Sorry about the short chapter this week, next week's will be longer. Also, I seem to be all over the place with the order of author's names. I'll pick one and stick with it eventually.

Eika spends her weekends in the park, sitting on the same bench with a stack of Sen Takatsuki's books beside her. She doesn't usually read; she watches the people who walk by, eyes carefully scanning their faces, because she's waiting for someone in particular, someone she's never going to find, because Ken isn't that careless. He knows what she's doing, and he isn't going to fall for it.

Whenever he passes through the 20th ward, he makes sure to dress differently and covers his face with a scarf or a hood, lingering with the crowds at the end of the street and never passing in front of her. Ken waits for her to stop looking, for her to stop speaking to the camera during interviews and staying an extra half-hour at book signings watching the window. He waits for the day that he'll come by the park and she won't be searching for him.

But she never gives up. Weeks pass, and she keeps waiting. She starts to read out loud to anybody who's listening, and each time he sees her, he wonders if just a few more words, just one more taste, wouldn't hurt.

He shouldn't, he shouldn't and he knows it, but he wants it so bad, and doesn't he deserve that after everything he's been through? Doesn't he deserve something that would be gentle and soft under his hands, after all of the needles and centipedes, losing pieces of himself again and again and again—!

"He knew when he arrived that his mother had been there," Eika reads, "She was all around him. The oppressive stench of rotted meat was like her embrace. The dark red splatters dried on the walls were like her smile. The slab of flesh that had once been a human lying in the middle of the floor was like the echo of her voice, saying, 'Look here, my darling, and see how beautiful humans are underneath all of their lies and their skin.' The son of the black goat could not say that he loved his mother, but after all this time, he had begun to understand her."

Understand?

Yes, he does now, he completely understands. Rize ate and ate and ate. She ate until the hollowness inside of her was filled with flesh, and then she ate even more. She ate to ease her boredom, to kill the time that never flowed fast enough, leaving her with days of repetitive meaninglessness. She ate, and she had no regrets.

He resents her even now, but in some ways, he is grateful to Rize for giving birth to him, in a sense. If it weren't for her, he would never have the strength he has now. All he had to do was let the centipede inside, let it spread its legs along his nerves and feast upon his weakness. All he had to do was stop fighting it, and accept that he did understand Rize.

If he wants something, why shouldn't he just take it?

Eika isn't reading anymore. The silence is almost deafening, and it brings Ken back out of his thoughts, finding himself right in front of her without ever having realized he moved. She's staring up at him in shock, clutching The Black Goat's Egg in her hands, still open to the page she was just reading from. He isn't ready; he doesn't know what to say to her, what to do. He'd walked up to her without even realizing it, and now he's completely unprepared.

It's too late to back out now, though. She's stared at him long enough that she must be sure it's him.

Ken takes the initiative—another thing he would have struggled with before. "The Black Goat's Egg, huh?" he chuckles, "I haven't read that in a while."

Eika stares at him a moment longer before she scrambles to shove the books aside and make room for him on the bench beside her. "Do you want to sit down?" she asks, and her voice trembles a bit with uncertainty.

Should he, though? Shouldn't he leave now?

Stop thinking about it so much.

He sits down. Eika is looking down at the book in her lap, nervously playing with the corners of the page. Ken is trying to come up with something to say, but there's so much he wants to tell her that he can't pick just one thing. He knows he can't stay for long; he can't risk someone recognizing him or seeing them together.

"Sorry, I," Eika laughs nervously, "I didn't think I'd see you here. Or at all."

Ken nods wordlessly.

"Do you want the book?" She closes it to the front cover. "I don't really like it that much."

"Then why did you buy it?" he asks.

Eika bites her lip.

"For bait, right? You were using it as bait." He feels a smile working its way onto his face. "That's actually really funny. A year ago, it would've worked right away."

She relaxes visibly, returning his smile. "It still worked, didn't it?"

"I guess it did."

They lapse into silence, listening to the birds chirping overhead and cars passing on the road nearby. Eika looks down at her feet. "I wrote a memoir, you know. You're in it."

"I heard. Everyone thinks you made me up or imagined me."

She laughs. "Sometimes, I think that, too." She glances at him cautiously out of the corner of her eye. "Have you read it?"

"I...no, not yet." He looks away. "I bought it a while ago, actually. I just…."

