Trapped inside the psychosis of his genial and disturbed mind, Kurama isn't ready to share Shiori's attention. This will earn you an enviable rose garden, red like blood.
Fertilizer
Shuuichi has always been smart, so smart that he realized his obsession and jealous paranoia while he was still a 10-year-old boy. In all his cleverness, he knew that the inhuman strength he'd acquired that night in the basement was entirely from the chemical effect on his muscles, bones, and mind.
Even in elementary school he was fully aware of the adrenaline energy and satisfaction coursing through his infant body, with the nervous system sending out electrical impulses as an effective stimulus. It's good to feel the blood rushing, circulating with greater intensity carrying lots of oxygen cells to the muscles, which now work harder. He swore he could feel every tiniest strand of muscle as he carried the cadaverous volume across the tiles of the laundry room in basement.
Shuuichi is so smart that he realized and accepted his violent psychopathy and obsession while eating breakfast with his happily mother in the next day, without even flinching a word or tremble the voice, especially after having slept the best night of his childhood. Shuuichi woke up eager to eat meat cooked over the grill, preferably undercooked, but was content with a usual breakfast. He counted how many rings there were in his cereal for each color described on the package as he watched his dear mother sitting beside him doing the same, having fun and laughing.
"A morning gymkhana between mother and child," his father would have said if he hadn't been in bloody and decaying pieces in the basement. The body cut into pieces no bigger than the severed head itself. After all, in addition to being intelligent, Shuuichi was a perfectionist, linked to aesthetics, one would say quite vain. Of course, the boy was quite organized and tidy, at the level of cleaning up the mess as quickly as if he were putting toys away in the wooden chest.
During cleaning he found a missing tooth in the tile. He took a few minutes to analyze the curious souvenir, probably the tooth came loose from its origin by the first impact on the head. The boy decided to keep it to himself as a souvenir, after all, even though it was covered in blood, it was a perfect molar that curiously detached itself from its owner without damaging the root. One chance in a million.
Returning the, now clean, tool to the same location found it earlier was extremely easy. The extremely sharp ax felt like feather in his tiny hands, he knew where to hold, he knew the angle and the force he should use to ensure accurate and functional blows. He knew how to use the tool as skillfully as he used his crayons.
Interestingly, the slices of the human were in the basement just below the family dining table, neatly hidden inside the sacks of garden compost. Luckily, Shuuichi would use that same plot of fertilized land to renovate the garden now that spring is moving more vigorously. A small school project that became a hobby.
Shuuichi is so vain that he smiled to himself for perfectly matching the date of his violence with the need for nutritional supplementation his new rose bushes will need. He also saw to it that the least amount of blood flowed from the man's body, the liquid would be very nourishing for flowerbed. Hopefully, the roses will be as red as the liquid that stained the floor.
Shuuichi was only in elementary school, but he was already reading classical dramaturgy. Shakespeare and Sophocles. Shuuichi was only in elementary school, but he knew what psychology and philosophy were, and thought Freud was an idiot. He was obsessed with his mother, yes, but it was no description of Greek or psychoanalysis that would define him. He came to hate that man who was as kind and considerate to him as his mother, after all, that man had no right to try to match yourself with the figure so perfect that was the woman who gave birth to such an indifferent boy. Shuuichi thought him unworthy for the mere resemblance that husband and wife shared, he wanted him dead and did it with his own small, youthful hands.
Shuuichi was also patient.
He pretended not to mind the rudeness in mother's voice that night. He knew this was temporary. He came down the basement stairs, barefoot and wearing his spring pajamas. Light, clean and smelling like the sun. There, he dumped the dirty pillows into the basket without even looking at the pile of burlap sacks filled with dirt and human bits.
Shiori was worried waiting for the return of her husband, who had not returned since the night before. In her anxiety attack, she was startled by her son's voice saying good night. Scare made her spill her tea on the sofa cushions in the living room, worry made her scold the boy for his stealth. Made him go down to the laundry and dispose of the dirty pillows, the good boy offering a beaming smile and promptly doing the task. She was upset, but the big green eyes warmed her heart. She kissed her beloved son's forehead and wished him sweet dreams, like every night.
"Kurama"
Na adolescência, Shuichi exigia ser chamado pelo apelido, afinal, não adiantava ser o primeiro excelência se houvesse outra pessoa em casa com o mesmo nome e as mesmas ambições. He wasn't satisfied with that, not that the nickname wasn't perfect, but it wouldn't have been necessary if these two moles hadn't poked their noses into his life.
It was more than perfect the days and years spent alone with his mother, the exclusive and mutual dedication between the pair. Kurama was the perfect son that his perfect mother deserved, he made sure that nothing was wrong around her and when things threatened to change in her freshman year of high school, Kurama started to poison her daily. Minimal, controlled doses of an oil extracted from an unusual plant, just to keep her unwell and in bed, so Kurama could free her from the difficult choice between caring for her child or taking a long trip for work.
Kurama is dedicated, mainly dedicated to the poor mother who suddenly fell ill. He loved spending the evenings talking to her while he brushed her long hair, in thanks, she would do the same kindness to him.
When Kazuyu and Shuuichi Hatanaka showed up for a surprise dinner at his house, Kurama broke down inside, but on the outside he was the handsome teenager, smiling and glad his mother had been hiding a relationship from him for months. That night, Kurama saw in mother's eyes something hidden by the gleeful laughter, he saw that insecurity of having to divide her attention again, but this time it's worse, she would have to split in three.
Kurama couldn't stand this, his mother, the most perfect woman he'd ever met, torturing herself by having to devote herself to so many people. He would take action, but he knew his garden very well and unfortunately, summer is not the best time to compost it.
