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After Egypt, Holly could breathe more easily, but the air still weighed down upon her shoulders heavily. Mama and Papa didn’t stick around. They stayed long enough to make sure she recovered fully, and that she had a direct line of communication with the Speedwagon Foundation, but said they had other business to attend to back home. Based on the looks her parents gave each other in the midst of fussing over her, Holly thought their departure was ultimately for the best.
Jotaro hadn’t left his room since coming back. While her own parents kept her in place, noticing the lack of his presence was the bare minimum. Whenever she asked about her son, Mama only smiled and told her that she raised a strong boy. Papa would say that he had been talking to him. He never elaborated, but Holly trusted his judgement. Her father was full of life experiences, good and bad; he was more equipped to help her son right now.
While Papa had left out most of the important details, Holly got the gist of what had happened in their absence. They had been on a difficult journey, not only to save her, but also the world. Over the course of this journey, they had successes and failures. Three of them had lost their lives.
The house felt empty without her parents around, and with Jotaro alone in his room. As lonely as she felt, she wouldn’t push him. Instead, she busied herself with a few changes. The first, and most notable, was that she set up a station for Star Platinum to come and take things from. She knew from experience that the stand would go to any lengths to keep Jotaro going strong, so Holly made it easy. Any time she cooked a meal, she would set out a serving for Jotaro. Along with meals, she prepared his favorite snacks, fresh clothes, some magazines, and some books. It wasn’t often that she crossed paths with Star Platinum, but any time she did, she blew the stand a kiss. If she couldn’t embarrass her son with a kiss each morning, she had to get innovative.
Twice a day she found herself knocking on her son’s door lightly. Holly didn’t know her son’s sleep schedule, so she tried to cover as much ground as she could. He never responded, but she held herself back. Jotaro deserved time and space to process what had happened. Holly only needed him to know that he wasn’t alone.
“Good morning, Jotaro. I’m going to make breakfast soon.”
...
“Goodnight, Jotaro. I’m heading off to bed now. Come find me if you need anything.”
Holly spent a lot of time on the phone with the Speedwagon Foundation. In terms of her own recovery, she had regular check-ins with the doctors who had been working with her. She kept them up to date on her physical and emotional state, as well as news about her stand. Post-Egypt, Holly had gained a new sense of strength, which included the ability to manifest her stand properly.
It was amusing, to see the similarities between stands in her family. Much like Papa’s stand, Holly’s appeared to her as vines. Her stand didn’t have the ability to take spirit photos, at least, not at her current level of power, but she often found her stand opening cabinets to set spices on the counter while she cooked. A part of her hoped that she was the reason why Star Platinum was so helpful to Jotaro.
The Speedwagon Foundation had told her about the lie they were feeding Jotaro’s school. Apparently when the lie first began, she had been completely knocked out from her fever. Holly felt a bit embarrassed that truancy officers visited her home while she was completely incapacitated, but the Speedwagon Foundation proved more than effective in many ways. As far as the school knew, Jotaro was working with the Speedwagon Foundation, as part of some work-study program. They apologized profusely for not having the paperwork properly filed, and produced enough documents that the school just took their word for it without a fight.
At the moment, they were pushing to get Jotaro more time for his college entrance exams. The dates were approaching quickly, and Holly could guarantee her son wasn’t spending all day studying.
Those first few days she didn’t have much to tell them about Jotaro. The food disappeared from the station near his room regularly. Occasionally the neatly folded uniform would be replaced by a ball of dirty clothes.
“Jotaro,” she began, knocking on the door. “I’m not going to force you to talk to me, and I’m not going to force my way into your space. I just need you to know that I am here if there is anything you need. If you want to see your father, or your grandparents, or any classmates, I can get through to them. If you want a counselor, I can work with the Speedwagon Foundation to get one who will understand. You can take your time, honey.”
She paused, counting the seconds. Without an answer she turned to walk away, just hoping that Jotaro was awake and lucid enough to hear her. Holding in a sigh, she hefted up the laundry pile and made her way out. Maybe it was her ears playing tricks on her, but Holly relaxed upon hearing a muffled “okay, bitch” from the opposite direction. Progress took time.
