Theme: 40 Spring
Title: and if i want to i will
Word Count: 195
Summary: Innocuous things are important after you've been deprived of them.
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Ryou buys groceries.
It seems surreal. He walks down every aisle now, even when he only needs a loaf of bread and a carton of milk. He stops in front of displays of canned beans or ground coffee and considers; does he need it? Sometimes he picks things he knows the thief hated and toys with buying them, mocking him.
No, not the thief. Just the echo of a Voice, the lingering shadow of a malignant master, still whispering threats into his ear after one year and six days and three hours and four seconds.
Sometimes Ryou stands in front of the butcher's counter and listens hard for the snarl telling him to get more meat, now, or else.
Then he goes home and makes himself a lavish vegan meal. He eats as much as he wants, as slowly as he wants. He tells the imaginary voice in his head all the things he'd wanted to say to the real one.
Then he makes another grocery list — even though he doesn't need one, because he can go if he wants to — and promises himself that tomorrow, just maybe, he will make himself steak without cringing.
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