Disclaimer: Tenkuu no Escaflowne is property of Bandai and Sunrise, all rights reserved. I am in no way affiliated with these companies, and am not making profit. Any similarities between my work and anyone else's is purely coincidental. Lyrics to "Easier To Run" are property of Linkin Park, all rights reserved.
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"Whisper Memories" Part 4: Easier to Run
By The Last Princess of Hyrule
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It's easier to run,
Replacing this pain with something more,
It's so much easier to go,
Than face all this pain,
You're all alone . . .
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When the service ended the mourners slowly dispersed, lingering near the exit where Mrs. Uchida stood to express their grief and sympathy to her weeping form. Hitomi, however, walked to the front of the room where Yukari's coffin stood and looked into it. Only the front half was open, showing Yukari's face and upper body framed by silver silk lining. A white lace veil, which hardly obstructed Yukari from view, draped over everything. Hitomi reached out and touched the wood frame.
"I can't believe this is it," she said to Folken, who was next to her. "I can't believe this is the last time I'll ever see her."
Folken said nothing.
"I wish I'd been there. I know I could have stopped her from doing this." There was a moment of silence and Hitomi looked up at Folken. "You saw her, didn't you? Please . . . tell me what happened."
Folken hesitated. He didn't think Hitomi would be deal with the details of her friend's death and he had told himself a thousand times over that she was not going to hear it from him. But Hitomi's pleading voice crushed his resolve and inside he knew he'd be cursing himself for a long time after this.
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Something has been taken from deep inside of me,
A secret I've kept locked away,
No one can ever see,
Wounds so deep they never show,
They never go away,
Like moving pictures in my head,
For years and years they've played . . .
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The table of first graders Folken was working with sat in silence as they puzzled over the paper of simple addition problems in front of them. First graders were the easiest group of primary school students to work with—it wasn't until third grade that they got out of hand—and the ones Folken tutored after school each day were the most mellow of all.
The library where the help groups worked had been quiet for nearly the entire session that day, except for a handful of excited fourth graders with their faces pressed to the playground-facing windows just before 3pm. More than once, the assistants shushed their whispering and tried to get them to sit down, but had no impact.
Finally, Folken got up and went to the window, intending to herd the students back to their tables, and looked outside to see what was causing all the commotion. Sitting on her knees in the bark chips piled amongst the metal play equipment was a girl fifteen or sixteen years old in a brown-and-cream high school uniform.
Above her, the sky was covered in dark clouds and a steady rainfall drenched everything. The girl's reddish hair was plastered flat to the sides of her face and she was thoroughly soaked, but she did not move. Her gaze was directed down at something in her lap and she appeared to be oblivious to everything else, even the rain.
"Okay, everybody go sit down," Folken told the kids. "There's nothing interesting outside."
Some whining ensued, as well as lots of questions about the girl, but Folken answered them all with the stern command to finish their work. When everyone was immersed once more in their studies, Folken checked on his table to see that its occupants were on task, and then went to talk to the head librarian.
"What was that all about?" she asked him in a whisper.
"There's a girl sitting outside on the playground," Folken informed her quietly.
"In this rain? Doing what?"
"I don't know. Just sitting there."
The librarian's eyebrows knit together in thought.
"Do you mind if I go out and talk to her?" he asked.
"No, go ahead," she replied. "Tell her she shouldn't be on the grounds until after school is out."
"All right." Folken discreetly left the library, fortunately not attracting the attention of any of the kids, which would have caused as much disruption as the girl.
Outside, lightening flashed and thunder rolled while rain collected in puddles on the asphalt. Folken shivered in his school jacket as he hurried to the playground. The girl did not notice him coming. She seemed completely absorbed in her own world.
"Hey," he called when he reached her. "What're you doing here?"
With a startled gasp, the girl looked up. Folken recognized her in an instant. It was Hitomi Kanzaki's friend, Yukari, from English 2. Quickly, she covered the thing in her lap with her hands. "What's it to you?"
"You shouldn't be on these grounds until after school lets out," Folken informed her. "You want to tell me why you're here?"
"No, I don't think so," Yukari narrowed her eyes and the corner of her lip turned up in a kind of snarl. "It isn't any of your business. Go away."
"No need to get defensive, I'm just trying to talk to you."
Yukari gave a bitter laugh. "Huh, that's what they all say."
"What?"
