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It was late. The sun lowered itself behind the crest, spilling golden lights against the ground.
Shoko stayed, puffing on a cigarette. Blowing smoke, dispersing into the fading light. Stayed until the sunlight was nothing more than shadows cast over the landscape, stretching endlessly. Like it was trying to reach the other side, but never quite did.
It somewhat reminded her of herself, wanting to touch. To reach the others, the others who walked ahead. And whenever she closed her fist, she could feel the slight grazing against her fingertips. Like a dream standing just too high above her, something unreal. Out of her league.
But now it was different, she was the one who walked ahead now. The one who wasn’t in reach, not because she left them behind. Because they left the track, wandered into unknown lands. Not that Shoko wanted to follow, she simply didn’t care. Curiosity wasn’t enough to guide her to a ground too broken to stand upon. Not in the way it did to the others.
Because they all fucking died.
And now Shoko walked the path alone, tracing to the very edge of her loneliness. To the depths of what was unsaid and unseen, just hiding beneath the surface of what was real.
The only thing she could do to keep her sanity from slipping away was to remember—each one of the memories she promised herself she would never touch again.
Because now she stood on a surface too slippery, and she needed to go back to her tracks. Something the others couldn’t do, so she did it for them.
Shoko sighed a puff of smoke, barely visible in the night’s embrace.
Gojo Satoru.
It was like his laugh echoed through her mind, in that dragged, lazy way of his. He always looked detached from the world, or sometimes too grounded into it. Shoko would miss him, even his never-ending rackets about why Geto shouldn’t take the last piece of cake. It was interesting in a way.
Another blow of smoke, another who faded away. Away from her reach.
Utahime Iori.
It was nice having another girl around, one who looked up at her. Until Utahime didn’t need her anymore—it was nice while it lasted though.
And the last blow of smoke, lasting longer. Lingering in the air like it belonged, but stripped away from existence.
Geto Suguru.
The one who would listen to her problems, or even smoke with her when he felt like it. Shoko missed him not because of who he was, but because he stayed.
And now she would be the one to stay, elbows propped against the rooftop’s fence, eyes gazing at the horizon. Eyes who searched but couldn’t find—because they were long gone since Shoko detached herself from everything else.
Maybe it was her own fault to end up like this, like another loser. But her loneliness was enough to make her bask in the sense of “enough”. Shoko could only go forward, because taking steps back meant she would never feel true to herself.
And so she went forward, scattering what was left of herself, and leaving nothing worth behind.
Walking ahead, she would call it.