I don't own anything but the translation.
Breaking point
Portsmouth, Virginia
6 June 2008,
Day 48
She rolled the invitation in her hands, while the usual breeze that seemed to come to life only there, at that point of the roof.
She enjoyed playing in her hair.
... a medal of military value will be given to those who have distinguished themselves for their actions ...
She leaned her head against the railing behind her and began to look at the sky, where the nuances of the dawn were beginning to break into the grayness of the moment.
No more night, but not even dawn. The umpteenth she saw, in that one week.
She moved her shoulder again in pain, still unaccustomed to the movements which the motorbike forced it. She put the hand-made cigarette to her lips, and the map became incandescent when she took her breath: the taste of tobacco mixed with that of marijuana, and when the smoke returned outside after passing through the lungs, it was lost in the wind , leaving behind its typical smell.
Ruka.
Her whispered name echoed in her mind. She saw her smile, a ray of light in the awareness of that last moment. And she returned to the dust and rocks of the place where the scene had taken place, and to everything that had happened between the walls of the loculus.
She took her head in her hands, the invitation still tight in the palm.
She felt it. She felt it coming out of her skin, pressing it into her chest, into her temples, begging to go out. She felt her despair asking her to free her, and her body less and less able to restrain her.
But that was her punishment, the punishment for the monster she was.
For what it was stained. Learn from pain. Do not be weak, Tenou. Weakness kills.
She took the last puff and blew out the spinel, taking away the butt.
She crossed the roof and went downstairs to her floor, making sure to close the little door well. Once inside the apartment he went to the bathroom, throwing the remains of the cigarette in the drain and after having flushed the toilet, she opened the mirror above the sink, revealing the packs of medicines in a row that contained: she wondered what could make her sleep a dreamless sleep, and eventually took one at random.
So they all end up 'azepam', she thought, and none, however, will take effect.
She put a couple of capsules in her mouth and went to the kitchen, swallowing them with a sip of water from a small bottle abandoned near the refrigerator; leaning on the island table, she closed her eyes for an instant, noting that the niche was still there. She strode up to the living room and her eye fell on the phone, placed next to the controller on the low table in front of the sofas.
Call me for anything, at any moment, she once told her.
And for a long moment she stared at that little object, undecided whether or not to call Michiru and talk to her, finally.
Tell her everything, once and for all. And if you tell her, she will finally see the horrible being you are.
She will see the monster who has tried to kill her again, and she will leave.
That thought made her grab the phone. Sure, you idiot, because you did not think about it before.
If you tell her, she will run away. And you will manage not to destroy her too.
She began to dial the number, when another voice, in the corner of her mind, felt obliged to say his own.
But is that what you want? Do you want to lose her caresses, the sound of her laughter, the way she talks to you, as a friend, rather than as a patient?
She narrowed her eyes, and the same strength with which she squeezed her eyelids passed to the hand with which she held her cell phone.
Bullshit! You just want to fuck her!
"Leave me in peace, fuck." She groaned tightly.
Do you want to lose the one person who seems to love you for who you are? Do you want to lose the only normal thing in your life? For a moment she considered hurling the phone as far as possible, but decided to let it slip from her hand to the sofa cushion. She went to the stereo, scanned among the CDs and when she found what she was looking for, she slipped it into the compartment; she raised the volume a little, and flicked the time.
After a moment of silence, the sound of the synthesizers filled the room. She sat on the sofa, resting her head on the back, hoping that the voice of Matthew Bellamy could shut off all the others in her head, each one feeling the need to give her opinion.
Corrupt, you corrupt, Bring corruption to all that you touch. Hold, you'll behold, And behold and for all that you've done.
Everything became more muffled, and he thought that perhaps the sleeping pill, added to the grass, was doing its duty.
And risk, you will risk, You will risk all their lives and their souls. And burn, you will burn, You will burn in hell, yeah you'll burn in hell. You'll burn in hell, yeah you'll burn in hell for your sins.
Her eyelids grew heavy, and she could not explain why, but the idea of burning in hell made her laugh.
Our freedom is consuming itself, What we will become is contrary to what we want.
The electric guitar and the battery made the walls of the apartment vibrate, and Haruka raised her right hand as if to direct the course of the sound.
Death, you bring death and destruction to all that you touch. Pay, you must pay You must pay for your crimes against the earth.
x
Medical Hospital "Edward Dewenish VA Medical Center"
Portsmouth, Virginia
8 June 2008,
Day 50
From the bench where she sat Michiru watched the patients accompanied by relatives and nurses animate the green area of Dewenish, and flipping through some files glanced at a patient, in particular, who on the other side of the driveway was sitting in a chair on wheels, alone, throwing dull looks to those who passed by.
"Dr. Michiru ..." Michiru turned to the voice, low and slightly shuffling, that had called her, and smiled at the sight of the short-haired boy with very short hair - among which stood a long scar that went from behind the ear to the temple, passing through the parietal bone - kneeling in front of her, with a daisy a little lopsided in the unnaturally intertwined hands.
"Doctor, do you want to marry me?" The doctor did not stop smiling and closed her files, then took the flower that the other was holding out to her.
"Of course I want to marry you, Jimmy," she replied, stroking her face, and the other looked down shyly, producing a nervous laugh.
"But first you have to listen to what Dr. Chiba says, or you'll never get out of the hospital." The other man returned to look at her and nodded vigorously, and Michiru used the hand that still held on his cheek to bring it close to his face and stamp a kiss on his forehead.
"James! James!" Both Michiru and the boy looked at the woman in her fifties walking the driveway, in the hands of the drinks probably taken from the distributor inside the hospital.
"James, honey, do not bother." She helped her get up, then turned to Michiru.
"Excuse me, Dr. Kaioh." But Michiru answered with a wave of her hand.
