Chapter Four: Melting Reality

There are no glass slippers, only poisoned apples. –Unknown

Eiri stared in silence out of the surrounding fog of cigarette smoke, breathing in and out the toxic cloud. All was finally quiet, Seguchi's annoyingly doting presence finally gone, no doubt heading towards home mulling over in his mind what to tell Mika when he walked through the door and she demanded answers and he'd have to admit with remorse and guilt that he had none to give.

All that was left in Eiri's small, suffocating world was himself, the tight walls, and the poison air.

This was just the way that he liked it.

Self-fulfilling prophecy or not, Eiri wasn't the slightest bit surprised that today had turned into a complete disaster. Regardless of and apart from the meaning of what today really was, that didn't excuse Shuichi from being a complete moron.

Shuichi lacked any useful instinct-- a turtle would sense danger before Shuichi picked up the slightest hint of it. There was so much he should have known that he was completely unaware of. Maybe Eiri was spoiled by Tohma's incessant pandering, by his willingness to jump any and every hurdle that Eiri provided him.

Eiri felt like every breath he took was another domino falling. From start to end, he just existed until everything around him was in ruin and nothing was recognizable. In the end, everything was destroyed and he was left untouched, un-phased. From the moment he'd found himself kneeling in pooling blood, which was still warm and shimmering with the life that it was draining from the limp body on the floor, his spiral was downward.

When he thought back to everything that had happened before that moment, it didn't feel like part of his life. Memories of his childhood were detached like they were something he read in a book but hadn't experienced for himself. Instead, he felt like he had been born that awful second while the other died, faded away, withering until every last bit of it was gone.

Eiri could even remember the moment that last bit of it had finally disappeared from inside of him.

Afterwards, Seguchi shuttled him back to Tokyo as fast as he could. He must have slept a lot as they traveled, though, because he could barely remember anything from the time he got on the plane to when he was woken up in a car in front of his family's temple. Then again, maybe he was aware the entire time-- Eiri had been so numb, it was hard for him to tell that he was even awake when he was, even though he didn't sleep for a while. Reality was too distant and far away. His insomnia had been terrible-- there was no way to stop the nightmares.

On another one of those sleepless nights, Eiri lay motionless and awake in bed. His eyes were trained to the wall, watching the shadows dance across it, branches outside cutting the moonlight and making it sway. His father was praying, the low hum of the chants was unmistakable. Somewhere water was running, probably Mika cleaning up from yet another dinner that Eiri's place remained empty.

Swaying between numbness and a pain so intense that Eiri wanted to die or else go insane, he curled his knees to his chest. Eiri hated to close his eyes at moments like this because everything ugly and bad was imprinted on them and flashed in one horrible second every time he did. Seeing how… normal things were around him, how unaffected and calm, when he was dying inside filled him with hatred for everything.

There had to be something other than this pain.

There had to be some way to stop hurting.

But, the only thing Eiri was capable of feeling was pain.

It would be better not to feel anything at all. Ever.

How hard could it? Surely it had to be easier than enduring this. It could be severed, killed, and he would be a murderer again. But, it didn't matter, not anymore. Nothing had to matter to him ever again.

Like someone was slowly turning a dial and closing him up, he felt the tension in his stomach ease, lessen, grow lighter. And just like that, it was gone.

But, the one thing that Eiri could never get rid of was the anger. Was he angry at himself? Yuki? Was it what had happened that guided his rage? Or was it bitterness that this was what had to become of him to survive?

Whatever the cause, the reasons, this was his result.

It was a survival mechanism.

That was still what it was, even now.

Grinding his cigarette into the ashtray, Eiri rose from his desk. Walking to the window, quick, solid jerks closed the heavy drapes and plunged him into a faded daylight darkness. Leaning against the cloth, still gripping the ends, he pressed his forehead to the cool glass through it.

Secretly, Eiri wondered what he would have been like now if things hadn't gone so wrong. He knew there wouldn't be those nightmares, or those regrets, or his bitterness, or this much boiling anger inside of him. Life wasn't fair, and he felt like he was the prime example. People called him lucky because he was good looking, talented, and popular, but Eiri couldn't see it. All of that was veiled behind a shadow that he couldn't blink away. It just didn't have the same meaning for him that it had for them, he supposed.

With the apartment empty, it was safe to venture out. Eiri was in no mood for Shuichi's pathetic expressions and apologies. Heading for the fridge, Eiri pulled out a beer and opened it with the door still open to guzzle it down. When the can was half drained, he stepped back and finally closed the door, taking the remainder of his cold beer back with him to his bedroom.

But not before turning off the phone.

Eiri had expected Shuichi to have burst through the door by now. Usually, when the kid fucked up, he raced home to try to make it better (even if his attempts did make things a hell of a lot worse). Maybe that meddling friend of his convinced him that it was best to give Eiri a bit of space.

Falling onto the bed, he gave a soft grunt and ran his hand through his hair. Keeping his forehead resting in the palm of his hand, Eiri reached over and put the beer on the table next to the bed, pushing aside the alarm clock to make room for it within arms reach.

Dropping down flat, pulling his legs up onto the bed, Eiri draped an arm over his eyes to shield out any light. He wanted to block out everything, not just the sunlight, not just the noise or the annoying people. Eiri wanted everything to be gone.

Everything he did was to keep the images from his head. Drinking one beer after the other seemed to numb his brain enough, but even that didn't work all of the time. It was all too easy to close his eyes and see everything flash like a movie reel that he couldn't shut off. All he could do was watch it again and again, reliving every moment.

It could have been different.

The thought had come to him now and again that he should have made a different choice-- if only he'd not fought back, this would all be different. If he'd let them… then he would have one bad memory, but nothing like this. It would be like sacrificing one bad thing for another, but the lesser of two evils.

Because everyone would still be alive, and with a new set of regrets.

Rolling over in bed, Eiri stared at the condensation drops dripping from his beer can. It made him remember something. He'd seen this, something like water running down dark blue. That's right, it was a window pane. On their way home on the air plane, it had been raining as they took off. Eiri had a hazy memory of staring at that window pane, imagining that outside the world was melting and leaving only an infinity of nothing behind. Just darkness.

It had made him relax to think that, too, because it meant that everyone would feel like he was feeling. Never again would he have to watch another careless, happy smile and wonder why he couldn't feel that way anymore.

They all had to hurt just like he did.

Even Yuki. He didn't deserve to be dead when everyone else was fucked up because of what he did. This was Yuki's mistake and he was the only one who got to escape it. That bastard should be the one lying in bed, staring at a beer can, thinking about the world melting. Instead, that son of a bitch got an easy out.

On Yuki's tombstone was a message hoping his spirit was gone. Eiri wanted the opposite.

If there was such a thing as karma, why should someone have to pay for it in the next life and get off free in the one they fucked up in?

It made him think of something he had read once. Some old pointless legend said that spirits who had wronged people before death were stuck in between worlds and could only be free when the person who had wronged them prayed for them to be released. And then, if they wanted to shake off the seriously fucked up karma backlash waiting for them, they had to make amends.

Eiri thought he deserved fucking amends.

"I want you alive," he told the beer can, speaking to the silence and the stillness and the ghosts of his regrets around him. "I want you to see what you did. You should have to pay for what you did." All those fucking Gods that ever religion spoke about and prayed to should listen to THAT.

TBC