Notes: The author regrets everything.
He locked himself somewhere I can never reach.
She once learned in a behavioural psychology class that some people built walls around themselves to see who took the time to tear them down. These were the people they could trust, because they understood the struggle of getting where they were. Ishida Yamato was not one of these people. Mimi had learned early into their relationship (but not early enough, she complained) that the reason why he built all those walls around him was to keep everyone out. Especially Mimi.
There was no tragic backdrop to his story, though she imagined he liked to think himself quite the sad little case. His parents' divorce had been a relatively simple, quiet affair. The living arrangement had been chosen by Yamato himself, and his mother made a point to visit and call often. He and Takeru barely noticed the separation in terms of livelihood; Natsuko and Hiroaki tried their best to keep things civil and succeeded with relative ease.
But maybe Mimi had misunderstood him all that time, had mistaken his cries for help as cries for attention. She sat on the floor, counting the tiles in front of her. The apartment was quiet, dusty, unkempt. She could hear Yamato on the other side of the door, coughing and reeling into the toilet, shuffling around clumsily. Mimi knocked on the door, twice. He opened it only enough for her to see him through a crease, sighing and lips trembling at the sight of his red-rimmed blues and hallow, sickened face.
"Oh, Yama..." she murmured, covering her mouth with her hand. The smell of alcohol and vomit, of reckless abandon, hit her like a freight train. She wanted to ask how he'd managed not to kill himself but didn't, afraid that he'd reply it was what he'd been trying to do.
He shook his head, closing the door with a loud thud and emerging ten minutes later, wet and dripping. She had already picked out fresh clothes for him and he took them in silence, mumbling something and shrugging into them with a lack of grace she had never witnessed before. He collapsed on the bed and Mimi sat on the edge, hesitantly reaching out to move his hair out of his face. He opened his eyes and she was struck with their beauty, how startingly blue they looked in the dim light that came in through the window.
"You never told me," she said, and her voice didn't feel like it was hers at all.
"I didn't want you to know," he murmured, his voice a thread of a whisper. "I was getting better, Mi, I swear, I—,"
She gently pushed him, making space for herself to climb on the bed with him. Mimi brought him to her, pressed his face against her breast and kissed his pale forehead, stroking his still damp hair.
"You'll get better," Mimi told him, and the words threatened to crush her chest with the enormity of the promise they carried. "If I had known, Yama, I never would've—,"
"—I know," he whispered, "I know."