Work Text:
She can smell it, the burnt timber, soaked several times over by intermittent rain. But the sky overhead is clear, the sun streaking through the gaping hole in the rooftop, illuminating all in its path, the dark folds of her subconscious.
Someone else should be here. Wasn’t someone else supposed to come?
She should be crying. Her eyes should feel like ash, her throat scraped raw. But she’s simply kneeling on the ground. The detritus below hurts her knees. Her brother was just here, standing on the scorched rafters, looking for all the world like he could levitate. Like if a bullet were to strike him he could just breeze right past it, unscratched.
But she knows that isn’t true. Of him or anyone else.
The gun in her palm is cold and bright. She presses it to the side of her skull.
Nina gasps awake, then starts sobbing. She can’t help it even if she tried- the edge of sleep fringing her emotions is enough to peel away any of her usual restraint. Her lungs contract in her chest like she’s drowning.
“Nina?” A small, high-pitched voice. Dieter’s come into her room. He’s standing by the side of her bed, so tender and yet so grave, his little face creased with concern. He chews his quivering lip, unsure of what to do. Damnit, she didn’t want him to see her like this.
“Tenma,” she rasps, “get- get Tenma.” The boy nods briskly and obeys, dashing out into the hallway. Everything around her is still greyscale. The sun has not yet risen.
Tenma pushes the door open. She takes a moment to take them in, blurred as they are by her tears- a lanky figure with a smear of dark hair and ridiculous striped pajama pants that she always thinks look two centuries out of date. The mattress dimples under their weight as they come to sit at the foot of her bed. Nina wipes her eye with the back of her hand and she can make out their features more clearly again, down to the first streaks of silver sprouting in their hair, mussed from sleep.
“Can you tell me what’s wrong?” It’s their doctor voice. Nina isn’t sure whether to take this as them being guarded or them simply trying to ease her distress by being matter-of-fact. It can be hard to tell with Tenma sometimes. She doesn’t realize she’s been making a panting haah, haah sound until they put their hand on her shoulder, signaling her to stop. Nina starts shaking under their touch.
“I dreamed I was back at the Red Rose Mansion again,” she rambles, “only- only this time- you didn’t come and get me-” She’s cut off by Tenma abruptly pulling her into their arms. They hold her tight, slender fingers clutching the fabric of her shirt.
“I did get you,” they assure her. “We wouldn’t be here if… Listen, I got you. It’s okay. You’re alright.” It’s every bit as much an affirmation for them as it is for her benefit.
Nina just sobs harder. “This isn’t fair.”
“What’s not fair?”
“I ruined your life,” she cries, “I ruined your life and you just keep saving me. If I hadn’t shot Johan all those years ago, then you would-”
“Be denied the pleasure of knowing you. You’re a wonderful girl, Nina. Nothing that happened to me is your fault.” They thread their hands through her hair, cup her cheeks to make her look at them. “Of course I’ll keep saving you. I’m supposed to. You’re my…” They don’t complete the sentence. Nina doesn’t need them to finish it to know what they would’ve said, or why they didn’t say it. To claim Nina as their daughter is to invite death. That’s just the kind of people she and Tenma are. They radiate destruction in every word and action.
Tenma’s hand creeps back up to stroke the back of her neck, thumb smoothing out the soft vellus hairs. On a whim, they press a quick kiss to her forehead. Nina barely feels it, the lightest brush of their lips. “Do you think you’re going to go back to sleep?”
Nina shakes her head. Even if she did, there would be no comfort in it.
“Do you want to come downstairs with me? I’ll sit up with you. As long as you need it.”
She obliges.
Tenma puts on a pot of coffee for the two of them, the smell rich and bitter as it perfumes the kitchen. The sun has finally started to creep over the horizon, causing a golden light to slowly filter in through the closed slats of the blinds. At least it’s normal for Tenma, insomniac that they are, to be up way earlier than anyone else. She’s not imposing on their schedule by doing this. She’d feel even worse if she was.
Tenma sits across from her, hands her her mug. They both get cream. Nina doesn’t have to sip to know they put a big spoonful of sugar in hers.
They smile softly at her. “What do you want to eat?”
Nina’s face crinkles in confusion. “What?”
“What do you want to eat? While we’re here, I might as well make you breakfast. Anything you want. Even if it’s not a breakfast food. It’s on me.”
