Suki da Yo, Nee-Chan
The Earth was quaking below us. Pulsing tremors that shook our village. The black evenings were painted red by the wings of the butterflies. The Crimson Butterflies... the spirits of the twins before us. That fact alone tore at my heart. The fact that someday, your hands would be forced onto my throat, your strength would slowly but surely increase... and I would join those butterflies. And with the rumbling of the earth and the fluttering butterflies overhead, I knew that day would come soon...
I knew it was killing you. You were my Onii-san. You would do anything for me... you loved me. I knew as well as you did that you did not want to do this. It was odd... how I felt. Kiryu Azami never felt so afraid to die... or at least, she never showed it. I knew that it tore her heart apart to know that her sister was the one to kill her. But she was so strong... they both were. But it was wrong... children so young, so innocent... they didn't deserve to witness death and murder at that age... they just didn't. It wasn't right. You and I were both old enough to understand what was to happen... but I wasn't as strong as Azami. I could never hold my strength in.
"Tsuchihara Taka..." I blinked and turned my head. One of the priests stood at the door. My eyes widened at the sternness of his face... the murderous shimmer in his eyes... and the tensing of his muscles.
You and I had always been together. Well, of course we have. We were born together. Mother always told us, even though she knew our fate, that she expected many wonderful things to happen from us. We were different from the other twins born in this village. Rather than share the same gender, I was born as a girl, and you were born as a boy. It was a rare thing, Mother would say. She said it was an omen of some sort, and although she was uncertain of whether the omen was of good fortune or bad fortune, that she did expect great things to become of us.
For a long time, I believed her. For decades now, twins entered the Kurosawa House, and never once did the Repentance flood into the village. I believed her because in that time, twins went in and new twins were born... but they never called on us to enter the house. We were still here... even as we enter adulthood, we were both still alive. And that never happens... not here.
Remember when we were children? When we used to escape to the Cemetery whenever we were sad or lonely or angry? Or when the boys in the village would want to pick fights or our parents would anger us, we would always hide there? That was our place... our special place. Even on hallow ground, standing above the deceased, this was our hideaway, the place nobody would come to... the place nobody would find us.
The both of us were so small, I'm still amazed I remembered the day. Every detail of that moment was perfectly etched in my memory. I remember how messy your hair was, and the little bruise on your cheekbone after Father had hit you. I remember your white robe and my white kimono, and how my hair was pulled into a small ponytail no bigger than my thumb. We escaped to our little sanctuary after another outburst from our Father. To this day, I blamed myself for not trying to get you out quicker, or warning you ahead of time. You wouldn't have had to face the terrible experience of hatred... the hatred towards our own father. Sometimes I can hardly believe my own voice when that name emerges. Father. A man who's supposed to be there for his children, to bring them comfort, to sacrifice himself for them, to support them and love them, and let them know that he will always have their side regardless of what is right and wrong. And our sad excuse was a drunken old man dwelling on the past that hit his own wife and ignored his children. He was no Father to us.
But here... in the graveyard, we had a father. I remember the both of us making our way through the rows and rows of headstones graves. We scampered towards the very back of the cemetery, dropping to our knees and then crawling across the leafy, muddy soil, so if any visitors were to come, we remained hidden from their wandering eyes. The both of us crawled slowly, as infants do, making our way to the very back of the cemetery, then halting before a large tomb. The tomb inscribed "TSUCHIHARA".
Grandfather's tomb...
"Is your cheek okay? Does it hurt you?" I asked as we sat before the tombstone. You gave a smile and rubbed your cheek softly.
"He didn't hit me as hard as he hit before. I'm alright..." you said, then lowered your hand.
We both looked up at the tombstone and smiled. Despite the fact that it was a graveyard and not a playground, we were always happy to see the Tsuchihara Grave. Grandfather, even in death, had always been more of a father to us than the one at home. He was here to listen, he was always there for us to come to, he was our hiding place, and our special place... he was always there for us. Normally when we came here, he was more like our diary. We could tell him so many secrets and nobody could know. But this time, he was here to provide us safety as we spoke together.
