words you'll never read

watch another go on and do better without me

"Those things'll kill you, y'know."

A girl's blue eyes trailed from the end of the newly-lit cigarette to meet the brown eyes of the male next to her. Her eyes rolled, her lungs taking a long drag in response to his statement. Smoke came out in thin streams from her nostrils, the soft wind around them taking it away just moments after exhale.

"Or ignore me."

"I know they will. Why do you think I still smoke them?"

"Edgy." He plucked the cigarette from her lips, dropping it to the concrete and crushing it beneath his shoe. "What's up with you today?"

The girl watched her cigarette get taken, but she didn't argue or protest. She sighed softly, her eyes flickering to his for a moment before dropping to her shoes. "Been thinking."

"About?"

"Nothing."

"You're being more difficult than usual today, Mai."

She — Mai — grinned halfheartedly, shrugging lightly. "I guess." There was a silence, prompting her to continue. "You wouldn't be able to understand, Nao-kun. Nao-ya. Whichever you prefer."

"Naoyuki. Neither of those sound right coming out of your mouth."

Mai let out a soft snicker, but it sounded hollow — it mirrored the look in her eyes, though Naoyuki couldn't see them. "Guess so. Still. You wouldn't get it, Naoyuki."

Somehow, that didn't sound right, either; but he could decipher why later.

"Try me."

Another sigh escaped her; louder, more troubled. A hand was roughly shoved through her hair, strands being pulled out and falling to the ground around her feet. "Have I ever told you about my first boyfriend?"

Naoyuki looked at her and choked back a laugh. "Uh, no? Does he matter?"

"He's dead."

His held back laughter turned into a shocked choke, which then became a cough. "H-he's what?"

"Dead. You understood me."

"Fucking— How? What happened?"

Mai pulled another cigarette from the pack in her back pocket, followed by the lighter from the front pocket of her jeans. "Suicide. Gunshot." She lit the edge of the stick, taking a drag from it.

Naoyuki didn't take it this time, instead opting to watch her and wait for more explanation.

"But y'know what's funny?"

"There's something funny about that?"

"They never found his body." With each spoken word, smoke came out with it. "People heard the gunshot, and there was blood in his room and a suicide note, but he...wasn't."

Naoyuki visibly recovered from his shock, his muscles releasing their tension and his eyes watching Mai's profile. She looked older now; more troubled and weighed down by the shitty hand life had dealt her. "So," he started, his mouth unusually dry, "he isn't dead, is he?"

Mai shrugged. "Don't know. Maybe not." A soft, almost pained smile formed on her lips. "...I miss him, though."

"Can't you go find him?"

A silence befell them — a heavy silence, one that made Naoyuki feel as though he had asked something wrong. Mai took a long drag from her cigarette, releasing the smoke as she dropped the butt on the ground and put it out with her shoe.

"I don't think I should."

"Huh?"

"It's better I don't. He was a great guy; he could find better than me. Probably already has." She played with the sleeve of her jacket — an old and well-worn red one. "Deserves better than me, too."

"Hey." Naoyuki lifted his hand up as if to grab her shoulder, but he stopped himself at the last minute. "You're being too hard on yourself."

Mai shook her head. "I'm not. I'm awful. I was then, and I am now."

Finding himself at a loss for words, Naoyuki turned his gaze away from her, brown eyes falling to his shoes.

"But." Mai pushed herself up from the wall they were leaning against, making her way towards her car. It wasn't but yard or so away. "Wherever he is — whoever he's with  — I hope he's happy."

That means the most to me.

She looked over her shoulder as she walked, head tilting when she saw that Naoyuki hadn't moved yet.

"Hey. K-pop reject. You coming?"

Naoyuki blinked. Hearing the nickname — if you could call it that — sent a level of normalcy to their relationship again. There wasn't any pressure to comfort each other anymore; to listen to each other's problems. Mai probably realized that — that their relationship wasn't like that — and decided to try to force it back to their "normal."

Yet, Naoyuki felt dissatisfied.

Ignoring it, he nodded and stood up straight to begin following after her to her car.

"Yeah. Just so long as you keep calling me that."

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