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How do you describe love?
Is it something palpable? Something that you can touch and feel? Kiyotaka thinks of warm hands, firm, brown skin. He thinks of noogies and hugs and fingers running through his buzzed hair, palms on his shoulders. Is it something you can hold? Is it just an idea, a thought, a thousand thoughts that revolve around the same person, mind saturated like a wet sponge?
“I think,” Yukimaru says, after setting his cup of coffee on Kiyotaka’s desk, “I think you knew him better than I did.”
Kiyotaka’s body locks up as the words leave the other man’s lips. He looks up from his paperwork, his eyebrows knitting.
“You don’t mean…” But he knows. It’s rare for them to talk about this, and Kiyotaka wonders briefly if he’s capable. It’s been almost two years, but he still, he may always—
“Mondo.” Yukimaru says. “Back in Hope’s Peak...I mean, you don’t remember, but you two were really close. He trusted you with everything. He was so... different around you.”
Kiyotaka’s lips close into a tight line. He had promised himself ever since he left that dreaded school that he wouldn’t cry like he used to. He wouldn’t cry at times like these. He’d keep looking forward and stuff down any negative emotions that rose to the surface.
“...How so?” Kiyotaka asks, because he’s curious. All his memories before the mutual killing were erased. He’d tried to piece things together but going through his old locker proved to be more emotionally exhausting than he’d expected.
“He’d...smile different.” Yukimaru’s eyes are fixed on the floor. “He was always so handsy with you. The way he talked about you, he just glowed.”
Love was something that never came easy. For Kiyotaka, it was too much to even like other people. He couldn’t trust classmates, the kids he did kendo with, couldn’t trust teachers and had no one to even think of trusting outside that. He always thought he’d live the rest of his life alone, relying only on himself. Peaceful. Quiet. In perfect, still solitude. Kiyotaka had his whole life planned out, and he was sure from the beginning that he’d never need anyone else. He truly believed it for the longest time. Why did that have to change?
Mondo Oowada had sauntered into his life with a disregard for the vast chasm between them. He had gotten in his face, yelling and threatening violence. He was what Kiyotaka hated about delinquents; a coward who relied on violence to solve his problems. He wasn’t kind. He couldn’t be. How could someone who broke so many rules conceivably be so accepting? Why would he listen to him about his problems in the heat of a sauna, why would he cry with him and drag Kiyotaka out when he almost passed out? Why would he use the baths with him, why would he crack jokes the entire time and make him laugh? Kiyotaka laughed more in those few hours than he had in years. Why would this person who had no reason to even look at him as human ever be so wonderful? And why would he continue to treat him that way in front of the rest of their classmates?
No one ever liked Kiyotaka, and he took comfort in that. No one ever saw him as a friend, no one wanted to hear his words and no one ever treated him with the same respect they treated others. He just hadn’t worked hard enough for it. He hadn’t earned it, and that was why everyone around him laughed at him and shunned him. If there was a vast chasm between them, it was only that Oowada was so amazingly normal and likable, whereas Kiyotaka was a burden no one wanted to deal with. Kiyotaka knew that his personality distanced people from others, made him hard to tolerate, and that was why he had no friends. Why did it have to change? Why did Oowada have to enter his life only to leave?
“...Yukimaru-kun,” Kiyotaka adjusts his glasses. “What...what was he like? Oowada-kun. Before everything, I mean.”
Yukimaru frowns. “Like, before the tragedy? Or…”
“Before Hope’s Peak.”
A beat passes.
“Uhhh...real stern. He was like a demon, y’know? He could take down anyone in a fight. There was something about him that was just... scary cool. Like, this raw kind of anger. He could just destroy the competition. He’d get laid back sometimes, but...he was kinda professional with us. The gang, I mean. It was cool, like. Real cool and everything, but it made me feel like he didn’t...I don’t know, see me as an equal. Not in some superior way or whatever, but that we were almost coworkers or something, more than best friends. Even when we were on our own, it felt like there was something he refused to tell me. Something he was holding back.” That’s probably the most Yukimaru has spoken to Kiyotaka. He blinks. Yukimaru eyes his coffee, but doesn’t move to grab it. “He...liked us, I think. The gang. But he was probably stressed to hell. He couldn’t really consider us his friends when he was leading us.” Now he grabs the mug, taking a long drink.
