedicated to music. After the disaster he caused with them, he belonged to nothing but his passion (?) in music, for anything else was too selfish a pursuit. He didn’t maintain his last friendships and relationships, there wasn’t anything else about him that could define him as an actual person. Everything was just music. Over and over he would work until he could perfect it. Because he had nothing else left.

Even then, it was clear that he would never make the same impact on the world that his friends did.

But, he had nothing else, so he only ever told himself to try harder. To be better, to do better, because this was the only thing that he could do to make up for his mistakes. If he could become something, the world might forgive him. He might forgive himself.

He swore that he would sooner die than give up trying.

Akito never kept his promises.

|

The sudden popularity of Vivid BAD SQUAD on the internet was a complete blessing. 

When one of their earlier music videos blew up, the song was inescapable online, thousands of people raving on and on about the unique sound these mere fifteen year olds were able to produce. RAD DOGS, with expressions, and vocals completely unheard of, especially coming from random kids their age. The use of vocaloids was rising in popularity, but nobody sang alongside their vocaloids. New fans scoured their personal social medias and the group accounts, and began streaming every song. Their covers from other bands were held in high regard, their original songs even more admired, and some even said that these random fifteen-year-olds could hold their own against stars like ADO and Eve.

After years of independent work and months of team practices, overnight, they went from less than a thousand small fans to hundreds of thousands. Millions heard the music they poured their entire souls into– the music that was the result of sleepless nights and everything else being neglected (but it was okay because this was his purpose–), and the group couldn’t be happier. Finally, Toya’s father could see the worth in the art that he created. The affection that everybody showered Kohane with lifted her up and granted her what she needed to overcome any boundaries that prevented her from surpassing anybody else (Akito). An was proud and realised that they were all so close to receiving the same love that her father did years ago.

Akito wanted to be happy about it. He really, truly did. He swore to himself that he would ages ago when he started all of this. He made a promise to his soul that he would be happy about it. Even though they hadn’t yet surpassed RAD WEEKEND, everything was working out and he knew that his dreams were closer to coming true and everything he had given up to work towards them would be worth it. He pulled himself through the darkest moments of his life so that he could succeed. So he could be something.

But when he saw the numbers and notifications coming from his social media accounts, and when he read the comments speaking about himself compared to his bandmates, his heart emptied and something heavy settled into him.

CINEMA - VBS MV
22,387,364 views ━▼ comments (3,447)

popipo: this song is so good,, i lowkey wish toya had more lines since akito got most of them. toya’s smoother voice would probably sound better lmfao
♡︎ (1.4K)

rinlenranlin: ijbol akito’s dancing is so funny i thought he’d fall over
♡︎ (2.6k)

Aiondori: Did Akito seriously prepare for this?? even his past performances were better lol he just gets worse
♡︎ (3)

Anonymous: akito does a pretty good job working on the background track and rhythm, but his vocals and dancing are kinda lacking… imo he should stick to the background stuff
♡︎ (4.2k)

There were other comments, too, praising his friends' performances, and occasionally of his own, but the number of slight jabs sent in his direction outweighed anything said in defence of him. This was his song, the song he devoted everything he had left to. So why, why did things have to turn out like this?

After everything, he knew why.

There's nothing left for you here.

Breathe to exist.

Run rampant beneath his skin.

Above the bone.

Live to die.

He was pathetic.

|

Akito could tell it was happening again. He should be dead, now.

The aching, his heart bleeding over nothing. The weight pulling down every moment he lived through. He couldn’t look people in the eyes, couldn’t breathe without shuddering at the thought of other people simply perceiving him. He slept for hours past his ringing alarms, but no bodily functions returned to him. His eyes drooped at even the dimmest of lights. His ears never processed noises produced by other people because how was anybody else even there?

He knew that no matter how much he tried, he could never run from it forever. He’d told himself it thousands of times before; this was what he owed the world after all the damage he caused. Like a song that would never reach its end.

He looked at his clock– it was almost five am. His mindlessly completed homework for the day lay flat on his crowded desk, discarded and crumpled notes and letters taking up the vast majority of space. The basic need to rest called out to him, but there was still so much to do . The background track he had to get done that week, that English essay that he knew how to write perfectly but just couldn't bring himself to do. The chemistry lab he had to finish and the history project that he was working on with a classmate. (who, after sharing nearly a decade of classes, couldn't bother to remember Akito’s name so Akito decided to pretend not to remember his either.) Summer break ended about a week and a half ago and he spent his time during it either rotting in his room or practising until he couldn’t stand anymore. School felt like a waste of time in the grand scheme of things.

It was his mother’s birthday this Saturday, and he knew Ena and their dad wouldn’t do anything for her, so everything fell on him. He had to get a cake, he had to get gifts, he had to do something for his mother after everything he had done to her. He had to show that he was still sorry, even if it was apparent they’d already forgotten him long enough to stop caring. Because it was never their fault and He was still Sorry. He just didn’t know how to tell them. But, either way, he was sure that no matter what he said, they would still never forgive him. He wouldn’t either.

It’s been years. He didn’t want to hurt them anymore. 

“Is any of this even real?” His words bled into the dark of his room, as if anybody would call out in response. Silence rang through the room, the darkness and vacancy of it something he grew used to over the years.

His body felt heavy on the bed. His index finger traced the blanket blowing lightly in his desk fan’s path. A violent haze of words lingered in his brain like a stupid child reaching towards faux poetic words to explain this feeling.

This feeling. What words could even describe it? He didn’t think he’d ever have an answer to that.

His throat constricted, the wire wrapping around him tightly and binding his breaths from escaping. Warmth trickled up his throat and his eyes tightened. If only he wasn’t this way. Day after day, wasting away, alone in his room, thinking of synonyms to This feeling as if these lyrics of life would ever mean anything more.

The fan was turned to its lowest power and sweat beaded on the side of his body that wasn’t hit by air. The rolled up sleeves of his hoodie had pressed down on his skin for hours, holding sweat underneath its cloth and making red indents that were unseen against the violent marks on his arms. His fingers moved against his arms to pull the sleeves back down and relieve the itch from the band, but his fingers were caught on a rough mark from a new incision he left.

Like a depraved beggar on the streets, he began feeling for more. More feeling, more pain, and he pressed his hands down around the scabs. His fingernails traced and picked at the marks, the sweat blending into the pus licking the peeled scabs.

He dragged his hands all over his body. His horrifically scarred arms and legs, thin torso, and dry face. He searched for some semblance of proof that showed he was still human. Still alive. He touched his nose, ran his hands over his crusted lips, felt the lines and piercings in his ears, and pried open his eyes. His nails dragged across skin. They weren’t sharp enough to break it, but he craved the feeling like a pathetic boy. The pain. His nails couldn’t bring it, but he knew things that could help him feel, again, his eyes trailed to the glass bottle in the corner of his room.

A few times when he went alone to Vivid Street, there’d been some older drunks who called him over to talk. They shared a few drinks with him but the most recent one tasted foul so he left it strewn around his room. He was the only soul who ever entered his room, so it was okay to leave it out for the stars to see his sins.

If he drank all of its contents, smashed the bottle and cut deep enough to soothe the ache in his bones, he could feel it again. Sweat poured down his face. It was sticky and unpleasant. He could at least feel that. But, he wanted it to go away. For it to stop. This was it. This. It. It. It. It – it was broken in his head, now, now, repeat repeat repeat it it it this was it he ran his fingers over the bends again and again and again. It.

Do. It?

I need this.

The pace of his breath increased. Harsh huffs went in and out. In. Out. repeat. He turned on his fan and tore off his two hoodies. He felt warmth trickle down his face, it would never leave. His breaths became faster. His stomach was lurching and he felt sick– he was sick, sick in the head sick in body sick in humanity but he did not Have, that humanity, he said– repeat At least he felt. Two new things. Three whole sensations.

He blinked, but the sweat, the tears, and his breath wouldn’t stop. Three.

His hands moved and wrapped around his joints, his bends, his twists, the parts that opened and folded, between his fingers and toes, and he felt every wrinkle or mark that’s ever been left on him. His fingers traced his now uncovered forearms. They were rough. Four. Somebody tell him why were they rough? there was nobody left, He wanted them to be rougher. He was sweating and crying but his arms were dry. Maybe he could change that. He wanted a fifth.

He wobbled towards the bottle in the corner of his room. Why was there a bottle in the corner of his room he didn’t know he didn’t know he didn’t know anything anymore there was nobody left to tell him– His fingers twisted the cap off of the thick glass lip and Poured out All the contents of the bottle in the corner of his room. The taste of pure alcohol ripped through his mouth and throat, like fire fire fire, the liquid was clear like glass, clear like the glass of the bottle. He didn’t count the seconds he drank it, but he downed it like fire; Five.

He sat on the floor, dodging the clothes donning it, feet kicking at the waistlines of pants that were too loose for him to continue wearing, the bottle was heavy in his hand, He sat up against the couch at the foot of his bed. The stars looked down on him. The bottle was heavy in his hand. The sluggishness of his body made him teeter like a rickety thing, exhaustion and weight wearing on him, the stars bore down on him.

Would it ever change?

I wish I were dead.

The stars let go of his hand.

He threw the bottle against the floor, glass shattering like fragments of the world. A different view, a different look, but no perspective would make Akito be seen any differently. The impact was loud, but Ena was always distracted she hated hated hated him, the evil seeped into her (he was sorry) and his father was asleep in the cold dark room next to the kitchen where they all used to cook and sing and laugh and his mother was never home she left to escape escape escape him because he would not carry it Ever, nobody would intervene if they heard their God come to take him away.

He scanned the debris. The pieces were large and in a configuration easy enough to sweep later. He picked them up with his clammy and shaking hands. The stars would never return,

The moonlight from the small, rectangular window on his walls illuminated and reflected the pieces on the ground. The bright light coming from out underneath his door crack was jarring. He looked down. He grabbed a medium-sized chunk of glass. He was ambidextrous. Which arm would be used, which arm would be martyrized? would there ever be a difference, Both were evenly scarred, but if he were to shred one more than the other, it would be uneven. He didn’t like uneven things, some things would never change,

His fingers felt around the piece of glass in the same way he felt his limbs. Like he had in the countless times he had carved his skin before, as the stars watched. My sister, my apologies. The sharpest point was one that jutted out like a shark fin. When would it come for him? His fingers traced again; the glass curved and the sharp point was thinner than the rest of the glass. He selected his right arm first. Gripping the glass in his left hand and eyeing for a scarce clean patch of his already marked skin, he sighed. He looked up to the ceiling, the light green glow against the popcorn grain. Five points, it stretched. The stars looked down on him.

Let me forget.

