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It was awfully funny how fragile Kanade's emotional state was when she wasn't focused on her compositions, on her penance, on setting things right. How just one word, one sight, could trip her up and send her into a spiral of remembrance, a repetitive cycle of why she had chosen to be penitent in the first place. For quite some time she had tried to put up some kind of internal wall, to be happy sometimes though she'd rather cry her heart out. Neither of these reactions was ideal. Preferably, she'd have no reaction at all, for emotions were only useful to her in the context of her music. However, she was not a robot no matter how easy it would be to carry out her ruthless pursuit of self-redemption if she was, and so she experienced the full scale of human emotion, from the good (which was strangely evading her) to the downright awful.
And the sorts of things that could trip her internal sensors were ever so slight.
Such as the video Amia had just sent to the group chat. It wasn't something they would've been aware of; it wasn't like Kanade had told them all that this specific song had a special place in her heart and so they shouldn't send it to her because listening to it would make her cry. But nevertheless the stars had aligned and it was there.
Tantalizing her with its beauty and the memories it carried with it, of childhood dreams and a promise, a promise that had never been able to be kept.
A la claire fontaine. Marked as an instrumental from a video game Amia had mentioned they played from time to time. If Kanade remembered it correctly, this was the game they frequently said took too long to play a full round of. The one where you built a civilization and... well, she'd only heard a little about it. Mainly she liked to listen to the music; Amia had sent over a few files upon request. This was much of the same, except attached to the link was the message: Could we try something a little more like this? It's really cute and I have some great ideas for the MV!
Kanade had not listened to it yet. Her cursor hovered over the link. Enanan had already gone and played it, and now she was agreeing with Amia on the issue. Yuki wasn't online yet. A normal afternoon in other words.
She didn't have to click on the video to hear her mother's voice repeating words she had heard so many times, likely pronouncing them wrong, but singing them so beautifully nonetheless. A lullaby, one Kanade's mother's father had learned to sing to his daughter after a year spent in a country across the sea for work. Gentle words that none of them fully understood, except maybe Kanade's grandfather. Before he had passed on, he had sung the lullaby to her as well. Kanade barely remembered his voice, the rough cadence of his baritone, but it was enough to bring her tears to her eyes. He had spoken very little French despite knowing the song. Sometimes Kanade had wondered where he'd even learned it in the first place, but he'd only answer that with some mysterious quip.
How she missed him. How she missed her mother; how she missed her father.
Her finger slipped and she clicked on the video.
A lonely violin and a guitar filled her ears, singing to her a song she knew by heart, one of the few lullabies her father had not composed especially for her. Those were the melodies she cherished the most, but this one had a special place in her heart, too.
Her grandfather had said he would take her there once, to that far-off land that was covered in snow five months of the year, a place that could be so quiet compared to back home where everything was loud. A wonderful place that was larger than Kanade could ever comprehend. Japan could fit into one of its provinces, he'd said. But then an illness had come for him and he had never been able to take her there. Still, she had learned all the stories by heart, tales of this mysterious place with its endless forests and its beautiful skies and its three oceans. When she had studied geography in school, she had learned its name. So similar to her own.
Kanade found herself humming along to the melody, remembering her grandfather's voice as he taught her the song. Letting her mother's rendition of it overlap with his to form some beautiful duet in her mind's ear. A song of love, of hope, and a melancholy one at that, but still it had captured her childhood heart with how gentle it was.
Her tears fell freely from her eyes, soaking her jacket with salt water. She would have to wash it out, or at the very least let it dry, because wearing it too long would not be comfortable. Not that she cared for such things anymore, but she could almost hear her mother gently chiding her about wanting to wear a rain-soaked sweater inside the house because it was nice. You'll catch a cold, Kanade. And it's not very fun to wear a wet sweater, now is it? She could see her mother smiling at her as she encouraged her to go and change her clothing. Then her father had played a song about rain for her after supper and all had felt right with the world.
Those carefree days were long gone now. Did she have a right to yearn for them, to want that kindness? The music she composed would have said no. She needed to save someone more than she needed to care for herself, for to become a saviour would be the redemption she required. However, Amia and Enanan and Yuki would have probably said yes. There was a distinction there, a difference that Kanade did not fully understand.
The song finished. She hit the space bar and it began again. This time, Kanade allowed herself to sing the words, to feel the foreign tongue on her lips, to mispronounce words like rossignol and bouton and mérité. Words that she knew by heart but would still fumble. (She did not realize she had accidentally recorded this and sent it to Amia. She would not be told this for a long time.) She adjusted the speed she had learned to sing it at for this version was ever so slightly slower but it was noticeable and she would not allow herself to desecrate such a beautiful melody.
Her mother's arms wrapped around her, and just as the final note rang out, Kanade felt as if she was safe. At home. Loved. Then the suffocating darkness and cold of her room came back. No one was holding her. Her only comfort was that she had not cried as she sang though the tears had fallen from her eyes. Now, though, she could not stop herself from going through the motions, from ugly sobs and oh so disgraceful tears. All she needed now was her family, her parents, her grandparents; was that so much to ask?
Surely if whatever cause she had dedicated herself to had a leader, they would at least have sympathy for her and her childish wants and desires. Though given her current state she wondered if anyone would find it within themself to care so much for what happened to a girl who had chosen her fate and walked this path all alone with only letters from three whom she had never met. Such a person would have to be too empathetic for their own good, perhaps a benevolent leader who understood this sort of struggle?
Kanade knew of no such person. So she would have to carry her burden by herself as she had done for too long.
For some reason, the song played again, soothing her tears, lulling her to sleep as it had always been intended to do. Her heart ached. Yet she managed to finish listening to it and to write a message in the group chat:
Amia, that's a great idea.
And in the back of her mind, the final line, the chorus, the only line she had ever known the meaning of, repeated without even a slight pause, reminding her of her mandate, of its ever-knowing presence.
Il y a longtemps que je t'aime; jamais je ne t'oublierai.