She almost doesn't recognize him. Almost.
It could just be one of those stupid dreams she has every now and then, of waking up and doing her morning routine like usual, only to find herself still in her bed once she's ready to leave the house. She looks down at her hands — it's a technique she learned on some forum as a kid. Supposedly, the number of your fingers is always incorrect in a dream. All the other more well-known tricks like looking at a clock twice or trying to read something never worked for her — it was never any different from how it would be in reality. But this specific phenomenon is yet to betray her even once.
Five on each. Bust.
"That distressed look is going to give you wrinkles," Goro says, standing up so the height difference isn't as much of an issue. "What's on your mind?"
"It's nothing," Sumire sighs. "I was just thinking I make a really shitty detective."
"Heh, where's that coming from—"
Sumire is avoiding eye contact in the same manner people refuse to look at human accidents in subways. Ah.
He mirrors her in averting his own gaze, unsure of where to begin.
"Look, I know it's partially my fault. I came to apologize for that too." Neither of them can believe they never noticed how intriguing the kitchen's floor pattern has been this whole time. "I was asleep when your calls went through, and I'm sure you can understand, I have my phone on permanent mute these days. And then I just really didn't want to deal with your worthless contraption of a device — both you and I know full well we wouldn't have been able to hold a coherent conversation."
Sumire feels like she should probably be very angry. Or at least embarrassed by whatever he's seeing her wear. Neither of those quite reaches her limbic system.
"You know I tried to come as soon as on the day after, but your father wouldn't let me in," Goro finishes, suddenly remembering to take the tie out of his hair. "Ah, this stupid thing."
It's the truth. She wishes she were less logical.
"Don't tell me you thought a phantom thief was going to show up," he adds, tone between a smirk and an offended grimace.
No, really, even if he had died, she could never dream of replicating that deductive ability.
"Sorry," she says in his stead.
He only swallows.
The kitchen grows so quiet Sumire could almost swear she hallucinates cicadas' chirping filling the void. She turns around and walks out without sparing him a glance, which shocks Goro enough to prematurely shut up any mocking remark he may have been conjuring up, but it only takes several seconds for her to return with an extra chair. She occupies it about two-thirds of a meter away from him.
"So," she speaks like one would at an unwanted family meeting. "What have you been up to?"
Goro clears his throat. "Well, it's a lot."
"We have all day."
"You have all day," he corrects, unconsciously putting his detective smile back on. Sumire realizes it must happen on autopilot whenever he doesn't want to display his anger.
She isn't the slightest bit fazed, however. "I heavily doubt you're continuing your usual celebrity activities in that attire."
Their eyes finally meet. Goro clicks his tongue.
"You're one to talk."
"E—Enough about me," indeed, she would be lying if she said that comment didn't finally make her subconscious shame catch up.
Goro sighs and opens the unremarkable mini-backpack he's had put down on the floor. A significant upgrade from his ridiculous briefcase, Sumire notes. She can't do anything but observe him as he shuffles through what appears to be stacks of documents, and wonder what on earth he intends to show her. A diary? An eviction notice? Job termination contracts?
He pulls out a hairbrush.
"What are you—" she can only attempt to protest as he stands up and surprisingly gently takes hold of a part of her hair.
"Stay still, Yoshizawa-san."
She can only obey. She's wanted someone to tell her what to do all this time, after all.
"You know you don't need to call me that. It's not even that you're older, it's just bizarre to be held in high regard by someone incomparably more experienced than me..."
"Okay. Sumire," Goro shrugs, combing through her strands with professionalism that makes it easy to imagine him taking up a hairdresser apprentice part-time job at some point of his life.
I didn't mean for you to straight up jump to a first-name basis, but I guess I'm in no position to take my words back, either.
She lets him finish with the patience of an art model. In hindsight, it's quite fitting to have expected Kitagawa-senpai.
"I assume someone already filled you in on the whole hitman side hustle and engine room sacrifice thing," Goro finally begins, retracting his hands from her hair. Sumire swears she could kill herself on the spot for letting a thought on the vague topic of missing them occur. Well, it's only natural to be touch-starved after so many months of social isolation — in more ways than one, all at different intervals.
Therefore, all she can do is nod. The phantom thieves aren't cruel enough to let her work alongside a murderer without her knowledge. Goro sits back down as his hairbrush rejoins his backpack's contents.
"You know, I'm rather surprised by your readiness to just shrug off shit like that. I know you aren't exactly sane either, that whole roleplaying your dead sister shtick and all, but it's still hard to take you for anything other than... a normal person. You know, one who wouldn't want anything to do with psychopaths. One who would fear them."
"It's a good thing you aren't one, then," she simply replies.
They're both grateful. For his bluntness; for her acceptance. Neither voices a thing.
"Well," Goro coughs again. It doesn't seem voluntary. "So after I was supposed to die in the middle of December—"
"We have cold medicine right here," Sumire interrupts, standing up and closing the distance between herself and one of the blindingly white kitchen cupboards. As she takes out a packet of white tablets, several pill bottles on other shelves suddenly seem weirdly tempting. But no, she's already chosen a different method. Instead she wonders whether she has gained the ability to read minds, given how easily imagining Goro curse himself comes to her.
"There's really no need," his gaze is glued away from her once again. Oh, she's sure he doesn't like having weaknesses acknowledged. Too bad.
"Then just treat it as me not wanting to listen to you sound like a dying old man," she retorts before she remembers to be polite.
"Tch. Fair enough."
He doesn't need to be told how this medicine is meant to be consumed — having a nauseatingly busy public image to maintain means keeping yourself in tip-top physical shape at all times, after all. All those bathhouse trips as a kid may have built up his immune system some, but Tokyo's weather is nonetheless relentless at any time of the year. He could probably name every item in a drugstore without looking at labels by now.
Sumire absent-mindedly pulls out a pot from the rice cooker sitting on the counter. "Have you eaten yet?"
"I don't know why you keep the impression I came here for some sort of prolonged stay," Goro grumbles. "This is merely meant to be a replacement for an otherwise-impossible phone call. I worry for you if yours tend to last several hours... But no, to answer your question, I haven't. Only because you yourself look like you've spent the last couple of months in an ill-supplied bomb shelter."
She doesn't reply, because it's pointless to tell him what he already knows — she only ever really calls her father, and even then, each instance is but a 10-second request to pick her up at most. If she were to actually ask herself why she wants him to stay, she wouldn't be able to provide that answer, either. Hence, it's easiest to do no linguistic activity at all.
Goro watches her rinse the rice until the water runs clear with the nimbleness of someone who's done it over a million times, then drain it into a colander and measure it with a dedicated cup, but to his surprise, she doesn't put it back into the rice cooker. Perhaps using its pot for preparation is just a long-term habit for any rice dishes, he muses. Sumire takes out a donabe from one of the lower cupboards, repositions the rice into it, and adds about an inch of cold water. Goro doesn't notice he's holding his breath. She's making okayu.
He'd only caught a cold twice while his mother was still around, and both of those times, she'd prepared him okayu. It tasted angelic in a manner never to be replicated by any convenience store food he's been surviving off of. Frankly, he never imagined he'd have a chance to savor something like it again.
"It's going to soak for about 30 minutes," Sumire informs.
Goro shakes off the irrational sadness overwhelming him. He shouldn't get his hopes up — Fumiyo Akechi is dead. There's zero guarantee Sumire's cooking can rival hers.
"You just had to choose one of the longest to prepare rice dishes," he only says. "Instead of simply cooking it like a normal person."
Sumire doesn't need detective skills to sense that the discontent of his voice is performed. She wonders why, but naturally, she can't imagine herself worthy of asking.
She sits back down on the chair placed in front of him, eyeing him expectantly. Goro can't help but chuckle.
"Not going to interrupt me anymore?"
"That's..." Sumire feels herself caught off guard. It is her fault, but at the end of the day, it was all solely for his own well-being.
"It's fine," he cuts in before she can apologize. "So as I was saying! It's not actually all that complicated. As much as I hate to admit it, I believe Maruki's existence is the one reason I was able to get out of that whole ordeal..."
Sumire hums. She has no intention of saying anything, but Goro doesn't waste time in fighting back before he's attacked.
"Don't you get any crazy thoughts, I still hate the sucker," he breathes out, residual anger in the lick of his lips. "The Metaverse should have disappeared for good when phantom thieves achieved their absurd ordeal of killing god. But his decision to be the replacement caused it to persist for the entire interval of time until we got rid of the palace. I don't have too much to go off of, since there's no way to get in touch with the me that was living in this reality prior to my return, but... There's plenty enough evidence to propose a substantial hypothesis."
It's a bit charming, how he seems unable to let go of his false identity.
"You should hate him too, by the way, because one thing that is factual is him quite literally erasing my memory of over a week's worth of time," Goro continues. "I didn't remember jackshit about what happened to me after my, well, excruciatingly humiliating engine room defeat while we were stuck in his vomit-inducing ideal reality. Of course I would assume I up and died, no matter how much more embarrassment that may add up. But after waking up here... All my memories of that interval were back in place. Maruki is nothing more than a piece of shit manipulator, and I want you to drill that into your head."
Sumire doesn't know why she's surprised that only three minutes have passed as she looks over to the digital clock on their oven. Goro can tell perfectly well she just let that sentence go into one ear and out the other. Not wanting to argue just yet, or maybe out of pure genuine consideration, he doesn't push the topic.
"Ahem. Essentially, I spent the week in damn Mementos of all places, my phone somehow absent to even try and leave the Metaverse. It wasn't too surprising, because the way I ended up there in the first place wasn't natural, either — it sure as hell wasn't by my own will, and that was a first. After some wandering around the perimeter and not finding a single shadow, I concluded this must be my version of whatever purgatory Kurusu has that that Lavenza girl came from. Unfair, isn't it? The unconfirmed blur starts right about here. Without any sort of time-measuring device to tell how much I spent in that hellhole, and myself passing out an amount of times I too managed to lose count of, my memories end after an unconfirmed number of days. But, by pure logic, it must have been Christmas Eve. That's the day I found myself in Maruki's reality, after all."
"And turned yourself in, yes?" Sumire's gaze is as sparrow-like as the day he met her.
"I'm glad you follow," Goro smirks. "I actually have no real explanation for why that was my first course of action... I suppose after spending that much time in a limbo between life and death, or whatever exactly it was, and then so abruptly finding myself in my usual clothes in the normal world, I simply wanted some peace. You don't really need to know this, but I've never considered my apartment a home. So, clearly, a prison would provide that with just about equal accuracy — except it'd at least have other people."
"Um," Sumire says, hesitantly. "Thank you for trusting me."
"Don't get the wrong idea, this is all just so there aren't any inexplicable holes in my actions," Goro replies a little too quickly, and Sumire grins somewhere in her mind — this is no explanation for why she deserves to be filled in on every detail to this degree in the first place. Ah, well, she'll gladly accept it. "The rest is history that you more or less know of — I was released as if I'm a clean man, figured something is terribly wrong with that reality, and found the one who was most likely to also have sensed things're off, the leader of the phantom thieves. Then you joined us. And that rice would soak ten times over if I were to recount everything that happened in the meantime. So, much-awaited timeskip — we escape the collapsing palace, and I wake up... in my apartment."