The first slice wasn’t deep. It barely broke skin and barely felt like anything, the red and irritated line begging for more. It didn’t bleed unless he prodded and squeezed it, squeezing out whatever essence of his life that he could, but it itched more than it hurt– like a scratch from a tree branch with fleeting pain, pain running away from him like they all did, leaving leaving leaving and he would dig dig dig deeper and deeper into his skin to find out where they went, where they went, where he went–

His hands shook. Let it go. He tugged too deep and felt a sear. He could feel the tear on his arm like soft felt being cut through with a knife; a rip, ripping ripping his skin off with a blade he felt hot, The pain was intense but left a throb, so he dragged out the cut longer from one edge of his inner wrist to the other. This one bled more, more, more, but it was closer to his inner elbows and didn’t create a big enough mess.

He needed his skin to be ruined.

Inhale.

His fingers hurt after gripping the shard so tightly for so long. More and more slashes with far apart depths appeared on his arms, his bringers of kind, but he forgot how they appeared there. His eyes drifted, his thoughts moved, each time a new line, a thought spoke in his head– his room, his room, his kind, his home, these walls these foundations these people people people they didn’t know and he was sorry, He didn’t know if this had been going on for seconds, minutes, hours, days, years, decades, centuries, millennia, It was hard to tell. What was he thinking of? Where was he? Could he go now?

Oh, but he was bleeding.

He needed it to bleed more.

And more.

And more.

…And more.

This was it.

Exhale.

Five.

|

“Akito! Wake up already, I wanna go to bed!” His head lifted to the sharp pounds of his door and his older sister’s shrill voice. The window again lit up his room, but instead of just the floor, it was his whole bedroom. His neck hurt, his head pounded, but the blood on his wrists cracked into deeper pain. He rubbed his neck and looked in all directions to ease the pain. His eyes stopped on the small stars and moons stuck to his ceiling. He must have fallen asleep watching them, pretending they could move and pretending as if they were bright stars in the sky watching over him. They were glow-in-the-dark, and quite old too. When he and Ena were younger, they begged their parents to put them on the ceilings so that they could ‘star-gaze’ together. He frowned and wondered if Ena still had them on her own.

She wouldn’t. She wouldn’t want to feel connected to Akito.

“Akito?!” Ena called again, although it was from a farther away room this time. “Fuck, yeah, I’m up! I’ll be ready in a second.” Akito’s voice cracked at first, and his voice felt like it was lifting into a ridiculous and out-of-character smile. His face, arms, and hands felt sticky. His head felt like it was screaming and begging for release, but he also felt unnaturally giddy. It was stupid. “You sound insane, are you good in there?” Her voice became closer and by the end of her sentence, the door handle rattled with her grip on it, ready to open it in the next second.

You can’t see me like this. “Wait! No, no, everything’s okay. Don’t come in. I-I’m changing.” He pulled a hoodie from his floor to cover his arms in case she came in, but the mildewy smell from it being curled up was enough for him to gag to keep it off. “Jesus, are you high…? Whatever– Be out by seven-thirty and actually go to school today, please. Dad keeps pinning your truancies and tardies on me. So, go.” Her voice became quieter as she stalked off to her own room, closing her door with a click, trying to get away from him as soon as possible. I’m sorry, Ena.

Akito sighed and looked down at his arms, the cracks the same as hee had always known them. He felt lighter, which was most likely the alcohol, but four out of five of the things he felt last night had vanished. He was cold, he wasn’t crying, and his stomach was more stable, but he felt sticky and tired and like nothing despite the copious amounts of adrenaline and serotonin that his brain had pumped last night. The alcohol being the only thing powering what he felt and what his brain thought, given the lack of energy he needed to function. There was a hollow cavity within his chest, like all of his cherry red organs had been stolen from inside his body and there was nothing left but the blood pumping through him.

But he supposed he always felt that way.

Out of morbid curiosity, he poked and scratched at the new marks on his arms. There were tiny and dried blobs of smeared blood on the floor where he sat, but the blood on his arms was completely dry– cracked and powdery, even. Gummed and small blood spots were stuck to each cut he left that night, and when he tried to unsuccessfully peel them he only felt pain.

A metallic scent rang throughout his room, and he noticed the dark red seeping into everything around him. He didn’t know if he even had a goal last night. He just wanted to numb everything and have his blood drip down his body like he was a victim of a violent crime. He’s glad Ena hadn’t walked in. There wasn’t any way he could’ve hidden his disgusting body.

Akito attempted to stand up, and he was hit with a wave of overwhelming dizziness that left him back on the floor. Maybe it was vertigo, maybe it was dehydration, or maybe it was the fact that he was probably still as drunk as a grotesque psycho in the streets, but he needed to get up. He craned his neck to the right and over the corner of his bed, angling to stare at the digital clock on his desk.

6:03, it read, in bright red numbers. Forget two hours, it had barely been one. He leaned back and sucked in a big breath. He needed to get up, or else he’d be sitting there forever. His limbs were too heavy to move, but Ena needed him to leave. Akito pushed himself up and held onto the bed frame once he was standing. The exertion caused old blood to drip out of the deeper wounds and glide down his forearms. He sighed as the blood trickled down his limbs like a slow-moving sap trying to reach his hands to be held and smeared and inspected like data from a lab.

His shirt and pants had blood spots wiped all over them, but they weren’t severe enough to stain if he washed them soon. He was sure that his parents weren’t home and his sister had already locked herself in her room. He steadied himself before walking towards his door, trying to ignore the thoughts gnawing at his brain to just lay on the floor forever. The room seemed to spin and pain flickered in his body when he moved. He twisted the knob, and somehow made it to the bathroom without laying like a corpse and staring at the ceiling as if it were the most interesting thing in the world.

Akito composed himself well enough to only slightly stumble on his steps, even with the world twirling and lights glowing too bright. He looked in the mirror and almost wished he hadn’t.

Dried blood stuck to the creases in his face; he must’ve touched it in his sleep or when he was out of it. He’d traced his fingers over himself many times before, it was like a habit now. His eyes looked stupid. There were large eye bags from a lack of sleep over the past few months of summer vacation, and there was so much dark underneath and in his eyes that it looked as if he was in a fight. Pummelled and bruised, eyes gaunt upon skin that was pulled taut against his bones. His face was furrowed into a look of disgust. He looked like an asshole. He looked like a kid.

His body felt heavy. He stood in front of the mirror for longer than he should have.

He was taller than average, but still short enough to feel small in the bathroom his father designed. An artist born to create, to contrast, to detail, and Akito would never take after him.

He started to pick at the dried blood on his arms, feeling the uncomfortable sting and bumps that always came when cutting with glass. Glass never went deep enough to soothe when he was sober. Fresh blood came out whenever he picked at an especially hard-to-peel spot of blood, or when he even slightly squeezed either arm. The pain and blood proved to be a struggle, but the blood eventually began to clot entirely and it was easier to clean up whilst preparing for a shower.

Akito detested cold showers, but when the water from a warm shower flowed into open wounds, it always hurt more than the act itself. He hadn’t really cut deep that night, not like he had before, but the cold water would soothe the open wounds littered across his limbs. He didn’t want to feel pain right now when everything was numb– he only wanted to lay on the same ground as he had in the night. But, he had to show up for the day; he already missed two days of school since coming back from break a week or two ago.

Ena said that their dad had been blaming her for his mistakes, and not himself. He hadn’t spoken to him in weeks and he hadn’t cared about it in years.

What has changed now? no, there would never be a change. he could try, he could beg on his knees in front of them, but it would make no difference.

Akito wondered. Would they ever figure it out?

Would it ever be important enough to pay it any mind?

His arms started to itch. He didn’t want them to hurt, but wasn’t it something he deserved? Wasn’t he the one to cause this all? He wanted somebody to take this body away from him. This soul, because what else would there ever be for him? He was sorry, he told them before but they wouldn’t believe him. I’m sorry guys, I’m sorry Mom, I’m sorry Ena, I’m sorry Dad, I’m sorry Toya, I said it before, I promise this time, because to you it is the world.

He twisted the shower knob to the highest heat.

|

Akito watched every action he made in the mirror as he dressed. Each movement and function of his body like he was a machine programmed to do mundane tasks. Every slight contact to his sleeves burned from the raw and sensitive flesh being overwhelmed with touch.

His skin was red from the near-boiling water, the aggressive scrubbing from that feeling of bugs underneath his skin that were itching to be clawed out.

Akito wondered if it was possible to scoop the flesh out of his body with his bare hands. Watch the blood pour out of his skin and tear open his body with the canines in his mouth and the overgrown fingernails on his hands. Have everything melt off of his bones and feel it break and snap and open. He’d love the pain from it too. Pain enveloping his entire body and wrapping tightly around his torso and each arm and leg. His whole body burning and exploding with a pain that stung and stuck with him for the rest of his life.

Remove his skin and leave him with nothing but muscle and blood and cells and organs and bone. Have everything be an open, gaping wound, that would never be staunched or closed. Feel his blood trace and stick to every surface in the world like a white cloth stained with dirt. He could grope his very own expanding and shrivelling lungs and his beating heart from their places inside his ribcage. Feel the twists of his nerves and arteries, feel them branching off like the leaves of a tree.

They would be happy to see the sight. He would be even happier.

He grabbed some wet and dry black rags, and re-entered his room. He stared at the blood caked into the floor like a scientist staring at a mesmerising experiment.

He looked at the dead and dark blood and he wanted to keep the memory burned into his skull forever. If he could just take a picture to hang the gruesome scene on all of his walls. Print it hundreds of times and plaster it to his ceilings so he would wake up to the image. He knew he could do better, he knew he could make a bigger mess of the room he’d spent his whole life in, he knew there was more blood in his body willing to be let out and freed and exposed to oxygen. He knew where the sharpest blades in his room were hidden, where he could so easily drag them so deep across his body that his skin would split open and he would bleed forever.

But he had to go to school.

Akito got onto his knees and began to scrub. His fingernails scraped the floorboards and in-between the cracks of it. The water from the wet rags mixed with the blood and the room smelled like iron again.

He wanted to smear the blood all over his body and feel the thin layer dry onto his cracked and dry skin. The blood would replenish like a hydrating moisturiser, and he could lay in it for his whole life.

But he had to go to school.

He saw on the clock that it was six forty-five when he was done cleaning. His stomach was begging for sustenance, but he didn’t want to shove anything down his throat in a rush, and he was too tired to cook something hard. He had to pull himself together. He had to continue functioning in society. He had to. For the sake of his own self. If he wanted to feel dizzying pain in the future to feel good and happy, he had to deserve it first.

The pain from slicing himself open was a privilege. He couldn’t take it for granted. It was everything to him, but he couldn’t get overzealous and greedy about it.

It was a challenge to walk downstairs without falling flat on his face, but his skin was pale, head heavy, and he knew he needed some nutrients to prevent himself from passing out on his walk to school. He bent down slightly to look at the contents of the fridge. A bunch of random things with some cheese, tofu, meats, vegetables, and random fruit desserts that either Ena or his mother had bought from a convenience store. He didn’t know what meal he could make with such a sparse amount of ingredients, but it would taste bland in his mouth anyways.

How much time did he have? He moved to his pocket to grab and open his phone— it wasn’t in there. He had to go back up the stairs to get the hopefully still alive phone to take it for school. He left his backpack by the door like he always did, so he could just grab it on his way out.

