Author's Note: I didn't expect this to roll out so long like it did. But, I love how it turned out. More words just kept coming out as I kept writing this halo. I forget to mention that last week that the season premiere came out the same week that the stage play. It felt like the universe aligned perfectly for this season. Anyway, we get more of Makoto and Hya-chan's back story before this whole game started. Let's see. I have crumbs of next week's halo coming up. For now, enjoy this week's halo.

Trigger Warnings: Infant Death and Mental Illness

Halo One: Grief:

-November 23rd, 1986-

-Makoto-

I looked down into my son's crib. That would be the last morning that I would ever see him alive. Initially, I hadn't thought about being a dad. But my wife looked so happy once the news of her pregnancy sank in. She always wanted a family. I wanted to make her happy.

I had just grown to love my son too. I did love him, but I wasn't sure that I was cut to be a father. Before, I just had to care about myself. Gradually, I grew to realize that I wasn't going to be on my own anymore. I didn't mind when Hya-chan came into my life. It would just be two people to take care of. Soon, it would be three people to take care of. How many more would be coming after that?

Those short months with our son were a struggle, but I found myself enjoy them. His cheeks were round and chubby. Hya-chan said that he smelt like sunflowers. I couldn't smell it. He just smelt like a baby to me. I just went along with what she said. Hey, Hya-chan was happy. If she said that our son smelt like all of the roses in the world, who was I to argue?

I barely remember the day that he died. I just remember standing over his crib, watching him. He was still asleep at the time. He moved his little right foot in his sleep. I couldn't help but smile. I reached down and tapped him on the nose. I started to see his little black hairs on his head. Ten months. That's all the time I got to know him. If I knew that was going to be the last time I saw him, I would've stayed longer. When I got home that day, I hadn't expected to come home to a house of death.

When I think back to it, I don't remember much about that day. I just got up, saw my son, and went to work. My wife was asleep when I stopped by our son's room. I was already at work by the time she woke. I always called her around lunchtime. I made that call on the day our son died. It didn't last long. I think it was about ten to fifteen minutes. I couldn't tell. Everything seemed fine at home. My wife was as chipper as well. She babbled on about how the baby getting a bath. I could already picture what we were having for dinner that day. It's funny. There are always certain details that you can remember on the day of a tragedy. I don't remember what all I did at work that day, but I do remember how I suggested that we have a hot pot for dinner.

"Hot pot?" she asked.

"Yeah," I said.

"But it's not winter," Hya-chan said.

"I know, I know," I said. "But it's been so long since we had a good meal." We were poor at the time. Yes, this was the early days of the Japanese Bubble. Even then I struggled to make ends meet. I didn't have much education at the time. I think I was a high school dropout, but I don't remember. I was really good with my hands. With that in mind, things were starting to get a little bit better. I started to make more money per day. I had plans to get my wife and son presents that Christmas.

That money would end up being used to cover his funeral.

After that phone call, I went back to work. I remember that I was in a good mood for the rest of the day. I kept picturing that hot pot. We would eat like royalty that evening. Maybe I could pick up something sweet for her. I had a feeling that evening was going to be a good one.

Those hopes ended up being dark when I got home.

The lights were off in the house. I didn't think much about it at first. Sometimes, she would be sound asleep by the time I got home. I would find her on the couch sleeping before our son was born.

"I'm home!" I said. Silence. I looked around the living room. There was still some of the same mess from this morning. I remembered because she told me about spilling, I think it was carpet cleaner, on the floor. (I'm not sure what she said over the phone.) A confused look came over my face. Did something happen after I called her? Did she get sick or something?

I shouted her real name. No response. I walked past the kitchen and up the stairs. I made it to our bedroom and poked my head into the open doorway.

"Sweetheart, are you asleep?" I whispered. I slowly walked over to our futon. I didn't want to turn on the lights to wake her up. When I made it over to our futon, I became even more confused. It still made up like it would be after my wife got up. Okay… So, she wasn't in bed. I walked over to our son's room. The baby wasn't in the crib either. Where could they have gone at this time of night? When I walked downstairs, things got worse.

