Chapter Nine – In Need Of Medicine
Kyoko finished looking over a part in the script that she was practicing for the acting classes. She was dedicated to proving her skills as she mouthed over each part of the sentence whilst on her break. She tapped the words, trying to use different emphasis on the words paired with different emotions. Her concentration was only broken when she heard somebody coming in from the back of the restaurant.
She looked up with a grin that dimmed when she noticed that it was just Kuu there. She really did enjoy the times that she spent with Kuu but she had been hoping that Kuon would be there as well. She had become quite curious in him especially knowing that he used to be Corn but she couldn't state that. She didn't view him as an oddity but there was a fear in Kuu that that was the way that people were looking at Kuon. Rather, she wanted to get to know him on a personal level.
"Something wrong?" Kuu asked as he studied her and Kyoko sat up straighter. She shook her head and looked straight in front of her. "Come on, Kyoko," he said as he walked over to her and pulled out a chair. "You've never been this quiet before…okay, you have, but the two of us know that eventually I am going to ask you to tell me what you've been thinking."
Kyoko nodded and closed her eyes, "I was thinking…about Kuon-san," she said and Kuu remained neutral in his face. This made Kyoko worried. Even before Kuon had come back, Kuu had always smiled when he thought about his son but his eyes weren't holding contact with her own and she couldn't quite read his expression.
"Kyoko, are you sure that this is something that you want to talk to me about?" he asked as he raised an eyebrow as if warning her in some way. Kyoko sighed but nodded. "Okay. What pressing questions do you have with my son?"
Kyoko sighed. Kuu was being very formal so something must have happened between the last time she saw him and how he was today. Had something gone wrong with Kuon? Hadn't he said that he would be seeing a psychiatrist or something…had something gone wrong with that?
"What is he going to do?" Kyoko asked and Kuu looked at her. "I'm sorry," Kyoko said quickly before standing up so she could get into a deep bow. "I'm so sorry for being so forward, it really is none of my business, I'm sorry," she said as she stayed in a deep bow and Kuu chuckled.
"Whatever he wants to, I guess," he replied and Kyoko tilted her head to the side as she studied him. "I don't know. I haven't asked him, I should ask him."
"Is he going to wor-" Kyoko said and Kuu looked at her with exhausted and pained eyes.
"He can do whatever he wants. He's missed out on so many years of his life already. He can do whatever he wants and I'm going to help him do that. I don't even know who he is anymore," Kuu sighed and Kyoko looked at him confused before trying to give an honest smile.
"Yes, you do. He's still the same person on the inside, he has to be the same person on the inside," she said and Kuu laughed bitterly, he shook his head. As much as he wanted to believe that Kuon was the same person on the inside, that just didn't make sense in his mind. How could someone go through everything that Kuon had gone through and not be cracked or twisted in any kind of a manner. He looked down and then closed his eyes. As much as he wanted to believe he knew who Kuon was, did he even have the right to believe that any longer?
…
…
Kyoko had worked hard that night and the fact that the customers had left happily meant that it was worth it to her. She liked being able to help the Hizuri family and especially Kuu who had taken her in as if she were his niece. She walked up the stairs after checking the locks and froze as she heard sounds coming from the spare room. Her eyes widened. She knew that Kuu had gone home for the night and she hadn't seen anyone enter or come up here.
"Hello," she called out as she saw the light from the crack underneath the door. She grabbed a clock and went to the room before deciding to make a quick entrance. She froze as she saw Kuon sitting on the floor with books at his side. "He-Hey," she said as she attempted to catch her breath and Kuon looked to her with a tilt of his head.
"Hey, sorry, I thought that….you had no idea I was up here, did you?" he asked as he smiled to her and Kyoko stood up straight with a weak laugh. She saw the books next to him and then that he also had files about getting the equivalent to a high school diploma and different online schools and even physical universities that he could go to.
"It's okay," Kyoko said, "this is more of your place than mine," she said. She saw Kuon about to object but shook her head, she took a step forward. "What are you looking at?" she asked as she tried to see the books but he had them turned facing the wall. She saw the nervousness on his face. "Are you still thinking of being an actor?" she asked and Kuon paused.
"I don't know," he told her honestly and Kyoko knelt down opposite him, her eyes catching the title of one of the books 'A Very Brief Intro To Modern Medicine'. She studied it and then looked into the emerald eyes that always caught her off guard, "Kuu-sama has always said that you wanted to be an actor."
