"Shattered planes and fractured/hues. The color of a missing/heart. Worn out paths and worn down/shoes. The glowing of a missing/dark."
Path Song. Traditional.
"You're a good big sister, Akari. You take such good care of him."
Akari stared at the newspaper clippings all over the table. Jobs that she wasn't qualified for. Jobs that wouldn't hire her because she was still in school. Jobs that wouldn't hire her because she was too young, or too inexperienced, or she was too tall or too smart or from the wrong prefecture or some stupid ass reason why they wouldn't give her a job.
She groaned and dropped her head to the kitchen table, sending some of the clippings flying through the air. She banged her forehead lightly against the table a few times, more for dramatic effect than anything else—even though there was no one around to see her.
"Dammit," she muttered. "Assholes. Why did you—you dumbasses."
Her hands curled into the fabric of her jeans. Treacherous tears were threatening to spill from her eyes, and one dripped onto a clipping, smearing the ink. She lifted her head and rubbed angrily at her eyes with the back of her arm. No. No more of that. Her dumb parents didn't deserve her fricking tears after leaving them like that.
Missing? My ass, I bet they just don't want to come home, she thought—irrationally, and she knew it. But she needed to be angry. She needed to be angry or she was going to collapse.
She stood up from the table with a jerk and marched over to the fridge, ripping it open and snatching a can of soda. She stared inside for a moment, and then she grabbed two more cans, bringing them back to the table. She drained the entire first can in fifteen seconds, and then went for the second one. The sugar sloshed down into her stomach. It was probably a placebo, but she thought she could feel a buzz starting in her fingers almost immediately as she put down the second empty can.
"Will you keep an eye on him? He's got...very big things ahead of him."
She popped open the last one. She sipped this one slower as she stared at the newspaper clippings.
Their parents were officially labeled missing. They hadn't checked in at the preappointed point for months. One or two search parties had been sent out, but it was practically impossible to get very far into the Amazon to see where the tracks may have disappeared. Usually if they went dark for a weird amount of time, they would show up at the next point and laugh about how they had accidentally skipped the previous one. Not this time. They had gone dark in late September, and now there was snow dusting the ground outside, and no word.
Her fingers curled up on the table, crumpling a few of the clippings in the motion. Her head was already spinning.
She was eighteen. She was supposed to be going to Heartland University next spring. But she had seen the budget despite her grandmother trying to hide it from her, and she knew that without their parents working...no, there was no way. They couldn't afford it. They could barely afford to live in this house without a steady source of income. Their parents had left them quite a bit in savings, but even when Akari did the math, assuming that they'd be living as frugally as possible—she wasn't seeing it happening.
Grandma can't work, even if she insists she can, Akari said. And if we can't prove that we can support ourselves...
She tried not to look at the unopened letter at the other end of the table. The one from the child services foundation. She already knew what it was going to say.
She clenched her jaw and renewed her glaring at the newspapers. There had to be something. She was going to be graduating high school in a few months, and then she could work full time. Something, anything, she had to get something that would hold them over.
Until they get back, she found herself thinking.
She wiped the thought away. There was no point in thinking like that. As far as it was concerned...they were gone.
She had to hold things together now.
Tears bubbled in her eyes again but she squeezed them shut.
"Nee-san?"
Akari opened her eyes. Yuma peeked around the door, his single visible eye shadowed by the dim kitchen. Akari frowned, sitting up.
"What are you doing up, squirt? It's way past your bedtime."
Yuma's eye dropped to the floor. His hand tightened on the doorframe.
"It's...it's not that late..."
"It's almost nine, squirt. Bed time is eight til you're twelve. Sorry, but them's the rules."
"I can't sleep..."
Akari felt her shoulders slump. He looked so tiny, barely able to look up from his feet. His hand shook on the door frame. She sighed and set her can of soda down on the table.
"Okay," she said, turning around in her seat and holding her arms open. "Come here."
The nine year old scrambled around the corner, darting over to her. She oofed, almost falling over with the momentum of his hug, and wrapped her arms around him tightly.
"Bad dreams?"
"No...I don't dream anymore."
She felt him bury his face deeper into her.
"I don't like it. It's a scary feeling, not having dreams..."
She frowned. Her hand came up to stroke his hair softly.
"It's okay," she said softly. "It's okay..."
Yuma shuddered in her arms.
"When are they coming home?" he said. "To-chan promised we'd play Duel Monsters when he got back. When are they coming home?"
"Yuma..."
"Someday, Yuma's going to have something of a tough time...I hope you'll be there for him when that day comes."
Knock, knock.