I found her sitting on the kitchen floor with our son's body in her arms. She kept mumbling to herself with tears in her eyes.

"What did you do?!" I asked. Hya-chan didn't respond. I ran over and knelt down to her. Her eyes looked so empty.

"Baby? Baby? Baby?" I asked, shaking her. I screamed her real name. Only then did she look up at me. More tears filled her eyes. My heart sank as I could see where this was going.

"Hya-chan, what happened?" I asked. Her lower lip trembled.

"He's dead," she whimpered. "[Name] is dead." I looked down in her arms. Our little boy lay dead in her arms. I dreaded thinking about how long he had been like that. How could this have happened? Our son was perfectly alive this morning. My wife broke down weeping again. I pulled her into my chest and let her cry there. I could feel tears welling up in my eyes. The gravity of what happened hit worse than a punch to the gut. He was gone. Our little boy was gone. And I had just started to enjoy having him around.

The rest of that night and the morning was a blur.

It just came unraveled from there. You've heard the story already. Hya-chan spiraled into depression and I took her to Chou Mori. But what did I do in the months while she was away? What else could I do? I worked. What else could I do? My wife needed a home to go back to. Be homeless would make things worse. I tried to ignore the looks of pity on my coworkers' and neighbors' faces.

My house felt dead during that time. No baby crying. No smells of good food cooking. No radio playing in the background. The house felt cold without them. I felt so numb after those first few days without her. I would just get up, get dressed, eat breakfast, go to work, come home, have dinner, take a bath, and go to bed. I did talk to people. But sometimes, I just wanted to be alone. I thought back to that morning I saw my son in his crib. Little Doraemon pajamas. They were a hand-me-down. One of our neighbor's grandchildren grew out of them. Hya-chan was more than happy to take the pajamas. I didn't complain. I had to admit that they looked rather cute. White with little pictures of Doraemon's face on them. Hya-chan had just washed them last night. She was the one who dressed him in those.

I shook my head.

It's funny all of the little things that you remember from the day of a tragedy. He was supposed to have a doctor's appointment the week after his death. It would've been nice to get them out of the house for a change. It would've been his first time back in Ikebukuro since he was born.

I shouldn't be dwelling on what could've been. But still…

I sometimes go into the nursery and just sit on the floor for hours. I put so much work into it. I was the one who painted it up to look nice. Light grass with little animals on in. Getting ready for this baby gave me this burst of energy to make our home child-friendly. The crib came from a thrift store. Hya-chan was the one who spotted it.

"It's so darling!" she said when she saw the crib in the window. I made a face at the aging wood.

"You sure about that?" I asked. "I could make one better." My wife whipped around to me. She pouted at me.

"What?" I asked. Hya-chan grabbed onto my arm.

"Hey!" I shouted.

"Aw, but it's cute!" she yelled. She wouldn't let go of my arm. I frowned at her. Hya-chan stared into my eyes, pouting. I looked back at the crib in the window. I tilted my head. I dropped my shoulders.

"Okay, it's kind of cute," I said.

"See?" she asked. "Isn't it?" I rolled my eyes. I could see where this was heading. Pretty soon, we went home with that crib.

"How are we going to get this home?" I asked her. Hya-chan turned to me, smiling.

"We'll find a way," she said. I sighed and dropped my head. Once again it was up to me to work out the technical side of things. How she managed to do that, I don't know. And it didn't matter to her. We did manage to get the crib on the bus on the way home. I had to admit, it looked good in the soon-to-be nursery.

That's how we ended up spending our Saturdays. Hya-chan and I went to that thrift shop to look for more baby things. She was the one who spotted them.

"Aw, that's so cute!" she would say. "I like that one! Isn't this cute? Can we get this one?" I just smiled and went along with it. Anything to keep her happy, you know?

I haven't taken anything out of this dead nursery. I didn't have the heart to do it. Hya-chan wouldn't let me either. She broke down crying when I asked what we were going to do about the toys, clothes, and furniture.

"I don't want to throw him away! I don't want to throw him away! I don't want to throw him away!" she screamed over and over. My wife sank down to the floor at my feet in tears. My heart ached to see her like that. I didn't blame her. I lost a son too. I missed him too.

I reached down and patted her on the head.

"It's okay," I said. "We won't throw him away. We can leave his room the way it is." My wife looked up at me with tears in her eyes. I knelt down and pulled her into my arms. By that point, she felt too numb to cry.

Now, my son's room just mocks me. It reminds me of a future that we will never have. Our happy home died the moment he did. Sometimes, I will cry myself to sleep on the floor. Even that crib we got from the thrift shop was a painful reminder of him. I worked really hard to fix it up, you know? Tightening the screws and adding new coats of paint and polish. I did spend some money on a little mattress for it. I found the little mobile at a dumpster site. I straightened it out, repainted it, and added some new charms on it. Pretty soon, that old crib looked like beautiful art.

I was tempted to destroy that crib. I started about eight times. But I could never go through with it.

Her church wasn't much help. They said they would pray for her. I thought I was going to vomit. That's not going to help her get better. I avoided them as they knocked on the door. They tried to get me to join their church once. I said no. Some of them gracefully took the hint. Some gave me dirty looks. I don't think my wife's preacher liked me. I could've sworn that day I asked for help he had a smug look on his face. Almost like he wanted our marriage to fail. I think that he wanted her for himself. I voiced this to Hya-chan before, but she didn't believe me.

"He's just lonely," she said when she was five months pregnant. "His wife died a while back." I nodded uneasily.

"Okay…" I muttered.

When our son died, her church was like vultures. Some of them tried to get me to join their church.

"This will be good for you," they said. I didn't care. I just wanted to be left alone. My neighbors came by the house to check on me, but at least this didn't linger around the door. They would just knock on the door and leave food for me. I could tell who would be coming by the house. My wife's church would just be standing there, trying to look inside. Some have even taken to talking to my neighbors. One of those loony church nuts tried to follow me as I left for work. Why can't they just leave me alone? Don't give me that, "they mean well" crap. I don't want their sort of comfort. I just wanted to be alone.

I went to visit Hya-chan every Saturday at Chou Mori. At the time I committed her, I was desperate. I had already lost a son. I couldn't lose my wife either. But when I went to visit her for the first time since I committed her, I started to regret my decision. I heard the stories. Your mind doesn't think straight when you are desperate and in grief. The internet wasn't a big thing in the eighties either. So I couldn't get on something like Yelp to read the reviews. Not many people talked about Chou Mori either. I was starting to see why.

But what else could I do? Mental health wasn't taken seriously in Japan in the '80s. It still isn't today, but it was much worse back then. There weren't many mental institutions that I could afford to place my wife in. It didn't help that it took about more than an hour to drive from Ikebukuro to Aokigahara just to see her. That's right. Chou Mori was built near "suicide forest". Sure the building was roped off to keep some patients from getting lost in there, but I still had my doubts.

I'm going off on a tangent here.

My wife looks tired when I go to see her. Has she been sleeping well? She also looked so frail. Are they even feeding her here? Does she eat anymore? What have they been doing to her? She smiled, but her eyes looked so dead. I'm the one who has to do all of the talking. I can never tell what kind of state my wife is going to be in. Sometimes, Hya-chan would be lucid enough to talk to me. Other times, I wasn't sure if she was there or not.

However, there would always be one consistent.

"He freaks me out," Hya-chan said in a low whisper. I took her by the hand. That's what she always says about her therapist. On the surface, it would look like the paranoia of a mental patient who didn't want to be in Chou Mori. But something in her eyes told me that things weren't right in the place.

My wife's therapist was Kitano-sensei. But all of this mess happened, I had only met him once. I wished it would've stayed that way. I have never seen Kitano-sensei smile at Chou Mori. I met him by accident in an elevator. (Ha! That was one of the few things that worked in that place.) I forget why I was going in there. Maybe I just wanted to get away. If I was going to be alone for that short trip, I was sorely mistaken.