"You make a great storyteller."
"Hah, it would be weirder if I didn't, with the amount of dust I had to throw into an equally uncountable number of reporters' and TV hosts' eyes in my lifetime."
Sumire forces a smile. "So, did you deduce what must've happened to the previous you in this world?"
"Arguable," Goro sighs. "As I said, all I have is a hypothesis, but I do also have quite a lot of faith in it. I was surrounded by medical supplies when I came to, tons of gauze wrapped around my chest, and a quick inspection proved what I predicted that to mean — I have a bullet wound. Miraculously, at that point in time it's even healed enough to no longer bleed. I didn't find any medical records, so I can only assume I treated it myself the entire month and a half — or, interestingly, perhaps much less. The sole other item of note around me was my phone, and as it turned out, I have been looking my own name up on various news sources, presumably to monitor my popularity dying down. The strange part is that the queries in my history only start one week ago. Which can mean two things: either I was so out of it that I didn't bother with my phone at all until that time, or, much more morbidly, I spent almost five full weeks in Mementos before I found an exit back to reality. To be completely honest, I can't say I'm not glad that I don't remember. I may never know what actually happened, but as unfitting as it is of a detective, I find myself having absolutely no desire to."
"It must have been pure hell for the previous you... I'm so sorry. I can only hope your hunger and thirst were paused in that state..." Sumire says with an amount of concern that might be able to poison someone who can't stand being pitied. Someone who sits in front of her.
"Don't mention it. It couldn't have been much better for the current you in his palace," Goro replies, tone as casual as he can keep it. "Actually, now that you say it, there's one more piece of evidence that has been bothering me..."
Sumire wants to slap herself before she lets her thoughts drift away from the conversation at hand again, but loses the battle before it even begins. She hasn't considered that at all. For her feeble, unimportant self, to suffer as much as the poor boy wearing Goro Akechi's face did, someone she had just felt so much genuine sadness for? It's nothing short of preposterous. What, the amount of emotion she could never even try to imagine experiencing towards herself, much less putting herself on equal ground with him? She wants to vomit. Maybe she should.
"I-I'm sorry," she says, definitely interrupting him mid-sentence, but it's rather hard to bring yourself to care when your brain is completely out of control, and, as it gradually becomes more obvious, your stomach as well. It would appear that multiple days straight of sudden starvation after eating enough for two athletes at once for the year prior don't yield pretty results. She should've figured. Stupid, stupid Sumire.
"What—" Goro speaks as she abruptly gets off her chair and sprints into the bathroom, but he has no idea how to continue. After a second's hesitation, he takes off after her, but she shuts the door before he reaches it. He's never been so dumbfounded.
Unmistakable noise of involuntary throwing up follows. Ah.
"Is it something I said?" He asks, half-jokingly, failing to fully conceal his nervousness.
"Please don't worry—" Sumire tries to reassure, her voice muffled behind the door, but before she even properly finishes her sentence, more vomiting follows. Goro decides not to comment, and merely leans his back against the wall next to it as he crosses his arms.
"Are you sure I don't need to call an ambulance?" He still asks, turning his head in her direction just enough to make sure it reaches her properly.
"No, no, really, it's alright..."
Minutes pass. After a few more sounds of puke and water, the bathroom grows quiet.
Seriously, this girl...
"Are you doing okay?" Goro intrudes on the ironically unnerving tranquility first. He would never admit it, but this whole ordeal is quite worrying.
Sumire doesn't reply. Goro furrows his brows. It's probably about time he throws courtesy to the wind and simply invites himself to an occupied bathroom.
Before his hand even reaches the knob, however, Sumire shocks him once more, emerging with a smile he almost doesn't believe is fake for a moment. The color of her face matches the sclerae of her eyes.
"The rice may have finished soaking by this point, but we're not going to wait for it to cook. Go and sit down. I'll find something immediately edible in your kitchen," Goro says in a tone that makes it clear there's no room for argument. Sumire nods in utter defeat.
She's making a total fool of herself, but embarrassment just won't come. It's hard to decide whether the idea is calming or downright unsettling. Shouldn't she at least be able to discern her own contrasting emotions?
Instead, she lets herself wish he would hurry up and take his leave already.
But Goro's way ahead of her, pouring her a cup of fresh tap water and wasting no time in browsing through her family's pantry when she finally reaches the kitchen at her pace. After a good twenty seconds of turning its insides around, he pulls out a packet of unsalted crackers with something resembling a childish triumph, and Sumire has to mentally note it's quite fitting — she would never have remembered its existence on her own.
She takes it into her hands without a complaint as he rips it open and stretches it out to her, and reclaims her seat for the second time. "Um," she begins despite being deeply unsure of whether she actually wants for the conversation to continue, and picks a cracker out despite still having no appetite. Fuck it, she at least owes him showing some interest. "You were saying something about a last piece of evidence..."
"Right — it completely slipped my own mind with, er, everything," Goro really doesn't need to look so surprised. Can every man in Sumire's life quit assuming her to be stupid? She can do as much as remember a recent topic of discussion. Can't she? Please believe in me for just a second. "It's nothing too grand, don't get your hopes up. I call it the mystery of Schrodinger's trash can," Goro smirks, less genuinely and more so with clear intention to make her feel better. Sumire could almost throw up again — she knows a remark like that would make his usual audience roar with laughter, but she does not wish to be part of it.
"Right," she grits her teeth just briefly enough for it to go unnoticed, and downs her cup of water like it's a shooter of Smirnoff Ice.
"It was empty when I first thought of checking it upon coming back to this reality. So, two options, Sumire. What do you think they are?"
Huh. She's not dreaming? He's actually asking for her take on things? Thank you...
"I think," she starts, giving herself an opening to piece her response together as she swallows her fifth chewed cracker. It feels as if she's been invited to the stage as a lucky guest. "Option number one: the previous you has thrown the trash out right before your return, though it seems a bit unlikely, you mentioning waking up wrapped in bandages and surrounded by medical supplies and all. It wouldn't make too much sense for the mess to still be that prominent around you if you had already gone outside at least once — I assume even if it happened, it must have taken place just far enough in the past for the clothes and footwear to not retain signs of having been out in the snow? So then it must mean... Option number two, the previous you has never thrown anything out in the first place..."
"Indeed — I'm flattered you were able to remember so many details of my story. A good storyteller is nothing without an even better listener, you know? A+ for deduction. As we have never been provided with options on finding out which one is true, the trash can before my comeback is simultaneously both empty and full."
"But, Goro-senpai—"
"At that point, just drop the senpai too," he smiles with smugness she hasn't had nearly enough of during their third semester adventures.
"Oh, I'm-I'm sorry," to her own surprise, Sumire's quick to panic. "I must've thought it was okay since you were addressing me with my first name, u-um, how presumptuous of me, I apolo—"
"No, I meant that it's fine, literally do drop the senpai, I don't mind," Goro sighs. "I have a feeling I know what you were going to say, anyway."
"Oh, alright then..." Sumire takes a deep breath. She needs to get herself together... "Oh, right! Goro-senpai — I mean — Goro! That must mean the previous you likely hasn't eaten anything substantial in at least a week of your residence in this reality — I can't believe it, I can hardly think of any food items at all that wouldn't leave packaging or peels behind..."
Her brows are furrowed like she's ready for battle. It's endearing.
"Here we go," Goro doesn't hide the warm gleam in his eyes, but she's too busy rushing back to the long-soaked rice to notice. "I have to remind you once more — you're one to talk."
"And we're going to eat it together," Sumire affirmatively replies, turning the stove on and shoving her half-eaten packet of crackers into Goro's grasp without sparing him a second glance, because cooking is all that has her attention now. He hums in response, putting one into his mouth.
Sumire reuses the cup she drank from to add fresh water five times its capacity into the donabe, then covers it with a lid and places it onto the heated stove, lowering its temperature to medium.
"And now we wait for it to boil," she softly speaks to herself.
Goro spectates her with just a hint of curiosity.
"In hindsight, I believe I should've brought this up a lot earlier, but..." he's clearly having trouble picking his words. Something changes in Sumire's eyes, and still leaned over the pot, she chuckles quietly enough to let Goro believe he might've only imagined it. It appears all her previous inner turmoil was for nothing in the end, because she still allows herself a thought that maybe, just maybe, it would've been better if he had indeed died. Just moments ago, she'd almost forgotten to be depressed. Why did he feel the need to ignite this topic now, of all times? Why must nothing ever go her way? "You, well, seem to be faring rather badly. Like, uncharacteristically abysmally badly. Is something specific the matter? Other than the death of your older sister, that is?"
"I don't know," Sumire answers honestly, turning around to face him for no particular reason. "Not really."
Goro studies her expression.
"I see," is all that he has enough evidence to conclude.
They stay like that for a while. Only when the water finally begins bubbling does either of them shift the focus of their attention.
With much less airiness to her movements than before, Sumire removes the lid and places it into the sink to handwash later. A brief scent of rice fills the room. At any other point Goro would've gladly reminisced on bittersweet childhood memories again, but right now, he's far too preoccupied with knowing something is deeply wrong in the emotional atmosphere surrounding them, yet finding himself powerless in the face of figuring out what exactly. Sumire needs to speak first, but that seems as likely as a new place to live dropping onto him from the sky. Ah, he might as well bring that up.
When he speaks, Sumire's multitasking adjusting the heat to low with one hand and stirring the rice inside the pot with the other.
"So," it comes out much less confidently than he expected it to. "I'm not too sure whether you want to hear the rest of my story—"
"I do want to hear it," Sumire cuts in, her back still turned. "I just didn't know there was still more to it. Sorry I didn't ask."
"No, that's to be expected, I did change the topic as if that was all," Goro replies, a little thrown off. "Even so. I suppose it didn't quite stick out in the palace, but I never realized how unpredictable you are."
"Is that so?.. Thank you then."
Goro refrains from clarifying he didn't necessarily mean it as a compliment, because frankly, at this point, he isn't too certain of his intention himself. Sumire takes out a different lid from one of the bottom drawers and places it over the pot. His mother did it just like this, too, and he'd always been somewhat curious as to why one instance of a cooked dish would require two separate lids, but she was always too busy and too tired to explain it properly, or maybe she didn't quite know herself. Asking Sumire now could finally solve this puzzle from over ten years ago, but he recognizes it'd be far too impolite to switch the topic again right after bringing up one she's voiced interest in. It'll have to wait.
