28 DAYS [MakoHaru]

prologue → 01/03

Disclaimer: This book touches greatly on triggering themes such as homophobia, bullying, self-hatred, depression, anxiety/panic disorders, emotional abuse, suicidal thoughts, and suicide. I am aware of how dangerous these themes can be and want my readers to be safe while reading this. This fanfiction is in no way romatizicing suicide and if it comes off that way I am truly sorry. If you are having these thoughts, please tell someone or get help. My inbox is always open if you want to talk, rant, whatever. There is always another day.

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Prologue

Would you be satisfied if you died today?

One misstep, one mistake, and everything would end. Would it be okay? Would you have finished enough of your life, lived enough days to say you did something with them, to say dying today wouldn't be so bad as everyone thinks?

Is today a good day to die? What would you say if you had to decide right now, before you could think twice?

And if not today – when is?

The third of January marks the two-hundred-and-twelfth consecutive day Haruka Nanase wonders if today was the right day to die. At first he simply considered it; he would lie awake at night, plagued with insomnia and anxiety. As the days passed, the thoughts never ceased, and Haruka moved from thinking about it, to researching it, to writing about it in his journal, to walking to the Iwatobi Bridge every morning. He would climb through the gate, scale up to the platform, and sit on the edge, allowing his legs to dangle freely and feeling the chilly winter air blowing on his face.

The third of January marks the twenty-eighth day Haruka Nanase sits on that old bridge, chipping with spray paint from graffiti, missing chunks of cement and metal that makes up the passageway from the city to Iwatobi.

Iwatobi was a sleepy town in the northern area of the Tottori Prefecture, Japan. It was a fishermen's district where nothing exciting ever happened. The people who lived there only stayed in Iwatobi because their parents had grown up there, and they only stayed because their parents had lived there. Thus began a cycle of the town where everyone knew each other and nothing escaped unnoticed.

Sick of dealing with their boring, repetitive days, the Iwatobi townspeople busied themselves by new town gossip and secretly wished for something, anything memorable to happen to make this day unlike the rest so they'd have something new to talk about.

He would sit there for hours, contemplating life and death and everything in between. If he was brave enough, he'd stand up and dare to look down.

Maybe, Haruka thought dryly as he rose to his feet, this would give those airheads something new to gossip about over tea. Well, at least they would for a couple weeks until they got bored and moved on to something else, never truly interested but acting like they were to impress their neighbors.

The third of January marks the eleventh day Haruka Nanase manages to stand up on the cement platform, but the past ten times he'd chickened out and sat back down quickly, promising himself he'd do it next time. Every time his legs would begin to shake as he stared into the murky depths of the freezing river water hundreds of feet below, folding on top of each other, rushing back and forth angrily, beckoning, sucking him in. Haruka could practically hear their voices, the lost souls of those who had previously jumped, whispering: join us.

One misstep, one mistake, and everything would end.

Isn't that what you want, Haruka?

The wind was harsher today, and Haruka feels like a gust of wind strong enough would knock him right under and he'd tumble down, down, hitting the cement-like water. January waters are just above freezing; he knows if he even survives the initial impact, all the bones in his body shattering, there would only be two minutes until he dies of hypothermia and he'd sink to the bottom, disappearing from life.

It had been wordlessly established that Haruka was a loner at school. No one ever paid attention to the quiet, freaky kid who kept his hood up and sat in the back of the class, doodling in his journal. Still, he heard what they said about him, the whispers they thought they kept oh-so secretive, the judgmental stares as he walked down the halls.

There goes that one kid.

I heard he hasn't spoken to anyone in years.

I heard he went to jail for murdering his sister.

What a freak.

He should just d i e . . .

It's not like his parents would care if he dropped dead, anyway. They were always gone on business trips or vacations, leaving the house quiet and empty most of the time. He had long since accepted that his parents didn't love him as their son. It had become second nature to know he didn't have the capability of love or being loved.

Are you happy now? He thinks bitterly to the cruel people in the world, wishing he could scream it to their faces. The thoughts had been building up for years; with everything he wanted to say written out in his horrible penmanship in that same old journal. He clutches it tightly to his chest, knowing his words would disappear alongside him.

All it took was one fateful step.

Haruka always assumed that no one would even notice he was gone; at least, not until it was too late, anyway.

It is just for a split second, but Haruka has the passing thought that maybe there was the possibility that someone out there and would care if he disappeared forever. The thought, fleeting and hopeful, dances in his mind before dissipating with a shake of his head.

He wasn't going to waste his time on such silly things like hope.

Haruka stares down at the waters one last time before closing his eyes.

The third of January is the first time Haruka dares to take the step off the bridge. The scream that threatens to rip out of his throat never comes (whether it's because it's blocked in his windpipe or he just isn't scared anymore, he would never know), and he plunges into the water, engulfed in darkness.

The third of January.

The last day of Haruka Nanase's life.