"No problem, Mrs. Beouford, your son just asked me to marry him." The woman smiled, caressing the boy's face that now had taken a can of Coke from her hands and was trying to open it.
"Well, it's the second time this week, is not it?" Michiru nodded, and then placed her elbow on the back of the bench to rest her cheek on the back of her hand, without stopping to look at the other.
"Prepare to have me as a daughter-in-law, ma'am. James has no intention of giving up."
"You really have a lot of patience, Doctor." A slight smile curled the doctor's lips, watching the two walk away, not before James declared her eternal love.
James Beouford had volunteered for Afghanistan two years earlier, and during a reconnaissance he was the victim of an explosive device that had blown up him and the tracked vehicle on which he was. Once extracted he was immediately sent back to the United States and operated, but the boy had entered a coma, a state he had stayed for several months until a Jimi Hendrix CD had opened his eyes. Unfortunately the brain was seriously damaged and now James - who was Jimmy for everyone - was physically a boy of twenty, but with the mind of a child of four. Michiru sighed, and after pinned the daisy to the pocket, picked up her files and returned to the entrance to the park, finding herself in the lobby of the Dewenish. She started towards the elevator, registering a certain movement in the area of the sliding doors at the entrance of the hospital, with a couple of patients literally glued to the windows that gave onto the parking lot, all taken in many appreciations towards something that had a fork. it was supposed to be four times liquid-cooled: since it was practically Arabic, for her, she let that information get lost in some useless part of her cerebral cortex.
But then, waiting for the elevator, she saw the expression of two very young trainees literally change the sight of something behind him: when one exclaimed
'Look, it's Major Tenou!', Everything was clearer.
Michiru smiled and turned to the lobby, forgetting the elevator and coming into visual contact with the silhouette of Haruka, dressed in motorcycle clothing, surrounded by her many admirers.
"Good morning, sweet girls." The girl shook her head.
My God, someone stop her.
She watched the swarm of chickens, just missing the little hearts in her eyes, and wondered if they had behaved the same way if they had known: some probably, just how it had happened to her.
And for a brief moment in her mind the idea was formed of making her way up to Haruka and printing a kiss in her mouth: just to see the reaction of those fighting geese.
But she realized more than immediately the absurdity of that thought, and drove it off, taking a few steps forward, waiting for Casanova to notice her.
What happened after a few moments.
"I say where are the other three?" She asked her after a brief moment.
"The other three?" Said Haruka a bit confused.
"The Horsemen of the Apocalypse: If you came to the hospital, it means that the end is near."
Haruka smiled, and shrugged.
"I just went over to tell you that they will send a car to pick us up, to go to the 'Four Seasons' on Saturday."
The doctor inclined her head.
"IS...?"
"And since I do not even have a shoe as a clue, I need your address, or I'll have to run all over Portsmouth." Michiru smiled, and exasperated a dreamy sigh.
"Heck, it's just like an appointment!"
"Look, I'm leaving." The girl shook her head, laughing, and motioned for her to follow her.
"Come on, let's go to my office." The elevator had arrived but in the meantime had also been recalled to another floor, so they began to wait. And Michiru was about to ask the other woman why he had not just phoned her to tell her the information, when she felt something brush against her shoulder. Even Haruka turned around, registering a further presence behind them, and when she caught a glimpse of a scar-faced boy who crossed his skull, the man began to move back, obviously, frightened. "Jimmy, what's up?" Michiru asked, intrigued by the reaction, while Haruka raised an eyebrow. But the other shook his head and looked up at Haruka again, immediately lowering it.
The doctor looked at him, then turned to Tenou, and again to Jimmy.
"Haruka, what did you do to him?" She asked the others inquisitorially, and Haruka looked at her, looking at her.
"But if I do not even know who he is." James was approached by his mother, and he took refuge in the woman's embrace. "Doctor, James wanted to say hello to her before I went back to her room, and I told her a million times not to bother her when she's busy."
"Oh, no trouble." She reassured her, and approached the boy.
"Hi Jimmy. And do not worry, Haruka is a friend of mine." She revealed him pointing to the other. James did not seem too convinced but nodded weakly.
"Haruka," he repeated, and after a last sidelong glance at Tenou, he walked away with his mother.
"Who is it?" Haruka asked when they were inside the elevator, and Michiru looked at her, noticing for the first time her eyes, surrounded by deep circles.
"He is a patient of Mamoru, but I want to ask to start some sessions of Music Therapy with him." Then she pointed to the daisy in her pocket.
"Oh, I forgot: he's also my future husband, he asked me to marry him, and he gives me flowers ... Is not he so sweet?"
"A love." Haruka agreed more than flatly, and Michiru rolled her eyes.
"What happened to him?" They left the elevator, starting to walk the familiar corridor that Tenou had not missed at all. "An accident in Afghanistan," she told her only.
Then Michiru became absorbed, and the silence accompanied the moments necessary to reach the office.
"You scared him." She then stated.
"He seemed very intimidated."
"I noticed."
"Is not that he knows you?" She proposed, but Haruka shook her head.
"You said he was in Afghanistan, and anyway I do not think I've ever met him, how did you say his name?"
"Beouford, James Beouford." Haruka thought about it for a moment.
"Never heard."
"Are you sure you have not done anything?" She then asked her, opening the office door wide, and Haruka shrugged. "What can I have done to him? I just looked at him." Michiru smiled, sitting down at the desk and placing her files in a corner; she refrained from telling her that her eyes were a real weapon, sometimes: under the blows of those emerald irises she had risked succumbing on more than one occasion.
"Perhaps in his regressive state James identified you as the 'alpha male', and therefore he fears you." She put the pen to her lips, thoughtful.