"I consider this detail rather amusing, primarily because I never once took into account that it could ever pose a problem for me, until it showed up at my doorstep in the face of my landlord." If you were to ask Goro now why his celebrity grin is plastered back onto his face, he wouldn't know how to reply. It almost feels like being in Sumire's presence automatically makes his brain unlearn years of thoroughly studied and appropriated social skills — but wouldn't it be a paradox, if all he's doing now is practically overusing them? Why can't he decide how he wants to act? "It turns out the previous me hasn't been paying rent or answering calls, and seemingly deleting missed ones right away, too. Such questionable choices... I can comprehend not wanting to be recognized by the public, and sympathize with it, of course, but creating easily avoidable issues by not even bothering to pay on time when the saved-up money is abundant is... beyond me."
"This is just a guess," Sumire carefully begins. "But given it's factual you were futilely wandering around Mementos for a while, regardless of whether it was two weeks or two months or anything in between, and that whole time you were not only cut off from your corporeal needs, but also human interaction in its entirety — even though your entire life used to be dependent on it — I think it's likely you would have been... afraid, for the lack of a better word, of abruptly resuming it. Um, I mean, surviving such a predicament would've taken a major toll on anyone's sanity..."
"...Like the main character at the end of The Island of Doctor Moreau," Goro puts a hand to his face, deep in thought. "That is plausible. Embarrassing and unfathomably weak of me, but unfortunately, plausible."
"It should be ready to serve in about twenty-five minutes, by the way," Sumire adds with the intention of indirectly letting him know she doesn't care one bit and would never think any less of him. It doesn't take longer than a second for Goro to catch on.
"Right," he says, looking over at the pot. Expressing sincere gratitude isn't easy when you've never even been in a situation calling for it before. "So, in the end, I've shamefully been evicted from wherever I was staying since the last foster family changed their mind about me. I hardly even remember the address anymore."
The corners of Sumire's mouth just barely perk up. Sharing entirely too personal details about oneself is definitely a decent way of doing it.
"You can stay here, if you'd like," she says without a second thought. "This condo's had an extra room for almost a year now."
Goro glances directly into her eyes, but her entire demeanor remains unreadable. Such a curious girl.
"You know full well there's no reality in which I would agree," he replies. "And yet you still ask."
Sumire shrugs. "So that there's no room for you to consider a reality in which I don't."
It's fair enough. Goro suddenly remembers the abandoned packet of crackers sitting on his thighs.
"Do you still want some? There's around... six, no, seven remaining. And crumbs."
"No, that's okay, I might not have it in me to eat okayu if I continue with that," Sumire admits, picking herself up on her arms to sit down on the countertop instead of the chair she brought at the beginning. It's simpler that way — to bring up the one topic she's been afraid of. The distance between them is larger.
Watching him crunch on the packet's remainders with the knowledge of it being their last shared calm activity before the storm she's going to set off proves more painful than she'd imagined.
Like kissing your lover goodbye, knowing it's the last time you'll ever see them, before they set off to war or dangerous seas.
How unfair. She wants to delay it. This reality has familiarized her with its rules one too many times — only she can become the granter of her own wishes.
"Do you have anywhere to stay, though?" She inquires with perhaps too much sternness to her expression.
Goro raises the packet over his mouth, letting the last crumbs fall into it by themselves. "Mhm. I've found a really unpopular motel. Doesn't require an ID to book a night, just cash. And I've been told I can stay as much as I want as long as I pay up — in quite a rude manner, I must note — I'm guessing they might be on the brink of bankruptcy if they're that desperate, but it's none of my concern. The privilege of not being recognized is enough to make it heaven for me, regardless of how much they've clearly been economizing on cleaning services."
He's making it sound like he doesn't believe it's a big deal, but Sumire's sure he must be aware places like that have more to worry about than dirty sheets. "Don't get yourself killed, you know," she mumbles.
"Heh. I'll have you know that the motel's benefit number three is that they don't check my belongings," Goro pats his backpack with forged pride. So he's kept his gun. It makes sense — you never know how many former Shido's allies are still out and about. If they found out he's alive...
"Even you're not immune to being ambushed in your sleep."
"I know," he sighs. "Let me play it cool here."
Oh. Her fault.
Once again, the only sound filling the vastness of the Yoshizawa family kitchen is the soft bubbling coming from the lidded pot — it serves as the only accompanying instrument to maestro Sumire's sadness about the fact that a child his age would have to take such things into consideration.
The subito forte that follows then wastes no time reminding just how bizarre it is to think that it hasn't even been two hours since she found out Goro's still alive. What on Earth is she so worried about? She doesn't mean anything to him. There's nothing to lose — there never was, Sumire would like to conclude, but oh, the entire world might be at stake. It was torturous to evade any thoughts about him when she believed she'd already lost him. Going through that again? What is she, a strong-willed person? Haha...
...It won't be a problem if it's only for a short duration. The delivery time of her online order was somewhere around two in the afternoon, she remembers.
"You're not going to like what I say next," she breathes out.
Goro hums doubtfully. "I didn't like plenty of things others have told me, and yet I endured them all."
Sumire knows it's a bluff. Sensing emotional shifts in the air is always mundanity — he's wary of what she's going to say.
"I..."
She almost smiles. It's going to be so simple, after all.
A singular, bigger bubble audibly pops inside the pot, and it's the easiest thing in the world to perceive it as a shot of a starting pistol.
"I regret denying Maruki's reality," is all that leaves Sumire's mouth, and she could argue it's without her consent if she just hated herself the slightest bit more.
Without any notice at all, hostility heightens in the wholeness of their surroundings — almost tangibly so — like when a palace goes on high alert after its owner receives a calling card, except, owing to its current metaphorical owner's inexhaustible kindness, only at most around eighty percent now. How lucky she must be.
It's impossible to miss the grip Goro's fist takes the form of. He doesn't bother looking in her direction.
Sumire could laugh at how much lighter every muscle in her body suddenly feels. It's decided — ahh, that was so easy — she's going to kill herself today.
Hers is but one consciousness against the world's grand collection, and it takes no effort at all to tune out every inanimate sound around her. The shot only signified the beginning of a race, yet it feels entirely like she's the target, and they just won't stop pulling the trigger.
"I see," is all that ultimately reaches her ears. She would be surprised about having no idea what intonation it's spoken with if she still cared.
Surely at some point, the bullets are bound to run out?
It feels impossible to remember the recipe anymore. Was she supposed to check on the rice's cooking process, make sure there's enough water, or should she leave it alone? An urgent necessity to take some course of action overwhelms her. She picks up the lid's piping hot metal handle with her bare hand, and it doesn't hurt one bit. Instead of looking at the pot's contents, she eyeballs her own fingers rapidly turning red, mesmerized.
"What are you— isn't that boiling?!" Goro jumps to his feet, similarly forgetting to be angry, and promptly seizes the lid away from Sumire, hissing from the pain it causes him and immediately dropping it back onto the pot. The loud clanking sound it makes serves as the required cheers of the hallucinatory audience to bring Sumire back into reality.
"...Sorry," she whispers. The mild burn wound is evidently there, but it still doesn't extend to her median nerves.
Goro stares her down with an emotion she can't discern anymore — but at least it doesn't appear similar to repugnance. A breath of relief gets stuck in Sumire's throat.
Without saying anything, her guest invites himself to browse through the pantry once more. She has no reason to object — she'd be glad if he burned the house to the ground. Unfortunately, after no more than a several seconds' delay, he only pulls out an unsealed bag of wheat flour and places it on the worktop in front of her.
"Put your fingers inside; it helps with burns."
Isn't it one of those folk cures Kasumi had warned her to be false when they were little, after reading about it on some sort of cooking forum? Ah, but who is she to argue.
The flour is colder than she'd imagined. Strangely, her body seems to prioritize recognizing contact with temperature over inflicted pain — has every other being in history evolved differently from her, and she had been left behind? It's all too familiar. Sumire has always been surrounded by notions that others have implied she's meant to know by innate human nature. But when will that begin?
It's a bit heartwarming, in contrast, the memory of how Kasumi tried copying her talent for preparing delicious food, yet didn't quite get the hang of it even after they've both lost count of her attempts. Less so, the memory of her holding childish grudges against Sumire for it.
Sumire'd never asked to be better than anyone at anything. Isn't it all just so plain stupid — the way she'd agonized over not living up to others' expectations in gymnastics, the way she'd hurt herself for the sinful longing to match her sister's gift, the way all she's ever wanted was to be loved in the same manner, the way she drowned in guilt for finding that lifeline in her family thanking her for every meal she prepared for them, because clearly, Kasumi still deserved that love much more, but Sumire just had to rob her of that aptitude the moment her DNA was formed, and it was all, always, all Sumire's fault!
"Are you angry with me?"
Sumire's shocked to discover she's still standing in her own family's kitchen, her hand in a bag of flour, and her brows furrowed with fierceness she wasn't even aware she could exert. Goro is looking at her with about fifty-one percent sadness, forty-nine percent previous unreadable emotion.
"A-Ah, um, no, no, not at all, I just... remembered something," she truthfully replies, forcibly returning her expression to normal, but it's hard to tell whether he believes her.
"In that case, allow me to ask a question," Goro says and throws one more glance at her as he sits back down.
"G-Go ahead." Oh, this is so embarrassing.
"Why do you say that?"
Say what? Was she talking? Is he just clarifying why she's letting him ask a question? Why wouldn't she?
He's quick to halt her racing thoughts. "That you regret denying his reality."
Oh. That. She actually told him that, didn't she.
"Can I take it back yet?.."
Goro's complete lack of response speaks more volumes about how much he's judging her current behavior than any words would.
"Um, I mean," Sumire has to hold herself back from slapping her own cheek. What on God's green earth is her problem? "I guess I just... thought you deserve to know."
"That much I can comprehend." It's evident from his strained countenance how much willpower Goro's applying to not simply snap at her. "What I'm asking is — why do you believe that at all."
"Right," Sumire says. There's solace in the fact that clearly neither of them is at their brightest right now. "But I don't think you need me to tell you that."
Goro doesn't hold himself back from groaning.
"Your sister."
"Indeed," a smile reappears on Sumire's face.
It briefly reminds him of the time they spent together in the third semester. He'd put his entire carnival costume of politeness and pleasantries behind him at that point already, eschewing rehearsed happiness for minimizing pain, and she never required any sort of special explanation to accept him as he is — it happened as naturally as breathing air, and oh, how much easier it became to do so once he was free. Why, then, does she still occassionally dress into hers, at moments like this, when they've already intertwined their fates so tightly he could probably knit them into a get-along sweater if he tried? She probably doesn't even realize she's the only one he's informed of his survival, with zero plans to expand that list.
He's saved a group of could've-been friends through ego suicide once already. How should a person with nothing left to lose succour their own mirror reflection?
It's a stretch to give himself that title, anyway. No one's ever set a spot for him aside in the realm of human beings — he's had to make his way to the unattainable other side all on his own merits, incongruent creature of a wanna-be impostor but much less than even it, now finally having shed his suffocating sheep's clothing only to reveal that the wolf skin beneath it is identically tailor-made, yet sewed on so tightly he's almost come to believe it himself. The truth is, after all, too shameful.
