Spilled Ink (Sumi, Itsuki)

Itsuki stared at the weirdos at work in the Bohemian Club. He felt dislocated, as if he didn’t belong…

Well, he truly didn’t belong there. They were weirdos, freaks even, but they were far, far beneath him as far as anything truly evil went.

Did they even engage in a violent act? Or hurt someone more than just a sprained wrist? Itsuki scoffed as he felt the coppery taste of blood in his mouth.

So much blood.

Too much violence.

And those pansies thought they were hot shit with all the edging and pseudo-BDSM they practiced in that “Cave of Plato” of theirs.

They worked silently; some giggled. Despite having so few members, the Bohemian Club headquarters was quite big and expensive. Maybe it was for bigger projects, such as a sculpture or a large canvas. It would make sense if they tackled larger projects from time to time and needed the extra space.

The place was so large that Itsuki could find a corner anywhere and just stay there, watching the others work, with his arms crossed.

He was forced to stay there because he was a member of the club, but those people had interests that didn’t align with his. The only “art” he could dabble in was the art of violence and gang activity. Anything less or more than that was out of his ballpark.

A part of him didn’t envy them at all. They had their own madness, he had his insanity, and he would prefer that things stay that way.

They were not part of his life; he wasn’t part of theirs.

A part of him once yearned for companionship, people with similar interests in computer and data sciences, but that part of him… was gone. When did it leave him? He had no idea. Itsuki felt in his soul that it was no longer a part of him.

That was all that was to it.

“I can say you are bored. Would not care to join us in our highly esteemed activities?” Sumi stopped beside him, as they stared at the other club members working on canvas, others in drawings, and the rest…

Honestly.

Itsuki didn’t bother to see what they were doing. Too much effort on something meaningless to him.

“I don’t care about that. I am no artist. I only care about this club as much as it can help me.” Even his gigs for that Reiji guy were just that.

Convenient means of achieving what he desires. Nothing more. Nothing less.

Sumi placed a hand over his heart and slipped a finger under his choker. She pulled him down, pitting his gaze against hers.

A faint smile painted her lips, as Itsuki felt the heat of her hands graze his skin, a strange sensation, when all he was used to was the cold of his blood, or the blood of others.

When was the last time he felt the warmth of another person?

He couldn’t even feel the same radiant heat Momo once had.

It felt as if everything had become lost in the daze.

“You talk and act like an anatomy figure, but there is heat in your blood, and life left in your heart, prima materia. She pressed a finger against a vein on his neck and quickly released him.

Itsuki scoffed loudly.

Life, heat, in him?

His heartbeat halted to a crawl.

Such a joke was so cruel that he felt the urge to puke. He was a dead man walking. He is a dead man walking. He will be a dead man walking.

How could she dare say he was alive when all Itsuki felt was this numbing cold? This dreaded vacancy of life and feeling.

If he knew he would feel so empty and lost, he would have tried to kill himself a second time, and not jinx it that second time.

He wanted to puke his guts out.

Her words made him sick.

“Come with me. You are a member of the Bohemian Club. You will join our activities, whether you like it or not.” This time, her voice left no room for questions. Her face hardened.

Itsuki followed her. Despite the sickness that had settled in him, he had literally nothing better to do at that moment.

She took him to an empty room. It had a single chair before him, and black and white palettes, and a blank canvas. Itsuki narrowed his eyes as Sumi took a blindfold. “Since you think you are so above your fellow members. Why not try to paint something? By yourself? I think a blindfold may enhance your creativity, as you are so willing to use it for other activities outside of your zone of comfort zone.”

Her voice was teasing, but also heavy. She was fed up with his actions. His scoff affected her. He rejected her words, he rejected her as a person and artist.

He looked down on her art, her skills, and her esteem.

Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.

And none felt more scorned than Sumi.

She would punish him, devilishly well, for his transgressions.

Once he failed, of course.

Itsuki took the blindfold from her hands and walked to the chair. He sat on it and blindfolded himself. “So, what now, Missus Boss?” Itsuki asked without a single care in the world.

