"Are you out of your mind?"
His tone was harsh, it was cold and cruel. The sheer amount of emotion was enough to bring tears to Kazuna's eyes. Still, he did not cry, he did not move a single muscle. What was there to lose, anyway? What did he have left for life to take away? Nothing but regrets.
"You need this."
"Why the fuck would I need this?!"
Anger was pouring out of Kitakado Tomohisa like waterfalls. Bitter, pungent torrents of hatred and pain. Pain, there was so much pain.
Uncharacteristic harsh lines grazed that usually calm, handsome face. The one formerly known as the prince of B-Project had years worth of hurt in his gaze, Kazuna could see that. He once bore similar chains, after all. He was not a stranger to pain. The kind of pain that shapes your whole being, the kind of hurt that marks you forever and leaves a scar so nasty it would make one barf if tangible.
Tomohisa's arm tensed sharply under Kazuna's sudden hand, his touch beyond soft, almost brittle. It hurt, sure, but Kazu didn't blame the man for his disgust. After all, he had just suggested something absolutely repugnant, for lack of a better word.
"You need this…" He repeated, whispering now. "Just imagine I'm him."
The answer this time was not rage nor surprise, only silence.
"Him?" Tomohisa seemed to stop breathing for a moment, lost in a faraway memory. Kazuna could swear he saw a flash of something warm in those blue eyes. Or perhaps his own twisted mind was trying to overcompensate for the immeasurable hurt he himself hid behind a small smile.
A few seconds into the heavy silence, Kazuna felt a laugh sprout from his chest. A feeling he once associated with singing and performing on stage alongside his life-long friends now left a hole where his heart was supposed to be. Said laugh never flourished. It died before he could muster the strength to let it live. In its place was solely the realization that it did not matter in the slightest if it was real or if he had imagined seeing something in Tomohisa's now blank stare.
It never mattered: not now, not five years ago, not eighteen years ago. And the reason was so simple. Too simple, in fact, that it spread coldness over his chest, up to his elbows.
It didn't matter because those eyes were just not looking at him.