"Paradoxical." Haruka tilted her head. "I will take it as a compliment." She looked around, noticing how the room had changed its appearance since the last time it entered: the desk was now also occupied by several pen holders and a clip with a photo of which could only see the back in opaque paper. On the wall hung a calendar and a lithograph of 'The Kiss' by Gustav Klimt; on a cork panel, through several pins, were instead stopped several drawings of Hotaru. At the sight of the little girl's scribbles, Haruka was struck by a thought. She opened the zip of her jacket and took out a sheet carefully folded in four.
"Here." She handed it to Michiru, who got up to bring her closer.
"It's the design of Hotaru, the one with the dog." Michiru could not help but notice the irony in the words of the other.
"I must have stuffed it in my pocket without thinking, when I put Hotaru on the bike." She watched her put her helmet on the desk, and did not stop glancing here and there in the office.
"You can keep it if you want." She found herself telling her, but the other in response gave off a pin from the corkboard and placed the drawing with the others.
"Who is Itzhak Perlman?"
Haruka then asked, reaching out to grab something on the desk, and when Michiru finished scribbling her address on an acid green post-it, she saw Tenou in the hands of the classic music magazine that had attracted her attention, still wrapped in the cellophane that held a CD.
"He is a violinist, one of the most famous in the world."
She explained to her, taking the magazine out of her hands and holding out the note with the note. The other slipped it into her pocket, then turned around, sitting at the desk.
"And what's in the CD?" She asked again, pointing to the newspaper again.
"There are some of his performances dating back to 1990, taken from an evening dedicated to Tchaikovsky in St. Petersburg, when it was still called Leningrad." Haruka whistled, then leaned against the desk with her elbows.
"Looks interesting."
"More than interesting," replied Michiru, smiling.
"It's divine, the violin comes to life in his hands, sublime, I have no other words to describe it." She became thoughtful for a moment. "And what's more, he plays a Stradivarius, then the apotheosis of the sublime," she concluded in a sigh. Haruka frowned.
"Stradivari," she repeated absorbed, and Michiru put her hands on her hips.
"You're the daughter of a musician, I refuse to believe you do not know what a Stradivarius is." A smile was painted on Tenou's face.
"I know what Stradivari is, it's that reminds me of something, something," she paused for a moment to think, as if she missed the word.
"Familiar." She added after a long moment. "In what sense is it familiar?" Michiru was intrigued by the statement, and leaned against her desk, but the other shrugged.
"I know what it is, but not because I have read it or because it is a world-famous violin, and so I know it by hearsay. As you said the name my mother and my childhood came to mind. because, I do not remember it. "
"Stradivari was an Italian violin maker," the doctor suggested.
"Have you ever been to Italy?" Haruka thought about it, and the answer displaced Michiru.
"Yes. Or at least I think I was very young." I went with my mother."
The other took an absorbed look, bringing her hand to her chin.
"Could it be that your mother used to play the violin as well as the piano?"
She then asked, but Haruka was categorical.
"No, I'm sure, I would have remembered that." She stood up suddenly, arousing the surprise of Michiru when she found her in front of her, overpowering her.
"Well, whatever it was, I certainly do not think it matters much anymore." Michiru opened her mouth to answer them, but she saw herself looking at her from head to foot, her head slightly inclined to the side. "How come you're lower today?" The girl looked at her puzzled, then crossed her arms to her chest.
"I can not always wear heels. Today," she lifted one foot, to show the other black shoe with a white bow just below the rounded tip,
"I have the dancers." Haruka smiled and started to take up her helmet, but Michiru's hand rested against the hard surface of the shell, locking it in place.
"How long have you not slept, Haruka?" The other looked at her, not entirely surprised by the question.
"It's nothing, I'm just having trouble getting used to the idea of the house." A slight sigh came from Michiru's lips, which brought her closer.
"Haruka, if you do not want to go to that night-"
"It's okay, Michiru." She interrupted her. "Seriously." The doctor looked at him for a moment.
"Why do not you want to tell me what you see when you close your eyes?" She gently asked her, the hand that left the helmet to lean on her shoulder. She picked up only silence, and continued, just clutching the shiny fabric of the motorcycle jacket.
"Is this the place where they held you captive? Is that what you see?" Haruka stepped aside, breaking away from the doctor's touch.
"I have to go," she told her flatly, reaching for the door.
"Or maybe the person who called you 'Ruka'." At that sentence Michiru saw the other stop, and two green irises planted on the doctor's blue ones.
They had not talked about it since that day when she had discovered Haruka's reaction to the nickname, but the idea continued to torment her: who was that person? How much was linked to Tenou? Those, and many others, were questions that sooner or later would have liked to give an answer.
"I think it's time for you to talk about it, Haruka."
"And I do not think so, think." It was the dry response of the other, without stopping to look at her.
"You said she was someone you loved." Michiru urged her, and saw Haruka's eyes tighten slightly.
"Who was she? Why did zhe call you that?" Because you allowed it, while I can not do it, she added mentally, immediately realizing the stupidity of that question, but she could not avoid to formulate even if only in her head.
Haruka never broke eye contact, and Michiru wondered if it would ever be possible to open a breach in that exasperating silence. "I asked you a question."
"To whom I do not want to answer."
"You're annoying." She could not stop herself from saying them, and Haruka raised an eyebrow.
"I can help you carry this weight, get rid of it, why do not you want to understand it?" "Because there is no weight you should bring." She told her after a long moment. "It's only my business."
"It's no longer a matter of your own from the moment you've crossed the threshold of this hospital."
Michiru replied, getting a theatrical snort in response. She looked at Haruka and looked up at the ceiling, and brought her hand to her face, forcing her to look at her.
"There are times when we can not do it alone," she told her in a smile.
