CHAPTER 3: Loss

"How is it, Kyoya?" The young boss asked with a smile. "I know you would prefer some Japanese food, but spaghetti is the quickest dish I can throw together in short notice."

Both of them were sitting at the island in the Mansion's enormous kitchen. True to his words, the young boss had made each of them a dish of spaghetti al bolognese. All the staff had gone to bed, so they were the only occupants of the sparse kitchen.

Not even gracing Tsuna with a look, the other man kept digging in his meal with such grace and perfect manner that could only come from strict education from a young age. Tsuna wasn't much of a slob eater himself but Nana was pretty lenient on him when he was younger so he accumulated some pretty bad eating habits over the time. Reborn had to spent a lot time and effort (read: torture) on beating table manners into him.

Only when he had finished his meal, Hibari wiped his mouth with a handkerchief (never a tissue, only handkerchief or napkin to ever grace the man's lips). The man put his cutlery neatly on top of his impeccably clean dish and answered his boss' question with a glance.

"It was adequate."'I enjoyed the meal' was what Hibari actually meant. Tsuna beamed at the subtle compliment on his cooking skills. He had always been proud of his poweress in the kitchen after all. His love for cooking was actually a new development as he had never ventured into the kitchen once when he was younger and used to getting spoiled daily by his mother's food. Once he moved out, however, learning to cook became not a necessity but rather something to comfort himself with, being so far away from his hometown, surrounded by strangers and foreign culture 24/7. He took great joy in cooking for his closest friends too. It seemed like he actually took after his mother more than just her looks.

"You, on the other hand, barely touched your meal."

The burnet had indeed hardly eaten anything. He managed a few bites, then gave up and resorted to pushing the food around on his dish and watching the other man eat rather than actually getting some much needed nutrition into his body.

"I know, I know! I need the food but…" The young boss tried and failed to stop the wince from overtaking his features. He dropped the folk into the marble surface with a loud painful clank and grabbed his forehead with both his hands. The migraine that had retreated thanks to Hibari's presence now returned with a vengeance. Earlier he was able to squash it down by making himself busy cooking for Hibari. However, once he sat down, the idleness made the pain more prominent to the point he felt so queasy. The thing about his migraines was that once they reared its ugly head, the poor brunet would not be able to keep down any food or water until they subsided. That was why the man gave up on eating the spaghetti he had painstakingly made earlier all together no matter how hungry he felt.

And now it was torturing him with continuous ringing in his ear and swirling technicolor images in front of his eyes.

"Agh!" The brunet grunted in pain. The increasing pain was so intense and blinding that he had to grab onto Hibari for balance despite sitting down. His breath pattern turned into short gasps of air and the man swayed in his seat. Hibari quickly drew the brunet closer, adjusted so the pained brunet could lean onto him. He knew the other man was prone to headaches and migraines all the time but this was the first time Hibari caught the younger one in the middle of an intense episode like this. Even though the man looked calm on the outside, inside he felt extremely anxious and alarmed. He could not bear to see the brunet he cared much for (not that he would admit it out loud) suffering like this.

As sudden as it came, the pain promptly disappeared.

"Kyoya!" Gasped the younger man as he was finally able to take in a full lung of air.

"What is it, Tsunayoshi? I thought you would be in less pain while I'm around?"

"No! No! It was something different!" Despite the pain being gone, the man felt no less calmer than before, his pupils were blown wide and his heart beating loudly against the ribs. His Hyper Intuition was trying to hint at something he had not fully grasped yet and it frightened him.

Digging through his mind, Tsuna tried to find the keywords that had his Intuition ringing like a goddamned fire alarm, as though somebody was trying to split his head open with a hammer.

I was thinking about what to make, then how much I miss cooking for some like this, mom's secret recipe, mom's food filled with such warmth and love, mom who was on vacation with father…

MOM!

Whipping his phone out in a flash, he sped-dial number 7, much to Hibari's bewilderment. The man listened to the dial tone in agitation, muttering to himself with each second passed. "C'mon, Mom, please pick up please pick up!"

His mother had gone with Iemitsu, who was forced to resign from his position as the head of CEDEF by Vongola Decimo himself, on a months-long vacation that the couple call the honeymoon they never had. Also Nana never had the chance to travel when she was younger and Iemitsu wanted to make up for the time he did not get to spend with her so this trip was one stone hit two birds. Tsuna had given his mother a specially designed phone that had his personal number on speed dial and told her to call him whenever she missed him. She called him every weekend just to check on him instead of the other way around, though. He hardly had any free time during the day and when he did, it was usually too late at night. And at night, he was usually too beat and exhausted to hold an actual conversation.