It was probably around six-fifty, so he opted to make something that his whole household would eat if they got home or woke up by then. 

His arms hurt, but he lifted them up to reach the cabinets. He could try to make a simple mapo tofu, since their rice cooker was still full from breakfast he made them the previous day. Nobody but himself ate the food that took him an hour to cook, and nobody put it away while he was gone so the food was left inedible after staying out all day. It had no value. Ena would wake up late and she always preferred salty foods after sleep, so she could have that. Their father likely left while he was in the shower, and he’d return later in the night around seven or eight o’clock. Their mother would come whenever she wanted. She was hardly ever home.

Akito lazily chopped veggies, not caring if the dull and old blade accidentally hit a knuckle or two of his. He set the ground pork and boxed flavouring to start cooking, and tried to go up the stairs. One foot at a time, he climbed and held onto the rail like it was his lifeline. He nearly tripped and fell backwards multiple times, and his heart was racing when he got to the top. He made it to his room in search of his phone, and he’d luckily fallen asleep with it charging the whole night. At least his phone wasn’t dead.

But, when one thing works out, the others cannot, so Akito swore that every god out there was against him because when he checked the time, it was seven-fifteen. He wouldn’t be able to finish cooking the food and eat himself. Nobody else cleaned the house, and he didn’t want his family to return home to a disgusting haze that he should have cleaned up.

He ran back downstairs faster than he thought he could in this condition, his head aching and whole body dizzy. He was sure he looked stupid and was about to fall over at every step he took. It was still hard to see with dancing spots in the corner of his eyes that were already altered by the (what he assumed to be) vodka.

The smell of soy and salt filled his senses, and he went to stir the mixture in the wok. The warmth from the food was incredibly dizzying and he immediately grabbed a hold of the counters to steady himself. Akito’s breath was weirdly heavy and soft pants came from him. His mouth was unbearably dry, the steam made it hard to see. He felt like nothing, but it was so normal at this point to feel like that. He floated in the steam like it was transporting him to another world. It all felt warm and exhausting, like he was being squeezed and suffocated.

Hands fumbled to feel something– anything. The fingers that were tightly gripping the granite a second ago were now reaching towards the heat. He blinked and something rolled down his face, stemming from his eyes. What is that? His fingers grabbed the hot wok and he swore.

The pain grounded him, but it also hurt like hell when he had to scamper to the sink and cool his fingers that were now bright red.

God, what was wrong with him? “Can’t even cook a fucking meal…” Akito drowned out and his fingers began to grow numb to the rush of cool water running over his hands. The burn on his fingers now grew into a small white callous. It hurt, but it was pleasing in a masochistic way. 

He filled a glass from an open cupboard with lukewarm sink water, the way he preferred, and rummaged through the fridge for something to quickly scarf down. Out of all the easily edible food, there was… milk, cheese, egg whites, a cheesecake with Ena’s name written on it, a wrinkly apple, and more of the tofu that had probably been in there for months.

He grabbed the leftover tofu box and searched for an expiration date. It was only around a week ago. That wasn’t too bad. The tofu he was currently cooking was probably also expired. But, whatever. They’ll live. It would just be nice if he wasn’t stupid enough to cook expired food for the people he loved.

It was hard to breathe. He wanted everything to shut up.

He found it difficult to tear open the pack of tofu, so he opted to grab the knife laying on the cutting board from the food he chopped up earlier. The knife in his hands began to shake like a leaf in the wind. His hands were warm and a random cry clawed itself out of his throat at the same time as he felt liquid fall from his eyes. The knife clattered to the floor, and Akito joined it as he pressed the backs of his shaking wet hands to his eyes, feeling his knees collapse.

He was tired. Why did he always feel like crying?

His breath was shaking and fluctuating like a boat rocking on dangerous waves, and he felt like throwing up the warm water he downed. From the floor, he weakly held the tofu packet over the sink and drained the water from it. He scooped out a bit of tofu big enough to qualify as a bite and started eating to prevent himself from regurgitating whatever he had consumed within the past day. It tasted like nothing. Tofu usually did taste fairly bland, but it was as if Akito was immune to tasting anything. There wasn’t a single thing in this white blob that he could taste. He looked to his left; the knife was on the floor. There was a translucent white liquid on there.

He wondered if he could make the liquid red.

He blinked. He looked forward. The tall fridge in front of him felt like a looming entity, the white walls were empty and blank, and nothing seemed to have any substance to it. You’re such a piece of shit.

He heard nothing but slight steam and a sizzle for a few minutes as he lazily ate until he heard the front door unlock. A shadow reminiscent of his mother’s height wobbled past the door frame and was casted onto the fridge from the light of the front windows, and Akito could hear them throw keys and a bag onto the table next to the door.

“Aki’o?” A voice yawned. Oh. It was his mother. She was home so soon. “You cooking something? Unless it’s Ena, but God knows that child could never be awake so early.” Her words sounded sloppy like his own. He didn’t get up to look at her from his place behind the counter, but he could imagine that her makeup was smeared and her hair was a mess. It usually was when she came home. For once, he didn’t want her to be home. He didn’t want to be around anyone. He didn’t want anyone to see him as a living and breathing human. He didn’t want to talk, he didn’t want to interact, he didn’t want to breathe around someone else.

There was no god out there that listened to his pathetic and silent pleas.

“Where are youuuu? Are ya even down ‘ere?” He couldn’t get up even if he forced himself to. Nor could he raise his voice to speak.

“Think the food’s ready… I’m comin’ over there…” She hiccuped.

He could hear her staggered footsteps. He was like her too. He wondered if she would be disappointed if she knew his current condition. Maybe she would reprimand him; yell at him.

But Akito knew she wouldn’t. She didn’t care about him like that anymore. Not like how he cares for her.

“Hey… why’re you on the floor?” She flexed her index finger and pointed at him, in nothing more than curiosity. Not concern. never concern– He was right; she looked like a mess. She probably spent the night again with her good friends, like she’d been doing since he started junior high. Mom. We’re all so different now. He didn’t see the flicker in her eyes, the way her body shifted. He didn’t see it, and he thinks things would’ve turned out differently if he had.

“The food will be ready by the time I’m gone,” Akito said. His words didn’t sound as bad as hers, but they still were slow and sluggish as if he didn’t care. Not like she would notice.

He didn’t notice the pause in her movements, as if she saw his soul. “I needa shower. Thank you, sweetie.”

And then she left.

Akito was alone again.

|

The walk to school felt like nothing. Like his body was moving in the preprogrammed order he was told to do for years. He turned the same exact corners as he had hundreds of times before, he walked down the same alleys and past the same poles and he saw the same students catching up with their friends and complaining about having to wake up early. He left soon after the food had finished cooking and he set it neatly aside with a letter for whoever wanted to eat it later. (as if anyone would want something from him.)

Toya hadn’t caught up to him like he usually did during their walks, which meant that his dad was taking him to school. Akito could probably confirm that if he checked his currently buzzing phone, but all of his focus was on not collapsing and making sure he could actually get to school and not walk into the streets with his confused mind.

Maybe he could check later. When he had more energy.

If the day Ever,
Came.

His legs and arms felt heavy, and he felt even more light-headed, but the walk couldn’t have been any more than twenty-five minutes. It was fine. Fine. Everything would always be fine. Everything was everything and Akito was Akito– was he? it was fine he wouldn’t let himself sway and he could keep living he told himself he would–

He arrived ten to fifteen minutes earlier than he usually did, which was already early, and he couldn’t tell without looking at his phone, but he didn’t see the usual amount of students that he did whenever he arrived on time.

None of his friends had gotten here yet, (but at this point, he only really had Toya. An was kind, but he didn’t want to drag her deeper into his mess in the way he had with Toya.) but he saw Tsukasa Tenma and Rui Kamishiro sitting at the front of the school, with their hands tinkering with some probably explosive object.

Akito wanted to run away from it all, but Kamishiro locked silent yet intrigued eyes with him. Yellow eyes widened like the stage actor had seen a ghost. Akito had a strong urge to actually run away, but when Kamishiro began walking towards him, he knew he had to stay to convince the other that there was still life in him. That he could be left alone until the end of time.

“Good morning, Shinonome-kun! I wonder, is everything alright?” His put-together words made Akito worry. Would his words come out in complete sentences? Would they sound like he was under the influence? Would they be raspy from lack of speech, or light like a feather? Could he pass himself off as completely normal? There was no greater shame than having another pry into his petulance and grievances.

“E-everything’s okay. Is there something wrong?” He pitched up his voice, fighting against the urge to just stay silent because it was easier and he was tired, and he could fall to the floor and lay there Forever, He just had to focus on not falling to the ground at any moment. Akito must have taken a longer pause between his senior’s words and his own because Kamishiro’s eyes thinned out and his smile turned into a slight frown.

“Nothing special, but you look to be a bit tired. I hope you got enough sleep last night?” He frowned again as if he knew something that Akito didn’t. Every time he interacted with Kamishiro, he felt that same unease as if he knew every secret Akito hid underneath his sleeves. Everything underneath his sleeves, underneath his skin, and underneath his heart.

The breeze became stronger and the wind blew past the two of them. A cloud passed over the sun and the area became dimmer. Akito swallowed. Just get out of here. Hide your face for the day.

“I slept well last night. My mother came home earlier than usual so I had to wake up sooner… Ah, Thanks for the concern, but I have to get to class. I gotta talk to a teacher about something,” the younger of the two stated as if such a weak and horrible excuse would work. It was stupid. He was stupid. Waking up early does not warrant someone to look like how he did. Waking up early was something normal people did, and Akito could not convincingly lie about such a thing. Akito nervously prodded at his wrists that were covered by the school uniform that he was forced to wear by regulation. He was lucky there was reason to his concealment. He couldn’t have anyone worry about a person like himself. 

Just go already. It looked as if Kamishiro was about to say something in response, but there was an emotion on his face that Akito couldn’t decipher that prevented him from speaking out. Kamishiro nodded as he bid farewell and walked back to Tsukasa, whose yelling could still be heard twenty metres away.

A few crystal clear lies (that even a child could tell were fabricated,) were all it took for him to be left alone again.

He wondered if anyone would ever stop him.

|

Akito saw Toya settling in during lunch, taking the seat right next to his best friend. Akito’s face was resting against his flat arms on the tables, and his eyes opened at the movement the bench made. Toya’s grey eyes lifted up into a soft smile at the sight of his sleeping partner. Akito wished that all of the coldness in his body dissipated, like it usually did when he was around Toya. But maybe it was just one of those days where nothing could eradicate the desperation for it all to stop. Toya's hair was the same evenly parted cut of purplish-blue tones, and he had the same mole underneath his left eye that Akito wanted to trace with his fingers and admire like it was the north star in the sky. It guided him back to his home. Akito swore he could live in Toya’s eyes and live happily like that forever.

Toya’s eyes focused on Akito’s sullen gaze, and Akito noticed the smile fade from the other’s face– he saw how it turned into a small frown.