Akari flinched in spite of herself, knocking her elbow into her soda can and sending the spray across her newspapers.
"Oh shi—shoot," she said, hurriedly picking up the can as Yuma jumped out of the way. "Dang it, dang it—Yuma, can you go see who that is?"
Yuma scurried off down the hallway while Akari attempted to salvage some of the newspaper. It was already a lost cause and she moaned as she just ran to grab some paper towels to get rid of the mess.
"Nee-san! He needs to talk to you!"
"Who is it?" Akari shouted back. Someone from school, maybe? Nah, not even Kyosuke would show up at this time of night in the winter. And salesmen weren't going to be going door to door at almost nine. So who...
She wiped her hands off on her jeans as she strode out to the hall, tossing the soaked paper towels into the trash as she walked. Yuma hovered anxiously at the door, shifting from foot to foot on his slightly-too-long-for-his-body legs.
The man in the door was tall, taller than Akari was, and she felt a stab of nervousness in spite of herself. He wore a long, dark coat and a brimmed hat that sort of shadowed his eyes.
"Tsukumo Akari-san, correct?" he said in a clipped tone. "My apologies for being several minutes late."
"Late...?" she parroted, blinking. "I'm sorry, but you are...?"
The man blinked at her with his dark eyes.
"You received our correspondence, did you not? I'm Heartland Child Services, Sakaguchi Tomoyo. We called you several hours ago to make sure the meeting was still in place—you didn't cancel."
He pulled out a business card and held it out to her as he spoke. She only gave it a bare glance before she felt a burst of panic that froze her arms to her sides. Had—had that what the letter had been about? Oh, god, were they here to take Yuma away right now? God, that was the phone call she had ignored earlier—what the fuck, who planned this kind of meeting this late in the evening, what the fuck, what the fuck—
"I—I must...ah...have lost track of the time," she said. "Um, come in, please."
She stepped back, pushing Yuma gently out of the way. The man inclined his head as he stepped through the doorway, knocking the snow off his boots with a tight sort of motion.
"Yuma, would you wait in the kitchen, please?" she said.
"But, nee-san—"
"Go get yourself some milk, okay? I'll be back in a minute, and then it's bedtime. Got it?"
He pouted at her for a moment, his lip jutting out exaggeratedly far. But he listened, trotting away with a curious glance over his shoulder at the tall man.
Akari led him into the living room. She hesitated the barest moment before she sat down, with him sitting across from her, the coffee table between them.
"So I—I'm sorry, but this meeting is about...?"
"This is about you and your family's situation, as our letter clearly stated."
Akari winced.
"I'm sorry. I've been kind of busy preparing for final exams."
The man just blinked blankly at her. She ducked her eyes away, feeling unnerved.
"Your parents have been declared officially missing. We have to confirm that this living situation is going to be beneficial for your family."
Akari had to stop herself from blurting out "are you taking Yuma away?"
"I...I see."
"Is your grandmother not available?"
"I'm sorry, obaasan goes to bed around eight. She gets tired pretty quickly—if you'd have come a few hours earlier..."
She stopped herself as she saw his eyebrows draw together slightly.
"And that's what we've come to discuss," he said, setting his briefcase down on the coffee table. "Your grandmother is currently your legal guardian, and in your parents' wills, they have intimated that she is responsible for you in the case of their inability to care for you. However..."
"Grandma takes great care of us," Akari said quickly. "She does a great job."
"And I'm sure she does. But we have records here stating that she has been deemed unfit to work. If there isn't a stable situation here, it might be better to place you with other families."
Akari's heart lurched. She swallowed. Calm. She had to be calm. She breathed a few times to steady herself, the way her mother had taught her, and then settled into what her mother called the "power position." She sat straight backed, feet on the floor, hands resting lightly on top of each other on her lap, steeling her face and meeting the man's eyes firmly. This is how you convince people that you're in control, her mother had told her. Remember, Akari—control and power are all illusions. If you can fool people into thinking you're more powerful than them, then you already are.
"Sir," she said, keeping her voice even. "I'm going to be graduating in a few months. I'm already applying for jobs, so I'm sure something like that will be unnecessary—"
"Tsukumo-san."
Akari lost her momentum with a shuddering halt. She had already lost it—her illusion was gone. A shiver passed through her as she dropped his gaze. He was looking at her steadily, and she thought that maybe, just maybe, she could see his lips turning down slightly and his eyes softening. When he spoke next, his voice was less professional, and more gentle.
"Tsukumo-san...you will not be a legal adult for two more years. Your grandmother has to send us proof that this family can support itself, or for your sakes...we'll have to find other arrangements."
