Disclaimer: Nope, still don't own Detective Conan or Magic Kaito. Enjoy the reading!
The world has grown suspicious of anything that looks like a happily married life.
~Oscar Wilde
Remember A Time When Everything Was Perfect?
"I'm sure you're busy now, baibai!" and with a happy face she closed the chat window. Inside, though, it felt pathetic, really, how she was running away. She shook her head decidedly. She wasn't running away! She was giving her dead husband his just earnings. That was all there was to it. Rubbing her left eye wearily, she switched off the computer and stood up. She had an appointment to keep. Just why did it feel suspiciously as though she was the one doing the deceiving?
Former Happiness
Earlier, everything had been easier. Much, much easier. Chikage could vividly recall the time when everything had simply been –perfect-. They had been a fitting couple, happy and content. Both of them hadn't had that much money yet – her husband had only been on the verge of establishing himself as a magician still – though it had been enough. Chikage herself had been working fulltime as a shop assistant at a bookstore in order to get a little more money into their meager household fund. They had been alright, and that was all that mattered. Those were good times.
And then success had hit. They had gotten to travel around the world – their friends had fortunately never truly been out of reach due to the growing interest in the upcoming fashion to be "connected via the internet". First they had stayed in contact with emails, then via chats. It had felt like they never were far away, at all.
When Kaito had come along – rather late, she had to admit; her friends had had kids much earlier than herself – the world had filled up even more and finally had seemed complete. They had had the fun of their lives, trying to keep up with the little growing boy. He was like a whirlwind, keeping everything in motion all the time, while they had been scrambling to pick up the pieces after him. Her husband certainly had been something, she had to admit. Toichi had been really good with young boys, and she had been glad for it. It had been a peaceful episode in their lives.
However, there was one person which appeared to play a bigger and bigger role in their lives as time went on. First, it was innocent comments like, "Have you seen? Kaitô Kid has struck again!" that her husband started uttering one day (before they had their son) and which never really seemed to abate. She let it slide. Her husband was head over heels in love with her, and she could see it in the way he moved around her. Nevertheless, the descriptions only became more and more vivid, with elaborate details added. She played it off as a fascination of the moment. Her husband was known for having his "phases" at times. Toichi would just be utterly immersed in whatever had managed to grab his attention – and a few months, a year tops, later, it'd lay discarded in a corner somewhere.
Chikage had made herself believe that, then. But mentions of that person kept cropping up. She became suspicious when she actually started to compare her husband's recounts of the Kaitô Kid's exploits with the news accounts. They didn't fit. Her husband was either veeery good friends with a policeman (she didn't think so, at the time), or he had some inside informant.
It hadn't been until Kaito was six, after all, that they'd met the Nakamori. But her boy had still been an infant when the first more detailed stories appeared at the dinner table. It had made for great evening entertainment; that was for sure. It hadn't given her any reassurance, though. When first doubts began spreading in her mind, she still tried laughing them off as ridiculous, but a small thought lingered. What if it was true?
She had fought with herself a lot, at that time. It wasn't easy. Her husband got more and more worried as time went on – he could just –sense– that something was bothering her the way he always did. But she kept her mouth shut, afraid that the words she was close to saying would destroy the peace and the family they had built up together. At least her son didn't seem to notice her growing concern. Her mind was in turmoil. It couldn't be true, right?
But when she actually paid attention, she noticed things. She noticed suspicious things that kept happening. For example, her husband always was absent or "somewhere" whenever Kaitô Kid would appear. Kaitô Kid always would be prone to appear in whatever city they were just then residing in (or close to it,) too. And then there were those stories. They were another type of proof entirely. And they were both magicians. What if…?
Every time her mind came to the daunting conclusion, she'd let her thoughts wander back. He wouldn't do that to her! Toichi was in love with her! Never in a million years he wouldn't…!
Then again, she supposed there was a certain attraction to it, wasn't there? A phantom thief… never in her wildest dreams would she have thought of this! No. He couldn't. Could he?
Her world tipped sideways.
What if…?
AN: Siren: THANK YOU for the review! I was trying for short chapters with this ff, actually - it was sort of a personal experiment of mine, to see whether I could say what I wanted to say in brief chapters. But I might do a bit more for the chapters (aka flesh them out a bit more) AFTER I've finished posting all of them – or I might not. Depends entirely on my mood, really.
Anyway, on to what I wanted to say from the beginning: the next update will come on the 10.12.!
