Wait.
I'm not dying just yet.. I need to-
Ring
"What is all this." A white room. A monitor beside me. A person leaving the room.
Who am I?
"You... Who are you?" I quickly but calmly asked the person leaving the room.
He looks shocked. Did I say something wrong?
I followed his movements towards me, walking while tears were forming in his eyes.
He didn't say anything for a while and just sat down beside me. Crying. I wiped his tears with my hands. I don't know him but I somehow feel drawn to him, like he's someone close.
"Kaede."
Kaede?
...
Kaede..
Ring
It hurts.. my head hurts. But I can't express it..? How come?
Wait.. that name. Yes, Kaede. I think I heard that name before.
"I think I know someone called Kaede?" I answered but it somehow turned into a question with the way I said it.
I just looked at him, observing everything he's doing. What's that reaction? Is he angry? Shocked or happy? What does it mean to be happy? No.. what does all that feel lik-
"Lay back down, you're still unwell. Sleep for a bit." His voice. Kaede's voice cut my thoughts.
I don't want to sleep yet but...
My body seems to be disregarding its master. Why am I laying back down? Why am I closing my eyes? Why am I following orders?
"You just do."
Who was that? I can't see anything.. of course because my eyes are closed but still.
"I can hear you, you know."
What?
"I'm you, Hibiki."
Who's Hibiki? Me?
"Yes. Hibiki Onagawa."
Wait. I have to ask, what is happening right now? Why am I like thi-
"Not important right now."
...
"The important thing is for you to remember."
Ring
--"Take care of Kaede for me, will you."--
⁰-⁰
I've finally been discharged.. currently walking down the stairs, going out of the hospital.
'Are you there?' I asked myself inside my head.
...
I took a deep breath and looked up at the sky. The sky is clear of clouds, sun's already half way down the horizon and the sky, oddly enough, is colored in pink.
I looked back in front of me. Kaede, who has already walked a little far from me. Head looking down and one hand playing with his right ear.
'If the sky's so clear, why does my world look clouded?'
I asked myself another question.
As much as I want to voice out my questions, I can't seem to. As if my body has been set like this by default.
Why am I like this?
He looked back at me who stopped walking a while ago to look at the sky and observe him.
Ah.
I just noticed. His eyes are black... A few days ago, when we first met. Well, when I met him. His eyes looked like it was grey. It was just probably my head.
His eyes are dark... Very dark, like a void. An endless void that can't be filled. Devoid of light and hope.
How enigmatic.
"Hiki... Come closer here." I heard Kaede's voice call.
Before I knew it, and before I even got to process what to do. My body has already walked towards him quickly.
My body's like a servant's, quickly following orders. So this is me.
Hold on. He called me Hiki, I thought I was Hibiki? Seems like we used to be close. Who am I really? Who is he?
Huff
The sound of his crying. The tears that slowly fell onto my shoulders. The way his arm wrapped around my waist, holding me close and the way his hand touches my hair so adoringly.
Yes, we used to be close.
Processing what happened, I finally realized that he's already hugging me.
His head, laying on my shoulders, crying. His left arm around my waist hugging me so tight that I can't almost breathe and the other patting my head.
That day Hibiki has probably died. I am Hibiki too but I'm not the Hibiki they knew. From what I know, I'm far from the Hibiki they've met. But still. I'm Hibiki too.. just not the one they loved.
'Are you okay?'
That's the question that I wanted to ask just now, but I can't seem to utter a word. My body's not allowing me to.
Do I own this body or does it own me?
I didn't know what to do so I just responded by hugging Kaede back. They're crying... They're sad, so I should too right? But why can't I feel anything. I never did feel a thing these past few days I spent on this hospital.
What happened really?
I just met this person named Kaede when I woke up. Not knowing anything about what happened.
Who am I, who is he? I don't know. But right now, I don't think that that's too important. What's important is Kaede.
--"Take care of Kaede for me, will you."--
"Hiki," I felt his hug tightened as he called out to me, gently. "What do we do now?"
I closed my eyes and listened to the waves of winds, crashing, fiercely trying to blow us away. But here we stand, not caring about anything, outside, in front of a place I woke up from.
He slowly pulled away from the hug and we looked at each other so intently. As if we're the only people left in the world, like we were so important to each other that we can never be apart.
I held his face with both my hands, his face still wet from tears and the corner of his eyes, puffed from crying.
Me, my name?
Hibiki Onagawa. I think.
An unfeeling entity.
⁰-⁰
An unfeeling entity huh? So Asami was being mean. I don't feel offended or angry though.
I shook my head to focus more on what Xyla was saying, more than the random thoughts that kept on forming on my head.
Here I am, in the backroom of Xyla's closed shop. Sitting across Xyla in a small table with two chairs. While listening to Xyla's rants about her friends.
How did the conversation even end up here?
"So I was with my friends right?" Xyla asked the same question to start her ranting for the sixth time. "And they asked all of us if we would choose a bear or a man to spend the night with. Most of them picked bear..." She stood up with her arms crossed, wearing an annoyed face as she walked towards the mini kitchen. "Did they slip and hit their head against a rock? Cuz I'd rather get fucked in a necrophilia convention than to spend a night with A. Fucking. Bear."