Akari's jaw clenched.
"You mean separating us," she said.
"That's not what we want to do. We'd do everything in our power to place you and your brother in the same home."
"But that sounds like there's the possibility that it might not happen. And either way, we leave baa-san."
She met his eyes then. They were dark, distant, yes, but they were also...sad.
He sighed, his shoulders rising and falling.
"Tsukumo-san, we're here to help you," he said. "We only want to make sure that you, and your brother, are able to grow up in safe and healthy environments."
"You can't take him," she blurted in spite of herself. "You can't—he'll get chewed up out there."
He met her eyes.
"Then, you and your grandmother are going to have to make certain that we don't have to push that avenue."
He opened up his briefcase and withdrew a thin sheaf of papers.
"This is the paperwork you and your grandmother will need to fill out. We'll require proof of income and a few other things. If you have any questions, you can call us."
Akari tried to still the treacherous tremble in her fingers as she reached for the papers, taking them and flipping through them briefly. Her heart sank at all the legalese and boxes to fill in.
He rose, then, and she hurried to stand up too.
"You'll have three weeks to file that with us. After that point, we'll make our decision on what needs to be done here."
He lifted his briefcase back up, and hesitated. His eyes met hers briefly.
"We're not in the business of breaking up families," he said. "I hope that you understand that."
He waited for a breath. Akari didn't trust herself to speak, so she just nodded. She walked from the room, leading him back to the door. They both hesitated at the door as she opened it for him and waited. He looked at her one last time. Then he nodded, and stepped back out into the cold winter night.
Akari closed the door. She sank back against it, sliding down to the floor. The papers were crumpling against the floor beside her but she wasn't really thinking.
They could take him away.
I've already lost kaa-san and to-san.
Him too?
She heard the squeak of a board under feet. In the shadows of the hallway, she could see the shape of Yuma, squinting out from the kitchen doorway.
"Nee-san?" he whispered. "Are you okay?"
Her lips, her mouth, her throat, they were all too dry to answer. She swallowed a few times, licking her chapped lips. She opened her mouth and closed it again. She picked up the papers from her side and stared at them for a moment, the way that the wrinkles caught the half light from the streetlamps outside the window.
Yuma stepped into the hallway. His feet were quiet in his socks as he padded over to her and knelt down, frowning.
"Nee-san, what did he want?"
She could feel the lump rising up in her throat and the tears threatening to spill over her cheeks. For a moment, all she wanted to do was throw her arms around him and hold tight and never, ever let go.
His hands were full, though, she realized. His fingers were slipping and sliding cards back and forth in his fingers. He bit his lip as he pushed the top card of the Duel Monsters deck back and forth, off of the deck and back onto it, pushing halves of the deck against each other in a nervous motion.
"Yuma has a lot in store for him."
"Will you keep an eye on him, especially when he's dueling?"
"Take care of him, won't you?"
Laying sprawled on the floor with her hand over her head trying not to cry goddamn fuck this stupid card game—
Akari couldn't stop herself from shaking. Her eyes wouldn't leave those cards. Those stupid, stupid cards for that stupid, stupid game. What was so special about dueling? What was it about dueling that had made her parents talk to her in that car all that time ago, and her father had told her that Yuma had something in store for him that might involve dueling or something, she had no idea, her memory wasn't being helpful to her right now, but either way those stupid, stupid cards—
If Yuma has a destiny—
If he does what I did—
If those assholes find out about me or him and what happens when we play this game—
Is this game somehow going to take him from me?
The way that kaa-san and to-san are gone?
Her hand moved even before she realized it. The back of her hand smacked into Yuma's hand and he gasped as the cards went flying from his fingers. Scattering like petals, fluttering over and over themselves before hitting the floor.
Yuma gasped and immediately dropped down to scrabble for the fallen cards. But Akari grabbed him by the shoulders.
"No! I don't want—I don't want you to play this game anymore!"
Yuma's eyes widened at her, his mouth dropping open and his bottom lip starting to tremble.
"N-nee-san, I don't—"
Akari staggered to her feet, pulling him away from the fallen cards.
"That's enough, I don't want you dueling anymore, not ever, I don't want you to—"
—to disappear. I can't—I can't watch you disappear the way they did—
"Nee-san! Nee-san!"
Yuma was practically screaming, trying to pull himself out of her grip, but she yanked him into her arms and lifted him up even though he was almost too gangly for her to do that anymore. He screamed and kicked his legs out, his arms reaching past her head for the cards.
Akari was sobbing, squeezing him as tightly as she could, trying to stumble up the stairs as he struggled and shrieked in her arms.