But no problem, patience is one of his vast qualities, and time is a good ally for a botanical project.
"Hiei" he introduced to his mother as he served a small plate of fresh fish to the creature perched in the window.
Kurama didn't plan to name the black cat, in fact the feline presence was part of his gardening project, the animal would be trained for the purposes Kurama planned and that's it. But, as counterproductive as it is, Kurama got attached and ended up naming the cat with a name that matched his nickname, as they were almost inseparable due to training. Shiori never liked cats and was too superstitious to deal with a black cat crossing her path, so she never got too close to the animal, which in turn, never offered sympathy either for her or anyone. It was another point that made Kurama keep him.
At the symbolic funeral, Kurama saw in the eyes of those people the same thing he saw in the eyes of the neighborhood when they discovered his father's sudden escape.
"He seemed like a good family man, but he abandoned his son when he was still little"
"Must have run away with another woman one, a younger one"
"He wanted an adventure..."
"The poor boy will grow up lost, without a father around"
Little did the curious neighbors know that Kurama knelt on his father's remains every weekend while tending the rose bushes.
This time the condolences were different, closer to "Poor family, they don't even have bodies to bury" or "The authorities don't care about the population, they let this kind of thing happen to such a good family"
Kurama stroked his mother's shoulders as she tried to hold back tears. The teenager's thin jaw was locked. Angry and dissatisfied. His perfect project had so many twists and turns he could hardly count, in the end the result was the same, but it didn't come with the elegance that the designer had intended. He failed in his aesthetic measure and strategy.
The two Hatanaka men were presumed dead in a tragic accident, so tragic that they didn't even find their bodies. Kurama had planned something more interesting, aesthetic and noise free. Fortunately, the police were incompetent enough not to notice the small mistakes that Kurama was forced to make, with no possibility of correction, due to events so improbable that they were not accounted for. For Kurama, the project went so wrong that he compared it to the simple act of driving a blunt ax into Kazuyu's brain and then tearing it out without any beauty to shove it into Shuuichi's spine, then scattering its remains across the sidewalk and using the broken skulls like bowls of colored cereal. After all, by the way, the project was completed in time for winter.
"You find it fun, don't you?" Kurama spoke even though he knew the cat wouldn't understand "Watch me work while you relax in the sun"
The animal walked lazily along the fence, interrupting its steps to yawn in the hot midsummer sun. Kurama lifted the brim of straw hat with the back of hand. Took off his gardening gloves to caress Hiei's neck and spine. An excuse to look over the fence into the neighbor's garden that moved in late spring.
Kurama's jaw set in a thin, hard line when he saw his mother and new neighbor approaching him at the fence. Did she really go to greet him?
"Wow" the man looked at Kurama and the flowers in the flower bed "You really have a big rose garden here"
Kurama wanted to use the shovel in his left hand to pierce the man's neck. Unfortunately, he is right-handed. With a kind smile, Kurama greeted him like the etiquette required of a gentleman.
"The flower bed is three times bigger than when I started" Kurama completed with a fox smile.
"Sounds like a lot of work! Call me if you need help with the soil"
Kurama truly smiled in response.
When the man tired of socializing and returned to the house next door, Kurama was left alone. Shiori also went back inside, saying goodbye to his son with a playful smile and a long kiss on the cheek.
Hiei stretched his back, still perched on the fence, then looked at Kurama with the typical vacant gaze of a cat, blinking slowly and giving his neck to the caresses. As he smoothed the black fur, Kurama considered which other flower he would plant in the next expanse of his garden.
If this continues, he was going to need a few more acres.
Kurama sank his knees into the rain-soaked soil. Dirt crept up the white fabric of his pants, not that he minded. Bent over, he tried to focus on the drops wetting his hair. The icy feeling in her spine worsened, even as the warm blood oozed out.
Thunder muffled her cry of pain as he pulled the kitchen knife from her stomach.
"You have fun, don't you?" Through the red strands glued to his face, he looked at the cat perched on the fence. "In all your superiority, you think I'm weak in my humanity, don't you?"
Even wet in that early storm, the cat responded with a long, bored blink, but Kurama could see the disdain.
He covered the wound in his stomach with his hand and spat blood onto the ground.
This time everything went very wrong.
There were two corpses inside the house, unfortunately one of them was his mother's. He would probably be the third body counted.
Kurama leaned his back against the fence, among the rose bushes filled with late spring. The scent of flowers drowned out the scent of his blood, while the color was easily confused.
His mind tried to replay what had happened, to find out where he went wrong. Not even during the embrace of death could he stop being who he was. He couldn't die without knowing where he went wrong.
Hiei settled down among the rose foliage to avoid some of the rain.
Kurama stroked the furry ears, not caring about his bloody hand. The cat didn't seem to mind either.
Despite his downfall, Kurama wasn't so ashamed, the one he loved the most, the person who gave him life, also took it. An unfortunate paradox.
Plunging into the weariness of death he watched the rain fall on the ground and roses, the mud being washed away. He laughed ignoring the absurd pain, imagined the rain clearing the mud and revealing the bones of his past crimes, a great metaphor.
Or a big gossip to the neighbors, since apparently the mother and child aren't all that perfect.
He saw Hiei with his eyes closed and a calm feline countenance, so he decided to imitate him.
The last few seconds of his conscious mind were amusing, wondering if the police would be competent enough to discover there were more than three dead bodies, or if the headline would put the perfect boy and his mother as victims of a madman who...
...
He was too tired to finish the reasoning.
Sorry for any mistakes, I'm still getting used to English.
Thanks for reading!