"Trust me, Haruka. Take your armor off, even for a moment, you need more than you can imagine." Haruka did not know what to say, and for a moment she lost herself in the warmth of Michiru's caress. Then she shook her head, and grabbing her by the wrist removed her hand from her face.
"No," she whispered then. "The armor keeps me standing, doc. If I take it off, I'll drop and nobody will help me get up."
"Here you are wrong." Michiru objected. "How many times do I have to tell you yet? I'm here for you." A bitter laugh came from Haruka's lips. "You can not hold me, Michiru." "You can not say that." They looked at each other for a long moment, then Tenou sighed.
"Even Orlando could not scratch Durlindana, doc." Michiru looked at her in surprise, then smiled at her.
"Then you're not just a crude soldier, Major." "Well, at West Point I was also studying." She answered her, shrugging.
Before adding: "Occasionally." Michiru shook her head, and with a smile hid the bitterness of Tenou's lack of trust. Silence filled the room, and Haruka put her hand on the door handle.
"Think about what I told you, Haruka." Tenou looked at her for a moment.
"See you Saturday, doc."
"See you on Saturday." She replied before looking at her disappear into the corridor, remaining then thinking of being protected by the walls of her office.
x
She threw another glance at Hotaru, sitting at the living room table, all set to color the new design with yet another dog of the day. She smiled as she watched her, basking in her absorbed gaze; in the small portion of the tongue that tended to come out when she concentrated on something extremely important for her.
And she felt a pang in her heart, thinking of Mitsuo, who had that same little vice.
She detached herself from the wall from behind which she had observed the child, entering the room next to the bedroom that was her studio: the smell of tempera and brushes invaded her nostrils, but it was not to the painting that would be dedicated, that evening. She crossed the room to the corner near the window, where the music stand was in front of her.
From a nearby shelf she took the case of her violin: she opened it and lifted the instrument from the internal padding, then positioning it in the crook of her neck, not before she had placed the handkerchief on the chin. She quickly flipped through her scores, finding among the last ones with the words' Tchaikovsky: Valzer-Scherzo Op.23 ': even if, after hearing him play by Perlman, it was like giving a noose to his self-esteem and then saying' Go, and commit suicide '.
She took a breath and concentrated, not an easy task since that night her thoughts were monopolized by the speech that same morning with Haruka.
She began to follow the score, but got stuck in a not particularly difficult passage. There is no weight you should bring.
She began again, thinking that holding whatever weight that had been in Haruka's soul was no longer something she had to, but wanted.
She wanted with all her heart. Because to see her like that, closing herself in on herself and moving away from the others - including herself - in order not to hurt herself and above all not to hurt, in that absurd, annihilating golden that was seen around her, made her sick.
She groaned again, and closed her eyes, abandoning the arm with the bow along the body.
She decided to put aside Tchaikovsky for a moment with all due respect. And she wondered what melody could be Haruka. She remained absorbed for a long moment, the notes that crowded in her mind, arranging herself in an ideal pentagram, trying to better define the torment that animated Tenou.
She hesitated a second, then the bow returned to the ropes: the sound that drove the silence was nervous, hard. Elusive, like an impetuous wind. She recalled the moment she had met her; the day he had tried to strangle her. How it opened up and then hid, again. But she remembered the way Haruka talked about her mother, and that boyfriend of her comrade. And the melody became sweeter.
"Mom!" Hotaru's little voice forced her to stop, and she entered the study.
"What are you playing?" She asked, hugging her legs, and Michiru stroked her head. "I play the music of a man named Tchaikovsky." Hotaru sulked, and tried to repeat the composer's name, unsuccessfully.
Michiru smiled, then leaned towards the child.
"Would you like to try?" The churches. "It's been a long time since you've done it." Hotaru nodded vigorously, and Michiru helped her place the violin on her shoulder. She placed the chubby fingers on the keyboard, then accompanied the movement on the bow, which screeched at the beginning, and then softened slightly on the note end.
"Here is the 'Do'." Michiru explained, then changing the grip of the small fingers of her left hand. The bow rubbed again.
"This is the 'Sol'." Hotaru smiled, clearly satisfied with her musical production, and continued in this way for several other notes. Until the child broke away from the instrument and the violet irises looked for the girl's heavenly ones.
"Mom, Haruka can come to our house?" Michiru looked at her in surprise, placing the violin in the case. She smiled at the little girl, approaching her, then brushing her cheek with the back of his hand.
"Why do you want Haruka to come to our house, angel?"
"Because he always seems sad." The girl's response displaced her, and she lifted her up, kissing her forehead.
"Haruka has seen so many bad things, honey."
"How to the news?" The girl kissed her again, laughing.
"As on the news, yes." She put her on one of the kitchen chairs, and opened one of the cupboards, taking out the tea bag, not before turning on the kettle. Hotaru turned to her mother, the expression of who understood everything and found the solution printed on the round face.
"We can make him a cake!"
"And what cake can we do?" She asked seriously, and the child became very absorbed.
"Chocolate!" She then said.
"Does he like chocolate, mom?" Michiru thought about it for a moment.
"I do not know." She told her sincerely.
"I never asked him to." Hotaru did not say anything else, and summed up that thoughtful air that really did not suit a child so small but somehow -and Michiru could not explain the reason- to Hotaru fit well.
She put the tea bag in the boiling water and sat down at the table, above which the little girl was lying, her little hands holding her chin.
Michiru asked her to tell her about the school, and Hotaru did not have to repeat it twice, temporarily forgetting Haruka, and all her questions.
x
Portsmouth, Virginia
12 June 2008
Day 54
The trill of the intercom panicked Michiru, who groaned her disappointment from behind the bedroom door.
"He said at half-past eight!"