"It's not that I don't understand," Goro mutters.
He'd hate to admit it, but perhaps out of everyone Sumire knows, he sympathizes with her predicament best. There's far too much to think about, but memories of his first encounter with the Metaverse come flooding in like they have enough of a conscious mind to recognize they're most important — there's no arguing with the fact most mammals' lives begin in the womb.
Goro Akechi has felt genuine fear in his life exactly three times: one, when he discovered his mother's lifeless body. Elementary school. Nothing but a terrified fledgling with its beak gaping open, waiting for worms to be put inside. Then, when he'd first found himself in a place completely devoid of rules that the world around him normally flaunted, surrounded by unexplainable beings he for some reason innately knew to call "shadows", all evidently out for his blood. Middle school. Baby bird, learning how to fly for the first time. Lastly, his utter defeat in the engine room — his entire life, his chosen path of corruption in favor of vengeance, all turned to dust in seconds because of some nobody, that he'd always outright refused to crown a third, owing to his endless pride, converting his panic into fury with so much expertise that not even a residual echo was left in his memories. High school. To be a crow means to be a predator, yet you're fated never to reach the top of the food chain.
It's gaining one's wings that tends to leave the deepest impression when you've never felt much of a connection with anything in the first place. It was what gave him the only opportunity to have what to live for, as well as the much-needed outlet for resentment he's been building up for years in the form of raw battle and, after enough time has passed, vengeance. Of course he'd taken it without a second thought, never once regretting his choice — regardless of the agony it brought his day-to-day life, regardless of the way it turned out in the end.
It takes incalculable self-control to step back down on earth after you've witnessed heaven, and at that point it couldn't matter less how phony, erroneous, and shallow the latter's turned out to be, as long as it still provides you the salvation you originally came for (or at least, you're still able to delude yourself that it does). Self-control that neither of them has, couldn't imagine having. The red-eyed children remain forever tainted by the enticement of the Metaverse, even after it's long ceased to exist for everyone else, because it's by extension of their vow to keep their deceased loved ones in their hearts that it, too, must intangibly remain inside of them.
"Is that so..." Sumire says, skeptical. It's far too rare for herself to be understood by another instead of the other way around to even consider such an option.
"Just so you know, I've despised nothing more today than having to tell you this," Goro sucks his teeth. "But... The truth is, I might've been conflicted about accepting it too, if that failure of a doctor had brought my mother back."
Sumire ogles him like he'd just grown a second head — perhaps because it wears a face she'd never been allowed to see before.
"He must've assumed that just because she'd left me earlier than the parents of the phantom thieves, I wouldn't be as desperate to have her back in my life," Goro doesn't even know why he's continuing. It turns out quite a challenge to physically hold himself back from breaking into hysterical laughter. "They were all truly alive, you see. I'm sure you've been filled in. Their deaths never took place in that world at all. Why were they the only ones granted such a privilege?"
"I'm sure you don't want to hear it, but I think it's very likely doctor Maruki sincerely assumed you to be dead," Sumire weakly replies. "So he felt forced to resort to prioritizing the actualization of your own existence."
"You're still defending him," Goro's voice is laced with disappointment.
"It's not that at all. You see, it's just that I'm currently very mad at you."
Goro blinks. It's not at all common for him to completely overlook his conversation partner's emotions — he's hammered every principle of social interaction into his head since childhood on total autopilot, and it seldom failed him, last instance being at some point of his early teen years, when he hadn't yet fully perfected it. Is it just that the rulebook he mentally wrote for himself only applies to adults? Or is it specifically this one girl that is such an enigma in contrast to every human being around the both of them? He chose to trust her when she'd said she wasn't upset with him minutes ago — it seems entirely illogical for her to lie only to come clean so soon after. Then it must mean, something very recent induced this new sentiment... Well, there's no road paved to Sumire's brain in his own head. It appears vital to put his pride aside for a second and simply ask:
"...And why is that?"
Sumire's words come out so sharp with irritation that Goro feels like he's barely avoided his throat being slit. "If you literally get it... How can you still be so against me holding that belief?"
Kurusu may have been the first anomaly to strike intrigue, but it's hard to keep being surprised by someone who barely shows any emotion, much less voices it. Sumire is emotion personified: the more time Goro spends in her company, the more impossible it becomes to predict what face she'll wear next. It should be the other way around. All that leaves her mouth are words, and yet the form of them seems to get lost somewhere on the way to his receptors, because what he ends up obtaining each time are instead complex feelings, never too sure whether still hers or morphed into his own.
"There's no point to it if it literally isn't real, Sumire," Goro spits out. "I would have come around despite anything. You are intelligent. Why do you insist on deluding yourself?"
"Is that not hypocritical to ask?"
Sumire's words no longer carry any intonation. It's like she's merely pointing out a fact, and still, Goro once again finds himself sucked into an unexplainable typhoon inside his own amygdala. It's all too much, so he chooses to ignore it for once.
"What I'm also saying is, we've both been given the short end of the stick. Our families, unlike everyone else's, were never given a second chance at life in that reality. So much for paradise. Am I wrong?"
"If doctor Maruki had brought Kasumi back..." Sumire allows herself a moment of pondering before quickly shutting herself down. "No, forget it."
It pisses Goro off to no end just how much he can't seem to understand.
"You want me to keep talking," Sumire cuts in before he asks for her opinion again. It's all fair play. She's already taken the first step towards ruining their own shabby little oasis — she might as well go through with it. "I can do that. Goro-sen— Goro. Have you not tried to be your departed mother as well? Isn't your charming smile and attitude to win the hearts of others despite feeling nothing for them, something you must've learned to copy from her directly? I can't imagine how else you would've had the expertise to be able to become this popular at your age."
It's all a game, and he's never had to face a loss streak so continuous. Acquiring the cheat code for knowing exactly what and why the adults want him to say from observing his mother's interactions with others and then abusing its usage after some trial and error has been a breeze throughout his life; the side quests he took upon himself of cycling around town to gather stories and standing in long lines to try out the newest trending food items, all for utilization as conversation pieces with them — even more so. Intuiting an adult's needs before they are expressly stated (because his mother didn't want to burden him with her problems), refining his ego self and locking away his true personality to receive acceptance and appreciation (because his mother always loved him so much he couldn't help but yearn to spend eternity basking in it), all like stealing candy from a baby — robbing himself of his own childhood in the process — and yet the treat never being enough. Waiting to cling onto any sort of vague and undefined interest towards him once he'd been abandoned but knowing none of them ever want him for his real self, forever refusing to display even a crumb of such attention affecting him, now always alone, always on single-player mode. Just like he'd been told in that wretched engine room, having his inner workings revealed along with the ship. It costs nothing to give in to the temptation of tearing your own skin into pieces in front of the people who'd pulled at it once, but he's learned his lesson. It's not the time to tell her more.
"Do you think that made me happy?" He bitterly asks, deciding to turn the topic back around about her, questioning her naivety.
"Did I ever want to be happy? I think the more important part was wanting to be good at looking like it."
Wanting to be loved, Sumire would add, if she wasn't still so scared of being judged for being ready to give her life up for something so trivial.
Wanting to be loved, Goro would respond, if he wasn't so afraid of admitting to ever letting himself have such a revolting, far too human need.
Yet neither of them says a word. Tomorrow will come for the world around them like it always does, and all they can do in return is choose to continue celebrating their flawless infiltration, their achievements serving as incontrovertible evidence of being accepted into the circles of human things — all despite their scripted existence as idiosyncratic amalgamations, irrespective of their heads being hollowed out in favor of lovable traits seized from their immediate families. Or they can die. Their roles are swapped now — Sumire knows which choice is hers. Goro would like to say that his indecision is proof of his research towards a third option, but it doesn't take much self-analysis to realize he's merely hesitating.
"Being famous for my facade never filled my void." Resorting to honesty feels like the only remaining option to hammer any sense into her. "I remained a child whose birth only brought misfortune to everyone. I amplified that title tenfold, you know. You will always remain yourself, no matter how well the mask fits you."
"Maybe so," Sumire sighs. "Maybe I can never escape my foundation, either. I'm not denying it. But maybe that's exactly why it makes sense for me to remain true to what I wish for."
"What could possibly be the motive? I put it all behind me. I seriously cannot fathom how it would do you any good to hold on to that idea if your void can never be filled either. Your sister is not coming back."
There's no immediate response from Sumire this time around. Shit. Did he go too far..?
"Sumi—"
"There's no need," she interrupts. "I don't ask for anyone's understanding. Let's put it this way — for me, the best way to keep going is becoming Kasumi. Therefore, I have every right to regret losing that option."
"You would have died," Goro snaps. "I would have been talking to Kasumi right now. I don't know Kasumi. She's not who I came here for."
Sumire's glass pretense of rationality finally crumbles. "I was ready to die!"
"Well I didn't fucking want that to happen!" Their anger echoes through the kitchen. "It's objectively a bigger loss to everyone around us for a regular girl like yourself to simply cease to exist, rather than the irredeemable hitman's suicide should have been by rejecting that reality! I almost wish that actually came true, just so I wouldn't have to stand here arguing with a wall right now —"
"You just don't get it," Sumire mutters impatiently. "Do you seriously believe your mother would have denied this opportunity if presented with it? Do you think she wouldn't have wanted to escape her pain, and give the entire world happiness too, if she were at it? You fail to consider the opinions of others, Goro-senpai."
Ah. That was all out loud.
She doesn't bother correcting herself. There's a decent possibility that now her mistake isn't in the honorific — she might very well have lost the first-name privileges altogether. She doesn't want to know. Please don't let her know.
"Don't speak about my mother like you know anything about her, Yoshizawa," Goro says coldly.
Fuck. Fuck, shit, shit shit shit shit shit. She's really done it this time. It hurts somewhere deep in the chest first, and simultaneously the stomach, something so piercing she wouldn't at all be surprised if he had discreetly shot her with intent to kill, and she wouldn't be mad about it, either. But there's no outer wound. It hurts in the bones of her knuckles next, so much that she feels herself getting nauseous again, except it also proves not to be physical.
Goro stands up, staring her down with unveiled disgust. "I believe this topic is over. We've both said everything we have to say, and we're obviously never going to reach an agreement."
It's not true at all. It's obviously not true for Sumire — she'd left an immeasurable amount of things unmentioned — but it's not hard to tell it isn't one bit true for Goro, either. He's clearly itching to add something, and maybe it's nothing more than cussing her out, but she just has a feeling there must be plenty of points leftover to his side of the debate, too. It's too bad she's also more than aware that he's sick of her sixth-sense EQ bullshit, and that bringing that speculation to attention would only upset him further.
The sound of a backpack being zipped up breaks the silence next. Goro puts it onto his shoulder without sparing her another look.
"I wish you the best of luck in life," he murmurs as a farewell. It's supposed to be sincere, but the absurd hatred towards Sumire engulfing him against his will in this moment makes it come out no different from his usual gritted goodbyes towards various paparazzi.
