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Yusuke didn’t get a lot of mail. Well, any mail really. His friends just texted him if they wanted to talk, and there was no one else he really needed to talk to anyway. He always had been a solitary person, after all.
Then, one particularly drab morning, while he was running late for class, the dorm supervisor stopped him. He handed over a nondescript, cream envelope, saying “A letter came for you yesterday.”
“Who’s it from?” asked Yusuke, taking the letter from his hands.
“I don’t know,” he replied, with a shrug. “The school isn’t allowed to read any letters that are sent to our students.”
“Oh. Thank you anyway,” said Yusuke, chewing on his lip absentmindedly. Something about the handwriting was familiar, almost recognizable, but he found himself unable to put a name to it. He searched his mind, trying to figure out who might have sent him such a letter. Natsuhiko, perhaps? He had promised that he would write to Yusuke eventually...
“Aren’t you late for class?” said the dorm supervisor, checking his watch with a raised eyebrow. “I’d hurry along if I were you.”
Yusuke stuffed the letter into his bag and made his way to class, hoping he wouldn’t be late. Soon, the letter was left, forgotten in the vestiges of his backpack.
Later that day, while he was eating dinner with his friends in Le Blanc, he was rooting through his bag trying to find a sketch of Red Hawk from Neo Featherman, which he had done in art history class instead of paying attention to the lecture. He wanted to show it to Futaba, thinking that she would like it.
He had been correct in his assumption; Futaba had been delighted by the drawing. She snatched up the drawing from his hands, while Makoto gently reminded Yusuke that that school was important and that he should, in fact, pay attention in class.
On the other side of Yusuke, Ryuji leant in and swiped the letter from where it lay on the table - it had been pulled out while Yusuke was hunting through his backpack - brandishing it like a weapon.
“What’s this? A love letter?” he teased. “Do you have a secret admirer that you haven’t told us about or something?”
Yusuke shook his head, still trying to wrestle the sketch from Futaba’s hands. “It’s not like that. My dorm supervisor gave it to me this morning. I don’t know who it’s from. Futaba, give me back my drawing!”
“A likely story,” scoffed Ryuji, tearing open the envelope and pulling out the enclosed letter. “Let’s see what it says…”
He trailed off as his eyes swept over the letter’s contents, horror growing in his eyes by the second. “What the fuck…”
“Huh? Is it creepy?” asked Ann. “I’ve gotten some love letters like that before, believe me.”
“No,” muttered Ryuji. “It’s from… It’s from Madarame.”
Yusuke felt his blood run cold in his veins. When did his hands start to shake so much? He felt sick.
“From Madarame?” hissed Ren, disdain evident in his voice as he cast a pitying glance towards Yusuke. “I can’t believe he’d actually do that to you.”
“What does that sick bastard want?” said Haru, her usually sweet, kind voice becoming harsh.
“Let me read it,” said Yusuke, holding out a shaking hand. Ryuji handed it over silently. Yusuke read through the letter, rage building up inside him with every word.
Madarame was begging Yusuke for forgiveness. He claimed he had done nothing wrong. He wanted to meet up once he got out of jail. He wanted to reconnect. He wanted Yusuke back, studying under him again.
It took everything Yusuke had to resist the urge to tear the paper right in half.
How dare he? How dare he insert himself back into Yusuke’s life? Why now, when he finally felt that he could live without him? When he was finally getting better, little by little, with the help of his friends? When he finally had some semblance of normalcy after everything in his life was upended and changed all at once?
Ren stared at Yusuke, his gaze unshifting. “You’re not seriously considering going back, right? After everything he did to you?”
Yusuke shook his head vehemently. “No. I don’t think so. It’s just… You wouldn’t understand. I still care for him…”
There was a slight pause while Ren considered his next words, before he spoke again. “Everyone, raise your hand if you have or had at some point an abusive, absent or dead father.”
Yusuke watched as every single one of his friends raised their hands – some more sheepishly than others. “I had all three,” said Haru dryly, with a smidge of wit in her voice, as Ann gave her a sympathetic pat on the shoulder.
