A/N: Refs to ch: 101, 107.
I do not own or profit from any of what Kazue Kato has created.
"Good afternoon, Bocchan. Would you-?"
"Just leave me alone."
Shiro dismissed the demon housemaid in stride, thinking only of finding someplace where he could sit down and…
And what? Think? About time he did some of that – way too fucking late, though.
He had already slumped down on his favourite couch in the manga library before he noticed his lip was bleeding. His nose ached, his hands were sore, and he would probably have a bruise blooming over-
…he plucked off his glasses as gently as he could: the frame was kinked, but not broken. The following minutes he spent directing all of his attention to bending it back into shape. Not thinking about his lip. Not thinking about his eye. Not thinking. Not thinking as long as he could avoid it.
Fuck it all. Just… Fuck it all.
Shouldn't have lost it like that. Couldn't afford losing it like that, dammit…
Shouldn't have panicked. Shouldn't have run.
"They saw me fucking run to Faust Mansion…" He groaned, putting his glasses back on. He let his hands remain where they were, cupping them over the lenses to cover his vision.
Good job – bloody good job. Why couldn't he just stop and think? Was that too much to ask of a nineteen-year-old, that he would fucking think before he acted?
He should go and find them, right now; go back and apologise and explain…
Explain what? That he could throw people and vending machines like sticks, but Mephisto had absolutely nothing to do with that? That he was an irresponsible piece of shit who risked their lives and limbs just by being near them? Apologise for things that couldn't be forgiven and get himself another headbutt from Shizuku?
Tch, words. The ones you really need never exist.
There were no words to explain this. No words that could explain how sorry he was, how much he regretted what he'd done; no words that could set the wrongs right.
That's why he'd panicked.
That's why he'd run.
Like his dad. Abandoning ship when everything was too tangled up to sort out, when there were no words to mend the cracks and no way of repairing what was broken; a pathetic excuse for a man who couldn't make-
"How the fuck do I make this right…?!" he snarled, but it came out as nothing more than a strangled groan.
And the Order. Shit, the Order.
He sank deeper in the couch, sank and sank into the spiralling hell until his breath was nothing but shallow gasps. They would detain him now, surely. Forget about school, forget about friends: he'd be locked up indefinitely, with tubes and tests and syringes to dissect him for information. They wouldn't find any explanation, and they'd keep searching, and he'd never be let out, never-
"I wasn't possessed, they'll only take me if I'm possessed." He mouthed the words to himself like a silent prayer, repeating them over and over, trying to make his breathing fall into the rhythm.
They could still declare him too volatile to be in school. Could, and would. Forget about becoming an exorcist – perfect marks didn't count for shit if Beaumonde could have a say.
Someone like you doesn't belong in the Order of the True Cross.
Fuck – fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck…! There was no making this right, no returning to how things had been; nothing he could say or do that would change anything; nothing that…
Nothing…?
Not quite true.
If he really wanted to make amends, he could. If he really wanted to escape a laboratory cell, he could. He could still be in the Order, still become an exorcist: all he had to do... was pay for it.
Kasumi would never forgive him. After all he'd done to her already, this one thing was-
Tch, as if it would matter! As if it would matter if he made another wrong to set the first one right! Shizuku would never allow him near his sister again anyway – hell, Kasumi might feel the same once she learnt the truth! How sycophantic wouldn't he look if he did this now?! Like he was trying to fucking bribe them to forgive him! As if he wasn't doing it for her but for his own damn sake!
Was he, then? Was he doing it for her? Was he truly doing it for her…?
"For both of us", he conceded, not without tasting the bitterness of the confession.
He could have done it before. She hadn't wanted him to, but he could have. If he broke his promise now, it was because he feared for his own skin. Not hers.
Coward.
He didn't know how long he sat on that couch. His mind spun haunted circles between hope and despair, honourable destruction or cowardly redemption.
He could make things right: that was the milestone his thoughts kept returning to, each turn they traced the same, familiar tracks. He could make things right: save his own skin, and set right the wrongs he'd made against others. He could.
There's many things people can do, but that doesn't mean they should do 'em.
Could, should - too late for all that. He would do it.
Would that change anything?
No. No, it wouldn't. It made things right, but it didn't make them undone.
Still, it was the best he could do. The only thing he could do. There was no salvaging the shipwreck his life had turned into, but he could make sure that he was the only one who paid for the mistakes. Be a better man than his dad had been. They might not forgive him, but… This way, at least he could forgive himself.
After all, it's in human nature to wish for miracles when desperate.