「
"it ached to keep living. so why was he so persistent in it?"
」
~
Muichiro
Meet me after school.
um no LMAOOOO
just prtnd lik u r tutoring me or smth
we dnt ACTUALLY need to
Yes, we do.
I'm not going to get in trouble for something as simple as this.
Just meet me, and we'll walk.
h03
Love you too.
~
Today was gonna be hell. You already got an earful from your dad, and now you had afterschool tutoring. This sucks ass.
A small tap on your shoulder made you turn. "Sayaka?"
Sayaka was beautiful. Long, blonde-dyed hair and big eyes. Rumors regarding her going through with medical procedures on herself spread frequently, just to get shut down by perverted guys. You'd overheard loads about her anyway. "Hey, Y/N!"
She grinned at you sweetly. "I've got a little present for you. I know you don't drink, but that tutoring sesh is gonna wear you out." Her voice seemed to always be coated in honey, a sweet and softness in it that led you to the belief that she's probably the only one that could get herself out of this shithole.
But beneath her desk, she pointed to a bottle of sake.
You laughed nervously and stuffed it in your bag. "I'll see." Yeah, you were totally never gonna drink that.
Just staring at alcohol made you feel nauseous.
"Have you told Jiro yet?" She asked. "He's going out with us today. I think he wants you to come too." She pressed a finger to her plush lips and looked up at the sky, an innocent pondering expression on her face.
But you did not return this sweet sentiment, your mood souring at the mention of his name. "Tell him I'm feeling pretty sick after he fucking spiked my drink." You spat. "Sometimes, I hate him. I had to bike home while trying not to black out."
Sayaka just nodded with her same signature carefree smile. "I mean, what more can be done? We'll just have fun, okay?" She stuck out her pinkie and winked at you, sticking a small portion of her tongue out as she grinned.
Without another word, she slung her school bag over her shoulder and waved before walking out the classroom. You clenched your jaw at the sheer amount of people staring at her. At least be secretive about it, dumbass hoes...
Incoming footsteps shook you from your trance as you looked up at your newly assigned tutor. Fresh bandages adorned his face and arms. He didn't stop for you however, instead continuing to walk and motioning for you to follow with two fingers. "Hurry up. I don't have all day."
"Shogi nerd." You mumbled, tossing your bag over your shoulder and grabbing your phone.
--
The walk to his home was long.
And your phone was nearly dead. Not that your parents really cared anyway. "How much longer?"
"It's close." Muichiro replied. "Please don't tell me you're actually going to get drunk in my house. I saw that sake."
"For the last fucking time, I don't drink." You strained a smile. "I'd rather die. I wasn't even smoking either."
He just rolled his eyes and tightened his grip on the strap of his old school bag. His dull turquoise eyes flickered around the area before taking an unusual turn off of the road.
You remembered this unusual turn by heart, however. You also remembered the times when his eyes were not dull and depressing.
"Come on, just take the cigarette."
"No! What the fuck is wrong with you—?!"
A total fucking bystander. That's all you were.
Muichiro's pained scream still echoes in your ears time to time. That's why he has that burn mark on his arm.
It's been, what, four years?
Your junior highschool days were a total mindfuck.
But at least junior highschool didn't seem like it had a grey cloud casted over it all the time.
As the door creaked open, you slipped your shoes off and entered the dingy home. Not a single thing changed, huh?
"Sit." Muichiro curtly spoke. "I'll be back, I need to tell Yuichiro to leave us be."
You sat down and looked up at the small clock in his living room. The floor was wooden and light, a small throw rug in the middle of the eerily empty room. A small television set was directly across from the small couch in the room.
Muichiro was given a crow by Mrs. Ubuyashiki awhile back, in order to aid him with his lack of social abilities. Ginko.
She used to think you were tolerable. Now she thought you were a backstabbing, shallow bitch.
She isn't wrong... You sighed and stared at the bottle of sake in your bag, rolling your eyes briefly.
Muichiro came back after awhile, dusting his hands off and a hairtie between his teeth. Yanking it out and pulling his hair back, he looked back at you.
"I'm gonna start. Keep up, or don't. I don't give two shits."
—
"To add imaginary numbers, you need to..."
You were practically falling asleep as soon as he finished explaining the powers of imaginary numbers. Why can't I just say no solutions, or some shit? Nobody needs this.
"Hey." He snapped his slender, pale fingers in front of your face. "Copy this down."
You groaned. You were still pretty hungover from the party. "Quit it. I'm having a shitty day already."
"Awe, boohoo." Muichiro feigned sympathy. "What happened this time in Y/N's perfect little life?"
Muichiro's dark circles were evident, a bit of redness lining his under eyes almost hidden beneath his dark lashes.
He stared at you like no one else did. Not like Sayaka, not like Mae, and definitely not like Jiro. His gaze tore down every wall of defense you made and left you vulnerable, like a rabbit stuck in between a tree and it's predator.
Your hands trembled whenever he'd look at you with those same eyes. The same eyes he looked at you with on that day.
"... I don't wanna talk about it." You meekly whispered, biting the end of your pen and averting your gaze.
He smirked, gently tracing a finger against your jaw. "Do you know how amazing it feels to see the girl who's been helping make my life a living hell all defenseless?"
If you could tell the faculty in your school anything...
Muichiro leaned close to your ear.
... you'd tell them that...
He breathily chuckled against your ear. "I wanna ruin you. Every damn part of you. Only that way, you'd experience the hell I have. But you'd like that, wouldn't you?"