"I told you to get outta here!" She glared at Folken coldly with what should have been a sharp gaze, except that her eyes seemed unfocused, as if she was looking through him. Suddenly he noticed she did not look very good. Her skin was pale and she looked dizzy the way someone looked when they just got off a roller coaster and was about to throw up.
"Are you okay?" Folken asked with concern. "You don't look so good."
"It's none of you're business!"
Yukari put out one hand and tried to push herself up but all she managed was to unsteady herself and topple over on her side. Out of her lap spilled a silver switchblade, the blade out. A red stain was visible where her hands had lain on her skirt, and when she fell her wrists landed facing up, exposing several deep cuts on each, smeared with blood and fresh oozing out.
"Shit, you need some help. I think we should get you to a hospital." Folken reached out and tried to help her up, but Yukari shoved him away with what little strength she had.
"I told you . . . to go away!" Her breath was coming quickly and beads of sweat had appearing among the raindrops on her forehead. "Just let . . . me die . . ." The fierceness had faded from her eyes and she looked so tired, as if her very soul were exhausted from the effort of living.
Folken knelt beside her calmly. His philosophy of suicide was different from most people's: suicide was a person's choice and they had as much right to take their own life as to preserve it. He did not support the idea of killing one's self for any reason, but it was not in his opinion to get in the way of their choice. One's choices shaped one's fate and Folken did not believe in interfering in fate. It goes without saying that his was not a popular ideal.
"Are you sure this is what you want to do?" Even if he supported her choice, he hoped there might be a chance she did not.
Yukari's eyes were full of tears. "I can't go . . . back anymore . . . I'm not . . . not that person . . . they don't . . . know anything about . . . me . . ."
She was fading fast. Yukari's aim was good and she had cut the main blood vessel in her wrist, the one that would lead to a fast death. It wouldn't be more than a few more minutes.
"I don't really . . . want to do . . . this . . . but . . ." she looked up at Folken, her gaze fearful and desperate. "Am I . . . really . . . that . . . pe . . .person . . . ?"
He shook his head.
"Don't . . . tell . . . D . . . Dad . . . ."
And she was gone.
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If I could change I would / take back the pain I would,
Retrace every wrong move that I made I would,
If I could stand up and take the blame I would,
If I could take all this shame to the grave I would . . .
X - x - X -
Hitomi's eyes never left Yukari's face. In her mind, she played through Folken's account of her friend's last minutes of life, and somehow Hitomi felt nothing. There was no more sadness in her heart, no more tears in her eyes, nothing she could hear that could possibly shake her. She was blank.
"Unbelievable," she said monotonously. "Un-fucking-believable."
Behind her were the sniffling and murmuring voices of the mourners. Everyone was crying and talking, sad and regretful, but no one was broken and incomplete the way Hitomi was. No one hurt so deeply inside that they could not remember a time before the pain. No one was so immersed with grief that they could no longer feel anything else.
"Go away," Hitomi told Folken, not looking at him. "Stay away from me."
For a long moment, he watched her, searching her face for any indication of her thoughts, but there was none. And then, with whatever reason, he left. He did not say anything, he did not hesitate, he just turned around and walked away.
Hitomi was alone.
Several minutes passed. The ceremony hall began to empty—Hitomi could hear the voices beginning to fade—but she stayed by Yukari's coffin.
Then there was a voice behind her. "This has been a really hard time for you, hasn't it?"
Hitomi turned and saw Dilandau Albatou watching her with sadly. She nodded.
"I mean, I know all of us," he said, referring to the circle of friends he, Hitomi, and Yukari had shared, "will really miss her, but I know it hurts you the most."
Dilandau, with the same silver hair as the coffin's lining, shining tears that reflected light the same way as Yukari's once-bright eyes, and dressed in the black of the darkness that claimed her. They would have been great together, Hitomi knew. How hard it must have been for Dilandau right then, trying to say goodbye to a friend whom his perspective of was just drastically altered. How would he come to peace with the loss now?
"I'm really sorry," Hitomi began, "if what I said . . . if I've done anything . . ."
Dilandau waved her off. "It's nothing. No big deal." He shrugged and almost smiled. "I mean, it's kinda different . . . knowing how she felt and all that, but . . . I dunno . . . I guess I kinda knew all along . . . I don't know how to explain it."
"I understand."
Dilandau reached out and touched her shoulder. "Are you gonna be all right?"
