Stay Silent

Tadashi had to be the one to call Takahiro. Hiro was still in no state to do it himself. He had a good hour to kill before Takahiro came over and he used that time anyway he could to try to calm himself down. He had a bath, he had some tea, he tinkered with bots, he played on his brother’s gaming laptop, but nothing seemed to work. He wasn’t calming down, little by little, as he should’ve been. He was just tensing up. And up. And up and up and up and up and UP AND–

His hands were shaking that bad; Tadashi must’ve heard the pill bottle rattling, even from his workshop down the corridor. Tadashi burst into the guest bathroom unannounced and knocked the mysterious pills out of Hiro’s hands. He grabbed the bottle and wouldn’t let Hiro have any more until he explained what they were, where did he get them from, what he was doing with them. He demanded to know which psychiatrist had prescribed them but Hiro didn’t have an answer for him. Hiro was forced to admit that he’d been back on anti-anxiety medication for a few weeks now, maybe a month, he didn’t know, and a grim look entered Tadashi’s face.

Hiro knew he was disappointed, maybe even scared, but he didn’t care. He was handling things. He held out his hand and asked for the bottle to be returned to him, to which Tadashi just shook his head incredulously. He left the bathroom, taking his brother with him, and sat Hiro in front of a complex circuitry problem. It’d distracted Hiro long enough for him to realise all too late that Tadashi had hidden the bottle. Just the thought of not having his pills on him anymore, when he needed them most, made the anxiety unbearable.

But of course that wasn’t the real reason why his heart was pounding and his breaths were short and quick. It was the anticipation. It was waiting for Takahiro to finish up school and find Tadashi’s address and come through the door and…

Finally understand who the beast from his nightmares was.

Despite his many efforts, he was still tense when Takahiro walked in. He’d half-hoped that the tension would ease once Takahiro had arrived, but it didn’t. He gave a stiff, “Hello” after his brother’s formal greeting. He’d stopped crying – mostly – but his eyes were probably still mottled red and puffy; he could tell from the way Takahiro seemed to stare longer at him than he did at Tadashi.

The very first thing Takahiro said to either of them was, “Am I in trouble?”

Hiro made a noise like someone had knocked the very breath out of him, and Tadashi had to be the one to smile and softly assure him, “No, Taka-kun, you’re not in any trouble. Hiro and I would just like to talk to you.”

Hiro could see it in that boy’s face, how daunting those words were. Just like to talk to you. Takahiro looked scared. He bordered on petrified, what with the way Tadashi was trying to get him to discard his bag and shuffle across the living room. Hiro was already sitting down, on the couch, and Takahiro looked like he wanted to take the empty seat beside him, but Tadashi directed him into a cushy armchair instead. It sat just across from the couch, squarely facing it, just a coffee table with mugs of fresh tea and old interior design magazines Mei liked to read every now and again. Hiro found it easier to stare at them than he did to stare at Takahiro.

“Hiro?” the boy asked quietly when Tadashi had just stepped out of the room to bring them some snacks. Hiro found his gaze flitting up to him. Takahiro’s face was almost dejected. “I am in trouble... Aren’t I.”

He probably means the party…

Hiro put his face in his hands and begged his body to stop doing this, to stop trying to cry with every single, fleeting emotion that overcame him. Where was Tadashi? He needed his brother back here with him, right now. He needed him.

Tadashi came back with sweet bean-paste buns that no one touched. He took a seat beside his brother and Hiro felt a tap on his arm – like a wordless order to straighten up, to swallow it back, to come back out and look Takahiro in the eye. They were supposed to be making their guest comfortable but Hiro doubted either of them were doing a very good job of it; the boy sat, perched and taut and rigid, like his chair were made of spikes.

For a while, nobody said anything. They sat in a deafening silence, blowing on their hot teas, glancing up occasionally only to glance away again. It was agonising. It got to the point where Hiro wished someone would say anything. He finally heard Tadashi draw a breath, preparing to speak, but Takahiro beat him to it.

“Did I do something wrong?”

“No, Taka-kun,” Tadashi sighed. “Nothing like that.”

“Then what’s wrong,” the boy asked, and Hiro wondered if he might’ve been sitting on his hands because they were shaking. “No one’s saying anything. You said you wanted to ‘talk’ so why aren’t you?” He turned his nervous gaze onto Hiro then. “Why’ve you been crying?”

Hiro noticed his brother turn his head to him, and he looked back. Tadashi seemed to be wordlessly asking him something – something hesitant, something gentle and supportive and encouraging. Can you speak now, or…?

