Disclaimer: Just own the words, not the folks.
A Picture PostcardI hated my stepfather.
But that's not why I ran away. I'd hated him for years. Gozaboro Kaiba was a cruel man. I knew that before he married my mother. Though only four at the time, I could see the fiend within him.
I begged my mother not to marry him.
"But you need a father figure in your life, Seto," she'd explained, as though that were reason enough to shackle herself to such a man. My own father had died two years earlier. Pneumonia.
Several weeks after the wedding, I learned the real reason we became his pawns when she started to show. Mokuba was born six months to the day after the wedding. A year later my stepfather's true nature emerged.
He hired a nanny for Mokuba as soon as he was weaned and kept my mother and me far away from him for the next four years of his life.
At least he tried to.
When the Kaiba mansion first became our home, I explored it thoroughly. Though only four, my photographic memory allowed me to retain knowledge of every nook and cranny, every trap door, every secret passageway I found. At the time, I just thought I had a good memory. It wasn't until Gozoboro started 'training' me and had my IQ and retention skills tested that I found out the truth.
During the years Gozoboro tried to keep my mom and I away from my little brother, I used my secret knowledge to spirit us back and forth to see him. Usually I went on my own to the forbidden wing of the mansion where he'd set Mokuba up like a prince. My mom would send notes for him through me and I'd read him bedtime stories. When he'd ask why he never saw us during the day, I'd tell him whatever outrageous lie I could think of that made him feel like he was special for being so pampered.
Then mom died.
I know he killed her. I didn't see him do it, but I know he did.
'Died from an asthma attack', is what his doctors tried to tell me. She didn't even have asthma. There was nothing wrong with her except a desire to see her son.
She'd begun begging Gozoboro to see Mokuba. He'd ignore her most of the time. Until that one day...
"But if I could see him just a little bit more," she'd pined.
I'd gasped involuntarily at her mistake. Gozaboro looked at me and knew. I could tell from his eyes.
He'd smiled at my mother and patted her hand lightly.
"We'll see," he'd crooned, the sugary sweetness of his tone sending shivers up my spine.
The next day my mother was dead. He didn't even allow Mokuba to go to the funeral.
The day after her funeral was the first time he touched me. I was 9.
He'd called me to his office, as he did often to 'test' or 'train' me and I went willingly, knowing there would be no solace anywhere for me with my mom gone. I'd hoped he'd give me a few days to mourn my mother, but when I was summoned, I knew that had only been a pipe dream. I expected more tests and training. What I got was far worse.
I've blocked out most of what happened that first time. I only have bits and pieces.
I remember being glad that I didn't see the table and books set up, I remember his hands grabbing my wrists, I remember pain and crying, but not the act itself.
Every incident after that one is burned into my brain with perfect clarity.
I learned that I wasn't his only victim in the spring after I turned 12. Early one May morning, I heard crying downstairs and left my room to investigate. Gozaboro hadn't touched me for a few days, so I was able to walk around a lot easier and much quieter. Making my way to the railing at the top of the stairs, I saw Gozaboro and a man shaking hands in the front hall. Beside them was a boy about Mokuba's age.
The child had tears streaming and could obviously barely stand. Gozaboro was handing the man, presumably someone of importance based on how the boy clung to him, a large envelope. It took viewing several of these early morning departures with numerous young boys for my brain to completely comprehend the evil that was my stepfather. Even with the continued comings and goings over the next year, he would find his way into my room at least once a week. I probably would have endured until I could move out at 16, if he'd just left it at me and those other random boys.
After my mother died, and Gozaboro began molesting me, he'd tried again to keep me away from Mokuba. About a month after the funeral, while I recovered from a recent attack, he moved Mokuba to another room in the mansion. It took me several days, but I finally found him. I couldn't see him as often because of Gozaboro's visits, but I saw him when I could. Sometimes I had to wear turtlenecks to hide my stepfather's markings. I didn't want Mokuba to know anything about my suffering. Somehow, he was growing into a stable individual and I didn't want to mar that.
In addition to bedtime stories, we played various board games, watched a little TV and had long, rambling conversations about nothing in particular. When he turned 7, I taught him to play chess, one of the few activities forced upon me by Gozaboro that I honestly enjoyed. We'd sometimes spend our hours together on just one game.
After I'd taught him chess, our evenings usually fell into the same pattern; we'd talk and play chess for a while, I'd read him a story, tuck him into bed and then slip back out to my room. I'd then have about an hour to myself before Gozaboro came for me, if it were one of my days. If it were not, I'd collapse into sleep at around 2:30 in the morning.
During the continuation of one of our longer chess matches, I learned the truth of Mokuba's absence at mom's funeral. She'd been cold in the ground for three years and he didn't even know she'd died. . The conversation started when he compared mom to the queen for 'being so strong.' Gozaboro had concocted some tale about her moving to another city to 'take care of her ailing mother'.
"Dad said she was very generous to do that." Mokuba had gushed.
I'd always hated to hear him call that monster 'Dad' with all the affection he laced into it, but couldn't bring myself to shatter his world with the truth before then.
The night I told him about mom was the only time I'd ever stayed more than a few hours. He'd sobbed in my arms and I held and rocked him, soothing as best I could. As night began moving into morning and his tears didn't let up, I'd started to panic. I instinctively knew that I couldn't stay in his room overnight. I knew I couldn't afford to be caught with him. So, I did the only thing I could think of at the time, I pushed him away. He cried harder. I called him a baby. Told him to get over it.
