Chapter Text
Kirara was always a peculiar child. From a young age he found a love for dolls and dresses. It was endearing as a child, just a little kid dressing up, not understanding the world. Kirara would spend most of his time with his mom cooking and cleaning. His father was always traveling for work, so him and his mom were very close. She would let him do her makeup and draw silly drawings, and they went on picnics, and he loved it when he got to wear his nice clothes. Kirara’s small town was a closely knit community, for good or for worse. A little boy of the Hoshi family would storm into town and talk to everyone who would listen, but the highlight of going into town was his favorite place, the local clothing store. Looking through the store and seeing all the pretty dresses and shirts filled him with some sense of understanding. He eventually grew a sense for his small town’s fashion, but after a while, dressing up and doing girly things stopped looking cute. As he grew older, his cute habits became a habit of embarrassment, he wasn’t some 6-year-old trying on tiaras anymore. He never understood why he had to stop, but he did.
Or at least tried to.
When his mom found out about the magazines and having no guy friends, she decided the next best course of action was a private religious boarding school. He would surely grow out of his abnormal habits if he were in a proper school with positive reinforcement, she convinced herself.
His first day went surprisingly well, he was still in primary school so his eye for fashion and artistic abilities were adored by his classmates. It wasn’t till secondary school when things changed. All these people who once loved his femininity started to feel grossed out by it. Kids are very impressionable, it could have made them realize how weird it was to like dresses that sparked when he twirled in the sun or drawing only girls, or it could have been the school's strict dress code and religious beliefs that labeled him as a freak. He learned that his interests needed to be kept close to himself. He spent almost all year at this school, he was only home for breaks.
He was 15 when he first got a phone. Most kids by then had been given one already, also most kids were dating or had crushes, but he never understood how they felt. He didn’t like girls like that, it was yet another thing that got thrown in his face. At first it was just how he could never get a girlfriend, but once a boy had spread a rumor that him and another guy in his grade had kissed, then he was being called slurs under their breaths and refused to touch him. They were convinced that if they touched them, then what he had would infect them and turn them into freaks. He used to hate being alone, but when he was alone, he felt freer. He could wear pink and draw cute outfits without the judgmental eyes viciously tearing him apart.
There is another secret he’s kept for a long time, he can see things no others could. These creatures that mimicked the world around them, he would see many of them in old buildings or in the woods. When he was a kid, he would refuse to be left alone in fear that the monsters would get to him, like one time when he went to an old building that was barely being held together, but it was home to, at the time, his mother's place of work. He saw a beast that looked like a horrible abomination, making a home in that raggedy office like a disfigured bird. He screamed when he saw it and begged his mom to take him home. She was flustered and embarrassed by her son’s sudden temper tantrum. When we wouldn’t stop crying is when she relented. He told her about the disfigured beast, she didn’t seem to understand. She tossed it up to his imagination. She only became very concerned when it didn’t stop in his childhood. She told him to cut it out and to stop drawing so much attention to them. After years of being told he was acting crazy, he started to believe them. He stopped mentioning the beats and ghouls. He lived his life next to them in silence.
Kirara found a home in the library, though. It felt like the only place where he could exist without causing problems. During Secondary school, he would finish school and walk there. The library wasn’t a mighty building, just an old house converted into a hodgepodge space to store books. The floor boards creaked when he would walk over them and you could hear everything a person said in that place. But that didn’t matter to him, he would still spend hours reading and learning new information. Books were his escape from the world. Each page was filled with new, unexplored knowledge on an ocean of topics. Every book is different and unique, and each expresses its own identity. It didn’t need to hide its knowledge; it didn’t need to try to fit in. It could just be it. But out of every topic he ever picked up, astronomy was his favorite. Kirara has always had a tie to the stars. His father’s last name was Hoshi, and in every memory Kirara had with his dad, they would talk about the stars. Kirara would spend hours reading about the stars and space. Then go back to his dorm and look out his window just to try and see what he just learned about. It was what made being at that school bearable.
It wasn’t till the summer of Kiara’s 9th grade year that he got to see his Aunt again. His Aunt was from his dad’s side, and even though his father wasn’t around much, his Aunt would take the time to visit when she could. It felt like she was the only one who understood Kirara. When Kirara would freak out about the monsters, his Aunt would calm him down and wouldn’t judge him. She didn’t try to make Kirara change, if anything, she fought for his parents to be less strict.
This visit felt different, though, his Aunt approached him and asked him about some sort of school. Kirara thought she was asking about his school, so he started into his usual rehearsed spiel about how wonderful the school is and how much he is learning. His Aunt repeated herself; this time, Kirara realized what she was asking.
“Do you want to go to a school that is meant for you?” she asked straightly.
Kirara was taken aback. “Huh?” he responded.
“You aren’t like the rest of them; you’ve always known this. Y-we can see things they can’t”, Kirara couldn’t help but stare. He never realized that his Aunt could see the ghouls. In a moment, years of convincing himself that he was crazy seemed to be lifted. “I think it would be great for you. We have a unique ability that they couldn’t even understand, and I haven’t even done my part to help you.” She paused, she was trying to stop working around it, “Kiara, there’s a school in Tokyo that can teach you better than I could. I won’t make you do anything you don’t want to do, but I also went there. I think it could be what you need”.
Kirara was stunned. How should he respond to this? He didn’t know that other people could see these monsters. He wasn’t even aware that there could be a school for people like him. In some way, hearing that there was a school for freaks like him made him happy, maybe he wasn’t so weird after all, maybe he could see people like him, and maybe he could finally be understood. This could be it, this could be where he doesn’t need to be a perfect cut and copy of everyone around him. He had to keep his hair short for school, and he stopped trying to express himself in his clothes, but maybe he could try to express himself again. Could he grow his hair out there?
Then a crashing, unbarring thought flooded his mind. His mother would never let him leave. This school was too much; it wasn’t structured and didn’t promote her ideas. All he wanted was..
“Kirara?” snap “Oh, sorry. I -uhhh- like this idea, but mom would never let me go. She’s scared that if I’m not in a place that promotes structure and strong values, I will become a freak again. I want to, I really do, but she won’t let me go.”
“She doesn’t think you are a freak, Kirara…” Those words felt like a warm hug, “... and I already thought of this. The public knows this school to be a religious school. I would tell her this is a top school for academics and religion. She would never know otherwise.” She added a bit of spunk to the way she said it. It almost made Kirara chuckle.
The deal was sealed in Kirara’s head, freedom was coming, and Kirara was finally feeling a glimmer of hope again. It's strange how he forgot the feeling exists. Hope used to be something he felt, but after so many years of being crushed and shamed, He forgot about it and focused on surviving. It felt like a dream for Kirara, finally not having to pretend to be something he’s not. This couldn’t be better. A mix of so many emotions started to swell in his chest and hugged his Aunt. She pulled him in; it was more intimate than usual. It felt like the support he had been clinging to that nothing had given him before. Then it all spilled out, every emotion he had bottled up. Just tears loosely flowing from his eyes. He had perfected cringing without sound to keep people from realizing he was crying. This time, it failed.
Kirara could only wait till his Aunt and mom were done talking. He felt like a kid again, peaking through the door and listening for what emotion he picked up in his mom’s voice. “KIRARA!” His mom called out; she clearly didn’t notice him at the door. He waited a second, then walked through the door to see his mom at the table with his Aunt.
“You want to go to this school?” she asked, semi-exhausted.
“YE- uh- yes ma’am,” he quickly corrected his eagerness. “I think it would be a great way for me to further my education. This would provide me with more opportunities for my future education.” he stood there like a soldier preparing for battle. He waited for the rebuttal, but it never came.
“Ok,” She said in the same voice as before.
Ok, OK? That's it? Just okay. When has she been this easy to convince? He would have to beg for days to go and do anything. I guess his Aunt really did have a talent for convincing people.
It was about a month later when his Aunt told him that he had been officially set to meet the principal. He guesses that he's gotta talk to him before he can start. He doesn’t even know what to talk about. He has no idea about this other world that he's only recently been introduced to.