God, they’re making it worse. Their kindness is intolerable- Tenma, who so often struggles to eat themself, ensuring she is fed. That she is taken care of. Nina doesn’t deserve their care, even if they forgive her, even if they never resented her in the first place. They have every right to hate her, and they don’t, and for the life of her Nina can’t understand why.
She glances at the clock on the stovetop, digital numbers lit up green. Thank god, she has an out. “Oh, don’t worry about it. I need to start getting dressed for class soon anyway.”
They look at the clock themself, then frown at her. “But you’ve got at least an hour before-”
“Really! It’s fine, Tenma. You’ve done enough.” She’s grinning. Her grin is too broad and she knows it. The effect is unconvincing, manic.
They submit anyway. “If you’re sure,” they reply, doubtful. Nina slumps like a puppet whose strings have been cut, the act complete. She brushes a stray hair out of her eyelids.
“Anyway,” she mumbles, “you wouldn’t have had what I wanted anyway.”
They sit up, focused on her once again. “What was it? I promise I can-”
“Plums! And it’s too early in the season. Okay? Don’t bother.” Embarrassment heats her face. She shouldn’t have admitted to anything. “I’ll just get something on the way to class. You don’t need to do anything special for me.” I don’t want you to.
Tenma leans back in their chair, thoughtful. “If you’re sure,” they repeat. Nina nods firmly. “I’m sure.”
The moment punctured, they spend the rest of the time in silence. Nina swiftly drains her mug, unbroken by interruptions like talking, then hurriedly washes and rinses it in the sink before hanging it back on the mug tree. She scrambles upstairs, throws her clothes on in rapid succession, quickly runs a brush through her long blonde hair to get out any tangles or static left over from the night. She grabs her bag and runs to the back door, her preferred method of entering and exiting the house. Tenma lingers in the doorway, still holding their own mug, the coffee only half-drunk.
“You’re sure you’re alright?” they ask, and Nina winces. “I could call the school and pull Dieter out for the day. You could just tell your professors you’re sick. We can spend time together-”
“I’m fine! Really. I’m alright.” Nina smiles at them again, trying to carefully modulate her face to be as convincing as possible. She knows she’s not fooling anyone. But they let her go anyway. They make no move to stop her as she unlocks the door.
“Have a good day,” they reluctantly call after her retreating form.
“You too,” Nina fires back.
Nina doesn’t end up grabbing anything to eat on the way to class, which she supposes makes her not only a murderer but a liar as well. There will never be an end to the list of sins she keeps acquiring. Or maybe she’s just half-delirious from terrible sleep and a belly full of nothing but caffeine.
Someone’s calling her name, big and bright and spangled with excitement. Nina whips her head around, trying to place them, before crashing directly into the caller. Her ribcage connects with theirs as she slips out of what she realizes too late was meant to be a hug, falling directly onto her ass.
Lotte stares down at her, flushed with horror. “Oh, Nina, I’m so sorry! Are you okay?” The other girl extends her hand and Nina takes it, pushing herself up with her other arm. “I’ve had worse.” Nina lets out a little laugh, and Lotte mirrors it with one of her own. Her palm is warm and squishy, smelling of shea lotion. Lotte makes no move to let her go, and Nina sees no reason to drop her hand either, and thus they end up walking hand in hand to class.
Nina likes Lotte a great deal more than she’d care to freely admit. She likes the smattering of freckles that appear across the bridge of her nose when the months get warm again, the sun highlights that bloom in her mousy-brown hair. She likes the way Lotte purses her lips when she’s deep in thought, because then Nina can see the shine of her strawberry lip gloss, which she always applies too much of, leaving greasy pink stains behind on the rims of her cups. She likes the boundless idealism Lotte displayed to her once they’d gotten to know each other better, untarnished by the depths of despair that mire her and Tenma, underlying all things. As much as Nina needs the darkness they share, their bond at the outskirts of humanity, selfishly she wants this too- this soft and easy kinship. A way into the world.
One time recently Lotte rested her head on Nina’s shoulder while they were watching a movie, took her glasses off and curled up and went right to sleep where she was. Nina held deathly still the entire time. She didn’t dare displace it, the dearest weight in the world.
But she doesn’t voice any of that to Lotte. How could she? She could turn her to a pillar of salt with a glance. Any good thing she touches either leaves or withers if it’s unlucky enough to stay. Yet to everyone she knows, she’s just a brilliant student, talented and fit and bright. The Ideal Girl. Now that the dust has settled, Nina doesn’t dare dispel their image of her. The distance from reality is what keeps her safe.