Though he forgave me for it a long time ago, that night is also burned into my mind with perfect clarity.
"You asshole!" he'd screamed at me. I didn't know he even knew such words. "She may have meant nothing to you, but she was my mom! How can you be so cold! Get out! I don't want to see you anymore!"
I could have said something then, could have defended myself, but I knew it was getting close to sunrise and I could not be found there.
"Whatever," I'd mumbled and left him sobbing on the floor.
I didn't visit him anymore after that. Though even if I'd wanted to, I couldn't once Gozaboro's visits become more frequent. One night a week became two, and then three, and then four. For a solid month he came nearly every night. It took a heavy toll on my body. I was too sore to leave my room, let alone sit for tutoring, or for any of his other 'tests' or 'training'. I'd stopped eating from the shame of being taken by him over and over and lost nearly 20 pounds. He was killing me, but I admit I wasn't fighting death too hard. I suppose that was the lowest point in my life. I wanted to die then.
A crisis with his company and his subsequent disappearance to America for nearly three months saved me, though at the time I wasn't grateful. I still refused to eat for weeks after he'd left.
I guess it's more accurate to say that Mokuba saved me, rather than give credit to Gozaboro's disappearance. Though his disappearance served as the foundation for Mokuba's rescue, it was still Mokuba who performed the act. And I'm sure he had no idea what he did that day, nor does he have any now. Just his presence gave me strength and hope.
He'd worried when I never came back and snuck out of his rooms to find me. Having never been outside of his wing of the mansion before, he'd gotten lost. One of the newer maids had found him, and not knowing what else to do, sought out her superior. As it happened, her superior had just left my room after changing my sheets.
Curiosity had gotten the better of Mokuba as the maids talked and he'd poked his head in my room. His eyes widened at the sight of me lying in bed. I'd tried to make myself more presentable and less ghoulish as he made his way over to me.
"God, Seto, you look awful!" He'd exclaimed. "What happened to you?"
"I've been really sick," I'd lied.
A lie that I've never corrected.
"Is that why you haven't come to see me in a long time," he'd asked in that small, pained voice I'd eventually come to hate. At the time, I only heard an accusation of abandonment from someone who told me to go away, so I lashed out again at the only person left in my life that cared about me.
"I left because you told me to, Mokuba. Are you now begging me back? Make up your mind. You'll never make it in this world being so wishy-washy!"
"Seto," he'd gasped, the hurt on his face cutting into me.
"Whatever," I'd mumbled and turned away, too stunned by my behavior and it's resulting pain for Mokuba. I couldn't face him.
I heard him walk away slowly a few moments later. It would be after Gozaboro's return when I would see him again.
Remembrance of Mokuba's hurt face spurred me into getting better. I had to live so I could explain myself. I couldn't let things stay like that between us. I loved my brother far too much to let him think he meant nothing to me. It truth, he was the center of my universe.
Gozaboro had been home a few weeks when I recovered completely. Thankfully, he'd left me alone all that time. Looking back, I wish I'd wondered about it more, but I guess I didn't care as long as he left me alone. I should have cared. I should have tried to find out why.
Silently slipping into Mokuba's room from the secret passage in the back of his walk-in closet, I was surprised to hear a faint whimpering. As I opened my mouth to call to him before stepping from the closet into the darkened room, I heard another voice.
His voice.
"Shhh, Mokuba. I told you it would hurt a little. It didn't hurt that much last time did it," he'd crooned in that same tone he'd used on me all those years ago.
I froze. Torn between running across the room and snatching my beloved little brother away from that sick bastard and running to cower under my bed in fear. Instead, I chose a third option. Swallowing my revulsion and fear, I slipped back into the secret passage and made my way to Gozaboro's office.
I'd known the combination to the safe and of the large sums of cash he kept there for over a year, but had no motivation to use that knowledge. Pulling out three-quarters of the cash, nearly 3,000,000 yen, I made my way back to my room to get ready to run. I only packed essentials, three changes of clothes, mom's picture, my passport, toothbrush, deodorant, and the money. Then using one of Gozaboro's company cards from the safe and my laptop, I purchased plane, bus and train tickets in either Mokuba's or my name to several dozen locations, all leaving on different days over a period of three weeks. To further cover our tracks, I booked 20 hotel rooms as far away as Boise, Idaho in the United States and as close as the Tokyo Hilton, next to my stepfather's building.
In truth, I'd planned to operate on a strictly cash basis.
Making sure to stash money several places on my body, I'd grabbed my full shoulder bag and a large empty backpack and slipped into the passage to Mokuba's room. When I arrived in Mokuba's room again, I found him sobbing on his bed.
I'd frozen in place, momentarily reliving my own horrors at Gozaboro's hands. How many nights had I spent in the same state?
Shaking myself from my stupor, I turned on the bath water then went through his room, packing essentials for him into the backpack I'd brought with me. After putting some of the cash into the backpack and zipping it closed, I moved to take care of Mokuba.
Carefully, I removed his stained pajamas, trying my best to ignore what they were stained with, and put him into the bath. Though he stopped sobbing, his tears never receded, even after I had washed and dressed him and we were on our way through one of the passages outside.
After that night, neither of us would suffer at Gozaboro's hands ever again.
We caught a train to Fukuoka, several hundred miles to the east and never looked back.