"Onii-san..." I whispered, then lowered my head. You looked at me, but since my head was lowered, I was unaware of your expression.
"What's wrong, Taka?" you asked.
How was I to tell you? How was I to say that I overheard Father speaking with a Priest about a terrible ritual? How was I to look you in the eyes, at that age, and break the news to you that someday your hands, your soft, fragile, gentle hands, would bring forth my death? For a long, long time I stared at the ground, unable to speak, to breathe... only focusing on something so heartless, so terrible, and so frightening inevitable… and how I was going to tell you.
"Taka...? What's wrong?" you asked again. I heard you place both hands on the ground and you move your face closer to mine, trying to see if I was crying, annoyed, smiling... anything.
It was at that moment when I leaned forward and threw my arms around you, holding you tightly. How I wanted to cry at that moment. How I wanted to bury my face in your now stained robes and cry and cry and cry. But I never, never wanted to do anything to alarm you. I didn't want you to worry as I worried. I knew that even though I was so scared of death, you would be even more scared to know that you, my sweet, precious Onii-san, would be the one to kill me.
"Nee-chan..." you whispered, hugging me close as well. I choked on a sob, tried desperately to calm myself, and wiped away my tears on your shoulder, trying to bring myself back into control.
"Onii-san..." I shook my head. "Toki..." It sounded better that way. You had always called me by my name, calling you by yours sounded much better. "Toki... can you promise me something?"
You nodded. I rested my head against yours, still hugging you tightly, never ever wanting to let go of you. "Promise me that no matter what happens, we will always be there for each other. No matter how terrible things get, no matter how much the children call us mean names, how bad Father hurts us, or how scary the nighttime thunderstorms can get... that we'll be there for each other."
Although I couldn't see your face, I knew you were smiling. I felt you nod again, and we pulled away from each other. I moved my hand towards yours, and placed my palm against yours. I remembered how our hands opened in unison, how our fingers danced and moved against each other. We would always do this when we were little. I don't understand why. Perhaps it was a symbolism of trust and gentleness, of the bond we had. A secret handshake or some sort… it's kind of funny. Sometimes I would picture tiny ropes tying around our hands as our fingertips caressed the skin of our palms, wrists, and fingers. I smiled at you... you smiled back.
"You promise?" I asked.
You smiled and nodded again. "I promise..."
"Sir...? Is something wrong?" I asked, looking at the priest. His eyes grew harder.
"Where is your brother?" he hissed. I stepped back... my heart nearly skipped a beat.
"I... I don't know where he is." I said, lying between my teeth.
Obviously, it didn't fool him. He moved forward and grabbed me by the roots of my hair. I gasped at his strength, which formed into a wince as he yanked back. Squeezing my eyes shut and wincing at the pain, I felt his eyes fall onto my helpless form, his anger increasing. Again, he growled.
"Where is Tsuchihara Toki?"
I squeezed my eyes closed and managed to allow a whimper to escape from my lips. I looked at him again. "I don't know where he is, I swear. He left this morning and didn't say where he was going!"
Annoyed by my lie, the priest threw me onto the ground in his rage. I winced again, breaking my fall with my hands, which then rose to my scalp, stroking the roots with comfort. A loud, swift noise of metal through the air forced me to flinch in surprise, and I found myself staring at the tip of the priest's staff, which had pointed in my direction. My eyes trailed from the tip of the staff to the fiery stare in his eyes.
"Hell will embrace you with loving arms... just as your brother did..."
My eyes widened and I gasped louder...
He knew...
We reached age ten when we began to grow more adventurous. As small children, we thought the world only consisted of our own abusive household and the cemetery. You were always the bravest out of the both of us. Every day you would carry that smile on your face, the smile that made your face glow brighter than the sun, and I knew a new adventure would begin.
"Come on, Taka! Over here!" your voice would call out.
