Marked (BokuAka)

47. Sixteen

Akaashi's POV, End of Day 9:

"Bokuto, I–" Akaashi began, before being stopped by Bokuto's hand being held up.

"Don't. Just..." He sighed. "Don't."

Akaashi looked at Bokuto's broken form, crumpled and unkempt like a cardboard person left out in the rain. "What can I–"

"Sixteen times."

"What?" Akaashi pursed his lips. Sympathy wouldn't do any good in this situation. He was too late. But maybe it wasn't too late to just listen.

"They stabbed her sixteen times. Once in the lower spine to paralyze her, and then twice in the surrounding area. Thirteen times in the chest and stomach. And the worst part? She didn't die from that." Bokuto's eyes were glazed over, staring at a white hospital wall as Akaashi listened in gruesome curiosity. "As the blood trickled from all these wounds, she slowly bled out. Painfully. And apparently, they didn't carve the symbol into her dead body. They did it while she was still alive. And then they repositioned her on the chair." He sniffled and wiped his snot away with his arm. "The only thing they could say to console me was "She died fighting". That's it. No, "It was painless" or "It was quick" only that she was scared and she died fighting for her life."

A vision of Bokuto's mother sitting at their table flashed through his mind. Her golden spectacles, her long, wine-red painted nails, and the smile that seemed contagious, lighting up even his mother's face. Then he tried to imagine her, blood dripping down her back, dead eyes staring out.

"How did you find her?" Morbid, the way the human mind works. No sympathy at this moment. Just want for a better picture, macabre wishes for understanding.

"Lying with her head on the table." Bokuto stared off, reliving the grisly moment. "Pee on the floor, burning cookies in the oven. Book in lap, favourite t-shirt riddled with holes." The image of Bokuto's mother became sharper, the scent of burning food and sour pee intermingling as Akaashi imagined the scene. Burning cookies and library books. "They didn't want the book back."

"Hmm?" He asked absentmindedly, still thinking of the horrid scene. He couldn't colour it in, couldn't imagine the deep red of the blood or the yellow of the puddle. It remained in black and white, the monochrome colours turning it into but a picture, not a moment.

"They let me keep it. Can't get bloodstains out of paper." Bokuto let out a manic laugh, causing the other patients to look at him in concerned horror.

The fluorescent lights flickered, glaring at the sterile white walls and glinting off the tiled floors. "But why are you here? At the hospital?"

"My dad had a heart attack. Apparently, you can get them from broken hearts." Bokuto stood up robotically, turning to look at Akaashi sharply. "Well? Let's go to your house. Is your mother there?"

"She's waiting to drive me home and then go to see her friends. Why?"

"I need to know if your mother killed her. Please, Akaashi. For me."

"What? No!" Akaashi shook his head, placing his hands on Bokuto's shoulders. "Look, this won't help you. There are no good outcomes here!"

Bokuto pushed back against the hands restraining him. "I need to know. I need the knowledge. Because if she did it, it'll feel all the better to put her in prison. If I never know, I can never get it out of my mind."

Reluctantly, he nodded, waving Bokuto over with him to the door. "She likes you. She'll probably let you come." And she did. They spent the car ride in silence, Bokuto looking out at the sunny weather with a downcast look. If only the weather was rainy. It felt better to be miserable when the sky was too.

Akaashi's mother dropped them off at the front door with a wave and a quick, "Are you sure you're okay, Bokuto-kun?". She didn't really care. It was more of a formality. Something said to make the speaker sound like they actually wanted to know. They never did. How could Bokuto be okay? He'd lost his mother, his dad had a heart attack... nothing was 'okay'.

Nevertheless, Bokuto slapped on a painful smile, one that looked more like a grimace, and nodded. "Yes, thank you, Akaashi-san."

His mother smiled back, not maternally. It was more like a knowing grin, one full of wisdom and smarts. Betrayal practically oozed out of it, invisibly trickling and twisting through the crevices of her perfect white teeth. "I'm glad. Our house is your house." The windows rolled up with a glint much like the one that flashed through her eyes as the windows closed, and she drove away.

Bokuto stood aimlessly, staring at the empty spot the car once stood. Akaashi grabbed his hand, the warmth shocking Bokuto into movement, and dragged him through the door and up the stairs, straight into his mother's room.

"There's no going back from this," Akaashi warned, hand hovering over Bokuto's forearm, almost in an attempt to stop him.

"I know."

And he pushed on the engraved heart.

With a click, the doors slid open and finished with a quiet smack, displaying the glass case once again.

Bokuto said nothing.

Neither did Akaashi.

Because sitting on a shelf, raised on a pedestal like an award, was a pair of spectacles and a diamond ring laying beside them.

Labelled:

Bokuto Riko - 47 - Kitchen Of The Bokuto Household - Bokuto Akiharu - Stabbing.