Chapter Text
The setting sun illuminates the sweat on his skin. Starting from his forehead to his underarms, forcing him to uncomfortably press his cuff to face. His older brother, Aki, walks next to him. Poking and teasing untill Yuuchi responds, either with a mock glare that promises mud down his shirt, or by rubbing his sweat on the other boy until he screams for their parents to pull Yuuchi off.
Yuuchi exhales. The long day of amusement parks and restaurants weighing on him much like the moisture on his shirt, his legs are burning and the orange sun is too bright, ‘Sleep would be nice right now,’ However, Aki is there, wrapping an arm around his shoulder, giving him the strength to not face-plant into the wet sand and drown from the high tides. Yuuchi doesn’t acknowledge the gesture, because he is just that petty, and chooses instead to lean into the taller teen.
“Ew! Mom! Yuuchi is rubbing his sweat all over me!”
Smirking, because Yuuchi didn’t feel the to call him out on a lie that’ll become true soon, the youngest trapped Aki in his arms and jumped onto his side, securing his place by locking his feet together. “Eeek! Let go of me you demon!” Aki is gripping his wrists trying to pull them apart, but is failing miserably. He changes tactics and tries to tickle Yuuchi’s ribs. Struggling to think through his giggles, Yuuchi holds on tighter and pointedly rubs his forehead into Aki’s neck.
He can’t breathe from laughing as Aki spins and screams and pleads for their father to pull Aki off.
“You shouldn’t have messed with me Aki, this is punishment,”
His sibling is then pulling him by his hair, not too roughly, and pushing him with his elbow, fake sobbing all the while. Yuuchi inhales and exhales deeply, feeling the sand stuck between his toes, the warmth in his chest, and hears their parents laughing behind them. He doesn’t know what made them want to go out randomly today, but he sure is thankful, both Aki and him needed a break from entrance exams and middle school-end of term exams, respectfully. “I’ll help you with your homework! Please!”
Yuuchi respectfully declines,”Nah.”
Their Father, Yoichi, helps him with that regardless, without deals that would make demons proud, and without gloating at the end of it. Yuuchi, he doesn’t admit this, also doesn’t trust Aki’s math and history. Remembering all the times their parents had exasperated looks on their faces from seeing Aki’s test scores. (They weren’t ever mad, he noticed, they just found it funny because it was practically expected at that point, no matter how much they intervened.) Yuuchi nearly jerks out of his full-body lock of Aki, their Mother’s hand trailing through his curls. He doesn’t think he hid the flinch well enough, the hand stops for a moment before continuing.
“You tired, Yu?”
He must’ve dozed off a bit, considering its now quiet and Aki is holding him to his front. Yuuchi nods and tenses in Aki’s arms. He’s just realised that Aki will most definitely call him a baby later and print out a whole scrapbook’s worth of pictures from every angle and filter possible of his current position. “Let go of me, Spare-parts,” Yuuchi releases Aki and rubs the tiredness from his eyes, nearly falling over from the not-smooth transition of being carried and walking. Did Aki not want to let him go?
“Aww, did you want to carry your baby brother, sweat and all?” he teases without looking back, staring at the end of their journey, the parking lot. He might not like going outside, but if their parents want to go to the beach again, he won’t say no. The high tide is licking at his feet, washing away the sand and occasionally hitting him with a piece of seaweed. The sky is a watercolour painting of warm yellows, oranges, pinks. Decorated with a few seagulls that sing in a random tune with the sea’s waves. And every so often, there’s a breeze that makes him shiver, but it makes him feel present. Tied, to this very moment. There isn’t an ounce of him that wants to stare into oblivion, or conjure up childhood dreams in favour of reality.
He’s tired. But he won’t complain, everything is perfect right now.
He frowns, Aki didn’t respond, and the footsteps are slower.
Yuuchi stops his gait and turns around. Haruka, his mother, and Yoichi, his father are standing side-by-side, looking at the sunset with Aki beckoning him over. He has a frown on his face, but doesn’t voice his concerns. When he comes close, their parents turn to him with shy but excited looks in their eyes. Aki then hugs him from behind as Haruka and Yoichi kneel.
Why does he feel foreboding?