The dial tone felt infinite, wringing his nerves out like a rubber band. The man waited and waited and waited until finally someone picked up at the other end of the line.

"Tsu-kun?"

The young man let out the breath he had held in for god knew how long.

"Mom? Oh thanks gods. Where are you right now? Is dad with you?"

"Calm down, Tsu-kun! Why do you sound so panicked? I'm just having dinner with your father! He found such a perfect restaurant for us, Tsu-kun!"

"Is he there?"

"No, he went out for a smoke a few minutes ago. He will come back in a moment, though. What's wrong, Tsu-kun? If you need to speak to your father I-"

"No! No! Listen, mom! You need to get out! Wherever you are, JUST GET OUT!"

"Tsu-"

BANG!

The sound of gunshot was followed by a long beep signaling the call had ended abruptly. The young man froze in place and the phone slipped from his slackened hand. Hibari caught his fallen phone with a swift move and brought it to his ear. He frowned at the disconnected continuous beeps and asked.

"What happened?"

"M-mom- "

He felt so dizzy and extremely weak in the knees and his legs could not carry his weight anymore. He collapsed on his knees and would have kissed the ground if it wasn't for Hibari quick reflexes to catch him around the shoulders.

"Tsunayoshi! What's happening?"

"My m-mom, sh-she-"

He never managed to finish his words as his vision blackened abruptly and all strength had escaped his limbs. And then, blessedly, he felt and heard no more.

o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

The funeral of Sawada Nana was a quiet affair.

It was held in Namimori, where she was born. The number of attendants was scarce since the woman had no friend or relative, her life since becoming a Sawada had always revolved around her no-good son and the ever absent husband.

Among the mourners, asides from the son and husband, some familiar Namimori faces could be seen: Yamamoto Tsuyoshi and his son, some of her son's friends like Gokudera Hayato and his foreign half sister who stayed with them for some time, the Sasagawa siblings, Miura Haru, a young woman with eyepatch and Hibari Kyoya. The remaining mourners included the kids whom Nana had adopted: Fuuta, Lambo and I-pin; and the ex-boss of her husband who was now in a wheelchair, wheeled to the service by a tall foreign-looking younger man who bore great resemblance to him. Taking a few seats to the edge of the vicinity was one tall and handsome blond who was seen a few times around the town and his bespectacled subordinate, a timid-looking redhead and strange red eyes and an extremely tall, stern-looking lady with a ponytail. Some of the father's former co-workers were also present.

Oddly, the one who was in charge of the ceremony was neither her husband nor her son, but a kind-looking young man with dirty blond hair. He called himself Basilicum. He was the former subordinate of the father and now the second in the son's incorporate. He was polite and soft-spoken enough, but none could explain why he was the one who made the arrangements and not the very available son or husband.

But one look at the only family of Sawada Nana, they would understand the reason.

None of them was in a well-enough state both physically or mentally to perform any of their duties. They looked haggard and gaunt, their eyes sunken in, their lips dry and flaking off. The father was deep in his own grief, tears never stopped streaming down his face once since the start of the service. However, the stocky blond was in a slightly better state compared to the other Sawada though: his eyes still held some light and he somewhat functioned like a normal human being. The poor son, on the other hand, was completely unresponsive. His face was unemotional, his eyes darkened and blank. He did not react to anybody when asked, did not say any words during the memorial service. His messy hair and sickly pale skin contrasted starkly with the neatly-pressed black funeral attires he was wearing: Needless to say, the man looked just as dead as he must have felt on the inside.

Poor man! Their neighbors whispered to each other. No good as he is, only his mom had ever accepted him. And now, she is gone too.

How did she die? They would ask.

The woman was caught in the middle of a scuffle between local gangs! Poor sweet Nana who has never done anything wrong in her life, she did not deserve it.

As the service was finally over, everyone had come to say their farewell to Sawada Nana and offer their condolences to the remaining Sawada, then they gradually left the cemetery one by one. The husband's former boss was the first to leave, giving both Sawadas a small nod and then wheeled away by the tall foreign man. The redhead with red eyes came to the son to give him a quick hug and part ways. The tall blond patted him on his shoulders and soon followed the redhead. The son's group of close friends kept throwing subtle worried glances at their unresponsive friend but eventually left without approaching him. The Sasagawa daughter seemed intended to say something to the younger Sawada but her brother stopped her with a light headshake and subtle pull on her arms. Finally she relented and walked away, too. The famed Hibari Kyoya, though, stayed behind to leave a small nadeshiko flower in front of Nana's gravestone then departed shortly, but not without patting the brunet son on the head.

Soon the only person left in front of the new grave was the son. The brunet sat in his chair, his face was still a mask of stone cold indifference as he stared off into space. After seeing off the last of the mourners, the father came back and sat on the chair next to his son and spent the next fifteen minutes in suffocating silence. And finally he spoke.