Hiro got it. Now was the time to… set things right. He leaned forward in his chair, shifting to get a little less uncomfortable than he was without success, and then he was staring into Takahiro’s wide, fearful eyes. Eyes that looked a lot like his own right now.

He cleared his throat. “Taka… kun.” He glanced at his brother. Honorifics, honorifics, honorifics. “I… I’m sorry. I lied to you.”

“Lied to me?” Takahiro stared like he didn’t understand. “About what?”

“About…” Hiro sucked in a deep breath and held it for a few seconds. He gently let it out and continued, “When you were younger, living with Cass… There’s a lot of stuff I didn’t tell you, or… maybe lied about. And… you need to know the truth.”

Takahiro didn’t respond. He stared indignant and unblinking at Hiro, then at Tadashi, then back to Hiro again, and he looked so fearsomely small in that instant that Hiro considered ranking this the hardest thing he’s ever had to do in his entire life, and there had been several. Confessing his own abuse had been hard, but confessing to his own victim was… a whole new level of difficulty.

But his brother was right here, his hand just a few inches away from his own. It was OK. It was going to be OK.

He stared at his lap for a few moments before looking back to Takahiro cautiously. “Do you remember the very first time we met?”

Takahiro started, “In the café–“

“No,” Hiro cut him off, shaking his head. “She– Cassgot you to deliver a letter to me at my residence in town. You were just… this random kid, who appeared out of nowhere, and you were so full of energy. You ran up to me and smiled like you already knew me. You wished me a happy birthday in Japanese and then you just… sprinted off, just like that.”

He paused to take in Takahiro’s expression but there was nothing yet – not a shred of understanding. If anything he looked even more confused, and Hiro gave a pained sigh.

“That letter you gave me was from Cass. She… wanted to make amends with me. This was about three or four years after she’d abused me and, all of a sudden, she remembered that I existed or something, and she wanted some kind of closure. I didn’t want to, but I still went back to her place, and when I went upstairs I saw you for the second time. You looked so much like me when I was your age that it just… terrified me. I had no idea who you were, or what you were doing there. I thought… I don’t know.”

He dropped his eyes a little. His body felt numb and it was making it easier to speak.

“I thought she was abusing you, like she’d abused me… People told me I was wrong – that Cass had changed, and I was being unfair and should’ve given her the benefit of the doubt, and… Maybe I should’ve. Maybe if I hadn’t been so distrustful then things might’ve been different, but… Anyway, my life just sort of… collapsed around me. And you were at the centre of it because, I just kept on thinking to myself that if I could saveyou from her, then I could… I don’t know. Validate myself… Make myself feel better. If she was abusing you, like I thought, then… I would be right, and she would be a monster, and maybe I’d have a better chance at putting her away where she couldn’t hurt anyone else anymore, most of all me.”

He looked between Takahiro and Tadashi. They seemed to be with him so far. They seemed to be listening. Hiro couldn’t remember saying anything this personal even to his own brother before, but he went on.

“People got worried about me. I did… some really suspicious stuff – stuff that everyone but me could see was bordering on creepy and obsessive. I snuck into your room – my old bedroom – when no one else knew I was there, and I hung out with you. I set you up with an email account, and you sent me so much spam,” he chanced a small laugh, “but it was there so that you could contact me if anyone ever hurt you, which I thought would happen. And I did other stuff I only realised later was really wrong too. I took you out of your home, and you got into trouble because of me, and then I got into trouble… I told you Cass was a witch. Do you remember that? I convinced you she was so evil that when you saw she’d made me cry, you… threw hot tea at her.”

Instantly Takahiro’s eyes widened and he shrunk down in his chair, looking a lot smaller than he really was. “What,” he blurted.

“It’s true, Taka-kun,” Tadashi interjected. “I don’t know if your dad ever told you – he wasn’t there when it happened – but I saw it. She has some light scarring,” he added, his fingers brushing over his neck and chest to indicate the affected areas.

Takahiro’s mouth fell open a little. “I did that,” he whispered, horrified.

“No one holds it against you, Taka, really,” Hiro insisted. “Everyone blamed me for it because you wouldn’t have done that if I hadn’t… well, told you Cass was a witch. I just– I wasn’t a good influence on you. I told you to keep secrets from everyone. I was always asking if Cass had ever hurt you and, though you never said anything, I still chose to interpret that to mean you were too scared to tell anyone what was really going on… When, really, I probably just freaked you out. I just pushed and pushed for something that’d probably never even happened…”

His throat was sore. It was already still sore from all that crying earlier, and talking extensively wasn’t exactly helping. He paused to sip from his mug, giving Takahiro some time to take everything in and just process, because he looked like he needed a little time. From beside him, Tadashi reached for his hand and squeezed it reassuringly. You’re doing great, it seemed to say.