"Actually it's half past eight, Doctor," Jenny said from the living room, smiling then at the sight of Hotaru splashing off the couch to run toward the object hanging on the wall and respond.
"Haruka?" She began to say, and Jenny joined her, spurred on by Michiru's request to respond.
"Haruka, can you come to my house?" The girl asked after a moment of silence in which, Jenny imagined, the soldier answered.
She lifted Hotaru in her arms and had the telephone receiver ring at the same moment that Michiru's head was facing the corridor.
"Tell Haruka I almost did, just two minutes." She snapped her lips, totally annoyed by the delay she had accumulated. She went back to the bathroom, accompanied by the sound of Jenny's voice repeating her request to Haruka: she brushed back the blush, straightened her hair - which in the end, after a long internal conflict, decided to leave it loose on her shoulders, and ran in room, where the dress awaited her on the bed.
"Doctor, he said that if she does not go down in five minutes he will have to hitch her." Michiru laughed, pulling off her sweatshirt and soft pants, and carefully pulled on her stockings. Then an idea lit up. "Ask if he wants to go up!" She called from the room, and shortly thereafter she began to hear the voice of Hotaru shouting the request in the intercom: she imagined it in Jenny's arms, holding on to the receiver with both hands, and could not help but smile.
She took the zip down on the back of the dress and after checking that he had cut away all the tags, she carried it over her head, making it go down to her chest where she placed the bandeau bodice and positioned the shoulder well that crossed on the otherwise. She heard a knock on the door, and invited Jenny to come in, assuming she was the girl since Hotaru had never had much regard.
"Wow, doctor!" She exclaimed the baby-sitter when she saw her in the long, water-green dress.
"You are beautiful!"
"The shoes are still missing." Michiru objected, looking for heeled sandals around the room, and recognizing them after a moment near the door.
"What did he say?"
"He grunted something that frankly turned out to be incomprehensible, then asked to open the door."
"Typical of Haruka, definitely." She put on a first shoe, and Jenny gave her a hand with the other.
"But, um, doctor," she began, and it did not take Michiru long to figure out what she wanted to ask.
"So you and this guy-"
"I'm just accompanying him to this evening," she interrupted her.
"It's not an appointment, if that's what you want to know. Major Tenou is a patient of mine. " Jenny blushed at the embarrassment of having made a gaffe, and when Michiru stood in front of the mirror she arranged the long folds of her dress.
"You seem rather nervous, that's all." In fact, she was a little agitated: she had never been to such an event and, in all honesty, did not know how to behave. It probably should not have been too different from the evenings of the most important concerts, and this thought had encouraged her. But there were many other variables, for that evening, not least the curiosity on the edge of the morbid to see Haruka dressed in all its official uniform.
She did not have time to reply because Hotaru announced - probably to the whole building, given the tone of voice decidedly too many decibels beyond normal - that Haruka had arrived. The baby-sitter rushed out of the room, a gesture that tore a smile at the doctor, and after a last look at the figure reflected and a quick pass to the aquamarine hair, took the clutch from above the chest of drawers and went to the door of the room. And almost colliding, in the doorway, with a breathless Jenny. "Female doctor!" The girl hissed in a very low voice, coming back from the living room.
"God, but it's a crash!" Michiru smiled, shaking his head, and the other reached her hands in front of her face.
"If you really are not interested, you must present him to me!"
"I'll introduce you right away if you want." She murmured, looking at her, crossing the corridor; and when she turned and the living room opened to her sight, she spotted Hotaru intent on saying something to Haruka, standing on the doorstep, who had just given her a lump.
He stopped in the middle of the living room, and not noticed from the other she observed the gray uniform on which stood the rank of Major just above the pocket, on which the US Army pin was pinned on the left side of the jacket. On the right side, instead, there was the plate with the name and symbol of the Fourth Infantry Division; on the shoulder of that same side he immediately recognized the patch of the Cent Battalion, which she had seen many times on the uniform of Mitsuo.
And while Michiru looked at her, the unexpected happened: a shiver ran through her spine, while she felt the blood flow to her cheeks and sensations come to life from a certain point of her body that she preferred not to mention in her head, and that indeed she tried to repress with all her strength.
Haruka looked up from Hotaru, and looked at her without saying a word: the doctor saw a wrinkle forming between the blond eyebrows, the only emotion that betrayed the face of the other.
"Finally." Tenou then told her, without taking her hands out of her pockets and standing upright.
"The driver has had time to become a grandfather, since we've been waiting." Jenny laughed at the joke, and Michiru rolled her eyes.
"Jenny, this is Major Haruka Tenou." Haruka stood to attention, then shook hands with the girl who looked at her without reactions, her lips slightly parted. Tenou gave her a puzzled look, and when she managed to pull the limb out of Jenny's grip, she turned to Michiru.
"Shall we go?" The other nodded, and after the latest recommendations to the babysitter and a kiss to Hotaru, who did not stop calling Haruka, they left the apartment. "But do you trust leaving Hotaru with that girl?" Asked Tenou once inside the elevator. "She seemed catatonic."
"Maybe you do not realize the effect you usually do, more than ever in uniform," joked Michiru, hoping that the other did not understand how much she believed in what she had just told her.
"Well?" So she inquired after a long moment of silence. "You do not tell me anything?" Haruka leaned against one of the walls, and spoke to her, turning slightly.
"You're pretty." She only told her, and Michiru shook her head.
"Better to die rather than compliment me, huh?" Tenou smiled and did not reply, until she noticed the very curious look of the other turned towards her own anatomical part that apparently seemed to have disappeared.
