A cold November wind blew past the quaint house at the back end of Ash Court, bringing with it the first few snowflakes of the forecast snowstorm that was due to hit the small town over the span of the next couple of days. Past the second floor window and drawn curtains lay Natsuki, curled up under the comforter on her memory foam bed. Very slowly she began to open her eyes, blinking a couple of times as she did, getting her bearings as she came out of her voyage to the other side of the sea of sleep. The cold air licked at her face like a puppy eager for it's masters attention, quickly rousing her as she realized just how chilly it was in her bedroom. She slowly sat up and looked over to her bedroom window thinking she may have accidentally left it open for some reason during the night but it was closed tightly. Slowly she pushed her comforter aside, slightly shocked by just how cold the hardwood floor was when she put her bare feet down on it. Getting up slowly she put on her robe as she was only wearing boxer shorts and a very thin spaghetti strap top to sleep in and made her way out into the hall. It felt as if she were walking on ice cubes as she passed the bathroom and then made her way downstairs. The smell of bacon and eggs permeated the air the closer she got to the first floor. Slowly she made her way to the kitchen where she found her dad cooking breakfast for both of them.
"I'll never get used to this" she said sleepily as she greeted her dad, seeing him cook away, "The whole you cooking breakfast thing"
He turned to her and laughed.
"I used to do this all the time when you were little, it's just like riding a bike. In fact I think I'm even better at it now than I used to be" he said with a smile. "Coffee?" he asked.
Natsuki nodded, "Cream and sugar in it please. Oh, and dad...so, it's like...freezing in here..."
"Oh yeah, not a nice surprise this morning. It was like this when I woke up, I took a look at the furnace and it looks like it stopped working for some reason. I have a repair guy coming out though, they said they should be here by late morning" he said.
"Ugh, well whatever they need to do I hope they make it quick, this cold is brutal" Natsuki said.
"Well here, in the meantime have something to eat. It'll at least warm you up" her dad said as he began to put some eggs and bacon on a plate for her.
"I will, I'll be right back I just want to put something on quick and use the bathroom" she replied and headed back upstairs.
Having used the bathroom and then splashing some water on her face, Natsuki took a hard look in the bathroom mirror at herself. Her skin seemed to look ok, no blemishes or rogue pimples that stood out, and her eyes didn't look overly tired. She looked over at the bathroom scale for a moment and then back up at herself in the mirror before starting to poke at her cheeks before taking a deep breath and letting out a sigh. Natsuki decided to take off her top and boxers and get on the bathroom scale. The digital scale took a moment before finally displaying the result. She got off and shook her head, walking back over to the mirror.
"Stop being such a fat fuck" she said to herself before turning her attention to her stomach, pinching it as hard as she could. She winced in pain, a purple welt was left behind where she had latched onto herself and dug her nails in. She looked back at the mirror, "You don't have Yuri's boobs, you aren't funny like Sayori, and you aren't athletic like Monika...what could you possibly offer him? Don't be fucking stupid, you deserve to be alone..." she said to her reflection before sinking to the floor, feeling completely defeated.
There was a gentle knock at the door, she hadn't realized that she'd taken so long to get ready.
"Kiddo...you ok?" her dad asked gently.
Natsuki composed herself quickly before answering.
"Yeah, I'll be right there dad" she said as she got back up and splashed some more water on her face.
After changing into a warm green sweater and a pair of galaxy pattern purple leggings, Natsuki put on her slippers and joined her dad for breakfast. She was starving and the food smelled delicious. As her stomach growled in the back of her mind she was already worrying though that this would just make her fatter than she already was. In truth at just barely five feet tall and weighing only a hundred pounds, she was already extremely small. She was lean and for the most part healthy, but even her doctor had told her previously that it would be good for her to gain a bit of weight. The advice fell on deaf ears though. During the past months Natsuki found that the more stress she found herself under, the more purging she was doing. Any time she ate anything of real substance there was a good chance that she would vomit it out at the first opportunity. She absolutely abhorred the way that she looked, and having Genji on her mind as much as she did only served to make these feelings worse. Natsuki looked at Sayori and saw someone who looked fit and healthy, nothing like her who was short and fat. She found that she was really struggling with her feelings, her body felt at a fever pitch any time that she thought about Genji, so much so that she fantasized about killing her best friend over it. Knowing that these feelings were unhealthy and over a line kept her in check to a degree, but everything was taking a toll on her. She felt tired more often than not, and felt as if she were starving almost all of the time. In fact, not two weeks earlier Natsuki had baked a dozen cupcakes at home complete with homemade frosting and eaten all of them, only to throw them up less than an hour later. It was a self-destructive cycle that had its seed planted years earlier without her even realizing it, during countless years of family disfunction.
