Children of the Mirror 3: Acceptance
...Fourteenth Part: Krad...
When Dark wasn't busy stealing other artworks, he and I were researching Gomenasai's history or some such thing. I was curious to know what Rita and Meikano had gone through before their death – their heads had both completely healed, but their eyes, I figured, would never – but I was getting frustrated with it all.
First of all, when I was home, Rita didn't want to let me out of her sight – in a manner of speaking. Meikano clung to Dark in much the same way, and when he was gone, I was stuck with her, too. I was about to take Dark up on his offer and go with him each night to steal art just to catch a break – I thought about making Towa babysit them, but she was just as busy as the thief, if not more so.
While I fumed over this one night, Rita came up to me and tugged on my pant-leg. I looked down at her and she flinched. Apparently, I had been scowling without really realizing it.
"Rita is sorry," Rita said.
She pulled her sister over to her. "Meikano wants to tell Dark sorry," the other girl objected. Then Meikano sighed after Rita gave her a good shove toward me. "Meikano is also sorry," she relented.
I knelt down more to their level. "Sorry for what?" I asked them.
"Meikano is sorry Dark is so busy," Meikano told me.
"And Rita is sorry Rita knows," she said.
"Rita and Meikano are sorry Dark and Krad are miserable!" they chorused, and rushed forward to wrap their little arms around me.
I didn't know exactly how to respond to that...
. . .
Dark came trudging through the door with his latest steal and literally dropped the artwork to the floor. "I never thought I'd be saying this," he announced, "but I'm getting damn tired of doing this!!"
Towa walked into the room just then, presumably with news of another one, but she backed off when she saw how irritated the thief was. The girls both crept back to hide behind me, peering around my legs.
Dark really did look tired. "Daisuke, you're taking over for me, got it? The next artwork that shows up is yours and With's problem," he said. He walked off to the couch and sat with his elbows propped on his knees and his hands twisted back through his hair.
There was a silence that followed which was thick with astonishment and disbelief. Apparently no one thought that Dark could get tired of stealing.
"Dark doesn't want to be busy every night!" Meikano told them, frowning poutily. She was going to continue talking them down for her favorite one of us, but I took her hand and pulled her away from the Niwas over to Dark. She snatched Rita's hand, too, as we went, sticking her tongue out at the others over her shoulder.
"You might want to handle this next one, though, Dark..." Towa told him after a while, breaking the group's frozen silence.
He glared up at her. "And why is that?" he wondered, picking Meikano up and setting her on the couch next to him.
Towa looked at me. "Because... Krad made it!"