Kiyotaka ponders this for a bit. “And...you said he was different with me?”
“Loads different.” Yukimaru’s voice is a bit throaty, having just finished swallowing, but it’s back to normal in a second. “I did a lot of thinking when they holed me up in Towa. Why was he so different with you? I was jealous for a long time. But...I think it was, like. You weren’t in his gang. You didn’t want to be his friend because you looked up to him as a leader. You two were equals from the beginning.”
Kiyotaka looks down at his desk.
After Oowada was executed, things went downhill for him. He had the worst meltdown of his life, anxiety gripping him tighter than it ever had before. He would shift from hysteria to dissociation, hyperventilating to the point of vomiting, but after that first night, he couldn’t get himself to cry. Had he cried himself out? Had he shut down? There was a certain feeling like he wasn’t in his body, staring at nothing for hours and just letting his thoughts swirl in his head. Could’ve. Should’ve. Didn’t. He never knew his body could feel so heavy with nothing on it. He never thought he’d be unable to sleep after lying in the dark for hours. He never thought he’d skip so many meals, unable to find the words to respond to anyone’s questions, thinking and thinking and thinking about all the things he had ever done wrong. After seeing Alter Ego, he’d even started trying to talk like Oowada, trying to act like him, anything to reforge that connection. It was pathetic. He’d been like that when Celestia killed Yamada and Hagakure, and only started to calm down after Oogami killed herself. All of those events were a blur to him. After that...he was just exhausted. Naegi and the others attempted to breathe some life back into him, but for a long time…
Nothing. Numb.
Kiyotaka felt...scared, without Oowada. Until he knew what the world outside was like, he’d agonized over what he’d tell Oowada’s parents. His first friend, and he’d failed him so horribly that he died. The grief was unbearable. Many times Kiyotaka had considered ending it, but something kept him going, whether it was the automated voice of Alter Ego or Naegi’s hand on his shoulder. With his father missing and the world in shambles, the smart decision was to join the Future Foundation. It was an empty life, being accepted into the sixth division, having responsibilities assigned to him and paperwork to fill out. But the busywork was something he was used to, and it gave him something to do with his hands instead of tearing themselves apart. He fell back into a familiar rhythm.
When he heard his father was alive, things picked back up— and meeting Oowada’s dearest friend...he had so many questions, so much he needed out of him. Yukimaru had been callous when they were first assigned as partners, but it seemed that finally…
Kiyotaka was almost surprised to hear Oowada was his friend before the mutual killing. What would’ve made them become friends twice? Did he deserve that kind of luck? Was it fate? From what it sounded like, they were in their second year at Hope’s Peak when the lockdown was initiated, and they spent a year in captivity...What were they like, then? Were they close?
“Equals…” Kiyotaka whispers. “I...suppose we thought we were.” He chews his lip for a moment, feeling a great weight on his shoulders. “...I’m sorry.”
“Sorry?”
“I’m...sorry I couldn’t stop him.”
Kiyotaka chokes back tears. He won’t. He can’t. He promised not to. He wants to be strong, strong like Oowada was.
“...You didn’t know.” Yukimaru says carefully. “You couldn’t have.”
“I should have. They...they always said I was bad at reading the atmosphere…” He squeezes his eyes shut. “I should have known. I should have done something. He...he and Fujisaki-kun, they’d be alive if I hadn’t…”
Yukimaru turns his head away. He seems put off by Kiyotaka getting emotional, and Kiyotaka puts all his effort in controlling himself.
