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It’s so… quiet, Satoru thinks. He had forgotten what it sounds like without the voices in his head.
Strange, so strange. Satoru couldn’t fathom what he was feeling. Somehow his body felt empty. His limbs, hollow and his chest, so light. Almost like he couldn’t even feel himself breathing.
And yet his soul… his soul felt full. Intact. Pristine. Whatever missing pieces there used to be, they just weren’t there anymore.
For the first time, Satoru was… whole. He didn’t feel the crushing weight of the world’s problems on his chest. It was as if his heart was finally free from the shackles of all the grief and misery he had been carrying with him for years. His mind no longer wandered with grim thoughts. No guilt-tripping. No self-loathing. No shame. No regrets. Nothing.
Is this what peace feels like, Satoru wondered.
His face twitched when he felt something tickle his nose. A feather. No, a leaf. Satoru slowly opened his eyes and saw a young boy in a navy blue yukata staring down peculiarly at him. Satoru stared back, observing the way his black hair falls over just a little above his shoulders. He had this soft gleam in his eyes that sparkled with innocence and curiosity.
“Who are you?” Satoru asked as he got up into a sitting position and realised that he had been laying in a vast meadow.
It looks just like those in the movies, he thought. An endless tract of postcard-green grass that stood as tall as his elbows, festooned with wildflowers in the prettiest shades of pink, purple and yellow. His nose twitches slightly at the sweet scent. Above him, the maya blue sky stretched as far as the eye could see, punched with thick, fluffy clouds.
Satoru hears the gentle song of the river as the chinking and tinkling of water flowed over the gravel bed. He could feel the tender stroke of a cool breeze on his skin and inhaled the calm, earthy scent of rain from the soil.
“Where am I?”
He glanced down at his own clothes and found himself in a coin grey yukata. Satoru turned around and sees the boy getting on a wooden swing suspended from a tree that he swore wasn’t there before.
“Push me!” The boy excitedly grinned as he swayed his little legs.
Satoru blinked at the boy whose eyes crinkled at the edges. Those crescent moon eyes, he thinks. They were the kind that smiled first before the corners of his lips knew to curve upwards. He felt his heart stop.
Could it be?
A smile that was the sunshine and birdsong, the silencing of clocks. Time would stand still and nothing would move beyond the heart that beats in Satoru’s chest when he sees that warm and winsome smile. One that extended to his eyes and into his soul.
“…I’m sorry, what?”
“Push me.” He says again and Satoru complies, albeit confused.
He walked over and stood behind the swing, his palms resting on the curve of the boy’s shoulder blades. It was only then did Satoru notice the pattern of dragonflies on his yukata. He proceeded to propel the boy forward until the swing gained enough momentum to move on its own.
Satoru watched the boy from the side of the tree. His occasional little outbursts of laughter made Satoru’s heart swell. There was just something heartfelt about seeing a young child be so naive, so carefree in a world that seeks to extort suffering and despair. Unfortunately, Satoru couldn’t say the same for himself. He wondered if perhaps a part of him still craved for the childhood he was so quickly robbed of.
Being destined for greatness since birth would sound exciting and promising to any child who knew nothing then of the corruption in a society that only showed great deference and respect to power and authority. But Satoru would eventually learn what it truly meant to be the strongest. A weapon for humanity. A political hassle. A mass of responsibility. A front row seat to a war he never even wanted any part of in the first place. And most of all, it was an incurable loneliness.
They would call him the honourable one. But where was the honour in living a life with no capacity for love?
And yet, there was always someone who taught him to see through all of that. Someone who carried a heart far bigger than himself. A person who always poured more empathy and compassion into others, more than they would show for him. Even when the world was cruel, even when the kindness he had for himself ran out, he never stopped pouring for others. For Mimiko. For Nanako. For the people he called his family. And for the friends they both lost. He had always fought for love. For Haibara. For Riko. And while his means were questionable, at his core, Satoru always knew his best friend had his heart in the right place.
He looked back at the boy and the swing had slowed down, swaying back and forth at a steadier pace. He frowned.
“Hey kid, your yukata,” Satoru pointed out, “It’s on the wrong side. Right over left means you’re–“
His smile faded.
He looked down at himself.
Of course.
The feeling had left almost as quickly as it came. So nimble. So precise. Death comes and it takes and leaves nothing in its wake.
Satoru tried to recall his last moments but his mind would not allow him to. He could only remember it feeling painless. And easy. Almost like drifting off to sleep.
As the realisation hits him, Satoru fell to his knees and his face softened, eyes stinging with tears that threatened to fall.
“Do you… know me?” His breath was shaky, a tinge of hope in his voice.
The boy got up from the swing and walked over to Satoru. His eyes, his lips and his spirit smiled at him, all at once. “Do I know you? Satoru, I’ve waited for you.”
