AN: A big THANK YOU! to all the feedback, faves, and follows. They do wonders for my typing speed.
Another interlude, but this one's a little longer. Disclaimer still applies. I also hold no claim over the brief mention of Totoro or Kenshin.
WARNING: Slight mention of self-harm, plus more violence and swearing (in Italian).
The Golden Canary
Intermezzo: Due
Maso dragged a hand over his face, his frustration reaching an all-new boiling point.
«No, Leo; that's not how you conjugate the verb!»
He cuffed the boy over the head, and Leo's pencil streaked an angry line across the notebook.
It was a whole new level of messed up; that he'd be used to this kind of routine where Leo would forget a word right after Maso had taught it, Maso would punish him in some way, and he'd accept the abuse with nary a complaint. Then Maso would feel cheated and start teaching again, and the whole cycle looped round again.
It was like rolling a boulder down a bottomless mountain, and Maso wasn't sure when it would stop.
This just confirms it – I never, EVER want to have children.
He was the type of person who didn't have the patience to wait for other people to catch up, and making him teach a child was an unusual form of torture for him.
It was just his luck too, to get stuck with one of the dumbest kids in existence. It was as if the boy wasn't even trying; like he just gave up somewhere between then and now and was waiting for the routine to break so that he would finally be free from the pain.
I would've sent him to the school for mafia kids, but it's definitely not in the budget. He could also picture his superior waving his gun, saying «He's a prisoner, Maso, not a would-be Mafioso.»
He sighed, and tried again.
"You still aren't getting the basic grammar right. I know Japanese doesn't have the same rules, but you're not in Japan anymore."
Leo kept his head down as if he was ignoring Maso, and Maso's temper flared again.
«Look at me.»
The boy's head shot up, fear creeping into his eyes at last. It was the only Italian sentence he knew by heart.
«Repeat: Good morning, Signore. Good afternoon, Signorina. Good night, Fratello. See you next week, Sorella.»
Leo stuttered through the first half, and blanked out on the rest.
Maso dragged a hand over his face again, wondering if this was what it was like to go crazy.
The three friends huddled together in the corner of the unused storage room, whispering to each other even though they knew the kid in the other corner wouldn't be able to understand them anyway.
«Boss(1), it's been two weeks, and he still can't count to ten.»
«'Tch. I dunno why we're doing this. I mean, Maso's cool and all, and I know how busy he is right now, but if it wasn't because of your dad's orders I wouldn't even touch the runt with a ten-foot pole.»
«Hey, what my father does is always for the benefit of the famiglia.» Enzo glanced at the despondent blond, and for a brief moment, doubted his father's instructions. He quickly shook it away though, and went over to the kid with renewed determination.
«Oi, kid. Repeat after me: chair.» He pointed to one, and repeated the word again as slowly as possible. «Se-di-a.»
A blank look, but otherwise no response. Enzo sighed, blowing his bangs out of the way before they settled over his eyes again.
«Maybe he was dropped on his head as a baby. It happened to Piedro, and look where he is now.»
He flicked the boy's forehead, eliciting a startled "Ite!"
"Ite"? Where've I heard that before? He stared, and smiled slowly. Ooooh.
"You. Boy. Japanese?"
Tsuna blinked in surprise, then nodded furiously, hope kindling in his eyes again.
"Y-yes! Do you speak Japanese too?"
"Slow down. I speak…little bit Japanese. Me, my friends, like manga and Rurouni Kenshin."
He made some sword motions with his hands, grinning even though he'd just admitted they were all otakus.
«Woah! Nice, Enzo! The runt is actually Japanese! Maybe he can tell us what it's like over there.»
«Hm. I'll need some help.» He turned to the largest of the three of them and waved him over. «Rossi, you're better at this. You say something.»
«B-but, aren't we supposed to teach him Italian? He won't learn anything like this. And Maso and your father are both expecting results.»
«I know, but we can't teach him anything if he doesn't want to learn.»
He grabbed Leo's unbroken arm, dragged him to the middle of the room, and sat him on the ground like a true teacher and student.
"We know Italian. You know Japan. We…trade."
Leo gave him a confused look, clearly not understanding the broken sentence.
