Funeral For A Friend, Part 1

He looked like a preserved corpse.

No, that's not right. I shouldn't think that now.

He was too dirty for that. Too much blood splattered across his gakuran. Too much grime ground into the fabric from the alley floor. Too much wear and tear on the seams, like he'd been fighting in it for weeks without taking it off.

He was more like... a neglected painting. One of those old, heavy portraits you find in a forgotten attic. A perfectly still subject that could be preserved for eternity. Even if the canvas gathered dust, even if the edges tore and frayed, you could wipe the surface clean and there he'd be, unblemished beneath.

The others around him were not so lucky.

Iwaya Mita, Kaedehera Miyashita, Ren Miura, Seiki Deguchi, him, him, him, her, him, him.

Bodies, bodies, bodies.

Bodies.

They were the corpses, not him. Some were piled at the base of the wall where he'd thrown them. One of Miura's arms was bent at a sickening angle. Deguchi's face was a swollen, bloody mess. Most of them were delinquents from the next ward over, but a few were from my turf. Their friends had come to me, fearing they would be the next victims, and begging me to pay it back.

Back then, the Fujiwara Senki could hardly be called the Fujiwara Juuki. It was me, Madoka, and a loose collection of kids who thought my scowl made me look cool instead of bitchy. So, instead of investigating the situation and making sure I wasn't being tricked into fighting for someone else's dumb mistake, I took off and accepted to up my street cred.

Still, the story came to me anyway, bits and pieces echoing from the trail of the defeated.

He was a lone wolf, lashing out at anyone and everyone because he couldn't find his real target. Some real piece of shit from his school who'd charmed his girl, left her hollow, dumped her, then skipped town when she jumped from the chair.

By the time I reached him, the sun was setting at my back, casting long, deep shadows across the alley.

I looked at the pile of bodies, and the man standing in the middle of it all, his chest barely moving, his knuckles raw and bloody.

I registered the sheer, terrifying amount of combat ability and raw, stubborn willpower it took to paint a scene like this alone.

And I knew what I wanted and how to go get it.

"Oi."

His head lifted slowly.

"Wanna fight?"

A flicker in the hollow eyes. A spark of the fire that had fueled this mess.

"If I win, you join my gang and stop running like a mad dog biting anyone he sees. If you win... I owe you a favor. I'll help you find whoever you're looking for."

The painting came to life. He shifted his weight, the dried blood on his uniform cracking. Yet, he did not speak. He just gave a slow, grave dip of his chin.

The truth is, I'd won the moment he'd accepted.

If he joined my gang, I would help him find his target, because it'd be my duty as his boss.

If I owed him a favor, I would still get to point him in the right direction.

But I made sure to win anyway. I owed it to a fellow fighter to try my best.

He lay on the ground at the end, panting, one eye swelling shut, a new layer of grime and blood on top of the old.

I spat a mouthful of copper-tasting saliva to the side and walked over, looming above him.

"C'mon, pretty boy. Get up.'

Something else flickered in the depths. Slowly, he reached up and took my hand.

"... Itsuki," he corrected with his name.

"Momofuku," I offered back.

"... can I call you Momo?"

"... slow down."

He did it anyway.

Months passed. Years, even.

I made good on my word. I poured the Fujiwara Senki's growing strength into his hunt. We spread our numbers, listened to every rumor that slithered through the Forbidden Zones, tried to turn over every rock in Kageoka he could have crawled under.

Nothing.

Before he skipped town, the mystery man had been a ghost. He'd burned school records, cut ties, vanished into the ether with his family.

He was dead, he was overseas, he was a figment of a grieving boy's imagination, it all depended on which day you asked.

And Itsuki... he was fraying.

In his quest, he'd been disowned by his father.

His old friends had drifted away, scared of what he became.

Now, he was fighting the gang's battles, my battles on top of his, while his revenge was a road leading into a blank wall.

I tried.

"Eat. You'll need your strength for tomorrow."

After a tough fight, I'd drag him to a ramen stand, shove a bowl in front of him, and growl. He'd eat in silence.

"Clean it. It's yours... don't make me tell you twice."

When I found out he was sleeping on park benches, I dragged him to a half-dozen abandoned warehouses in our turf and made him pick one.

"This is Itsuki. He was here first. Don't piss him off."

When new members joined, Fumiko, Dawn, I'd drag him to the hideout and hope he'd find a new friend.