Most mothers would take offense to Jotaro’s language, but Holly never really minded. She admired her son’s strength and compassion. There was nothing wrong with the ways he chose to express himself. Plus, she knew she came on too strong with her affection as a mother. It wouldn’t be as fun without the push back. An honored Joestar (and now Kujo) tradition was teasing the heck out of your family members. Papa was notorious for messing with anyone who so much as breathed near him.
After that interaction, things got better. Jotaro still didn’t leave his room, but he responded to Holly’s greetings. Sometimes he even left his door open a crack. As much as Holly appreciated Star Platinum’s help, she took the time to deliver meals directly to her son on those occasions. She knocked gently at the partially open door.
“Jotaro, I made lunch.”
“Thanks.”
Holly set the tray of food down to open the door just enough to pass through. She ignored the mess and gave Jotaro a gentle smile, careful not to send any pity his way. He looked like hell. Holly brought the food into the room and sat down, gesturing for him to join her.
Reluctantly, he sat across from her, hiding bloodshot eyes behind his hat. Holly took initiative in serving portions onto each of the plates. It took a significant amount of willpower for her to not just watch her son eat. She hadn’t seen him eat anything since before the trip, but she couldn’t let her own worries ruin the progress she had made with him.
They ate in silence, neither willing to call upon the elephant in the room. Holly focused her attention on her own plate to the best of her ability. Jotaro finished before Holly did, muttered a ‘thanks’ and returned to laying down.
“Of course, Jotaro. I’m always happy to spend time with you.” She replied with a smile as she began to place dishes back on the tray. Holly took her leave and left the door cracked open as it was earlier.
As the two began to share meals more often, Holly acted more boldly. She made small efforts to tidy the room, pretending that it was simply for setting up their food. Instead of eating silently, Holly made small talk. She filled the space with local news stories and recipes she heard about from neighbors. The most risky gambit involved acting as if she had forgotten something in the kitchen and asked if Jotaro could get it for her. He grumbled in response, but it got him up and walking around the house.
With a more active and present Jotaro, Holly made bigger plans. She worked around his sleep schedule, only asking him for help around the house when she knew he would be awake enough. He never took up her offers to go shopping, but she didn’t expect him to. The offer was symbolic, a reminder that his presence was wanted, not unlike the message of capability coming from her other requests.
One day, a photograph fell out of a coat she had been preparing to wash. She examined the Polaroid, only to see Jotaro, Papa, Papa’s friend Mr. Avdol, the boy from Jotaro’s school, another man, and a dog posed in the desert with smiling faces. Noticing the edges of the photograph seemed a bit worn, Holly retrieved her sewing supplies to take some measurements before finishing up the laundry. She left shortly after, determined to find a frame to protect it.
Not telling Jotaro that she had taken the photograph with her had been a mistake. By the time she came back, both his room and the laundry room were in shambles. “Have you seen a Polaroid around here, bitch?” Jotaro asked, clearly distressed, but hiding his face under his hat.
Holly blanched, and tried her best to diffuse the situation. “Ah, I’m so sorry, Jotaro. I saw the photo fall from your coat pocket while I was doing laundry, and I wanted to get a frame for it. It’s a nice photo and it clearly means a lot to you; it deserves to be in a frame. I should have told you what I was doing.” She reached into her bag, producing the photo encased in a blue frame.
He took the photo from her gently and examined it in the frame. The signs of anger and distress on his face faded into fondness and heartbreak. Holly tried to find the words, but her son’s vulnerability was almost alien.
Jotaro sat down, still focused on the photo. “I saw the old man die. We revived him, after everything, but I watched the life leave his eyes. I watched Hermit Purple disintegrate. I didn’t have time to think about it. The enemy was still trying to kill me.”
“Jotaro...” Holly sat beside her son, offering a comforting touch on his shoulder.
“In the ambulance, the doctors from the Speedwagon Foundation told me it was impossible to save him. I didn’t listen to them. I don’t know what I would have done if I had been wrong.”
“Sometimes I think you’re just like him,” Holly mused. “You’re both so brave, but you worry too much about things you can’t control. I don’t know if your grandfather told you this, but he lost a friend when he was young.”