Xyla's wordings impress me the most. A woman with no filter.
"I don't think they meant spend the night as in-"
"Anywayssss" She interrupted as she prepared coffee, she looked back to me and said. "Sugar?"
I nodded.
"So... I feel like you've come back here to discuss something important. Speak." Her voice and manner that was without a filter and not caring about anything turned serious, with words that are picked very carefully.
"Before anything... How come you're still here?" I asked. Before, when she was just about to close her store, she said that she wouldn't be here for a while.
"Hiding." She answered with a playful smile. I didn't pry to anything she must be doing any further and just got to the point.
"It's them. They visited my house, not very friendly though. They didn't even knock."
Xyla walked back to the table with two coffees and carefully gave one to me. "I see."
We sat in silence for a minute and took a sip of our coffee.
...
"What should we do now?" I asked.
Xyla who was looking down at her coffee just a while ago. Thinking deeply with while wearing a cold emotion, looked at me.
"Would you like to go head on?" She asked me with such seriousness in her voice.
"What do you mean?"
"You know what I mean," She stopped to take a sip of her coffee. "Going against them, themselves. Are you ready?"
What she said stopped me for a moment. I looked down at my coffee that is already starting to get cold. Looking at the reflection of my face that still doesn't hold any emotion. Do I need to? Do I really need to do this to save him?
Why do I have to save him himself anyway? Right... He said that he wanted to spend his time with me rather than doing part time jobs for his debt. So basically I am the reason he was taken right?
The debt, it was probably from them.
"You don't have to answer now." Xyla said and crossed her arms again. But then... "Ah- Achoo!"
Huh?
Meow
Oh.
I quickly pulled Kade, my cat out of the pocket of my jacket and carefully put her on the table. Xyla who was just looking intimidating, well she would for normal people. Was now shocked, scared of the animal I just put on the table. Moving away with the chair from the table a bit.
"That." Xyla pointed to Kade and looked straight at me.
"My cat."
"You have a cat?" She asked. "Why didn't you tell me? Also that's a weird cat because we've been talking for a while and he- I mean she. Wait Kade's her name? Ooooh I can see whose name it came from~"
I didn't even get to process every emotion she showed as she said that. But from what I just saw, she was scared, full of curiosity, excited yet now teasing me.
"She's so cuteeeee." She squealed as she moved her finger up and down, as if petting the cat even though she's far away.
"You like cats?"
"Who wouldn't? It'd be a crime if anyone says they don't. It's just that I'm allergic to them."
That would be sad. I think? Since she likes cats but can't really be close to them.
"Oh by the way, let's stop talking about serious stuff like that for now. Let's chill."
She really said that when I almost got killed by visitors just a moment ago that don't even know how to knock?
"Hmm... How about you? Have any allergies?"
There was this one time when Kaede visited me the day after I got discharged from the hospital. I was alone the entire time in my apartment when he suddenly visited me with nothing but chocolate milk and a.. bouquet of flowers.
Looking back at it, his ways of finding a reason to visit were very interesting.
When I smelled that flower though. My lungs immediately shut down and my throat, in incomprehensible pain.
There was this aching, painful, yet soft feeling inside my lungs at that moment. As if flowers have also grown inside it. How weird.
My vocabulary is so bad that I can't explain anything further. I wonder how I'll graduate High Schoo-
"Hey, you okay?" Xyla asked while waving a hand in front of my face. She then pointed down at the table. "Your coffee."
I looked down to see Kade beside my coffee that has already lost its warmth. Kade drank from it a little, he was able to reach it since I barely touched it. And then she suddenly ran circles on the table.
...
"Is something bothering you?" Xyla added from her question a moment ago.
Well it's not really important, but it's a topic that's definitely worth the thought.
"With the way things are now," I took Kade and put her in my lap. Patting her and playing with her my hand as I talked to Xyla. "Do you think I'll even last long enough to graduate High School?"
I heard Xyla sigh but I didn't look at her, I just continued on focusing my attention on Kade.
"Don't know, anyone would know based on what I look like, that I've dropped out. Haha. Drop out.." She laughed to herself. She sighed once again.
"I guess if you stay away from the Yakuza, then you'd be able to. Still, meeting more of them would be inevitable because they're already alert, especially with you. But if you actually choose not to get involved with anything from now on, then that would mean staying away from me too."
I see. I understand. I already knew that it'll end up to me choosing what to do next anyway. So what's stopping me now from wanting to have a peaceful life?
Maybe because I know that even if I choose stay away, they'd still come after me?
But still if I do that, then I'd leave a close friend too. If I continue on getting involved then.. wouldn't that just be stepping into the depths of an unknown? Who knows if I'll get lucky enough to survive and leave without a scratch or get stuck inside and die?
But still... Even though the reason I have right now is purely out of the result of myself blaming me. I'll still try to save him myself.