Now here came the hard part.

“So…” Takahiro wasn’t looking at Tadashi anymore. He only fixed Hiro with his icy, perplexed stare. His words were slow and wary. “Why are you telling me all of this?”

Hiro breathed out a loud, anxious sigh. He was tensing again, he could feel it, he was losing himself little by little to the fear – but another squeeze from Tadashi’s hand was enough to ground him. To keep him on point. He wouldn’t have even made it this far without his brother.

“Taka-kun, my life fell to shit–“

“Don’t swear.”

Hiro… scoffed. Unbelievable. Here they were, a minute away from professing potential child sexual abuse, and Tadashi still cared about whether young and impressionable ears were exposed to profanity?

“Sorry – my life turned to crap, and I was so alienated from everyone that I genuinely believed that you – an eight year old – were the only person in the world who still cared about me, who understood me. You were my only friend. An eight year old. When, really I just… manipulated you, and I’m sorry. They… uh, Cass, your dad, Tadashi – they all told me to stay away from you, and they deleted your email address, and… I tried to get help for you but no one would listen to me. Everyone thought I was crazy, and I started to think it too. And I just felt so awful that… I ended up getting wastedat a party, and I went with the first person who showed me any affection… I wasn’t careful, and I got raped.”

He’d… just sort of said it, hadn’t he? No tact. No wonder Takahiro reacted the way that he did. Tadashi, too. Hiro couldn’t even hear them breathe, couldn’t even see their chests rise and fall – they were that silent and still. He coughed, feeling ashamed, and ran a hand up the back of his neck.

“That’s kinda why… I don’t want you to go to that party, by the way,” he murmured to Takahiro. “I read your email and… I don’t think you should.”

Tadashi was suddenly back with them. “What? What party?”

Hiro groaned. “Never mind, Tadashi.”

Tadashi looked to Takahiro sharply. “You’re going to a party? With alcohol?”

“Tadashi.” Hiro yanked on his brother’s hand until he had his full attention. His eyes were wide and a little bit livid because he was so close now and they were getting side-tracked. “Just leave it, OK? We can talk about it later.”

Tadashi seemed to remember himself and he gave a single apologetic nod, turning his head away as if he only just now realised what was coming next. Hiro stared back at Takahiro and the boy just looked so confused... But this was why Hiro was doing this. So he wouldn’t be confused anymore.

“I was in a dark place, Taka,” Hiro said, his voice just a little above a whisper. “I didn’t know what to do… I felt like I couldn’t trust people anymore. I felt like anyone I could’ve reached out to for help would’ve just turned me away, like some of them had done already… I went for Tadashi’s place – we were living apart by then – because that’s where I knew you’d be, and I still had the key…” He took a deep breath and Takahiro seemed to join him. “T-To let myself in, and… Y-You were there. In my bed, and…”

He paused for a while. He stared hard at the boy and waited. He waited for the memories to hit either of them, for a flash of recognition or understandingor something, but Takahiro’s face remained as blank as his did. Their minds empty. An absence of an objective truth.

Maybe if he had more details…

The lump in Hiro’s throat rolled with his dry swallow. It was time to keep going.

“You were sleeping, when I came in… I turned on the light, by the bedside table… I-I,” he slowly stood up and walked over to Takahiro. In response, the boy’s fingers fanned on the armrests and dug in, like claws. Hiro was standing over him now, and Takahiro glared up with a dangerous look. “I… So you wouldn’t make any noise, I put a hand over your mouth, like this…”

He did it, just lightly, just the ghost of a touch, and he stopped as soon as he heard his brother exclaim something like “hey” from behind him. But Takahiro’s eyes began to light up with something like remembrance, and Hiro could only wish that it was good things. Not bad things. Please not bad things.

“I started to cry,” he continued, voice wobbling now. He was sure the look in his eyes was just as distraught as Takahiro’s as it started to click what was happening. What had happened. As it was all coming together, like the most debauched jigsaw puzzle in all of human history. “I lay next to you. I’d been drinking a lot. You a-asked me what was wrong and, I said… another witch got me.”