“Caesar.”
“Mhm. When your grandfather was young, everything went by so fast. There wasn’t even time to truly mourn his friend. Once the grief hit, it hit hard. I remember being a little girl and hearing him talk about the regrets he had.”
“...” Jotaro stayed silent, so Holly continued.
“Loss is hard to deal with. I know it must feel irrational to you that you’re running through these scenarios, knowing that you made some close calls and have regrets. You don’t have to face these feelings by yourself, Jotaro.”
“The other day you mentioned the Speedwagon Foundation.”
Holly nodded. “Mhm, I talk to them regularly.”
“Have they told Kakyoin’s parents what happened?”
“Ah, I haven’t heard about that. I’ll ask them the next time I call.”
“If they haven’t, I want to be there. It would be one less thing to regret.”
She covered her son’s hands with her own. “I will do my best to arrange it. And even if the family already knows, I don’t think they would mind a visit. He was a friend of yours, you could swap stories and honor his memory.”
Jotaro huffed in response. “Yeah, I just gotta edit out the part where he got fucking brainwashed and tried to kill me.”
The next time Holly called the Speedwagon Foundation, Jotaro was sleeping. While it wasn’t necessarily on purpose, Holly welcomed the coincidence. She would need time to rearrange any bad news she might hear.
“Jotaro has been more active and talkative lately. I think he’s really starting to work through what happened.”
“That’s wonderful, Mrs. Kujo. Is there anything we can help with? We still have counseling services available.”
Holly twirled the phone cord with her finger. “Actually, Jotaro was asking about the Kakyoin family. He was wondering if they knew, and if he could get in touch with them. I think he’s looking for closure.”
“Ah, I see. Let me pull up the file… Noriaki Kakyoin’s parents were told that their son was fatally wounded in the massacre in Cairo associated with senator Wilson Phillips. From what we heard, this was actually caused by DIO, but the general public is not aware of that.”
Holly readjusted the phone against her ear, picking up the notepad and pen her stand presented in front of her. “Do you think I could get their phone number? I think it would be good to get Jotaro to talk with the family.”
After confirming the information, she thanked the Speedwagon Foundation employee on the other end and wished them a good night. She would call the Kakyoin household in the morning.
At breakfast, she withheld the details of her conversation from Jotaro. Holly figured it would be best to tell him after she had heard from the parents, as to not get his hopes up in case they weren’t welcome to visitors. She made haste cleaning up their morning meal and took the phone call on the opposite end of the house.
“Hello, this is the Kakyoin residence,” a voice on the other side of the line greeted.
“Good morning, this is Seiko Kujo. My son, Jotaro, was a classmate of your son. We recently heard of what happened, and we are so sorry for your loss. Jotaro had asked me if we could get in touch with you to talk.”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Kujo, but I don’t understand. Are you saying that your son was friends with Noriaki? He… never really talked about any friends and mostly kept to himself.”
To say that this complicated things was an understatement, but Holly doubled down. “Jotaro was not friends with him for very long, but they were quite close. I welcomed him into my home once after school. Jotaro even has a photo of himself with your son.”
“Immediately after transferring schools, Noriaki ran away. Then after over a month we heard that he was killed in a car accident. This timeline of yours isn’t adding up.”
Holly pulled the phone away from her mouth to let out a sigh before continuing. “I mean no disrespect. Truly, I know you are grieving, and I have no intention of making that more difficult for you. This might not be something I have permission to say, but my son was in Egypt. He was working with the Speedwagon Foundation at the time as part of a work-study program. Jotaro recognized his friend from school, and he wanted to bring him back home. My son feels responsible for the death of your son.”
She paused, taking time to steady her breathing. At this point, it felt like only half of what she was saying was a lie. Holly knew Jotaro felt responsible for everything that happened in Egypt, even though he was just a kid.
A moment of silence passes before the voice on the other line speaks again. “Alright, I believe you. It’s not like this is any weirder than what we already know. Can you bring the photo with you? We’d like to make a copy of it.”