I was never really shy... just not as outgoing as many children. I remember our first "adventure" perfectly. You told me that we had always traveled to the Cemetery many times before, and we knew the way there so flawlessly that we could paint a portrait of the route. You said that it was time for us to find different places to run off to, more play areas for us to run to, more landscape to explore. At first I was uneasy about it. Were you trying to say that we needed a new hiding place? That we wouldn't run away to Grandfather when Father got angry? It wasn't until later when I found out what you truly meant by your words.
But I stayed quiet... I guess deep down, I did want to see more of the village. You gave your glowing smile and took me by my hand. The both of us sprinted down the streets of All God's Village. I remembered some of the houses, most that Mother told us about when she went out. We ran down the stone steps of our house onto the streets. The village was very quiet, although many people lived there. Mostly the adult would stay indoors and the juveniles and younger children would play outside. Other adults were out foraging the mountains for food. This morning, the streets were empty. The both of us scampered under the hot sun, running pass the Kiryu House and under the bridge between the Kiryu and Tachibana houses.
The run from our house to the cemetery was usually very long. Sometimes if we were so inclined, we would climb up the tall stone stairs and explore the Kureha Shrine. But we had done that many times before, and you, Toki, becoming a boy with a lust for adventure and excitement, already grew bored with traveling to the same place every day. This time, we traveled through the village, and took the opposite direction rather than the road to the Old Tree. The both of us ran down the empty streets, hearing excitement buzzing in the houses and smelling the sweet scent of rice cakes filling the air. I think that scent was what had comforted me. Up until now I had been a little timid to travel away from the Cemetery. I guess knowing that there were loving, happy families living in these houses, who cooked and baked and laughed with their families was what lifted the mood a bit.
"Taka, you're dragging behind!"
Your voice snapped me back into my senses. It set off a trigger, and I felt myself stumble, almost falling onto the ground. You stopped, your eyes full of concern, and wrapped your arms around me.
"Are you okay?" you asked. "I didn't mean for you to fall..."
I dusted myself off before my legs and your arms pulled me up to my feet. Slowly, my head rose... and I found myself staring into your eyes. Those eyes... those large, dark, innocent doe eyes. So gentle... so comforting... eyes that could relax anyone, who could make anybody stop worrying about what they were doing or what was to happen, and just calm down. It was at that moment, looking into those beautiful dark eyes and realizing their power that I knew that I would look into those same eyes as you...
"Taka? What's the matter?" you asked.
My eyes watered. My hands trembled, and I let out a loud sob. I pulled myself against you and buried my face into his shoulder. My tears poured out from my eyes, wettening the white silk of your robes. My hands clutched the silk on your back and I sobbed harder and harder. Seconds seemed like hours to me... no, more like, time ceased to exist for me. Just those thoughts haunted me. The thoughts of those cruel priests leading us pass the gates that were shut off to the village. Leading us into the Kurosawa House... the thoughts of the pain I would feel and the pain you would feel afterwards.
My sobs ceased as I felt your hand stroke my back and the roots of my wetten. I lifted my head away from your shoulder and looked up at your face. There were no tears in your eyes, but from the liquid smeared across your cheekbones and lower eyelids and the reddening of your eyes, I knew that you had been crying as well. But if I knew my Onii-san, he would never admit that he was crying. He would always mask it with a smile, like he did now. Your face slowly began to glow again and your hand wiped away my tears.
"Hey... don't be crying now. You didn't fall that hard, and we're going to go on an adventure! We'll have fun." you said with your cheery voice. I closed my eyes, smiled, and nodded.
Taking my hand in yours, we ran pass one of the houses on the outskirts of the village... the Osaka House, I believe it was called. The both of us ran pass the house, then halted. From that house was a pathway that led uphill. Up that hill was nothing but a path surrounded by forest. I trembled slightly... I've never been in the forest before. I was afraid of getting lost... what if we were never found? What if we starved, or were eaten alive, or were kidnapped by outsiders? An arm wrapped around me, and I noticed I had tightened my grip on your hand. You were holding me, comforting me, and smiling. Why is it that you were never in the least bit afraid of anything? You were always so brave... always so happy.