"I put some bands." She answered the silent question, and Michiru nodded slightly. The elevator ended its run and Haruka held out her arm, silently moving toward the Lincoln through the darkened windows that waited on the road, with the engine running.
x
'Four Seasons Hotel'
George Washington Hotel
Portsmouth, Virginia
9:15 pm
The great room in which the guests would have waited for the beginning of the dinner, which would take place in an elegant hall with large arched windows and mosaic floor, presented a decidedly Liberty style that did not escape Michiru when she put foot: ignored for a moment the aperitif that young people in white livery offered to the many soldiers and their companions to look at a series of windows decorated with artistic floral doodles, finding themselves colliding on a grand piano that, for that evening, It seemed unused.
She turned around, looking for Haruka between the talking faces and among those who, standing beside the long table at the back of the room, were eating veggies and voulives standing.
She saw her approaching her, two glasses of champagne in her hand, and her body reacted again to that sight. What scared her not a little.
"It's a kind thought, from you." She told her when she was next to her, and Haruka looked at her in confusion.
"Bring me a drink."
"Actually they are both for me," was the other in response, draining the first glass in half a second. Michiru shook her head, and took the other flute out of her hands.
"I do not want to be a nuisance on duty, but you take drugs and you should not see alcohol from a distance. "
"Is not it a little late to remind me?"
"You would do it on your own, as always." She raised her glass to Tenou, in a hearty toast.
"To your liver, and to the atrocious torment you are forcing it." Haruka smiled, and leaned on the piano.
"Exaggerated," she murmured, then covering the entire hall with her eyes.
"Nine hours," she said then, and Michiru cocked her head.
"On your left, the guy who walks with the crutch." The girl identified the military man, who was chatting with a couple of younger soldiers.
"Colonel Tucker, commander of the Second Brigade, First Infantry Division, stationed in Baghdad." She explained, and Michiru nodded, then turned to look at Haruka, whose gaze was lost in the room.
"Twelve o'clock," she continued, and the girl looked straight ahead, toward a rather tanned soldier with short graying hair. "Lieutenant Colonel Robertson, Third Brigade, First Cavalry Division.They took care of the Green Zone, and the passages to and from Baghdad." Then she unexpectedly approached her, and nodded at her a graduate with white hair, across the room.
"Stay away from that, Michiru." The doctor became curious, and looked for Haruka's gaze.
"Who is it?" Brigadier General David Andrew Lloyd. " She told her after a long moment. "It's thanks to him if I have not practically slept in West Point for three years, and now I have trouble sleeping." Michiru looked at her, and the other started talking.
"He was a sergeant at the time, and one of the instructors." She explained, stealing the flute from Michiru's hands.
"He hated me for my surname and my Japanese origins, I hated him for how he treated me ... Now I hate him heartily, but the fucking head really did a great career." She took a sip, then handed it back to Michiru.
"What exactly happened at West Point?" The other worried, but Haruka shook her head.
"Night trainings, exhausting races in the rain, paths of resistance to the limits of sadism, he made me see all the colors, that son of a bitch." Then she hissed through clenched teeth. And she was surprised to hear Michiru's hand take her own.
"Now many things are explained."
"Like, why am I a fucking psycholable?" Michiru smiled. "Maybe." She only told her, and Haruka pulled away from the piano, carrying Michiru's hand under her arm. "Let's go for a ride." The girl followed her in the middle of the hall, watching her respond to several greetings, and accept without showing particular emotions the compliments received by some local politicians. A thin figure in a pinstriped suit, which Michiru recognized as belonging to the Virginia Senator's staff, asked her about her father: she heard Haruka tell him that the parent was in Europe at the time, and deduced that probably in that visit to Washington they must have at least felt, particular that she had decided not to tell them.
It seemed calm, all things considered. It was not exactly the Haruka she was used to interacting with, but she was doing well. And she had noted, with great pleasure, that she tended to keep her close; sometimes even in close contact, like at the moment.
Maybe she really needed a presence that calmed the spirits, and Michiru basked in the ephemeral idea of having some relaxing power on the other.
"Major Tenou!" Both turned to the call, seeing a young blondish-haired soldier with dark eyes approaching them in stride, after taking leave of a girl in a black dress to whom he had left a glass of champagne in hand: Michiru recognized the same patch of the Fourth Infantry Division was split, and it was not long before she felt Tenou stiffen next to her.
"Major Tenou, he does not know how pleased it makes me see you again!" He told her sincerely, after greeting her at attention.
"Michiru, this is Captain Wyatt, Captain Wyatt, Dr. Michiru Kaioh." Haruka introduced them, and the boy kissed her hand.
"Wyatt was with me in Tikrit, before he was transferred to Fallujah." He nodded, and looked at Michiru. "It was an immense regret for me to leave the Fourth, and especially the Major, what he did in that ambush just outside the town of Tikrit is legend." Haruka snapped her lips, and Michiru looked at her curiously. "Unfortunately I can not share, Captain, since I do not know the facts."
"Well, if you let them talk." The young man replied, before being overtaken by the words of Tenou. "How come here, Wyatt?" The other shrugged.
"I came back in January, I was injured in my right leg during an evacuation." He began to explain.
"I do not know when I'll have to leave, but at the moment I'm enjoying my marriage, Major." He turned slightly, glancing at the girl who had left behind that now, three-quarters, revealed a rounded shape at the level of the belly.
"Kim is pregnant." Michiru smiled. "Congratulations, Captain." The boy taunted, thanking her.
"It's unbelievable how that child has already changed my life ... Before, it was hard for me to think that life could somehow go on." A certain sadness spotted Wyatt's words, looking for Haruka's gaze.
"Especially after certain things we are forced to witness." He sighed, before continuing.
"How are you, Major? They told me of the attack, and that it was done prague."
"I'm fine." Haruka interrupted him more than immediately, and the boy smiled at her.
