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“I should call Satoru right now,” she said around her cigarette, watching Suguru out of the corner of her eye but forcing nonchalance. A mass murderer was standing next to her, she couldn’t forget. A mass murderer, but it was also Suguru.
“You should,” he agreed, smiling down at her. He wasn’t fooled by her act, it seemed. Something about Suguru had always been that way — perceptive, and so so good at reading people. “So why don’t you?”
Her lips paused around her answer. She didn’t have one. If she was smart, which she was, then she would’ve done it immediately. But now, the moment had passed. It didn’t feel right or safe to dial Satoru’s contact. “I could.”
Chuckling, he held out his hand, palm up, for one of her cigarettes. Wordlessly, she handed one to him. “You could,” he agreed, in a very amiable tone.
She didn’t. Neither of them knew why.
The bustle of midday Shibuya passed around them. Unknowing civilians, going about their day. There was a mass murderer in their midst, right next to her. Could they not sense it?
Then again: Suguru did not look like a murderer. He looked like he always had, beautiful and kind, if a little thinner. Gaunter. Shit, how did she not notice it all before?
Finally looking at him, she noticed the way his face pulled taut over his cheekbones, the looseness of his clothes.
Have you been losing weight? She remembered Satoru saying, and cursed him for not pushing more. She was there too, though. At least Satoru had noticed something. Meanwhile she stood oblivious, playing nonchalant, now here she was. A doctor was supposed to have real keen eyes, but she had never been much of a real doctor. A morgue technician, more like. She noticed changes in the dying and dead, but not in the living.
But that wasn’t quite right, was it? Watching him now, Shoko could tell that Suguru had been rotting for a long time now.
Amused, Suguru lit his cigarette and inhaled it like he would oxygen. “Like what you see?”
“No,” she said simply, eyes tracing his face and making note of all the places he had changed.
He tapped the butt of his cigarette against her shoulder, playful. “Rude.”
“Haven’t I always been?” she snapped back, then regretted it. Something in herself urged her to do something stupid, like to smooth his hair back or maybe touch his arm. Old habits die hard, she guessed.
It was hard to connect the image of Suguru’s face to the report detailing the 112 casualties in that non-sorcerer village. That wasn’t the hard part to take in — sorcerers were crazy, and it wasn’t hard for someone to cross that line. It was something else that had taken her by surprise, when she first browsed through that death sentence of a report.
“True,” Suguru said, sounding like a sigh. “I liked it, though.”
“Gross.” She wrinkled her nose, inhaling another lungful of smoke. It was too early for this. Morning had never been her best time of day. It was too early for an encounter like this. Maybe later, like ten years down the line, she would be ready to confront Suguru about his motivations like a proper adult. She needed time to think, time to shape her words into a rope and wrap it around Suguru’s ribcage, tying him to her. If she had ten years to think maybe she would’ve been able to make him stay.
But she didn’t have ten years. She just had right now.
At least she was better than Satoru.
She shuddered at the thought of Satoru confronting Suguru, glad that she didn’t have the chance to call him. It would end horribly.
They lapsed into silence, and Shoko half expected Suguru to leave. He didn’t. Simply, he closed his eyes and smoked, the lines of his body loose and relaxed. Now that she saw him like this, relaxed and vulnerable, she realized just how tense he had been in the weeks leading up to his defection. Guilt came to her in a flood, filling up the marrow of her bones. Yes, she should’ve noticed. Yet, she didn’t.
“Why did you kill them?” she asked eventually, voice hoarse.
Suguru’s face tilted up to the sky. She didn’t believe in an afterlife, but the way Suguru was searching in the clouds for a second she almost believed there was. “There were two girls, Mimiko and Nanako. They needed me, so I-”
“I’m not asking about the villagers,” Shoko interrupted. Suguru’s shoulders tensed, a small change but she was looking for it. “They probably had good reason to die. You know who I’m referring to.”
“My parents?”
“Yeah” she said. “Them.”
For a long while he didn’t say anything and they stood there together: a murderer and a doctor. A killer and a killer. Something almost fragile clouded over his eyes and there it was again, that funny feeling in her stomach. Urging her to comfort, urging her to heal the hurt. She had never been good with her words, and so she soothed that imperfection over with her hands.
“It’s complicated,” he finally said, knowing that it wasn’t a proper answer. But what answer would be a proper one? Was there ever a proper reason for killing ones parents, one that could answer for the most heinous crime? There probably wasn’t. If there was, Suguru would be the one to come up with it. He had always been so good with his mouth, even when he was using it for lying. Especially then.
“You said you would take us to meet them one day.” Something in her chest twisted, aching for something she would never get. “Satoru and I never had parents like yours. We were excited.”
“We all get let down by life,” Suguru said, his voice losing the false cadence to it. It was hard and her heart thudded against the tone. “It’s not fair. That’s how it is.”
“It wasn’t life,” she pointed out. “You were the one who killed them.”
There was a moment of silence and he didn’t say anything. She was getting sick of him pretending nothing was bothering him, anyways. The blood was spilt. What was done was done. They could not go back to what they once were. She spoke, before he could say something to convince her again. “You let us down.”
When she looked at him again his eyes were dark. There was no shine in them, and for a second Shoko could see the shape of a murderer standing in his shoes. “Yeah,” Suguru admitted, voice sharp. “But you and Satoru let me down first.”
And what could she say to that? He was right. It was too early for this, and maybe if you gave her those ten years to think of a response it would’ve been a sufficient one. But she didn’t have those ten years, and so her words weren’t enough. “You’re selfish,” she told him. “And childish. Pretending won’t get you anywhere. Neither will murder."
“Maybe you’re right,” Suguru said, voice amiable and false again. It grated against her ears. They lapsed into silence. This time, it was far from comfortable. Something charged rested between them, urging them to bite.
Shoko wasn’t stupid enough to provoke Suguru. Instead, she pulled out her phone and dialed Satoru’s number. It was a cowardly move, something that would no doubt end in disaster. But it would anyways, and she didn’t want to be caught up in its immediate impact. Satoru could handle it - he always had. Thinking that made her eyes burn.
Watching her, Suguru drew out one last breath of his cigarette. Then, he let it fall to the concrete and stamped it out underfoot.
“See you around,” he said. They both knew he wouldn’t.
The cigarette head laid there on the sidewalk untouched. A small flame flickered among the ashes and Shoko watched it for a good while. It could probably be symbolic of something. A metaphor, of sorts. But she had never been particularly adept at reading the living, or processing their flowery emotion.
So after a moment, she stomped on the cigarette again and the flame went out. Then she picked it up and threw it in the garbage bin
Dead things were so much easier to get rid of.