It takes three steps for him to reach the entrance of her family's kitchen.
This is where it all ends. Right? Wasn't she okay with that fact?
"The okayu... it should be about ready now. Please," Sumire suddenly exhales, shutting her eyes tight as if readying herself for a physical blow. "I... won't be able to eat it all by myself."
It comes as quite a shock for both of them. The quiet noise of the water inside the pot became so background they've almost entirely disregarded its existence. How cruel.
Goro stops for several seconds — but Sumire must be on a different planet with how warped her perception of that time feels — and slowly turns around.
Maybe it's how unintentionally miserable she looks... Or the emptiness of his stomach except for the painfully unfilling crackers, or his deep-rooted desire to possibly taste his mother's cooking again. But he drops his backpack back on the ground.
"Alright", he accompanies the soft clanging sound it produces. "Just the okayu."
"Of course—!"
Sumire turns around to turn off the heat like her life depends on it, because it sure as hell feels like it does. It should steam for ten more minutes now, but will Goro wait that long?
"Um, do you want any toppings on it? I believe we should have... scallion, umeboshi, ginger, probably kizami nori as well..."
"Soy sauce, if you have it," Goro says, sitting back down in silent protest against his own brain screaming at him to leave. That's how she made it.
"R-Right, that should be in the fridge..."
She dawdles on purpose, acting as if making a fool of herself through movements is easier on the heart than explaining anything to him directly. It's too bad she's not the only person in the room who has forced themselves to study human behaviors to the point of memorizing the cause of nigh every flaw since the day they were born.
"I know it has to sit for a while," Goro sighs. "It's fine. I've already agreed."
Sumire only swallows. She's said enough stupid things today.
It takes mere seconds to mix the soy sauce into the pot's contents. The dread of two all-hating replicas of their respective selves coexisting in a shared space waits for no one as it fills the air.
Nothing should matter anymore. It's the last time they'll ever see each other.
"I just don't get it," Goro starts, despising every moment of having to admit such a ridiculous shortcoming. "Yoshizawa. You have no idea how good you have it..."
Sumire hops back onto the countertop, this time putting her wrists on her knees, bending her sitting position in half. "What do you mean?"
"Loving parents to come back home to. A passion you followed all your life — a direction for it to continue. I simply — I can't fathom a compelling enough reason for being so ready to throw it all away. Sure. It's easier not to exist than to exist with grief. But your alternative doesn't even bring back the person you're grieving for. It only kills you."
A snort reaches his ears. Sumire quickly shakes her head as if she wasn't the source.
"Do you sincerely believe I'm not aware of that?"
"I don't know what I'm supposed to believe anymore," Goro retorts, narrowing his eyes. "I can only remain sure that in your position, I would never make that choice."
"So you think — it's okay to be suicidal only as long as you no longer have a family," Sumire replies with condescension she would never allow herself in any other scenario. "You lack empathy."
"I'm quite aware of that, too. But this isn't about me."
"Oh, but it is. You're so fucking special, it makes me sick."
Goro leans back in disbelief. It gives him just enough of an opening to be able to parrot "What do you mean?" before his pride prevents him so.
"Recognition for your skills," Sumire hisses in annoyance. "Personality everyone's always drawn to. Ability to know what you want from your existence and to strive towards those goals. Everything. Everything I ever wanted. You drift through life, no matter how painful it is, and think that gives you the right to disdain those who fall apart under such pressure. I can't stand being looked at like that..."
The room falls silent. Sumire puts her head onto her arms and squeezes her eyes shut before imminent tears stain her face.
"None of that is true," Goro carefully replies. "Nothing of what you say is true. But somehow, I get the feeling you already know that... Does that mean I lose again? That none of my envy carries any truth to it, either?"
"What do you think?" Sumire's fetal position makes her question come out terribly muffled, but it's enough for Goro to catch on.
"When your father greeted me, he appeared to be a very kind person. The genre of near-extinct businessmen who got to where they are through honest means. Is that wrong?"
"People of that kind — have you ever met one that wasn't a doormat kind of human?"
"Not really, no," Goro says, beginning to understand.
"So there's your answer. He's incredibly disappointed in me and everything I do, and he never stops pitying me like I'm terminally ill, yet he always beats around the bush, as if not voicing it will not upset me. It makes it so much worse," Sumire holds back a sniffle, wiping her nose with the bottom of her palm. "I think — I think it's ready now. Let me give you your portion."
"What about your mother?"
Goro watches her take out a pretty ceramic bowl from one of the cabinets, and grab the cooled-down pot's handle with her left hand to spoon the rice inside it with her right. His own mother did everything with chopsticks, but this method appears more efficient. It's not long after that he's presented his steaming portion of delectable-looking okayu, thick in consistency, the texture of rice grains appearing to be swollen and soft. A very familiar sight.
"I don't know when the last time I've seen her face was," Sumire says, getting back to the pot to serve her own meal. The rice is drenched in soy sauce like Goro requested, and she's never eaten this way before, but she wouldn't have been able to pick her own condiment even if she had given herself that option — it's easier to let someone else make the choice. Her parents both preferred honey. Kasumi loved beaten eggs. "She hates me. She's never told it to me directly, either, but she's been avoiding me the entire year — I'm sure you can guess why. She'd always preferred Kasumi. Every practice she escorted us to or from, every gift she's given us, Kasumi was always favored. I don't mind, but..."
"You should," Goro says, directing his gaze at the chopsticks he's been given, and wielding them in one swift motion. "A good mother should love her child."
"I'm sorry," Sumire replies, sensing the sorrow in his voice.
"Then, your passion..." He prompts, uneager to let that topic go on.
Sumire stares off into the distance.
"Longest story. Well, synopsis: I don't hate it. I don't like it. I've never felt anything towards it. It's not a passion. The only reason I got into gymnastics was because Kasumi did, and asked me to follow. I've never... ever had any idea what I wanted to do in life."
"There's this mecha anime I think you should watch," Goro chuckles. "You might end up relating to the entire main cast."
His lack of concern is invigorating.
"Do you watch anime often?" Sumire asks, knowing full well he wouldn't have had the time.
It catches him off guard. His less "fashionable" hobbies are not something he'd ever exposed to anyone.
"It's more that I used to in my childhood," he averts his eyes. "The other children in the kindergarten and then elementary didn't like me much when I kept bringing up my favorite characters. It was around then that I started discussing mature topics instead... But it only attracted the attention of strange people much older than me."
Sumire tries to mute the pity she feels — it's obvious he wouldn't want it.
"Maybe we can watch it together," she replies like it isn't their last ever conversation. Like she won't cease to exist by tomorrow. It's calming.
Goro doesn't reply. She doesn't expect him to.
The salty scent of soy sauce welcomes itself into her nostrils as she picks up her first piece of hot okayu, occupying the countertop again, her red bowl on her thighs with one of her hands supporting it, its temperature warming her up.
Right — his meal. It's become a long-term habit to completely ignore whatever he was about to eat if he's recognized and chatted up by someone else, normally a reporter, due to the risk of having an unphotogenic photo of himself appear in tomorrow's papers. His fans found the crumbs around his mouth endearing the first and only time it's happened, but he'd failed to perceive it as anything but humiliation, and swore never to repeat such a shameful mistake.
The rice melts into his tongue immediately as it contacts it. Cloud nine is never to be reached by him, but it must feel exactly like this, with the memory of his mother's hand stroking his hair as he eats her dish enveloping him whole, and the whisper of her well-wishes for him to get better soon shooting him point blank with more accuracy than any bullet ever could.
Suspicious watery substance wells up in his eyelids. He can't believe it. What an embarrassment.
Sumire watches him with interest, swallowing her fourth bite. "If I can ask..."
"Just ask," Goro interrupts, unable to wholly conceal the quivering of his voice. "I know I can be irrational at times, but for the most part, I've learned to manage that."
"You said you could tell I knew that nothing I said about you was true," Sumire nods. "But I would still like to hear it from you firsthand. It's not fair if I'm the only one who elaborates."
It's nothing to do with his mother, like he expected it to be. He figures she's playing it safe — to his biggest dismay, there's no way in hell that she, of all people, didn't notice him cry.
"Envision a perfectly coagulated personality," Goro smirks, playing with his chopsticks. "Envision your entire day, and week, and month, scheduled to the last minute. Envision waking up earlier than anyone you know, simply so you never risk missing your usual hour of a much-too-scrupulous makeup routine, because that's how the public loves it. It doesn't matter how physically spent you are, how close to black the color of the circles under your eyes gets — caffeine and concealer rescue all. Thousands of observers follow you wherever your countless media appearances take you, so you can never let your guard down for a fraction of a second. You convince yourself you love it. You convince yourself it's all worth it, because it's the one path you pave for your revenge — the only life goal you've ever set for yourself. Once it's over, you'll have nothing, but until it's over, you burn yourself alive every day time and time again, pretending that there's still parts of you uncharred enough to be combustible. None of your show's spectators ever notice your anger, but you suppose it's only natural — it's what you're meant to be best at, after all. Would you still call yourself an actor if your public was capable of unveiling your masked emotions? You weren't born one, but you mold yourself into one as if it's all you know. It all comes so easily to you. The spotlight never leaves your face, and you almost forget what it really looks like, until late at night you're returning to your devoid of any real furniture apartment that has never once seen another visitor, barely reaching the sink to throw up into because you've skipped how many meals now — I'm sure personal experience can aid your imagination of this part quite well — and then it's back to normal, the concept of free time nonexistent for you, all only ever spent on studying because they all expect your genius to ace the nationals. You never identify with anything you're praised for. Nobody is ever there to tell you what to be, so you embrace the collective consciousness's conception of a flawless existence."
He pauses to eat a few bites of okayu. It's indescribably delicious.
"And then there's the part where you kill people."
Sumire chokes on her own rice.
"It was never your turn to have fun, like all your peers," she comments, faintly coughing.
"Happiness is reserved for happy human beings. All facsimiles like us can do is code the command to smile into ourselves, as sentient robots would."
"But did you ever figure out why? Why you became this, instead of any other kind of human?"
"When the universe orders you to perform metamorphosis, you can only obey," Goro replies, scavenging for the last pieces of rice inside his bowl. It's not fair that such a delight has to be finite.
It's also not what he means to say at all. The truth is plain and simple — so that someone would want him around. But it was far easier to admit that during the climax of the worst mental breakdown of his life, rather than this complete contrast of a domestic setting.
"Even if it's not who you're meant to be?" Sumire clarifies, drinking the leftovers of her own dish directly.
"Even if it's not who I'm meant to be."
"But now you refuse to step on the stage. How does one command their legs to walk away?"
"That is up to the individual to find out," Goro stands up, face painted with something almost resembling a genuine softness. Extending his hand to Sumire and watching her be struck with confusion for a moment before giving his empty bowl to him, he brings it to the sink along with his and lets the lukewarm water run. Manually scrubbing used kitchenware is nothing new — he could never be bothered to install a dishwasher.
