Chapter Text
[ From You to Me ]
C h a p - II -
“It is a happiness to wonder; -- it is a happiness to dream.”
--Edgar Allan Poe
The garden is beautiful as always.
Kaneki looks out from the open sliding door. He sits on his knees, back straight and shoulders back, and picks up a lovely clay teapot off the tatami floor. He pours the green tea into a black teacup. The water mists and fogs into the air, like a breath of relief from the confine of clay. He sets the cup down and pushes it gently forward to the other occupant in the living room.
“Father.”
A hum of approval, and the man seated opposite picks it up.
“Instead of the usual sencha, I thought it would be a pleasant change to have ceylon green tea imported from Sri Lanka,” Kaneki says, pouring a cup for himself. The gentle breeze from the outdoors drifts into the room, teases the fabric of his robe, and mingles with the warmth of the brewing cup against his lips.
Peaceful.
A chaste smile envelopes his soft features. “Ceylon green tea has strong antiviral and antibacterial qualities. Its fragrance is stronger than sencha, and the taste, too, is exquisite. The presence of antioxidants increases neural activity and enhances memory, allowing for greater concentration. It also has thermogenic properties, which stimulate oxidation and boosts metabolism.”
The man takes a sip, nodding at the aftertaste. “The vegetal aroma and slight bitterness is refreshing.”
“Yes, father,” Kaneki agrees. “That is largely due to antioxidants preventing wrinkles and aging of the skin.”
A moment of quiet lapses as the noises around them continue on, unperturbed. The snapping of the bamboo fountain in the backyard, the trickling of water that descends into a stone pond, the small rippling of waves following the trails of red and white koi - splotches of paintbrushes hiding in the depths.
Kaneki rests his hands on his lap. In this household, men dress in yukata while the women adorn simple versions of kimono. Tradition defines and conformity commands; one who does not obey is reprimanded and punished until they learn it from the welts in their flesh. In a highly respected household like this, with a stake in the Japanese government and power from old money, these rules and strict regulations do not tolerate change.
The man earns the living, the women cook, clean, and take care of the children, and the children study hard to be the top student. Sometimes the pressure to succeed is too much, and they break. But for Kaneki, who’s always been a bookworm of some sort, he doesn’t mind. Books are a part of him, after all.
“Hide has married?”
Kaneki nods. His fingers press into his lap, kneading. “Yes, father.” He’s been dreading this. “The ceremony was held last week.” Flashes of the event in his mind, the pink petals and thrown bouquet, white suit and happy smiles all around. “Hide and Yoriko-chan looked incredibly happy.” He smiles down at the blue texture of the yukata. “I’m glad. Hide deserves someone like Yoriko-chan. They’re like a pair of vibrant flowers, a match of sunflowers and daisies coming alive. They were glowing.”
His father chuckles, the wrinkles of his eyes crinkling behind his glasses. “Hide has always been a bright child. When you two are together, it is like the clash of yin and yang itself. The sun and moon, each illuminating in different ways while coexisting in harmony. I thought for sure - ‘ah, this child will drag my Ken into plentiful of merry trouble.’ But, as Socrates once said, ‘The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.’ I knew nothing but the judgment I placed on Hide, which I have regretted until now. Strange, is it not? The child who I patronized would be the same young man dropping by every two weeks with a delivery of homemade ricecake.”
A soft smile spreads over Kaneki’s face. How nostalgic. “Hide...he’s always put me as his priority, taken care of me even though we’re already adults, and stayed by my side for so long, despite the problems I bring. I think…” his voice trails. It’s hard to admit, sometimes, the truth. Because more often than not, it hurts. “I think it’s time that someone takes care of him in return.”
Because he’s not the right person. Not at all.
Seventeen years.
That’s how long he’s known Hide. Before he’s noticed, it’s surpassed both his left and right hands. He used to keep count of the changing years as they pass, and with each new year, he’d smile as a closed finger lifted to join their standing kins. “There we go. We’re still friends.” Add a small, contented smile.
At some point, he’d stopped counting. Maybe it was getting a little tiresome. Maybe he grew up. Or maybe he started to take their friendship for granted.
“You have not visited the household as of late, Ken.” His father looks at him inquiringly. The tea, temperature dulled to a lukewarm state, is set to the side. “As the future head of the house, I expect you have been preparing for the inheritance.”
“Yes, father.” Kaneki bows his head. His knees are starting to feel the effects of being locked into a position, aching. “I apologize. Please excuse my rudeness.”
