Archive of Our Own ^beta

"I was in love with Kasumi, y'know," Akira says tonelessly in the dimness of Leblanc's attic. 

Sumire says nothing. Akira is on his bed, and she's sitting on a wobbly chair across from him, one leg too short.

She hasn't been up here many times before but the tasteful level of mess is very characteristically Akira. Sumire finds herself staring at the thin layer of dust on the windowsill instead of meeting his eyes. She risks a quick glance though, and he's not looking at her either. 

Sumire turns back to the window. It's not snowing, but it looks like it could start at any minute. The sky is white with cold. 

Akira continues on. "I was going to tell her. Was gonna pray at the shrine on New Year's, and tell her after that. But I woke up that day, and, well," he gestures around. "Everything. So I didn't. And now…" He trails off. 

Everything , he says. Everything being Maruki, and dead people being disturbingly alive, and seemingly alive people turning out to be dead. Sumire thinks, for the thousandth time since she's come to her senses, that the wrong girl died that day last year. 

Sumire has taken down her ponytail and Kasumi's ribbon in her pocket feels like an anchor. Whether it's keeping her from drifting too far out into the open ocean or pulling her down until she drowns, she's not quite sure yet. 

"I miss her," Akira admits, more to himself than to Sumire. She feels like the priest in a confessional. 

"You're talking about me like I'm not even here," Sumire finds herself replying. That's mistake number- something. She's lost count. The priest is meant to listen in silence. Besides, he's not talking about her, not anymore. 

"Oh." In the corner of her eye, Akira fixes his posture, like he's just remembered he has company. "You're right. Sorry. Sumire." He tacks her name on the end like the afterthought it's always been. 

"It's okay. I'm not upset or anything. She's the one everyone loves." She pauses and chews at her lip. It's a nervous habit Kasumi never had a need for. "Loved. It's not like you'd be any different, Senpai." 

Because to Akira, Sumire is a stranger. She just happens to look a little similar to someone he loved. He'd only known of Sumire in passing comments about a dead sister now and then- Kasumi had no need for grief, not when it was only Sumire she had to mourn. Sumire carries grief everywhere she goes like it's all she's got left to cling on to. It's a lifeline from a passing ship, though she wishes it wasn't her life that had been saved. She supposes God loved Kasumi more too, and that's why He took her first. 

Sumire felt her heart in her throat at every road she crossed on the way here. Something in her wanted to stop, stand still in the middle of the road as the traffic lights change just to see what would happen. Kasumi's hair had fanned out framing her face as she lay motionless, the same red as the blood pooling beneath her. Sumire wonders if the dye will start to grow out soon. 

"I forget that you're- that you're still kind of her. You feel like different people." 

"We are." And yet it still feels strange to hear Akira talk about her in third person. 

Sumire could never be like Kasumi. If it weren't for Maruki's intervention, she wouldn't have been able to muster even an ounce of Kasumi's boundless confidence and charm. 

"I guess." 

Sumire leans her head back to look up at the glow in the dark stars pasted above Akira's bed. They're cute. The attic has the same effortless charm that Akira exudes in his every action. She doesn't remember what her bedroom was like, before. After the accident, her parents had moved one of the twin beds into storage and amidst her delusions of being Kasumi, Sumire hadn't minded. There was more space to practice stretches that way. As her real self, the emptiness of the room aches tangibly. Sumire dreads going back. 

"Do you remember it all?" Akira asks. "Everything we did. Practicing gymnastics, you making us bento, the cultural festival." He sounds softer as he lists them off. 

Sumire remembers, it's not like the whole year has disappeared from her mind, but it feels like someone else's memories, like a detailed story she heard from a friend. She knows everything they did, everything they said, but it feels like she had listened to Kasumi talk about her day, rather than something she had experienced first hand. She knows that she did things and she felt things, but thinking back on those moments doesn't bring any emotions with the memories. 

If Akira had confessed to Kasumi on New Year's, she would've reciprocated with glee. Kasumi liked, even loved Akira. Sumire doesn't feel any of that. She doesn't feel much of anything except for the bleeding, gaping hole in her heart. 