But the gang was growing. Kageoka was getting messier. I had turf to defend, entrance exams to pass, and [Bleeding Zones] to put out every other week.

I couldn't spend every afternoon with him like I used to.

They say "Time heals all wounds."

Not his time. His was spent immersed in the salt of that old, festering wound. Every day he didn't find the guy was another day the wound seeped.

And if I'm being brutally honest with myself... I didn't want him to stop. The thought of him... giving up? Letting that piece of shit get away with it? It made my blood boil. It was also a personal failure. I'd used his strength, made him my enforcer, and failed to deliver the one thing he'd really joined for.

In hindsight, I was enabling him.

I gave him purpose. Kept him fighting. But it was for the wrong cause.

He must have figured it out too. Because eventually, he left.

There was no big, dramatic spat. We simply... drifted. The gang got bigger, the missions more complicated. He'd be gone for a day, then two.

Then, after the debacle with Alyona, he was gone for a week. When we crossed paths again, he finally said it.

"I will be leaving the Fujiwara-Senki. I need to find my own way, my path. I hope you understand."

"I... understand. Make sure to make it count, then. I will not forgive you if you become a hobo passing out on the streets again."

The next time we met, there was a spat.

I was desperate, trying to save Madoka from [Fushihara]'s mark, and he was... in the way. Or I thought he was. I said things. Ugly things. Called him an ungrateful bastard, asked if his new friends were worth more than the people who'd bled with him.

But even through my rage... I could see it. He looked better. Healthier. The gaunt, haunted look was gone. Even when he stood still, he was no longer a neglected painting, but a moving, breathing person, blending in with the world. And when we were forced to team up against the common enemy, that once fragile, angelic [Idolon] of his, it had grown stronger. Given a new light.

It was bittersweet, seeing him flourish. Knowing it could only happen because he'd walked away from me.

After the battle, we went our separate ways again.

I wondered, idly, how he'd look the next time we met.

I cannot do that anymore.

The casket at the front of the room is closed. No viewing.

All that's there, perched on the dark wood, is a single, framed photograph. It's an old picture. From before our first meeting, the blood, the hollow eyes, the fighting. He's younger, smiling a little awkwardly in a crisp school uniform.

He was just a boy.

I stare, but my mind refuses to settle on it. It keeps clawing back, trying to paint over it with the last image it can't have.

How did he look at the end?

Was he angry? Did that old, backed up fury I'd first seen flare up one last time, a final defiance at the world that took everything from him?

Was he sad? Tired of the fight?

Was he peaceful? Did he have time to realize it was over, to accept it?

Did his killer see that face, and decide to maim it? To break the portrait because it looked too composed in death?
The questions are a swarm of hornets in my skull, buzzing, stinging

But the boy in the photo knows nothing, and I am left with no answers.

Somber and efficient, the funeral staff arrive to lift the coffin.

The [Moment of Reflection] is over.

My feet feel like blocks of cement, but I force them to move.

Outside, the hearse is waiting, deliberately subtle. A sleek, unmarked black van, its rear windows tinted to opaque. No flowers. No decorations.

A black Toyota sedan idles behind it.

I approach it and pull open the rear door.

The inside smells of clean leather and faint, floral perfume. Kanae is already there, sitting stiffly in the middle of the back seat. She's dressed in a simple, severe black dress, her hands clasped around a small, perfect bouquet of white lilies.

The best I could wear is a black blazer I outgrew two years ago, straining at the shoulders, over a plain black shirt and my least-tattered skirt. In my clawed hands, I clutch a similar bouquet. Chrysanthemums, bought from a grumpy old lady at a stall near the train station.

In the rearview mirror, a pair of hard blue eyes meet mine. Kusanagi. Itsuki's father.

"..."

I slide in beside Kanae, pulling the heavy door shut with a soft thump.

She doesn't look at me.

The sound of the lock engaging is final.

Only then does he start the engine, a quiet purr, and ease the car forward, falling into line behind the vanishing hearse.

I look out the window. There are no other cars following. No procession of friends, no gang colors, no student council members.

If Kusanagi had his way, we wouldn't be here either. But Kanae had been the one to find the body.

She'd seen the signs, followed the fading spiritual resonance, and… found him.

And not knowing his family, not finding any contacts on Itsuki, she called me instead.