He hated everything in his existence for making the person who was his everything sad. Akito loved Toya, and that would never change. He just wished it was enough to live for.

It was, it should’ve been, but he knew nothing would be enough because too much had already been ruined. Akito had done too much, he had ruined too much, and it was too hard to continue onwards. Nothing could fix it. Not even Toya.

He wanted it to be fixed. He wanted to live. He wanted to live. He wanted to live. But that was too selfish to admit.

“Rough day?” Toya started. He asked this every day, so much to the point that his words became lost in their meaning. He knew how Akito was, that he couldn’t live like a normal human, but it was hard to approach it in any other way. But each time Akito answered truthfully. He couldn’t lie to Toya. He nodded slightly, his voice too weak to bring up above a slight whisper, and with the cafeteria noises, his voice would remain unheard unless his mouth was pressed up against his ear.

“Well, I brought your favourite. They aren’t as good as the ones Ken makes, but school pancakes are better than none at all. If you don’t want them right now, I can save them for you.” Toya’s voice was gentle, not in the way a teacher would talk to a child, but in the way that made Akito feel so full of love that it disgusted him. Toya was good to him. Too good.

Akito knew that he hardly deserved it. After everything, was this the right path to walk? Should he even be pushing them away? But, he knew better.

"Thank you,” he tried, but nothing seemed to be audible. He was about to try again, louder, but Toya cut him off.

“You’ve done so much for me, this is the least I could do.” Strong arms wrapped around Akito, and his breath caught in his throat.

Leave it to Toya to hear anything Akito has ever said.

Akito knew he was loved. Loved by many. He was loved, but he knew it never went beyond the surface. He was loved, but he knew that if they knew how he truly was, that love would be gone in an instant. He was loved, but he knew that love was truthfully obligatory. It was just hard to care about it when everything hurt too much. He was constantly given more love than he deserved. Toya was wrong, Akito never did anything good for them. He didn’t deserve anything – he only hurt and took from everyone else.

Similar words must have slipped from his cracked lips because a hand wrapped around his own and Toya’s head shook in disagreement before he buried his head in the back of Akito’s neck; the ginger’s head still remained in his arms. Pure pain shot throughout his body– his arms, his aching bones, his pounding skull. He felt like he could decompose and just die at any second and he wouldn’t even resist. It’s like every day he became less and less stubborn; less and less like himself.

Everything hurt. Sometimes he just wanted to stop feeling. Breathing. Wouldn’t it all be nicer that way?

In Toya’s embrace, he felt water well up in his eyes like a baby crying in his caretaker’s arms. In Toya’s embrace, he felt warmer because of the love between them, but he knew that love only extended as far as his hand could throw. Any farther and the tie would sever because Akito was not someone who could keep meaningful bonds together. He was not someone who could maintain that connection the second the other person pulled away.

It was so unfair to Toya. Toya deserved a better partner than him. A better partner than someone who would ghost him if he didn’t devote every second of his energy to him. Akito was selfish.

“I’m sorry, Toya. I’m so sorry for being like this.” I’m sorry for loving you. You always seem to be next to me but I don’t think I’m ever present for you. “You haven’t done anything to apologise for. It’s okay, I’m here. I’ll always be here,” Toya’s smooth voice rang in his ears. He felt delicate hands run through his slightly wet hair, and Akito could feel the warmth radiating off of his gentle hold. It was… sweet. It was everything Akito shouldn’t be given, but he couldn’t help but lean into. His eyes watered more at the embrace of Toya, his beautiful partner.

Toya laughed, eyes lighting up in a way that always made Akito’s heart dance, “Did you shower this morning? Your hair never dries fast, does it?” Akito pulled away from Toya and rubbed his shivering eyes dry to stare into Toya’s own.

He was beyond lucky that Toya was his best friend. It felt like they knew each other like two souls who spent millenia apart, searching for the other until they finally reconnected. At least, Akito wished it did. He knew that wasn’t true. He wasn’t a desirable person.

Toya was everything.

“Akito, what do you want to do once we surpass RAD Weekend?” Toya asked after the two of them were laughing and doing karaoke of stupid songs, one hand on their mics and the other tied up with their partner’s hand. “I know that we’ll do it soon– you can do anything you set your mind to.” And Toya’s voice and face was beyond optimistic when he looked into Akito’s eyes. And Akito’s face fell, the mood between the two fourteen year olds dropping, because How was he supposed to answer? He didn’t know what he’d do after RAD Weekend. He was just supposed to die,

His one purpose was to make a good change. There was no other reason to live once he did it.

“I don’t think I’ve ever thought about it. I’m just living through whatever happens, I guess. There’s no reason to think about the future stuff when I’m already like this.” And Akito stared back at Toya as he looked back into his eyes. The next song began, and Akito took the first line. His voice cracked on the second, trying to keep his voice stable, and he winced when Toya caught his eye. Akito looked at him, eyes flickering between the lyrics on the screen and back at Toya’s face.

Toya was deep in thought, eyebrows furrowed in worry for his best friend and partner.

I’m so sorry.

|

That was bad. He held a fist clenched against his mouth, the applause for the next group performing echoing louder and louder as their starting volume increased. Sweat still poured down his face, his other hand against his left eye as he stared down into the corner of backstage. How can I still be so horrible after all this time? I can’t keep living like this. “Hey, Akito. Are you okay?” Toya pulled him back from his shoulder, fingers gently prying the tight hands from Akito’s face.

Akito looked up at him, and Toya’s mouth dropped ever so slightly when he saw how his eyes shimmered with liquid that glowed in the stage lights. The squeezing of Akito’s eyes, fingers, throat, and quivering of his lips was all Toya needed to see before he leaned down slightly to pull his partner closer to him. “I’m sorry for being so horrible, Toya–” Akito cried into his partner’s and best friend’s arms. “How can you say that? You were incredible tonight, Akito,” Toya whispered into his ears, mouth pressed close against him to remain audible against the blasting music.

“I messed up so fucking much. God, I’m so stupid for thinking this would work,” he cracked, crumbling against Toya because his dreams would never come true like this. None of this would ever mean anything. He was going to die without making the world better. Without making up for his mistakes.

Toya gripped his shoulders tight and pulled away from their embrace. He smeared his thumb on Akito’s face, his tears absorbing into Toya’s skin. Akito shivered.

“'I've never met somebody as dedicated as you are. I… my heart is fuller when I’m around you. It’s like you flip this switch that inspires me to be better. So, even if you make a million mistakes, I know that you can make this work. You’re Akito Shinonome. You’re my partner.”

But is that enough?

“I’d go crazy without you,” Akito whispered to him, eyes down in his lap where his hands were fidgeting. He could barely hear himself over the loud sounds in the cafeteria and encroaching shadows in his eyes. Like a vignette was placed haphazardly over his sight. Their faces were close to each other and Akito could feel his warmth in the cold and echoing room. Toya grabbed his left hand with his right and their bodies were turned into each other. It was comfortable– familiar. Akito needed more of it. (but was it something he deserved? the answer was clear,)

“You’ve helped me in more ways imaginable, it’s my turn to do the same for you.” Toya’s voice was like a god-send capable of clearing every thought out of his muddled head. The grey eyes Akito was staring into (he swore they were beautiful,) looked down before meeting Akito’s own again. “But, Akito...” Toya paused, eyes squinting in a pain that Akito didn’t understand. “I need you to promise to come to me whenever you need something. Someone to talk to, or if you need reassurance. Whatever it is, I’m here. I’ve always been here. You’ve been struggling recently and I don’t want it to get bad for you.”

You wouldn’t get it. I can’t do that to you too.

Akito loved Toya, and he knew Toya did too, but it wasn’t enough. Akito was loved, but that love still felt hollow. He couldn’t tell if it even meant anything. “Toya… you know that I can’t promise that. I can’t keep my promises to anyone. Never really have.”

Toya’s face looked pained, and his body seemed to recoil. He knew this would happen, so why did he look so hurt ? It didn’t really mean much. Akito would continue on like always, and Toya would eventually be freed of him. It was reaching that point, anyways.

Akito didn’t know how much he had left to live for.

“Akito… I don’t ask much. Please, if anything, do it for me? I want you to be happy, Akito.”

Liar. None of it mattered.

So Akito lied back.

“Okay. I will, Toya.”

And the smile on Toya’s face grew bigger and softer and kinder than ever before.

And a gentle laugh left his mouth.

“So, do you wanna ditch?” Toya asked. Toya, the model student, top of his class, asked Akito Shinonome (top student in rankings but completely defined to others by his delinquency) if he wanted to ditch school with him.  

What the hell? Akito had skipped all the time, sure, but that was nothing new. Toya only missed days of school if he was literally inches away from death from sickness or illness.

Akito still hadn’t answered, but of course he wanted to. More than anything. “School and classes seem out of the question for you. Come on, let’s go. If we leave right now we can’t get caught since it’s lunch,” Toya informed.

“Y-Yeah! Uh, let's go…?” Akito was still really fucking confused. And concerned. To hell with someone being concerned about himself, someone needed to be concerned about Toya because something wasn’t… right with Toya.

“Alright.” Toya immediately grabbed Akito by the wrist and grabbed both of their bags and hastily pulled them up. Akito’s mouth gaped even more, if possible, and looked deep into Toya’s eyes. What was even happening? His confusion was different from the type he felt when he was alone. When he was unsure of everything. When he didn’t know what was real anymore. This confusion was nice. Nicer than anything else in his life.

His partner with dual-toned hair tugged harder at his wrist, and Akito saw him getting out of the benches connected to the cafeteria tables. A little giggle left his mouth, “Akito, you know I can’t swing your legs out of the bench. Unless, you want me to?” Akito’s face blew up into a red haze . “Toya, genuinely what the fuck is going on with you? I’ve literally never seen you like this,” Akito muttered in surprise, and began to swing his legs out.

Toya swore under his breath, “Shame, I wouldn’t have minded carrying you out of here like a princess.” Akito’s face became even redder, if possible. “You’re such an idiot–” Akito laughed out, the stickiness of his tears already thinning on his skin.

“But still, you aren’t acting like how you usually are, so why should I? It’s like we switched personalities,” Toya filled in.

“Oh.”

“You look like a damsel in distress right now. Face a mess, hair all over the place, and staring at their saviour with love-struck eyes.”

“Love-struck?! You can’t be serious!”

Toya pulled his arm with a tight grip and they walked around the crowded room. The only adults in the cafeteria were busy on their phones instead of supervising the students, so leaving was easier than it should’ve been. They made their way to the outside of the school buildings, and Akito led him along to a hole in the fence that he often climbed through to ditch or enter whenever he arrived at school late.

Akito wasn’t alone. He had Toya by his side. He always would, even if Akito didn’t ask for it or didn’t hint towards the fact that he needed it. But he knew he always was. He’d tried everything. There was nothing that could help him breathe and be something. He wanted to live, he wanted to live, he was going to die. Toya was there. His partner of multiple years was there. The person Akito loved and cherished and held close to his heart even if he would never be brave enough to say how he felt about him.