"Enzo says we want you to tell us about Japan, and as a trade, you'll learn Italian." Rossi caught on to his friend's ingenious plan, and added a few words of his own. "Keep it a secret though. If you tell, we'll hang you on the pole in the garden to show people what we do to traitors. Understand?"
Tsuna nodded, relieved at meeting more Japanese speakers. Maybe they'll be nicer to him.
"Good. And you have to repeat everything we say when we tell you to. Every time you don't, we punish you." Rossi gave the boy a cheery smile. "You'll learn faster that way."
Everything came crashing down, and Tsuna swore to himself to never trust an Italian ever again. But he nodded anyway, knowing they would hurt him if he didn't agree.
«Okay. Boss, anything you want to ask him first, or make him say?»
«Hmmm.» Paulo rubbed his growing stubble of a beard, then settled on something. «Ohhh! I know! Repeat, "Sono un pezzo di merda."»
«Umm…S-sono un...un pizza di meluda.»
The teens howled with laughter, and Tsuna never felt more humiliated in his entire life.
«Report.»
«Si Signore. The boy – prisoner – is adjusting, but very slowly. He's still struggling on basic sentences, and the teenagers are having similar problems, although they seem to take great interest in teaching him the more vulgar side of the Italian language.»
«Hm. That's fine, but make sure they don't leave out the formal side. I don't want him speaking to me, or god forbid, the Don with such language. What about his vocal training?»
«Ah…well…you see, he hasn't started that yet.»
«…He hasn't?»
«I-it's not like I haven't tried! I spent the last week looking for a suitable instructor, but because of the nature of our…project, the list of requirements is much longer than I thought it'd be.»
«I assumed you'd be smart enough to figure it out. Perhaps I have overestimated you.»
«…»
«Try reading the list out loud this time.»
«...Okay. "Someone skilled, but not famous. Someone who's alone and won't call attention to themselves."»
«Continue.»
«"Not currently a Mafioso, but retired or ruined. Knows how to speak at least some Japanese; enough to be able to teach. In addition, someone who's good with children, yet knows how to discipline." Pardon me, but that part I don't quite understand. Why does the instructor have to be good with children?»
«We don't want to spoil the kid, in either sense of the word.»
«Uhh…»
«Part of what makes our project unique is the prisoner's innate innocence. You'll know what I'm talking about if you think of all-boy choirs, such as the Wiener Sängerknaben(2). That part of his voice can't be trained; it's a gift he's been given. It is…particularly soothing on the ears.»
«Ah. I see. But…I still don't know which instructor I need to find.»
«A hint, then: men are not the only creatures caught up in the aftermath of our activities.»
Tsuna didn't even bother to crawl to his dingy mattress, too tired and bruised to care. It'd been a long, exhausting day filled with angry faces and fists and feet, and there were many more bad days than good.
Every morning, he's jolted awake by a short man's rough kick. There's no breakfast, so after brushing his teeth in the basement's tiny bathroom and changing out of his oversized white shirt, the short man would take him to his 'classroom': an empty storage room with a few scattered chairs and a desk. Oni-san would come in, try to teach him something, and fails because Tsuna isn't smart enough. He then punishes him in some way before the process repeats.
It only stops for lunch, when he's given a glass of milk and a roll of bread.
He always eats as slowly as possible.
After lunch is his lesson with the teenagers, as they didn't finish school until then. After a few hours of a different kind of torture, the day finally ends with another loaf of bread – if he could tell Oni-san what he learned that day. In Italian.
If he gets dinner, he eats in his room. If he doesn't, which is more often than not, he tries to fill his belly with water from the tap in his bathroom. It helps a little, but it made him pee more often. And if the night is kind, he manages to get to bed and sleep.
He'd been going through this routine long enough to be wrung dry of tears and courage, not like the first day he'd arrived and sang that fateful song. The result was nothing but fear and overwhelming regret, and he wished to God that he hadn't sung as well as he did. Anything would have been better than…this.
Tsuna cradled his broken arm to his body, squeezing through the cast on purpose. He found out some time ago that the greater physical pain swamped his smaller ones, and helped him forget about the emotional ones too. It was a small comfort, but one nonetheless.