And anyway, what could Lotte find worth loving in the real thing? Nina isn’t really a good person. She’s just good at acting.
Lotte swings their joined hands, wide and carefree, as they walk.
The rest of the day passes in a blur. Nina reviews her notes after the lecture two and three times over and can hardly make any sense of them- the sentences are poorly strung together, the penmanship worse than Tenma’s mangled shorthand. Lotte has slunk off somewhere, Nina not even noticing until she practically jumps out of her skin when she taps her on the shoulder. “Whoa! Are you feeling alright?”
Nina just studies the threads of Lotte’s heavy red cardigan for a moment, discombobulated. The color suits her, she thinks. It pairs well with her eyes. “Yeah, I just didn’t sleep well,” she halfheartedly admits. There’s a sympathetic tug in the corner of Lotte’s mouth. “Aww, I’m sorry. Hope this makes up for it- and for knocking you over earlier, too…” Out of nowhere, Lotte produces a croissant. The pastry is golden and flaky and she can see a glossy bead of melted chocolate oozing from one of its ends. Nina feels sick.
“Oh, Lotte, I can’t take this, I really…”
“That’s okay! We can split it.” Lotte plops down beside her, confident and happy, entirely assured of her own belonging. Nina would never tell her to leave, of course. But she’s not so sure she deserves to sit at Lotte’s side.
The bread emits a cloud of steam when Lotte tears it- that’s how fresh it is. Nina wonders just how long she stood in line for it, how long Lotte was gone for her sake. She mechanically forces herself to chew, the fluffy foodstuff dissolving on her tongue, bittersweet.
It would taste better if it felt like a punishment.
She says her goodbyes and drifts back home, a boat without anchor. It would be frighteningly easy to veer back out into the street, into the path of the cars. Nina doesn’t do this, of course. But the thought is still at the back of her mind.
She lets herself in through the back door again. She likes this path because it lets her cut through the garden, which has leafed out into full green and peppered itself with colorful blooms, building to the riot of growth that is midsummer. It’s beautiful and fresh and alive and Nina can’t stand any of it.
The house is eerily quiet. Normally around this time the television would be on, their little group huddled up in the den to drink in the evening news, but the screen is black and silent. She wanders around a little until she finds Reichwein, asleep in the library, and gently shakes him awake. “Where are Tenma and Dieter?” she asks.
Reichwein snuffles a little, then takes off his glasses to clean them on his shirt. “Oh. They forgot their appointment at Münster Medical University was tomorrow. They’re probably still on the way there right now.”
“The job interview?” Nina screws her brows together. “And they took Dieter with them?”
“From what I understand the boy insisted.” He shifts a little in his seat. “I’m sorry. They must not have found the time to call you before they left.”
Nina doesn’t say anything. That isn’t what’s bothering her anyway. It’s not that they left without saying something, it’s the simple, pathetic desire not to be left alone.
Nina goes to the kitchen and fixes herself a can of tomato soup on the stovetop, eats it in monastic silence. Then she retires to her bedroom early, gazing out the window, watching the street lamps flicker on for the night.
The next day and a half is almost comically nondescript. Nina goes to class and buries herself in her studies because what else is there to do. She cancels after-school plans with friends, calls in sick from work. Karl, the sweetheart that he is, sends her an email expressing his concern, but Nina just sleeps it off without replying. She’ll think of an excuse when she has time, she tells herself. She hopes it’ll sound believable.
She lets herself in after class again, not even looking up as she enters. She sets her bag down quietly, shaking the strap off her shoulder, and instantly goes to work unlacing her boots.
Tenma softly clears their throat. Nina bolts her head up, feeling a surge of unexpected relief at the sight of them and Dieter just across the room, their faces graced by burgeoning, expectant grins. “You’re home,” she breathes, feeling her nerves relax a fraction almost immediately.
Something looks unusual about Tenma and it takes her a moment to place what it is- firstly, they’re wearing their old clothing, a crisp blue button-up and slacks. Nina hasn’t seen them out of a skirt unless they’re in their pajamas for at least six months. They don’t look bad, but she must admit the outfit hangs strangely on them now that their figure has changed. Secondly, she notices that both they and Dieter are slightly disheveled- a streak of dirt under Dieter’s eye is to be expected, but the same for Tenma is highly unusual. What have they gotten into?
