Chapter Text
“Get lost, Rin. You’re not necessary in my life anymore.”
The words replay in Rin’s mind like a cursed mantra, chipping away at him bit by bit.
He isn’t sure how long he stays out on the pitch, but by the time he stands, his legs are already numb beneath him, and his jacket is soaked through. The snow has already begun to pile all around, hiding the grass under a melancholic sheet of white.
Slowly, he makes his way out. His steps are staggered and unbalanced, and his backpack is forgotten somewhere by the goalpost. It doesn’t matter. He keeps his eyes on the ground. If he squints, he can still see the lines Sae’s suitcase left behind in the snow.
“You make me fucking vomit.”
Rin chokes back the burning sensation in the back of his throat and heads for the train station. If he wanted to, he could just walk back to the house and avoid the train all together. However, he isn’t ready to face his brother once again. Not in front of their parents, so blissfully unaware of the turmoil lying underneath their smiles. He isn’t ready to go home.
Instead, he boards a train heading closer to the seaside.
The train is silent and empty, except for himself and the driver. Instead of looking out the window, he stares at his frostbitten hands. His fingertips are red and burning, yet his palms are icy no matter how much he rubs them together. He’s shivering, but still leaves the train once it reaches its destination. He moves as if on autopilot, like a child wandering aimlessly through a nightmare.
He doesn’t want to go home.
The sea is dreary around this time of night, but the familiarity is comforting. The waves crash against the rocks methodically, but it’s hard to differentiate where one ends and another begins. If it wasn’t for the reflection of the moon across the water, it would have just been a void stretching out into the horizon. The ocean winds are prickly against his skin.
Slowly, Rin sits himself down on the sea wall – the same way he did when he was little. Or rather, whenever he needed time to think. The space beside him is empty, the same way it has been for the past four years. However, this emptiness weighs like iron in his lungs. He can feel his lower lip shaking and his eyes stinging, but it’s just the cold. He won’t allow it to be anything else.
“You’re not worth anything at all.”
The first part of Sae’s sentence is hazy in his mind, but these words cling to his heart like thorns. He would never be able to forget them. Even if he were to bury it in the deepest corner of his mind, it would find its way back as if to mock him. But what hurts the worst is that maybe he’s right.
Maybe these past four years – no, maybe everything before then too – haven’t been worth anything at all. He was just a stupid child chasing after something unattainable. Trying, hoping, pleading desperately to be like someone leagues away. A comet wishing to be a star, a star wishing to be a planet.
Rin sits there for a while, his back against the icy metal railing. He doesn’t care to move, even when the snow begins piling on his head and shoulders. After a few hours, he can barely even feel it anyways. He keeps his eyes on the water and tries to ignore the emptiness festering inside of him.
He thinks back to all those matches, all those awards. What was it all really for? He only started playing because it meant spending time with his brother. He enjoyed the praise and the pride his brother seemed to radiate as they decimated their opponents. Even as Sae rushed ahead, leaving him behind to become the best in the world, he never really minded. Because at the end of the day, they would always be brothers and Rin would always be second-best.
That’s what they promised.
”Maybe you see me as someone special to you. But to me, you’re just an eyesore of an annoying younger brother.”
“How cold…” Rin whispers, his speech quiet and slurred. “I think I might cry…”
But he doesn’t. All the tears may have frozen inside of him. He can’t feel anything at all.
He just sits and waits for the one person who might never come back. The person who went to Spain and disappeared. The one who wouldn’t have said those things to him. The brother who would have taken his hand and bought him a winning ice cream. Could that person really be truly gone?
His eyes feel heavy, and he can barely remember breathing. Is it still snowing? He can hardly tell. He should be cold, but at the same time, everything feels so warm. It’s soothing, and he sinks deeper into the sensation. It’s almost lukewarm. His body, however, remains still.
Everything is so quiet all around. It feels like the entire world is sleeping. Maybe – just maybe – he’s already sleeping too, and this is all just a dream. He hopes it’s a dream.
He’ll talk to Sae about it once he wakes up.