“It’s nothing bad Yuuchi,” Yoichi says, his tone gentle, but his smile even more so. It soothes Yuuchi, at least for the moment, Yoichi has always that effect on Yuuchi (at least till Yuuchi let him). Haruka was able to push you, encouraging you to go just a little further and put in more effort, but Yoichi was there when you failed, or didn’t achieve what you wanted. He’s stayed up with Yuuchi when he couldn’t sleep and was there to hold Yuuchi when things got too much. Yuuchi can vividly remember hot chocolate at three in the morning, a warm body to chase away the cold and the right words to assure him that he doesn’t-shouldn’t- feel like he’s unwelcome, that they’ll leave him if he comes home with less-than perfect test scores or if he makes another mistake.
Yoichi is an ocean to stave off the heat, and Haruka is allure of the summer beach.
“Yuuchi we have to ask you something, you don’t have to answer now,but-” Haruka then interrupts Yoichi, putting a hand on his shoulder and reaching for Yuuchi. She looks less shy now, at least compared to Yoichi’s sudden nervous expression. Hazel eyes don’t stare into Yuuchi-piercing his thoughts and making him feel like he has somthing to hide- they're patient and look similar to when she leans into his space for a hug, or when she wants him out of his comfort zone by going out with friends that Yuuchi is nervous to lose and keep. She takes his hand and laces their fingers, chasing away the foreboding feeling.
“Yuuchi, you are our son, no matter what. You have been for months now, ever since you walked into our home, we knew you were what we were looking for,” she took her hand off Yoichi and held his cheek, the palm warm and soothing like the ocean breeze in summer. “A few weeks ago, we-we asked the foster agent for adoption papers, Yuuchi, and we signed them. All we need to do is send them in.”
Aki’s arms tighten and he can feel tears on his head.
Yoichi takes his other hand and squeezes it tight.
Haruka is wiping away his tears with her thumb.
Yuuchi finds it hard to breathe, nervous to break the dream, to disturb the moment.
The sky is a watercolour painting of warm yellows, oranges and pinks. The ocean is licking his feet, pelting it with sand and seaweed. A lukewarm ocean breeze ruffles his hair and makes him suppress a shiver, his body is sweaty from chasing Aki and walking all day. Yuuchi can’t inhale enough salty air laced with iodine, but he can force himself to, he forces himself to not crumble under the weight of his past. Of never-forgetten families that pulled Yuuchi's puzzle apart and broke his pieces to fit in their desired traits and paradoxical behaviours.
Be quiet, but don’t make them feel like their talking to a brick wall.
Don’t outshine the others, but don’t fail us.
Lie to the agent and say you’re okay, but tell him the ‘truth’.
Haruka Honmo, Yoichi Honmo, and Aki Honmo, all put him back together. They helped him find and remake the peices of himself that he lost or that were damaged, they even gave him parts of their own puzzles and showed him where they could fit without hurting him, without tainting who he was. Yoichi showed no hesitance in helping Yuuchi with his homework, even when he was tired from work, near sunken eyes that regained life when he came home. Haruka was there when he came home from school, nearly crying with a swolen eye and bruised lip, she didn’t believe the boys and teachers that said he started it, she fought with them and would make them spin with clever diction. Aki was always touching him some way, a hand on his shoulder, bumping into him as they walked; Aki would push and set the boundaries in the Honmo household, not-so-subtly showing Yuuchi what he could do and how to make up if he pushed people too far.
The Honmo cared for him for so long, he didn’t know how to react if they stopped anymore. Yuuchi didn’t have to hide smiles and could joke and tease all he wanted, he didn’t have to be perfect in school or at home. If they left him, he wouldn’t be alive anymore, just breathing and living. Without a purpose. He just had to be himself, be Yuuchi. Who was a good listener and wouldn’t hesitate to help others, he would babysit Yoichi’s friend’s kid on occasion and have her smiling and laughing with barely any effort. Yuuchi would be helping cook dinner or provide distractions for them when they struggled to get through the day.
Yuuchi didn’t know if that was all him, or the Honmo’s, or even a mix of the two. But what he did know was that he enjoyed it, he enjoyed being who he needed most on his not-perfect days, for them on theirs.
Before they can doubt themselves in the silence, Yuuchi is rushing them, dragging Haruka and Yoichi into arms that can’t wrap around them, even when he tries. He’s sobbing into someone's chest and nodding, not trusting himself to speak, he feels so happy it’s like he’s going to burst. For once, Yuuchi doesn’t feel like hiding the fact he’s a child, and just grips them like a baby. Aki is there too, “You have to let them get up, Yuuchi,” With reluctence, Yuuchi does so before resuming. Somone is giving a wet chuckle at is behaviour, and he can feel Haruka taking out her phone and using it.