Toya Aoyagi was right by his side. Akito wasn’t Alone. 

He just wished it was enough.

|

They walked around the shopping mall for a few hours until students began filling in, signifying the end of the usual school day. They settled at a little café on the second floor of the mall, and their arms were stacked with bags after shopping for so long. Akito had purchased things for his mom’s birthday so it didn’t feel like she had nothing. If Akito was his mom and he was the only thing she had left from her family, he would stop coming home too.

Akito sat across from Toya in the booth seats, their table propped up against a window that looked out onto the hundreds of shoppers walking through the establishment. Akito’s head was nestled into his arm, flat on the table, but his free hand was entangled with Toya’s. Toya was reading a book he bought an hour ago, and they were sitting in complete silence, waiting for their food to arrive.

Olive-green eyes looked out the window.

Toya watched his face melt into one devoid of anything; like there were both a million thoughts or absolutely none in his head. It was scary. Someone so full of passion and motivation should never look like this. But at this rate, this was turning into Akito’s normal. Ever since Vivid BAD SQUAD was formed, Toya couldn’t remember the last time Akito acted like his normal self. But, sometimes, he would wonder if he ever really knew Akito’s ‘real self’.

When they were in Junior High, Akito was hyper-motivated to succeed. To surpass RAD WEEKEND, to be something in his life. There were times where Akito stuttered and fell lower than his normal, but he always eventually reset and acted like everything was the same. But it had been a while since he reset– since before summer break. It was as if that spark that made Akito, Akito, had burnt out completely. 

And Toya was scared, because he knew (thought he knew,) that Akito took things very seriously, and even small defeats could build up into much larger ones for him.

And Toya was scared, because they had been winning and winning but he was afraid Akito would only ever think back to the loss. He was scared it wouldn’t be enough for him.

And Toya was scared, because Akito hadn’t been himself recently. He hadn’t been even close to it for the last few months. Toya wasn’t sure if he ever knew Akito’s real self.

And Toya was scared, because his partner was not the same boy he met when they were thirteen.

Olive-green eyes turned to look at his partner, his grey eyes standing in contrast to his lighter skin.

Akito loved Toya. And there was no way Toya would love someone like him. That every normal cycle would continue on, even if it made him feel pretentious in his misery.

A tired waitress lowered a tray of food to their table; a large stack of warm pancakes and two plates of hamburg steak. Toya had ordered the food while Akiko was still out of it, so they were left with their usual orders. Toya grabbed a knife and fork and began cutting up the stack of pancakes. Akito always liked them in small chunks; he never ate them in large ones. The warm smell of syrup and butter was sweet and powerful, but welcoming. Like a warm hug. When he was done, Toya pushed the plate towards Akito, but it was still positioned in front of both of them so they could share. He grabbed the hamburg plates and cut each patty into fourths while Akito watched.

Their moves flowed like a simple routine, one rehearsed and ran through dozens of times. As if they knew every thought going through each other’s heads without even having to look at the other.

They ate in silence, but it wasn’t an uncomfortable one. Whenever one of them spilled even a drop of food, the other would immediately bring a napkin to their partner’s face. They were practised; they knew each other. Each and every movement they made, each action they would make next. Their reactions to things, how they processed them. What made them, them. Their own person. Their tethers to each other.

The simple thought of sharing himself with another made Akito’s heart hurt. I should just die, would it be easier, then?

“You can’t know me,” he whispered beneath his breath. He didn’t mean to, but it slipped out. Really, Akito did just about any random thing in front of Toya. Toya lifted his head up from his plate, “What? Akito-” Akito cut him off and sucked in a harsh breath, “Sorry. It’s, uh, nothing. Just eat.” He averted his eyes to his plate to bury himself away from Toya, but it was a futile attempt.

“Don’t kid me,” Toya snapped quietly. Toya was soft, gentle, and patient. And Akito was being selfish right now. Of course he was fed up. Akito was surprised it didn’t happen sooner.

Toya started to scoot out of the booth seat. He pushed his bag back into the corner, where he was just sitting, and got up to sit next to Akito.

“I need you to talk to me, Akito. Are you scared of me?”

Toya was looking straight into his eyes, and the very action made Akito want to run away and die in the dirt. He wanted to live. He’d thought of it a million times before. Whenever his skin bled and retracted at his own control, or he couldn’t breathe through his nose because of the snot running through it, or when his throat became sore because of the cries of increasing volume that he tried to keep in. He thought of it all the time, and yet, as Toya looked into him, another human being, that’s when the idea of it hurt the most.

“Please stop.”

His head was hurting. He wanted to get away.

He was about to tear his head away from Toya’s direct gaze but his hands stopped him from doing so. His hands wrapped around his face and cupped him into his grasp. “Akito. Please. Tell me what goes on in your head." And Toya’s eyes were glistening, though not as much as Akito’s. Toya’s thumbs rubbed softly against the skin on his chin. He wanted to run, to leave, but he was trapped within the booth. His breath was so close, and Akito breathed him in. Toya was alive. Toya was a real person. Akito was stealing his partner’s happiness. He responded like a coward.

His voice broke, “I can’t, Toya. I can’t tell you. I really want to but I just can’t . Everything will be fine with me, so just go on like always. You know how I am.” You don’t know how I am. You don’t know how I drink. You don’t know how I beg to my ceiling every night. You don’t know the dotted red lines on my sheets. You don’t know how my limbs sting. You don’t know how my Mom or Dad or Ena see me. You don’t know my future. You don’t know my dreams.

“Do I?”

You never will.

Akito felt fear. There was so much to face. He didn’t want to sing. He didn’t want to dance. He didn’t want to hear music, or he didn’t want to hear another’s voice. He wanted silence. He wanted peace. He wanted the world to be passive and to stop moving and for everything to just shut up and go away so he could be miserable alone. And I’m sorry for it.

Akito shook his head and his shoulders crunched into a sob. Akito thought he was fresh out of tears from the night before, and earlier at lunch, but the waves of saline liquid trickling down his face betrayed his composure. He ripped his face out of Toya’s comforting hands and stared back at his food.

He brought a fork of hamburger patty and rice to his mouth and continued eating. All while Toya was watching in visible tears and utter frustration. Toya’s fingers clenched into a tough fist and Akito wouldn’t even mind if he punched him right then. He deserved it for hurting Toya. For hurting everybody in his life, especially you, Toya, I am _____

So they sat in silence again, two high schoolers sitting in the weight of something bigger and more mature than they could handle. Toya didn’t know what to do, but Akito preferred it that way. Akito preferred to deal with the consequences of his existence by himself, like he had since he was a child. He didn’t need the help of someone else, it was horrifying to see it, because it wasn’t real. He swore, it wasn’t, real, he didn’t need It.

Everything about himself was wrong and terrible and it made his skin itch like there was dirt and blades and nails underneath it. He couldn’t tell Toya that. He knew his thoughts weren’t normal, but Akito didn’t want to concern him, or anyone else, for that manner. Not Toya, not An, not Kohane, not his father, not his mother, not Ena. They weren’t important thoughts. They were bad, he would end up dead from them, but that didn’t matter. It wasn’t important.

None of this ever was.

He doubted Ena would care if she knew. Would she see him in the same light as she used to when they were younger? When she could confidently call herself his big sister? It was stupid and selfish and lowly to think it, but he wanted things to go back to how they used to be, how they were when he was younger. When they were younger.

He knew they wouldn’t ever be able to. He couldn’t be a naive little kid anymore. The first realisation of this (ages ago, it’s been years since he had hoped for it, ages ago, it was not going to change.) felt like a cold bucket of ice water was poured over his head; he was left unable to breathe. He would never smile at Ena’s silly antics again. He would never sit with his mother on the couch and fall asleep to a movie they watched together. He would never cook with his father in the kitchen after a long day of work and laugh at the things they dropped. And he was the reason why they were that way.

His very existence created bigger and bigger rifts between his family. They grew apart and became cruel because of him. He was the one who stripped the comfort and warmth of a family away from them.

He loved his family dearly. He missed his family dearly. He craved the love and elated feeling that came from their presence.

But he was no longer a kid, and he had to face the truth of his existence and life.

Akito Shinonome was not fated for happiness. He wanted to live.

|

“Here’s your bill, sirs. Is there anything else I can assist you with today?” A waitress asked as she approached with a paper. She looked older than the two of them, but couldn’t be older than 25. Stress lines and early-appearing wrinkles were found on her face, and Akito wondered if she was like him, in a way. Completely and utterly lost in their life, and clinging to practically nothing. She was pretty, but she definitely looked the part.

“Thank you, but we’re alright here,” Toya replied to her. She turned to retreat back to her post but her eyes got caught on Akito. For a second, Akito was confused, but he figured that the dark underneath his swollen red eyes (from crying and bawling like a baby that he wasn’t anymore because of the things he did–) and the dazed look in his eyes didn’t create the prettiest sight. She sent him a compassionate smile, with a knowing look in her eyes, like she could relate.

Relate. Nobody could relate to him. Akito Shinonome, pathetic being. Nobody was as awful as him. He loved the world, he loved how people existed, and how they lived. But there was no life for him. And he had accepted it. His cries clung to his throat, releasing in the middle of the night when the stars were out to bear down on him and light stopped leaking from the hallway into his room. He clenched his hands and his eyes bled into his sheets, his soul being ripped from his body at his sobs. His brain melted into his pillow, his skin grew back into his blankets, his blood and sweat marked their territories into his bed, He accepted it. He accepted it. He did not accept it. The pain, the pain, he accepted it. 

This was his destiny. This was his passion.

He felt cold again. It was all gone.

The world whispered over his shoulder every second he breathed. It was like his mind and the whispers could never sit in agreement. He wasn’t good to anybody, and it made his skin burn.

Limb by limb, it’d tear him apart. It was his repentance. he’d been forsaken to this life to pay for his sins.

Akito turned and looked at Toya. He was beautiful. He was everything. And what was Akito?

“Hey, love birds! Stop being gay already, we promised to practise with Len and Miku,” a familiar female voice rang out in the cafe.

Len? Miku?

Akito turned his head; An was there, Kohane trailing behind her. He twisted his head back to face out the window to wipe his tears. What was An talking about? “Like, Hatsune Miku? And Kagamine Len? The vocaloids? We just made a song with them– didn’t we choose Kaito for this new song? And how’d you find us, anyways?” Akito covered everything up in his voice, like there was nothing bad to begin with. He erased everything he possibly could, but he couldn’t entirely erase his physical and outward appearance. He avoided eye contact with Kohane, looking closer to An who was distracted and looking down at her phone.

“Did you hit your head or something? We promised to sing with Len and Miku today– they’d be upset if we ditched. But anyways, we saw you two in the window from across the mall. Truly, your homosexuality knows no bounds. But on the way here we got stopped by like, Koha, what was it? Maybe seven people? They took photos with us and tagged us on Twitter or something, but interacting with fans is so cool!” An rambled, but Akito was only wondering, how could a computer be upset if we didn’t play with them?

Toya looked at him, his eyes squinted into confusion, “Akito…?”