"Thank you," Sumire says, uncertain of what exactly she means it for.
"Pass the pot too."
She complies, spectating his handiwork. "Do you enjoy philosophy? Or poetry? You speak in such a graceful way sometimes."
"I've forced myself to enjoy philosophy, yes," Goro scoffs. "Adults like it when you're well-read about the most irrelevant men. I actually prefer psychology. Helps with understanding people."
Sumire aches to get to know him better. Between the charismatic detective and the homicidal gremlin, it's weird to realize she can hardly describe him at all.
"What's your favorite... um... psychology... ex—experiment, I guess?"
She doesn't mean to come off so uninformed, but Goro pays it no mind.
"Good question," he replies, putting the last bowl onto its respective shelf — it's quite impressive to have memorized where it belongs from just one sighting, Sumire notes. "I would probably say the surrogate monkey one. It's pretty extensive, so you can read about it yourself sometime, if you'd like, but the general idea of it was testing whether infant monkeys would prefer a cloth mother doll who offers warmth, inessential for survival, or a wire mother doll who offers milk, necessary to live on. Which do you think they chose more commonly?"
"Well," Sumire ponders for a moment. "If I were a baby monkey, I think I would choose the cloth mother. It would be quite lonely without any physical comfort provided. I would prefer to die believing that I'm loved, instead of surviving surrounded by nothing but scary wires."
"Indeed," Goro makes his way to the backpack resting on the cold kitchen floor. "It's a choice we're both actively making."
Sumire jumps down from the countertop. "It's very sad... if they had to be taken away from their real mothers for that experiment."
Goro says nothing as he picks up his luggage.
"Do you have to go, then?"
"I have a meeting scheduled with another landlord. I wasn't planning on staying in that motel forever, you know," he responds, turning to face her. There's a height difference of a mere couple of inches — Sumire must be going through a growth spurt. "I don't expect it to go well, considering they implied I've merely been squeezed in as a backup potential tenant. Per usual, though, you miss all the shots you don't take."
"I see," she only replies.
"Speaking of which. Even though it really isn't at all my place to intervene in your life path's choosing, I would like to make a small suggestion. That okayu just now," Goro somewhat lights up at the memory as he makes his way to the genkan to put on his shoes. "Was the best thing I've eaten in around eight years — since my mother last prepared me the exact same dish when I went down with a cold. It was nothing short of incredible, and for that I must thank you. Have you ever considered dedicating yourself to a cooking career?"
Sumire's pupils drastically widen, and she would not be able to tell whether this fight or flight response is caused by extreme fear or something else entirely even if her cerebrum's functioning didn't just come to a complete halt.
"Well, I'm just saying — I believe you have limitless potential. Alright then, I must be off."
What? What? What's going on?
Goro turns the front door's lock with the apparent accustomedness of a full-on resident of this condo, and it throws Sumire off just enough to put her current colossal confusion aside for a moment. Instead, she remembers another thing bothering her all this while — neither of them has used one another's name the entire time period after their supposed fight, both waiting for the other to re-establish the rule. It'll be too late to ever take the initiative if she doesn't do it now.
"Good luck with the meeting, Goro-senpai," she says, with her best attempt to hide the shaking of her voice, and her most earnest apologetic intention.
"Right," Goro murmurs in response, stepping outside. It's hard to tell what expression his face conveys, but his tone lacks any hostility. "I'll see you later, then."
The door shuts with a click.
The loneliness of her own home has never weighed heavier on Sumire. After all, it's the first time she's ever received a visitor. It's such a shame he refused her offer to stay.
More importantly, he'd also reputiated her entire spectacle of a metaphor for her upcoming suicide through the hypothetical of regretting denying Maruki's reality... Was it all for nothing? Did he catch onto any of it? Why else did he say that? Why the fuck would he say something like that?
Becoming a cook... It's not that the thought has never appeared in her head on its own before. It's that she's never allowed it in. The younger daughter of the Yoshizawa family, daring to consider a direction for her life that wasn't dictated by others? Simply ludicrous. The fear of being made fun of might as well be primal for Sumire — one too many failures at practice and the consequences they conjure serve as good fodder for an environment-imposed Pavlov pseudo-experiment. Humans are social animals; therefore, so must be imitations — she can't unlearn such a thing all by herself.
The universe they all share doesn't seem eager to let her, either, because it's not even after minutes of herself facing the front door that she hears footsteps behind it again, and doesn't even get a split second to hope they're on the way to one of her neighbors before a deafening ring of the doorbell accompanies them.
Time is always relentless, and she's had more than enough of it to memorize the way Goro's walking sounds, so in exchange, she doesn't get any to hope for it being him coming back, either.
Her father has no reason to end work this early. She knows the only remaining option very well, and so she presses on the handle regardless, pushing it to fly open.
"Good afternoon," the deliveryman says with a smile. "I'm going to need you to sign here for your package, and that'll be it."
Sumire beams back, and does as instructed without another word.
"Thank you for your time!"
She's handed a small carton box with her initials and address on it as she's left all alone again.
What a nuisance.
The entryway's walls must surely be closing in on her.
She doesn't dodge. Gymnastics forced her to be supple in the same manner public presence forced Goro to be tactful — something neither of them wants, or needs, or knows represents their actual personality. He's tried to make it a point that she isn't any worse than him; therefore, she concludes that as the lesser being, she should listen, and reject it as well. She pays no mind to her crystal clear knowledge of the fact that by that logic she should also listen to the way he described her cooking — simply because it's such a major clash with her own perspective that it feels almost like she'd lost her hearing the same hour she lost her last chance at life.
Sumire is mediocrity. Taking up cooking in the first place was technically pure chance of her family's schedules — nobody else had the time, so the black sheep, rebellious enough to at least refuse to spend her free time practicing what she never cared for in secret like her sister did, took it upon herself to alleviate the burden of their lives, caring for quality of her work only not to endure any more harsh words, never fully believing a single praise she was lavished with yet breathing every last instance of it in like a baby seal does the bubble of air their mother leaves for them below the ice, when they're yet to get used to holding their breath for long enough to travel tedious underwater distances. It's interesting to consider a possibility of her simply never assuming that duty, and lazing away like her spirit yearned for, yet her suffocating conscience didn't allow. Then she and Goro could bond over always eating only heated-up, ready-made grocery store meals. And he would never have said that. He would never have said that. Ever. She sincerely wishes he hadn't.
It takes seconds to rip the packaging open. The contents of it are tiny, and so very alluring. Her escape from these thoughts. It's easier to die than to figure out your future. It's easier to kill him than to analyse his words. Sumire has it in her to do exactly one of these things.
Own death, after all, is terrifying, because you can never be sure that what awaits you afterward won't be much worse.
He'd implied to her that he has nothing now that his only life goal turned out to be for naught. So how can he still retain the need to survive? How does he find it in himself to look for places to live? Why did he come to visit her, not seeking any sort of assistance, but instead changing her own life with some stupid couple of sentences? In his shoes, she would've frozen to death days ago. By choice. Why is it so hard to make choices in her own body, then?
The hatred lingers because jealousy does, unarguably true on both ends, though they'd never say it to each other's face. Their elaborations are far too small to matter in the grand scheme of the grass around them always being greener on the other side. After all, the construction of cerebral models present in humanity since the earliest days is the most lamentable, yet wonderful thing — no individual possesses a wholly objective perspective of another, thus each of us can only resort to creating it akin to a self-fulfilling blank canvas of a puzzle, the image on which only appears as it is pieced together, through our limited perception as gathered via an interface of communication methods like speech and body language, and we retain the knowledge that others build models of us based on their own limited perception. We inhabit their thoughts as fragments shaped by how we present ourselves to them, and they exist in us all the same. We become aware of becoming aware of each other; we see ourselves reflected in each other, tinted by shared, yet so drastically divergent frames of reference. Socially, we exist as people — no matter how defective — because we see people seeing us.
And so, as observed by the universe, Goro returns to his motel with his brain burning up over an excess of new perspectives the prior interaction has made light of to him, while Sumire returns to her room, packet of razor blades in hand.
Outside her window, a murder of crows sings their victory cries. The red-eyed teenagers' ostentatious race for the meaning of life ends in a dead heat.
The clock on Sumire's wall reads 14:30. She suddenly remembers one of the proverbs her mother taught her when she was still too small a kid to be labeled a disappointment: ichi-go ichi-e. One lifetime, one encounter. If nothing else, she can't shake off the feeling this morning was in some way destined — and not for her.
Closing her eyes comes harder than she remembers it should, but as she does it, she takes hold of her writing table with the palms of her hands, her wrists facing it, and suddenly, the pain that comes with the pressure of her weight makes it feel like her own anguish is becoming palpable to her. She briefly wonders if she could crush the blades still under her right palm if she pressed down hard enough, but exhales as she brushes the thought off to her usual nonsense. It would be easier if the entire packet just disappeared on its own. Then her only problem would be having nothing to do next.
It's not that the current ordeal is much different. Decision paralysis is child of oblivion.
She hardly remembers how she ends up in the bathroom, or how the tub becomes plugged and filled with water. There's no hint of light in her eyes and no possibility of thought behind them. Her ridiculous pajamas meet the perpetually cold tiled floor as she invites her body to be engulfed by liquid of entirely unknown to her temperature.
It feels so enormously, so intimately right — like finding yourself at the bottom of the ocean, knowing you belong to it, she reckons — she almost swears she could drown, if not for the vexing understanding of the fact her reflexes wouldn't allow it. How unfair this world was built, that even taking your own life comes as a chore. Sumire sighs once more, but it comes out rather as a desperate whine of a dog unwilling to be put down.
Different liquid abruptly streams down her arm, so she opens her fist and finds that she doesn't remember when she could have unpacked and taken out a singular razor blade, either. The water she's in quickly welcomes a new color, painting with it like a barista performing coffee art — that takes her mind back to Leblanc. Two sharp cuts are drawn on the inside of her palm. She must've been squeezing it with more force than intended, but even with that new knowledge, she doesn't let go.
So this is how it would feel. Like nothing. Ever.
She's half-pretending, of course, but the enthralling mist of the water in the tub would inevitably make up for the missing percentage.
Her very own DIY crimson red bath bomb keeps dissolving, as do her brain cells — if only relaxation was still a word she remembered the meaning of. Tiny bubbles pop under her body, and for a brief moment she wonders if it's finally her turn to be someone else's boiled meal, only to then unwillingly recognize the phenomenon as sweat. More of it covers her forehead as her bangs stick to it, and the exploding pain behind it makes her think of the Mount Fuji volcano. The water she's in might as well be its lava. Ah, what unpleasant conditions for death.
Was her deleterious being not made just for it?
"I'll see you later", my ass.
It's not like she would object to meeting him anew in the afterlife. Maybe they could start over — together. How saccharine it would be to not only have her own debilitating thoughts for roommates. Does hell even have residential areas?