“It’s sent, Yuuchi. You’re officially a Honmo now,”
Yuuchi laughs at her, not surprised an email was drafted and ready to be sent at a moment’s notice. ‘Typical Haruka,’ He thinks fondly. Yuuchi looks up, the sky is burning the clouds, the pink bright and nearly-blinding.
‘That’s wrong,’ He thinks.
‘That’s too bright,’ Yuuchi can barely keep his eyes open now, the pink light turning white.
“What,” he says.
There's a scream. Multiple. A woman. A man. And two boys.
A car swerves, the tires screeching so loud its inside his head.
A boy pushes the other.
Yuuchi can’t breathe.
That is the first thought that clouds his head. When he clutches his chest and heaves air that isn’t enough, it persists, drowning all other thought in panic and cold fear. The remnants of the dream fade from his mind, already forgotten, but didn’t need to remember to know. Yuuchi knows that this will always be his reaction to that particular dream, the memory that takes place just hours before the accident, he takes deep breaths. Yuuchi doesn’t realise he’s shaking untill his heart is just a drum in the background, still beating too fast but more manageable, and he is forced to think again.
There is an ache behind his eyes, and it isn’t a headache.
The bandages wrapped around his head make him feel safe and hidden, but the course fabric hurts his temples and forehead when he buries himself into a pillow. Yuuchi isn’t quiet with his sobs, every part of his head now aches, and with everything else going on in the background, it feels much more painful than normal. Every scream that tears itself from his throat is another memory he can’t replace and add on to. Every fresh wave of tears is another comforting phrase that he will never learn, and every sob reminds him of what he lost, what is painfully gone.
When he’s done, the bandages are soaked and somehow worse on his skin, but he can’t take it off. No matter what. And in the privacy of his own thoughts, he doesn’t care, he doesn’t want to. Another moment he cares about something as trivial as the rough fabric of bandages, he’s reminded he’s alive and others are not.
He sits up and shakes his head to clear the drowsiness still fogging him. Sometime during the night the duvet fell off, leaving him to shiver and struggle to feel any warmth in his feet. When he shifts to the edge of the bed, he flinches, the wide-open curtains that he forgot to close the previous night now gives way for the noon-sun. That was what most likely woke him up. Not that he could afford to still be asleep, he reminded himself, Gojo would be coming to fetch him today...
He strangles the sheets in a white-knuckled grip.
Not too gently, he turns to the dresser and turns over his phone. Theres a text from Gojo saying that he’ll be there within an hour, that was 20 minutes ago. Yuuchi ignores the persisting reminder at the forefront of his thoughts, he ignores the fading smell of flowers and vanilla fading even more so when he practically runs from the room.
He turns right, a corridor that led to his and Aki’s bedrooms. It also led to a bathroom. Stripping without hesitation, he turns the shower tap without consideration and braves the lukewarm water. It is a reprieve for his cold feet, but the sudden shower spray makes his chest stutter. ‘Earlier was worse,’ he thinks. Yuuchi takes a moment to adjust the tap, sighing when much warmer water washes over him. Taking a step back, he carefully held his head away from the spray, he was already dealing with damp bandages, and didn’t need them to be completely soaked.
Yuuchi was aware of every second he spent under the showerhead, standing under it, doing nothing but watching the drain swallow the water kept his mind empty. Clear. He didn’t know why he needed this, to just forget for a few minutes, to not hear the ringing in his ears from the vacuum of silence. To feel like he was missing something when he walked into a different room. Yuuchi didn’t know what it was, but just that it was missing , was it the constant mechanical typing from Haruka? The sound of a Yoichi’s car entering the driveway? Or was it Aki’s constant pestering whenever they saw each other?
Yuuchi didn’t know. And it hurt, it made him feel like he was back in the old houses. When he didn’t know which rules he was breaking and how to make up for them. He hated that the feeling of not knowing was in every action and breath he took. The acts of straining his ears for the thumping footsteps of a sadistic woman who was never wrong and forcing his shoulders to relax long enough for it to start hurting when he did his chores (everyone’s chores),Yuuchi despised it all. And what he hated just as much was that there wasn’t any satisfying end to the day, he climbed into his parents bed and just laid there till he fell asleep. Knowing whether or not he’ll wake up to someone shouting his name because he made a mistake worsened how he slept.