If there were anything he hated the most about being here, it would be the teenagers, because while Oni-san's lessons hurt, the boys' lessons humiliate, and Tsuna didn't know how much more he could take.
At least Oni-san let him keep his backpack. The single shoe he kept after his struggle with the older man was useless, and the water and bandages have long been used up. The man had taken the soft green hoodie he got for his fifth birthday, so he didn't know where it went. As for the money, it didn't work here, proved by the teenagers when they took a thousand-yen note from him, went outside for a while, then returned with red faces and crammed a balled-up note down his throat. From their angry yelling, he could just make out that they tried to buy something with it, but it didn't go as planned.
He'd choked on the paper pellet, and was forced to endure another round of beating and kicking right after.
He was tired. Tired of not having enough to eat. Tired of this new life he had to endure. And more than that, so very tired of clinging to hope and missing his okaa-otou-home-birds-park-school-life, but even more than being tired, he was afraid of forgetting.
Today, he tried to describe to the teens what people do during the Tanabata festival, but to his horror he burst out crying instead because he couldn't remember what he did last time. They'd made fun of him like usual, jeering and laughing about "some stupid dress-wearing festival", but Tsuna barely heard them over the crippling terror that coursed through his heart.
He remembered afterwards: the memory of his okaa-san smiling and holding his hand so they could walk together to the local shrine, the wish he wrote, the games he played, and the cute girl he danced with to the steady beat of the taiko. But it made him feel worse, and that was how Oni-san had found him crying and curled on the ground.
He didn't have dinner tonight. And he had no way of knowing, but Tanabata had most likely come and gone. Even so, he could tell it was still summer because of the heat and the calling cicadas he could hear throughout the day.
There were some things that remained the same, even when he was in a different country.
I wish there was something I could do to tell mama and papa where I am.
A flash of inspiration suddenly struck, and he struggled to a sitting position so he could reach over to his bag. The money may be useless for buying anything here, but maybe…
He took out the small Totoro-shaped purse, opened it, and turned it upside-down, allowing the coins to clatter onto the wooden floor.
Please please please let there be one.
He spotted the gold-coloured coin as it fell, and snatched it up eagerly. It was a 5-yen coin that was a little darkened with rust on one side, but otherwise good.
Now for some string.
After some thought, he carefully pulled the shoelace out of the lone shoe, and threaded it through the hole in the coin before tying the ends into a knot. He looped the string over his head, and felt the weight of the coin settle around his neck.
Next is…the ritual.
He stood slowly, mindful of his aches and pains, and bowed. Then he hobbled to the bathroom and washed his hands and mouth, being careful not to get the cast on his arm too wet. He'd done it once by accident, and Oni-san was angry that he had to take him to the doctor again.
There was no bell to ring, so he went back and put all the extra change back into the purse and shook it with a muffled tinkle before bowing twice and clapping twice. After that, he clasped the coin between his hands in a prayerful position, and squeezed his eyes shut.
He'd never been particularly religious before, but he found himself praying fervently to any god out there.
Please, if you're out there, please help me. Please.
He bowed one last time, and let the coin fall back. He knew he wasn't supposed to keep it, but he wanted it as a talisman of sorts: an invisible link all the way from here to there, his true home.
He yawned, suddenly feeling very sleepy, and he tottered over to the mattress and lay down. In the moment before he drifted off completely, he curled a hand around the coin, and prayed one last time.
(1): He's calling him "Boss" out of respect because Enzo and Rossi are Paulo's followers, not because Paulo is the Don.
(2): The Vienna Boys' Choir.
AN: I think this might be my favourite interlude, even though I haven't written all of them yet. And cookies for anyone who can guess the upcoming character.
I've always wondered how so many people in the KHR mafia world can speak Japanese, even when they don't live in or are from Japan. My theory is that they're all secretly rabid fans of manga and/or anime. Think about that.
On a side note, I'll be away for the next week. I've written ahead so I can post while I'm out, but I can only do that if I have internet connection, and if my phone decides to cooperate with me. Even if I don't manage to update, don't worry - I'll definitely be back! This story is too fun to stop writing.