It's hard to think about you when I know I can't have you, is what he thinks, but he doesn't say anything.

"That's okay." Eika smiles sheepishly. "I was hoping you hadn't bought it yet so I could trade you. I lost a book after I bumped into you last time."

Ken blinks, trying to remember back to what she's talking about. "Oh," he says, laughing, "Zoo, right? I didn't bring it with me, sorry."

"Then bring it with you next weekend," she says, carefully watching his face.

Ken tries not to let his hesitation show, but it must by the way her smile falls. "Next weekend," he murmurs, "Right."

"It's fine," she says, reaching into her bag and pulling out a copy of her memoir, holding it between them. "You can have this copy anyway. It's a special edition. I signed it." She flushes a bit, and he looks at her out of the corner of his eye to take in the sight. "Are you enjoying Zoo?"

Ken looks away, rubbing his chin in embarrassment. "Actually, I haven't been reading that, either," he says, "I took it because you spend a lot of time with books in your hands. It...it smells like you." He regrets the words the moment they're out of his mouth, eyes flying to Eika to watch for any disgust or fear. Instead, he finds her trying to cover her laughter with one hand. "Is that funny?"

"It's weird," she says, "But it's cute somehow. I'd expect a guy to smell a girl's clothes, but you smell her books instead, huh? That's just so you."

"Ishihara," he snaps, covering his face with one hand when he feels heat rising to his cheeks. Embarrassed. He can't believe this. After everything he's been through, he can still be embarrassed by such a ridiculous comment.

"I'm sorry," she says, looking genuinely worried. "I shouldn't tease you. I really missed you"

Ken's expression softens. "So did I," he says quietly.

"You look different. I'm sure a lot's happened since we talked last. You don't have to tell me about it yet." She holds the memoir out to him. "But I'll be here if you decide you want to."

When Ken reaches for it, she hands it to him and wraps her arms around him.

She's touching him.

He hasn't been touched for a long time, hasn't let anyone touch him. He kissed her the last time he saw her, but that was different, he knew that was coming, it was on his terms and he was in control then. This isn't the same, this is her hands on him, around him, trying to keep him from moving, from escaping, and Eika's scent is fading even though it's all around him, because all he really notices is that someone is touching him and trying to keep him still and the last time this happened he was there for days, he was there for so long that he started to forget his name and his age and all concept of time, he lost everything except for numbers, one thousand, one thousand minus seven, minuends and subtrahends, he remembers that, he never lost that.

He looks around himself and he sees nothing but rust and blood, his feet in a bucket full of his toes and fingers, and the floor is writhing, the floor is made of centipedes, and it's surging up to meet him, trying to pull him down into oblivion so they can get inside his ears and his eyes and his mouth and they'll eat and eat and eat until there is nothing, not even numbers, left.

Yamori's face looms over him, asking if it hurts, the words spoken with a cruel sneer. But he's stronger than Yamori now, he knows he is. He reaches for his throat and pulls him down, because if he has to die here, the centipedes will devour them both.

"Ken," Eika whimpers, but she wasn't there, was she? She wasn't in that room with Yamori, and he's thankful for that.

Ken blinks and he's back in the park, Eika trapped under him on the bench. His hand is on her neck, and she's scratching his wrist, tears in her eyes. Two of his kagune are arcing over him, the pointed ends dangerously close to her face.

Oh.

Oh no.

No, no, no.

"No," Ken whispers, releasing her and falling backwards off of the bench. He scrambles to his feet and backs away, looking down at his own hands in horror. They're clean. His hands are clean. Eika isn't bleeding. He can still smell her on him, though. Her sweat, her fear. He meets her eyes and finds her sitting up slowly, coughing as she rubs the bruising skin at her neck, blooming red like spider lilies, her heartbeat filling his ears alongside his own. She's afraid. Of course she's afraid.

"Kaneki," she says hoarsely. Did she try to scream for help? "What...why…?"

"I'm sorry," he whispers, never breaking her gaze as he backs away, "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry."

Stupid. So stupid. He knew this would happen. It's his fault, but he still feels frustrated with Eika. Why does she keep looking for him? Why does she keep haunting him, calling to him with that look in her eyes and the books she brings with her only so he'll come closer? Doesn't she understand that the boy in the memoir is dead?

Ken runs. He runs until the park and Eika and her scent are all far, far away.