Chapter Text
part i
i want you i’ll color me blue
JUNE
“What is a ghost? Something dead that seems to be alive.
Something dead that doesn’t know it’s dead.”
- Richard Siken
*
“This will be good for us.”
His mother’s words sound dull through his headphones but Nicholas catches them anyway. The battery died an hour ago. He’s been wearing them as a pretense, as a guise, doesn’t want to hold meaningless conversation with words that don’t matter when he doesn’t even know what he’s feeling. There’s too much green passing by outside, too many trees. He wonders if there’s a forest near their town.
“It’ll be good for us,” his mother repeats, her gaze drifting to him for a moment before she focuses on the road again. For you. These words go unspoken but Nicholas hears them anyway.
He wishes she would’ve said them outloud. Then he would’ve had a reason to reply, something bitchy which he would regret in the evening, starting an argument that would’ve had both of them tired and mad and hurt.
I didn’t ask to move to a different country.
You know that’s not what I meant -
It’s what you implied -
I just meant that we need a fresh start -
Because of the shit I pulled right?
Yixiang -
Don’t call me that I hate that name -
Which is a lie because there’s not a world in which Nicholas would ever hate the name his parents gave him but hearing it outloud would just cause all the broken strings in him to unravel, the ones he so carefully tied together after the accident.
Sunlight breaks through the trees outside and the forest gives away to clear skies and a blue horizon in the distance. He closes his eyes and tries to sleep for the rest of the trip. It’s gonna be a lonely summer.
*
His grandparents’ house sits nestled at a corner of the street, unassuming and bland - just like the rest of the town, Nicholas had gathered, as they finally reached it and passed through the neighborhood. He watches as his mother opens the door for the movers who’d reached the house just a few minutes before they did, watches them start unloading their furniture, their boxes. Seventeen years of his life packed away, all to start over in a different country.
There’s an old tree in the front yard, big enough for a wooden swing to hang from one of the branches. It sways in the light summer breeze. He wonders faintly if he ever used that swing, if he played in the yard as a kid. All the memories from his childhood are hazy but after the accident it changed. They became blurry, started fading. Like a fog had settled over them, the edges blurring, yellowing, like an old photograph. He didn’t even have any kind of brain injury - only a slight concussion and after two days in the hospital he was cleared to go home. The doctors called it a miracle. Nicholas doesn’t know what to call it.
His grandparents - his mom’s parents - passed when he was young and the only time they ever came here was that one Christmas when he was around seven or eight and his grandfather got sick and his parents suddenly decided to bury the old family hatchet and act like a real family again. It didn’t help.
Now, Nicholas stands in front of the fence, watching his mom, watching the movers, watching his entire life change like he’s just some kind of background actor in a low-rated movie, like he’s standing at the edge of a dream and maybe if he moved he could change something, maybe if he just lifted his finger or started walking -
The wind moves and brings the breeze of the ocean over to him. Nicholas closes his eyes and breathes.
*
“I’m gonna explore a bit.”
Nicholas stands in the doorway to the kitchen, not daring to step over the threshold, not knowing if he’s allowed to. (It’s stupid. It’s so stupid but he’s scared if he steps over his mom will glare at him, will yell, will blame him -)
His mother only smiles. She looks tired from unpacking and cleaning but she’s smiling. “Okay, honey. How do you like your new room?”
He nods, awkward. “It’s nice. Bigger than my old one. ‘m mostly unpacked too.”
She seems relieved at that. “Your bike’s in the garage,” she nods over to a door at the far end of the kitchen. “Don’t stay out too late. Got your -”
“Phone? Yep,” Nicholas finishes for her and tentatively crosses the kitchen. “I just wanna see the neighborhood.” Since I’ll have to stay here for at least a year.
He’s able to breathe again when he closes the door, staring at the sunset through the open garage door. Under any circumstances it’d be beautiful. If it were any other occasion, he might even stay behind and help his mom with unpacking and cook dinner with her.
His bicycle’s leaning against the wall and he’s almost reached it when he notices the chipped paint on the handle bars. The smashed bell which he never got around to replacing because why would he? He stares and stares and stares and sees headlights behind his eyelids, hears the screeching of metal and tastes blood in his mouth-
He trips over his feet as he pushes himself away, bile rising in his throat. His chest rises and falls with each breath he takes and his wrist throbs with phantom pain, despite the cast being off for two weeks now. His eyes catch onto his skateboard, sitting in some box in a corner. His skateboard’s fine. He hasn’t ridden it in like half a year but it’s a better option than his bike. One last deep breath to loosen the tightness in his chest and he disappears into the setting sun.
(He hopes his mom won’t check his room. His phone sits on his unmade bed, turned off.)
*
The town is quiet for a summer evening.
It’s quaint and boring and maybe that’s exactly what his mother had envisioned for them when she sat him down one morning and told him they were gonna move to her hometown.
Nicholas had gotten too used to the bustle of the city, the fast trains and even faster cars, the nightlife. Days passed by in a flash. The city didn’t stop moving after the accident, the funeral. As if it didn’t care that Nicholas’ entire world had tipped over the edge and there was a hole in him so big he knew it was only a matter of time until it swallowed him whole. He hasn’t stopped bleeding since.
Here, life is slow. Like someone put a video on pause and forgot to press play. He spots a family mart, with two children standing in front of the gumball machines. He passes a library, a coffee shop. And everywhere he looks, he can’t escape the ocean.
The salt air refuses to leave his nose and the summer breeze engulfs him like a warm hug. A sweaty hug, more like, because it’s only the beginning of June and Nicholas wonders how much hotter this summer is gonna get if it’s already this warm.
The skatepark sits near an elementary school, overlooking the ocean, and Nicholas hops off his board, lets it roll a few feet because the park is empty anyways, and steps up to the fence.
It’s beautiful, even Nicholas can recognize that. The shimmering waves and the glimmering water, turned orange by the sun, makes him feel homesick for something he can’t place, a feeling he can’t put into words. When he saw the ocean for the first time as a kid maybe? When he did that study abroad in South Korea and him and Euijoo drove to Busan and spent the entire day at the beach and he filled his entire pockets with shells? But thinking about Euijoo just makes his chest hurt and he remembers the unread messages on his phone and the guilt starts creeping in.
He doesn’t realize he’s been gripping the fence so tightly it cut his palm until he lets go of it and then he’s left staring stupidly down at his hand. It’s not a deep cut and he’s not bleeding heavily but it still feels -
Good. Vindicating.
Nicholas slumps down and leans his back against the fence, staring up at the sky. The sun’s mostly gone now. Back in the city, he could never see the stars. The sky was always lit up by some billboards or high rise apartments. Here, in a small seaside town in Japan, he stares up at the stars in open wonder, like he’s a kid again.
Blood is still trickling from his hand. Pulling his knees up, he drops his head on them and breathes in. Out. His chest loosens up a little. He should go home. Soon, his mother is going to start on dinner and she will call him but the call won’t go through because his phone is turned off and then she will check his room and she’ll find his phone and his room not yet unpacked and she’ll realize he lied-
Or maybe she already knows. She’s his mother after all. Even if he doesn’t like to admit it, she knows him better than he knows himself.
How is his mother feeling, living in the house she grew up in? Does nostalgia follow her in every room? This move was supposed to be a fresh start for Nicholas, for the both of them. A place without any painful memories attached to it. But does that apply to his mom, when memories are all she has of this town?
He notices the boy too late.
He’s about to get up, finally, and look for his skateboard when he hears the sounds of someone else skating nearby, the telltale sounds of someone skating down a ramp echoing in the dark. He locates the figure easily - a boy, presumably his age, his height - just skating leisurely, up and down, like a seesaw.
Nicholas clears his throat. Maybe this is stupid. But he also knows it’ll make his mom happy if he tells her he already met someone and maybe it’ll lessen her anger when he comes home too late, so he stands up, wipes his hands on his jeans-
“Hey.”
Maybe it was too quiet - he’s about to speak up again when the boy looks up and his eyes widen and he almost stumbles in his haste to get off his board.
“You -” The boy starts. He points at himself. “Were you talking to me?”
His hair’s blond, honey colored, and it seems to shimmer in the dark.
“Uh, yeah,” Nicholas says. “No one else around.”
The boy swallows, steps closer. “You - you’re talking to me?” he repeats, almost whispering, but then he smiles and Nicholas feels blinded, like the sun burst through the sky. It’s dumb. It’s still dark outside and evening has settled over the town like a blanket but Nicholas feels weirdly warm.
“I’m Taki!” The boy, Taki, says, all smiles and excited. “You’re new here, right? I’ve never seen you around and everyone knows everyone here.” The words stumble out of him like Taki hasn’t talked to anyone in days.
Nicholas nods. “Just moved here with my mom,” he replies. “Uh, I’m Nicholas, by the way. You can call me Nico, though.”
Taki grins. “You look to be around my age. Seventeen, eighteen? So you’re gonna start at our school too?”
“Yup,” Nicholas pops the p. “Senior year.”
Taki’s mouth falls open in an oh. “You’re older than me,” he laughs, rubbing his neck. “Sorry.”
Nicholas waves him off. “I don’t really care about that.”
Taki laughs again. “I have to introduce you to my friends some time. They’re uh, out of town right now but you’ll meet them before school starts!” He’s all smiles and grins and excitement bubbling out of him and Nicholas thinks that if he had a tail he’d be wagging it right now. He bites back a grin and nods.
“That’d be cool. My mom will be happy to know I made some friends. But, uh, speaking of my mom,” he shrugs. “I should get home. She’s probably worried by now.”
Taki nods. “Of course! I’m busy during the day but I’m here most nights, if you wanna meet again.”
When Nicholas smiles, it’s the first real smile he’s worn in weeks. “Thanks. I’ll keep that in mind.”
He walks home, carrying his skateboard under his arm, and when he gets home he feels tired but calm, like he’s been standing in direct sunlight the whole day.
*
He starts meeting Taki almost every night.
It’s easy to talk to him, to hang out with him. Sometimes they just skate in silence, Taki marveling at some trick Nicholas learned in middle school and immediately copying it. Most of the time, Taki talks. A lot. But Nicholas doesn’t mind. It’s easy to listen to Taki, as he talks about school and the town and his friends. His older brother who’s currently staying with them for the summer. What he wants to do after school, where he wants to go.
Nicholas tells him about life in the city, about a different country, and Taki listens earnestly, asks questions which Nicholas answers easily.
Only when Taki asks why did you guys move here? does Nicholas pause in his skating.
“My mom, uh, got a new job opportunity,” he lies, hopes Taki doesn’t notice the slight quiver in his voice, his eyes darting around. “It was too good to pass up.” And it’s not even a lie technically. His mom did get a new job here. So what if he leaves out some minor details like I almost died. Someone else did.
The only times he doesn’t see Taki is when Nicholas and his mom run errands the entire day and he simply falls into bed that evening, exhausted and asleep in a minute. The other time is when his mom has old school friends over for dinner and Nicholas answers their questions, smiles at their compliments, nods when they tell him he’ll meet friends in no time. He doesn’t tell them about Taki; only his mom knows and that’s because she started asking questions.