"I imagined it, you're not the type that breaks easily." Wyatt had a look so admiring that Michiru did not feel like telling him that she was Haruka's psychologist, and that the other was being treated for Post Traumatic Disorder.
"Is the others still in contact, Major?" He asked that suddenly, and Haruka shook her head. "And the girl, do you have any news?" A spark of curiosity lit up in Michiru, but when she turned to Haruka to ask for information, she noticed that her cheeks had lost color.
"No," she said monotonously, and Wyatt nodded. The announcement that the guests could sit in the Great Hall for the beginning of the dinner - by the mouth of the director of the room, broke the slight tension that had arisen between the three; and when the young soldier took his leave to join his wife, Michiru clutched Haruka's arm.
"Who was he talking about?" The churches, moving in a corner. But the other got rid of the grip.
"Nobody ... Go ahead, I'll be back in a second."
"Haruka-" He tried to reply, but the other struggled every attempt to objection in the bud.
"Michiru, I'll be back in a second, I have to go to the bathroom." She saw her disappear among the bystanders who neatly went to the salon. And soon she saw Kim, Captain Wyatt's young wife, sit alone at the table.
x
'Four Seasons Hotel'
George Washington Highway
Portsmouth Virginia
10:00 pm
Dinner was starting and Haruka was practically gone. For a second, Michiru was seriously afraid that the other one was leaving with her car, but no one seemed to have seen Major Tenou. Not even going out, which was a slight consolation. Captain Wyatt had been back for a while in his place, and managed to be told only that he had left Major Tenou near the hotel bar: at the look she had seen when she saw her approaching him, Michiru suspected that Haruka had warned him of anything they had said, perhaps even using veiled threats. At the bar, however, she had not found her, and asking one of the stewards scattered here and there had learned that a soldier had headed for the hotel lobby: she then entered a corridor where the noise of her heels was muffled from the carpet.
Then, looking around for a moment, she decided to follow her sixth sense and walk up a flight of stairs, which ended in a concourse atrium between the hall and the elevators that led to the rooms.
She threw open a door and found herself in a corridor leading to the baths: at last he saw her, sitting on the floor next to a mahogany table, her head against the wall, looking at the ceiling in the gesture that was her trademark.
"Haruka!" She exclaimed with mixed irritation and relief.
"When you mentioned the bathroom, I did not think you'd choose the one on the other side of the hotel." She started jokingly, until she realized the unnatural movement of the other's chest, which rose and fell too fast. "Haruka?" She approached her in a hurry, and knelt in front of her, putting the clutch bag aside: she was pale, and holding her head back, she tried to regain a perpetually broken breath. "I can'-" she began to tell her in a painful gasp, when she realized the presence of the doctor.
"I can not ... breathe." Michiru appealed to her cold blood and quickly unbuttoned her jacket, then loosened the tie's knot and opened the first buttons of her shirt.
"It will be all right, Haruka," she reassured her, then lifting her left sleeve to take the pulse. In the meantime he leaned over her, spreading an eye with two fingers and making sure the pupil was normal.
She mentally counted the recorded beats, and deduced that she had gone into tachycardia.
She wiped the sweat from her forehead with the palm of her hand, warning her to breathe as deeply as possible.
She reached for her purse to pick up the phone, intending to call 911: but when she recapitulated the symptoms Haruka presented, the diagnosis came to light.
"It's a panic attack, Haruka," she told her, taking her face in her hands, to be seen, but the other closed her eyes.
"It hurts me-" she stammered, touching her chest, and Michiru approached her again. "It's in your head, you're not going to die, it's a reaction from your mind."
The girl tried to nod, while her breathing had become more and more broken.
She tried to say something, striking the wall behind her in an attempt to catch her breath.
"Ssh, do not talk." The doctor ordered it. "Breathe deeply," she instructed her then. "Look at me Haruka. Breathe deeply." Haruka did not seem to cooperate, so she took her hand and placed it on her chest; she did it with her own, on the other's chest.
"Breathe with me, Haruka." She managed to make them complete two deep breaths, and she watched her open her eyes. The green irises looked for those colors of the sea of Michiru, and what scared the girl was to read a total, disarming despair.
Haruka moved her lips again, and finally the doctor could understand what the other was saying.
"I did not want to, I did not want to." Michiru did not answer, waiting for Haruka to regulate her breathing.
"I did not want to," she repeated in a whisper.
"I did not want to, Michiru."
"What did not you want, Haruka?" She asked her, scared by the mantra that the other kept repeating them.
But Haruka looked at her for a long moment.
"Help me." She murmured only after a moment. And Michiru watched her approach her and hug her tightly, hiding her face in the hollow between shoulder and neck.
The surprise did not make her react, so on two feet, and shivered at the contact of the cold metal of the insignia of the other's uniform on the skin. Although she was not sure it was just for that.
She felt Haruka's breath tickle her neck as she spoke.
"Do not let me fall, Michiru." The girl heard herself say. "Please do not let me fall." At that request Michiru could not help but hug her in turn, sinking his fingers into the soft fabric of the uniform and holding tight with all her strength.
She closed her eyes, resting her cheek on Haruka's hair, which now, finally, he was breathing normally.
"I'm here, Haruka." He murmured. "I hold you." Haruka strengthened her grip on the slim body of the doctor, and stayed like that, sitting on the ground in a corridor of the 'Four Seasons', while unaware diners began to eat a few rooms away.
x
Portsmouth, Virginia
When Michiru threw open the door of her apartment, immersed in the darkness given the time, she felt exhausted but at the same time extremely anxious.