Her right hand wields the razor blade like a pen with which to write her suicide note, and her left wrist is canvas with the golden ratio already sketched out, alas, only inside her mind. It's the most overstimulating experience she's ever subjected herself to, and as much as she's aware she must be dramatizing, it truly does feel like any next blink might be the last.
"I believe you have limitless potential."
All of a sudden, it's unbearably difficult to breathe. Necropolis of her what-ifs impends over Sumire, and she dares not raise her head.
I hate you.
She hasn't the slightest clue as to who is meant to be the addressee.
Her hands slip on the tub's walls twice as she attempts to get up, only to fall back in with a splash. She wishes she were dead. It takes a ridiculous amount of teamwork from all of her limbs to fall butt-naked onto the iced by comparison bathroom floor next. It really hurts. Blood seeps onto her forgotten pajamas, and her eyes glue themselves to the ceiling light.
The womb must've been equally uncomfortable. It might've been favorable to enter this world stillborn.
The accidental cuts of her palm are the only open wounds on her entire body. The razor blade is the only object still inside the tub's water.
Because... Afterlife is never guaranteed. If it really existed, wouldn't Kasumi have sent her some sort of sign already? Would she deserve it?
And deep down, bitterly, she knows he won't join her. Even if they should end up in the same place, he won't go. But he'll come back here. He promised he'd come back here.
Does she deserve to start over?
Her headache almost grows intense enough to puke. She opts to stay lying on the floor.
"We'll reach the top of the world together... That's our dream, right?"
Guh. Sumire — right, that's her name — swallows the unwanted barf back down. It's not the time. She's not in a state to clean up more than there already is a need for.
Her stomach pulses in pain. She should get up and grab a bite.
***
Ornithologists on TV often give friendly reminders to citizens who wish to do a good deed by feeding wild birds during the winter, when it's much harder for them to hunt for insects: most importantly, one must remember that once they've put a feeder out, and consistently refilled it with seeds, they must keep refilling it as often as possible, never allowing for pauses of over a day — all the way until winter ends, or, if the person wishes to remain cautious to a maximum extent, the whole time of their residence in the area, which can sometimes mean until their own death. There are multiple reasons for this. The most commonly known one is that once birds find a source of nutritious seeds that seems to never run out, they latch onto that opportunity, and expect such a source to provide them with their favorite food forever, sometimes leading to the birds forgetting how to hunt for food on their own — and why wouldn't they, if it's suddenly become so accessible that they no longer need to overexert themselves on tedious journeys, especially during freezing winters, when their energy runs out much sooner?
It's not so different from the phantom thieves' effect on society. Birds unlearn self-sufficiency once provided with the altruistic assistance of humans, and humans unlearn self-improvement once the phantom thieves keep solving their problems for them. It's easy to rely on someone who willingly offers you help, expecting nothing in return, and you won't realize how helpless you've become on your own until that magical assistance disappears.
Hence, you must never stop feeding the wild birds you have begun feeding. You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed.
The other relevant reason isn't particularly different, but it's one Sumire hammered into her brain in distant childhood, after an incident directly related to it. Winter takes a major toll on the tiny city birds' vitality, and they are not able to fly distances as long as they would be in a better climate, because most of their bodily energy is spent on keeping themselves warm. It is crucial for them to plan out their scavenging routes for the day in the most efficient way possible, and make sure they don't end up in a situation where they've flown around all day, expended all their energy reserves, yet found nothing to feed on to replenish them. This is why human-made feeders are incredibly helpful for keeping birds alive. But the harsh reality never allows for a situation with no downsides: as aforementioned, you cannot stop refilling your feeder abruptly after you've already done so multiple times. The birds that have discovered it and eaten from it, and were so thankful for your altruism towards them, upon finding that one day it is empty, will simply sit nearby and wait for you to refill their feed, completely oblivious that it will never come. They will wait all day. They will freeze and they will let their little bodies process all the nutrients from the previous meal to produce heat, until it runs out, and then they will freeze more. As a result, after much time passes and they realize the feed may not be renewed again, they will no longer have any energy to search for food on their own, and it does not matter if they haven't even at all forgotten how to do it.
The birds will starve to death. The same ones that you've helped, the same ones that have grown to trust you and depend on you.
Many years ago, little Sumire's strict mother decided to cut off her pocket money once she found out she'd been wasting it on wild bird seeds. Sumire was upset, but figured the birds would just go back to their previous meal sources. That is, until she'd found a sparrow lying below a big bush outside their apartment complex, near the balcony she used to have her personally crafted feeder on — one that her mother had unceremoniously thrown away. The sparrow would not respond to little Sumire's attempts to get it to wake up. And then, suddenly, as she was cradling it in her hands to warm it up a bit, its tiny chicken-like legs simply... fell off.
Sumire Yoshizawa's fate as a murderer had been sealed from the start. She screeched, she threw up, she bawled her eyes out after both of her crimes, but in what world would mere anguish rewrite her mistakes — no matter how badly she wanted it to?
Not this one. Maybe Maruki's, yet still not quite in the way she'd like. Such a spoiled and demanding child she must be.
It would be better if she could confess that her entire monologue on that topic was a bluff, but she doesn't want Goro to deduce that she almost died. Did she? Does changing your mind at the last second even count as an attempt? She's pathetic; she sustains no injuries — the ones on her palm could easily pass for paper cuts. It took almost no effort to handwash her pajamas from the stain they left. It took the entire rest of it to make herself a meal, and an excess to prepare an additional bento.
He'll surely come back, and she will give it to him as an apology. He won't forgive her, but he will eat it, and that will be alright.
She's hardly ever tried so hard to cook something for someone else in her entire life, and it's not one bit surprising: until today, meal prep has been an act of guilt; a sin of self-indulgence. After acceptance of Goro's see-you-soon remark, however... A maneuver of defiance, a revolution, a first-in-her-lifetime disagreement to live on only to continue someone else's dream. She's a horrible person already. How much would it change to take one step to steal what is rightfully hers?
I'm sorry. I got ahead of myself, as usual, and misinterpreted your mother's character. It wasn't my place. It won't happen again.
Sumire stares at her phone's screen, scanning the message for any typos, scrolling it up and down again to make sure she doesn't miss any behind the cracks. The car accident has truly caused it substantial damage, but still, she won't bring herself to replace it just yet. She's thrown her real phone away when she'd just started being Kasumi. It's a shame — she used to enjoy the Tamagotchi apps it had. Even the snake game would be a nice change of pace from Kasumi's fully career-oriented, no-distractions-allowed layout.
The last sentence is far too presumptuous, she decides. It will be up to him whether he wishes to see her again at all. It takes a bit of spam-clicking to get the delete button to work.
I understand if you don't wish to forgive me — it's entirely my fault, she writes instead.
Who knows if she means a single word. Whatever. Pressing "send" takes effort as well. Every movement does.
She owes so much to him. If he stood in front of her, he would probably condescendingly say something like, Are you planning to stand here until you pass out from exhaustion and hit your head? Nostalgic for all the times you've been dropped as a kid?
Fuck you, Sumire mentally retorts to her very own Goro impression. He's right. She should sleep — the sky has been dark for hours already.
Sighing, she puts the packaged bento onto the top shelf of the fridge, hoping that way her parents will know it's reserved for someone else. The sound it shuts with stays ringing in her ears.
Her head hits her cheap pillow less than a minute later. She'd only ever had one pair of nightwear, and it's yet to dry from all the blood scrubbing, so she simply crashes in her regular home clothes. Father isn't going to turn the lights on to check, and she isn't going to be reprimanded for not upkeeping basic tradition — all of that stopped mattering after Kasumi died. Thank god. It's been unbearably pretentious.
Tomorrow can't come soon enough.
...Or so Sumire thinks, until she wakes at dawn, and there are still no new notifications on her lock screen. Its background image is a post-practice photo of both Yoshizawa sisters, Sumire slightly out of frame. She's going to need to change it.
Goro's bento still rests on the highest shelf. Well, that's about it for the day. She dreamt of his comeback — and she would kill for that dream to continue. It takes a while for her to fall back asleep, and she spends that entire timeframe thinking about what she's going to say to Goro once they meet again.
The day after that is not one bit different, and her dormant life remains significantly preferable.
Sumire falls into a state of torpor.
Could something have actually happened to him? But it's Goro Akechi. He wouldn't let himself die that easily.
Heartbreak, heartburn, cardiac arrest — all the same to an amorphous matryoshka doll, partible into as many copies as there exist figures to perceive her. Which one might it be? Am I sick? Am I all of me?
"This bento has been untouched for a couple of days now, Sumire," a voice calls. "Its vegetables are going to go bad."
"Just eat it," Sumire spews, covering her head with her blanket and turning to a side opposite to her room's door. Her father leaves without further argument.
The mattress she lies on is but a morass of her self-destruction. The only person in her life who was still willing to talk to her every day has finally given up on her.
Sumire Yoshizawa is but a sparrow starving to death, patiently waiting for a refill of hope, for a comeback that may never happen. And it's all, always, always her own fault.
Even so, to her greatest dismay, she has not unlearned scavenging just yet. Languid, later in the evening, she gets up to heat up whatever leftovers her father's been eating — purely because it's a revolting thought to die in her bed, surrounded by her own watery vomit. She'd always wanted to turn that wheel herself. Her packet of razor blades still awaits its next use in the bathroom (is it not a miracle that neither of her parents seemed to notice?), and that, in turn, is a thought as casual as a comment on today's weather (far too cold, if anything).
Having marginally filled her stomach, she goes back to sleep. It always comes naturally to spend entire days in bed during these episodes.
The morning birds' chirping sounds a little like summer crickets, and the ring of a doorbell just slightly reminds Sumire of the toll of a funeral bell.
Huh.
It's ear-grating. Her mother is never home, and her father wouldn't have left the guest waiting this long, so he's probably already at work, too. What a major pain in the ass.
Sumire presses parts of her blanket into her ears. They'll give up eventually... probably.
...
They do not give up eventually.
Trrrrrrrr. Trrrrrrr. Trrrrrrrrrrrrr.
Holy fuck, is an apocalypse coming along? Should she hurry up and evacuate — is an earthquake about to hit, or perhaps, a tsunami?
Sarcastically smiling, Sumire manages to get herself to stand up. The ringing obviously only gets louder the closer she approaches. She wants to die.
She kicks the front door with the most force a severely malnourished, bed-rotting teenage girl can exert. The doorbell shuts the fuck up. Wow.
Sumire stands still, hoping to hear footsteps walking away. They had to have gotten the hint their presence is not desired.
Trrrrrrrr.
...Of course. How naive of her.
She thanks whatever gods she can remember the names of upon noticing a key lying directly on the table under the hallway mirror, even though it is most definitely her father who left it there. At least there won't be any need to further endure the ringing while searching for it.
It takes a few attempts to remember which direction it's supposed to be turned in for the door to open — she hasn't left the house in ages, it's only expected — but finally, she pushes the door ajar, making sure irritation is visible in every part of that movement.