After, Nicholas is quietly loading the dishwasher and his mom sits at the kitchen counter, content with a half-drunken glass of wine in front of her. “What was that boy's name again?” she asks suddenly. “The one you met at the skatepark?”
The plate almost slips out of Nicholas’ hands. He busies himself with rinsing off some food scraps. “Taki, why?”
His mom snorts. “His family name.”
“Ah, I never actually asked him about that,” Nicholas laughs sheepishly. “You think you know their family?”
“Maybe. Everyone knows everyone here.”
Everyone knows everyone here. It’s exactly what Taki said the first night they met. Nicholas wonders - if his mom knows their family after all, would it be weird to go to their house? To meet him? They haven’t exchanged phone numbers since neither of them offered to do so and Nicholas realized he enjoyed it - the disconnection, the slight anonymity that still existed between them. He only meets Taki in the evening, after sunset, and he was under the assumption that both of them liked that arrangement.
He turns the sink off and reaches for a dish towel. “I can ask him next time,” he offers. He focuses on drying his hands, picks at the skin by his nails, doesn’t notice his mother watching him intently.
“Okay,” she says eventually. “And another thing -“
He looks up.
“You need a job.”
Nicholas scoffs, laughing. “A job?” His smile drops when his mother only continues to look at him with her eyebrows raised. “You’re serious,” he says flatly. “How am I supposed to find a job here?”
“They have stores here,” his mom says, now starting to grin. “The library, perhaps?”
He scoffs again.
“Nico,” she sighs. “You’re sleeping till noon. Your only friend is a guy named Taki who I still haven’t met. You need a regular schedule before school starts.”
She’s right. He knows she’s right. “Yes ma’am,” he salutes mockingly and she rolls her eyes. “I’ll go job hunting tomorrow.”
*
ej🍊: how’s japan
ej🍊: do you want me to come visit
nicho: don’t u have work??
ej🍊: i can call in sick
nicho: u would never
nicho: it’s fine
nicho: made a friend already
ej🍊: i’m so proud
nicho: 🙄🙄🙄
*
“My mom wants me to get a job,” Nicholas says two nights later when he finally has time again to slip out of the house after dinner. He’s sitting on his skateboard, Taki in the same position opposite him. An energy drink sits by Nicholas’ side. The one he brought for Taki still sits unopened by his feet.
Taki hums. “Any idea where?”
“Wherever,” Nicholas shrugs. “D’you have any recommendations? You know this town better.”
“There’s the library,” Taki starts but at Nicholas’ glare he laughs. “Thought so. Uh, my brother used to deliver medicines in the morning but he also got up super early for that.”
Another glare from Nicholas, another laugh from Taki. “Oh, Yuma works at the coffee shop,” Taki perks up. “He said it’s really chill.”
“Coffee shop sounds nice enough, I suppose,” Nicholas mumbles. “Could you ask him for me? Or can I just go in there?”
If Nicholas hadn’t looked up at that moment, he wouldn’t have noticed Taki’s smile slipping. It’s back in an instant and he wonders if he imagined it. “You can just go in,” he reassures him. “Yuma’s pretty chill.”
Nicholas nods. “Ah, my mom wants to meet you,” he starts slowly, gaze drifting past Taki, toward the ocean. He doesn’t see Taki’s smile falling, doesn’t see his shoulders tensing up. “Kinda? Well, she didn’t say that exactly but she’s worried I’m making you up which she also didn’t say but it’s what she meant and, uh, yeah, she does want to meet you, I think.” His voice grows quiet and he feels stupid suddenly for saying so much at once, can feel his ears redden.
“Forget I said anything,” he laughs quickly, loud, uncomfortable. “My mom’s just worried, but -” He shakes his head. “I don’t wanna pressure you into anything.”
“You’re not,” Taki says softly, smiles at him. There’s kindness in his eyes which Nicholas doesn’t deserve. His chest tightens. “But it’s -” Taki takes a deep breath. “Complicated right now?” He shrugs. “Family situation, y’know? Give me time.”
“Oh,” Nicholas. “Of course, I - I’m sorry. Didn’t know.”
Taki waves him off, the smile back on his face but it’s small and sad. “It’s fine!” He hugs his knees to chest, looking like a little kid and Nicholas has the sudden urge to hug him, to reach over and hold him. He crosses his arms, hides his hands under his armpits.
“Life can be weird sometimes,” Nicholas mumbles. “Especially family.”
Taki looks up at him. “Do you ever feel…like you’re not there sometimes? Like no one even sees you?”
Nicholas swallows. Every second of every fucking day, he thinks. Ever since that stupid accident. That fucking argument.
He didn’t know. Taki smiles brighter than the sun. He has honey colored hair and his voice is even sweeter than that and he looks at Nicholas like he hung the stupid stars in the sky.
He didn’t know, didn’t even consider that Taki might be feeling the same way he does.
“I see you,” he whispers, low and quiet. Kinda hoping Taki didn’t hear him, kinda hoping he did.
Taki exhales. He relaxes and stretches his legs out. Their feet don’t touch. Almost. It’s enough for now.
*
Yuma has an eyebrow piercing, a nose ring, dyed platinum hair, and chews his gum in boredom when Nicholas meets him for the first time.
Nicholas instantly likes him.
Just don’t mention my name, Taki had said the evening before. He’s gonna be insufferable, talking about how he did me this big favor since I know you and all.
So Nicholas doesn’t mention Taki. He doesn’t mention anything except that he’s new to town and needs a job. It’s the truth anyways. Yuma doesn’t need to know more.