“Of course,” Holly obliged, picking up the pen and paper once more to jot down the address. As soon as she hung up the phone, the kettle went off in the kitchen. Holly looked fondly on the trail of phantasmal vines extended in that direction.
During the next meal she shared with Jotaro, Holly broke the silence early. “Do you think you would be ready to visit the Kakyoin household tomorrow?”
“Sure.”
“You don’t have to be ready if you need more time. I got their address and convinced them to let us visit. The Speedwagon Foundation told them that your friend was wounded in the car accident in Cairo that night. I told them that you were working with the Speedwagon Foundation and recognized him in Egypt as a school friend.”
“Good grief,” Jotaro complained. “Could this get any more complicated?”
“They want a copy of that photo you have,” Holly supplied, picking at the food on her plate.
Jotaro’s whole energy changed after that meal. His nervousness radiated through the house as he made preparations for the next day. Holly made sure to have out fresh clothes for him once more, and set an alarm clock so that they could both get up early.
The look on her son’s face in the morning convinced Holly that Jotaro did not sleep at all. She served coffee and a particularly nutritious breakfast to get them started. Jotaro stayed silent with the exception of a few grumbles.
Soon after, Holly found herself seated at a table across from complete strangers. It felt almost as if she was intruding on the moment as her son spoke to these people about their child. Jotaro asked her to stay, so she did. Holly could hardly keep track of the conversation, but Kakyoin’s parents softened at mentions of cherries and video games, or even something funny about a rock.
Reluctantly, Jotaro produced the photo in its frame. The parents looked over it, and asked questions about the people in the photograph. Holly recognized they were only asking to be polite, but she appreciated it nonetheless. It was good to get Jotaro talking.
“The one in the center is my grandfather, Joseph Joestar. He was close with the founder of the Speedwagon Foundation. Next to him is Jean-Pierre Polnareff. He was in Egypt on business. The man in the back is Mohammad Avdol, a friend of my grandfather. He also… We lost him in the accident. The dog as well. Iggy.” Jotaro explained, hiding his face again.
“And all of you spent time with Noriaki in Egypt?”
“Yes, we were all close. It wasn’t for a long time, but I considered him to be my friend.”
“It’s nice to hear that he had friends…”
The conversation continued back and forth through polite questions and awkward silences, just long enough for tea and a walk to the fax machine to scan the image. It wasn’t a perfect copy, but the parents were grateful just to have something. Jotaro expressed some regrets about not having more photographs of the group together.
After they said their goodbyes, it was Holly’s turn. She might not have been much help during his meeting with Kakyoin’s family, but Holly already had a plan.
“Did you forget where we live, bitch? We’re going the wrong way.”
Holly laughed in response. “No, no, we just have one more stop.”
“Good grief. Haven’t we done enough already?”
She knew Jotaro was exhausted. Who wouldn’t be after airing out the pains he had kept to himself for weeks on end? Even so, the place she had in mind was closer to the Kakyoin household than it was to their own. The aquarium was a rare, but well appreciated destination for Jotaro. Given that it was early in the afternoon, the two of them likely had a few hours of quiet before the other kids would be leaving school.
Jotaro said nothing when they arrived. He simply followed Holly in and watched as she paid the entrance fees. The two of them stood in front of the tanks of fish with no sense of urgency to get through the exhibits. Holly took the time to point out fish that she recognized the name of, which wasn’t many. She made a few mistakes, joking that she had only been testing him when Jotaro corrected her. Occasionally, Jotaro offered up his own commentary on the care recommended for certain species based on how they thrive in the wild.
By the time they made it to the end, the crowd began to thicken, and Holly could tell her son was done. She asked Jotaro to wait by a bench and braved the overwhelming gift shop alone. Most of the items there seemed to be targeted to little kids, but Holly managed to find a photo book that Jotaro might enjoy. The book contained images of the animals from the exhibits, complete with their names and care regimens. With her purchase in tow, she regrouped with Jotaro and they made their way to the exit.
“Thanks, bitch.”
The next day a letter arrived from France, addressed to Jotaro. Holly delivered the letter to Jotaro’s room with lunch. She didn’t expect him to open it in front of her, much less tell her the contents.