His father nods, pushing something forward. A picture frame. “What do you think?” he asks.
Kaneki looks down at the photo. The woman in the frame is no doubt -
“Beautiful.” It slips his mouth. He blushes, and his father chuckles. “She is very beautiful.” But cold. Her expression is penetrating and aloof, and the small smile on her face forced and unnatural, an obvious guise for the picture. A no-nonsense kind of expression. Probably a couple of years older than him.
“Would you like to meet her?”
It’s a miai after all. A tradition in which unattached individuals age ranges twenty up to thirty are introduced to each other with the hope of getting married.
“I - “
No. It’s on the tip of his tongue, but he can’t say it. He has never disobeyed his parents. When was the last time he said “no” to them? He tries to do everything he can to not bring shame. Be the number one student, get the highest grades, play classical instruments, excel, read high level English literature - Kafka and Nietzsche preferred - while his classmates were still learning the vowels. It’s always “yes, father” and “I will do my best, mother.” Children don’t disobey their parents in this household. They do what is right, not what is desired, for the sake of the family name.
“But where’s your self worth, man? If you keep letting others decide your future, you won’t be able to chase your dreams. What do ya wanna do, Kaneki? If you had a choice, I mean. If you didn’t have to lie about it.”
“I - I would…”
“Ken,” the gentle but firm voice brings him back to the present. “This woman is the daughter of the chairman of Mado Corp. You understand, do you not? The importance of this decision.”
He knows it. Of course he knows. The heiress of Japan’s multimillion bank, which even the government owes money. Mado Akira. There’s no way he can turn her down. Just what will happen to their family name if he does?
“Just think about it, Kaneki. Think hard. If you’re truly happy and willing to give up your dreams for your family, then why do you look so sad?”
“Hide, I - “
“If you have no objections, Ken, I will take it as a sign of acceptance. You will make the family proud.”
“All I want to do is...play the piano and read books.”
It’s bubbling up his throat; he’s so close to blurting the truth, can see in his mind the shock on his father’s face, can hear the disappointment in his voice, can feel the stifling tension in the air. His clammy hands, covered in cold sweat. He doesn’t ever want it, it’s too painful - being a disappointment to his father.
“I don’t need a lot. If I earn enough to pursue my hobbies, then that’s all I ask for. But once I take over the household, I’ll have to give it up. I won’t have time to perform anymore. Instead, I - I’ll have to…”
Live in immorality.
There’s a stinging sensation in his back, a tingling burning under his flesh all the way up his spine to his shoulder blades. His skin is alight; it remembers the way the needle pierced into him, over and over as it colored in its design, remembers the way the candlelight flickered and danced as he held in his utters of pain.
“Then tell them. Directly, because no one can do it but you. You should be selfish for once, ‘neki.”
“Now that that is settled, I will schedule a time with Mr. Mado for the two of you younglings to meet.” His father smiles. A pleased smile. There is no defiance in his household. “It seems as if just yesterday you were born, yet here you sit before me, the family soon to welcome a new leader. If Miss Akira looks upon you with favor, then your future will be twice as promising. I am proud of you, my son.”
The praise washes over him, but all he feels is dread.
But Hide - I’m not as confident, or brave, as you. I think that I...I’ve been prepared for a long time. We’re no longer children, are we?
“Yes, father.”
-
“Fortissimo! Smooth like the endless river of the flowing Nile, the piano’s every dismal note resounds ah! So! Beautiful! Its somber, reflective melody cascade down into the waterfalls of the passionate Niagara and reaches the dark chasm of my mind - and pulls! A tremolo in my heart, a sorrowful crescendo! Très bien! Ah, truly magnifique you are.”
The extravagantly, shameless man pauses there, long fingers pressed to his model-like face, and inhales deeply. There’s a less than normal glint to his eyes and a delirious curve to his lips. “Calmato, calmato…”
At this rate, Kaneki is one hundred point two percent positive that he’s caught in the right place at a wrong time with a crazy fashionista and a table of judges who are most likely not going to intervene, and that he probably won’t make it out alive.
“You are simply - “ the man spins, twirling around gracefully with a red rose (where did it come from?) attached to his lips - “fantastique! Génial! Talent itself runs in your nimble fingertips; a one in a light year’s talent! Monsieur, what is your name?” He comes close, putting a hand on Kaneki’s shoulder.
“K-Kaneki Ken...sir,” he answers rigidly, glancing at the hand and then back at the inane director. The intrusive hand pats him softly, almost feeling him? Oh my god. Goosebumps.