"My god, Akari, Yuma, what is—"
Grandma appeared at the top of the steps as Akari lost her footing on the stairs and she yelped as she almost tumbled forward on top of Yuma. At the last moment, she was able to twist herself in midair so that she landed on her back with Yuma on top of her. The air whooshed out of her lungs as her back struck the edge of the steps and Yuma tumbled forward out of her arms. He immediately scrambled off towards the cards, and Akari was only barely able to stagger up and grab his wrist, pulling him back to her in a tight, possessive hug.
Grandma was shouting, trying to figure out what was going on, and Yuma was yelling and crying and pounding his fists on Akari's shoulders with very little force, over and over "nee-san, nee-san, why, why, why, why—"
And she couldn't answer. She could only sit there and hold him as he wriggled and let the tears roll down her cheeks as she felt his warm bulk in her grip and thought—
God, please don't take him away too.
The cards were gone from the floor of the entryway in the morning. Akari didn't know if Yuma had sneaked downstairs after she had put him to bed, or if grandma had picked them up. She didn't care. She never wanted to see those damn things ever again—she didn't want to look at them and see the ghostly image of her father's hands flipping through the cards one at a time, showing Yuma each holographic face and laughing as Yuma's eyes shone at the way that the artwork caught the light.
Yuma skittered nervously around the edge of the kitchen, skirting around where she sat at the table, still looking at newspapers and classified ads, hoping for something. Anything.
She looked up at him, but he would not look at her.
Her chest tightened as she stared at the back of his head. He opened up the fridge and stood there for a little too long looking at what was inside. Her mouth opened for a moment to tell him to pick what he wanted and then close the door before he wasted anymore energy. Her mouth hung open for a few breaths. Then she closed it again, and dropped her eyes back to the newspaper.
What right did she have to act like his mother, anyway?
Yuma did not eat his breakfast in the kitchen. He took it and skittered back to his room. She could hear his feet on the steps and the sound of the trap door plopping open, and then shut again. She was pretty sure she heard the sound of him shoving boxes next; probably blocking the door shut again.
Her fingers tightened on the sides of the newspapers and tore a hole through it on one side.
She let her head drop slowly to the table. Tears were already bubbling in her eyes.
God, what have I done?
What had come over her last night? She was—she shouldn't be acting like this. Dammit...dammit...he wouldn't even look at her...
She heard the tappy sound of slippers on the kitchen floor and turned her head on its side so that she could see her grandmother walking into the room. Her wrinkles looked deeper than normal. She was holding that damn envelope in her hand, finally slit open after Akari had ignored it.
"Why didn't you tell me that we had gotten something from Heartland Child Services?" her grandmother asked, her voice so quiet that Akari could barely hear it.
Akari didn't lift her head from the table, dropping her eyes away from her grandmother's gaze.
"I didn't want to worry anyone. I thought I could handle it."
She chanced a glance at her grandmother again and saw the lips turn downward slightly. She almost flinched—she hated that look. The barest hint of subtle disappointment. A look that said, apparently not.
Her grandmother shuffled to the table and set the envelope down on it. Neither of them spoke for a very long time.
"...I'm sorry," Akari finally said.
"I'm not the one you should be apologizing to."
Akari closed her eyes and turned her face, pressing it into the table again, her arms coming up to fence herself in.
"Why did you tell Yuma that he can't duel anymore?"
"To-san said that Yuma's dueling could put him in danger."
"And so you decided to go off on the one thing that Yuma has left of your father?"
Akari's hands tightened.
"Yuma's not the only one that hurts," she said, her voice cracking.
"You think I don't know that?"
"I can't...baa-san, I can't. I can't do this."
She lifted her head, hands pressing into the table, shoulders shaking.
"I can't be kaa-san and to-san and nee-san all at once! I can't—I can't do this. I can't do any of this..."
Her grandmother didn't respond. She only sighed, deeply, and then she walked around the table with cracking knees and put her hands on Akari's shoulders, drawing the girl against her.
"Sh, sh," she murmured, running a hand through Akari's hair. "I'm here. I'm still here."
And Akari felt like she was six years old again, burying her face into grandma's shoulder and wrapping her arms perhaps a little too tightly around her tiny, bony frame, and sobbed into her grandmother's embrace.
Her grandmother held her, then, for a long time, just stroking her hair, humming softly, a tune that was somehow familiar and yet...not. A melody from a long ago dream that she couldn't quite remember, a place of darkness and warmth and tiny sparks of red floating around in the air like dust, and a giant door staring down at her from the end of a jagged path.