How many times are people going to ask me that? Hitomi wondered off-hand. "Yeah, I'll be okay," she told Dilandau. He did not seem how little feeling was in her responses.
Dilandau looked skeptical, just like everyone else when they heard that answer. With good reason, of course, because they were concerned for Hitomi and the way she was coping with "such an untimely tragedy." No one, however, really took the time to look deep into her soul and see the truth.
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Sometimes I remember the darkness of my past,
Bringing back these memories I wish I didn't have,
Sometimes I think of letting go and never looking back,
And never moving forward so there'd never be a past . . .
X - x - X -
After the reception, Hitomi and her parents went home. It was evening by that time and, had there been any visible sun at all that day, it would have already set, but it was just as dark outside when she returned to her room as it had been when she left. Perhaps darker.
That night, Hitomi's parents were attending an important dinner meeting with some representatives from America who were interested in doing business with the company Mr. Kanzaki worked for. As head of the translation services department, Mr. Kanzaki was obligated to attend, and Mrs. Kanzaki as well, for both had R.S.V.P. a month in advance, when the preparations began. Though neither parent wanted to leave Hitomi alone that night, the dinner was an obligation they could not get out of.
After they left, Hitomi slumped down on the couch with a carton of banana-fudge-ripple ice cream and watched imported cartoons. Then sometime around seven, Mrs. Uchida came by and dropped off several boxes of Yukari's stuff that she figured Yukari would want Hitomi to have.
The first box was clothing. Hitomi pushed it aside. The second contained Yukari's Linkin Park collection—posters, clothes, CDs, and a variety of more obscure merchandise—her surround sound stereo system, music, books, movies, and some other hobby-type items. The last box was random doodads.
Hitomi sifted through these boxes in front of the TV. In a mosaic jewelry box, she found a tiny shrine of things that must have belonged to Dilandau at one time—an old ID card, a band-aid, some notes he passed Yukari in class, a sticker, a pen, and some lint. Most of the items in the third box seemed to be stupid little things Mrs. Uchida had found and did not know what to do with.
A while later, the stuff from the boxes was strewn all over the apartment and Hitomi was sitting on the countertop watching her microwave dinner spin as it heated up. It was nine. Mr. and Mrs. Kanzaki would not be home for another two or three hours. The microwave beeped and Hitomi pulled out her dinner. Taking a knife from the drawer, she sliced off the plastic and looked around for some clean utensils. Another half hour passed. Hitomi threw away her empty tray and looked at the time. Ten o'clock.
Grabbing some of Yukari's CDs from the second box and the knife on the counter, Hitomi went into the bathroom and closed the door. She set her things on the floor and turned on the hot water faucet on the bathtub, shoving the stopper in the drain. As the tub slowly filled, Hitomi picked a CD at random, stuck it in the bathroom CD player, pressed play, and cranked up the volume to nearly its highest setting. Was it fate that the sounds of Linkin Park were those that blasted out?
Hitomi pulled off her clothes and turned off the water, stepping slowly into the tub. Steam clouded the air and she watched it fog the mirror, blocking the reflection of the opposite side of the wall from view. With a deep sigh, she let herself sink beneath the water's surface. Thirty seconds later she came up again for air.
The light in the bathroom was faint. Only the light directly overhead the bathtub was on and Hitomi had adjusted it to a medium setting. The clutter of objects in the bathroom cast dark shadows across each other and Hitomi watched their haunting forms dazedly for a few minutes, feeling the steam settle on her chest.
After a few minutes, she picked the kitchen knife off the floor and twirled it idly in the palm of her hand, watching in a sort of trance the light reflecting off its steel surface. Yukari had died by a knife like this, with a cold blade of ice. It was only fitting that, if Hitomi were going to follow her friend into death, that she go the same way. With her grip calm and steady, she touched the point lightly to her left wrist and etched a tiny line across the little bump of a blue vein beneath its delicate layer of skin.
As the knife left its mark, the blood welled out, each bead blossoming from the cut like a tiny flower. It was beautiful in a dark surreal way, elegant and fine. Hitomi moved the knife and drew another line beneath the first, then slowly made three more lines and changed hands, making five identical marks on her right wrist. Then she set the knife onto a gray bathmat on the floor. Crimson blood staining its blade dripped on the tile floor, the shadow the knife cast on it making it look black.