"That's quite a grip you got. I almost thought you were scared for a minute." you said, teasing me. I gave a small laugh and shook my head.
"Not me... I'm not scared." I said with a smile.
"Well then, let's go!" you responded.
The both of us sprinted up the path without a moment's hesitation. I glanced over my shoulder, watching the Osaka House grow smaller and smaller, then out of my view as you and I rounded a corner. The path twisted, traveling higher and higher, the forest growing larger around us, then eventually evening out as we entered an open landscape. The ground was sandy... and four huge talon-like objects stood out from the ground like large towers. Torches were scattered here and there, and the talons were bided by ropes. In the far corner was a small red lantern.
"Hey, look!"
I turned to your direction, and smiled. The both of us moved away from the talon-like objects, and moved towards what lay in our vision. We were now high up on a cliff... and below us, shining in the sun and shimmering with a peaceful serenity, was our home, All God's Village. Our eyes saw beyond the village, looking beyond the gates of the Kurosawa House, seeing a large river and a long, long bridge trailing across it to the huge house. We saw the Kureha Shrine, and the Old Tree. We saw the Cemetery and the houses. We saw our home.
"It looks so peaceful from way up here..." I whispered. You smiled at me, our hands still holding onto each other.
"I knew you would like our adventure..."
"What were the both of you thinking? To jeopardize our ritual like this!" the priest shrieked as we moved down the steps. His iron grip clutched onto my hair, forcing me to move.
"Please! We didn't do anything to disrupt the ritual!" I pleaded.
His anger was outrageous. Before I knew it, the priest pushed forward and released his grip as I went tumbling down the stone steps. It was probably his intention for my face to hit the stairs, but it was my reflex to prevent that from happening. I threw my arms in front of my face and cried out as it smacked against the bumpy stone and my knees smashed against the angles and corners of the steps. What I didn't realize that was falling like this down a flight of steep steps forced me into a tumble, and as I neared the last few bottoms steps, the back of my head smashed against the final step. A loud scream emerged from me as pain ebbed through the veins and arteries in my skull. Both of my hands slapped against the back of my head and tears poured from my eyes. I lay sprawled on the ground holding my head and trying desperately to keep myself from crying harder. But the stomping of the priests feet were heard and I felt the pulling on my hair once again.
"You're disgusting..." he hissed, moving forward with me still in his grip.
"Where are we going?" I whimpered, stumbling behind weakly, aching from the fall.
"Since you won't tell me where your brother is... we are going to find him together..."
As we grew older, I began to realize all the wonderful things this ritual will prevent me from experiencing. As I matured and grew into womanhood, I began to find many ways to escape from reality and enter a world of my own fantasies. Fantasies of a life and family. Fantasies of smiling faces, more adventures with you leading us out of the village and into other lands, but mostly fantasies of romance. That was something I longed for the most... the one fantasy that truly broke my heart for knowing that it would never come true.
Often I would return to the graveyard and tell these feelings to Grandfather. Sorrow always grieved me... I knew I would never find somebody I could truly love. I knew I would never live to raise a family, own my own house, be free to escape this village and never return here. How I longed for these things to happen... how it killed me to have such beautiful dreams, so realistic, so angelic, and then to wake up and know it was just my imagination...
"Taka? What are you doing here?"
I nearly leapt out of my skin at the voice. Shifting my head, I released a sigh of relief as you approached me. Your hands rested on my shoulders and I rested my cheek against it. One of your hands left my shoulder and stroked my cheek softly.
"Taka... you've been crying again. Please, you know it hurts me to see you so upset." you said.
My eyes widened at that. I was wrong... I was so wrong. I never was aware that it was hurting you... all this time, I was so focused on how I was going to die, how I was cheated out of life and how you would feel nothing but pain. And all this time, all I was giving you was grief. The shock itself gave me a sense of numbness. How could I have been so ignorant of his feelings? I lowered my head.
"I'm sorry, Toki... I never wanted you to be sad."
"Taka... I'm not an idiot." you hissed, your eyes hardening. This shocked me... I never saw you this way before... well, towards me at least.
