Chapter 2:
The Student
Hiraeth (noun)
A homesickness for a home you cannot return to, or that never was; the nostalgia, the yearning, the grief for the lost places of your past.
Over the years since the White Plague ravaged Edo, the Shimura dojo became a refuge for the weak, the ill, and the homeless. Many are grateful for the unselfish generosity of the Shimura siblings, and the dojo is often regaled with as much respect and awe as a well-known school. It is not the reputation either sibling had imagined or aspired to create with their home and legacy, but neither regret it. It's something to be proud of, to see the weary smiles bloom on starved people's faces when they are offered a meal as simple as a fresh bowl of rice and a cup of hot tea.
Shinpachi stares at the numerous relaxed faces around him, some withered by the Plague, others weakened by Earth's gradual deterioration, and doesn't feel anything but the familiar, sharp stone of grief that has been weighing in his stomach since Gintoki died. It has only gained prominence since his sister caught the Plague. He used to wonder about that, early on. He used to question his emotions and the foreign emptiness that dug itself a niche within his heart where Gintoki had taken root. It had only grown larger over the last five years, encompassing the entirety of what had been the happier times of the Yorozuya. His mind, for a moment, conjures an image of Kagura sitting in Gintoki's old chair, rocking back and forth and sucking on pickled seaweed, and all he feels is irritation.
Sakata Gintoki is dead. Even if he were to somehow be alive, there isn't a Yorozuya for him to return to any longer. Kagura can sit and wait for his ghost for as long she wants, but Shinpachi refuses to depend on the whims of dreams and what ifs.
"Glasses guy!" a young boy calls from the corner of the dojo from where he sits beside a futon, holding a cup of tea for his trembling mother. Shinpachi's eyebrow twitches, but he does not rant as he would have done five years ago. He has grown beyond his immaturity.
The poor woman is obviously suffering. Each one of her ribs is plainly visible, her eyes are sunken in and staring emptily into space, and her hair is a tangle of ghastly white strands. Shinpachi kneels at the boy's side and gently helps him with getting the woman to drink. He rubs her throat when she croaks and tea bubbles on her lips, and then carefully eases her back on the sweat-soaked futon. Shinpachi sits back and watches over the kindly woman until she has passed. The boy is crying, sobs muffled by the hands he holds over his mouth, as he witnesses his mother's fading life. Once, Shinpachi may have comforted him, but now he does not even try; they all carry grief inside them permanently now. What more is another death?
Shinpachi's hand rests on the wooden sword at his hip, an unfathomable ache in his chest, before he ruthlessly destroys it with the gleaming steel edge of his sword.
Published: 8/18/2017
Edited: 8/19/2017