"There's nothing wrong with acting," Kuon said knowing full well that Kyoko had landed at the point where she could see her dreams come true in the acting field. He wanted to provide her hope and happiness and a fulfilling life but he wasn't sure where he belonged. Acting just meant that he would have to pretend and sometimes pretending was much better than facing your own pain.
"But you don't want to be an actor?" Kyoko asked and Kuon looked at the books again.
"There's not much of a chance of me actually becoming a doctor but maybe I could become a nurse, a physical therapist, maybe even a police officer," he said and Kyoko watched him. She could hear by the tone of his voice that he had gone through some heavy pains in his life but he didn't want to just throw in the towel and quit and claim that he had been through enough pain in his life.
"Why would you say that?" Kyoko asked, "You can be a doctor. You're smart and I don't see how Kuu-sama wouldn't support you with this," she told him and Kuon paused and closed his eyes as he created a fist but then opened it and put his palm on the floor.
"My dad wants the boy that he raised to come back, he doesn't understand that I'm not entirely that boy anymore. I don't want to tell him that I wonder what it would be like to try to undo some of the pain in the world. My dad wants me to act and I might as well just give that a shot," he said and Kyoko looked at him fiercely.
"Don't live your life on what other people want you to do," she said and Kuon blinked as he watched her. "I'm serious. Don't live thinking that Kuu-sama wants something a certain way without talking to him about it," Kyoko said passionately before they both heard a sound from the kitchen.
Kyoko sat up but Kuon put a hand to her shoulder. He shook his head and then went down the stairs with Kyoko following closely behind him. Kuon sighed as he saw that Kuu was in the kitchen, looking out of the window. Kuu smiled in relief as he saw Kuon and Kyoko put a hand to Kuon's upper arm.
"I…I forgot to….I forgot to print the recipes…the menu," Kuu stumbled as he tried to cover up for how worried he had been about Kuon and how he had had to come back to the restaurant in order to check up on him. He felt that he was being a very overprotective parent in doing that.
"I'll make sure to have them for you in the morning," Kyoko smiled and Kuu nodded as he kept his head bowed and Kyoko looked to them. She turned to see the fear on Corn's face. "You should just tell him," she said and Kuu's head jolted up as he turned to Kuon and watched him. The words 'tell him' going around in his brain.
"Tell him?" Kuu panicked and Kuon looked away, he felt a little guilty about the panic that his dad still had but they were all going through this trauma, his parents' trauma might pale in comparison to his but they still had believed their son had been murdered. He needed to have as much patience with his father as he wanted his father to have with him.
"I've been considering possible options for my future," Kuon told him and Kuu watched him silently, respectfully. "I think that I might want to consider acting and I might want to consider something in the medical field as well. There's a lot of pain in the world and I want to help people, I don't want to create any more pain in the world."
There was silence before Kuu nodded and smiled. "You'd do amazingly as a doctor. I can help you figure out the first steps if you want to. We can do that tonight." He offered and Kyoko grinned to Kuon as he seemed to teeter on the edge of whether to really try to help others or whether to try to cover up his pain through following his father's dream.
….
….
"I can't help you, help yourself," one of the other boys was saying as the three of them sat together in a very small space where katana could drop on them at any moment. These particular crime lords really did want to use them as target practice and if Kuon was too quick, they'd hurt him anyway. He had learned to just accept pain and know that as long as he was feeling pain, he was still alive.
"Please, it really hurts," the other boy – the youngest of them – said and Kuon saw a little space on his side. He moved back and managed to angle his head so that he could see the boy's reflection off of one of the swords. They had broken his arm and there was no way that they would get medical attention.
"You want to hold your arm as close to your body as possible," Kuon said before ripping off his sleeve. As he moved forward he saw that the boy's arm wasn't broken but his collar bone was sprained. "Okay," he said before making a temporary sling out of the dirty shirt sleeve. "Keep it there for as long as possible and try to think of something other than the pain."
"Like your damned voice, Hizuri," the third boy barked and the younger boy looked at him.
"What do you think of?" he asked and Kuon smiled as he kept his eyes closed and lent his head back.
"My dad. I never needed any super heroes if my dad was there."
End of Chapter Nine
Thank you for reading, reviews are appreciated
Thank you to the reviewers of Chapter Eight
H-Nala, Kaname671, Kris XD, The Real Jackie-O
