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KID forced down the suffocating panic that seemed to surface any time he looked down at his left hand. At the silver band encircling his ring finger.
He had thought he’d been doing the right thing. Marrying Aoko. Giving her the life she’d always pictured. Always dreamed of.
She loved him for it.
And it made him sick.
The boy that Aoko had been in love with was long gone. Reduced to just another disguise that KID wore like a second skin.
“Kaito? Keiko questioned as she dropped onto the cushion next to the magician.
“Just thinking.”
“About how you’d rather skip the public celebration and get to the private one already?” She asked with a leer.
KID chuckled in response. His and Aoko’s five-year anniversary dinner wasn’t the right place to let the cracks in his poker face show. Not with all of Aoko’s police officer friends in the room.
“I can’t believe you guys don’t have any kids yet.” Keiko continued. And she wasn’t the first to imply they were falling behind their peers.
They weren’t having kids though. KID had seen to that before he’d ever proposed. Before he’d ever hinted that he saw Aoko as more than just a childhood friend. And a part of him hoped it would be reason enough for her to leave him.
She wouldn’t though. Aoko was stubborn like that.
“Is it worth it?”
KID’s head swiveled to the left. Edogawa Conan looked back at him expectantly.
“You mean marriage? Yeah it’s worth it.”
And maybe that had sounded just a little too defensive.
The expression on Conan’s face was placating. And as always, a decade more world weary than it should have been. “Seeing her smile like that is worth your sanity?”
No. “Of course it is.”
Conan’s smile didn’t reach his eyes. It never did anymore.
“We do crazy things for the people we love.” KID expanded. Like lie to their faces. And hope they never find out.
The smirk that found its way to Conan’s lips was a shadow of what it had been when they’d first met 9 years ago. He was tired too. Just as tired as KID was. Of wearing a mask. “You especially, huh, Kaito-niisan?”
If only Conan knew. Knew that Kaito’s entire life was a lie. But he didn’t. Not even Jii had realized that Kaito was gone. And all that remained was KID. “Now why would you say that?”
Conan’s expression softened, his voice quiet. “Because it’s true.”
“Okay…?”
Conan turned his head to scan the room, acting like the bored teen he was supposed to be. “None of this makes you happy.” He explained as he rested his chin on the palm of his hand. “And she doesn’t see it.”
She doesn’t see me, KID corrected in his head.
“Doesn’t see you.” Conan echoed aloud.
“It doesn’t matter.”
“You plan to keep living a lie then?”
So, Conan did know. “We do crazy things for the people we love.” KID repeated.
“Loved.”
Ah. So, Conan knew that too. “Aren’t you a little young to be so jaded?”
Conan raised an eyebrow. A roll of his eyes telling KID to stop playing dumb. He couldn’t though. Not here. Under fluorescent lights. Surrounded by fake friends.
“It’s amazing isn’t it?” Conan questioned, his eyes unfocused as he stared into an imagined distance. “Larger than life and not afforded the chance to have one.”
KID would have liked to argue with that. He had a life. He just wasn’t sure who was living it anymore.
Conan’s fingers laced together behind his head as he leaned back. “You could change that though. If you wanted to.”
KID didn’t have an answer to that. He couldn’t allow himself to have an answer to that. As close to breaking as he already was. Hope wasn’t a luxury he could afford. He’d chosen his lot in life. Chosen her happiness over his. And his vengeance over hers.
“It’s not like either of us have anything truly tying us here anymore.”
KID blinked. That wasn’t true was it? Conan had friends and the Mori’s were practically family to him now. Weren’t they? “Your sister would be sad to hear you say that.”
Conan’s mouth twisted in disgust. A micro expression that no one else would notice. “She spends all our time together comparing me to Shinichi-niisan when he was my age.”
Ah. Shinichi. The name that Conan had used before fate dealt him bad hand. Left him trapped in a cage of flesh and bone. His, yet not his. Just like KID. They really were two of a kind, weren’t they? “So, you’re planning on leaving?”
Conan seemed to brighten, turning to KID with an air of excitement. It only felt half faked. “I’ll be going to college soon.”
Ah. So, Shinichi had an out.
KID didn’t.
“You should come with me.”
KID felt his eyes widen just a touch. Was Shinichi actually asking him to…
Oh. That’s right. KID didn’t have a life to give up. Kaito did though. And Aoko would be the one to suffer for it. “I can’t.”
But gods did he want to.
Conan’s expression fell, not into disappointment, though that was there too, but into acceptance. “I knew, but I still had to ask.”
KID’s hand shot out, grabbing the teen’s wrist as he started to stand. Shinichi hadn’t said the words, but KID knew this was a goodbye. The final one. Once ‘Conan’ left, he was never coming back. He couldn’t. Shinichi was going to find a place to start over. Find a place where they called him by his name and not an alias.
“KID?” Shinichi breathed.
And KID broke.
He couldn’t lose the only person in the world that knew him. The real him.
Civilian identity be damned. Because Aoko had friends. And family. And all that KID had was this one last chance.
Otherwise… All he’d be left with was the lie. The lie he’d been living for over a decade. That made him feel more artificial than alive.
“When do you leave?” KID questioned, tacking on a “for college” as an afterthought.
And as he looked into Shinichi’s eyes, he knew he was making the right decision. Because Aoko had never looked at him like that. Like he was her safe haven. Her salvation. The way he wanted to look back at Shinichi, if only he could still remember how.