Yuuchi hadn’t felt like this in months, years in fact. There was always a long period of waiting-but-not between placements, parents went for perfect children, not children that had ‘incidents’ and wouldn’t speak to them unless absolutely needed. Yuuchi was 15 and didn’t mind the next three years being the same, the only difference between 15 and 18 to him, was the expectation of having money to live. He could deal with that, he was always independent and able to take care of himself. Years of skills and habits that he never let people take from him.
Except the Honmo’s.
Food was always available, warmth was always expected and kindness was a necessity. Yuuchi forgot what it was like to go hungry, to be cold and miserable, and to never let anyone say anything that could affect him. Because he let people in, he let them explore the vile insides of his past like it was a rotting carcass and instead of ignoring their attempts to connect, he responded. Curious and scared, but curious regardless.
Why did they tell him he could eat in his room instead of being a stranger at the table? How could they inch closer and closer to him every time he wasn’t looking and take hints he didn’t know he was giving out? Where did they get the patience to deal with Aki breaking their rules repeatedly?
He wanted to know, what were the answers to all those questions that kept him up at night and distracted during the day?
Yuuchi doesn’t think he ever voiced those questions, but he does remember Haruka answering them. Either she knew what he was thinking or just wanted him to know and it was a coincidence. ‘ Haruka was staring at him. He could see it in his peripheral and how goosebumps raced down his arms. Yuuchi knew he shouldn’t listen to Aki’s requests, and thankfully he did, because now she was alone with him while Aki was being scolded by Yoichi. The boy had trekked mud through the house from the doorway to the lounge and now to the kitchen. Yuuchi inwardly sighed.
He just wanted something to clean his windows with.
Yuuchi turned to Haruka, meeting her eyes. Hazel meeting brown, guarded looks meeting gentle ones. She wouldn’t punish him for Aki breaking the rules, she had never done before and was very clear when he did something she or Yoichi didn’t like (they just told him how to use certain cleaning products, and gave advice on certain math topics he struggled with) but it was still nerve-wracking. Standing in a doorway observing her husband and son fight ( Yoichi was telling Aki he has to clean the floor, and change his clothes before he got a cold) not something he was comfortable doing, however, the universe seemed to hate him in particular today and had them both walk into the kitchen at the same time.
“You’re confused aren’t you?” She was blunt and straightforward, but it was more stating the truth than hurting him. A change of pace he wasn’t used to, even after being with them for a few months at this point. He couldn’t look her in eye when she acted like she knew something her didn’t, focusing instead on the beauty mark under her eye, close enough but not too close. Yes, he was confused, it was the third or so time since he was assigned to the Honmo’s that this has happened. Yoichi and Haruka insisted that Aki’s never gone out in the rain willingly and ran around in the mud, and wanted to know why, all the boy said it was only recently that he found out it was fun.
“No, I just wish that he didn’t do it,” he was lying. Yuuchi was confused. They aren’t taking away his possessions or hitting him, just telling him to clean the mud up and not to roll around in the dirt like he’s five. It didn’t match with what he expected, and he didn’t like it. He’s going to question all his assumptions if this continues, and Yuuchi doesn’t like what he might be wrong about.
Haruka just huffed at his answer, but still pierced him with her knowing gaze. Questions of ‘What does she know?’ ran amok in his mind, he hadn’t said or done anything recently that would cause this; he was quiet and kept to himself, even if Aki tried to include him in something. “We aren’t going to do what you think we’ll do,” Just that alone was enough to cause him to turn, his skin prickled, burning alight with an itch that dug under his skin. Yuuchi dug his nails into the hand hidden from her and bit his cheek. The reaction was instinct, and now she knows she’s affected him.
‘What does she know?’
‘What does she know?’
‘What does she know?’
“We aren’t going to hurt him or anything like that, never,” Her eyes were still on him, digging and piercing. She could probably see the itch under his skin. “He isn’t doing it to annoy us, and he isn’t going to blame it on you, you know that right?” She turned from him, allowing him to breathe as quietly as possible. Quelling the anxiety but doing nothing to the itch.
