Chapter Text
Kotoko is largely certain that Shidou hates her. Which is a funny thing to say about the man who keeps looking at her like he's searching for something, isn't it? But she is certain, she does know he hates her. He's not quiet about the fact, which is especially funny when you remember they met in a hospital and they shouldn't even be in contact anymore. Everything about this situation is absurd.
Yet, even though it's absurd, it's true. Kotoko lays against the wall behind the hospital with her ankles crossed, waiting for him to come out. It could be now, it could be in a few hours. It's a whenever he gets the time sort of thing; it has to be, she's learned. What, with him being a doctor and all. They don't get a lot of predictable free time.
Kotoko waits for him. There's nothing for her to do today, and Shidou's good at giving her something to do. He's got a terribly scrambled sense of morality, and he's so stressed from work that he can't help but spill. It starts like that, at least. Maybe intentions shift, when he keeps seeing the people he tells her about beaten to a pulp on the news. She supposes that she can't be sure.
It takes another half an hour before he slips out. Shidou knows where to find her by now, can anticipate the fact she'll be there reliably. She can anticipate the fact he'll lean in and tell her all about the woman he treated earlier today, with the bruises all up her back and the son she won't let out of her arms and the husband that wouldn't leave her alone. Kotoko asks for a name. He tells her, and doesn't flinch when she points out he's breaking the law. He never does.
"I don't see why it matters," Shidou retaliates. What a dull thing he is, she thinks. Eye bags right down his cheeks, a near-sunken face, and a cigarette almost always jammed between his fingers.
If she's being honest, Kotoko finds it distasteful. She doesn't say anything about that, though. Instead, she says, "I guess it doesn't. Just thought I'd say so."
Shidou snorts. "In case I suddenly grew a conscious or something?"
"Pfft." Kotoko gets the impression she's meant to laugh at what he's said. The snort she gives is mostly mocking. "As if. I don't think that that's possible, no offence."
"No, none taken. I agree," he says in response.
Everything has gone quiet again, all of a sudden. Kotoko doesn't particularly know what she's meant to feel about it, because she doesn't feel much of anything. Except for, maybe, that this is a bit of a waste when neither of them are saying anything. When she spares a glance in Shidou's direction, she catches him staring at her with that look, the one she mentioned before, before he corrects himself. She catches him staring at her like that a lot.
What a weakling, she thinks. She doesn't know what to feel about that look and it frustrates her to no end. A lot of things about Shidou frustrate her. Mostly because she doesn't understand them. He's frustratingly soft and repentant, constantly considering bringing himself over the line between life and death and yet always too cowardly to just take the plunge. Always reminiscing. Always weak.
In Milgram, Shidou does not stop hating her. For good reason, Kotoko thinks. Whilst she doesn't blame herself for how things went down–she doesn't blame him either, actually–she knows he probably blames them both. It probably is both of their fault, to be honest, but it was an entirely meaningless situation that they indulged themselves in. Nothing at all in the grand scheme of things. Really, he ought to leave it behind him if you ask her.
To be entirely fair, it's not exactly a secret that Shidou isn't very good at doing the things he ought to do. He still wants to die. Kotoko knows all too well that that's not new. She's begun to think maybe he'd always wanted to die on some level. Not that it matters to her.
It's just an observation. Kotoko likes those, after all, likes learning about people from an entirely objective lense. She'd said this to Mikoto when they'd first arrived, despite the fact she immediately didn't like him, and Shidou had made an odd noise somewhere in the distance that captured Mikoto's attention. Either he wasn't very subtle or she was just too observant as she felt eyes in her back, anxious and insistent, as she watched and watched everyone else pass her by. On that first day, she made a series of mental notes about everyone.
Shidou has a considerably longer list than everybody else to this day. Kotoko is unsure of how to precede. Shidou's never stopped making her unsure, making her uncomfortable, making her squirm with a complete and utter lack of certainty. Honestly, the only thing that makes it worse is the fact that no one else has quite mastered that ability.
Well... Mahiru might be beginning to, but that's still just a might, and even then, it's not the great, vast world of uncertainty Shidou forces open inside of her. It's a mere hairline fracture in her defences. She can tape it back together, still, and she's fully intent on controlling it before it spirals out of control this time.
Kotoko can't risk making herself that vulnerable again.
"It's, ah. It's been a while," she hears from behind her.
