home? back? starring ; mushimae, maoaru.
12/03/25

the house was never quiet, but it had never been loud for him.

mushimae had always been the smallest voice in the family, if they even considered him one at all. tentten was their bright, golden girl. maoaru was their difficult but interesting son. and then there was mushi—quiet, frail, and fading into the wallpaper like he was just another part of the house. something unimportant. something that didn’t need to be acknowledged.

days passed without anyone speaking to him. nights passed without dinner being set aside for him. he would sit at the table sometimes, hopeful, staring at the plates being placed down, only for his parents to walk past him like he wasn’t even there. his stomach would twist, his hands gripping the edge of the table, but he never said anything. saying something would only always make it worse for him.

his siblings had tried to be there for him, tried to let him know that he was a part of their world. but it never truly felt like he was. they lived in completely different realities to him.

he knew this. he had always known this.

there were times when he tried to be useful, thinking maybe if he was helpful, they would look at him. love him. he’d sweep the floor, clear the table, fold the laundry, but his father would shove him aside, muttering about how he was getting in the way. his mother would scowl when he lingered too long in the kitchen, as if his very presence was an inconvenience.

“useless,” his father would say, more to himself than to mushimae. “what a fucking waste of space in my house. space that could've been used for a child who was really mine.”

the words didn’t sting anymore, well not as much as they used to, anyways. he had learned to let them pass through him, like wind slipping through an open window. he was used to being a ghost in his own home.

but the hunger, the exhaustion—that was harder to ignore. his limbs felt heavier every day, his steps slower, his vision sometimes blurring when he stood up too fast. he had stopped expecting food. stopped expecting warmth. when he was lucky, maoaru would sneak him leftovers, a piece of bread, a small handful of rice wrapped in tissue paper. but he couldn’t always do that. he couldn’t risk getting caught.

and mushimae understood.

then, that morning—everything changed.

the house was too quiet when he woke up. not the usual kind of quiet, the kind that left him alone in the background. this quiet was sharp, heavy. something was wrong.

when he stepped into the hallway, he felt it before he even saw it.

the grief. the rage. the way the air was thick with it.

tentten was dead. and apparently, his older brother was responsible.

he heard the words in pieces, his mother’s sobs, his father’s voice shaking in fury. he didn’t understand.
he couldn’t understand.

but then, suddenly, the second that they had finished scorning maoaru, they sent him upstairs and his father’s eyes were now on him.

“why couldn’t it have just been you?”

mushimae barely had time to process the words before the first hit landed.

he crashed against the wall, gasping, but there was no time to recover. his father’s hands were on him, fists gripping his collar, shoving him to the floor. he barely heard the accusations through the ringing in his ears.

“it should have been you.”

“you’re the worthless one.”

"you're the one we didn't fucking need. we never needed you."

“she had everything ahead of her, and you—”

a kick to his ribs. another. another.

“you were never supposed to be here.”

his mother was watching. she didn’t stop it. she just stood there, her arms crossed tightly over her chest, her face twisted in some unreadable expression. her eyes were puffy from crying, but there was nothing left in them when she looked at him. just contempt.

when his father finally stopped, mushimae could barely move. his face was pressed against the floorboards, his breath coming in short, sharp gasps. the pain was everywhere, searing, sharp.

but what hurt more was knowing that this time, he couldn’t pretend they had ever loved him.

they left him there. stepped over him like he was a discarded piece of furniture, like he wasn’t even alive.

he wasn’t sure how much time passed before he found the strength to push himself up.

but when he did, he only felt himself growing more dizzy, more lethargic.

“look at you. pathetic. useless.”

his father’s voice was quiet now, almost calm, but that only made it worse. mushimae barely had the strength to lift his head, his cheek pressed against the wooden floor, blood pooling in his mouth. his ribs ached with every shallow breath.

his mother’s heels clicked against the floor as she stepped closer. she crouched beside him, fingers gripping his chin, forcing his face up. her nails dug into his skin, but he barely felt it. his whole body was nothing but pain.

she stared at him for a long moment, then sighed, almost disappointed.

“you don’t even fight back.”

she let go of him like he was something rotten, something unworthy of even her disgust, and his head smacked against the floorboards

his father grabbed him by the back of his shirt, yanking him up just enough to shove him toward the door. mushimae stumbled, his legs barely holding him, but it didn’t matter. his father was already dragging him, his grip like iron, pulling him through the house like he was just another piece of trash to be taken out.

the door swung open, and the cold, whipping air hit him like a slap. the rain was still falling, heavy and relentless, soaking through his clothes instantly.

his father shoved him forward.

mushimae collapsed onto the wet grass, his palms scraping against the gravel, his body too weak to break the fall properly. the mud was cold against his skin, the rain washing the blood from his face, but it didn’t feel like relief. it felt like the final proof that he wasn’t meant to be here.

behind him, his mother stood in the doorway, arms crossed, her expression unreadable. his father didn’t look at him. not really. just a glance, sharp and final.

“just stay out here where you belong.”

his mother turned away first, stepping back into the warmth of the house without a second glance.

his father lingered for just a moment longer, watching as mushimae lay there, shivering, rain dripping from his hair, his breath coming in shallow gasps.