When I finally tracked down Kusanagi, he laid down the law.

Keep it quiet. Keep it private. Let the funeral be a family affair.

For a moment, I wanted to scream at him. I wanted the whole Fujiwara Senki here. I wanted the council, I wanted Mei, anyone who cared, anyone who wanted to say goodbye.

He... he deserved that much.

But the protest died, smothered by the absolute desolation in Kusanagi's eyes.

This man was burying his only son.

What did I know about that? What did I know of the howling void inside him?

My rage, my sense of fairness, means nothing next to that.

So I agreed.

The buildings shrink, then give way to sprawling suburbs, then to open, marked green plains. We drive through wrought-iron gates, ornate but understated, bearing the name of Hakuto Reien Cemetery.

It is vast and rolling, dotted with elegant, simple headstones and ancient, weeping cherry trees. Meticulously raked gravel paths wind between the plots, and small, graceful bridges arch over narrow streams that glint in the filtered sunlight.

We follow the hearse down a narrow lane, deeper into the garden of stones, leaving the world behind. It pulls to a stop on the gravel path beside a freshly dug plot, a dark rectangle in the perfect green lawn. A simple stone marker, blank and waiting, stands sentinel at its head. The funeral staff move with silent efficiency, preparing the ropes and the winch apparatus to lower the casket.

Our car doors open in near-unison. Kanae exits from her side, I from mine. The cool, damp air of the gardens hits me, smelling of wet earth and cut grass. Kusanagi steps out, collecting a larger, more formal wreath of white roses from the passenger seat.

We walk the few steps to the graveside and stop around the void in the earth. A small, pitiful triangle of mourners where there should have been a crowd.

There are no chairs. With so few of us, the funeral staff—two men in dark suits—simply stand at a respectful distance, waiting. A priest in black vestments steps forward, a bible in his hands. He clears his throat, the sound sharp in the quiet.

"The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want..."

The staff moves with silent efficiency. Straps are adjusted. The coffin, suspended over the open, dark mouth of the grave, begins its slow, jerky descent.

I stand rigid, my bouquet of wilting chrysanthemums held in a death-grip.

I thought I would be used to this. But it's nothing like my parent's funeral. No incense or chanting monks, no rhythmic clack of wooden prayer beads, or the smell of sandalwood thick enough to choke on.

"...he leadeth me beside the still waters..."

The coffin lowers another few inches. The polished wood gleams dully in the diffuse light.

It's also nothing like Tako's send-off. That wasn't even a proper funeral. It was hurried cremation I had to arrange by myself because his gang couldn't.

I left his ashes in a cheap plastic urn at his gang's trashed hideout. A promise. A marker. I'll settle this with Fukuzawa. Then you can rest.

"... though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil..."

The coffin reaches the bottom of the grave with a soft, final thud that vibrates up through the soles of my feet. The straps go slack. The staff steps back.

Mom. Dad. Tako. Itsuki. The temple, the pyre, this serene garden. The settings change, the rituals are different, but this hollow, sucking feeling in my chest, the way the world grows thin and unreal around the edges... it never changes.

It's not getting any easier.

The priest's voice fades on a final "Amen."

Kusanagi is the first to move. He steps forward and lets the wreath of white roses tumble from his hands. It lands on the polished lid with a soft, leafy rustle. Kanae follows, her movements precise. Her lilies fall like a scattering of snow. My turn. I step to the edge, look down into the dark, and open my clawed fingers. The chrysanthemums drop, already wilting.

The staff moves in with their shovels. The first thud of earth hitting the coffin is a physical blow.

I flinch.

Behind my eyes, I sent a silent, clumsy prayer to any [Kami] that might be listening. To the spirits of the wind, the stones, the grounds we walked.

Watch over him. Let him find the peace he couldn't find here. Let him find his love again.

The grave is filled. The earth is patted smooth, a neat, brown scar on the perfect green. An empty vase is placed before the blank headstone.

It's done. The priest closes his bible. Kusanagi approaches him and the staff, his voice a low murmur. Money changes hands, nods are exchanged. Polite, final bows. The hearse and the staff car rudely start their engines in the sacred quiet, then slowly glide back down the gravel path.

They disappear around a bend of cherry trees, and then it's just the three of us.

I stare at the mound of fresh soil.

There's a gentle tug on the sleeve of my too-tight blazer.

Kanae's eyes are fixed on the path ahead, not on me. She gives another slight pull. I glance at Kusanagi.

Right. This is his time. I should stop intruding even more.

I let Kanae lead me away.

Our shoes crunch on the gravel, the only sound in the world.

The quiet presses in, thick and suffocating.

A practical fear, sharp and sudden, cuts through the fog in my head.

[Fushihara], the [Kasha], any [Yokai] related to [Death]...

"The body. Is it safe?"

She doesn't look at me. Her pace doesn't change. "I'm not an expert on Christian consecration. But I'll come back tonight. Make sure the boundary's firm."

The knot in my chest loosens a fraction. "Thanks."

The gratitude hangs there.

... it occurs to me that she would know.

She saw him last. The image my mind claws for, she possesses.

I stop walking. She takes two more steps before halting, turning slowly to face me. The bleak afternoon light hollows out her eyes.

"Kanae." The name is a plea. "What... what did he look like?"

She stares through me, at something only she can see.

When she speaks, it's barely a whisper, almost lost in the rustle of leaves.

"He was smiling."

She turns and continues walking, leaving me standing there, gutted.

Smiling. What does that mean? Peace? Triumph? A final, cruel trick of rigor mortis?

The hornets in my skull redouble their frenzy.

I catch up to her, but...

A single smile could be interpreted in so many ways... I can't ask her to do that job for me.

I wasn't there in time. That's all there is to it.

We pass through the wrought-iron gates with no more words, leaving the garden of stones behind.

A bus stop sits across the quiet service road, a single metal bench under a plexiglass shelter. We cross to it and sit, not quite together, not quite apart.

For a while, I watch lone cars drift past in the distance.

Then, in the harsh, flat light of the ordinary world, I finally look at her. Really look.

Kanae's shoulders are slumped, defeated. The careful perfection of her usual appearance is shattered. Dark bags bruise the skin beneath her eyes. Her hands, clasped in her lap, tremble slightly.

She's barely holding it together. Finding him, identifying him, arranging this with Kusanagi, keeping it hushed from Madoka, from the gang, from everyone...

The purr of an engine announces a man returning to an empty house. Kusanagi's black sedan slides out of the cemetery gates. He doesn't look at us as he passes. The car accelerates, shrinking down the road until it's swallowed by the landscape.

A few more empty minutes stretch. The bus is a ghost.

What do I do now?

Go back to the hideout, let the news leak out in time? Go to the council, try to arrange... what? A moment of silence in the morning announcements? A black ribbon on the school gate?

Cheap. Hollow.

And more than that... dangerous. If something from the [Idea World], some lingering curse, hungry ghost, or one of these evil [Awakened]... if any of these was responsible for this, drawing the attention of the rest to his grave would be painting a target on it.

No. I'll tell the ones who mattered to him.

Another car turns off the main road, slowing as it approaches the gates. A sleek, silver European sedan, too expensive for this place. As it passes our bench, I catch a glimpse of the backseat passenger. A young man with sharp, carefully styled hair, looking out the window with an unreadable expression.

Kurobane.

if someone in his usual orbit had died, it would be in the news... he's here for Itsuki.

How? When? Itsuki never mentioned him.

... then again, he stopped mentioning a lot of things.

I stand up. I need to talk to him. Someone else who knew. Someone else who felt this loss enough to come here.

The distant groan of a diesel engine cuts the air. The bus, a green and white rectangle, crests the hill in the distance.

Kanae rises beside me. She looks from me to the approaching bus, then back to my face.

"You're staying?" she says more than asks. Her eyes dim further.

She's already closing herself off, preparing to carry this alone on the long bus ride back to her place.

I reach out and take her hand. Her fingers are cold.

Before she can react, I turn and start walking, pulling her with me, away from the bus stop, away from the cemetery gates.

"Nah, we're leaving," I say, my voice firmer than I feel. "If his old man isn't putting up a gathering, we'll do it."

I won't make the same mistake twice. I'm not letting her drift away, I'm not taking her for granted. Kurobane will have to wait.

Kanae stumbles a step, then keeps pace, her hand limp in my clawed grip. "Do you even have any money to pay for food?"

"I'll figure it out," I grunt, steering us toward the main road. The bus rumbles past us, a blast of hot air and missed opportunity. I don't look back.

We walk. Streets. Traffic.

Faces, and with them, places.

A sleek sushi bar. A ramen place with a line out the door, the air thick with pork fat and ambition. Another sushi joint, this one pretending to be a rustic fisherman's hut.

This is all too fancy for my wallet.

I stop under the awning of a pachinko parlor, its electronic symphony a jarring counterpoint to the psalm still echoing in my head. Kanae stands beside me, a silent, black-clad ghost.

I turn to her, my mind scrabbling for something, anything solid.

"Yakitori or tonkatsu?"

"Listen, Momo... I totally appreciate what you're trying to do here, but... maybe it's better if we leave to mourn by ourselves, like his father."

"... I'm not tryin' to do anything. It's just... being alone would be bad. You know, [Aramasa]. [Isolation]. Can't let her get a foothold."

"Oh."

The moment the words leave my mouth, I want to claw them back.

Kanae goes perfectly still. Then, her shoulders, which had been slumped, straighten with a rigid, mechanical precision.

"Gotcha," she says, her tone switching to a detached, clinical mode. "We gotta go for spiritually-rich, poor-people food, then. Salted grilled salmon, miso soup with wakame, pickled vegetables... I know a chain two train stops from here that should have options at your budget—"

You idiot. You piece of garbage. Guilting her into staying because you can't get the words out. Turning her mourning time into more exorcism work for her.

No wonder you couldn't help him.

I grip her shoulder before she can stalk away. I can't meet her eyes, so I stare at the pachinko parlor's garish poster instead

"... s'not about aramasa..."

"...?"

"It's not about [Aramasa], dammit. Just... forget it, okay? Pick the damn place you actually want to go. Please."

The silence between us is filled with the tinny pachinko-pachinko melody and the distant wail of a scooter.

After what feels like an eternity, her shoulder relaxes slightly under my hand.

"There's a curry place," she says, her voice quiet again. "Near the station. It's very thick. And cheap. The owner puts lotus root in it for..." she sighs. "Well, it's good."

I let go of her shoulder, the ghost of a nod my only reply.

The curry place is called Ganesha's Grub. It's squashed between a discount shoe store and a boarded-up love hotel, its sign a peeling, sun-bleached image of the elephant god holding a steaming bowl.

Not exactly auspicious, but the smell that hits us when I pull the door open is undeniable.

Inside is a cramped cave of warm, yellow light and dark wood. Foreign movie posters, their colors faded to pastels, are tacked to every spare inch of wall. A low counter runs along one side, behind which a grinning man with a mustache is stirring a pot big enough to bathe in.

He looks up as the bell jingles, his face brightening. "Ah! Jinguuji-cha—"

The greeting dies halfway. His eyes sweep over Kanae's severe black dress, my straining blazer, our shared, hollowed-out expressions. The professional cheer in his face melts into something softer, more careful.

He gives a slow, understanding nod, then barks toward the back. A young server scrambles out, and the owner gestures with his ladle toward a small, two-person table tucked in the far corner, partially shielded by a faded poster.

We shuffle over and sink into the rickety chairs. The menus are laminated, dotted with old stains. I stare at the blurry pictures of golden-brown curry.

"Which one's got the lotus root?" I ask, if only to fill the air.

Kanae doesn't look up from her menu. "The cheapest one, duh."

My foot finds her shin under the table with a soft thump. "I could afford the second-cheapest one if you really wanted it."

"Could you afford a drink with it?"

"..."

We order two plates of chicken curry and two glasses of tap water.

The brief, brittle moment of banter evaporates as soon as the server leaves, leaving that thick, mournful silence to settle over the table.

"You a regular? Owner seemed to know you."

Kanae pokes at the chipped wood of the table. "Nah. That'd be so lame. He knows my grandma. She did a purification for this place like, a decade ago. Bad vibes from the love hotel next door. He gives me free pickles sometimes."

"Huh."

Silence again, broken only by the rhythmic thump-thump-thump of the cook's spoon against the giant pot. I watch the steam rise, trying to count the beats.

"I saw him. Before."

She's staring at a poster of a man and woman dancing in the rain, but she's not seeing it.

"In the woods where... It happened. He was training, not in any style I was familiar with. And he was keeping clear of the sacred grounds, so I figured he wouldn't need my help. Didn't wanna bother him."

She takes a shaky breath. "I don't know when he died. Maybe it would have happened while I was still at school. But I keep thinking. If I'd... gone over. Asked what he was doing, if he needed a better spot to train... something. Anything. Maybe things would've gone differently."

