Caricature | KNY

0 | A World That Takes

Longing.

That is the view that greets you as you gaze past the veranda of the Kibutsuji estate and into the vast gardens, at last finding the figure of your patient who stands motionless adjacent to the pond.

For what?

Although he has never discussed such matters with you, the answer is obvious.

The air is stagnant, saturated with a stillness that you almost mistake for tranquillity if not for the faintest of currents that nips at your cheeks, the sigh of a waning winter season.

While the draft is harmless to you, the same cannot be said for the man who stands in the midst of it. The thick fabric of his clothing drapes over his frame and brushes the grass as he stares ahead into oblivion, fixed within an impasse invisible to your eyes. There is no telling how long he has remained in such a state, but you surmise with fair certainty that he has seen both today's sunrise and the moon and stars prior, as well as the forbidding temperatures that are only barely warded away by the weak winter sun.

Perhaps someone less astute than yourself might mistake him for a spirit, one of the forsaken condemned to a world that is entirely oblivious to their torment. However, you know better; voicing such an assumption would warrant anything between a glare of silent disdain to a blade embedded within your skull. Accustomed to navigating your patient's volatile temperament, you have learned to tread lightly – at least around the areas that actually set him off.

"Kibutsuji-sama," you call, more a weak fulfilment of courtesy than anything.

Unsurprisingly unheeded, you descend the wooden steps of the veranda and move carefully through the stagnant air and toward your patient who has so foolishly chosen to challenge the elements.

It feels as if you are intruding upon a standoff, but you opt to play arbitrator over the possibility of worsening his condition and [most importantly] making more work for yourself.

"Kibutsuji-sama," you are close enough that you are sure he hears you approach, yet still he makes no move to acknowledge you. You stop when you are next to him, not quite brushing shoulders but close enough to discern the darkness that rims his eyes. They are no darker than you last saw them, but their presence is indicative of his ever-deteriorating condition and, by extension, the impotence of your treatments. Your lips press thinly. "Your medicine is ready for you now."

Your patient meets your gaze, and you see your bitterness reflected in his own. The tip of his nose is faintly flushed where it is skimmed by the wintry breeze, softening the intensity of his visage into something that nears pitiable or even endearing. But as his physician, you only think he is foolish.

"Inept doctor," he utters, but there is no true malice in his tone. Only the objectivity of truth.

"Troublesome patient," you reply, just as impassively. "Unless your goal is to court an even earlier demise, I suggest you break this habit of venturing out into the cold. Your brooding would be best conducted within the comfort of four walls."

Something you struggle to discern as either a huff of wry amusement or scoff of vague disdain escapes his lips. "I tread on death's threshold already, doctor," his words are laden with cynicism and detachment. "And your remedies and nagging have been useless thus far. But I suppose I can indulge your persistence to prolong the inevitable a little longer."

With that, he walks past you, stirring the cold air which briefly brushes against your skin.

Even after weeks of regular checkups, this is the closest you have gotten to drawing anything close to mirth from the man: a bleak jest suspiciously adjacent to derision. But for all his subtle jabs to your dignity and ambiguous signals of disdain, you are grateful for his cooperation in your efforts, dutifully ingesting every foul concoction you have presented before him. This is unsurprising, however, considering you share a common goal that is to see his condition improve. Your subtle jabs and his candid retorts are the threads that bind you both in a state of mutual tolerance as the time ticks down to a deadline that hangs heavily over both of your heads. You can barely fault him for being cynical when he can do nothing much outside of stewing in his imminent fate, with you, an amateur barely his age, as his sole hope for survival.