She had hoped to just focus in on breakfast and put everything else out of her mind, but life had other plans in mind this morning. As she joined her dad at the kitchen table a gentle snow had begun falling outside. Their table was up against the wall just beneath a large window that looked out into their backyard. There was still a swing set in the far corner of the yard that she and her brother used to play on when they were much younger. Natsuki still went out there to sit on one of the swings whenever she needed time alone to think, or in years passed to put space between she and her father when he was drunk. During casual conversation, her dad began telling her more details about his new job. Having been hired on as marketing director at a brand new manga publishing studio was a miracle in every sense of the word, and he was determined to be as successful as he possibly could. While telling her about the interview process he mentioned that one of the executives had the last name Matsuo, and that he remembered that her friend Genji also had the last name. So during conversation at work the two got talking and when talking about family it came out that he was Genji's father. Her dad explained that Genji's father had talked about having a son that he wanted to reconnect with, and hoped that he would be able to one day.
"Wait...hold on..." Natsuki said as she gobbled down more of her eggs and then reached for the butter to put on her toast, "Genji's dad? As in my friend Genji?"
"Yeah, small world I guess. I mean, I guess we shouldn't be surprised, plenty more job opportunities in the city than out here and it isn't that far away. I can't imagine what happened with their family's past, but it's not our business" he said to her.
"He's a son of a bitch that abandoned Genji, that's what happened" Natsuki said, bristling.
"Nat...everyone makes mistakes, sometimes little ones, sometimes major ones. I know I sure have. It's whether or not we're willing to own them and then do what we have to in order to fix them that decides who we are" he said.
Natsuki shook her head then slowly gave up and shrugged her shoulders.
"Dad...well, Genji has no idea. And it isn't our business. I just...let's stay out of it" she said to him, "I really don't think he would be too happy to hear about his dad doing so well for himself, or any nonsense about wanting to reconnect. I just don't want to see him get hurt, that's all"
Natsuki's dad looked at her and smiled.
"You're exactly like your mother" he finally said.
"What?" she asked, "No I'm not, I'm nothing like her"
"I just mean that you have a big heart, you must really care about him. It's written all over your face" he said, Natsuki looking away, blushing slightly.
"I..." she began and then stopped, changing course "I'm nothing like mom. She ran away when things got hard, just like Ichiro did"
Her dad shook his head and took another bite of his food, looking out at the swing set for a moment.
"I don't blame your mom, and I don't blame your brother. I'd have left if I were them too. My drinking made life here impossible...I don't expect that either of their opinions of me will change, but that doesn't mean I won't spend the rest of my life trying to prove to them that I really am different..." he said, his voice beginning to crack slightly as he did.
"They're cowards" Natsuki said firmly, speaking up, "Ichiro most of all. He took off as soon as he finished high school because he didn't care about us. And mom? I'm really glad she was able to get remarried and have a WONDERFUL new family, not like we needed her at all"
Natsuki's dad put his hand up gently, trying to calm Natsuki.
"Kiddo, listen...life isn't always black and white. My drinking...it was a terrible decision I made, and not a way to cope with anything. I don't blame your mom for leaving, and I truly hope she finds happiness even if it's somewhere else. And Ichiro? I really don't know if he will ever forgive me for some of the fights he and I had, or things that I did...but please don't be mad at your brother. I know he loves you more than anything, even if he doesn't want to stay in touch right now...there is going to come a day when he will. Just give him that time and space, he'll be back" he explained.
