future.

< You were everything, everything
that I wanted.
We were meant
to be, supposed to be,
but we lost it.
All of the memories
so close to me
just fade away... >

Why is it that all the sad songs have suddenly become about us?

now.

STERN, SMART AND SUCCESSFUL.

Fitting words to describe Tsuchigiri Kyoko, principal of Aoba Johsai. The old woman, who was probably in her sixties or something, looked like she was just in her thirties. There was no trace of grey or white hair in her tresses of black (pulled into an immaculate bun, of course) and that God awful smile on her face made Mana's knees quake.
Of course, it didn't help that the woman was her equally revolting grandmother.

Mana hates clocks but this woman is fond of them. Her office is a pastiche of different kinds of clocks- vintage, wooden and etc. All decorating the vast expanse of her office and ticking and tocking.

She also hates this woman, deep down in her soul, for surviving. She was her mother's mother, but they had a huge fallout and now this woman hated Mana to pieces. She didn't even bat an eyelash when her only daughter died, when her own daughter drowned in madness. Madness she had probably caused for endless whip lashing and cutting the woman out from society.

Her mother died, young Etsuko too. And yet this woman.

Shrewd. Snake.

More fitting words to describe her.

"So you've decided to live with relatives in Kyoto?" the woman arches an eyebrow, eyes the same grey as her mother and Etsuko but sharper and more dangerous. "I can say I'm relieved."

She flips the notice of transfer to the next page. Mana's legs hurt from standing and the overwhelming fury she feels make her want to reach across the table and slap the old woman, but she doesn't out of the most minuscule tint of respect she has left.

"It's only too long that I can handle such a useless girl," she says as if she's even bothered helping Mana. (Well, she did twice, in the most inconvenient and unsuccessful way possible). "Very much like her mother."

Mana remembers her mother before madness, kind and loving, exactly what a mother should be. True, she often failed to reach an understanding with the way Mana and Etsuko grew up, unknowing of what and how they should be raised as children (never having the experience of becoming one herself), but Mana loves her to bits.

It also helped that Mana thought she was her mother's favorite. And maybe she was.

"And gladly so," Mana replies. She's already gone through the most horrifying moments of her life. Failing grades, heartbreak, death. Standing up to an old bag of bullshit seemed so much easier. "Very alike. And unapologetically so."

Kyoko sneers, the most fitting expression in her face. "Watch your mouth, you brat," she hisses, steel eyes boring into hers but Mana doesn't waver. "You have been spoiled by the world! You have forgotten more significant things and you choose to enrapture yourselves with vanity and trifling things."

Spoiled? Mana wants to tell this woman that she is a coward, yes. She is afraid, yes. She is broken, yes. Annoying, yes. Lonely, yes. Self hating, yes. But she is not spoiled by this world.

"I am not spoiled," it is the only thing Mana says. Because this woman does not deserve her words.

"And you dare deny facts- my judgment?" she asks and her voice has become an octave higher. "Do you think I am not aware of your shameful grades and activities within this school? Is failure something to be proud of? You are a failure and you should have accepted my help when I offered it!"

Mana's fist clench and she looks at her, looks at Tsuchigiri Kyoko with every last bit of contempt buried inside her heart. "You tried to have me adopted by a family! With those disgusting high and mighty people of all things! You wanted to send me away and throw me. With no regards of how horrible I was feeling because of my mother and sister died and I lived. To hide evidence, to bury the fact that my mother was your daughter and she burned our house down!"

"It was for your own good, you ungrateful brat!" the woman rises from her chair. "For the good of the family!"

"You messed with the investigation!" Mana accuses. "You paid someone to alter the records and you-"

The slap stings but Mana takes it. No place for regret, for looking back. With a glare at her direction, Kyoko approves the paper and throws it at her face. "Never show your face to me again, you lowly child. I couldn't be happier that your mother couldn't carry our last name! That shameless creature. I wish she'd never been born."

"Take those goddamned papers and go to Kyoto!"

Mana says nothing, spins on her heel and leaves. Her anger has subsided but she isn't hurt by the least. Eventually, there will be a reckoning, the world burned to ashes, the sinners removed and Mana will gladly watch them burn.

* * *

"Good morning," the man says, his face blurring in the details. The yellow hard hat fastened tightly on his head reflecting some of the sun's rays. "You must be Etsuko, right?"

She shakes her head. She isn't Etsuko. She isn't brave like her sister. She isn't selfless. She's nothing like Etsuko. She's nothing.

"Then you must be Mana," the man says. "Etsuko must have been your younger sister?"

Nothing escapes her mouth, eyes barely blinking and all that's left of her attention pinned on the cement posts adorned with majestic carvings of wings and flowers.

"We apologize for your loss, Mana," the man says. "But we require your immediate presence in regards to this case."

She doesn't say anything, just nods at the direction of the man. At that exact moment, Tsuchigiri Kyoko decides to darken the doorway with her presence.

She's wearing all black and white, a white button up blouse topped with a black pencil skirt and a black coat slung over her shoulders. Her grey eyes are tear stained and Mana looks at her with wonder.

Her Mama had always told her that Kyoko was a bitter old woman, Mana thinks otherwise, seeing the woman's bedraggled form. She must be in distress because of her daughter's death, Mana thinks. They never even had reconciliation. Mana feels bad for this woman.

"We're very sorry, madam," the man begins, "but I'm afraid we're undergoing investigation and visiting-"

"Oh hush!" the woman says, shedding the skin of grievance to show the true serpent underneath. "My granddaughter is grieving. She needs me her for support. I can sue you for adding to the emotional distress of this child!"

"Very well, then," the man says, monotonous.

"Then I'll talk to her first," Kyoko says, pointing the door with her pointer finger which an abnormally long fingernail has grown from. "You can keep yourself busy with the door."

When the man is gone, Kyoko faces her.

"Listen Mana," the woman begins with an eery quiet voice. "Tell me what happened that night. Your theories, suspicions, opine them."

Mana told her everything.

And when the story ended, the woman's eyes had turned arctic cold. "I should have known," she said and told Mana to omit bits and pieces of her story if she didn't want to get hurt. If she didn't want to make things worse than they were.

When the man asked questions, Kyoko's fingernails bit unto the skin of her palms, forcing her to omit the important details and merely nod and shrug as response.

By the time the inquiry was over, Mana's palms were bleeding.

* * *

Mana has conquered a monster, but she's ashamed that she's not strong enough to survive in this place haunted with memories of her beloved. She will leave.

It is not wrong to let the unbearable things pass, like wind to flowers. What's wrong is to fight when you have nothing at all.

Mana straightens the skirt on her uniform, watch the fabric crease and flow away with the breeze. It might be the last time she wears this and she prays silently that the next uniform she wears is as beautiful.

She likes the blue.

She goes down the stairs, slowly, gently. This is the last time. She revels in all the fading memories she made in this school, the minuscule number of friends she have.

And she closes her eyes.

She doesn't notice nor hear the resounding footsteps and the blue and white jersey. The boy she has abandoned, the boy she loved most of all, the boy who in his way thought her to be cruel. The boy she made feel unloved. And then heartbreak flashes in his eyes again.

"You're leaving...?"

* * *

e n d.
-
[ Supermarket Flowers ]

'sometimes, it's just better to let go.'

[ a u t h o r ' s c o r n e r. ]

i want to go into Kyoko's background but unfortunately, i don't have enough time or patience to do so. and the quote, "it is not wrong to let the unbearable things pass, like wind to flowers. what's wrong is to fight when you have nothing at all." is inspired by touch me not by jose rizal or more commonly known as noli me tangere :)