Yuma nods once when he’s finished and then slaps a pen and a napkin on the counter. “Write down your phone number and the manager will call you.”
Nicholas raises his brows which Yuma doesn’t miss. He grins. “What, expected me to be the manager?”
“With the way you’re acting, kinda,” Nicholas shrugs, sliding the napkin back over to him. “Nothing really happens here, does it?”
“Exactly.” Yuma busies himself behind the bar, then slides an iced coffee over to him. “So, why do you wanna work here?”
Nicholas thinks of honey colored hair and sunshine. “My mom wants me to get out and meet people before school starts,” he says instead. “Coffee shop’s the best place for that, I suppose.”
Yuma snorts. “Cheers to that.”
*
Nicholas gets the job.
He tells his mom and she’s a bit too overjoyed for his liking but he entertains her and they go out to dinner that evening in the nearby city and come home well past midnight. He tells Taki and Taki goes to high five him but then pulls his hand away at the last second, leaving Nicholas hanging, and jumps on his skateboard, laughing loudly.
They pass the time like that, just skating around aimlessly, when Taki breaks the silence. “How was Yuma? Good?”
Nicholas stares at his back. “Yeah, I guess. I like his style,” he says, more for the sake of saying something.
“Yeah?” Taki snorts. “Well, I guess he’s dressing in normal clothes now. Can’t really look that cool in a school uniform.” He grins over his shoulder.
“I guess,” Nicholas agrees, still staring at his back. Something about his words seems wrong but he can’t place it. They nudge themselves in his head, refusing to leave, begging to be dissected.
“I like his hair,” Nicholas says absently, stepping off his board. They’ve reached the half pipe and Nicholas watches as Taki skates around. “My mom won’t let me dye mine.”
Taki frowns. “But you have the same hair color?”
Nicholas stares at him. His hair is black. Yuma’s was definitely not black.
“It’s - it was blond,” he says slowly. “When was the last time you saw him?”
“What?”
Taki stumbles off his board and it seems to echo loudly in the dark. He’s staring at Nicholas with wide eyes. “He - he dyed his hair?”
Nicholas feels like he said something wrong but he doesn’t know what. “Yeah, he - are you okay?” he asks because Taki has grabbed his board suddenly, seemingly in a hurry to take off. “Taki, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing, I-I’m fine, I just -” Taki’s rambling, his smile forced. “Sorry, I gotta go, I just remembered I have to -” His shoulders slump. He looks defeated. His voice sounds small when he speaks again. “I’m sorry. I’ll see you around?”
Nicholas nods. “See ya.”
Taki starts walking. Nicholas bends down to pick up his board and when he looks back up Taki’s gone, swallowed by the night.
*
Nicholas can’t even bring himself to be mad at Taki’s abrupt disappearance. Taki seemed genuinely shocked by the information about Yuma but Nicholas figures there’s more to it; he wants to ask him, wants to know everything there is to know about Taki because -
Because it’s as simple as that.
Because Taki makes him feel calm.
He goes back to the park the next night and skates around for an hour but Taki doesn’t show. The next day, he starts his job.
More than once, Nicholas finds himself wanting to ask about Taki. The words sit at the tip of his tongue through Yuma teaching him the basics, through taking orders, making coffees. He doesn’t know why he stays silent. Maybe because he promised Taki. Maybe because Taki was his first actual friend here and he wants to keep it a secret, just for himself, just a little longer.
Around noon, the bell above the door jingles and Yuma looks up from where he’d been reading manga behind the counter, Nicholas lazily cleaning the espresso machine. Yuma was right; nothing really happens and apart from a few customers the day passes by slowly.
“Yudai,” Yuma greets the man, smiling brightly. Yudai’s tall, taller than both of them, brown hair falling into his eyes. He’s holding a bouquet of flowers. “On the way to the hospital?”
Yudai nods. His eyes pass over to Nicholas, curious, but then he’s talking to Yuma again. “You haven’t been by in a while, right?” Yudai’s smile is small and teasing but Yuma ducks his head, laughing awkwardly. When he speaks, his tone is quiet.
“Sorry,” Yuma says. “Busy with work. You know how it is.”
“It’s okay,” Yudai says. “I get it.”
“How is he? Still - ?”
“Same as always,” Yudai confirms. Yuma slides a coffee over to him. “Which is good, I suppose.”
Yuma nods. “I’ll come by soon. Don’t want him holding this over my head when he wakes up.”
Yudai laughs at that, grin bright. “You know he won’t. See you around.”
Nicholas watches him go, their conversation settling beneath his chest. A reminder that this is still a completely different world and Nicholas is just a stranger. Someone who came into their town, standing at the edge, begging to be invited in. A reminder of lives lived before he came here, lives changing.
Yuma speaks when Nicholas’ gaze slides over to him. “His little brother,” Yuma nods at the door which Yudai closed behind him. “Got into an accident a few weeks ago. He’s been in a coma since.”
“I’m sorry,” Nicholas says softly.
Yuma nods once. “He was my friend,” he says then. He looks so different from the Yuma he met a few days ago. Smaller, somehow. Carrying a grief that Nicholas is all too familiar with. A different kind of grief, maybe. But still the same ache in his bones.
Nicholas doesn’t say anything, knows Yuma expects him not to talk. Stares out at the glass front, can see the ocean in the distance, knows exactly which roads to take to get to the skatepark.
Still your friend, Nicholas wants to say. He might wake up. He’s not six feet under.
They don’t share the same grief, he realizes. Grieving for the living is different than grieving for the dead.
