Chapter Text
I didn’t know what pain really was, until today.
It hurt so, so much, deep inside my chest.
I wanted to tear open my ribcage, and expose my beating heart, to shrivel and dry up in the sun, to be pecked apart by crows, to wither into ash. That seemed like a far more preferable fate.
I laid curled up in a ball on the kitchen floor, sobbing, my whole body shaking with the effort. Every attempt to try and control myself just resulted in me breaking down further, my muscles already exhausted and sore from the effort.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this.
I thought that she—
We’d come so far . Miyagi had changed so much over the past four years. She’d even started to smile for me, though it was still so much rarer than I would have preferred.
I’d spent so long agonizing over my own feelings for her. I’d come so close to telling her, so many times. I’d always been afraid of this, this rejection. That she wouldn’t believe me.
And, now, here in what I was sure would be the perfect moment, the last chance, I saw it in her eyes.
Miyagi trusted my words. Believed them.
And had been utterly horrified and disgusted with them.
If it had simply been a miscommunication, then maybe I could still hold onto some hope. That it could be fixed somehow, if I said the right things, could prove my sincerity.
But this? I’d offered her everything, and she didn’t want it.
She didn’t want me.
There was no coming back from that.
And so all I was left with was pain, and a gaping void inside of me that nothing would ever be able to fill.
“It hurts.”
“Miyagi, it hurts. How could you?”
I was her property, wasn’t I? She should treat her property better.
It didn’t make sense. I really thought that she felt the same as me. She’d demonstrated her care and concern and love for me in so many small ways. In everything but name we’d been a couple for years now.
Was the name really that hard of a thing to accept? Or maybe it was marriage. Was I too insane, too obsessed, to be jumping straight to marriage when we technically never dated? I thought… Miyagi liked promises, rules. Clearly defined relationships and boundaries. I thought that something so formal could help her conceptualize us in a way that made sense to her. Give her the assurance and security that it really would be forever.
I was such an idiot.
Stupid.
Stupid!
I don’t know how long I laid there on the floor, my mind spinning like a blender, chewing up any rational parts of my brain and spitting out a slurry of self loathing. I think at one point I passed out, for a bit.
But the funny thing was, that even when your whole world crumbled into ash before you, you still had to keep going.
My tears ran dry. My body became too exhausted to shake and sob any longer.
And I needed to pee.
For a brief moment, I just considered lying here in a puddle of my own filth until I starved to death.
But that was too pathetic, even for me.
Summoning my last remaining scraps of willpower, I pushed myself to my feet, my entire body aching.
I shuffled to the bathroom in a daze, did my business, and then splashed water over my face, washing away my ruined makeup.
My stomach growled, and I made my way to the kitchen. I was in no shape to cook anything. I’d probably chop off one of my own fingers by accident. But I should at least be able to manage cup ramen.
But then, seeing the cup of ramen in the cupboard caused a fresh wave of grief to pierce through the numbness permeating the rest of me. Miyagi once lived entirely off of the stuff. But she’d become quite a talented cook over the years, even if she didn’t believe it herself.
Taking a deep, shuddering breath, I turned away from the cupboard, and braced myself against the kitchen table for support.
My phone was resting on the table, where I’d left it earlier. I saw that there were a number of notifications and messages, and that it had been four hours since Miyagi had left.
I snatched up the phone, a desperate hope surging through me, my fingers fumbling as I tried and failed to unlock it twice before getting it right the third time.
Just as quickly as it had appeared, that hope drained out of me. None of the messages were from Miyagi.
As I stared at the phone in my hands, my mind sinking back into a dark pool of oblivion, it buzzed, and caused me to jump.
Utsunomiya was calling me.
I let it ring for a moment. I considered letting it continue until it hit voicemail. I wasn’t exactly in the mood to hear congratulations and pleasantries about graduation.
But… what if I didn’t have to? Utsunomiya was a good friend. She was Miyagi’s best friend, who knew parts of her that I didn’t. Maybe she could…
“Hello.”
“Ah! Hello, Sendai-san. And congratulations!”
“I would have liked to come see your ceremony too, Sendai-san. It was really inconvenient that we both had them on the same day, huh?”
Fresh tears brimmed in my eyes, and my throat felt swollen, unable to say the words I needed to.
“Shiori seemed a bit out of it today. How is she feeling? I know the next step for the both of you is probably going to be a big one, huh?”
My hands were shaking so bad, and I couldn’t even see the phone in front of me anymore
“...Sendai-san? Are you there?”
“H-help.”
“Eh!?”
“Help me, Utsunomiya-san. Please. Miyagi, she…”
My words failed me, and I burst into sobs once again.
“...Okay. I’ll be over as soon as I can, Sendai-san.”