An old man in a white coat walked in and pressed a button. The doors closed and the cab started rising up. I tried not to make eye contact. Everything would've been fine if neither one of us said a word. I looked at the man out of the corner of my eye. Apparently, that was all it took.

"Are you [NAME]'s husband?" he asked. "Makoto, wasn't it?" I didn't make eye contact.

"Who's asking?" I asked. A moment of silence passed.

"I'm Kitano-sensei, her therapist," he said.

"Uh-huh," I said. So this was the guy causing my wife anxiety. How was I going to approach this? I took in a breath and faced forward.

"Listen. You're making my wife uncomfortable with whatever you are doing."

"Is that so?"

"Yes." Without looking at his face, I could tell why my wife saw him as intimidating. But I wasn't going to back down now.

"Hino-san, I can guarantee you that your wife is in good hands," Kitano said. I wouldn't look at him.

"That's not what I hear her when I come to visit," I said.

"I assure you that there are patients that are convinced that we are out to get them. That is not what we are here for."

I gritted my teeth. There he went with the bullshit. Of course, he would imply that my wife was crazy.

"She's not paranoid," I said.

"Excuse me?" Kitano-sensei asked.

"She's not paranoid. She's afraid of you. I can see it in her eyes." I looked at him out of the corner of my eye. No emotion on his face. Nothing. Still, I wasn't going to back down.

"Well, I can guarantee you that that was never my intention," Kitano-sensei said. I clicked my tongue.

"Just stop scaring her, okay?" I said. The cab pulled to a stop. I stepped out as soon as the doors slid open. I forgot what floor it was, but I was happy to get out of there. I wished that had been the end of the exchange.

"See you later, Hino-san!" Kitano-sensei said. I didn't turn around as I walked faster.

Back in present day, I pressed my forehead against hers as I held her hand.

"Okay," I said. "I will talk to the director. I promise. Okay?" I paused and saw the same look eyes she would have when at her lucid times.

"What's the matter?" I asked. Her lower lip trembled as she stared into my eyes. She only said one thing that stuck into my chest.

"I want to go home, Mako-chan," she said.

Those words were worse than any kick to the stomach. This put me in a difficult place. I wanted her to get better, but I couldn't keep her in this place anymore. I didn't know what to do.

As promised, I reported my wife's concerns to the director of Chou Mori. They didn't do shit about it. Either he just didn't care, or Kitano-sensei managed to talk himself out of discipline. As a result, nothing changed. It didn't matter. I was going to get her out anyway. The visit after that was all it took to convince me.

The problem was that no time ever felt right. I can't explain it now, but it just didn't feel like the right time to go and bring my wife home. I want to say that life got in the way, but that wouldn't be accurate. I just couldn't explain it.

By the summer of 1987, I couldn't take it anymore. I had to get my wife out of there. I figured I would take her to the doctor and work from there. I would have to keep her out of our son's room. (Yes, I still kept it up. I figured that I wasn't ready to take anything down yet.) I had plans that day on August twenty-first. I was going check my wife out of that hell, take her to a nice restaurant, and get home. Once we got home, I would just let her sleep for the rest of the day. That first day home would make a difference they told me. The following Monday, I would take Hya-chan to the doctor and work from there.

As you can guess, it all came unraveled from there.

I don't know how I ended dragging her and everyone else into this. I just wanted to take my wife home. Strangely enough, I still want to do that. I think I found her again. Now, I just want to take her home. I thought if I just kept my head down and closed my eyes, this would all go away. But god damn Michiko had to come back and pull me back into this.

Now, this cycle has begun again.

What makes it worse is that she is now starting to remember. The last thing that I wanted was for her to be dragged back into this nightmare. Kitano-sensei wanted her back in their despicable game. Well, he's got his wish again. Because of that, I am going to have to try and save her and take my wife home.

To everyone reading this and is pulled into this nightmare that won't end, I apologize. You are going probably to die by the time this game is over. You didn't deserve this fate. My wife didn't deserve this. Nobody deserved this.

Now you will face death—again.

Do you know what the saddest part is? I can't even remember my son's name.