*
“Your dad called.”
The knife slices easily through the peach, juice coating the cutting board. Another cut, another slice. Nicholas picks it up, lets it fall in the bowl next to him. Four more peaches are sitting in a plastic bag by the sink. He’d picked them up yesterday after work, when he passed through the farmers market. He needs to start eating a regular breakfast anyway.
His mother’s words don’t register at first. “Huh?” he says absently, still cutting slice after slice. And then: “He did?”
He doesn’t see his mother at the kitchen table, his back turned to her, but he imagines her nodding. Imagines her reaching for her coffee cup before speaking again.
“He asked about you.”
“Funny. He has my phone number. Could’ve asked me himself.”
He imagines his mother sighing, mouth in a thin line. Can hear her say He’s trying, Nico. Cut him some slack.
They’ve had this conversation before.
The words never come.
Nicholas grabs another peach, inspects it for any rotten spots, readies the knife. His mother is still silent. He risks a glance over his shoulder.
The doorbell rang earlier that morning when Nicholas was in the bathroom and when he came downstairs the box was sitting on the table with his mom in a chair, empty breakfast plate and coffee cup in front of her.
She hasn’t opened it yet.
“Ma?” he starts. “Are you okay?”
“He sent over some of your sister’s things.”
The world stills. His grip around the knife tightens. His eyes slide down to the box and he stares and stares and stares like it might explode at any second. The words stay lodged in his throat.
His sister's life, packed away in a tiny cardboard box.
His mother stands abruptly, chair scraping on the floor, grabs the box and leaves the kitchen. Nicholas is alone.
The world keeps on turning and yet the air feels heavy. Like something shifted. Like they can’t dance around the topic anymore, like the last few weeks of their new life never happened.
Nicholas turns back to the cutting board, stares down at the peach. There’s a rotten spot right in the middle.
*
His parents got divorced when he was thirteen. It didn’t affect him as much as he thought it would. It had been a long time coming anyways. Strained silences at the dinner table, low arguments in the living room when they assumed their kids were asleep. Things changed a little, for the better, when his father moved out. His mother started smiling more. His father picked them up every second weekend and their parents didn’t ignore each other. Clipped hellos turned into pleasant conversation while they waited for Nicholas to pack the last of his things.
His sister, three years older than him, went to live with their father when she turned eighteen. Her university was closer to his place, that was her reasoning, but Nicholas wasn’t stupid. Even he knew that kids unknowingly pick sides in a divorce. His sister simply chose their father.
It had been raining the entire weekend by the time they sat down for dinner one Sunday evening. His father had some business to attend to in their city, his sister tagging along, and they’d been celebrating a job offer she’d received earlier that week.
Utensils scraped on plates, the rain hammering against the windows, when his father spoke up. “What about you, Nico?” He’d been on his second wine glass. “What’s new with you? Still going to your, uh, appointments?”
Appointments. Nicholas bit his cheek. “Therapy?” he says. “Yeah, if I keep it up I’ll be completely healed by the end of summer.”
On his left side, his sister rolled her eyes. “Knock it off,” she mumbled under her breath.
Nicholas didn’t want to. If there was one thing he was good at, it was souring the mood. Ruining family dinners.
“I think it’s useless,” his father continued. Of course he did. “You don’t need to go there.”
“Well, I kinda do,” Nicholas shrugged. “Since Mom thinks I tried to kill myself and all.”
His mother, having been silent the entire time, slammed her fork on the table. “Yixiang,” she warned, her voice thin. “That’s enough.”
“What’s this, then?” Not enough for his sister apparently. She prodded at his left arm, the bandages around his wrist hidden by a long sleeve. “You were just bored?”
“Might do it again if I get bored enough,” he bit back.
“Yixiang -”
“You need to grow up,” his father had said then, his voice louder than his mom’s. They all fell silent. “You’re gonna grow up and you’re going to realize this was a stupid and foolish thing to do. If you wanted attention, you could’ve just talked to us -”
“Attention?” Nicholas laughed incredulously. “You think I want attention? From you of all people? You fucking left us. I don’t give a shit what you think about me.”
And there it was. All the hidden resentment towards his father that Nicholas kept bottled up all these years, finally spilling out.
His father just smiled thinly. “Is that what you think of me? And you think you were the perfect son?”
“That’s enough,” his mother said. “We shouldn’t fight tonight.”
His sister’s chair screeched against the floor as she stood up. “I’m gonna go for a drive,” she mumbled. “Both of you need to grow up. Thanks for dinner, Mom.”
The sounds of his sister in the hallway, the door opening and closing. A few seconds later, the engine of her car turning on. Nicholas stared down at his half eaten dinner plate, biting his lip, tasting blood. His scars throbbed. “‘M done,” he mumbled and got up.
When he stepped into the hallway, he didn’t take the stairs up to his room. Instead, he opened the front door, stared at the rain for a second before spotting his bike on the front lawn and made up his mind.
He should’ve stayed at home that evening. Should’ve gone to his room, should’ve stared at the stupid glow in the dark stars glued on his ceiling, should’ve apologized later to his mom when his dad had left. That’s wishful thinking. As it was, he grabbed his bike and pedaled off into the night, didn’t see the car coming, didn’t register the impact until he laid on the street staring up at the sky, the rain plastering his face. Vaguely, he tasted blood in his mouth, registered a sharp pain in his arm and back. Didn’t hear the ambulance sirens coming closer, then drifting off again.
An hour later, police officers would arrive at his house, informing his parents about their child getting into an accident. They would find Nicholas in the hospital, his arm in a cast, bandage around his head. The doctors would say he was extremely lucky.