Akito felt like he was forgetting something.

An was busy on her phone, looking for the post, but Kohane looked into Akito’s face and her brown doe eyes widened like a deer who had just been caught in headlights. She gently tugged her partner’s sleeve, and signalled to Akito. An looked up and pouted at Kohane before turning to Akito and Toya.

An’s face morphed into one of worry, and Akito felt his skin crawl stop looking at me, “Hey, Akito? Are you doing okay?” She took a hesitant step towards him and continued. Let it go. Let it go. “S-Shinonome-kun, you can talk to us if you need anything. We’re your friends,” Kohane tried pitching in. Shinonome, Shinonome, that was his name, that was his name, that was her name, why can’t you stop caring? Can you start caring?

They couldn’t know or even hear what was wrong. There was really nothing wrong and he was just a miserable idiot who hurt and hurt and hurt and Akito didn’t want this. He should’ve never left the house. He should stop trying to interact with the world– it was too frightening. What was going on with him stayed with him. And it was all fake, anyways. None of it was real. Why would any of it be real? Why would any of it be real?

“Don’t treat me like a baby. I don’t need your coddling,” he snapped. He didn’t mean it. He didn’t mean anything. He just wanted them to leave and be gone because he couldn’t deal with another person he couldn't interact he couldn’t speak he couldn’tcouldn’tcouldn’t– Akito was mean. Akito was violent. Akito was loud. Everything was sharp and painful and everything he said and did and how he reacted was laid with points that would stab if you came too close.

An’s face twisted in an instant from genuine concern to anger. She was just trying to help. He was such a piece of shit. 

“Shinonome-kun, we’re just trying to help–” Kohane was cut off by Akito’s sudden sneer. Just leave me alone. I can’t do anything for you all. Just give it up.

Please let me go.

“I told you to call me Akito, Kohane. We’re teammates, aren’t we? What, are we strangers again ?” Akito was looking away from his closest (and only) friends and he just stared at the cafe table. His breathing was heavy. He wanted to go home. He wanted to never talk to anybody ever again. He wanted to stop thinking and he wanted to sleep and lay in his bed until it would all go away. He never wanted to go home. He wanted to stay with them. He wanted them to tell him he was okay and everything would be fine and he didn’t have to worry or be sad or want to die–

Toya’s hand tightened around his own again. A second ago he was calming him down from a sobbing mess, and now he was trying to calm him down from an aggressive storm.

“Is that what you think this is? Coddling? We’re not coddling you, we want to help since you’re obviously stuck right now,” An’s voice was loud. Not loud like An loud, but loud because everything was too loud for him right now and the only sound he could tolerate was the buzzing of his desk fan and the slow inhales and exhales that his lungs powered through to keep him alive as he laid on his bed with his sweat melting into him in the dark. Not like An loud, but she was loud.

Akito let go of Toya’s hand and looked out the cafe window. There was a boutique across the mall and a pretty dress stood in its display window. Ena would like it. The stars bore down on him.

His eyes widened in wet, his lungs chopping to pump oxygen through his lungs, alveoli splitting the waste from the atmosphere from the clean air to rejuvenate his body and keep him alive. We want to help you because you’re obviously stuck right now. Haven’t I always been stuck? Where was the change now, why was the change now,

“Akito, please stop this, think about what you’re doing before you actually do it,” Toya tried to reason with him, flames bursting on his skin and devouring him whole. Why don’t you get it? Why can’t I stop? He didn’t want to go through it all for the millionth time. Everything was the same. Everything was the same. Everything ended up the same way as before.

Akito would go out. Akito would be around other people. Akito would experience and see life living in pulses around him. But he wouldn’t know life. He would never know life.

“Guys, just stop. You wouldn’t know what to do, even if I told you, so d-drop it. It’s not even important.” Akito’s hands were shaking now, his voice was shaking now, the sky and the stars held him tight, His forehead was resting on his two stood up hands and he was rubbing his eyes dry to prevent even more tears from leaking out.

Why was he so scared ?

Wasn’t it always his fault?

“Akito, we care about you. Please just talk to us,” An pleaded with him. Akito looked up quickly to see her face, and he wanted to just melt into the ground. Her face was worried, and she wasn’t her typical and playful self. She looked on the verge of tears. He wanted to beg on the floor for her forgiveness. He could feel his face get hot again. His eyes were burning with more tears that he somehow still had. He wanted them to leave. So he could go back to the quiet and lonely existence that he was used to.

“Just go, All of you, Just leave already. Don’t want you here,” Akito tried to speak, but his voice cracked and fizzled out on his last few words. Just leave me to die.

Their faces grew pained, all of them each wanting to help but not knowing how . Akito knew he had to just keep them away from him instead of them uncovering his current state. “Shinonome-kun—” Kohane started, trying to reason. Tears were in her eyes now; they were all becoming increasingly scared.

Shinonome. Akito Shinonome. One in a billion, right?

The claps of a few people were the only reprise he was given on the stage. Bored and angry eyes pierced into his bones, jeers and people talking drowned out the announcer who was thanking Akito for performing.

His legs were shaking, his microphone was slipping from his fingers, his lungs were heaving, his eyes were splitting, his head was sinking, his heart was crying, and he just stared back into the crowd. He trudged his legs forward, to walk off the stage, away from the one moment he had that destroyed this dream, destroyed this life and purpose, and he heard the words of a more incredible, more experienced musician.

“Eh, I think some people just aren’t talented enough to thrive. That kid should quit while he’s ahead– It’ll be a lot less painful if he snaps out of his dreams before it’s too late.”

Akito wanted to fall to the floor and never pick himself up. He’d told himself hundreds of times, he fell asleep with the mantra whispering in his head– this was never going to work out. He was a fool for continuing this game. He was such a joke.

Your breath will remain buried beneath the ground.

But was this the right way?

“I don’t need your pity, I don’t need your concern. God, just stop acting like it ever mattered!” Akito yelled at them, he was cruel. It was later on in the day and the cafe was emptier than usual, but their arguing had drawn the attention of the other customers eating there.

They were all looking at him. I’m sorry. Whispers and nods behind hands covering their mouths could be heard. He needed to get out of there. Before it all burst from his chest and he said things that he couldn’t crawl back from.

He looked around once more, and the world felt like it was closing in on him. As if everyone was mocking him and everyone was screaming at him (like everyone else did). He grabbed his bag and stood up— too quickly to feel stable. He wobbled and his inhales became frantic and uneven. He still noticed his friends reaching out to him and shaking their heads. One of their hands wrapped tightly around his right wrist, and his body shook violently. It didn’t hurt much but the inclination of the touch was so frightening,

because if they saw the tears of his skin or felt the ripples of his nerves or the blood pouring beneath his broken veins, what would they say to him?

(this world was not one that he was destined to live in.)

Akito pulled himself out of their grasp and ran.

|

Home. He needed to get home. It was dark out by now, with the only thing lighting up his surroundings being the lights from the city around him. Akito had been wandering around for the past few hours. Like there was no aim or goal in his mind; just the urge to go somewhere. He’d been walking around for so long that he had reached the tall bridge that crossed the river around the city. He’d been to the bridge dozens of times before, even without the want to actually do anything there.

He walked up to the railings of the bridge and leaned forward against them— it wouldn’t hurt to look over. It wouldn’t hurt anymore to gaze into the beauty of the world that rendered him into nothing. Then, wasn’t he the world? Would it be too pretentious to say?

The stars in the sky were bright and shouting, he noticed as he looked up.

The waves in the water were loud and crashing, full of life, he noticed as he looked down.

The city lights to the left of him were pulsing and vibrant, the plains to his right were calm but contained the lives of thousands. 

Even when he was surrounded by so much life, he always knew that none of it would ever belong to him.

I would like to breathe tonight. And maybe, forever, until the universe bursts apart, and my love is taken from my soul, and my heart is glistening in the stars, and I can then sing, I would like to breathe tonight.

The ringing of his phone threw him off guard, it had been going off with hundreds of messages and calls for the past few hours, but he’d been deliberately ignoring them. Talking to somebody wouldn’t help him now. He would give anything to disappear and physically remove himself from the existence of everything. So he let the phone ring out, but it called again. And again. And again.

Akito pulled out his phone, about to turn it on silent, but the caller on his phone made his eyes fly open.

Incoming Call From: Ena

What?

His mouth went dry. She hadn’t called him in years. The most she did was send a one or two sentence message once every other week, or sometimes ignoring him for months. Why was she calling him now? Why now? But there was a high likelihood that she called so he could do something for her, not because she wanted to simply talk. Akito already burned that path years ago. 

So he picked up the phone and answered the call. An alarmed voice spoke in hushed words as soon as he picked up, “Akito. Come home, right now. He—”

“It’s been years since you called me, Ena. What do you need?” His words were flat and borderline hostile, he was a mean soul, but Akito only felt regret and betrayal shackle his heart to confrontation. He didn’t mean to, but he couldn’t regulate his emotions in the face of another human being, not anymore. Let alone his own sister. His big and sweet sister whose everything he ruined, whose life was altered by him in a way he could never repay.

“Akito, Dad is home. He wants to talk to you. He seems angry– please stop dragging me into whatever he’s mad at you for.” And she hung up the phone like it was nothing. It was only around nine-thirty, there was no reason for his father to be home so early. He typically came home close to midnight, if at all.

Akito looked over the edge of the bridge railing again. He could see the cool blue water with a nearly still surface, a few waves running up against the pilings that acted like foundations for the dock by the shore. Every time he had ever gone there, it felt like he was drawn to the tranquillity that came from just observing. Watching the life pass him by and just exist without anybody’s input. It felt beautiful.

Like life was so simple. He looked around him. There was everything and nothing. Everything and nothing. It was like a broken record, a mantra repeating over and over in his head.

He liked the things around him, he loved the world that breathed out its distastes, but his life was undeniable. He had spent every second of his life running. He couldn’t run from his family, too.

So even if his brain was screaming at him to stay away from home because something would happen, Akito began walking home.

Even if he wanted to stay at the quiet bridge and stare at the night sky for a little while longer, before he entered a predictable sequence that would last for a lifetime.

The stars were beautiful tonight. The world was so big, and he’d never get to see it.

|

“It’s late for you to be returning home on a school night. I hope you value whatever it was that you were doing all day,” his father spoke when he walked through the front door. His voice was bitter and cold, like he was trying to hook Akito onto the bait he threw into the water. He was sitting at the dining table, switching from his meal and the phone in his hands, not sparing a single glance at Akito.

“Yeah, I value the stuff I do. I don’t like to waste my time.” The last few breaths left of my life. I can’t let them fall out of my hands. Akito took off his shoes and leaned on the doorframe to remove them one by one. There were luggage bags sitting by the door, with a suitcase next to them and a wrapped canvas leaning on the suitcase handle. His father looked up at him and scoffed. “Oh, then, enlighten me–” his father waved his hands up in the air, “–why did I get a phone call from your school earlier while I was at work? You know, I wasn’t happy to get a message from them in the middle of a meeting.”

