Chapter 26: Chapter 24
!!! TRIGGER WARNING !!!
== brief mention of death and a short discussion about depression==
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“Why are you here?”
“I’m visiting my sick friend. Why are you here?? Wait, so the car outside is really yours? I thought it was uncannily familiar.”
“Well, yeah.” Kanryou squints. “You and Eiharu-san are friends?”
“He’s Ei, the coworker I told you a lot.”
“What?”
“Are you his friend too?”
“He is… the upperclassman I told you recently.”
“Seriously??”
Haruna is looking at both men bewildered. Her gaze shifts back and forth between the two, immediately noticing their similarity, though the aura they carry is seemingly the complete opposite. Kanryou is calmer and more collected, while this pretty guy is more cheerful.
“So he’s your brother, Yukisada-kun? And you two are Eiharu’s friends…”
“Ah, yes. I’m sorry for not introducing you earlier. He is Hakaru, my little brother. I don’t know if he and Eiharu-san are coworkers.”
Hakaru smiles sweetly. “I’m not lying, Aunty. I’m really Ei’s friend, not someone suspicious.”
Haruna looks flustered. “No, I don’t mean to be rude, sorry. My son never tells me about you, so…”
“Hmph, he’s always like that, isn’t he?” Hakaru dramatically clicks his tongue while shaking his head. Kanryou elbows him at the right moment before he starts talking shit about Eiharu in front of his mother. Kanryou understands he’s joking, but Haruna is probably not. It’s not a good first impression. “Well, putting that aside, how is he?”
“His fever is still high,” Kanryou is the one answers, “but he’s awake now.”
“Can I see him, then?”
This time, Kanryou glances at Haruna. She is still staring at Hakaru and misses Kanryou’s hint.
“Aunty, is it okay if I go see him?” Hakaru repeats, “I already offered to come, though he rejected me right away.”
“Oh-! Yes, of course! Of course you can!” Haruna snaps and nods somewhat eagerly. “I’m in the middle of preparing dinner. Why don’t you join us, Hakaru-kun?”
“May I? Thank you very much!” Hakaru grins. “Don’t forget to keep the fruits I brought in the fridge, Aunty. They taste better cold.”
“Sure, sure. Alright, go upstairs. Take that kid company while I’m busying myself.”
Haruna pushes the brothers towards the stairs. Kanryou hasn’t said anything, though he still half-believes the convenient coincidence.
“How come it didn’t cross my mind…”
“Hmm? About what?”
“About you two being coworkers. You mentioned his name a lot, but I didn’t think he and Eiharu-san were the same person .”
“What do you normally call him?”
“Back then? Just ‘Senpai’. Only recently I address him by his given name.”
“Maybe that’s why?” Hakaru shrugs nonchalantly. “Well, it’s not important.” When they enter Eiharu’s room, Eiharu is still lying with eyes closed. He seems to be sleeping but doesn’t seem like he’s sleeping peacefully. The crease between his eyebrows is deep, and his eyes are shut tightly. Hakaru sits on the edge of the bed and briefly touches Eiharu’s forehead. “Uwah, he’s burning.”
“It’s already a degree lower.”
“Seriously?” Hakaru stares at Eiharu, worried. “Brother, did he tell you anything?”
Kanryou shakes his head. “The last time we met, he caught a heatstroke after delivering his mother’s lunch, and I made him rest for a moment in my office. We haven’t talked since.”
“Is that so?”
Hakaru thinks briefly, remembering Eiharu’s rambled when he called early today. Eiharu’s inaudible blabbers were hard to understand as he only heard scattered information. But he could tell Eiharu was in distress because of something, to the point of giving him nightmares. Eiharu rarely sleeps peacefully, but as far as he knows, the nightmares usually revolve around the past. A certain someone Eiharu deeply loathed and was afraid of.
“Say, brother… you know who’s the bully, right?” Hakaru speaks lowly as if he doesn’t want Eiharu to hear it in his sleep. “I know Ei had a beef with someone in the past, but I don’t know the full story. Since now it’s clear he is the upperclassman who got bullied at school, I…” Hakaru inhales deeply as he recalls how Eiharu spoke nonsense in their phone call earlier. “This morning when I called him, he… vented. I don’t think he was conscious when he did, but…”
“...what did he say?”
“Things. His words were inaudible. I think he thought the line was cut and was too tired to realize he blabbered, but he mentioned something as ‘not his fault,’ ‘hate,’ ‘liar,’ and even said, uh…”
“Tell me.”