Even a scorned woman failed to make his heart and mind move.

“Make what your heart wants. Draw what you desire. Paint what your soul yearns, Mister. Too Good for Us.”

Itsuki closed his eyes and tried to search within himself for something to draw.

It was a grave mistake.

Of all scenes.

Of everything he had seen.

Just one scene appeared. No other thoughts, memories, or imagination were within him in that moment. Nothing, nada, zitch.

Just. That moment.

It made his heart sink to the bottom of the abyss.

He saw her hanging body.

The bloodied nails.

How purple her face was.

Bile rose through his esophagus.

Abject horror clogged his trachea as his mind forced itself to remember that day with vivid detail.

His hands trembled.

Sumi smiled. She thought he was trembling in fear because he couldn’t draw anything. He was fearful of her.

Oh, how mistaken she was.

She decided to “help” him, just to see him fail harder.

She gave him the palette and a brush.

Itsuki’s hand moved as if it were possessed. He had no way to see or understand what was happening around him.

His eyes, his mind, his soul was trapped in that memory, and did its best to replicate that.

He worked supernaturally fast.

Sumi scoffed as the image began to advance. The shading was messy and botched, and the details were blurry and lacking. It was a mess of a picture.

It was not until she saw that he was drawing something in the middle corner that she noticed that something was strange with the picture.

The details, the shading, drew attention to the left corner of the picture, as the image began to get clearer, but also scratched, colors in the wrong mixture, but still painted the image with an eerie accuracy.

As if it were the corner of someone’s view. Something they caught just a glimpse of.

She had to say, for someone who botched details and shading that much, he knew how to do a nice perspective.

Then, he started to move at unnatural speeds. The thing in the corner of the canvas started to tear into a chaotic mess.

It was a corpse, a straggly line, maybe it was meant to be a rope, on her neck. Half of her face was covered, as if out of sight.

A hanging body. Far more detailed than the rest of the picture, but a chaotic mess, like a children’s drawing collided with a traumatic event, far too detailed to ever be forgotten.

Then, something even stranger happened.

Itsuki dropped the brush and started to claw at the canvas.

He clawed so hard that Sumi heard his nails snap and break against the canvas, as he tore apart the paper.

Her high and scorn died the moment she saw him paint the wooden canvas holder with the blood coming out of his fingertips.

She took a moment to memorize the scene, the body in the left corner of the picture, before she intervened.

She yanked the blindfold out of his eyes and kicked the canvas holder away. Itsuki looked at her. He was sweating, his eyes open, but hollow.

There was not a soul behind them. Just a haunting memory replaying right before him. He was not even seeing Sumi. “You… have done enough. Go home, now.” She ordered him, her voice cold, but not stern.

Itsuki got up with uncharacteristically haste and sprinted away.

Sumi didn’t believe in hauntings, but seeing Itsuki right at that moment, as he sprinted away, confused, hurt, and so lost, she had no reason not to believe that her new club member was not haunted. That was not normal, even for the Bohemian club.

Her own heart raced with doubt and curiosity. Who was in the picture?

What was in it? Why did it affect him so much?

She knew he was cucked sometime in high school, and it affected him deeply, but having a girl ditch you for some other guy should never be this traumatic. She knew the rumours, but they told nothing about bodies, suicide.

The girl killed herself? If so, why? And why did Itsuki have such a clear view of her hanging body if she killed herself?

A small smile blossomed on her lips. She had a new obsession to focus, a secret to uncover. A mystery to solve. Her new club member was so fun, so interesting.

So full of hurt.

He was raw, a material that needed to be refined before it was ready for use.

She thought that violence and discipline, refined both in him, could yield results, but maybe that was not the best approach for the work in progress that was Itsuki.

She needed to know more and know who the girl in the picture was. “Maybe a visit to the student council is in order…” She heard that their gremlin was quite good at investigation projects.

Who better to gut out the secrets of someone?

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Pub: 11 Sep 2025 00:48 UTC

Edit: 11 Sep 2025 00:48 UTC

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