“Dieter, do you have the box?” They say, turning to him. The boy snaps to attention, producing a small wooden crate from behind him, brandishing it toward her. Nina leans forward to peer at the contents and gasps in surprise at the varicolored spheres within- damsons and mirabelles and greengages. She stares up at Tenma in disbelief. “How did you-?”
They grin shyly at her. “Call it a happy accident,” they say. “We decided to drive up to Münster instead of taking the train. On the way back, out in the countryside, we found a farm with a sign.”
“The guy told us we could keep whatever we picked as long as we picked it ourselves!” Dieter chimes in excitedly. “Tenma let me get up on their shoulders so I could reach.”
“Is that why you’re both filthy?” Nina raises an eyebrow.
“I may have lost my balance,” Tenma says, casting a meaningful glance in Dieter’s direction. The boy blushes and coughs, scratching the back of his neck. Tenma chuckles. “Turns out they had an unusually warm spring up there. Everything bloomed and fruited early. The farmer said he’d never seen anything like it. We were very lucky. You’re very lucky.”
“Why am I lucky?” Nina wonders aloud, struck by the dreamlike synchronicity of it. The narratively perfect timing.
Tenma gestures lightly at the fruit crate. “These are for you.”
Nina flushes deeply and bites her lip, flooded with emotion. It’s the very definition of an embarrassment of riches. “I can’t possibly eat all of these by myself.”
They just laugh- how sweet it is to hear their laughter, so rare and fleeting. “No? Then we’ll help you.”
The three of them wash their plums in the sink, careful to get off any stray specks of dirt on the surface. They’re unusually fat and hefty, their dark skins glistening under the stream of water. Nina crunches into hers and it sprays juice all over her chin, a pinkish slice of flesh carved away under the imprint of her teeth, sour and sweet, the quintessence of the sun. She wants more. She realizes she’s starving.
Dieter demolishes his plum in just a few bites, gnawed to the core before they know it. Dark stains mar his chin and hands, and Tenma chides him to go wash up. He obeys, tossing the pit in the trash, then slips away to draw. Once he’s safely out of earshot, Nina speaks up. “So- how’d the interview go?”
“Oh, just fine,” Tenma says nonchalantly, pausing to take a bite. “I turned down their offer.”
Nina blinks, stunned. “What? Why?”
They shrug, reaching down to kick off their dress shoes. “I don’t want to be a professor. I can’t just get up in front of a bunch of eager students and teach them to make all the same mistakes I did.” They gaze pointedly at her as they say that last part and Nina feels the sudden urge to squirm away. Then they make a sweeping gesture at their whole body- “And anyway, whatever they’d be expecting of me, I’m sure it isn’t this. There’d be no point in doing it if I couldn’t do it right. I think that’s what I was thinking when I left Japan for here in the first place. I just didn’t have the words for that yet.”
Nina is silent. To hear Tenma talk about their life in Japan is like a transmission from another planet. The wow signal, wholly unexpected and frightfully capable of disappearing if contacted again.
They consider the plum in their hand, bitten and shiny. “I thought about your nightmare the whole time I was gone,” they say. “Have I ever told you that I’ve wanted to kill myself too?”
Nina feels as though they suddenly dumped a bucket of ice water on her head. “Wh- for how long?” she whispers, dry-mouthed.
Tenma smiles hollowly at her. “I’m not sure. Probably not always, but at least since I was a teenager. It got really bad in the eighties. And then again when- well, you know. It can be better or worse but it never really goes away. At least that’s how it is for me.”
“How can you stand it?”
They shrug again. “I just have to. Any reason is a good reason. One time in medical school I got very close to giving up, and then I saw a sparrow out the window and I couldn’t do it. It really was as random as that.”
Nina’s hand goes to the side of her head, stabilizing herself. “Oh god,” she says, unable to suppress her tears, “I don’t know what’s worse. That you always think of it- or that I actually tried…”
Tenma throws their arm around her shoulders, supporting her. A wall to lean against. If she lost Tenma she’d lose everything. It finally sinks in to Nina that they must feel the same way about her.
“It’s not a competition,” Tenma says. They raise their plum to their mouth and eat. Nina mirrors their motions, biting down hard, the same way exactly.