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#EBDCC4 was the color the paint chips in the little sandwich baggie he’d taken to the store read. It wasn’t really necessary, not really, to touch up the paint in the rental he was moving out of that next week. Much less with how few spaces needed it in the unit. But Yu figured it wouldn’t hurt to keep a pint in his things. Most of the apartments hed lived in had the same tone of white on their walls, and he liked to make things nice for whoever came after him.
It took only a couple of swipes to get rid of the little nicks and chips in the paint around the house. Places where he’d failed to be careful, places the movers bumped with furniture on their way out.
The big issue was his fault, a space on the wall near the door. A habit he’d also failed to break himself of. When he took off his shoes, he’d often reach out to steady himself on the wall, over time it’s worn away a dark patch where his skin oils stripped off the paint a few feet off ground.
He liked to make things nice for the person who came after him, and so he cleaned the wall where he’d touched it and painted over the patch. Soon enough, once the paint dried, there would be no evidence he was ever there at all.
That thought made him happy, that the unit would be just like new for the people who lived here after him.
He wondered what they would be like, would they be a family? Mother, father, child, would they plan to stay? Hang posters not with tape but with tacks, nail picture frames to the wall? Buy art that didn’t complement the furniture? Would they live there long enough to etch little notches in the doorframe to track birthdays?
It didn’t matter, it’s not anything he’d get to see, and it didn’t effect him in any way, but he was happy, none the less, to leave the house without having left a trace.
-
He has stuff, he knows he does because he has to pack it every so often to move, so he knows he has things. But it’s hard to remember where each thing came from, sheets and desk trendy and modern and smooth. Once upon a time he’d packed the flowers given to him by his classmates, names and faces all too distant and numerous to remember, but they never lasted, even when dried they’d crumble in the process. Eventually he’d stopped taking them from the school all together.
But this thing, that Nanako gave him, a little pair of training chopsticks she thought he may need when he moved in, they were different.
They had weight, they were real, not something he could toss and replace when he needed to.
He didn’t feel like he should keep it, it wasn’t right, they belonged to someone, they should belong to someone.
But…it’s not that bad to hold onto them until he is someone, right? Until someone real moves in, until someone worthy steps up and takes the wheel. He bargains with himself, reasons until he decides to hold onto them, keep them until whoever comes next decides what to do with them. They sit propped up against the wall on the shelf he can see from his bed.
-
This year was turning out to be…different.
The murders, weird dreams, rumors of something sinister on the TVs at midnight.
It wasn’t difficult placating the strong personalities around him, he just had to nod when appropriate, listen well, surround himself with good friends for whenever he’d get to step back and whoever would come after would take the reins.
Set things up, nice and tidy for when he left.
He wondered, from time to time, what to do if he was wrong somehow. If the day never came where he would wake up and be that person, someone clearheaded and ready to face adult life, with a want for a sensible job and a wife and a kid. Someone in finance who likes white walls and modern art and can make the right amount of eye contact. What happens if that day never comes and he’s set everything up for nothing? He’s wasted his life sleeping in a guest room when the master bedroom he’s set up in neutrals remains empty? What if there is no next tenant and no landlord to check to make sure he’s not painting the walls?
But what happens if there is? And he hangs the wrong painting or the mattress is too soft or the music too low and he’s wasted all his time making things comfortable for himself and he’s got to move again?
The risk is simply too high to consider it. So he’ll wait until the day, get things nice and comfortable for whoever comes after, go with the flow to make good friends and find a pretty wife and do good in school and
-
The tub of scar cream sat heavy in his hands as he reads the instructions in the junes bathroom.
It was his own fault, really, he made a mistake while fighting Yukiko’s shadow, and got a cut along the back of his arm, where the soft inner skin meets the rough outer skin of his arm.
It’s really his own fault, he should have been more careful.
But what’s done is done, and now he’s got the tools he needs to fix it.
He likes to leave things nice for whoever will live here after him.