Natsuki wasn't quite sure what to say. She was so angry at her mother and brother that it made it almost impossible to see things like her dad did. The truth was that she could see how both of them could have justified leaving...but to her? Her dad was her hero, even as a little girl she always wanted to be just like him. Maybe this was why she never left...never even wanted to leave. She'd take the beatings, the abuse, the fights the two would have literally in the middle of the night...all in the hopes that she would reach him somehow and bring the real dad back out from behind the prison of addiction. And in the end? It took a girl who attempted to kill herself to help clear his vision enough to see what was right in front of him. And for that, Natsuki would be forever grateful to Sayori, sisters until the end...which made it all the more heart wrenching when it came to Genji and how she felt about him.
"...I guess" Natsuki finally responded.
The two continued to eat for a few moments before her dad finally spoke up again.
"This boy, Genji...you really care about him?" he asked.
There was a long silence from Natsuki before she responded.
"I do..." she finally said, "But he's Sayori's boyfriend, so that's out the window"
"So?" he dad replied, much to her surprise.
"What do you mean?" she asked.
"I'm saying so what. Yeah, he might be her boyfriend today, but you're all extremely young, and that can easily change. You know, it took six months of stopping in to buy coffee where your mom worked before I finally softened her up enough to get a date. And she had a boyfriend during all of that, but I knew what I wanted..." he began to explain, Natsuki cut him off.
"Hold on...it took mom six months of you pestering her before she went out with you?!" she exclaimed.
"Yep, but I was dedicated. And like I said, she had a boyfriend at the time. But looking at her, I knew from the very start she was who I wanted to be with. So, every day I would stop in at the coffee shop where she worked and order a cup, and sit at the counter reading the paper and talking with her. I knew that her boyfriend had more money than I did, and a better job, a more affluent family...pretty much everything that on the surface would matter. But do you know what I was able to give your mom that he couldn't?" he asked.
Natsuki shook her head.
"I was able to fill in the space between the lines for her. Sure, her boyfriend was good at everything on a superficial level, but I was there for her for everything on a tiny level, whether it be her being in a bad mood and just needing to vent, or coming into work with a cold and being there to buy her a warm drink to have to help her through her shift. That's what most people never understand. The people who win aren't the ones who focus on the bigger pieces, the huge words on the lines of the story of our lives. It's the people who know how to fill in the white space and hold everything together for someone...those are the ones who win in the end. Be the person who can fill in the white space for Genji, you've got everything you need to make it happen" he said to her with a smile.
Natsuki blinked in disbelief. Was this her dad talking to her? His advice was...spectacular actually. She couldn't believe it, and slowly a huge smile came across her face.
"But...dad, this is Sayori we're talking about. She saved your life...I can't just do that to her..." she said to him.
He looked at her and just smiled.
"Nat, you and I both know that you made up your mind a long time ago that you were going to make a move on Genji one way or another, I can see it written all over your face. What kind of dad would I be if I didn't give you the best advice that I could so you'd succeed" he said with a big smile. She could hear the pride in his voice when he talked about her.
"I..." she began but trailed off, "...thanks dad" she finished, smiling at him.
While Natsuki and her dad continued on with their conversation and enjoying breakfast, on the other side of town there was a much more tense mood prevailing in the Chief's Office at the police station. This morning a meeting was taking place between Yuri's father, Detective Ken Tamura, his partner, Detective Toji Yoshida and the Chief. There was a media frenzy going on with the discovery of Sawa Higashi's body, and the public was growing more impatient by the day demanding answers. Unfortunately to this point, the investigation was slow going as it involved painstakingly going back through the details of the previous investigation and trying to find where mistakes may have been made. Additionally, they now had an additional piece of evidence that at least gave them a direction as to where to look.
"Alright, where do we stand on this shitstorm?" the chief asked.
"Our working theory is that Sawa was murdered by two students who were attending the same school. Initially we believed that it may have been only a single student that we were looking for, the button we recovered came from a blazer worn by the female students there but was a different color than the color worn by students in Sawa's grade. So we were able to narrow it down to female students in the class ahead of Sawa's" Toji explained, "But the injuries sustained point towards someone else being involved, very likely another student"
"And you think this because of the cervical fractures in the neck?" the chief asked.