“I’m telling you, it’s not your fault! Stop acting like it was.” His words sound like hollow sympathies. Yukimaru’s forcing himself, and Kiyotaka can tell. “That Enoshima bitch shouldn’t have done that to you all, she shouldn’t have ever done what she did to you all. You didn’t know you were being manipulated! And Boss— Mondo, he...He couldn’t...He didn’t remember you, so he didn’t tell you.”
“Would he have told me otherwise?” Kiyotaka asks, a bit incredulously. Were they really that close?
“Of course! Of course, you...you two…” Yukimaru grits his teeth. “You two were dating, I think.”
A pause.
The words hit Kiyotaka like a truckload of bricks. Without warning, without any chance to stop them, the tears scald his cheeks, stinging in his eyes. Dating? He and Oowada...were romantically involved? Before all that mess...they had been in love?
No. Saying they were in love was a bit presumptuous. But Oowada...had agreed to date him? Did they go on dates? Were they private? Who knew? What did they do? Had they kissed? Had they…?
Kiyotaka wipes at his face, but they won’t stop. Why is he crying so hard? Did something click? Did those words bring something back? He searches his mind, but finds nothing. He wants to remember so badly, even if it was just one thing, he wants something. Evidence. The man he had grown to love in such a short time, the man who had left him behind...That’s a bit much. That somewhere those feelings were realized…
“Are you joking?” Kiyotaka is afraid to ask, but he doesn’t want to misinterpret his words. If he were to mistake something this important, he’d hate himself.
“I’m serious.” Yukimaru says bitterly. “I wouldn’t joke about this.”
Had...he been happy? Kiyotaka wonders. Had he treasured that time? Had he taken it for granted? Had he appreciated Oowada while he was there? Had he smiled at him enough? Had he held him, and told him every day how wonderful he was?
The tears come down harder.
He truly, truly hopes they had kissed. Even just a little. Something to make it feel real, more than just two boys who carelessly decided to label it as something it wasn’t. Kiyotaka takes off his glasses, pressing his palms into his eyes. Stop. Did Oowada smile back? Did he get embarrassed, and blush? Did he laugh? Did he share the secrets that destroyed him? Romance was terrifying to Kiyotaka for so long. Disgusting to him. Oowada made that different. And to think that it wasn’t the first time…
“I was jealous.” Yukimaru hisses, anger clear in his words. “I was so jealous. He would gush about you for hours. He would get this look in his eyes, this little...starry look, and I hated it. I hated that he chose you, Ishimaru. I hated that he picked you over me.”
Kiyotaka tries to even his breathing. “Then you—”
“I loved him.” Yukimaru’s tone is sharp. “Fuck, did I love him. He was everything to me, someone I’d follow to the grave...and he just left me. Chose someone else. Fell head over fucking heels for you, like some kind of lovestruck schoolgirl… And the worst part about it was that it seemed so much realer than anything else he did. The Mondo I knew was fucking fake. The one you knew...that was the real him, and he…”
“Yukimaru-kun…”
“Shut up. Just shut up. I don’t wanna hear it. He adored you, and he left me behind. I was in that stupid room for ages, and when I left he was fucking gone. I never even got to say good-bye. I didn’t know why, or how, he was just gone. And you...you’d been with him the whole time, and you…” Yukimaru’s face breaks. “It wasn’t your fault. I know that. But it still feels like it was. If it were me...I would’ve torn that building apart for him, board by board. I never would have...fucking...l-let some shitty stuffed bear drag him off, and…” Inhale. “It should have been me. I should have been there. I wouldn’t have let him die. I wouldn’t. You…you just forgot him, just like that, and...God. Why you? Why the hell was it you?! Why wasn’t I good enough?!”
Kiyotaka’s speechless.
“I’ve hated you from the beginning. I never wanted to work with you. But it’s...i-it’s what Boss would’ve wanted. He would’ve wanted us to get along. The guy he loved...he would’ve wanted me to be friendly with ‘em. I can’t just let him down like that.”
“You...I.” Kiyotaka wipes his face again. “I’m...so sorry, I—”
“Don’t apologize. I don’t wanna hear it.”
“But what else do I say?”
“You think I know?!” Yukimaru snarls, glaring at him. “It doesn’t matter! He’s gone. He’s gone forever. I just have to get over it and move on.”
“You want to?” A pause. “I— I understand what you mean, but I don’t, I don’t want to forget him.”
“You already did.”
Kiyotaka has lost his words again.
There was no reason for him to have survived the mutual killing. Out of everyone in that game, Kiyotaka’s death would’ve been an act of mercy. He was miserable before the game, miserable during it, and even worse after Oowada’s death. He wanted to die, he really did. Everything was so much for him, trying to function normally as if nothing had ever happened. Being expected to just slap his cheeks every morning and face the day like he hadn’t watched a man be reduced to a paste. They didn’t even have anything to give to his parents but a hilariously insensitive carton of butter. How is that fair? How is that funny? How was he supposed to go about his business when all he could think about was Oowada’s screams of agony? How was he supposed to live with himself when all he dreamt about was taking his place?
Grief. Grief is impossible. Seeing a motorcycle on the side of the road, getting offered sweets in the workplace, meeting new people and facing holidays and birthdays— how would Oowada have reacted? What would Oowada have thought? It’s so horrible that he’s missing all this. Oowada would have loved this candy, Oowada would’ve thought the head of the division was cool, Oowada would’ve complained about work and kicked his feet onto his desk and looked forward to the violent side of their work. How is the world supposed to keep going when he’s gone?
It’s not fair. It’s not fair. That’s Kiyotaka’s mantra, and it feels like rust grating on the inside of his chest. Oowada should be here. Kiyotaka shouldn’t. Oowada should’ve survived, not Kiyotaka. He wonders if he’ll ever understand why things went the way they did.
“...Listen,” Yukimaru says, making a face that looks sorry that he ever decided to talk to him, “Just forget about it.” Like Kiyotaka ever could. “I shouldn’t have brought it up. I’m gonna go get more coffee.”
He stands up, and he walks away. Kiyotaka watches him, and then he looks down at his blurry glasses.
Anxiety’s raking its claws through his guts. He feels it creep up into him, screaming as it courses through his body. He can’t afford to have another attack on the job, but it feels like the world is starting to spin, and his thoughts are all one-track, all revolving around the fact he had Oowada and he let him go. It’s hurting him, growing and growing and oozing and burning. How can Yukimaru just say he’ll move on? How could he even think that?
His body hunches. Kiyotaka thinks of Oowada’s face as he was pulled away. He thinks of how their eyes never seemed to meet. He thinks of chain link fences, the crackle of electricity, the roar of an engine. He thinks of how he couldn’t tear his eyes away. He thinks of how he didn’t move an inch until the little ‘ding’ of the processor.
He thinks of cold concrete. He thinks of the smell of pancakes. He thinks of how they all watched. What was Oowada to them? Just another death. Just one less. He thinks of himself dry-heaving onto the floor. He thinks of Oogami lifting him to his feet, dragging him back to the elevators. He thinks of empty. He thinks of numb.
Kiyotaka desperately tries to calm himself down. But Oowada’s dead, and Oowada was in pain as he died, and it was a fucking insult to him to reduce him to that, to fucking butter. It must have been so funny to Enoshima. It must have been hilarious to her, to continue digging her fake nails into the wound and wiggling them around. Acting like it was normal for a human person to be ground down that fine, that was a face once, that was a living, breathing person, that was Kiyotaka’s friend, his only friend—
Someone’s shaking him by his shoulder and he feels sick. He tries to concentrate on who’s speaking to him, what’s happening, but all he can do is say “I’m fine” in a voice that doesn’t sound fine, and he realizes he’s still crying. He’s crying harder, in fact, and he doesn’t want to seem incompetent, but his heart’s beating so wildly he feels nauseous. Why is he alive? Oowada shouldn’t be dead. How did they all go back to normal afterwards? How did they keep going to sleep every night? Waking up every morning? Eating meals, smiling, laughing? He grimaces, and someone’s helping him to his feet. Where are they going? Infirmary? Kiyotaka’s exhausted suddenly, and he wants people to stop looking at him. He refuses to meet anyone’s gaze, focusing on the floor. An instant passes, and he’s sitting on a cot, swallowing two pills he was handed. This isn’t uncommon— Kiyotaka is by no means the first person to have a meltdown in the Future Foundation, but the fact he was vulnerable makes him want to vomit.