Haruka had not wanted to go after the attack that had struck her, and in the most complete silence they had returned to dinner: she had watched her just touch her plates and wait for the moment of the award, immediately after which she had signaled to follow her, finding themselves outside the 'Four Seasons', their car waiting. She had not said a word all the way, lost in her thoughts looking out the window, and was immediately brought home leaving instructions to the driver to take her back: she had tried to make her talk, to press her about what you do was said with Captain Wyatt, but probably asking questions to a wall would have given her more satisfaction. And as she walked toward Hotaru's bedroom to wake up Jenny, the cell phone still in the hands of the sleeping girl hugging her baby, she also thought that making her sick was not just knowing that something had broken inside Haruka - and thanking heaven that the reaction was a panic attack, rather than something more serious as reckless gestures, but also how the other was literally splashed off her arms when, probably recovering the clarity, she realized what was happening around: not that she expected a 'thank you', but not even that, later, treated her like a plague. She smiled at Jenny's loud yawn, and waited for the girl to regain some lucidity before paying her - leaving her a little extra, and letting her go, not before offering her a cup of coffee.
She stood for a while, watching Hotaru sleep, curled up on her side, then walked over to her room and began to undress, her mind flooded with a whirlwind of thoughts as the evening dress left room for nightwear.
It took longer than necessary to remove make-up, and thought to get a herbal tea already knowing that she would not be able to sleep: the state of the other distressed her a little, and wondered if it was risky to leave home alone after what was success. The bubbling of the water distorted it from its ruminations, and prepared the drink, then settling down at the kitchen table.
She tapped the spoon on the smooth surface, unable to calm the agitation that gripped her.
The last time she had underestimated the problem, she thought, she had found suicide and murder on her conscience, and months and months of remorse and guilt, which had not yet subsided.
She covered her eyes with her hands and groaned at that thought, until the idea that something could happen to Haruka became unbearable: forgetting the steaming herbal tea returned to her bedroom, replacing nightwear with an old sweatshirt and a pair of sports pants.
She then strode into Hotaru's room, and stroking her face began to call her.
"Hotaru, Hotaru, honey, wake up." The little girl moved into bed, lying on her back, and Michiru pulled a jacket and a light cover from the colored dresser next to the window.
"Love, we have to go out." She whispered to the little girl, putting her on the bed and slipping the garment over her pajamas: Hotaru mumbled something, and glancing at Sponge Bob's clock on the nightstand that was almost two o'clock in the morning, Michiru wondered if she was not total and sound crap.
"I'm sleepy, Mom." The child objected without even opening her eyes when Michiru lifted her up and walked out of the room, then putting the blanket over her shoulders.
"I know, angel, but I promise you'll sleep as long as you want, tomorrow."
"Where do we go?" She asked sleepily, repositioning herself in the arms of her mother, who grabbed the car keys from a bowl on a shelf near the front door, before answering them. "Let's go to Haruka's house, love."
x
Portsmouth, Virginia
13 June 2008
Day 0
2:18am
The first thing that opened up to her as soon as she opened the door of Haruka's apartment - not without difficulty, since she had to hold Hotaru in her arms, was a pair of legs spread out between the two sofas of the living room, while the body remained hidden just by the arrangement of the sofa. "Haruka!" She called, closing the door behind her and striding toward the shape that, in the darkness illuminated by the light of the forty-five inch on the CNN but kept at zero volume, stood still.
She breathed a sigh of relief when she realized that Tenou kept her eyes open, probably lost in the many thoughts that engulfed her mind, the backs of her hands crossed on her forehead.
She still wore her uniform.
"Haruka!" She called her again, and finally the other seemed to notice her.
"What are you doing on the ground? You gave me a shot!" She scolded her, and Haruka looked at her for a long moment, without betraying any emotion.
Hotaru remembered her presence with a cough, and Michiru began to feel the baby's weight numbing her limbs.
"Where can I make Hotaru sleep?" In response, the other went back to looking at the ceiling. Michiru realized that it would be a long night, and went to the corridor of the sleeping area, remembering that the first door she had met would have been Haruka's room: in fact, opening it, she found herself in Tenou's bedroom, occupied in the middle from a large bed to a square and a half completely intact.
She took off the jacket to Hotaru and placed it on the low and long chest of drawers in lacquered cherry wood that furnished the wall next to the door, surmounted by a large mirror, and laid the child on the bed, covering her with the blanket she had worn from home: when she was sure that the change of surface had not disturbed the little girl, she left the room, leaving the door open, while she closed the corridor.
Returning to the living room he recorded for the first time, thanks to the continuous change of light produced by the images in the television, the new piece of furniture that Haruka had mentioned: the elegant grand piano occupied the space that had seen the empty space day when she was injured preparing her lunch.
"Haruka, how are you feeling?" She asked her, sitting down next to her on the ground. Haruka had no reactions, and continued to look at the ceiling.
"Talk to me." She murmured to her then. "Holding it inside is destroying you."
Still no answer, and Michiru sighed at the idea of having to spend the night wrapped in the silence of the impassable marble statue that was Tenou.
They spent endless moments, and the doctor threw back her head, leaning on the low table that supported her back, trying to find something interesting in the white plaster ceiling while the anchorman CNN blabbering mute breaking news.
"I killed her, Michiru." Haruka said in a low voice, without moving an inch, or take her eyes off the ceiling.
Michiru's attention was immediately captured, but the girl did not reply anything, letting the other finally break the banks. "I let her fall in love with me, I let her trust me, see me as something special."
A sigh full of pain came from Tenou's lips.
"I could not protect her, Michiru, I did not know how to turn her away, and I killed her in the end."
Author's notes: I'm sorry for the late, but I have been quite busy. I hope you to enjoy this long chapter. Here we finally have the breaking point, in the next chapter all Tenou's past in Iraq.
Bye, and see you next chapter!
Leave a comment and let me know what you do think!
P.S. I'm so sorry that I accidentally deleted the previous chapter, you should check it out before reading this. I'm sorry again for the bother.