Hitomi lay back in the tub and water cascaded over her shoulders, only her neck, head, and arms dry. Her right arm she draped out over the rim, the side of her hand bumping the tub's smooth surface, feeling the condensation that had collected on it. Her left she leaned against the tiled wall. A small scarlet trail dribbled down into the tub, and swirling red designs flowered where blood dripped into the water. They reminded Hitomi of clouds the way they drifted across the water's surface and slowly faded away.
Slowly, Hitomi closed her eyes. The stereo's throbbing bass changed the rhythm of her heart to an irregular pulsation. The music sounded far away, like she was listening to it on an old radio from the 80s. Everything seemed to slow down and she became very aware of her breathing. The sound of a door closing seemed distant as a plane flying far above her head. Quite reluctantly, she opened her eyes.
Above her stood Folken.
He was dressed in the same black shirt and slacks from the funeral that morning, his hands in his pockets, looking down at her with no expression in his scarlet eyes. Hitomi, completely naked, looked back at him with the same gaze, unembarrassed by her body or their situation.
"What do you want?" she asked simply. She did not ask how he had gotten in or any details to that extent. "Why are you here?"
"I thought you might be here," he replied, referring to her suicidal condition, "like this."
Hitomi sighed and closed her eyes. "Can't you just leave well enough alone?"
"No. I want to help you."
"Yeah, you and everybody else, but it's not gonna do any good. Yukari's dead. I'm not. We're not together anymore." She sank a little deeper into the tub. The water was beginning to turn pink.
"I don't think Yukari would have wanted you to die too." Folken crouched beside the tub on the bathmat.
"Then why'd she leave me like this?" Hitomi's questions were tired and had little feeling, her loss of blood beginning to take its toll on her consciousness.
"She felt trapped and she was scared," Folken told her. His voice was warm and soothing, but Hitomi didn't notice. "She didn't want to go, but she didn't think she had any other way out." He looked at her sadly. "She didn't want it to end this way."
Hitomi opened one eye and looked up at him. Folken was no longer watching her; his gaze was locked onto the stereo on shelf just behind the tub. His visage seemed calm and expressionless, as Hitomi had come to recognize as his nature.
But in his eyes, Hitomi saw tears.
At first, she thought they were condensation, some trick her drowsy eyes were playing on her mind, and then they began to fall in little trails down his cheeks. Folken was crying. Folken. The one she thought had no heart, who could feel no compassion, happiness, despair, or even grief. Folken, who seemed so cold and distant, even when they kissed, was broken. No longer was his face blank and his words without feeling. Sadness and despair had come free and Folken's sorrow was as evident as Hitomi's suffering.
Slowly, Hitomi lifted her right hand, which felt as if it were laden with bricks, and lightly touched his arm. A few drops of blood glistened on the dark fabric of his shirt and a little bathwater spilled over the rim of the tub.
"I didn't want her to go," said Hitomi in a quiet voice quavering with desolation. "I didn't want to find her on the playground . . . I didn't want to deliver a eulogy at her funeral . . . I didn't want to feel this emptiness . . . I didn't want any of this to happen . . ."
He turned to her and Hitomi could swear she saw a look of wonder cross his face. The image made her aching heart leap. "But I do want your help . . ." her voice was barely above a feeble whisper as she reached up her other tired arm and wrapped the two around his neck."I do . . . want you . . ."
Gently, Folken reached out and lifted Hitomi from the bathtub, one arm under her knees, the other around her back holding her shoulder. Water cascaded onto the bathmat in pink-tinted torrents. Hitomi leaned her head against Folken's chest and closed her eyes. Before he could even carry her from the bathroom, she passed out and sank into the black abyss of unconsciousness.
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Just washing it aside,
All of the helplessness inside,
Pretending I don't feel this place,
It's so much simpler than change . . .
X - x - X -
When she awoke a couple days later, the first thing Hitomi saw was Folken sitting in a chair near the foot of her bed. He was asleep, his head lolling to one side near his shoulder. She looked around.
She lay in a bed with white sheets and several fluffy pillows inside a small rectangular hospital room. Protruding from one arm was an IV tube hooked to a plastic bag half filled with donor blood. To Hitomi's right was a door and window facing the halls, the privacy shades on both drawn closed. On the other side was a window, also closed, which looked out over downtown Tokyo.
Through the blinds streamed yellow bars of sunlight.
On the periphery of her vision, Hitomi noticed Folken stir. As he opened his eyes and blinked away sleep, she felt her heart growing warm again, a feeling she had come to associate with the time they kissed, one that had been absent since Yukari's death.