“you should’ve died instead.”*

then the door slammed shut.


it had been raining since morning. the kind of rain that soaked through everything, that turned the ground to sludge, that made the whole world feel colder than it should be.

mushimae lay in the mud. still. quiet. waiting.

he had been there for hours. maybe longer. his body was too weak to move, too weak to fight, too weak to do anything but sink. the rain slid over his skin, into his hair, down the curve of his spine, but he barely felt it anymore.

somewhere in the house, maoaru was watching.

pressed up against the window, his breath fogging the glass, his hands shaking uselessly at his sides. his heart felt like it was pounding out of his chest. he wanted to break the glass. he wanted to scream. he wanted to tear the doors off their hinges and drag his brother inside.

but he couldn’t.

the door was double locked and deadbolted.

and mushimae was already slipping away.

tentten had died earlier that day. he had watched her on the sofa. he had seen the way she laid so still, the way her breath was invisible, the way the life left her before anyone could stop it. the dead, cold look in her eyes. the state of her.

and now? now it was happening again.

mushimae blinked, his eyelashes clumped with rain. his vision was blurry, but not from the water. he could feel his body growing heavier, feel the way his chest barely rose when he tried to breathe.

but he wasn’t alone.

something moved beside him. small. soft.

the maggots.

they had found him earlier. he had felt them wriggling against his skin, burrowing into the folds of his soaked clothes. at first, he thought he should shudder, recoil, crawl away.

but they weren’t hurting him.

if anything, they felt warm.

they crawled over his arms, over his fingers, into the spaces where he had once been full of life but now only had emptiness. he watched them through half-lidded eyes, their small, white bodies wriggling in the mud.

they weren’t leaving him.

they were staying.

mushimae swallowed, his throat too dry, too raw. he had spent his whole life being told he was nothing. being treated like he was nothing. and now, at the very end, these small, mindless creatures were the only things that didn’t abandon him.

he almost smiled.

but maoaru wasn’t smiling.

he slammed his fists against the window, staring hard as if the focus of his vision would direct energy to his brother, who lay still in the rain.

“MOVE!”

mushimae didn’t move. didn't even see that there really was someone who wanted to be by his side in those last moments.

“PLEASE.”

nothing.

maoaru turned, ran. his hands clawed at doorknobs, rattled against locks, tried to force his way outside, but it was no use.

the rain kept falling.
and the maggots kept crawling.

and mushimae let his eyes fall closed.

maoaru stopped breathing. it took him a second to understand what had just happened. one second. two. three.

his brother was completely still, and maoaru lost it.

he slammed his fists against the window so hard he thought the glass would crack, but it didn’t. nothing broke except for him.

“NO—NO NO NO.”

he turned, ran, scrambled through the house, looking for something, anything, a way out, a way to get to him, a way to fix this—

by the time he threw the door open and stumbled into the storm, mae's body had already started to cool.

maoaru dropped to his knees in the mud, his hands reaching for his brother’s shoulders, shaking him hard, too hard, like he could force life back into him.

“mushi.” his voice cracked. “come on. come on, wake up—”

his hands pressed against mushimae's wrist, his throat, his chest—nothing.

he wasn’t breathing.

mao's vision blurred. his hands were shaking, fingers curling into the soaked fabric of mae's clothes, gripping him so tightly it hurt.

and then, he saw them.

the maggots. still crawling. still moving. still with him. disgusting.

his stomach twisted. there was only one thing that maggots could possibly mean, right?

“mushi, please.” his voice was barely a whisper now. begging. “please don’t leave me aswell.”

but there was no response. no warmth. just cold skin, cold rain, and the quiet, endless movement of the maggots, the only things that had stayed by his brother’s side when no one else would.

maoaru let out a sound that barely even sounded human. a choked, broken thing. he pulled mushimae into his arms, cradling him like a child, like a little brother, kissing his head all over, like he could protect him now when it was already too late.

he had already failed. first tentten. now mushimae.

and soon—him.

mao held onto his brother like if he just kept him close enough, held him tightly enough, refused to let go for long enough— maybe he could convince the universe to undo this. to take it back. to give his true love back.

but the universe didn’t care. it had never cared. not about him.

the maggots still wriggled beneath his fingers, tiny bodies pushing against mushimae's cooling skin. maoaru felt sick. he wanted to wipe them away, to shake them off, to do something—but he couldn’t. they were the only things that had stayed. kept him company when he had died.

not their parents and not tentten, because she was already gone.

just them.

he buried his face in mushimae's soaked hair, his body shaking with something too deep to be just grief.

“i should’ve done something.” his voice was a whisper against the sound of the rain, hoarse, empty. “i should’ve saved you.”

mushimae didn’t answer. he would never answer.

and maoaru was alone.

alone with the sound of the rain.

alone with the crawling of the maggots, crawling through and out of the one person he had truly seen as his soulmate.

alone with the knowledge that soon—he would be next.

continue further reading about the 9th of August, 1956?

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Pub: 11 Mar 2025 13:31 UTC

Edit: 31 Mar 2025 19:47 UTC

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