"It's consistent with considerable force being placed on the neck from being choked" Ken said, speaking up. "We believe that the fractures found on her skull were either caused by a rock or a blunt object, but she likely died from being choked to death afterward"
"So whoever is responsible for this...they hit Sawa, repeatedly from what the coroner's report said...and then when they saw she wasn't dead finished her off in one of the most horrible ways possible..." the chief said as he took out a cigarette and lit it. He took a deep drag from it and held before finally exhaling, looking at the file before him on Sawa. He turned his attention back to Ken and Toji. "So let's say that one of our killers was a female student a year ahead of Sawa, that's suspect one. What about the second killer? Any ideas?"
"We're thinking that based on the severity of the injury to the spinal cord that it was a male, either that or an extremely strong female, but considering the age group we're looking at our money is on the second killer being a male. Whether or not he was a student at the school as well? We don't know, at least not yet" Ken said.
There was a long, tense silence before the chief spoke again.
"Go back through all of the statements provided by students and their families at the time, find any inconsistencies, and I mean ANY, and follow up on them. We've got a pair of murderers walking free in our town, and I want that remedied, understood?" the chief said to Ken and Toji.
"Understood sir, we'll get started on this right away" they both said before leaving his office.
While Ken and Toji were setting to work pulling statements provided by students and their families to begin reviewing, not too far away Genji and Sayori were spending their morning taking a walk down a bike path that ran alongside a river that cut through both Blackwood Park and the town, being fed by the mountains beyond Blackwood. There were so many days that Genji looked out at those mountains and wished he could just get in his car or on his bike and go, just leave for whatever was beyond them and never look back. It wasn't that he didn't love Sayori, he just found that there was something growing in him that wanted to see the world...and that was a flame that Sayori unfortunately didn't share. She would be content for them to settle down to enjoy the quiet life right where they had grown up. Genji on the other hand wanted to pursue his music, and that was something that he simply couldn't do where they lived now. Even if they were to move to the city, it would be a good step but it still wouldn't be big enough for Genji to have a realistic shot at any of the things that he truly wanted out of life. He found that was a common thing where they lived, most everyone was pretty content with their lives with almost no interest in what lay out there in the great beyond.
"Hey, space cadet!" Sayori said as she hopped in front of him on the path, waving a hand in front of his face.
"Huh?" Genji replied, startled.
"You still with me? I've been talking for like five minutes and all you've been doing is saying "cool" and not really adding to the conversation. Are you ok?" she asked, sounding concerned.
"Oh I'm fine, I was just thinking" he said.
"About me I hope!" Sayori said, giggling.
"I always think about you" Genji replied, "But I was just thinking some about the future, things I want to accomplish...goals...stuff like that"
"One of those goals better be a ring for this finger" Sayori said, holding out her hand.
"I guess you'll have to wait and see" he said laughing.
"Meanie" Sayori replied, sounding defeated.
They continued to walk and enjoy the crisp, cold air before Sayori spoke up again.
"Oh, you know I wanted to ask you something. Do you remember when we had our literature club meeting the other day? When you wrote that stuff for your story...do you really not remember writing all that gibberish down and then going into a trance almost telling me some story about giant robots?" she asked.
"I honestly really don't remember any of it. I mean, my mom told me that when I was a kid where had been a few times when I'd done stuff like that but she never made a big deal about it...I guess just chalk it up to a blip, nothing to worry about. Next time I write for our club it'll be better, I promise" he said with a laugh.
"Well...hey if it ever becomes something that you feel like is a problem, or you need to talk about, I'm always here for you, ok?" she said and took his hand. "I love you Genji"
"I love you too, Sayori" he replied and squeezed her hand.
And as the pair walked and enjoyed their morning, Genji received a text from Monika:
Hey! Let's get coffee sometime soon, I think we have a lot we need to catch up on. Talk to you soon Genji!
YOU ARE READING
Doki Doki Literature Club - The Taste of Sunshine
FanfictionA second chance. An unsolved murder. A chance at happiness. In the months following Sayori's suicide attempt, she finds that the stronger that she becomes, the more pronounces the cracks in those she cares most about are. With this newfound clar...