But his sister -
A week later and Nicholas would stare down at her grave, his chest aching with a kind of pain he’d never experienced before. When he was ten, his father’s brother died. Cancer, a disease that followed him his entire life. He didn’t understand then, as a child, why his father was the last person to leave his grave after the funeral.
Seven years later, as he stared down at his sister’s name, he finally knew.
*
Rain drumming against the sidewalk, one wheel of his bike spinning helplessly around. His mother’s screams echoing down the hospital halls.
Nicholas wakes with a start.
Sweat is clinging to his back, his chest tightening with each breath he takes; it just gets worse. He needs a few minutes to regulate his breathing, ends up staring at the sliver of moonlight shining onto his floor.
It’s been a while since he dreamed about that night. Felt guilty about it, thought it meant he might forget his sister soon. How stupid he’d been. He will carry his sister with him, forever, will carry the grief and shame and anger and love all his life.
He stares down at his wrist, at the faint scars. How miserable he had been as a teenager - he will never get those years back. Had made a promise to himself the day after the accident, had sworn to grow up and get better and actually do something meaningful in his life. Even if it’s just growing old. Staying alive. He owes that, at least, to his mom. His sister.
The stairs creak softly under his feet as he makes his way downstairs, doesn’t want to wake his mom. He passes her office on his way to the kitchen, stops in his tracks when he notices the door ajar and a light on.
He hears the sobs before he sees his mother. She’s hunched over at her desk, the box with his sister’s things open in front of her, cradling something in her hands. Her journal maybe, or a postcard she wrote and never got around to send.
Mom, Nicholas wants to say. Wants to go over and hold her and cry with her because if the pain of losing a sibling is hard, losing a daughter is completely different.
He leaves her be.
It’s a curse, he thinks later in bed. To be the one alive when he wanted out of his life so bad, to survive his accident while his sister didn’t survive hers.
Softly, he hears the creaking of stairs, his mother’s bedroom door closing. He turns, staring at the wall, counts the minutes in his head. Silence settles over their house, both of them grieving alone, grieving for the same person.
*
Nicholas doesn’t see Taki the entire week.
He goes to the skatepark every evening, stays until sunset, skates around aimlessly, waiting for something to happen, someone to show up.
Nothing ever happens.
One evening, he reaches the park, doesn’t see Taki, immediately turns around and disappears into a side alley. There are stairs there, leading down to the beach, and Nicholas drops his skateboard when he reaches the sand, lets his body fall right after, stretching his arms out.
They’d been to the beach once when they were kids. The drive took two hours and his father had been cranky but Nicholas didn’t care because as soon as he saw the ocean he forgot all about the fight his parents had the night before, about the stifled silence in the car. He only noticed the blue of the water and the sky and the sand burning under his feet.
His sister had thrown a ball at him then, laughing while running off to the water and Nicholas stayed by his mom impatiently as she applied sunscreen on his back, itching to run after his sister. He ended that day sunkissed and sunburned, freckles dotted on his nose, limbs weary and bones heavy. It’s the most he’s laughed his entire childhood.
He closes his eyes, lets the sounds of the waves rush over him.
Sometimes, he misses his childhood so terribly it makes him feel sick. The want, the need, to go back to a time where nothing was heavy and the days were endless and his laughter was real. A game of tag on the playground. The sunlight shining through the sprinklers. Holidays never seemed to end and his sister still let him sleep in her bed, scaring him by making up fake horror stories. Let him go back. Let him curl up next to his mom on the couch after a nightmare, let him wake up once more on a summer morning and the kitchen windows are open and his mom is listening to the radio and the curtains are fluttering in the soft breeze. Let him go back one more time.
“Yo.” A weight suddenly plops down next to him and he blinks his eyes open, sees Yuma grinning down at him. There’s a beer bottle in his hand, a cigarette in his other one. “Why are you moping around here?”
“Not moping,” Nicholas mumbles, drags himself up, takes the offered cigarette. He takes a drag, the smoke burning his lungs. “Why are you here?”
Yuma stares out at the water. “Had a fight with my friends a few weeks ago,” he confesses. Maybe it’s the alcohol, lowering his defenses. “Been chilling alone most of the time because none of us wanna apologize.”
“Well,” Yuma snorts. “Maki tries every day. But Harua and I are both stubborn as hell, so.”
Maki. Harua. Nicholas swallows. These are Taki’s friends too, knows their names from various stories Taki has told him. That itch is back again, the urge to ask about Taki because now he’s next to someone who knows Taki apparently, who could maybe tell him more about him, who knows where the hell Taki is right now.
Faintly, he realizes that Taki must be one of Yuma’s friends too.
Yuma shakes his beer bottle, realizes it’s empty. “Friendships are weird as hell,” he sighs. “Who even knows if I’m gonna be friends with them after we graduate.”
Taki has once told him that all of them grew up together, or at least met in middle school. He wants to tell Yuma as much, wants to say you don’t just throw away life-long friendships like that, wants to say if you have friends where you’re this upset after a fight you better cling to them.
He feels like a stranger again, an intruder. He doesn’t know them, not in the way they know each other, doesn’t even know Taki like that. Realizes that as much as Taki told him, in the end he doesn’t know him either. He considers Taki a friend, his only friend. Well, maybe Yuma’s the second one now. But does Taki see him the same way?
“Oh, fuck,” Yuma exclaims, dropping his head on his knees. His voice comes out muffled. “I need to go to the hospital.”
Nicholas blinks in confusion. “Now?” Then, he remembers. “Your friend?”
Yuma nods.
“Why now?”
