𝐇𝐈𝐃𝐄 𝐍' 𝐒𝐄𝐄𝐊 | ohshc x bsd

thirteen

Asahina Kim owed her life to many people. Oddly enough, the person she had most treasured wasn't part of that list.

It was a boy, a year younger than her. His circumstances weren't the same as hers. He was shielded from a reality, locked up in his abode to rot in solitude; He was protected in a less than optimal way.

On the other hand, she was exposed, feeling naked to a world of piercing eyes who watched her every move, ears who hung onto every word she said, and tongues that savored every single bit of blood she learned to spill with her calloused hands.

They had been similar but different in every sense of the words.

They had met when Mori had insisted she go talk to the lonely boy inside the container. Back then, when she was learning the ropes of the Port Mafia, her understanding had been slim, and her curiosity just as big.

The man had then told her to consider it a training mission, that being the motivation she needed to do what she was told. Dazai had given her the advice to always be mindful of Mori's instructions, if she didn't want the food in her mouth and the bed she slept on to be taken away from her. With a methodically studied expression, she had peaked through the rusty entrance, and hazel met green in a stilled gaze.

Oura Dazai sat atop of a single bed, curling in on himself like a prey shielding itself away from its predator, covering half of his face with a red book.

With spiking curiosity and sparkling imagination, she had approached him, realizing she needn't use malice to complete her mission.

talk with him, Mori had said. She wasn't there to cause harm.

Her first words weren't exactly the softest. A crude comment about his disheveled appearance was all that made it out of her lips. To her surprise, he giggled, and like an untied knot, his body language relaxed.

For days and years on end, she listened and listened to him talk for hours about the many stories his book held. She watched him in awe, with anticipation in her eyes and cheer bubbling in her laugh. She also stayed when the frustration and neglect caught up with him, hearing her own heart break with each tear that fell from his gem-like eyes.

She was ten at the time, and he was nine. They understood what they shouldn't at that age, and for a while it seemed the cruelty they had faced was the basis of their friendship, a silent understanding and unspoken comfort because both often stated firmly "no, you are not alone".

And then Oura Dazai disappeared on the day of Asahina's fourteenth birthday. The cupcakes in her hands she had made herself from stolen goods fell on the dusty floor of the damned container she had always hated to see Oura sleeping in, and her eyes colored hazel lingered on the oddly melancholic image of a lonesome book sitting in the middle of the room.

It was Oura's favorite book; Asahina had never understood why, she never really liked the plot of the story.

It became her most prized possession after that.

So when she first saw her former friend that first day at the Academy, her disappointment was incomparable; Because there wasn't an ounce of recognition in his green eyes.

She was pained at his lack of emotion, lack of a bright grin.

She was talking to a stranger once again.

"Oura-san" She called, bringing the boy out of his head. She felt like that same little girl who, under Mori's orders, first approached the boy in the container, except this time, she knew a friendship wasn't blooming.

Not under their circumstances.

"yes, Asahina-san?" He asked, lacking enthusiasm. She sat down beside him.