Oowada was funny. Oowada was so genuine— no, that was wrong. If Oowada was genuine, why did he lie? Why did he kill someone? Kiyotaka still doesn’t know. Why are people so contradictory? Why are they so hard to understand? Why did Kiyotaka want so desperately to understand him? Why did he want to be trusted by Oowada?
It hits him again that they were dating, and he silently pleads with his body to process the anxiety medication faster. Oowada was so wildly different, a complete outlier in a line graph of people Kiyotaka had known in his life. A flat line of those who rejected Kiyotaka in every way, only to spike up to the point of the friend he found in Oowada. Why was he like that? Why did he make Kiyotaka feel this way?
Being alone was so nice. It was so easy to be hated. It was so easy to think he didn’t deserve friends, that he had to make some grand change to earn everyone’s positive attention. If he deserved it all along, then why did everyone in his life hate him until Oowada? Why were things so unfair? It seemed unlikely that everyone Kiyotaka went to school with were just bad people. Was it just unfortunate circumstance, then? A problem of being in the wrong place at the wrong time? Was he just the easiest target? That made it feel worse. It wasn’t black and white, it wasn’t rigid enough. Kiyotaka needed order, and the world refused. Nothing made sense, and Oowada was dead.
They always said that when someone passed, you’d get a dream— some kind of closure. They said that your loved one would come to you, tell you to move on, give you some obvious sign that they still cared from beyond the grave. Oowada never did that. Kiyotaka had nothing, no clear pompadour shaped cloud with the words “I believe in you, bro!” emblazoned in the white fluff. Did Alter Ego count? It was a computer. Was being assigned Yukimaru a partner a sign? It didn’t feel like one. Oowada felt incredibly far away, and that hurt more than anything. Kiyotaka wanted so desperately to run after him, but giving up seemed weak.
Oowada was charming to Kiyotaka in strange ways, from the way he slapped him on the back to the way he angled his chin when he talked down to people. The way he made a face whenever he had to think, or how informal his words were. How his intentions were always clear, and he had no reason to pretend to be Kiyotaka’s friend, and he was there and friendly and— and he treated Kiyotaka like he was a normal human being, and that shouldn’t have been new but it was. Oowada made Kiyotaka feel real, gave him the attention he wasn’t sure he deserved. Never took too much, never gave too little. It was perfect, what they had, and Kiyotaka had wanted more, and he’d never...he’d never get that.
A part of him wonders if his love was based on the fact that he liked how Oowada made him feel. That Kiyotaka’s feelings were selfish. Oowada only mattered because he made Kiyotaka feel good about himself. That hurts more. It’d be a worse insult than any to Oowada’s memory if Kiyotaka’s grief was only so intense because of his pride.
“...maru-kun? Any better?”
Kiyotaka looks up, finally. There are painful twinges that bite into his temples, and he’s incredibly aware of how his clothes hug his body, how the blankets scuffle around him. The lighting of the infirmary is too strong, and it makes him anxious, but it’s dulling. Quietly, the pills smother out the hysteria. Kiyotaka blinks slowly at the blurry form of Naegi, and he wishes he had brought his glasses.
“What...what was...Can you repeat that?”
“A-Are, um. Are the pills kicking in, yet?”
“Yes.”
Kiyotaka’s gaze shifts back to the floor.
“What happened? If that’s okay to ask.”
“...Interesting conversation with Yukimaru-kun.” Kiyotaka shakes his head. “I was being over-sensitive again.”