She tried to push the thoughts of that away. They brought goosebumps to her skin and a shudder down her spine. But the same thought pulsed through her again and again no matter how hard she tried.
Where is that door taking me? Where is it taking all of us?
The ringing of the phone sounded like an explosion to Akari's ears and she jerked out of her grandmother's grip with a start. For a moment, her heart stopped in her chest as the irrational part of her thought—oh god, it's Heartland Child Services, they're calling because it's too late and I don't have a job and I haven't turned in the papers on time and they're going to take Yuma away—
Her grandmother was the first to react, shuffling across the floor to the landline, picking it up with a snap and pressing it to her ear.
"Tsukumo Residence...ah, Akari-chan, it's for you."
Akari froze where she sat. But grandma didn't look uncertain or nervous so...maybe it was one of Akari's friends? Why wouldn't they call her D-Gazer then? Or wait that was in the next room over so maybe she had forgotten to check it in a while...?
In a half daze, she stumbled across the floor to take the phone from her grandmother's hand.
"...hello?"
"God, finally, I've been calling and texting you for ages! Why don't you have your D-Gazer on you?"
"Tetsuko?" Akari said, blinking. Her friend Tetsuko wasn't really the kind of person that called or texted. She was the kind of person that would just show up at the house, announce that they were going someplace, and drag Akari off to the train to visit the next city over or some other ridiculous adventure. Sometimes skipping school in the process. Usually it was under the pretense of them getting some kind of scoop for the school newspaper that they were both on, but most of the time Tetsuko just ended up taking pictures of cute people to squeal over with a bewildered Akari later, who personally was not attracted to mohawks and crop tops the way that Tetsuko was. Pictures that would be of absolutely no use to whatever article that Akari had written based on their trip.
But one way or another, the fact that Takeda Tetsuko was trying to get a hold of Akari through the phone meant that something was up.
"Who else?" Tetsuko said, laughing. "Listen, I'm about fifteen minutes from your house, I'm coming to pick you up right now."
"Tetsuko, this isn't really the time—"
"No, no, listen, I gave you some excess warning because I need to make sure you're ready—Heartland Daily is hiring and I just put your name down for an interview in a half hour."
"You what?"
"Yeah, see, my uncle's got a column going there but he's retiring soon and they need someone to pick up the slack—I showed him some of the stuff you've written for the school newspaper and he's super impressed! He wants you to come in ASAP."
"W—now?"
"That's what ASAP means, girl! Put on something professional and grab your makeup, you can do it in the car. Oh! And bring that portfolio of yours, the one that you were putting together for college apps? He'll wanna see that."
There was a loud honk on the other end and then the sound of Tetsuko screaming and swearing at someone out the window. Akari had to hold the phone away from her ear for a moment while Tetsuko finished her tirade.
"Whew, sorry about that! Asshole just cut me off!" Tetsuko said. "Okay, fifteen minutes, and I'm gonna be there. Get ready okay?"
And she hung up with a click, leaving Akari standing there with the phone hanging from her hand and her mouth open. She might have stood there in a daze for the whole fifteen minutes if her grandmother hadn't touched her shoulder to pull her out of the daze.
"What was that about, Akari?" her grandmother asked.
Akari felt tears bubbling in her eyes and she had to put a hand over her mouth to still the sob of relief that was just about to pour out of her.
"Tetsuko found—oh, god, I have to try and get ready, she found an interview for me, I can't mess this up—"
She bolted without anymore explanation, taking the stairs two at a time and barreling for her room.
But she paused just outside of Yuma's room. Hesitated with her hand on the door frame, her eyes searching the darkness for the trapdoor that was closed tightly shut.
That's not safe, she thought. If he gets in trouble, I won't be able to get up there...especially if he's got boxes on top of the door like I think he does.
She wondered if he was looking at those damn cards even right now. Probably reorganizing them over and over like he did when he didn't know what else to do with himself. Her hands tightened on the doorframe and she felt another burst of rage at that game, that stupid game that her father had taught them how to play and always pretended like it was some kind of magical game would make people happy, that would forge bonds, friendships, make people safe. A farce.
That game only hurt people.
The rage faded. Her hand slackened.
She sent one last look to the trapdoor, and then she hurried to her own room to get ready. Later. She could talk to him about it later.
Right now, she had to make sure this went through. She had to make sure that she could keep Yuma safe. She had to.
Later, she could talk to him.
And later...later she could start figuring out what the hell had happened to her parents.
The thought made her hesitate for a breath in between changing clothes. And that was when she realized just how true that was. She wasn't going to quit. Not by a long shot.
You guys can't just walk out on us, she thought angrily towards her parents. I won't let you.