“Because,” Yuma lifts his head. “I know for a fact Harua won’t be there since he and Maki are on a date right now. Insta stories,” he adds at Nicholas’ furrowed brows.
“And you’re this scared of running into Harua that you wanna go to the hospital now?”
Yuma scoffs. “Not scared,” he mumbles. “Just…not in the mood for another argument. It’s either this,” Yuma shrugs. “Or getting blackout drunk. Which do you wanna support more?”
“Six months ago, I would’ve said get drunk and just forget everything,” Nicholas replies and Yuma laughs. “But I’m trying to be a better person. So, hospital it is.”
Yuma raises his brows. “How’s that working out for you?”
Nicholas thinks of his mother crying alone at night, thinks of his childhood and the life they left behind and the family picture he has hidden in his drawer, thinks of the scars on his wrist. Thinks of honey colored hair and full lips forming into a smile at his jokes. He shrugs. “It’s day by day.”
Yuma snorts. “I’ll drink to that.”
“What accident did your friend have?” Nicholas asks half an hour later, when they’ve passed the reception and are in the elevator up to the fifth floor. “If you don’t mind me asking.”
“Car accident,” Yuma replies. He’s nervous, doesn’t know what to do with his hands, keeps crossing his arms and dropping them to his sides again. He’s biting on his lower lip. “Well, a car hit him. He was on his bike.”
Nicholas stares at his reflection in the elevator doors. Just like him. Only he got out with a broken arm and Yuma’s friend is -
The elevator stops. The doors open and Yuma’s frozen, back rigid, face expressionless. The doors start to close again and Nicholas jumps forward, holds his hand in between them, nudges Yuma’s shoulder in passing. That seems to bring Yuma back to his senses.
Nicholas follows him quietly down the hallway as Yuma looks at each room number, mumbling under his breath. “Here,” Yuma stops suddenly. “He’s - it’s here.”
Nicholas nods. He points over his shoulder to a small waiting area. “I’ll just be over there.”
“Yeah.” Yuma doesn’t look at him, simply takes a deep breath and vanishes behind the door.
As Nicholas turns, he catches a glimpse of the name plate underneath the room number. Takayama Riki.
*
His mom’s out on the back terrace when Nicholas gets home later that night, book open in her lap and wine glass next to her. A blanket is covering her legs and Nicholas has to grin at that. While he’s still running hot in his tank top and shorts, his mother always gets cold easily.
“How was your day?” she asks when he sits down on a deck chair. She glances up at him. “You’re always getting home late. Should I be concerned?”
Nicholas laughs quietly. “I was out with a friend, actually.” He hopes Yuma won’t mind that he called him his friend and deep down hopes Yuma thinks of him in the same way. “Yuma, we work at the coffee shop together. Nakakita Yuma, I think.”
His mother’s face lights up. “I know one of his moms, we went to school together. She’s always telling stories about him.”
“You know more about him than I do, then.” He leans over to the side table, makes a move as if to reach for her glass of wine, only to see her raised eyebrows. He laughs, grabs a handful of chips instead.
“You’re friends and yet you don’t know anything about him?”
I know one of his friend’s in a coma and he’s ignoring his other friends and he’s traumatized by whatever else happened before I came here. “Seventeen year olds don’t really talk about that kind of stuff, Ma.”
“Oh, spare me,” she groans theatrically. “I don’t need to know what seventeen year olds do in their free time.”
“As if you were any better at my age.” He grins when she rolls her eyes. “Do I need to call up Yuma, ask his moms to tell me about your high school days?”
“Shush.” She swats at him playfully and he laughs, jumping to his feet.
“I’m gonna shower,” he says and she hums, turning back to her book. He stops at the porch door, hand gripping the handle. He feels like a little kid again, like he’s ten years old or twelve or thirteen. “Ma?” he asks and she looks up.
He doesn’t know if it’s the truth, doesn’t know exactly what he’s feeling. But he knows he wants her not to worry. “I like it here,” he says in the end and when she smiles at him, soft eyes with so much love in them, he supposes it was the right thing.
*
It ends when he sees Taki again.
Or at least, that’s the beginning of the end.
Nicholas stops when he reaches the park and sees a lone figure skating in the distance. He already knows it’s Taki; recognizes the blond hair, the same tricks he does. There’s something squeezing at his chest, his heart.
“You’re back,” he says when he’s close enough.
Taki stops. He still has his back turned towards Nicholas when he steps off his board and then he’s turning around and Nicholas’ next words get stuck in his throat.
Taki’s beautiful. It never really registered for Nicholas before. Or maybe it did but he didn’t make a big deal out of it. Filed it away under things that are normal and happen every day such as meeting a beautiful boy under the stars and your chest glowing every time you make him laugh.
The sky’s blue, water’s wet, and Taki is the most beautiful boy Nicholas has ever met.
“Sorry,” Taki says with his voice that’s sweeter than anything Nicholas has ever tasted. “I - Stuff happened. I’m sorry.”
Nicholas takes a step forward, then another and another, until he’s standing in front of Taki with almost no distance between them, their feet almost touching. It’s always almost with them. If he reached over, he could hold his hand. Intertwine their fingers together, Nicholas’ silver rings a contrast against Taki’s sunkissed skin. He doesn’t. He wants to so badly.
“Nico -” Taki starts.
“I missed you,” Nicholas says stupidly, softly. A confession. “You just disappeared. And I didn’t even - I don’t even have your phone number and I had no way of knowing if you were okay and I showed up here every night and you weren’t fucking here -”
“I was,” Taki whispers. “I was here.”
“No, you weren’t.” Nicholas laughs, short and cold.