“I see.” The sound of fabric shifting. This strikes Kiyotaka as annoying. “Was it about Oowada-kun…?”
“Yes.”
A short silence.
“Do you want to talk about it?”
Kiyotaka thinks about that for a bit. He wonders if it’ll help. Confiding in people...was it really helpful? Did it make sense? Even if it didn’t…
It...it was almost...nice, that Naegi wanted to hear.
“Did I deserve to live?” Kiyotaka blurts out. “Without him...I failed him as a friend, and I...I shouldn’t have lived. Celes-kun should have killed me instead of Hagakure-kun. It was depressing! It was...it must have been agonizing, watching me plod along like some pitiful zombie. Anyone would have found it pitiful! Wanted to put me out of my misery! Wouldn’t it have been merciful to let me die?”
Naegi doesn’t miss a beat. “No, of course not! You don’t deserve to die just because you were mourning!”
Kiyotaka’s struck speechless for the umpteenth time in the past few hours.
“You weren’t pitiful, Ishimaru-kun. Nobody wanted you to die.”
“But I don’t...I was...I’m still so…! I don’t want to be alive! I was so miserable, Naegi-kun! I always have been! It always hurt! It all just came crashing down, and I, I didn’t. I never thought it could get worse but it did. And I wanted to...I wanted to die, I want to still, it should just be ended before I waste more time and resources! I don’t understand why I deserved to live when someone, someone like him just—”
“You deserve a chance.” Naegi says firmly. “Just like anyone else.”
“A...a chance?”
“To recover, I mean! I get that, uh. You were depressed for a long time, and...didn’t want to live, but. Just because you were mourning, and hurting...that doesn’t mean it would’ve been merciful to kill you. You should be given the chance to get back up from that. Hitting rock bottom...it doesn’t mean you don’t deserve to try again. Doesn’t mean that you’re disqualified from getting better.”
Kiyotaka’s trembling.
“I...I just feel...Why do I live while he dies…? I never wanted to...He had so much zest for life! And I...I should be in his place! I don’t understand why he had to die! It doesn’t feel fair. He was young, and I-I didn’t...I just met him! And he was so nice to me, and then he just died, just like that! I wanted to know him better, and I wanted to hear his problems! He was so important to me! I’d never had a friend before! I don’t want to forget him, not ever! And I don’t want to be alive without…!”
The tears are back, but the blanket of calm prevents another anxiety attack.
“So embrace that life. He wouldn’t want you to give up, and neither do we. You don’t need to forget him, or pretend it was fair. Just...I know it sounds hollow. I know it sounds stupid, because I can’t understand what it’s like to be you. But we care about you, Ishimaru-kun! And we want you to live! I don’t care if you were the most hopeless person on the planet, that doesn’t mean you should’ve died! So many things happened in that school, and I don’t think any of us will really forget it. But...We can get through it, together. We can’t pretend it never happened, but we can let it heal.”
Naegi stands up, and he sits next to Kiyotaka.
“Can...I give you a hug?” He asks, his voice soft.
Kiyotaka nods.
Naegi’s careful. One hand goes on Kiyotaka’s far shoulder, and the other on his back. His body jerks with the force of his sobbing, but Naegi doesn’t seem to mind.
“I’m glad you lived with us, Ishimaru-kun.” He says, and Kiyotaka hiccups. “I’ll never wish you were dead, and I’ll never trade your life for another. What happened, happened. We just have to face tomorrow together, okay?”
Kiyotaka swallows, trying to find some way to pull himself back together.
“Promise me you won’t do anything rash?”
“I-I promise. I never...I never do.” A congested attempt at a laugh. “I always just sit there and stew.”
“Alright. You can talk to me, if that’ll help.” Naegi pulls back a little. “I’m here for you, alright?”
Kiyotaka has a hard time finding the words to say ‘No one’s been so kind to me since Oowada-kun. These are the nicest things anyone has ever said to me’. So he just mutters a tearful “Thank you”.
Naegi smiles.
“Take care of yourself.”
Kiyotaka nods.