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Let me take your hand, I'll make it right
It was like watching the last rays of dusk disappearing under the horizon, leaving behind a land of darkness and secrets. It sent his emotions reeling and his bones shuddered with dolour. Witnessing who he recognized as his childhood self recoiling as far away from 24 year-old Kuroo as possible and curling into himself, shutting down any cognitive function for the both of them from shock.
Void. Dark.... black everywhere. Feeling only the emptiness and each other's presence. How they got here neither one knows, how they'll get out is an even bigger mystery.
It's almost foreign. He nearly doesn't even realize the child is also him. Well, how could he? The child is a walking, breathing proof of all the things that don't make him Kuroo anymore. All the traits that are the farthest from defining him - in fact, he would say it somewhat describes teenage Kenma more than it ever could him. He's spent years correcting himself, finding the person he is, the person he wants to be. The child is the embodiment of everything that he had long left in the past, all that he had gotten rid of.
And maybe i don't quite know what to say
Trembling. A leaf. cold, oh, it's so very cold. How fragile. Not one blow away from caving in, no. More like a culmination of denial away from disintegration. When did he forget? How did he forget? it's awfully blurry, like dropping alcohol on a photograph. Cloudy days have always been his favorite and maybe he knows why now.
What to feel? There's no guidebook around. There's no margins even though there is a boundary. Colossal disparity between them. Two very real beings, living the same life, yet so different. Slowly the ghosts of the past start to haunt him again. The whispers long forgotten start resounding in his skull once again.
What accompanies them is the two things he was desperately running away from
I’m sorry for the way my life turned out
Fear.
I'm sorry for the smile i'm wearing now
Regret.
For the first time i see an image of
my brokenness utterly worthy of love.
But for the first time in his life, he sees himself dealing with these. Both of them are feeling. He feels the dread sink deeper into his muscles as he watches wide-eyed as the child stands still, stops curling into himself and looks around frantically. He's still shaking, he's still soundless. But he raises his head even with the burden right above him. A weight that should crush him if it were a physical manifestation. And that's the thing right, Kuroo knows. He knows because he feels it too, he has felt it too.
It's a solo song, and it's only for the brave
'oh what have i been doing?'
He feels awful. Knowing that the kid had to bear the burden all by himself, to not disappoint. To make sure that he's living in a way that will not make him regret anything. To not live for himself but for this ideal that was spun together by the arachnids of history, of time, of the people who came before.
How could he have forgotten such an unadulterated vitality? Why was he ashamed of the timid, trembling child that he once was when he should be feeling pride, warmth? Why is the child still looking at him with steeling glances as if he were an obscure entity?
A harp's melody.
'I never expected to make it this far'
.....Wait.
An erratic beat
That's it.
He never expected to make it. That's obviously why the child doesn't identify him as himself. Adult Kuroo doesn't exist in his mind. The revelation struck him like lightning. Unforgiving. It broke his heart into tiny, tiny pieces. Scattered here in this- scattered within himself.
He knows what to do now.
We are all misfits living in a world on fire
It all makes sense.
I wanna reach out for ya, I wanna break these walls.
I speak a different language, but I still hear you call
He takes a step forward, to test it. The child takes a step back, panic clear in his eyes that still refuse to stare directly at him. That is it then. His hunch was right, he really has only one way to do this.
yeah you've got a lotta time to act your age,
can't write a book from a single page
He retracts his step and closes his eyes, taking in a deep breath. This is it. The tablecloth slips off the edge. The ribbon is pulled out of the knot. The curtain unveils. The tears are shed in silence. As everything comes back to him, as everything feels real for the first time in the longest time. The worry, the guilt, the loathing is washed. Not away, but washed to a point where the grime, the dirt, the stains are all polished into something new, something entirely different.
it's so dark tonight, but you'll survive, certainly
Somewhere along the way, he became a reflection of the child- curled into himself, trembling, accepting. This part of him, this small, scared part of him the child recognized. The revelation dawned upon him with soft wisps of light. He approached Kuroo instead. Non-calculated steps but never faltering. He put his tiny arms around Kuroo's shoulders, resting his head on top of Kuroo's as Kuroo himself had his head ducked into his knees.
but we never noticed how long it'd been,
got too caught up in the life we were living
Eventually, Kuroo had gathered the courage to look up. He saw a solemn child with the kindest expression he had ever seen on himself. His heart ached. His entire body ached. He gently grabbed onto the child, holding the back of his head and keeping him close. He tearily whispered everything he wanted to tell himself, everything he needed to hear.
You're not alone.
I'll always be right here, forever.
It's okay to be scared, it's okay to feel lost.
Be proud of yourself.
You deserve it.
but I know we've made it this far, kid.