Upon hearing those words, Satoru let out a soft gasp, tears helplessly streaming down his face as he felt the soft, familiar embrace of the very person he had longed for all his life to see again.
“Satoru?”
The boy’s voice was deeper than before and Satoru’s eyes instantly widened. He backed away and sweet, young Geto Suguru was now his own age. He still looked as kind and beautiful as he always had been, in the only way that Satoru remembers him. The years that pass could do nothing for him to forget.
He, whose crescent moon eyes crinkled at the edges. The kind that smiled first before the corners of his lips knew to turn upwards. Time stopped but Satoru’s heart didn’t. Every bit of his beating organ was in reverberation of the man who sat before him. If this was death, then how could Satoru possibly feel more alive?
“Suguru.” His voice breaks. “Oh, Suguru.”
Satoru surged forward into a hug, his arms tightly wrapped around Suguru’s back, too afraid to let him fade away for the third time. Satoru felt his breathing slow down as his head laid in the crook of Suguru’s collarbone, tears staining his yukata.
He felt his heart beat calmly as Suguru’s hands tenderly caressed his back, their limbs just feeding off each other’s warmth. Something that Satoru had for so long ached to feel again.
They pull away, letting their foreheads touch instead. Satoru gazed into Suguru’s eyes that were blacker than the night sky. He had used to feel like he might drown if he looked too hard. But now he knew he didn’t have to hold his breath anymore. He didn’t need to hold back. He would let himself fall again and again into those eyes that had always held him like a galaxy holding its stars.
When a bond of love is forged, the eyes grant free passage to the soul. It was the only reason Satoru could truly see Suguru for who he was. That underneath all the anger and the hatred and the violence, Suguru had always still been his loving, altruistic self. It was the one thing he never changed. And the one thing Satoru would utterly, sincerely and undoubtedly love about him.
Suguru flashed a soft smile as his thumb fondly grazed Satoru’s cheek. “You’re here.”
He smiles back, cradling Suguru’s face. “I’m here.”
Satoru tilted his head and leaned forward, gently pressing their lips together. The yearning that he and Suguru have felt for this moment was tangible in the way they desperately pulled each other close, craving to feel every touch, every fiber of the other’s body. A kiss that fiercely overflowed with years of longing as they impatiently devoured each other’s lips.
As they both pulled away to catch their breath, they pressed their foreheads against each other again, noses touching slightly and faces completely flushed.
“How long have you been waiting to do that?” Suguru asked as they both intertwined their fingers and laid back to cuddle on the soft grass. They would cave into each other’s touch, bodies melting together as if they were always made to fit.
“Too long.” Satoru replies, plucking a daffodil from the grass. He tucked it carefully behind Suguru’s ear and twirled his fingers in his long, silky hair.
A couple of dragonflies whirred around them and Suguru giggled as one landed on his nose. The sound of his endearing laugh struck a chord in Satoru’s heart and he laughed with him. Back in their youth when they could still smile and fool around a little, but now they could smile even wider and laugh even harder than they did when they were alive, an eternity of pure happiness to share with none other than their one and only.
How wonderful it is, to be so helplessly happy and in love, Satoru thinks. And to be completely loved right back.
Satoru realises that he was never afraid of death. Sure the uncertainty was terrifying, but there is comfort in knowing you’ll see the people you love again. To touch them again. To really feel them.
This, he thinks. This is the perfect ending . There was nothing more he could ask for. Satoru had known love and he had known loss, and now he’ll finally know forever.
Suguru raised his eyebrows, interrupting Satoru’s train of thoughts. “You know I’d have to ask, right?”
“Does it matter?”
“You don’t think I should know how you died?”
“I do. And I’ll tell you everything, I promise. But… there is something else more important that I want you to know.” Satoru answered, his fingers brushing Suguru’s hair to the side. “I want you to know that I love you.”
Suguru’s face softened and he squeezed Satoru’s hand in reaffirmation.
“Even when you left, I never stopped. No matter what you did, I forgave you. I just wanted you to come home, you know? And even after you died, I still couldn’t stop remembering you. It had killed me to lose you twice but it killed me even more that despite being gone, I still felt every bit of love that you left behind.”
After all, love is the most twisted curse, isn’t it?
“But you know what?” Satoru whispers, as he rolled over and rested his head on Suguru’s chest. “That love made me strong. You make me strong. You always have.”
“So have you,” Suguru smiled at him reassuringly as he held Satoru’s delicate face in his hands. “We’re two halves of the strongest, aren’t we?”
Satoru nodded, placing his own hand over Suguru’s and bringing it down to his lips where he gently pressed them into the ball of Suguru’s palm.
“I love you forever,” Satoru leaned in, his face hovering above Suguru’s.
“And I’ll love you for even more.” Suguru replied as their lips touched and they kiss in a fit of passion. The way they cradled each other was evident of the devotion that binded their souls.
They say everything ends when you die. But for Satoru and Suguru, their love would carry on endlessly even after death.