“He…” Hakaru glances at Eiharu’s sleeping figure before leaning towards Kanryou and whispers lower, “...die. He said that word.”
Kanryous expression turns solemn. When he undressed Eiharu to help wipe off his sweat, he saw the marks on Eiharu’s wrist. He has his suspicions, but he hopes Eiharu’s problem never escalates to that point. He still has no idea how bad Eiharu’s relationship with Toshiya was. The sudden change of school, the disappearance, Toshiya’s attitude, and Eiharu’s behavior, according to the materials he studied at school about mental illness, can lead to that point. The case of bullying that ends with losing life has become a norm and somehow romanticized. He dislikes it. He always hopes none of his acquaintances ever experience that.
“Brother?”
Kanryou blinks and snaps out of his thoughts. “Hmm?”
“Are you listening? You’re too silent.”
“Yeah, no. Sorry, I stopped listening after what you said.” Kanryou clears his throat and inhales. “If I tell you it’s not important or serious, will you believe me?”
“No.”
“I figured.” Kanryou smiles faintly. “I can’t tell you much because I have no idea about the whole ordeal yet. However, I will never let him experience the same thing.” Kanryou pulls a chair and sits before Hakaru, looking at his little brother seriously. “Hakaru, you’ve known him better than me. In the past three years you befriended him, what do you think of him?”
Hakaru turns his head to look at Eiharu. In the past three years they have worked together, Eiharu hasn’t been the most fun to communicate with. Eiharu is always reserved and withdrawn. He never tried to get close to his coworkers, limiting their interaction solely to work-related conversation, refusing to attend any bonding activities, and not bothering to politely chitchat with whoever was online with him.
Eiharu’s job doesn’t require him to visit the office, so he hasn’t shown himself since the first day he got recruited. The older coworkers aren’t fond of the idea, and some voiced their discontent directly to Senri. The Boss Lady already gave them a logical reason why Eiharu has that privilege, but it doesn’t clear out their dissatisfaction despite having nothing else to retort. And the way Eiharu quietly turned down other’s efforts to get close, he created a thicker wall separating him from the others. Though, aside from being anti-social, he never creates trouble and does his job remarkably. The others then pretend like he never exists, and Eiharu clearly prefers to be that way.
Hakaru, for the first time, heard the complaint from other coworkers about Eiharu’s coldness from Senri. She mentioned it in one of their meetings and casually gave Hakaru a task to break the ice. Hakaru is the mood-maker, so he didn’t think much about why Senri gave him that task--she is the type who doesn’t bother with her worker’s private matters, after all. Being a busybody as he was, hearing someone was excluded, he happily tried to fix it.
Hakaru’s first approach was simply to make Eiharu open up a bit. It took him some time to discover that Eiharu was only socially awkward. He never hates his teammates; he just doesn’t know how to participate in a conversation. And, because Eiharu is a big introvert, his social battery is too small. He can’t stay in a group chat for too long; it drains him. But he responds to personal messages and is immediately available for urgent matters about work.
However, being socially awkward, his speaking manner and texting style are flat. Emotionless. If one isn’t reading or listening carefully, they will misunderstand and think Eiharu is angry. Hakaru also thought the same the first time he spoke to Eiharu through the webcam. Eiharu’s weary expression and lack of response made Hakaru think Hakaru was disturbing him, so Hakaru genuinely apologized and tried to reason that the discussion was urgent. When Eiharu heard it, Eiharu was visibly confused. He said Hakaru didn’t need to feel guilty and didn’t think Hakaru was bothering him. Continuing their discussion, Hakaru noticed how Eiharu never once cut him short. When Eiharu had questions, he waited until Hakaru stopped talking. Despite the aloof and disinterested expression, Eiharu was the most attentive compared to the rest of their coworkers.
“He is… an awkward guy,” Hakaru replies. “He doesn’t talk a lot, but if you get to know him, his texts are long, much longer than the words he speaks of. He is easily overwhelmed in the crowd and seems to avoid strangers. He doesn’t know how to stay in a long conversation, but he listens to what other people say without cutting them short. And he often says he wants to be invisible.” Hakaru chuckles. “He is annoying, isn’t he?”
Kanryou smiles. Eiharu didn’t have a single friend to share his thoughts with back then. He is an only child, and his parents were divorced when he was young. His relationship with his mother is awful; it’s hard for them to mend the bridge as the crack was ignored for too long. For Eiharu, suppressing everything to himself is the only way to live.