-
When he first met Yukiko, he thought, really a foolish thought, that she might be like him, not real. A placeholder, a stock photo in a frame waiting for someone to put a real picture in its place.
He can’t say he feels that way after meeting her shadow. But she’s leaning into him more and more and she’d probably make a pleasant wife for whoever picks up where he left off.
He gets the feeling she’s looking for a mannequin husband to prove to the world she’s being a good daughter too, so the deal would work for her as well.
Neither of them would ever speak to their preference for brunettes.
He thinks they could be happy if not in love.
But she’s stronger than him, and quickly her sparks are catching and she’s leaving him in the smoke and dust as she makes progress on burning her inn to the ground and building the house she wants to live in.
He can’t say he’s convinced himself to take a chance and paint his own walls even when the very existence of his multiple persone prove enough to himself. he’s not enough of a person to fill the space required of him. So he’ll just pretend to be one of them for a while longer.
-
“Do you like them?” Kanji asks him while the gang are hanging out at his mothers shop. It’s a pair of earrings, a micro crochet octopus in purple on each ring.
Yu just blinks at him, unsure what to say,
“Oh they are cute!” Rise chimes in “you should get them! Oh but are your ears pierced?” She asks, and Yu feels like covering them with both hands like a child.
“I could do them for you, I did mine” Kanji offers.
“Oh come on guys, Yu’s not like that, not like you…people” Yosuke says drawing everyone’s attention towards him. it’s light hearted and they don’t really have any heat behind the straw wrappers and jabs they throw at him. but Yu is thankful the attention is off of him.
But it does get him thinking.
Maybe it wouldn’t be too bad, maybe, just a small piercing, wouldn’t matter? That close up over time, it’s not a forever thing. You can take down a poster, even if you have to fill in the holes after.
No, he couldn’t, it’s not his decision to make.
But maybe he could tape a poster up, even if he couldn’t pin it up.
He does buy the earrings, the next day. alone.
Kanjis mother smiles at him as she packs them up and tapes the bag shut.
He brings them home and all but wanders his room wondering what the next step is.
There’s no instructions or lessons on this.
Eventually they’re placed down, cardboard backing leaning against the chopsticks Nanako gave him.
The little sea creatures smile up at him.
If the next tenant doesn’t like them…they can throw them away.
But now they’re vibrant and purple and real and sitting on his shelf.
They make him a little sick.
A little light headed.
A little nauseous.
A little excited.
They make him feel brave.
They make him feel naked.
Like if he put them on everyone would instantly know what he actually was.
Like the empty space that is him was somehow also a nuisance.
Like he’s doing the air around him a disservice by not making it easier to pass though him.
The idea that anyone could look at him and know he likes dangly earrings and harsh colors and little sea critters.
That he likes girl things too.
That he was so selfish as to ruin his future just to show everyone how embarrassing he actually is.
He’d call it dramatic to say that but it feels like it. The moment a house is lived in its value goes down.
The same goes for him.
He never feels like he’ll be wanted, that he’s been on the market for rent for years, for his whole life.
Why must his bones sit empty when he has so much space for warmth and laughter and love beneath his beams.
Why hasn’t his landlord moved in himself?
Why is he sitting empty when someone is willing to buy?
Even if that person is himself?
Why would that be wrong? To want to live in the house you own.
But thoughts like those, are what cause houses to loose so much value it’s cheaper to tear them down and repurpose the land.
So he won’t put any holes in the walls, and they can stay their pristine white.
But if he could see the future, he could see a house with wallpaper and accent walls and things hanging in the windows and little handprints all over the doorframes. And a husband asleep in a recliner and their daughters trying to climb him without rocking it too much.
And he’d see a carpet they badly needs a steam clean but getting dinner on the table and dessert started in the oven is genuinely more important.
And he’d see a jewelry rack in the closet with more tacky earrings than there are days in the year.
He’ll live in a house that he built himself with people who don’t care about resale value.
And he’ll never have to think twice about a thumbtack in the wall except for if the picture will hang straight on it or not.