Akito stiffened. His father looked up to stare directly into his eyes. Narrowed eyes bore into hazel ones, and Akito felt like falling to the floor. Or running to his room. Or just dying. Really, any one of those things would be okay to him right now. His eyes landed on the kitchen counter; every dish and plate of food was left exactly the same as it was in the morning. Had his mother gotten out of bed to eat? Had Ena eaten that day?

Akito averted his eyes. That wasn’t a question he wanted to answer. His father wouldn’t stop prying until he answered every question he sent his way, but that wouldn’t stop him from trying to avoid him.

He had to avoid it. Telling anybody what was wrong with him was like being sentenced to a life of even more misery. It wouldn’t be fair to anyone else and would only hurt in the end. Just the idea made him shiver; it was terrifying. The thought of everybody knowing, everybody hearing and understanding the whispers in his ears that made him feel like he was going crazy. The ones he brought upon himself. So he didn’t want help. Didn’t need help. He didn’t need anyone to know, because, really, there was nothing wrong to begin with.

He was just living until the time comes when he needed to stop. 

“Akito, do you want to tell me why you weren’t at school after lunch? Perhaps you were ill– you don’t exactly look well– but I highly doubt that you would be bold enough to place a few coughs over your future.”

My future. What future?

He had no future. Akito had no future. There was nothing. Of course there was nothing. Why would he have anything at all? He was just alive. He was just left alone and filled with nothing. He would fall lower and lower, become less than garbage less than everything less than the world and chase after things that weren’t important because his dreams were not real and not real and not real

Akito’s life ultimately meant nothing. He could continue to live, and the hurt would continue, to die was to let the hurt die with him. If he were to live it would be for Toya and his friends and everybody he’s ever spoken to because that’s what he owed the world. (and yet the hurt would continue,)

If he were to die, their lives would be so unaffected (that it made him sick.) that it made him almost yearn for it. 

No matter the outcome, his very existence would not change anybody else’s.

And it would be so easy to let the hurt stop now.

So yeah, no future. He had a future, he had every future, She said he was the world and he would be beautiful and it could be beautiful and he believed her because She loved him and She created him and he was supposed to live for her and live so that she would never see a child cry again and Mom, so much has changed,

It was clear now. He wasn’t supposed to be here anymore.

His father stood up and approached where Akito was standing by the kitchen counters. His face was stern. His face was mad. His face was upset. His face was worried. His face was worried. What was it? What was his father going to say? Was he going to berate him? Scream at him? Tell him he wished he was never born? It would not be the first time he said such a thing because Akito was the scum beneath his feet on the dirt, and– “I’ve had to do a lot to support this family. Your mother and I were in art school when we had Ena– do you know how much I had to do to build a life for our family? All I ask at this point is that you go to school and graduate. You can’t just stay at home all day and sing. You’re in high school now. Take this seriously. It’s your life at stake, here.”

Akito stayed silent. How should I tell you about my head? How should I tell you about the stars?

“Akito, what’s going on with you? How could you have fallen so low–?”

“So low? How high do you think I fell from? I was never shit– if you think I’ve changed so badly then you need a reality check.” Akito was desperate. Completely desperate for everything to just fall flat on the floor and for him to ignore it all and let it pass him by. Desperate for his father to stop caring because Akito knew he didn’t and desperate for everybody to just. Stop. I didn’t mean it, please start please start please oh please if you cared then I could breathe and we could breathe and you would see me, Me, again,

His father started to walk towards him but Akito couldn’t meet his eyes. He turned to stare at the untouched plates on the counter with his note completely ignored. “I’m sorry I only fuck things up, but I’ll be like this for as long as I live,” Akito muttered, his voice weak and simply tired. But it would be okay, because he wouldn’t live long.

“Akito, look at me,” his father demanded. I can’t look anybody in the eyes anymore. Everything was scary; he would just crumble if he made the most human connection of looking into somebody’s soul. Akito’s eyes were burning. He didn’t turn to look his dad in the eyes. “Have you even talked to Mom or Ena recently?” he whispered, his voice light and detached from everything around him. If you have, could you sing it in my ear? Could you whisper into the walls and carry your voice to my room as I die? Could you deliver it to me, wrapped up in a tight, white, package with a green bow because that was her favourite colour anyways,

His father sighed and Akito could see him place his hand on the counter by where Akito was standing. “What does that have to do with this? Son, we’ve talked about this before. Remember that? Years ago, when you were in junior high. Back when you would always skip school and began to talk back to your parents. Back when you gave up art and threw away all that you had going for you to self-learn street music.” The artist ran his free hand through his hair. “This needs to stop. You can’t just stop doing something important even if you don’t like it. Even if you don’t feel like it or would rather do something else, you have to go to school.” 

I’m going to die. Could you hear it now? Could you bear it now?

Akito was still. He didn’t move. He didn’t react. He felt the tears bloom upwards in his throat like vines strangling his breath, but he didn’t do anything. This was all because of him, truthfully, I’m sorry, Dad. Akito shouldn’t be there right now— he should be buried in a broken and worn down casket far far away from where his family lived. He placed himself into a self-proclaimed exile from society and humanity, and yet, here he was. It would be much easier for them all if Akito was gone. Less worries, less pain, less stress. The shame in your hearts overwhelms my own with cries that I do not know how to digest. Is this the right path?

“Are you even listening? Do you even care?” His father’s voice was building up in volume with every word he spoke out to his son.

Akito tried to fight with the ropes wrapping his vocal cords to force out an apology, but his lips only moved in a memorised movement (I am sorry, beyond this body) and his voice was not heard. He didn’t make a sound, and Shinei Shinonome was not looking at his only son. Akito made no impact on the world, when he stood there; still. His voice did not break the silence and frustration echoing between the two, standing there in the dimly lit house filled with memories they had shared together.

“Mommy, look what me and Ena made!” Akito held up an acrylic painting with a few little stick figures of people on them. His eyes were shining, and Kanako laughed as she patted his head and pulled him into a side hug. “That’s beautiful, sweetie. Why don’t we put it on the fridge?” 

“Wait, I wanna do it too!” Ena climbed down from the short step-stool where she was putting ornaments on the tree with Shinei.

Kanako placed a magnet atop the paper canvas and stuck it to the fridge. She took out her camera, “Kids, pose in front of your drawing! I wanna take a picture. Make it last forever.”

The joy on their children’s faces was infectious. Shinei and Kanako looked deep into each other's eyes, a message connecting between the two of them– this life is a precious one.

Forever was too strong a word for a family destined to be shred to ruins.

There used to be love, but Akito knew it was absent now because of himself. The only thing he produced was the waste from the carbon dioxide he exhaled from his mouth. The foul mouth he had used to curse others, everything else left in the dust.

Akito had to cough for his vocal cords to vibrate again, but it sounded more like a whimper of pain. Akito turned his head to look at his father who looked nothing short of pained. Now it was his father who wouldn’t look him in the eyes. “Dad—”

“Your mother and I did everything we could, but we still somehow ended up with you two being… like this . We— We were a good family. Kanako and I… We were twenty when we found out we were going to have Ena. We went to parenting classes and read countless books to undo what our parents had done with us.” His father looked reminiscent of the past. The past where two (barely) adults ran away from their parents who pushed them down below the ground, where they loved and it was something more than the cold glances they give each other now. The past where they looked for a new start, but that new start turned into the same life they did everything to escape from. And it was because of him,

“I don’t know where we went wrong. We indulged you two in everything you wanted, and we told you when things wouldn’t work out so there was no false optimism. Thousands of dollars and thousands of hours for what you wanted… but it all feels sour now.”

Akito breathed. His selfishness led to this, this violence of souls. They clashed, their swords up and soldiers armed, but their blood had already been shed and there was no heart behind it. It was stagnant now. This house was preserved like a memorial for what could have been, for what it had been, but it was vacant of the love that used to chirp through its walls.

the regret upon my soul weighs down on the earth, and i sang, i am lost in this suspension. and if you were to claw me out, i swear, the echoes of my song would reach into your heart.

“It was my fault, I’m sorry—” Akito’s voice broke like someone had snapped it with their bare hands. His father didn’t say it, but Akito knew it was all his fault. He was the one who tore this family apart. His birth and introduction to this world was the reason there was more pain than gentle care. 

Everything he did. Everything he said. Everything he thought. He was the start of the end. And he was the only one who could repent for it.

“I think it’s too late for that. I can’t…”

Shinei Shinonome looked at Akito Shinonome with a sense of loss in his eyes.

The man who hadn’t yet lived to his forties looked at his son who would never live to his twenties with a sense of loss in his eyes.

Akito looked into the soul of his father, who was far too weathered to be hurt by small things.

“It’s hard to see you as my son now.”

But Akito was not a small impact on his father’s life.

And Akito made it all worse.

They had both never experienced what it was like to be a child free of the pain from this world.

“I can’t blame you, you’re just a child. You’re still my kid, but maybe it was foolish to think that we could’ve made it work. I find myself wishing at times that there was something that could be done to fix ourselves, but the damage has already been done.” The mold has set in. Akito was the parasite who infected their livelihood.

His face was wet. Akito wanted it all to stop. It was supposed to stop. Life left to be squeezed out of his poisoned organs. To be fed a deadly medicine that would kill his heart and lungs and clean out the filth that built up inside him. The moment he stops breathing is the moment he can make up for it all. Every person he met and cursed with his existence would be free.

His father was silent as Akito wept, standing still in the same place he had been for the entire conversation. “Head to bed. I don’t want to see you right now.”

Akito didn’t move. He couldn’t move. Akito only cried.

“Akito, did you hear me? Don’t shut down. Go upstairs. Go to school if you want— I don’t care anymore— and set a damn alarm so you’re not in bed all day. I’m going to be away for a while because of work. Take care of your mother and sister, make sure they don’t wind up dead from negligence.” Shinei pinched his nose and sucked in a deep breath.

Negligence. Akito couldn’t take care of himself. How was he supposed to take care of other human beings? Oh, but they wouldn’t have anybody else to support them if he gave up. He felt bad for them. He was their last resort and there was nobody else they could trade him out for. He had to. He had to be there for them. He had to he had to he had to–

Akito didn’t move. He was still frozen in place, hands erupting with a tremor that couldn’t be staunched. It flooded his existence, his very being and he couldn’t just calm down. He couldn’t calm down, he couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t move, and his father could tell. He shoved the chair between them to the floor, and Akito jumped like electricity had been poured into his veins. It didn’t hit him, but a yelp escaped his mouth from the volume and suddenness of it hitting the floor.

“I’m sorry–”

“Stop apologising. You keep saying the same words but you never change. I don’t– You can’t keep going like this. You make it so much more difficult when you behave like this. You behave like you’re a shell of who you used to be.”

Akito looked at him. Akito looked at him. And his father was looking at him like he had betrayed everything he had ever whispered in promise to him. Like Akito was a sinner who was looking at the purest soul as if he had done nothing to regret.

Akito breathed in, to speak, to attempt a chance of forgiveness– a way to repent and fix what was already destroyed.