“Kaneki-kun, is it? Lovely. Oui, what a splendid name it is. Innocent and quaint, like a youthful Beethoven in his prime, playing the masquerade away until his demise. I can taste your potential, Kaneki-kun.” The man leans in, and expensive cologne wafts over him. Kaneki sucks in his cheek to hold back a sneeze. “And I will most definitely eat you.” He smiles, pulling away and snapping his fingers at the panel. “Judges?”
“We approve, Mr. Tsukiyama.”
“Yes, of course. He played Chopin’s nocturne most beautifully.”
Kaneki looks left and right, but there’s not a spark of acknowledgement at the completely illogical and not to mention absolutely illegal statement. D-don’t tell me...it’s normal?! Anyone?
The fashionista twirls back around and drops his waist into a bow. “Welcome to the Tokyo Sous-Marin Symphony Orchestra, Kaneki-kun.”
-
Today 6:15
“I did it, Hide.”
He doesn’t know if he should wait for a response (would Hide be awake to see it?), but the sun is on its way to rise, and he can feel the peek of the breaking light fall on his eyelids. Warm. And he wishes to see it, the sunrise. He feels cozy, wrapped up in the blankets, staring listlessly out the shuttered window.
It’s early.
Lately, he hasn’t been sleeping in the way he used to.
“Congratulations, Kaneki-kun. Or, should I say, Mr. Nagachika?”
Logic tells him to ignore the taunt -- emotions turn him into a ball of comforter and pajamas curled into the safety of his bed.
“That’s a little cruel...even for you, Rize-san,” he murmurs into the abyss, blanket pulled over his head as he presses into the mattress.
He imagines her tinkling laughter, like bells, as she fades into the darkness.
Bzz.
Sometimes, he wishes the darkness can take him, too. Swallow him up and make him company. Leave behind this world of responsibilities and twisted feelings, and vanish into the infinite plane of nothingness.
If the world begins without meaning or purpose, then existence itself is senseless. That is the essence of Friedrich Nietzsche’s existential nihilism. What is the meaning of life? Is it to find happiness? Or is it the product of nature’s desire for survival and death? To be born just to die in vain, to fulfill the prophecy of passionless survival in the name of Darwinism, then, truly, this -
Bzz. Bzz.
The vibrations of the cellphone disrupts the train of pessimistic thoughts. Mornings tend to find him wallowing in the depths of morbid philosophy, and he’s glad to be shaken off it.
Kaneki picks up the buzzing mobile.
Hide
6:18
“Stay there for a sec brt!!!”
‘Brt...’ be right there?
Huh. Kaneki cocks his head, tired eyes emotionless, and the blue screen reflects in the dark of his irises.
Another buzz, and a new message:
Hide
6:22
“Open your blinds and look out the window.”
Kaneki gets out of bed and heads over to the window, pushing up the blinds and the pane, meeting the open air of the morning. He winces; it’s brighter than he thought.
“Hide?” he mumbles, looking down the seventh floor of the apartment complex to see the blonde waving up at him. He’s carrying something in his arms. It’s hard to see far without his contacts.
Hide’s hands are around his mouth as he shouts, “Mornin’! Close your eyes for a sec, and open them when I tell you to! Ready?!”
Kaneki doesn’t bother to protest - history’s taught him that nothing will stop Hide from being obnoxiously cheery in the morning. He closes his eyes, waiting, a smile resting on his lips.
A loud “Now’s the time!” from below has him blinking up at the blue sky, sun coming out from behind the clouds, and seeing a giant bundle of balloons flying up past his window. He instinctively reaches out and manages to catch the fleeting tail of one, but it slips through his fingers, joining the rest of its colorful kins in their deserving skies.
They’re not meant to be captive.
Bzz.
Hide
6:24
“Grats man! I knew you could do it :D”
If you keep letting others decide your future, you won’t be able to chase your dreams.
There’s something wrong with him, isn’t there? His eyes feel like they’re burning, and his nose stuffed, and those are tears, definitely tears, threatening to leak. Those balloons - they’re just like the ones that Hide was always drawing, back when they were kids.
They remind him of their childhood.
“Hide!” He leans out the open window, and the latter dips backward, looking up at him with a silly grin, hands in his pockets.
“Yeah?!”
Kaneki smiles. If they were just like those balloons, with the freedom to traverse the skies as they wish. With all the time in the world, then maybe, just maybe, he and Hide would…
6:27
“I’m getting married, too.”