“See,” said Ren coolly. “We’re practically the daddy issues club over here.”
Futaba giggled “I like that,” she said, opening her laptop. “I’m changing the name on our website to ‘The Daddy Issues Club’.”
At that statement, Makoto reached over, taking the laptop from Futaba. “You have now lost laptop privileges,” she stated.
“I wasn’t actually going to do it!” exclaimed Futaba, scrabbling to pull her beloved laptop from Makoto’s grasp, while Makoto held it just out of her reach.
Ren rolled his eyes at his friends’ antics. “My point is: we get it. We do. You don’t owe him shit. You can do whatever you want with that letter. Keep it. Burn it. Reply. Whatever. But that has to be your choice – what you want to do – and not what you think he wants. You owe him nothing, remember that.”
Yusuke nodded slowly, taking in Ren’s words. “I think I want to reply,” he said at last. “Call it closure, I suppose.”
“Okay, as long as that’s your decision.”
“We’ll help you if you want,” offered Makoto, pulling a sheet of pristine lined paper from her satchel.
“Dude, do you just keep lined paper in your bag or something?” asked Ryuji, half impressed and half annoyed.
“Of course,” replied Makoto. “You never know when you might need it.”
“Do you have a pen?”
“Yes?” said Makoto hesitantly, taking a pen out of her pencil case. Ryuji snatched the pen and paper from Makoto’s hands, popping the cap off and scribbling on the paper in his signature messy handwriting.
“Dear Madarame,” he began, reading everything he wrote aloud. “You are a massive fucking twat and you traumatized me way more than you think. I will never forgive you for that shit.”
Yusuke was about to object, when Ryuji held up a hand, stopping him. “Don’t give any of that ‘it wasn’t so bad’ bullshit Yusuke. What happened to you was seriously traumatic, you’ve just been gaslit into believing it wasn’t.”
Yusuke blinked. “I hadn’t thought of it like that…”
“Yep. That’s what gaslighting does. It manipulates your memories and opinions of what really happened. That’s like manipulative parenting 101,” explained Ryuji, chewing on the end of the pen Makoto had given him.
Makoto grimaced. “You can keep that pen after this Ryuji,” she said. “I’m not sure I want it anymore.”
“Oh, thanks,” replied Ryuji. “I needed a new pen actually.”
Makoto rolled her eyes. Ignoring her, Ryuji continued to scribble. “I haven’t got anything else to say to you,” he continued. “You can burn and rot in hell for all I care. Fuck you. From Yusuke.”
“Well, that was… excessively aggressive,” said Makoto, handing Yusuke another sheet of paper and a different, clean pen. “ I think Yusuke should be the one to write it. This is his fath- This is Madarame we’re talking about, after all. It’s only right.”
“Yeah,” said Futaba. “Give it a go Inari.”
Yusuke nodded, picking up the pen, and began to write.
***
A few weeks later, Madarame received a letter. Pleased that Yusuke had finally outgrown his petulance, he turned the envelope over to open it and was greeted by a tiny doodle of a long-haired girl. A small arrow next to the drawing labelled her as ‘Futaba’. He assumed that it been drawn by this girl. He scoffed at her subpar artistic skills, opened the letter and began to read.
Dear Madarame,
Writing this letter was hard as I find it difficult to separate everything I feel about you. You are polarizing and confusing. I miss the good parts of you, and I fear the bad parts of you as well. Even so, you hurt me. I know you won’t acknowledge that and I have come to terms with that fact, but that doesn’t make it any less true.
People talk about forgiveness like it’s a cure all for recovery but I don’t think that’s true. I don’t think I will ever forgive you for what you did to me – to my mother – and that’s okay. I don’t owe you my forgiveness and you don’t deserve it.
As for your proposal, I will never come back to you. I will never put myself through that pain and suffering again. You burned that bridge years ago and I hope you understand that. I will be filing for a restraining order when you get out of prison. Should you break that restraining order I will report you without hesitation, nor regret.
Yours sincerely,
Yusuke Kitagawa.
Madarame growled, scrunching up the paper into a ball. Even his prized student had abandoned him. He truly had no-one left.