“You said so, but you’re still worried about him.”
“Of course I am. He’s annoying, but only my friend can annoy me. I won’t be bothered by strangers.” Hakaru scoffs. “He better be grateful to have me.”
“I’m sure he is, Hakaru.”
-I’m sure… he is grateful that he met you-
“That being said, what happened between him and the other guy?”
Kanryou shakes his head. “I don’t know. It’s not something we can ask out of curiosity.”
“True.” Hakaru glances at Eiharu again. “But if this continues, it will be bad for him, right? What if they met again? I don’t know how it happened, but you met that guy. Who can tell Ei won’t see him by chance as well?”
Kanryou hesitates to speak. “...my guts tell me they already met.”
“See? That’s why, I--hold on, what did you say??”
“Eiharu-san and that guy… probably have met already.”
Hakaru blinks. His mouth is agape. “How??”
“Big chance… around the hospital.” Kanryou sighs. “I suspect… this fever was caused by distress and not a simple heatstroke.”
“Have you checked?”
“When I arrived, yes. He is extremely agitated. It doesn’t help him recover.”
“What can we do?”
“To calm him down, to make him less distressed.” Kanryou shrugs his shoulders. “But it’s not an easy task.”
Before Hakaru can respond, Eiharu stirs. His eyelids flutter open, and he stares at Hakaru’s face for three seconds before shifting his gaze to Kanryou, giving the other man three seconds to stare at as well. Eiharu squints his eyes at the two but says nothing. His brain cells are too fried up to notice the anomaly before him.
“How are you feeling, Ei?” Hakaru is the first to break the strange silence.
“Dying,” Eiharu answers nonchalantly. His throat is still burning. “Why are you here?”
“To visit you, of course. I don’t care if you don’t want me to; hearing your voice on the phone worries me. You can throw me out later, but let me stay for a while.”
“You’ll catch the cold after me.”
“I don’t think it’s contagious. Stop giving half-asses excuses, you pimp.”
Eiharu glares, but his glare is too weak; Hakaru doesn’t feel slightly intimidated. Hakaru knows exactly what Eiharu tried to do. Seeing Eiharu struggle, however, he refrains from teasing the guy further.
“Here, drink some.” Hakaru pours Eiharu a glass of water and hands it to him. “Your fever is too high. You have to drink a lot.”
Eiharu says nothing and accepts the glass of water, emptying it right away. He can’t handle the stuffy air and tries to lower the air conditioner's temperature, but Hakaru moves the remote away from Eiharu’s reach. “No, Ei. You shouldn’t.”
“It’s hot.”
“Because you have a fever. If you stay in a room colder than this, your fever will rise even more. You don’t want us moving you to the hospital when you’re unconscious, do you?”
Eiharu wants to retort, but he has no energy left. So he gives up and bears with the heat and uncomfortable dampness. His clothes are sweaty again, even though Kanryou helped him change not too long ago.
“Seishichi-san is preparing dinner. It should be done soon.” When Eiharu opens his eyes, Kanryou is already sitting next to Hakaru and touches Eiharu’s forehead, feeling his temperature. “Have dinner first, then you can return to rest. I will take Hakaru back with me so you can have undisturbed sleep.”
“You shouldn’t let him come in the first place.”
“I’m sorry about that. I didn’t know he was coming.”
“Neither I am.” Eiharu buries his face in his pillow. “I don’t want visitors…”
“We know, but we’re worried. Your fever hasn’t come down for three days. Normally, you should check yourself, but you refused to go. I have no choice but to come and see you myself.”
Eiharu glances at Kanryou. “...sorry.”
“Don’t be.” Kanryou unconsciously caresses Eiharu’s hair. “Please get well soon. We promised to hang out on my next day off, right?”
“Mm… sorry…”
“I’ll forgive you if you recover before the day.”
“I’ll try…”
“Good.”
Hakaru watches the two interact. He didn’t think much at first, and he didn’t think he could judge since he rarely met Eiharu in person. But Eiharu’s behavior around Kanryou isn’t normal. Eiharu is too tamed. His gestures and words were also said in a different tone. It doesn’t sound dismissive or expressionless. His tone is suspiciously expressive.
Hakaru involuntarily squints his eyes. However, he has no chance to say anything as Haruna enters the room with a big tray in hand.
“Dinner is ready, kids. Let’s eat, shall we?”
Gifts
-- Gift
received Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone