Ink Stained

92: akira*

昭

The trio left Taiyou Café shortly after Aihara's shocking revelation. Aihara gave Pai her contact information and said to call her when she was ready to. She said there were things to do, tests to run, to help her along in her 'transition'.

Pai doubted there was anything on earth that could possibly help her. As Aihara was handing her card over to Pai, Shin swiftly stepped in and snapped it up, pocketing and coldly informing her that they would decide what to do next on their own, thank you.

Pai would never want to be on the receiving end of that deadly, blaming glare.

They walked back to Ayashi House in total silence, both absorbed in the confines of their thoughts. She knew she could no longer go on keeping her secrets. She'd reached a breaking point. She wasn't sure if it was the right timing, or if it was even the right thing to do, to be blurting out her memories after what Aihara said.

She just hoped she was brave enough to follow through with it and wouldn't chicken out at the last minute.

She had no idea what was going on in Shin's head as they walked home. Every time she glanced at him, he was focusing stoically ahead, an inscrutable look in his eye. His utter silence was nerve wracking, and only alleviated by the fact that he held her hand all the way home, never once letting go. On the train, they sat beside one another in the vacant seats. He wrapped his arm around her shoulders, ignoring all the stares they got for it. She laid her head on his shoulder, too tired to do anything else but relax with him next to her, finally.

When she was too absentminded herself to notice, he'd pull her out of the way of being knocked over by an incoming car or someone hurtling down the street on the bicycle like Izanami's wraiths were at their heels. He held her hand all the way home, but she knew he wasn't entirely there with her.

Unbeknownst to her, Shin was there – he was almost too aware of every aspect of her. She completely didn't notice the way Shin would glower at literally every man who so much as looked at her for more than two seconds. She always dressed depressingly plainly, according to Shiori, but that didn't stop people from noticing first the shock of white hair, then the girl it belonged to, whose soul shone through her eyes no matter how hard she tried to hide it behind deliberately impassive, flat gazes.

He watched her like a hawk without her realizing it, noting the shadows under her eyes, the paleness of her skin, the rush of blood to her cheeks when he, out of the blue at the foot of the climb up to the house, kissed her right on the street where anyone could see them. She didn't notice how he couldn't keep his eyes more than a few seconds away from her before being drawn right back to her.

She would have noticed, if not for the irritation swirling in her at Kuniumi's reappearance, and complete refusal to divulge where she'd been for almost a week. Irritation, and a nagging, persistent rush of relief at her reappearance that refused to abate no matter how Pai tried to ignore it.

Shinigami was right, Kuniumi chirped, acting so casual, as if she hadn't vanished for days and left Pai alone again. You are dying. This is what he meant. This is why he didn't need to act to fulfil his desire to see you dead. You're already dying.

Shut up, she thought grouchily as her feet crunched on the fallen leaves littering the ground. She blushed furiously when Shin put his hands on her waist and lifted her clear off a rather large log that had fallen right across the path they walked up on, blocking it.