"Toki, I know you're not. It's just... I never wanted you to be sad..." I stammered.
"Taka, my sadness is what you have been dwelling on since we were kids! You think I haven't noticed? The ritual is inevitable... there's nothing you and I can do to stop it! Please, for once in your life, stop worrying about the future! Stop worrying about me being sad! Stop worrying about death!" you shouted. My lips trembled slightly and my eyes watered again. I stood up and spun around, facing you. The feelings I kept inside of me for so long… they finally came out.
"I can't... I can't stop thinking about it! I can't stop thinking about how much pain you'll be in. How something as gentle and loving as you will be forced to kill a human being! I just can't stop worrying about how you'll--"
I could never finish that sentence. In my hysteria, a sharp sting struck my cheek and my head swung to the side. It seemed to have happened so quickly… I didn't even see it coming. But the pain that struck me seemed to happen in slow motion. Tears flew from my impossibly widened eyes as the stinging burned against the softness of my cheek, and my brother's hand returned back onto my shoulders, pushing me back and roughly pinning me against Grandfather's headstone.
"That's enough, Taka!" you shouted, louder this time. "How can you think so much about how I'm going to feel in the future? How can you dwell on it to the point where it's become you're entire life! Despite everything I've done to try and make you focus away from that, you still continue to go to it! How do you think I'm feeling? Do you understand how worthless I feel to know that my effort is meaningless? That how many times I try to help you, you just throw it all away? Do you want to know the truth Taka? I've been scared more than you could possibly imagine... you think I want to stand there, in front of complete strangers, in front of cold-blooded heartless pigs and kill my Nee-chan in front of them, so they can go on living their lives?" you scream screamed.
I couldn't take my eyes off of you the entire time. Tears streamed down his beat red face... pent up rage and an unknown sorrow poured out of your beautiful spirit and flowed in your blood and tears, masking your face. Your arms that had pinned me against the headstone began to weaken.
"Why can't you just be happy... with the life you have now?" you stammered, then looked away.
My eyes watered up once again. I never knew such power... such passion existed within my Onii-san. The more I stared at you, the more many things began to clear up. I knew it must have taken so much for you to say all of that after not saying anything for all these years. That you had to sum up the strength to hit me when I knew you'd rather break all of your fingers before doing such a thing.
More thoughts came to me. I was worried about so many things I would miss out on before death came to me. I was worried about the love I would never have. And yet... here was a boy... no... a man, sitting before me, who could tell me everything he felt, and so much more just right at this moment. Who stood by my side for so long, trying to make me happy. Doing everything in his power to make me happy…. to make me forget about how we would feel... how it would destroy us. Wasn't this a man who loved you was supposed to do...?
"Toki..." I whispered. I leaned forward, and wrapped my arms around you.
Your arms wrapped around me and your forehead lowered into my chest, staring at the ground as the tears poured from his cheeks. I softly stroked your hair. By the Gods... how ignorant was I? I was worried about never having anything. And everything I had, everything I ever wanted was right in front of me, in my arms.
"Toki..."
"Toki!" I screamed out.
The priest had sent two others to the cemetery... had sent them after Toki. Both priests held him firmly by his arms, forcing him towards us. His eyes narrowed as he saw the priest gripping my hair... I recognized the anger on his face. The face of our father... the rage in our father's face and eyes was perfectly etched on the face of my brother. Although I understood his anger... it terrified me.
"What did you do to her?" he snapped.
The priest narrowed his eyes and clutched my hair tighter. "Nothing you need to concern yourself with. I did nothing compared to what you two did to each other. To have such disgust... such selfishness to put the fate of the village in jeopardy by spoiling yourselves, ruining your cleansing, letting the filth sink into your purified souls..."
The priests eyed each other suspiciously. They didn't know... they retrieved my Onii-san, assisted in our capture, and they were unaware of what had happened. One of the priests had finally asked him just what had we done that was so sinful. And the priest, his rage building up and his grip on my hair tightening, glaring daggers into the eyes of my Onii-san.