He gave a non-committal hum. Watching Aki now laugh in Yoichi’s face and get a roll of paper towels thrown at him. “Yuuchi, my father used to say that kindness is a form of love, and that to be kind to anyone-even someone we don’t know-is to love them like a fellow person.” She walked into the kitchen, stopping to look into his eyes with honesty. “I live by that, we all do, and when we give you space or make changes for you, we’re treating you like a person. We’re loving you like you’re a person...because you are.”
Yuuchi decided to clean his windows in the morning, and cried in his room that night.
He’s crying now. Clutching his arms tightly enough to part the skin with his short nails, without thinking, he falls. The dull thump of his knees banging against the tiled floor, the pain was momentary and fleeting, replaced by another, similar ache. Yuuchi was in a dogeza, but he was not asking for forgiveness, he was asking for his family to come back.
No amount of clutching his arms would recreate the warm embraces of Haruka, grounding and safe, hidden from the rest of the world and a past that he was still chained to. Haruka would rub up and down his arms, a gentle pressure to remind him that she was there and that she would chase him if he ran from her, she would put her chin on his head, before pulling him closer and hiding his face in her neck. (It wasn’t the same, what he was doing wasn’t even remotely the same) His eyes would burn and burn, his throat would scream with childish sobs he never had the chance to mumble, and he would hold her close, closer than he’s let anyone ever before.
She was his mother, not like the woman that left him in the rain under the awning of the orphanage, in the rain and screaming for a woman that didn’t have the will to fight for his survival, nor the will to fetch him later on. She was his actual Mother, even if he didn’t call her that, even if he could barely voice it in his thoughts. Haruka Honmo, was his Mother. Whether she thought of herself as that didn’t matter, he could live with it. What he couldn’t live with, was not admitting that. He couldn’t live not seeing her soft smile when his teachers praised him during their meetings, or the way she beamed at him when he laughed for the first time.
He couldn't. He couldn't. He couldn't. He couldn't. He couldn't.
But he was, he was here breathing, hunched in on himself while sitting on his knees. She’s there, rotting and dead, completely and utterly dead. He can feel his heart beating and the air in his lungs, Yuuchi’s nails are digging into the grout between the shower’s tiles, his knees are sore from him falling and he can feel the water pelting his back and streaming down his neck. Yuuchi lets out a close-mouthed scream, his throat straining and the muscles pushing against the skin of his throat like they’re trying to escape from the confines of his body. His chest heaved and burned from a lack of air, the sensations overwhelming him as his eyes and head felt like they were a moment from exploding.
He gets on one knee and grabs the tap to return it to the middle-most position, and doesn’t bother to stand. Yuuchi stays as still as possible, every inch of what he can feel hurts and he doesn’t want to move. His chest still heaves but in a practiced rhythm, the repetitive motions strangled. ‘Deeper, deeper, deeper,’ he chants.
‘That’s it, Yu.’ He hears. He recognizes the voice, soft and anchoring, ‘Haruka.’
There’s a memory that comes unbidden, the words are the clearest parts of it, everything else is blurry and absent; no matter how hard he tries, he can’t make sense of where it’s from. ‘Breathe in, 1-2-3-4,’ the memory noticeably quiets, ‘Hold it, 1-2-3-4 and out, 1-2-3-4.' He unconsciously follows the instructions.
No longer do his head and eyes feel like they’re going to explode, all he feels now is a numbness set deep in the hollows of bones and more tired than when he woke up. Groaning, he gets up, his legs are wobbly, weak, and the kneecaps are most likely bruising. He hisses as they jolt with pain and force him to steady himself with the shower door. Yuuchi grits his teeth and wraps a towel around his waist, the fabric much softer than the bandages.
Maybe it’s because it isn’t wrapped so tightly? Could Ieiri’s technique make them obsolete and that’s why she struggled to find newer ones?
As he walks out of the bathroom, he hears a knock on the door.
He swears and races down the corridor and into another corridor which leads to all the bottom floor rooms, taking a right, he runs past the lounge and slips down the first step into the genkan. ‘Who could be here, now of all times?!’ Yuuchi doesn’t really like new people, the feeling of not knowing if he could trust someone dictated every social interaction he had, even with the neighbors. Not only that, but he wasn't dressed, he was barely calm!
“Yes?”
“Yuuchi-chan, you need to get dressed, we’re nearly late!”
‘Gojo!'