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Chapter 10 - Anzu Kaiba
Two little boys sat together at lunch and with them sat their sister. The boys laughed and ate but the girl was staring at a sulking child who sat by himself. His eye were red from crying too many tears, and his nose was pink because he kept sniffling and rubbing it. The girl looked into her bag and looked back at the boy. Then she looked back into her bag and seemed to make up her mind. She took a deep breath, took something out of the bag, and made her way over to the weepy boy.
"These are yours."
The boy jumped when Anzu spoke. She set the eyeglasses down on the table in front of him. His eyes widened with relief and he grabbed the eyeglasses. He clutched them to his chest and then turned to thank the deliverer. But as he looked up he saw who it was and he stammered. His eyes filled with fresh tears and he looked around for somewhere to run.
"I don't want to hurt you. Just… don't be mean to my brother." Anzu turned and began to walk back.
"Tha- thank you… I'm sorry…"
Anzu stopped and turned to look at the boy. He glanced at her and then looked down at the table.
"I'm sorry I scared you so bad." She mumbled.
"I shouldn't have picked on your brother…"
"Your brother is mean to you, isn't he…"
The green haired boy glanced at her and then he looked back down at the table. He nodded.
"You don't have to be mean. You don't have to be like him. You might feel better if you're not mean."
The boy looked at her, confused.
"You don't like it when he picks on you. Why do it to someone else?" Anzu looked at the boy and knew that this conversation wasn't going to go any further. He was staring at the table. He probably didn't understand what she was saying. Maybe she could try to tell him the fairy story... She decided that she wouldn't be able to tell it like Bakura had. She looked back at Mokuba and Yuugi and then at the boy again.
She sat down next to him. "My name is Anzu. If you promise not to be mean to my brother, I will not be mean to you.
That was the beginning. The tipping point that lead to a cascade of change.
It all started with the little boy. The boy was the first friend that she made at school. He was an odd kind, with a fascination for bugs but when he spoke about them so passionately those things could be really interesting. Anzu got to know him and soon she realized that she could help him. She did not have to be another monster for him. She could be the fluffy bunny.
At night, Anzu happily awaited the new ritual. An affirming chant, rewriting her story.
Seto came to wake her up and they would look at all of her scars and he would tell her that she was not defined by her hurt. Slowly she came to accept that her scars were just a part of her story. Nights multiplied into weeks and she sat awake waiting for him to come get her. As weeks became months, she began to wait for him outside the bathroom. Eager to begin the ritual as soon as possible. As the months stretched into years, she began to say the mantra herself. The words formed in her mind and fell from her lips. They rubbed out Yami's ownership of those scars.
Then the night came, in the wee hours of morning, when Seto found that she had gone into the bathroom all by herself. She no long required a guide on her journey. This was her life. She had taken ownership of it all. Her scars. Her hurt. Her history. Her story of renewal. She stood in front of the bathroom mirror and examined every scar, some fading with time and some too deep to disappear. She no longer flinched or looked away. Anzu stood firm and looked at each reminder of misery and she obliterated their power.
"You are not your hurt."
As she recited the mantra, outside the door her new father listened to every single "You are not your hurt" and "Your pain is just a part of your story." She felt his presence in every word. She felt his strength bolster her own.
She grew stronger and stronger. She took a firm grasp on her life and she chose its course. She was no longer some thing defined by the actions taken upon her. She was a person, with a life of choices rolled out before her. This gave her the ability to undergo fundamental change. She evolved.
Anzu became Anzu Kaiba, she accepted that she had two brothers. She accepted that she had a father. She accepted that she had two uncles. She accepted that she had friends. She accepted the new person she had become. She was a person who made friends to help them see that they were not just their hurt. She worked tirelessly to make sure that they each saw that they were amazing people in their own right.
More than anything else, the greatest thing to change in Anzu was that she accepted herself. She was not garbage. She was not a monster. She was not just a ball of anger, spreading destruction wherever she went.
She was Anzu Kaiba.
She was more than just what a monster had done to her.
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"...so that's why I want to tell each and every one of you. You are not your looks. You are not your possessions. You-" She turned and smiled at the seated teachers, "and forgive me, staff and faculty, for saying this- you are not your grades." A murmur ran through the crowd, a mixture of chuckles and anticipation. "Most of all," Anzu smiled out at the rows and rows of her friends. "Your pain is only a part of your story, it does not define you. You are not your hurt."
A roar of cheers exploded from the graduating class. Hugging and crying ensued. Applause erupted and students stood up from their seats. Each one of them knew these words. Whispered in their ear as they had cried in a stairwell. Written across a computer screen as they had contemplated dark finalities. Yelled at them as they had raged. Passed to them in scribbled notes. To the entire graduating class, these words had been a beacon in dark times, a reminder of a hopeful future, a promise of something meaningful for them. These words had changed their lives. Simple and pure, and filled with a sincerity that had given them the strength to become so much more than they had ever dreamed.
Parents and family members sat in confusion. They wondered what the words meant, but still they felt themselves moved. There was something in those words. There was something in the hearts of all those students who were whistling, shouting, and clapping. Something about those words was magic.
'You are more than your hurt.'
Though there was much confusion in the crowd sitting behind the graduating class, there was one person in the audience who knew what those words truly meant. One person who knew better than all others, what they meant to the girl who had uttered them.
It was with this understanding that a smile came to his lips, as he thought about the young woman his daughter had become.