“Are you even listening? You never listen– why don’t you listen?”

To confess his sins to the priest before God looked down upon him like a tainted devil.

But, a mere boy like himself had no business speaking to a master of the universe.

Akito stood still.

“Go! Get out of my face–” his father shrieked before he spoke, his hand shoving a glass from the counter to the floor, the shattering glass ricocheting on Akito’s feet. His father hated him. It was clear now, the look of anger in his eyes. Like Akito was a failed piece the artist had devoted too much time to to turn back on. There was one word ringing in his head like a church bell echoing through a small town possessed by beliefs of a divine god. 

Listen.

Akito stumbled to turn around towards the stairs, and he forced his body to pull in the direction of the stair rails. The carpeted stairs with white painted railing where the paint was peeling in the corners. Akito climbed a few steps until he was out of view from the kitchen, and collapsed halfway up the stairs until his face was scraping against the rough carpet. The exhaustion of his body was catching up to him now. The world spinned from his perspective on the floor of the stairs.

Akito heard his father throw another chair to the floor. He heard him swear. He heard him cry out. He heard him rummage through drawers, and pull things out into his harsh grasp. He heard glass bottles clank in his hands, and he heard the door swing open. He heard the suitcases and bags roll out of the house. He heard the only car their family had start. He heard the trunk open and he heard things get loaded into the trunk. He heard him shut the front door of the house. He heard him lock the door and fiddle with the handle to check its security.

Akito heard his father leave.

Every single noise of departure Akito heard was made by his father. His dad. His dad. The one who made everything and did everything for him. The one taught him and nurtured him when he was a young child. The one who put up with him for decades. The one whose life he ruined. It was all Akito’s fault.

The mere existence of a person like him had single-handedly brought the lives of others to ruin and crumble. He was a trespasser in their lives. Their worlds.

Akito cried. Again. Again. Again. 

He couldn’t help it. He shouldn’t be allowed to stop.

Everything hurt. His head was pounding hard, and even in the dark, the things he could see were dizzy and blurred. His hands grasped pathetically around the corner of the carpeted staircase, and they curled into themselves as his body shook with silent sobs.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to…” escaped Akito’s mouth, his eyes in a frenzy and clothes and hair a mess. Where did he go wrong in his life? He was just trying to exist. But existing was so hard, and he didn’t think that he wanted to try it anymore. He hurt them all. They were kind and he was cruel. And they wouldn't know him. They would never know him.

He still missed it. He missed it all. He missed when his father loved him. When his family cared. When Ena would help him with his homework, when his mother would put his hair into tiny and short braids while he read an above-grade level book. And even when his father would only scold him with a teasing look, instead of one with pure hatred.

He missed everything. Everything was different and nobody was there to help guide him through the change. He had nothing. He had nothing. He sobbed into the carpet.

Ena had her online friends, his father had his art, and his mother had the friends she’s had since high school, even if they were all broken by this world. Everyone had something. A reason to keep going. But Akito had nothing but self-inflicted pain and hurt shoved down his throat. He loved his friends, but they didn’t love him in the way he cared for them. His music was nothing, his music was everything he lived for for so long but it was so easily rendered into something that could be thrown away at the click of a button. Every thing he made, every thing he did, it was all just worthless fucking garbage. It was all pointless.

It was all his own doing. His own being. He had everything.

How did he ruin it all so miserably?

Harsh and gut-wrenching sobs that made him feel like he was about to throw up strangled his throat, and the dimly lit carpet appeared even darker with wet spots.

Every day for the past million years was a bad day. There weren’t any days where he felt as though he could breathe, or where he could sleep without a guilty conscience, or just exist without thinking. Make it all stop. Make this stupid, repetitive, cycle stop.

He felt his arms burn at the friction from his sleeves rubbing against the carpet. It would be so easy to give up and make it fair for everyone else whose lives he infected.

He’d planned it out before. His death. His erasure of life. It was so easy. He was too scared to go through with it before. Maybe some time in the future, he would be less afraid. Maybe some time in the future, he would stop running from what he deserved.

He pulled himself to his feet and prayed with everything in him that Ena didn’t hear his dumb crying, even if she probably did.

The door to his room was open in the same position he had left it in the morning, but upon walking in, he could smell something stale. It was either the mix of clean and dirty clothes strewn across the floor that he was too tired to clean up, or maybe he missed a few drops of blood. Or it was the alcohol hidden around his room, or the plates from a few days ago with food he was too bored and tired to eat.

He didn’t really care anymore.

He fell onto his bed, the moonlight from the night cascading over his window. The scene felt vaguely familiar until he realised that he was in this exact position the night before. School started up from summer break about a week ago, and he couldn’t even handle that one week before he started crumbling beyond recognition. He didn’t even see a reason to continue going, at that point. (all of these hopes, all of these dreams, he didn’t see a reason to continue going.) He left his homework undone and opened up his phone as he sunk deeper into his mattress.

He had a few dozen missed calls and texts from an assortment of people, they didn’t know him. His sister, Toya, An, Kohane, and oddly enough, their other friends. Ena’s friends; a second-year named Kanade Yoisaki and an unknown number. Toya’s friends; Saki and Tsukasa Tenma, and Rui Kamishiro. (he regretted speaking to him this morning, he knew, Akito could tell he knew, and knowing was horrifying) He barely even knew most of their names. He wasn’t anything to any of them.

The stars in the sky outlast the ones who have fallen to the ground.

They were all just people. There were other people, the friends of his own friends and family, who he had shared one or two conversations with in his life and who barely knew of his existence. Toya, An, Kohane, were his friends. People he had shared his life and passions with. They were the three people in his life who he could comfortably be around on bad days, but even they couldn’t help him navigate his own stupidity and regrets.

Akito felt like there were people he was forgetting. Maybe it was a place? A thing? Something bizarre, but a key to who he was as a person. He hated himself for forgetting.

He stared at his phone, thumbs twitching between apps before he decided to click on Twitter. An was talking about a post a fan made about them. Maybe it would make him feel less, horrible, (nothing ever would,). He found the tweet on his timeline with upwards of a hundred thousand likes, and attached was a photo of two fans posing with An and Kohane in front of the cafe that Akito and Toya were eating at.

He inspected the photo, and suddenly regretted ever sitting at a stupid window seat. He damned the fan’s phone for having such a detailed camera, must’ve been an android or something, because in the background you could see clear and vivid tears rolling down Akito’s face as he sat with Toya in their window seat. If it were just him and Toya wasn’t also obvious in the picture, it wouldn’t be nearly as bad. But Toya was easy to identify. He lit up rooms, he lit up the sky, Akito swore the angels would be jealous of Akito for being so lucky to be graced by Toya’s presence.

He clicked on the tweet, and saw that Kohane, or most likely An, had retweeted the post from their group’s twitter account– no wonder it had millions of views in the analytics. The replies to the tweet were full of different responses.

stelle !! ✧˖° @STERE0T4PE

━  OH MY GOD I JUST MET KOHANE AND AN FROM @VividBADSQUAD ??? MY FRIENDS AND I WERE JUST GOING TO THE MALL WTF
–▼ attached image

➥ (76.3k) ♡︎ (105.8K) 

shoe @suujin : how is an so gorgeous how is she real

➥ (22k) ♡︎ (8.2K)

ELISE @kazuh.a : is that akito and toya in the background? is akito crying or smth :(

➥ (7.1k) ♡︎ (13.8K)

marc @leons_jfk : OOMF UR LITERALLY LIVING MY DREAM?? congrats but when is it my turn hdskfkhfkbhkn,,,,,,,,

➥ (209) ♡︎ (9.4k)

lin @catnoin : bro akito is crying?? like ugly crying?? toya is comforting him?? akitoya real ig but anhane better – ▼ attached image  

➥ (19.6k) ♡︎ (23.5K)

xia @loweronesballs : HELP AKITO’S CRYING?? act deserved

➥ (9.6k) ♡︎ (4.1k)

loser @aiondori : i fucking hate akito why is he so silly

➥ (1) ♡︎ (3)

Slyvie <3 @Mikuday0u : Hot take but why is it so funny to see akito cry lmao??

➥ (463) ♡︎ (703)

lai | on limit @chengxiaoshikisser: why are u all so horrible let akito rest ? he’s just a guy sdfknfkn

➥ (8.2k) ♡︎ (24k)

There were other comments, thousands of them, but Akito wanted to do nothing more than look away from them. 

He always understood that he would never be enough for this world and the people in it. How his voice would crack on the notes he sang, how the crowd parted when he passed through the streets because his existence was too heinous to be around. He would always be a stupid little kid living through dreams that wouldn’t come true. His whole life he had tried so hard to become something else. Day after day, week after week, even if he hated it, he would at least try.

“I hate you,” Akito whispered. He dropped the arms that held his phone, and he stared at the white nothing on his ceiling. “You can’t do anything. You’re nothing–” and his voice broke. He pulled his hands to his face and let warm tears drip onto his hands. For what must’ve been the millionth time that day, Akito let himself cry. It comes and goes, but it’s never fully gone. it will never leave, it will always bleed, and when the world stops to sing, the stars will start to sink.

“I’m so pathetic. God, what is wrong with me? I can’t do anything and I can’t make anyone happy and I’m just so mean and loud and stupid. I don't want to keep doing this. Stop thinking, for the love of God, please just let me stop thinking. Stop sobbing, just stop crying, stop being so fucking ridiculous, and just give up already,” Akito begged to no god in the world. He didn’t beg to anybody but himself. A sinner didn’t have the right to do anything but that. 

“It doesn't matter what you do, Akito Shinonome. Get over it.” He continued to berate himself. "You’re nothing," he weakly muttered. Akito wheezed out a pained and brutal laugh, tears falling further down his face. It was a disgusting feeling. The saliva being sputtered out of his mouth, the snot running from his crying and the tears being spliced with the sweat holding onto the sides of his face. He was gross. He was filthy.

“You’ve never been anything. It’s not a horrible thing. Just don’t be stupid about it. You’re nothing to them all, you shouldn’t be anything to them. You don’t deserve that right.” The scars and ugly marks on his body were proof of that. He was just something that deserved to be destroyed. He was whispering it all while he faced his wall and curled into a pathetic ball on his side.

It would be nice to cut deep enough so that he could pry into his flesh and look inside of his body. Maybe then he’d find what he’d been desperate for all his life.

Akito swiped his face dry with a damp sleeve from the crying, but liquids just trailed down more. He was a sick and infectious boy to anyone who came near him. His family was the first to succumb to his sickness, falling at the biggest cough of germs he spread to them. His old friends, old teammates, were the second to fall. Luckily, they were able to get away before he could ruin them any more.

His new friends, his family, the people he loved more than anything else in the world.

It was pointless.

It was all pointless. He was pointless.

He’d spent his whole life trying to be better; trying to be something else. He was chasing after something different. A different life. But it was so impossible.

He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t do any of it.

When he was younger, he promised himself he would push through anything that stood in his way.

Akito Shinonome could never keep his promises.