“Believe me.” When Taki smiles, it’s sad. There’s something unreadable in his eyes. “I was here every night.”
“Great.” Nicholas swallows. He feels so angry suddenly. “Thanks for fucking ignoring me then, I guess, what, did you see me and leave again because -” He stops and takes a few steps back, widening the gap between them. He tugs at his hair in frustration. “What happened to you?” he asks then, dropping his hands to his sides. “You can talk to me. I will listen. I’m here.”
“Nico -” Taki starts again and when he looks at him his eyes are glistening with unshed tears. “You won’t believe me anyways.”
“Fucking try me.”
His next words make the world stand still. Nicholas is sure even the waves of the ocean stopped. “Nico, I think I’m dying.”
“You -” Nicholas swallows. “What do you mean? Are you sick? Is that where you’ve been?”
Taki’s shaking his head even before Nicholas has finished speaking. “I’m not sick,” he says slowly. “But I think I’m gonna die soon.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Fuck, I -” Taki throws his head back, staring up at the sky. “Have you asked Yuma about me?”
“I -” Nicholas stares at him. “No, I haven’t. You told me I shouldn’t.”
Taki laughs quietly, runs a hand over his face. There are tears drying on his cheek when he looks at Nicholas again. “You should,” he says. “You should ask him about his friend in the hospital.”
His friend in the hospital. His friend.
In the hospital.
Takayama Riki. Ta - ki.
Nicholas thinks he’s gonna be sick.
“What the fuck?” he whispers. “What the - fuck, do you think this is funny? Is this some kind of sick joke?”
He turns around, almost expects Yuma to pop up behind some bush, laughing wildly. “Is this your idea of a prank? Are your friends in on this? Let’s all play a joke on the new guy, haha, funny, let’s embarrass him before school even started -”
“Nico.”
Nicholas stops in his rambling, stares at Taki. Even while he was talking, the pieces slowly started putting themselves together. Only meeting him at night. Never seeing Taki around town during the day. His genuine surprise when Nicholas talked to him for the first time.
Were you talking to me?
The way Nicholas would look at Taki sometimes and he’d swear he could almost see through him; his blond hair suddenly white, his skin paler than usual. Nicholas chalked it up to the moonlight. And sometimes, he’d catch Taki looking at him, something akin to wonder and fascination in his eyes. Like Taki wanted to make sure Nicholas was still there, could still see him.
Do you ever feel…like you’re not there sometimes? Like no one even sees you?
Oh.
He swallows, despite the tightness in his throat, resists the urge to drop to his knees and throw up. It was staring him right in the face.
“How,” he whispers. “How can I see you?”
Taki shrugs. “I don’t know. But I am so happy that you can. When you talked to me that first night -” He rubs his eyes. “That was confirmation for me that I wasn’t…dead. That I was gonna wake up soon. But it’s been weeks and -”
“Don’t,” Nicholas says. “Don’t say it.”
He does anyway. “I don’t think I’m gonna wake up,” Taki says. “Now I think I met you because I needed closure.”
“What fucking closure is that?” Nicholas bites out. “We don’t - we didn’t even know each other before your accident. What did you need from me?”
His vision’s become blurry. Nicholas rubs at his eyes furiously, hates himself for getting this upset, this angry, hates Taki for leaving him. Not really but -
He hates himself for finding this skatepark that very first night, for talking to Taki -
Hates the driver of that car that hit Taki -
Hates the driver of the car that hit him all those months ago, the driver that hit his sister -
“You can’t fucking leave me now,” he says. He tastes salt on his lips. “Not after I thought I was getting better, not after I thought I was finally gonna be okay this summer -”
“You will be.” When Taki smiles, it’s that soft, understanding smile he always wears. “You barely know me. You’ll be fine. You have Yuma and he’ll introduce you to the others -”
“They all have you in common, idiot,” Nicholas interrupts but then Taki’s laughing and he’s laughing too, wet and nasally. The Taki asleep on the fifth floor of the hospital is haunting his friends and this Taki, his Taki, down at the skatepark, under the stars, has been haunting Nicholas since they first met.
*
The house is quiet when Nicholas gets home.
He’s exhausted and tired and only wants to go to bed but then he’s passing the living room and notices something differently on the shelves. He slowly grabs the picture frame and stares at it, doesn’t notice he’s crying again until a tear drops onto the photo.
As kids, they could’ve passed as twins. Relatives, strangers, always told them that. Their features changed when they grew up but their smiles stayed the same. Nicholas stares at his sister’s face, tries to commit every tiny thing to memory. Her bangs which she always complained about but never grew out. Her eyes, same shape as his, squinting slightly because she refused to wear her glasses.
The tightness in his chest is back and he carefully puts the picture back on the shelf, tries to breathe, in and out, ignores the dark spots behind his eyelids as he stumbles up the stairs. He barely remembers to knock on the door before he’s crashing into his mom’s room and then she’s sitting up, half asleep, leaning over to turn on the lamp on her nightstand.
“Nico?” she asks blearily. “What’s wrong, are you -?”
“Mom,” he chokes out, knees almost giving out beneath him. He’s sobbing now, chest heaving. “Mom, I - Ma, I miss her so much, I can’t - I don’t know what to do -”
“Oh, honey,” she says and that word does it. Nicholas falls into her open arms, sobs wracking his body, and she’s patting his head and talking to him quietly, calmly. He can feel her tears dripping onto his shoulder and clings to her a little tighter.
He’s grieving for his sister, grieving for Taki, grieving for the life he used to have, the life he could have had in this town if things turned out differently.
June leaves quietly, as soft as it began.