"The most impure piece of treason to the ritual to ever be performed by shrine twins..." he growled, then eyed the priests.
"...Incest."
The previous evening, before our punishment, I had been thinking of many things. Your words replayed in my thoughts over and over, never ceasing to repeat. I thought of all the times you had been there... how you could have just as easily left me alone. How you kept your promise for so long, and how you showed me so many beautiful things about life and our home that I can just completely brushed aside. Then more thoughts began to play in my head... why did you do those things? Did you do it because it was what a brother was meant to do... or was it for another reason?
You hadn't been home the entire day, giving me plenty of time to think these over. Morning turned to noon... noon turned to twilight... twilight turned to sunset. And it was then when I couldn't handle it any further. The silence suffocated me... the loneliness was more than I could bear. I left my room and exited the house, making my way down the stone steps. Moving down the streets and approaching the steps leading to the Kureha Shrine, I continued down the path until the Old Tree was completely in my sight. I walked through the tree, and made my way into the cemetery, seeing you standing before Grandfather's headstone. I wasn't five feet in front of you before you turned to see me, lowering your head.
"Taka... I'm sorry I hit you. I didn't want to..." you said, then looked away. "You must really hate me now… don't you?"
How foolish I was. How my actions would lead to both of our suffering. I did something so impure and so unnatural that we would both suffer for it.
I approached you….
I stroked your cheeks with my fingertips….
I brushed away the hair falling into your eyes….
And I kissed you...
I kissed Toki. My Onii-san.
Yes... I had kissed you before, but nothing like this. I never kissed anybody with such power. I never knew I had that power within me. The kiss itself must have startled you. I know that in the past, if you had done it to me, I would have been beyond shocked. But for some reason... some completely unknown reason, you never backed away. You never pushed away from me. Instead… you kissed me deeper. I pulled away slowly, just to look into your eyes again. The eyes I stared into when I was only ten years old, when I was fully aware of the gentleness and relaxation they had given me. Now I looked at them... into the eyes of a man, not as soft as they once were, but filled with something more. An emotion seemed to build up in those eyes that almost frightened me, before he wrapped his arms around me and held me against his chest.
"Suki da Yo..." he whispered. I smiled, holding my head against his chest.
"Suki da Yo... Onii-san..."
We were waiting...
The priests had led us across the bridge and into the Kurosawa House, informing the Ceremonial Master on what had happened. About how we were now so impure that throwing me into the X would probably never appease it… or maybe even do something worse…
Toki and I waited with other priests in the library as the three priests from before discussed our fate with the master. I looked over at my Onii-san... the man I had grown to love... who all this time had always loved me. Was my life here nothing more than a plague? Did everything I do in his presence bring him such trouble? Toki stared back at me, and slowly placed his hand on mine.
"Don't be afraid..." he whispered. I nodded, but nearly jumped as the door swung open and the Ceremonial Master entered the study.
His eyes were so cold, falling onto me with a hateful expression. They seemed to burn into my eyes... staring into my thoughts, into my heart, and disgusted with what he saw. He turned and looked at my brother, eyeing him with the same disgust, before finally speaking.
"Which of you presented it?" he growled. I knew Toki was going to take the blame for me... I knew he was, and before he could open his mouth, I spoke faster.
"I did, sir..." I confessed. He bent down and grabbed my chin roughly, staring into my eyes more powerfully.
"And did he try to resist it when you did this?" he growled.
"No sir... I did not..." Toki's voice responded before I could speak.
The Master glared, and released his hold on my chin. With a powerful swing of his arm, his fist smashed against my cheek and I fell to the side. Toki gave a yell of surprise and wrapped his arms around me as I held my face in pain. The master glared harder, angered with his devotion. Before Toki could respond, the master finally spoke.
"You believe you can endanger the village and go unpunished? You are sadly mistaken. You are also sadly mistaken if you believe we would take the risk in throwing your sister's disgusting impure body into the abyss in attempts to save this village. Throwing a whore into hell in exchange for our safety? What could be a bigger insult?" he bellowed.