She briefly considers slitting her wrists in front of the intruder if they try anything, but that thought evaporates like the morning dew once her eyes meet theirs.
...The man behind the feeder.
Sumire groans. Naturally, she'd already guessed. She just really wanted to be proven wrong.
It's too late. All your sparrows and tits and bullfinches have already passed away, waiting for the day you'd restock the seeds and the fruits you'd so generously put out for them. Your gifted reason to live is long past its best-before date.
Would she get a bellyache if she were to bite in?
"Look, um, I overreacted about you mentioning my mother. Actually, I've been thinking, and—"
Took you long enough, Sumire wants to say. Sumire wants to burst into laughter and into tears simultaneously and maybe hug him a little, clawing her fingers into his coat in fear of him disappearing again.
Sumire packages herself back in and does a total zero of those things.
"Forget it," she says, her facial muscles sculpting her best smile. "It's all good. I've moved on."
"You have?" Goro asks, turning his head like a confused puppy.
"Yeah!" Sumire nods enthusiastically. "I have a new goal now, and we have different opinions, so you can go ahead and live your life."
Has she finally taken up cooking seriously? That's good for her, then; she truly does have talent, Goro thinks, unconsciously putting several of his fingers to his chin out of habit.
"What goal is it?" He still asks. More out of curiosity about the way she'd phrase her reply than clarification.
Sumire's grin doesn't reach her eyes, and she does not care enough to craft an elaborate lie. The concept of being a cook has long vanished from her head. "Haha, it doesn't matter."
Those are not at all the words Goro was expecting. Something is not right.
"Are you absolutely sure you don't want to talk?" He pries, suspicion evident in his tone. Shit.
"Yes, no doubt about it," Sumire replies, never relaxing her mouth, drawing the door closer to herself with every pronounced syllable.
If she doesn't even know the sincerity of her own words anymore, it's truly all over for her.
Goro puts his foot in front of the doorframe.
"Can I just ask you to promise me one thing and nothing else — I swear?"
"I don't—"
"It's really nothing big at all. You've done it a million times already," Goro brings his head closer to the small gap he created.
Sumire sighs. "Sure."
"Can you promise me you'll still be alive tomorrow?"
...Stupid girl. Of course, you could never dream of outsmarting a nationally recognized genius detective.
Neither of them says anything for a good half a minute. For Sumire, this silence is soothing, but Goro cannot stand the mildest of awkwardness, and so he takes hold of the door, and flings it open enough for himself to enter. Sumire lets go of the handle, and does not protest.
"I really hate you for this, you know," she only says, still sporting her false grin.
Anyone in Goro's place would think twice about their own audacity and perhaps have a good reason to fear for their life. Unfortunately for Sumire, though, the only person wearing Goro's shoes is the man himself.
"Yeah, yeah, all that. Can I use your bathroom?"
"To your left," she finally lets the corners of her mouth drop.
"I do remember, but thank you nevertheless," Goro flashes a smile and disappears out of Sumire's line of sight. She decides to go sit down in the kitchen, and does not bring in an additional chair this time around.
It's dead silent today. The birds must've flown away to hang out in another spot. Sumire closes her eyes and places her elbow on the table, and her head on that arm's fist, as if readying herself for an afternoon nap. The sound of a toilet being flushed goes off in the distance, followed by one of a running tap.
Goro re-enters the kitchen seconds after. Sumire finally gets a good look at him — his hair's no longer in a ponytail, but clearly ruffled, so he must've taken the band off while tormenting her doorbell. Not much else is different from his first appearance here — the same ugly black is wearing him, but... his brows are unusually furrowed. At least he seems healthy this time around.
"So let's get this straight. I want you," Sumire abruptly exhales, "to leave me alone."
Goro rapidly blinks around six or seven times, then lowers his gaze.
"Finish your sentences," he mumbles.
"What?" Sumire laughs, sarcasm echoing throughout. "Nostalgic for all the times you've been confessed to in high school?"
"That's something I would say."
"Oh, I know."
"Doesn't suit you."
"Whatever," she kicks the kitchen table's leg. "At this point, what does?"
"Cooking?" Goro inquires, still confused about her reluctance to accept her talent.
Sumire bites her tongue.
"Okay, yeah, let's get the elephant out of the room, you're mad at me for not contacting you in days," Goro sighs. "Rightfully so."
"Oh, really? I'm allowed to feel this way? You're too nice to me."
"Quit it," Goro places himself on the table Sumire's sitting at, not a hint of hostility in his tone. "You know I'm no prodigy at human emotions. Can you just — explain to me, why exactly you do feel this way?"
"Didn't know I was back in Maruki's office," Sumire sneers. She has absolutely no idea why she has allowed herself to act so passive-aggressively for the past few minutes.
Goro kicks her knee almost playfully, and both of them know all too well that this game is not winnable without reaching a compromise. There's a distance of about twenty centimeters between Sumire's elbow and Goro's thigh. Too close for comfort. It might've been better to start on easy mode, but they remain too stubborn and too prideful, always biting off more of a worm than they have learned to swallow.
"You cannot stop feeding the birds you've kept alive," Sumire whispers into her hand.
"What?" Goro asks, leaning down slightly to hear her better, perhaps purely out of instinct.
"You cannot," she angrily repeats, "give someone a way to live. And then disappear on them."
Goro stares at her for an absurd amount of time. Sumire doesn't break eye contact, either. Goro blinks first.
Game over.
"Is it not unfair?" He smiles, but the unhidden annoyance in his eyes stands out more.
Sumire tilts her head, unafraid, and waits for him to continue. Goro understands then — she did not mean for her words to be an expression of a close-minded opinion, but rather an opening for a debate. Quite intriguing. He's always happy to bite the bullet.
"To paraphrase you — truly, you could've made groundbreaking advances in philosophy, but I would've hated studying it all the same — you cannot expect others to owe you their time," he begins. "Imagine... Mm, say, someone who never brings lunch to school, and one day in the cafeteria, out of the goodness of your heart, or perhaps specifically because you don't have an appetite that day, you give them yours. And then, with no sort of encouragement or implication from you, they start to expect you to give them your lunch every day. Would it not grow exhausting, would you still want to do it? Simply because you help someone once doesn't mean you remain obligated to keep doing it forever."
"I understand," Sumire nods. Emotion is still void from her voice. "But I think... this is just a little different. I just wanted a single message back."
It's a much shorter argument, yet infinitely more effective. The new-and-improved Goro knows when it's time to admit defeat — to swallow the bitter pill the bullet masked itself as.
"I know," he scrunches over, putting his wrists on his thighs, staring into nothing in front of him. "I'm sorry."
Sumire looks away, too.
"I had your contact open when you sent it. I watched you type that minuscule message for like twenty full minutes," Goro continues. "I figured there was no point in subjecting you to dealing with that phone for that long a time period again if I could just come back and convey my thoughts directly. I thought I could come back the next day. But to be frank, I was still... angry with you for saying that. So I kept procrastinating coming over..."
I wonder if there exists a type of history that doesn't repeat itself?
"If you were a bird, I'd make you suet with oat and wheat flakes, and raisins, and apples and elderberries, sunflower seeds, grasshoppers and mealworms, all loaded with soy oil, to apologize for skipping two days of feeding. But what can I do for human Sumire?"
Ah. So he's heard her the first time...
"Those ingredients... are so specific and so... accurate," Sumire muses, turning her whole body towards the table in order to allow herself to put her head onto her arms. Now, she faces the north, while Goro faces the south. "Are you familiar with birdfeeding, Goro-senpai?"
"The apartment I used to live in was heated, but the sheer loneliness of me always being the only one existing in it has made it feel colder than any outdoors," Goro admits. "So I invested in a feeder — simply so that I could at least watch small birds appreciate what I do for them while I study. I kept feeding them throughout every winter I spent alone."
"That's nice of you," Sumire says, genuinely, as she rests her head on her left cheek to give herself a better view of him.
Goro slightly repositions himself, putting his right leg over his left. Body language of someone who's pissed, Sumire figures.
"So... How did the meeting with the landlord go?" She asks, as if they're nothing more than old friends reminiscing.
"As shitty as you could imagine," Goro grumbles. "I'm starting to consider searching for places outside of Tokyo at this point."
"You never did that before? I never took you for someone who could get homesick."
"Because I don't. It's just... My mother's grave is here. It's more convenient to visit if I live nearby."
"Oh. I'm sorry..."
Sumire's quick to turn her face away from him and bury it into her arms. It's better if she doesn't speak.
"She..." Goro starts, but cuts himself off with no explanation.
Naturally, Sumire doesn't pry — intentional or not, it's deserved payback for her own lack of elaboration on Kasumi the previous time he came over. He almost wishes she would, and hovers his hand above her head, as if about to stroke her hair, but retracts it after several seconds of indecision.
She would like you. You're so similar.
This everlasting play has always lacked a dramatist, but perhaps somewhere in heaven, two people are gradually taking on the roles of substitutions. If it exists. If they exist.
It's silent beyond imagination. It might've been preferable if they were robots physically, too — at least there would be buzz or static to distract one's mind on. How does one file a complaint for never consenting to having a soul (hers esoteric and insuperable, his arcane and indefatigable, both equally magnanimous towards their opposition despite it all, never fated for a chance to display it towards one another; because in order to be loved, you're not allowed to make mistakes)?
They'd just begun introducing quantum entanglement in physics when Goro left school for good (as he's already told the phantom thieves, it was nothing other than a game to him, anyway — guessing what the teachers want him to say gets boring fast, and numbing his emotions to prevent himself from burning over completely only lasts so long). The concept describes a codependent relationship between two particles from an observer's perspective — essentially, when the two interact in a way that links their quantum states, it becomes impossible to characterize them individually. They become intertwined; therefore, once you measure the state of one particle, you instantly know the state of the other by extension, by red thread of fate, no matter how far away it may be. Until the observation occurs, however, both particles remain in what's known as superposition — both outcomes exist at the same time.
Schrodinger's former actors, afraid of intimacy, yet wanting it all the same. There still remains so much for them to talk about.
"I bet you're thinking about something real complicated and fucked up right now," Sumire mumbles into her sleeves.
Goro wishes he had the courage to tell her just how much her ability to read his mind means to him. It's all he ever wanted — it's all he'll never voice. Admitting dependence equals admitting inability to live, and it is still his turn to be the guiding hand.
"Did you deliberately place that freshly bought and already opened packet of razor blades on your bathroom shelf in an attempt to try and force me to believe that I'm visiting a lost cause?" He asks instead. His voice is soft, yet intimidating. "Or, perhaps, you honestly think me blind?"
Sumire scoffs. He's good at switching topics. Why did he spot it after but one visit, when neither of her parents could in days? Surely, just the investigative skills coming in handy?
"I think my mind has a permanent fever," she replies, picking herself up to a normal sitting position again, massaging her neck with one hand and tugging a filament sticking out of her pants with the other. Goro finally notices the wound on her palm.