... Tokito Muichiro isn't...
"I'd drag you down with me to this hell you've made. Just for you and me."
... as innocent as he seems.
—
The sound of broken glass echoed in the air as you watched the sake drain in the soiled sink.
Your mother trembled on the couch in the living room, her cuts and injuries bandaged as black and blue littered her body.
You despised her for how weak she was. The faint snoring of your drunken father served as a reminder to you of that.
Each scream and cry in pain was nothing but a hindrance as the sight of beer cans and empty bottles hit you. But somehow you always found each one leaving an impact on you, like a scar on your leg.
"He can lick it up. That pig." You whispered, heading to your room with your school bag in tow.
Your mother sat limply on the couch and tried to pass you a faint and hurt smile, but you didn't spare her a glance.
How could she be such a pushover? Letting your father abuse her like that? Not even doing anything in defense?
Pathetic. You hated pathetic people.
Your brother sat by your father's bed, a book in his hands as he looked up at you through his glasses. He wrinkled his nose in disgust before turning his attention back to the worn down pages.
Your brother was more conservative in the way how he presented himself. He frequented collared shirts and sweaters, his hair was always slicked back.
He found your style repulsive.
Paying no mind to his hushed "slut" and "whore" insults, you trudged past the trash all over the house to your room.
And you shut the door. Hard.
—
"Maybe you should just ask to switch classes?"
Muichiro blowed another puff of smoke, holding it between his two fingers. "Tried. They don't give two shits. I could be half-dead and they'd still keep me in the damn class."
A musky smell wafted off the porch of the house as Muichiro slumped back onto the railing, his forearm resting onto the old wood leaning onto it.
Yuichiro applied another coat of ointment onto his fingers, dabbing it onto the cuts and scars on his younger brother's face. "Smoking is no good for you, y'know?"
"You do it too." He shrugged. "If you're not dead, then I'm fine."
It was true, after all. Yuichiro picked up smoking awhile back, after his friends pressured him into it.
His skateboard was promptly picked up and leaned onto the railing, each scratch on it a familiar sight to the both of them.
But the older twin shook his head. "Bullshit. I'm the guinea pig. You have a chance to be better, you dumbass."
Another puff. "What a shitty time to be alive..."
"This is about Y/N, isn't it?" Yuichiro grimaced, screwing the cap back onto the ointment and leaving it on the outdoor table. "Your sudden urge to be like this?"
"Shut the fuck up." The younger twin spoke flatly. "You know nothing."
The older of the two sighed and looked over at the cigarette. "Well, pass me the damn lighter if you're gonna be a little bitch about it."
Muichiro nodded and passed the box and the lighter, watching Yuichiro flick open the lighter and pish a cigarette between his lips. He cradled the fleeting flame with his open palm as he pushed the lighter up to the edge. A twisted delight sunk in his chest as the smoke floated up in the air.
"Where'd you learn anyway?" He asked. "Lots of people find it hard and icky to smoke, y'know?"
"Just one puff, Muichiro."
"No, what the fuck?!"
"Then choke."
His hand instinctively moved to his neck at the distant memory in his head. He couldn't forget. How could he? The burning sensation in his throat, the coughing, and the darkness.
"I have a good teacher." Muichiro shifted his gaze to his brother to be met with a concerned stare.
Yuichiro shook his head. "I'm not gonna stop you, but you're gonna regret smoking. Do you know just how hard it is to quit?"
Grey clouds covered the horizon as a large shadow was casted onto their meek house, blue skies out of reach and out of sight. The hum of the radio accompanied this desolateness, distant music and static accompanying the ringing within their ears.
"I don't give two shits. I've come to accept it." Muichiro tossed the cigarette to the floor and stomped it out with his heel. "Nobody here has a future. At least, not a good one. That doesn't exclude us. Come a few years time, my intellect will be a waste and I'll be rotting away at some shitty job that barely lets me pay the bills. Poverty isn't exactly uncommon here."
His words had the other's heart throbbing. "That's not true. You have a chance to get the fuck out of here and get a nice job. People like you get paid really fucking well in the west." He slowly exhaled. "Leave this shithole behind and get a nice job. We all die eventually."
Muichiro dipped his hand into his school bag and grabbed his workbook and a pencil, resting it on the narrow railing of the porch. "Whatever. I'm right, and you know it. You're just trying to give me hope so I'll feel a little less shitty about it."
"At least you're better off than that group." Yuichiro spoke. "Poor Y/N. She used to be such a sweet girl."
"The fuck about her?"
"Jiro's such an asshat." He continued. "I've seen it before. He corners her and always pressures her into doing weird shit with him. Smeaking out, doing drugs, and even... you know."
His heart dropped. "It was consensual, right?"
"They didn't actually do it." The smoke blended in with the clouds. "Y/N keeps shoving him off and making excuses."
A thick silence stood between them. The thought of you being grabbed, shoved, hurt--
Muichiro grabbed his school bag and his workbook, tucking his pencil behind his ear.
"I'm going inside. Night, Yuichiro."
「
"one step felt like knives. one breath felt like poison. but dying is too much of a hindrance for him."
」
a/n: its kinda ironic how see you again is playing rn but im writing shit like this LMAOOOO anyway
tysm for 150 reads! i cant believe that ive already gotten sm exposure in one day 💕 it really means a lot gys 😭
STAY SAFE!!! DRINK WATER, EAT FOOD, SLEEP WELL, AND TAKE CARE OF YOURSELVES!!! ILYSM 💕💕💕