I told Utsunomiya everything.
I’m not sure how much of it made sense. I was a blubbering, incoherent mess, curled up on my bed, going through an entire box of tissues. But I told her all about our story, our strange connection, our relationship, over the past four years.
I wasn’t sure how long it took me. If I were to write it all down in a book, it would surely be hundreds of chapters long. But I felt exhausted when I finally ran out of things to say, like I’d just run a marathon.
Utsunomiya, for her part, listened quietly, a pleasant smile on her face, nodding along and occasionally asking clarifying questions.
I sniffed, blowing my nose. It was raw, from being rubbed so much.
“My my,” Utsunomiya said, letting out a quiet sigh. “This was certainly unexpected.”
“I’m sorry,” I mumbled. “I… wanted to tell you. About us. But we…”
Utsunomiya shook her head. “That’s not the unexpected part, not really.”
“Huh? What do you mean?”
“Sendai-san… don’t take this the wrong way, but I’ve known that you and Shiori were lovers ever since our first year of university.”
“Eh?”
“The surprising part then is that you weren’t lovers. Or at least, that you two were so tangled up in yourselves that you couldn’t define yourselves that way. Sheesh. What a troublesome pair, the both of you are.”
“I… were we really that obvious?”
Utsunomiya paused for a moment, her finger resting on her chin.
“Do you know what I got my diploma in?”
“Umm…”
I wracked my brain, trying to remember. It wasn’t something Utsunomiya talked about much.
“Psychology, right?”
“That’s right. And now that I’ve got my diploma, I’m going to pursue a master’s degree, in order to become a licensed therapist.”
“Wait, really? That’s incredible…”
“And as a therapist I want to specialize in helping people who are LGBTQ and other underrepresented populations.”
“Eh!?”
Utsunomiya sighed again, and shook her head. “Good grief. It always made me really angry, that you two felt that you couldn’t be open and honest about your relationship. Not angry at you, mind. Angry at society, for making relationships like that something people felt they needed to hide. So I wanted to do something about it, wanted to help people in that situation however I could.”
“So you…”
“And now!” Utsunomiya crossed her arms over her chest, her expression twisted into an exaggerated pout. “It appears that I was completely wrong, and that the entire impetus for my future was based on a misunderstanding. You weren’t hiding it because you were afraid of what society would think. You were both just very stupid. ”
I winced, and looked away. “Sorry.”
Utsunomiya laughed. “Oh well. I’m committed to my path, either way. It’s still the right thing to do.”
A small smile made its way to my face. Utsunomiya really was an incredible person, with a big heart, and a lot of talent to back it up. And to think I never gave her a second glance in high school. School hierarchies really are a whole lot of nonsense, huh?
And I never would have gotten to know her if it wasn’t for Miya—
Ah, right. For the briefest moment, I’d forgotten my despair.
“What am I supposed to do now?” I choked out, barely a whisper.
“Hmm. Well, what do you want to do?”
“I… I don’t know. I didn’t have any backup plans. I bet everything I had on this proposal. I have nothing left. I don’t know how I can live without her.”
Utsunomiya was silent for a few moments before speaking again. “Well, for starters, you absolutely could. You’re a strong person, Sendai-san. It would hurt, but I know that you could eventually pick up the pieces and move on.”
The thought made me double over, shrink even further into myself.
“But, what you want is to be together with Shiori, right?”
“Of course I do! I want that more than anything. But she doesn’t want that. She hates me, she—”
“Sendai-san,” Utsunomiya cut me off sharply. “Did Shiori say that she hates you?”
“Well, no, but how else am I supposed to explain—”
“Sendai-san. Shiori doesn’t hate you.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do. I’ve been Shiori’s friend for a long time. I’ve watched her change so much since meeting you. And I’ve watched the two of you together. She adores you, Sendai-san. She cares for you more than I’ve ever seen her care about anyone before. That girl is madly in love with you. I’m sure of it.”
The thought that those words might be true filled me with equal parts hope and gut wrenching dread. “If that’s true, then why…?”
“I don’t know. I can’t speak for Shiori. But I’m sure she doesn’t hate you. She ran away, maybe because she was scared. But this isn’t over yet. If nothing else, her stuff is all still here. I’m going to help make sure the two of you have a proper conversation.”
“Will that really be enough?”
Utsunomiya held up a finger. “Honestly? It might not. It’s possible that, even with a proper conversation, that the two of you end up going your separate ways. But you’re not going to let things go without that, are you?”
I took a deep, shuddering breath, and sat up on the bed.
“No. I’m not. But… how do we get a hold of her?”
“Well, she didn’t contact me to stay with her. So there’s really only a few options, right?”