"It has," Kotoko agrees, staring at a far point somewhere in front of her as she works her jaw. "Do you need anything? Anything to tell me, or?"
Shidou sits beside her. His voice is unsteady and shameful as he shares, "I've been thinking about her again."
Briefly, a memory flashes in Kotoko's mind. She remembers them both trying, trying, and trying again to forget or replace images stuck in their heads. Trying and failing; failing and then trying again, like a broken record. They were just the best thing available to them. "You've been thinking about her again. Not me," she points out.
"What's the difference anymore?" Asks Shidou. Even he seems to wince at his wording.
"... I'm not helping."
It is, decidedly, not a lie, not even when she shows up outside his cell door later.
The first time Kotoko comes to Shidou's house, she's bruised and bloodied. This time, he looks afraid when he looks at her. She hits him in the arm and asks if he's got any bandages laying around, and when he says he does she waits to be let in. In the end, she has to remind him that she'd still like an invitation. When he gives her one, she immediately walks past him.
Right away, Kotoko decides she doesn't like Shidou's home. Everything in it stinks of grief, from the stacks of unwashed dishes in the sink and paper plates in the bin to the bed that's been left perfectly made on one side. He haunts her side as she looks throughout his home, rudely invading every cabinet until she finds his first aid kit. It's a shabby-looking thing, but enough. She finds an out of date prescription in his medicine cabinet and throws it out for him before she sits herself on the edge of his bathtub.
Out of the corner of her eye, Kotoko spots a blood stain by the sink. For a moment she stares, then she decides that that part of this isn't any of her business.
"Do you"–Shidou clears his throat–"do you, maybe, want any help with that?"
"Not really. But you can if you want," Kotoko replies, hiking up the leg of her joggers to reveal the weeping wound on one of her calves.
Shidou sinks to his knees in front of Kotoko, cradling her leg in such an embarrassingly tender way it makes her feels like a prey animal. She catalogues the facts, while he begins to disinfect her leg. If she's sharing, she also makes a few theories. It goes as follows:
Evidence one; Shidou definitely doesn't like her as a person, if the way he grimaces any time the topic of their personal lives comes up means anything at all. Evidence two; he is the number one most obviously mourning man she's ever met. Evidence three; he stares at her like he's looking for something he lost. Theory; he's seeing a dead person in her.
Shidou presses down with a disinfectant wipe. Kotoko hisses.
Evidence one; there's a wedding ring on Shidou's bathroom sink, she's looking at it right now. Evidence two; she's never seen him wear it, not even once. Evidence three; there is clearly no one else but him living here right now. Theory; he's seeing his dead wife in her.
Shidou begins to wrap bandages around her leg expertly. Meanwhile, Kotoko is rather preoccupied by how foolish he must be to see a woman he once loved in her of all people.
Evidence one; Kotoko is, regrettably, a human being who requires human connection. Evidence two; Shidou is so weak and fragile and so incredibly in need of human connection too, somehow, despite every time she's seen someone hold out a hand to him as he walked out the hospital. Evidence three; he's caring for her physically despite not caring for her mentally, making an attempt at connection. Theory; they both have something to offer each other.
When Shidou is done, Kotoko grabs his face. She swears that he stops breathing as she tilts his head back and forth. Something terrifying courses through her as she remembers something from a long, long time ago, and what drives her to kiss him isn't something soft or romantic. Whatever bullshit it is that makes other people kiss, she's not feeling it. He gasps into her mouth and cries, sudden, like a dam breaking.
"You- you look- your eyes. Your face. You're- you act different, but the same, and–" Shidou stammers, once she leans away, never once taking in a full breath.
"And it doesn't matter," Kotoko mutters. Her eyes catch the sight of blood in the bathtub again, dried and crusted along the drain. A failed attempt at a lot of things. She reaches out and turns on the water. "You're a mess. Wash yourself up."
Shidou notices something about Kotoko, on one of the evenings they're cooped up in his cell together. This is beginning to happen mortifyingly often: Yuno and Mahiru have both taken notice, and Mikoto doesn't seem far behind. Kazui seems to be upset recently, too. The man must believe he's lost his opportunity, even though neither of the two are interested in each other. Not really.
"What are these scars from?" Shidou asks, looking at her belly where her uniform had ridden up. He reaches his hand out, hovering just above her skin, silently asking for permission to touch them.
"Fights, mainly," Kotoko answers. Guesses. She doesn't entirely know what the split is, between scars from fights and from dizzying nights of blinding, pitiful emotion. The latter doesn't really matter, after all. She grabs his hand and presses it against the raised tissue all over her torso.
The expression Shidou makes is distinctly displeased. "That's not... I guess you'll say that I should 'see the other guy'?"
"That does sound like me," she agrees.
Kotoko was, in fact, about to say that if he said anything stupid or looked betrayed, like she was really meant to embody the role his wife had left behind. His wife, who sounds nice enough. She sounds like she would've gotten into a lot of verbal fights with neighbours, stuck up for everyone, but backed down before hits were thrown. Not to mention that she obviously sounds like a better conversation partner than her.
"I guessed," says Shidou, tracing at the scars. The more jagged ones, he doesn't seem to have any issues touching.
"You're getting nervous. C'mon, tell me what you think of them," Kotoko murmurs, staring him down insistently.
Shidou swallows around nothing. "I think... you shouldn't spend any nights alone anymore. Preferably. Some of these are too fresh; keeping you on watch is what I'd recommend. As a doctor."
"It's what you'd recommend for most people," Kotoko corrects, turning onto her side to face him. "I'm not most people. I can handle myself, I won't die if you're not paying attention to me."
Clearly, it doesn't do anything to soothe him. Shidou just seems to have another spark of anger to stomp down, now. "I can't make you do anything."
"Damn right you can't."
Shidou is an angry, angry man. To this day, Kotoko has no clue why he hides it away as much as he does. He should know that she won't be angry if he just gets irritated with her. Not when it's him. It would kind of piss her off, if it was most people, but she can think of a few reasons off the top of her head why he would be angry with her. She would let it slide.
When Shidou captures her lips in a kiss, Kotoko feels anger flare in her, too. Then she sees someone else entirely, briefly. She hates and hates, and she's never hated anyone more than she hates him in this moment. He doesn't protest, when he's shoved hard enough to hit the floor with a THUD. In the morning, people will stare at him; curious, concerned. They'll pretend they aren't being nosey, and neither of them will say anything in the end.
It begins exactly when Kotoko's said it begins, but it doesn't end when she wants to say it does. She wants to say it ends right there, after the first night she spends quietly asleep in his arms. It's the most peaceful she's slept in forever, ever since she was a teenager. That's a glaring weakness, at the end of the day, and so she puts her foot down. She tries, at least.
Obviously it doesn't work very well, because Kotoko ends up in his house more often than not, after that. More than her warehouse. She reasons with herself, tries to, at least. His house is nicer than her warehouse, she reasons. He doesn't mind her here, she's just someone to talk to, she reasons further. Then she reasons further than that.
The reasoning hardly matters when it's happening all the same. You can insert something about actions speaking louder than words here, if you'd like. Kotoko doesn't curl into his bed beside him every time, doesn't lay with him until they're both eased to sleep, but she does stay over far too much. She's making herself too vulnerable, she thinks. It has to stop here, she thinks. She thinks every second of the day, that's what leads her to do this.
They're both on his couch when Kotoko says it finishes, for real this time.
"The man you killed," she says, carelessly. She waits for him to respond, but he doesn't say anything. Instead, he's tensed up where he's sat, silently giving her a chance to say anything else. The chance isn't taken. "He had two kids. They'd been planning to see him that weekend."
"Had they, now?" Shidou asks, slow as he can, staring at a painting on the wall that she's been told his wife liked. She'd been told that the woman said it brightened the room.
Kotoko nods. "Yeah, they had. Shame, isn't it? I wonder if that's what yours would be thinking, if they were here now and you weren't."
To be entirely honest, Kotoko doesn't really think it's a shame. Both of those kids are, most likely, better off without him. Shidou's got an undeniable complex over it though, and so she plays on the string all the same. It's clearly upsetting him, judging by the expression on his face.
"You're so weak," Kotoko says, almost whispers, as she stares at him. "You're–"
She worries she's going to break him.
"If I told you half of the things I've done, you wouldn't just hate me. You'd want me dead," Kotoko inists. She says it harsher this time, as harsh as she can. "If I told you half of the things you've done as they are, you wouldn't pussyfoot around the obvious conclusion here."
"Pussyfoot around"–Shidou replies, then his face softens marginally–"Kotoko. What's gotten into you? I know you're not the softest of people, but..."
"But what? You thought it'd be different with you?" Kotoko challenges, mean and teeth bared. There's something welling up inside of her, something horrible, but she doesn't dare stop to question it. She won't question it ever. Not really. She'll take it out on someone in an alley later but she won't ever pause and think it through.
Shidou looks hurt. Offended, even. It makes her want to laugh. He says, "... Well, yes."
"Then you're just as stupid as I suspect that whore wife of yours was."
"I'm not falling for that again," Shidou sighs the second the words leave her.
"Falling for what?" Kotoko yells, itching to hit him. To slap him. To kick him into the ground. To wipe that pitying look off of his face, the look he's began giving more and more these days, like he's some saviour or whatever it is that's driving him to live now.
"For this." A very general gesture is made in her direction, causing her hackles to raise. "Maybe it worked, the first time, but-"
Kotoko rolls her eyes. "Oh, don't give me that. Defend your wife's honour or something, don't avoid-"
"-I'm not, you're the one-"
"-am not-"
"-don't act like a child-!"
Kazui opens the door and they both fall silent. Nervously, he questions, mostly to Shidou, "what's happening in here? Need me to step in?"
Annoyed, Kotoko huffs. Not that she hadn't been expecting the animosity, she knows that most people don't get it. They don't get it in that hypocritical, feeble-minded way most people feel about real action, about what she specialises in. She doesn't respond, and doesn't mock him how she desperately wants to, because she knows that'd just make things worse. But she shakes with the urge to.
"It's fine. You really don't need to hover outside the door," Shidou tells him.
Kazui doesn't look like he believes him. He leaves the room, but Kotoko is left with the sense he's still hovering. He's trying to prove himself, she knows. It's some half-hearted attempt at redemption, the same sort basically everyone here seems to be trying to achieve, if they're not too busy denying wrongdoing. They don't want redemption, that she knows. They want to be excused, and it makes her want to stomp out of that door and give him a piece of her mind.
She doesn't. Kazui's just as strong as her, if not moreso. She's got the sense to stand down for now.
"I'm not... I don't... I do, actually. I hate you, Kotoko," Shidou tells her, like it's not easy to tell. He obviously hates her. If people weren't so insistent on being so gentle all the time, he would've said it earlier.
"Yeah. I'm okay with that," Kotoko replies. "Fuck's sake, I'm not looking to you for life advice. Who would?"
Shidou doesn't sound very sure of himself as he defends, "Kazui does, sometimes."
Surely he has to know how little that means. Kotoko says, "Oh, please. It's Kazui. The man practically worships the ground you walk on. God knows why! I definitely don't. Not when I know what you do when there's no one around to stop you."
"That's my concern for you," says Shidou, and–what? That's what? His voice has dropped to a whisper, and she knows he knows Kazui is probably outside of the room. Is he trying to maintain her dignity or something?
Bizarrely, something about that makes Kotoko falter. "What? What do you mean?"
"Oh, please," Shidou mirrors.
Kotoko's shoulder's come up to her ears. "No, seriously. What do you mean? What do you mean by that? Tell me. Right now."
"The scars," Shidou tells her, like it's obvious. "I'm not, Kotoko, I... I've seen people with scars from accidents and fights before. And I've seen scars that happened on purpose. And even if they were all fights, well..."
"Well, what? Don't go preaching like you're so perfect now." Kotoko doesn't pay any mind to his attempts to be quiet and keep this between the two of them.
He brought her to his cell again and started just preaching at her about things that are none of his business. Not before and not now. She thinks she's got the right to yell at him. Really, she's got the right to do more than that. He's commited so much wrongdoing, after all, and he agitates her constantly; when she thinks about it, she's not sure why she hasn't done anything yet.
That's another thing to hate about him. Just how unsure he makes her feel, that is to be specific. At this point he has to be doing it on purpose. He just has to.
Shidou looks like a whole bundle of nerves in an instant. "You always knew about that. This is- new. Different. Isn't it?"
"You're morally screwed, not stupid." Kotoko pushes past him. "I'm leaving."
Like before, he doesn't make any move to stop her. Kotoko's grateful. After all that fuss she'd made about not taking the risk again, and she went and made that very mistake. She needed to be brought back to earth.
She thinks.