"Yes," she says, instead of trying to explain all that. It's not like Akira particularly cares about the inner workings of Sumire's mind. She's not Kasumi, and he fell in love with a dead girl, and that's all that matters. 

"Oh." 

Akira sounds neither pleased nor disappointed, just speaking with the same detached ease he always does. Sumire isn't sure which way she'd rather he lean. 

"I don't- I guess this isn't the right thing to say anymore, but would she- would you have said yes? If I had asked." 

"She loved you." 

"Oh," Akira says, again. 

Sumire is still not looking at him, but she can imagine the conflicting emotions flickering over his face. 

They sit in silence. It looks like the first flakes of snow are starting to fall outside. Sumire shivers, even with her coat still on. The space heater by Akira's bed is unplugged. 

"Do you? You said she… loved me. Do you feel-?" 

Sumire has nothing really to say in response. 

"I don't know. I don't- I don't know anything." 

"Okay. That's okay."

Akira seems more like he's trying to reassure himself than reassure her. Sumire doesn't particularly mind. 

"Are you going to accept Maruki-sensei's offer? It'd be better for you. You'd get her back. You could both be happy. And everything else too, all your other friends. It'd be better for them." 

"I can't." 

"I don't understand. I'd give anything to stop feeling like this, to be her again. I'm a stranger to you, Senpai. You don't need to feel bad if I stop existing." 

"Is that what you want?" 

Sumire shrugs. Outside, a car door slams and she flinches. Akira is looking directly at her now, probably has been for a while. Her eyes flicker to his, then she averts her gaze again. 

"Hey. Is that what you want?" His voice is kinder than she deserves. 

"She deserved to live more than I do. Everyone liked her more." 

"That's not what I'm asking." 

Sumire wonders if Maruki would listen if she accepted his offer rather than Akira. Though, Akira would probably keep fighting nonetheless. There's no point bothering to ask when he's so stubborn that he'll refuse to accept a new reality no matter what Sumire does. 

The impending doom of normality tastes like blood in her mouth. At least for the next few weeks there's still a chance, she could still go back to being Kasumi and these past few days could just be a blip on the radar. Sumire wants to live in her sister's skin. Her own feels alien. 

"Hey." 

She finally forces herself to look at him and he's looking right back through long eyelashes. Kasumi thought that was cute. She liked his eyes.

"I don't know. Maybe. Yes. I don't want to live like this if I can't- if I can't be her." 

"You have to." 

"It hurts." 

"I know. But you have to." 

Akira doesn't know, will never know how it feels. He's not the worse twin, didn't kill his sister through his own selfishness, didn't know how good it felt to be her. If she can't have that feeling back, she doesn't want anything at all. 

"It's getting dark," she says, and stands up from the shaky chair. She's always hated how early the sun sets in winter. "I should go home. My parents-" 

Thinking about her parents hurts. They deserved their favourite daughter and were robbed of her, left with just Sumire instead. She doesn't want to sit across from them at the dinner table tonight. 

Akira grabs her wrist as she turns to leave. 

"Not all of the Kasumi I knew was fake. I think that's you when you're not being eaten up by grief. She was- no- you are important to me." 

"You don't have to try and make me feel better." 

He looks, just for an instant, like she's broken his heart. Then he turns away from her and drops her wrist

"Get home safe." 

She nods a goodbye and starts down the stairs. She's halfway to the station when she hears her name being called. When she turns, she sees Akira running after her. He didn't even put on a coat and his cheeks are red from the cold. 

"Senpai." 

"Sumire." 

Her eyes flick between him on one side of her and the path to the station on the other. 

"I wanted- I wanted to say. I was- I am in love with Kasumi. But you're still the person I knew and I want to get to know you again. I'll wait for you, Sumire, however long it takes." His breathing is heavy from running. 

He takes her hands in his and just holds them, nothing more. It's intimate. Kasumi loved him. Sumire doesn't know if she does, and he doesn't know if he loves her. Kasumi's absence is tangible in the space between the two of them. Sumire doesn't know when, or if, she'll ever be ready, or if she even wants whatever this is, but when Akira looks at her, she finds herself believing, against all odds, that he really will wait.