When Folken saw her awake, he smiled. His feelings were no longer hidden beneath a mask of cold acceptance. He was open and expressive, the sight of which made Hitomi feel good inside. Sometimes, to hold things in is to miss great opportunities, relationships, and Folken wanted to experience them. He really does care . . . he cares about me . . .
"I'm glad you're awake," he said, standing, and walked over to the side of her bed. He touched her arm. "I'm sure everyone else will be happy to hear so too."
"Everyone else?" Hitomi thought he was referring to her parents, but the way he said everyone made her want think it encompassed a much larger group of people.
Folken's smile brightened and he pointed to a table in the corner Hitomi had not noticed. Its surface was covered with get-well-soon cards, vases of flowers of every color under the rainbow, bright bouncing balloons, and an assortment of charming stuffed animals. From the pile, Folken plucked a white plush bear with a green ribbon and handed it to Hitomi.
"Everyone's been really nervous since you were admitted," Folken explained. "They—we—were afraid we'd lose you just like Yukari."
Amongst the cards were pictures in frames, pictures of Hitomi's friends and family, and there were quite a few. Until that moment, she had not really realized there were so many people who cared about her. So many people, who noticed her when she spoke, knew her face when she walked by, and enjoyed her company. So many people who liked her.
Folken sat on the edge of her bed and stretched an arm around her shoulders. Hitomi pulled him closer until he was leaning into her, his cheek next to hers. For the first time that week her heart felt content and she wished she could stay in that moment forever. Then, there was a knock on the door. Through the blinds, Hitomi could see her parents and Mamoru waiting to be let inside.
"You've got some visitors," Folken pointed out.
"I know." Hitomi smiled. The empty place where Yukari had been was no longer empty, for a piece of Yukari's immortal soul resided within, fulfilling her promise to be with Hitomi forever.
That was the first day the sun had shown in Tokyo for almost two weeks and Hitomi could feel it lifting her heart to the sky. Up in heaven, Yukari was surely looking down on her with glossy white angel wings sprouting from her back and for a moment, Hitomi almost felt a pair of her own.
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If I could change I would / take back the pain I would,
Retrace every wrong move that I made I would,
If I could stand up and take the blame I would,
I would take all my shame to the grave . . .
X - x - X -
Afterword
I want to thank the following people who were involved in the creation of this story, whether they knew it or not.
My mom: For impressing the fact that suicide was never the answer and giving Hitomi a lot of good opinions. And then again for listening to me go on and on about this story at random times whenever I felt like it.
Rhea: For taking an uncharacteristic break from her obsessive editing and grammar checking of my stories and letting me try to do this one by myself, then going back over my work to find what I missed. And then for talking Hitomi out of killing herself the first, second, and third time.
Rai: For music ("Headstrong" by Trapt, "Easier to Run" by Linkin Park, and "My Lover's Gone" by Dido), Escaflowne, mayhem, and because she started Yukari's Linkin Park obsession. Also for letting me borrow Folken (who she hides in her basement) and letting me torment him for a while. And then for telling me about her mom, and her mom: Whose character and circumstance were the loose framework of Mrs. Uchida.
My friends, Kayla and Amanda: For having absolutely no modesty when they were around me, and being themselves all the time and showing me how they're both an integral part of each other, just like Hitomi and Yukari.
Another one of my friends, Anerchia: Because she watched the Escaflowne movie on her own free willand has at least some idea what I'm talking about when I go off on one of my customary Escaflowne rants.
Susan: For listening to a story of suicide and suffering as it unfolded, then showing Hitomi the way back to life.
My family: Whose reactions on the topic of suicide became those of Mr. and Mrs. Kanzaki.
My brother, Frostbyte: For being so disgusted at the fact that the pairing was Folken/Hitomi, then proceeding to read the entire story out loud upside-down as I wrote.
And to an anonymous someone: For telling me about her father, who became Mr. Uchida, for having suffered the same pain as Yukari and being strong enough not to end her life like Yukari.
This story is a story of life that plays itself out many times over in real life. As I worked on this, my eyes were opened to similar happenings around me. It's almost ironic, I think, how it all worked out, because almost every instant in this story is based on something that happened to someone I talked to in real life. I guess that makes this a different kind of work of fiction. A fiction of a realism of a world where these happenings are all too common.