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Elise wonders, sometimes, if she is truly alive.
She holds her hands close to her chest, pressing so tightly she is sure she will leave bruises but never does. She feels the beat of her heart, listens to the rhythm and wonders if it does so because she would die without it or if it is only there to add immersion for Rintarou.
Sometimes, she holds her breath, counting up numbers in her head until she feels light headed and she wonders if it is because she needs air or if it is because she does not want to face the idea that she does not need it at all.
She remembers fighting, for Rintarou, but she does not remember what she felt as she did. Was she in pain when she was hurt? Was she bleeding when she was cut? Was she scared? She asked Rintarou, once, but he smiled at her— for once, it did not frustrate her, it only made something deep inside of her ache— and said it didn’t matter to him.
It matters to her, she thinks.
Elise fights back, sometimes, kicking and scratching at Rintarou as if to prove to herself that she makes her own decisions. Refuses to let him dress her, avoids him. She almost tricks herself into thinking the thing she feels is freedom, but Rintarou’s amused smile reminds her that she can only act that way because he lets her. Because it makes her more real to him.
Once in a while, memories of a little girl filled with fire come back to her. She remembers the way Rintarou used to threaten anyone who went close to her, how the girl screamed at him that she was not his property, that she was her own person. Elise knows it is not herself, because those words always catch in her throat whenever she tries to say them.
Rintarou laughs and changes the subject if she asks about the girl. He never answers Elise.
—
When she’s particularly frustrated — when Rintarou’s tired of her— Elise likes to make the members of the Port Mafia play with her.
“Chuuya.” she had called out once. “Today, you’re going to be my big brother,” she says and he looks at her with surprise. Rintarou was never surprised. He stares at her, for a moment, before sighing and lifting her up unto his shoulders. She thinks she saw him smile and it makes her smile back at him because Chuuya is so utterly infectious.
“Well,” he laughs, “At least we know good looks run in the family.” Elise thumps him, demands he put her down this instant, but she knows that she would not mind if he was her big brother everyday.
Chuuya runs a brush through her hair, and she thinks to herself how different it makes her feel compared to when Rintarou does it. Chuuya looks at her as if she is a person, Chuuya scolds her if she demands too much, Chuuya smiles softly watching her when he thinks she is not watching.
(She remembers how Chuuya used to be as small as her, and she does not dwell on the fact he has grown so very much and that she has not grown at all.)
—
Elise likes to sneak down into the basement.
She knows that she could just walk down there, that no one would stop her. That it was only pretend but the excitement that fills her chest when she narrowly avoids being spotted by someone is too addicting.
The excitement when she approaches her goal, deep down in the prisons, and she slips one of her hair clips out and picks the lock in the way of her target. She feels like a secret agent and the idea makes her grin so hard her cheeks begin to ache. It takes her far too long to jimmy the lock open. She knocks three times like a secret code on the door and pulls the heavy door open to meet the wide eyed expression of Q.
Elise rants about Rintarou, sneaks them her favourite foods, tells them all sorts of stories about the things that happen to her. Tells them about the sun and the air and the flowers.
“Why do you get to go outside and Q doesn’t?” they ask her once, and she does not know how to answer.
They fight, too, but Elise does not dare let Rintarou know because she fears what he would do. Instead, she buries herself in Chuuya’s arms and asks him why they can’t get along and Chuuya laughs and tells her that friends do not always get along.
“Are we friends?” Elise asks Q the next time they meet but Q only looks at her blankly because they do not understand anymore than she does.