★ | I, Rhys Kakyoin | Jotakak

53 ☆ The rogue

Respectably, Mom and Dad resort to talk it out with Mr and Mrs Kujo inside while I stand outside the living room, on the elevated veranda, leaning against the panelled walls; I look out into the blurry darkness, the misty rain that softly veils the horizon ahead, the endless rain that brings with it an unfriendly cold. The night outdoors is crisp and the nippy air is wrapped around me, seeping under my clothes and embracing me like a wet blanket.

  I can hardly hear Jo's footfalls under the sound of the raindrops that drip from the roof overhangs above my head and the rain pouring onto the ground below. Silent, he stands next to me, leaning his shoulder against the wall, staring out into the distance as I do.

  I still do wonder what he's thinking of right now, what thoughts must be racing through his head as he stands beside me. Is he thinking of the rain, the smell? The elaborate figure he sees in his sleep paralysis? Or maybe the prospect of everything changing because of an incident that had happened two years ago? I would love to know. I really would. He feels much like a shadow the more I think about him and the more I see him; a person devoid of a face. He feels like a stranger in a vast crowd, a person you see every day at the bus stop you wait at to get to work or school but never really find out who he is. He is strange, in a way. A stranger.

  Maybe he's thinking of me. Maybe about how good I am, or about how bad I am. I wonder if he knows I faked it, faked my crying to make him look better. I don't really know if I did myself, or merely allowed my feelings to come through in spite of all the obstacles that restrict me from doing so; if it was just me being brave, carefree, for the first time, in a long time. There is this part of me that knows I am somewhat, if not completely, a bad person. I admit it, and yet I don't. There is still the side of myself that wants to believe I am good; I am pure. But I'm not.

  I am a good person.

  It's a bit confusing. I know, but I don't. There are a lot of buts, excuses I make for myself to feel good, even if just for a while, exaggerations I form in my head to make me look worse than I do. I'm a good person: I help people, even without them knowing it, because I want us to be free, I want us not to live in a prison of a destined world. But I'm a bad person: I treat the people I care about like they're nothing and I expect them not to mind that in return, to love me as they always have.

  Is that what Jo is wondering about as he stands there? Whether or not I am good? I can't know. He might not tell me, even if I ask, so I save myself the trouble.

  Suddenly Jo catches hold of my hand, urgently, as if to take me away somewhere. I hold back. It's cold. I shiver a little.

  I expect him to say something, make conversation, but he just looks at me, looks at my hand, maybe. I think I've started not to mind at all his avoidance of my gaze. There are better things to worry about than what he looks at.

  The scar that runs down my arm is still there, from when I had duelled Polnareff all that time ago. It's more or less faded now, but it is still a reminder of when everything changed for me, maybe for Jo too.

  I wonder what possibly he would say, if he does want to speak. Maybe he'll say he knows what I want to do, knows that I want to go to Natsukashii Bookstore, use the Hiraeth and learn his secrets, and it'll all be over. Because he knows that I don't trust him, and that I know he doesn't trust me. It'll all be over in a flash. Or maybe he'll really talk about his past this time, tell me the things I want to hear from him at last. And we'll both be better for it, because he knows I trust him, and that I know he trusts me. It's like flipping a coin.

"It's cold out 'ere," he remarks. "Sure y' wanna stick around?" Or, of course, he can say something completely different.

"I'm fine," I say. I hear the hushed whispers of the wind circling the air, light and jocund, meandering through the light shower of rain ahead as it lands onto the ground and pulls ripples in the pond. I still think about the monster I had seen Rosalinda become, right before my eyes: it was a frightening sight that stays real in my mind still, and how I feel trying to make sense of it is like how a bird feels frantically trying to find its way out of a room.