Chapter Text
"You're so sweet."
That's the first thing you said to me when you came back into my life after four years.
"You still have my favorite whiskey and my glass." You looked up at me after so long. You didn't bother to keep the lights off.
I'd be lying if I told you it was only because of this that I realized you were in my house.
I lingered on your alcohol-slicked lips and your fingers running along the rim of your glass.
"Whatever." I left my clothes on the coat rack and went to take a shower.
You had already crossed the line.
I prayed not to find you in my house that day. I asked heaven if it still had a little mercy for me, I asked it to search for even a crumb in its supposedly infinite supply.
God has never cared for me, has never given me a single bit of grace.
When you rubbed lotion on my naked body, I felt the first fracture.
In your own way, you tried to take care of my body, like you did before you left.
I wasn't ashamed anymore; I had nothing to hide from you.
You should have hidden your sighs and your frown; you should have been careful with your hands, which lingered for moments on the new scars.
Anyway, we didn't talk much that night; I was tired, probably of you, and I didn't bother correcting your mistakes or making conversation.
When you came into my bed and hugged me, you spoke the wrong way again.
"I saw you today, you know?"
I didn't feel angry with you because after four years you had the presumption to come into my house and act as if I'd never left, or because you thought that glass was yours (today I understand that perhaps you were as excited as I was).
Back then, there would have been a place for you in my house.
You know, your bottle of whiskey ended up, along with the glass, on the wall now covered by the bookcase, and its pungent smell haunted my house for weeks.
I bought both again, left them in the usual place so you could find them.
I burned your vinyl records and bought them again, I used all your body wash.
But first, I cried on your clothes for weeks.
Weeks during which I thought you were dead.
First came despair, only later anger.
You know, after a while, voices reached me that claimed you were somehow absurdly alive.
I suspected it, I couldn't believe it, and I remained in doubt until that day.
That's why I turned my eyes to the sky, because if you were dead, I could continue to love you and my tears would have meaning.
Instead, you came into my house, the day Atsushi—I didn't know that was his name at the time—pulled you out of the river.
You created the first crack with your cowardice. You came to me that night because you knew I'd seen you; I never hid from you; you know Albatross's motorbike.
-I saw you today, you know?-
You only asked because you tried to put out the fire before it flared up.
-I know.- I held your hand, I left a kiss on it. Your cowardice had already stopped being my problem.
--Now, just let me sleep.-
You arrived before I started looking for you. What a nuisance that would have been, right?