I whimpered, holding my face with my hands as Toki held me closer, glaring at the Ceremonial Master with such hatred. Without a hint of emotion, the Master continued…
"You both have one of two choices. You both can both keep your lives, but live the rest of your days as Mourners. Don't hold your breath, it is not a pardon. As a Mourner, you will live under the ground, isolated from the village, living among criminals and traitors. And when the time comes, the both of you are to cut your hair, sew your eyes closed, and be presented during the Rituals." he began.
A shiver trailed down my back. I had heard of the Mourners... I've never known of their way of life until now. And now... what kind of life would that be? To go on living that way? To endure such terrible pain and loneliness, to live as monsters under the earth for years to come? How is that even considered life?
"Or..." he said. "You, boy, will be forced to strangle your sister as her death penalty. Afterwards, you are to be hanged for your own penalty. Choose now."
Our eyes widened at the second offer. The both of us stared at each other. This was it… this was what we both wanted, wasn't it? A way to escape our fate… to not be the Shrine Twins. Why couldn't the offer be something different? Why couldn't we just be banished from the village? Would that be an influence to other twins? Would this be an influence to warn twins of what had happened?
I think now that it was quite obvious what we wanted to do. Either way you looked at it, we were both on our way to death, may it be isolation from the world we knew, or choking to death. I held my brother's hand tightly... and he held mine. We stared into each other's eyes for such a long time until tears began to form. Slowly, we nodded.
"We'll choose death..." Toki whispered. The Ceremonial Master nodded, and made a gesture to the other priests. Their strong hands grasped onto us, pulling us apart and leading us out of the study and into the basement.../i
I stared up in his eyes as Toki leaned over me. The tears in his eyes were more than I could bear. And the more I watched them fall, the more pain I felt. I knew this was entirely my fault. Why couldn't I have made him happier? Why was I focusing so much on death when I could have honored and cherished the life I had? The life we had. Why couldn't I have cherished the promises we made? The adventures he took me on? The time we had together in the Cemetery, talking to Grandfather and looking after each other?
His hands slowly enwrapped around my throat. I whimpered slightly... they were no longer the soft, delicate hands I used to touch as a child. They were no longer the soft hands of a child that used to caress my hand after we made our promises. They were hard, rough, and cold. But had so much strength... so much power. And that power brought so much pain. I felt my head tilt back as the strength of his hands squeezed tightly and the tears in his eyes fall onto my face. I felt panic build inside of me as my hands clutched his figures and my eyes widened, as I tired desperately to breathe but no air came.
Memories of our childhood returned to me. The first memory I had with him when we were just infants, resting in my mother's arms. The faces of my mother's happiness began to glow in my thoughts like Toki's smile lit up brighter than the sun. I was almost shocked to see the face of my father, smiling sweetly, holding my brother lovingly in his arms, and rocking him gently with a look of supreme happiness. The happiness I had never seen before in my life. And another face appeared... the face of an old man, sitting weakling in a chair, smiling at my parents and the twins, and nearly crying as he held the both of us in his arms.
Pain increased. More tears fell. The blood running to my head began to throb and ebb, forcing pain to rush through my skull. And another memory came... the memories of the cemetery in front of Grandfather's grave. Our promise... the stroking of our hands...
My eyes slowly began to roll back in their sockets as my fingers twitched and tensed. Chokes escaped my mouth and my eyes strained as the throbbing in my head seemed to spread to my throat, and into my chest. Another memory... the both of us standing on the cliff, staring out at the beauty of our village... of our home... holding hands and smiling.
My back arched and a weak attempt for a scream escaped from me as the final memories of his words of wisdom that were too late to wake me up... and our first and last passionate kiss.
My nerves began to cool, then grow colder. My heartbeat slowly began to weaken... and my vision darkened. The warm, wet tears splattered on my face grew numb... and my head slumped to the side. And the final words I heard rang into my mind like a bell before nothingness overcame me...
"Gomen nasai... Suki da yo, Nee-chan...