Sandpaper Over a Bruise
"Home is a reminder of what would happen if he were to fail." Monoma Neito carries a reminder so close to his chest that it is often forgotten. By all but himself.
Part of Bloom in All Four Seasons.
Title from the poem "A Marionette Without Its Strings" by Amanda Reed.
"Name's Neito Monoma."
"Like Spector Match?"
The enthusiasm in his voice when asking about Neito's brother is almost cruel in its naivety.
"I—Yes," he manages, at last, the smile having grown stiff on the other boy's face from the awkward silence following his question. "I should go."
"Ah, wha—Bye then!"
He makes sure he walks to class instead of running, leaving the stuttering A-1 boy behind in confusion.
He's learned to be very conscientious of his own thoughts and not only for himself. It is better to avoid a situation altogether when it comes down to it, topics of his family are easier to deal with when not mention at all. His mother taught him that and his brother was the cruelest lesson.
Home is a reminder of what would happen if he were to fail.
He dreams of it, of how their kitchen floor had been unbearably cold beneath his feet, of the shuttering gasps that had replaced his mother's wretched sobs, and of how she clung to Katsuo's limp body, sprawled and unwieldy only half in her arms. Like a marionette with its strings cut. He dreams of his brother's smooth unwrinkled face staring listlessly up at the ceiling, his eyes glassy and unseeing.
What his dream cannot capture his memory does, the careful clarity of it all lingering on the edge of his mind, never completely forgotten. The twisted puckered edges of an ugly scar.
Some nights it is not his own mind that haunts him ruthlessly, there's no peace at home between his own head and his mother's. That mutated past shared between the two of them is a divide a lifetime's wide.
He'd hate Katsuo if he had it in himself too.
Not even close to being completed how I imagined it but I need to clean out my computer.