Her fingernail digs a little harder into the soft wood. "It's stupid, right?"

The server chooses that moment to arrive with our steaming plates of curry. It suddenly looks like the most disgusting thing I've ever seen.

"Yeah. But I'm doing the same thing. Running through every time I saw him after he left. Every stupid thing I said. If I… hadn't been so angry. If I'd asked where he was going. If I'd followed him. A thousand little moments where I could've done the right thing and didn't." I stare at the glistening surface of my curry.

"So what are we supposed to do about it?"

The question hangs in the aromatic air. I pick up my own spoon, the weight of it unfamiliar. "I'm... gonna avoid making the same mistakes twice. But you… you didn't make a mistake, Kanna-p. You can't be everywhere all the time. That's life."

She doesn't look convinced. She stirs her curry, watching the steam spiral. "I know that much. But... my whole life, it was drilled into me. See the unseen. Protect the vulnerable. That's the job. So when someone that had been right in front of me slips through and dies… it's like I failed the only test that matters." She lifts her gaze, bleak and direct. "Don't you feel crushed if someone gets hurt in Fujiwara Ward? Even if you weren't right there?"

"That's… different," I mumble, knowing it's a weak, pathetic defense.

I can't argue anything besides semantics.

"Itadakimasu," I mutter, hollow and automatic.

"Itadakimasu," Kanae echoes softly beside me.

The curry is thick, just like she said, and fiercely spicy. I can feel the heat, the complexity on my tongue, but I can't taste it. It's all texture and warmth, something to mechanically shovel into the void inside.

Somehow, I see a curve forming on the plate.

Itsuki's smile. Why does it haunt me so?

Knowing he was at peace in the end would only soothe me so much. He would still be gone.

So why? Is it the mystery? No, what's more important is the mystery of who did it.

So why? Why, why, why...

Ah.

I never saw my parents' faces either.

They went into the mountains on a job and vanished. No bodies to recover. Their caskets were purely symbolic, and I spent weeks after the funeral still thinking they would turn up at any moment.

Deep down, I guess a childish part of me needed to see it to believe it. To move on properly.

Once again, I can't even get that much.

We finish the curry.

The owner nods solemnly as we bring our trays to the counter. My wallet is a tragedy of loose change and receipts. Kanae sees my pathetic fumbling and wordlessly slides a crumpled thousand-yen note across the worn wood.

I don't have the pride left to protest.

We step back out into the evening. The sky is bleeding from orange to deep purple, and the city lights are starting to wink on, one by one.

After a block, Kanae stops and turns to me. "Why are you still following me? The subway's back there."

"Night is coming. You're going back to his grave later, right? To do your thing. I'm coming with you."

She shakes her head, a strand of hair falling across her gloomy expression. "Nothing big will manifest before eight or nine. You should just go home."

"Are you staying home until then?" I ask.

She looks away, studying a faded poster for a missing cat.

Yeah, that's what I thought.

"Your [Idolon]'s a Possession type. If you need to defend yourself from a physical threat, your body will still be vulnerable. I'm not leaving until I know you're back home. Safe and sound."

I'm sorry, Itsuki.

I wasn't there.

I couldn't help you. I still can't. The only thing left is to make sure it doesn't happen again.

... but isn't that what you did?

You left her. You let go of the past, the revenge eating you alive, and chose to grow stronger for the sake of protecting what was in front of you.

So... I'm sorry again, for a different reason. I'm finally staggering onto the same path as you, but it's too late to walk it together.

"Wow. So gallant, Momo-chan. Are you going to walk me home every night from now on, or only until you start feeling better?"

"Don't test me."

"I might." She falls into step beside me again, our shoulders bumping. "Your stomping could scare off the harmless ones and attract something meaner. You're loud even spiritually, ya know? Like a bull in a china shop where everything is cursed."

"Better a bull than a sitting duck."

We continue down the quiet street, the last of the sunset gilding the rooftops. Our bickering is soft and aimless, halfhearted barbs with no energy in them.

It doesn't fix anything. The grave is still fresh. His final moments are still a mystery. The guilt is still there, weighing on our shoulders.

But at the very least, we can help each other carry it.

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Pub: 13 Jan 2026 01:57 UTC

Edit: 16 Jan 2026 01:10 UTC

Views: 58