“Polnareff is asking how I’m doing. He sent photos of France.”
“Do you want to take some photos to send back?”
Jotaro shrugged, putting the letter back in the envelope. He passed the photos over to Holly. Each was a Polaroid with a date scrawled in the corner and a description on the back. France was a beautiful place. Polnareff sent photos of rivers, flower gardens, statues, bakeries, and more. She wasn’t sure why he thought Jotaro would enjoy this idealized look at the European nation. That was, until Holly noticed that almost every photo shared a similarity. The photos Polnareff sent were all of women in short skirts despite the cold winter weather.
Holly masked her minute annoyance with a smile and handed the photos back. “France looks very lovely. Your friend has an eye for photography.”
Again Jotaro shrugged. He looked like he had something else on his mind.
“Jotaro?” She tried, not wanting to push him into talking.
“Can I have the number for the Speedwagon Foundation?”
Holly relaxed at the request. “Of course! Let me write it down for you.” She got up to find a pen and some paper. After dialing it so often, she had the number memorized, but she double checked against her own copy to be sure.
“There was a kid, Anne. We met her along the way and then sent her back home. I want to know if she made it back,” Jotaro offered, taking the paper from Holly.
“I hope they can help you get in touch.”
“Thanks.”
“Jotaro,” Holly started carefully. “If you call the Speedwagon Foundation, they will probably ask you about school. They’re trying to help you, but you don’t have to answer if you don’t want to.”
“School?”
“College entrance exams are coming up. They want to get you more time to prepare.”
A spark flared behind Jotaro’s eyes that she hadn’t seen since before Egypt. “Tch, Am I just supposed to pretend things are fucking normal now?”
“No. No one expects that of you. There’s a lot of learning and adjusting that I will never be able to understand, and I’m sorry that I can’t understand what you’re going through. You have me despite that. You also have your grandfather and Polnareff, and the whole Speedwagon Foundation. We don’t expect things to be normal, but we expect things to get better.”
“...” Jotaro hid his anger beneath his hat, silent.
Holly reached across to cover her son’s hand with her own. “You don’t have to go to college if you don’t want to, but we don’t want to have the door close on you before you’re ready to make that decision.”
“It should have been me.” Jotaro said, shifting away from Holly.
“Huh?”
“Avdol had his shit together already. Kakyoin’s parents will never understand what they’re grieving. Even the damn dog had aspirations. It should have been me.”
Holly’s heart dropped into her stomach, watching as furious tears streamed down her son’s face. She knew Jotaro blamed himself, but this was new to her. This wasn’t something she prepared for at all.
“None of you deserved to die, Jotaro. It shouldn’t have been any of you.”
“Doesn’t mean I’m still not the worst fucking choice for this. I don’t know how to live anymore. If the others lived, maybe they wouldn’t be fuck ups like me.”
Holly moved so that she sat beside her son, offering him a cloth to clean his face. “You’re not a fuck up.”
Jotaro raised his eyebrows, surprised at his mother’s language, but said nothing.
“You’re grieving a loss that no one should have to go through. That’s hard. No one is going to rush you through it, because it won’t go away. It’ll get easier only with time.”
“It’s not fair,” Jotaro blurted out before cringing at his choice of words. “Good grief.”
“Hey, no, you’re right. It’s not fair. I wish I could make it fair for you.”
“Somehow I feel like the oldest person on the planet and a baby at the same time,” Jotaro grumbled, wiping off his face with the cloth.
Holly smiled. “There’s a lot of expectations about what certain people are supposed to act like depending on their age. I just don’t think that’s true. There’s no shame in feeling emotions.”
A silence passed between them, as Jotaro processed what she said. “Do you think I need counseling?”
“I’m not going to make any big decisions for you, but I think it would help. The counselors with the Speedwagon Foundation are trained for helping people through their traumas, and they will understand the things you talk about much better than a normal counselor who can’t see stands or doesn’t believe in vampires.”
Jotaro handed the cloth back to Holly. She folded it up and picked up the lunch tray to take it back to the kitchen.
“How about I make us some tea and after that we can call? If you want, I can do most of the talking.”
“Thank you, mom.”