"I felt something was wrong and went out of the restaurant to check. They tricked me, luring me away to get to her! I- "

"Was she in any pain?" The hoarse voice of his son cut him off mid-sentence. These were the first words he heard him speak in days ever since he came back to the Mansion after his wife's d-death.

"No. No, she wasn't in any pain. It was a clean shot. She did not suffer." He answered.

"Well, that was good then." The man said and stood up preparing to leave. Just as before he exited the vicinity though, he dropped off a few final words without even turning back to face him.

"Father, please do me a favor and never appear in front of me again."

The other man was stunned, perplexed by the coldness in his son's voice. They had never gotten along in the past, but he had no idea how their relationship had deteriorated to this point.

"Tsun-"

"The next time I see you, I will end you. Please, mark my words."

And his son's retreating back was the last image he had of the brunet for a long long time.

The brunet took a month off his duty as Vongola Decimo and stayed at his old childhood home. Iemitsu had indeed heeded his words and never showed up at the house to bother him so he got the whole house to himself. His old childhood home was of modest size in the neighborhood but without his mother and the exuberant bunch of kids she took in, the house felt way too big and empty.

Couldn't bear to stay in the house for too long, for the whole month, he establish a new habit of hitting the nearest pub as soon as the sun was down and drank himself to a stupor, then stumbled back home extremely late, or perhaps extremely early in the morning and slept the remainder of the days away on his childhood bed. He allowed himself the small luxury of vulnerability, felt like he deserved it, however the main reason was how he always felt Hibari nearby, not necessarily within sight, but available nonetheless, ready to pick up after him if needed.

On one monday of the fourth week of his stay, he woke up in bed at noon, parched and starving with a killer headache from a hangover. However, he did not make any move to address and actually resolve his discomfort. Instead he used them to ground himself before he slipped into another vicious circle of drink, drunk, sleep to get away from reality.

Trekking downstairs in the clothes he still had on from yesterday's outing, he padded into the kitchen with bare feet.

Sat on the chair he used to claim as his own when he was younger, he had a pleasant view of the whole kitchen and whoever was supposed to be cooking, which was why he enjoyed this particular position so much. He closed his eyes to imagine the sight it used to be, noisy, chaotic and always bustling with life. The kids screamed, fought and generally be annoying all the time, Reborn who was simply there to make his life more miserable than it already was; and his mom, ever bubbly and warm, almost always a constant present, the only note of ordinary left from his former lifestyle as an oblivious civillant. Her presence alone was enough to soothe his always acting up nerves and over stimulated brain ever since Reborn happened.

He ended up going to the shop for some groceries and once back at home, he made himself some food. All the kitchen appliances were working well enough despite not being used in a long time. He made some salisbury steaks- his favorite that his mother made all the time, with a small bowl of salad. Alone at the dining table, he muttered a small 'have a good meal' out of habits before digging in.

Finishing about half of his portion, the man gave up and put his cutlery down on the table. And for the first time in weeks, he let himself grief over the loss of his beloved mother properly.

Also, for the first time in forever, he finally admitted that he was in fact, lonely.

Even the presence of Hibari close by, even though always out of sight, could not fill the emptiness left behind by the loss of his mother, the only one who loved him unconditionally no matter how much of a loser he was. Even Hibari Kyoya, the only one who still stayed, would have detested him as much if he turned out to be completely incompetent.

The rest of the day passed in a blur of tears, bouts of depression and misery, some more alcohol and destruction, then the man decided he had vented enough and booked his flight back to Italy first light in the morning.

Greeting him at the gate of his Mansion was his external advisor- Basil and the ever dutiful butler- Vincenzo Greco. Despite being away for a whole month, the Mansion was still standing strong and not suffering any visible damage by either the Guardians or any rival Famiglia. Both his CEDEF head and his butler had done a very good job. Tsuna had to smile at this show of dedication and competence given to him by his subordinates as he only notified them 20 minutes ahead of his actual arrival. Handing over the key of his hired car to the butler, who also took the beat up jacket he found in the closet at home, Tsuna muttered a word of gratitude and turned to his CEDEF head.

"Did Iemitsu turn in his report yet?"

If Basil had any comment about how his boss addressed his old master, he refrained himself from actually saying anything.

"Yes, Sawada-dono."

"Put it on my work desk, please." He walked away from both of them to the direction of his own private quarter in the West wing of the Mansion.

"Also, tell the underbosses and the Guardians to get their asses here in 3 hours. I don't care where the fuck they are, if they are late, they have me to answer to."

No time for idle chit chat anymore. After all, he had too much to do and so very little time.