Tadashi moaned sadly behind him, but Hiro didn’t acknowledge it. He was only focusing on Takahiro now, his eyes boring down into his… The boy stared up at him like he was seconds from death. He stared like he was actually waiting for more, but mercifully – not so mercifully – that was the extent of Hiro’s memory.

“A-And the rest is just black for me,” he finished, and he swore he saw Takahiro’s shoulders lower just a fraction. “The next thing I remember is waking up to Tadashi screaming at me… I-I thought I’d passed out, beside you, but… Taka, do– Taka-kun, do you…?” His tone was so tentative. So careful. So pleading. “Do you think that anything else happened, that night…? Like… was that your dream? That you described to me? Was I the…?”

He waited. And he waited some more. Every second that ticked past unanswered just made Hiro want to tear his hair out. He was staring at Takahiro, he was right here, and he just wanted the boy to say something, to do something, to acknowledge that Hiro had even spoken – but Takahiro just kept up the impossible stare with his wide, alert eyes. Like he had done when he was just a kid, and he was still a kid, and… Hiro felt his breath hitch, felt his heart pump, felt his stomach lurch–

Tadashi was instantly beside him, an arm ready and waiting to catch him as he stumbled, falling against his brother, leaning on him for support. The room was spinning and he couldn’t feel his legs. Tadashi was speaking now, and going by the severity of his facial expression it must’ve been important, but it was so hard all of a sudden to focus…

“…to be honest, Taka-kun,” Tadashi was saying. “If you think that you were touched inappropriately, or… or you were hurt in any way, or anything else might’ve happened, you need to tell us. OK?”

Hiro jolted as he was placed back on the couch, and he didn’t quite know how he’d got there. It was like he’d just teleported from the armchair to the couch in an instant. A glass of something was pushed into his hands and pushed into his mouth, and the room still swayed an awful lot, didn’t it, like it wasn’t really a room at all, but a carpeted lake, and the furniture were cosy, rocking rafts. There was a hand on his forehead, moving to his cheek, eventually coming to rest at his back in soothing big circles.

“Is he OK,” someone asked, and it took the longest time for Hiro to realise that they were talking about him.

“Hiro, lie down,” his brother said, and then he was tilting the world up like magic – Hiro was staring at the ceiling and he panicked, quickly turning on his side to stare at the boy a few feet away from him. The boy was shivering – or maybe that was just him. A bucket appeared beneath him and Hiro was convinced for a moment that it was the presence of the bucket itself that caused him to vomit. The sounds he made were just wretched, and he was pulled back up into a halfway decent sitting position to better angle his upchucks.

It took another few minutes of what Hiro thought was dry retches to understand that he was crying again, and the thought of crying again depressed the hell out of him. He hated crying, yet he seemed to be doing it all the time now. It was horrible, it was painful. Tears and snot leaked from his too-hot, too-cold face and he pressed it into the crook of his elbow and– why was he wearing a blazer? He didn’t wear blazers, he wore hoodies. Where was his hoodie?

Some part of him was still in operation, distantly aware of how embarrassing he was right now. How alarming this all must’ve been. He didn’t know what had happened. He’d been just fine – well, in the broadest sense of the word – one minute, and the next he was feeling like the death Takahiro had so terrifyingly gazed upon. Was he going through withdrawal already? Was the stress of the situation and the ramifications of what he may or may not have done – what he had in fact just done –caving in on him? Was it both? Was it neither?

He reached out for someone – anyone – and thankfully someone took his hand. They wrapped their hot fingers around it and squeezed.

He wanted to complain that someone was making a lot of noise, but he already knew it was him by now. Who else would it fucking be.

“It’s OK, Hiro,” his brother murmured, from quite close by, and it was both startling and calming. But mostly calming. His brother continued to murmur at him, just sweet and reassuring little nothings, “I’ve got you, buddy, I’m right here. Just breathe. You’re OK. You’re gonna be OK.”

“Will I,” he tried to say, but it probably sounded nothing like it did in his head, from the way he was immediately shooshed. He should’ve just kept his mouth shut to minimise the risk of looking even more pathetic and disgusting than he already did. Than he already was.

An indeterminable amount of time later – it could’ve been ten seconds, it could’ve been ten minutes, Hiro didn’t know – he felt something damp and cool move across his face. By then his body was twitching a lot less, his breathing was steadier, and he wasn’t making nearly as much noise as before, thank God. His brother whispered to him words that he could hear perfectly fine but couldn’t much care to parse right now. Maybe later. When he was less tired.

“I’m so proud of you, Hiro. I know this hurts – I know this feels awful, but you did it. You’re so brave. It’ll get better now. I promise.”